RECongress 2012 - Period 8: Friday, March 25, 2012

CONGRESS 2012 WORKSHOPS & LINKS
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2012 FEATURES	• Youth Day • Theme • Archbishop Chat • Updates • Schedule • Speakers • Topics • Order Recordings • Photos • Exhibitors • Exhibitor Categories • Statistics • Theme Songs • Comments

We know there are many among the unaffiliated – those who no longer belong to a parish community or actively live their faith within the Church. An even greater number come to Mass somewhat regularly but do not connect their faith with their lives in any real way. How do we lead these people to hear the voice of Christ, the one who gives us life? How do we help real people find real faith in a living relationship with Jesus through the Body of Christ – the Church? Explore effective strategies and practices to engage people in lasting faith.

Based in Indianapolis, Leisa Anslinger is Director of Catholic Life and Faith, and a founding team member of the Catholic Strengths and Engagement Community network. She is author of “Turning Hearts to Christ,” and author and editor of “Grace in Action.” Anslinger is a former member of the adjunct faculty at The Athenaeum of Ohio and has presented at national, regional and diocesan conferences and in-service days.

The sacramental celebration requires us to experience reconciliation in daily life, dealing with violence and its effects, facing the truth, and within the spirituality of reconciliation.

Miguel Arias is Editorial Director at Liturgy Training Publications in Chicago. Previously he served as Consultant for Hispanic Ministry at Loyola Press. Arias was also on the faculty at the Hispanic Institute of Liturgy in Chicago, a guest instructor at the Tepeyac Institute in Texas, and a faculty member at the Cultural Institute of the Midwest. Author, editor and translator of books, articles and book references, Arias is known for his pastoral work on reconciliation.

Not another workshop about what we already know, but one about what we overlook. In his book, “10 Things They Never Told Me About Jesus,” John Bell explores facets of the personal life, relationships and ministry of Jesus, which are seldom the stuff of preaching or conversation, but are all rooted in the Gospels and are necessary if we are to be freed from the passive stereotypes that still dominate thinking about Christ. In this session John will share the stories of encounters with people on the periphery of religious life and in situations where politeness was not a prerequisite for discussing faith.

With his colleague, Graham Maule, John Bell began the Wild Goose Resource Group and is Liturgical Resource Worker with The Iona Community, based in Glasgow, Scotland. He has worked for more than 20 years with churches and Christian organizations. Bell lectures on spirituality, liturgical music and Scripture and has been on broadcasts on BBC national radio, and has authored two books and the DVD series, “Living the Questions.”

This is a personal renewal session specifically intended for those who feel they have responded to a vocational calling to serve young people as a volunteer or professional. Through the use of audio visuals, personal examples, research and concrete suggestions, you will be able to privately reflect on the personal challenges you face and be offered specific practices that enable you adapt to those challenges in order sustain the Spirit fueling your commitment.

Data shows that the U.S. Catholic Church has had more losses than any other mainline denomination; many of these are joining Protestant “evangelical” communities. While individualism, secularism and relativism have had their influence, data shows that the message of our church leaders isn’t being heard or, if it is being heard, it is not being received, especially by more and more young people. Why? Michael Crosby will address the dynamics involved and suggest the issue of “meaning” is at stake.

The U.S. bishops have issued a rich resource for Catholic voters for local, state and national elections in 2012. Fr. Allan Deck will: 1) discuss political participation of Catholics within the framework of Catholic social doctrine and the Church’s identity and mission to evangelize; 2) outline the U.S. Catholic Bishops’ document, “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship,” including issues of religious liberty, immigration reform and economic justice; and 3) highlight challenges facing the Catholic voter today. The focus will be on public policy concerns, formation of conscience and how to share the bishops’ vision with your parish, school or organization.

Jesuit priest Fr. Allan Deck holds the Charles Casassa Chair of Social Values at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, where he is Professor of Catholic and Latino Studies. He served from 2007-2011 as the first Executive Director of the Secretariat of Cultural Diversity at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington, D.C. In addition to research, writing and teaching, Fr. Deck has served in pastoral work as parish administrator, diocesan director of Hispanic ministry, and as Executive Director of the Loyola Institute for Spirituality in Orange, Calif.

Refresh and deepen your prayer life. Moving the body gently in harmony with mindful prayer could bring new life in our love for our God, our neighbors, and all of creation. In this Lenten prayer session, we will pray with the body, heart and soul the scriptural Stations of the Cross all the way to Resurrection. You will also learn how to move your body with the Sign of the Cross, the Our Father, and the Glory Be. As the Word became flesh, with God’s kindness, so too our prayer can be.

This interactive workshop will explain the practice of servant leadership, which answers the question, “How would Jesus lead?” Beginning with prayer, scriptural reflection and a brief presentation, participants will dialogue about the leadership style of Jesus and draw conclusions about what this means for the practice of leadership. Specific examples will be presented and discussed to illustrate the potential that servant leadership holds for today’s church and society.

It is probable that “Keep Holy the Sabbath” is the Commandment that is most often broken by Church ministers! Sabbath is essential and life-giving. It is an opportunity to find balance and be restored. This workshop will provide participants an opportunity to look at their own practice of Sabbath (more than going to church on Sunday) and find ways to honor the rest and restoration that they need.

Forty-seven percent of Christians – including Catholics – have said pornography is a major problem in their home. One in three visitors to adult web sites are women. Eight years old is the average age of children first exposed to an adult web site. In the United States, revenue for pornography exceeds $6.2 billion. This workshop will help you to look for the signs of pornography in members of your family and with students and youth. Learn the steps for helping people get over the attraction to pornography. There is hope! Where sin abounds, grace abounds more. The root of all sins of impurity is a desire for true love, true intimacy and acceptance.

“No one has greater love than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13). Jesus’ words are so familiar that we can easily miss their deeper implications. This presentation explores what it means to choose love as a transformative way of life. Human intimacy has many different faces – including romantic love, the bonds of family, faithful friendship and other circles of caring. It also has different ages – from young love to the quiet commitments of our maturing years. We invite you to reflect on the profound challenge of “laying down your life” in everyday loving.

With the advent of the new translation of The Roman Missal, opportunities for liturgical catechesis in the parish abound. Discover ways that the newly translated Mass texts themselves can become foundational for initiation ministry.

This is a practical, hands-on workshop on the emerging new ministry for catechists – reaching the “plugged in/tuned out” youth of today. Learn how to meet the needs and speak the language of the digital natives of the media culture through a sampling of media-based lesson plans. Participants will discover a hybrid approach to religious education that integrates 21st-century learning tools – blogs, social networking (e.g., Facebook), Google Docs, etc. – with traditional spiritual practices. The workshop will allow time for an “open space” exchange of ideas and resources.

This workshop will explore the various stages of illness and healing, connect them to the church’s rites, and propose music in a diversity of styles from a variety of publishers to assist sufferers and ministers to encounter the healing power of God.

Our key objective as catechists is to proclaim the Word of God to the people to whom we minister. Thus, we embrace the mission to which Jesus called us: “Go ... make disciples of all nations … teaching them to observe all that I have told you” (Mt. 28:19-20). As catechists, how do we go about doing this? What might we do to ensure that the disciples of Jesus today come to know and understand God’s Word and their own mission? This presentation will discuss the goal of catechesis, proclaiming the Word, and making new disciples, in light of “The Six Tasks of Catechesis,” outlined in both the General and the National Directories for Catechesis.

Do you ever wonder how to get young adults involved and keep them engaged? Young adults need good mentors who will believe in them, challenge them and support them. Mentoring relationships give young adults the confidence they need to become the leaders and disciples that they are! This workshop will explore ways to a mentor 20- and 30-somethings into leadership roles at your parish or ministry site.

“Praying in Color” is an active and meditative prayer practice for adults and children. The process uses pen, paper and markers to create a time of stillness and listening. The product is a prayer drawing – a visual reminder to continue to pray throughout the day. If you have a short attention span and a restless body or would like to talk to God without words or are just looking for a new way to pray, come learn about “Praying in Color.” Absolutely no artistic ability is necessary! The workshop is based on Sybil MacBeth’s book of the same title. (This workshop is limited in size and is a repeat of Session 7-18.)

So much of our Catholic story is carried in the songs that we sing. In preparing and celebrating sacraments of initiation, deeper understanding can be enhanced through the use of appropriate music. Join Michael Mangan as he presents a range of songs for baptism, confirmation, Eucharist and reconciliation, which will help candidates and their families unlock their sacramental imagination and make vital head/heart connections.

Would you like to meet Jesus as if for the first time? Join Fr. James Martin as he invites you to encounter Jesus in his time by the Sea of Galilee. Can you feel called like the disciples? Can you step out of the boat like Peter did? Can you let him feed and forgive you as he did after his Resurrection? Reflections on these New Testament passages, stories from his own life and recommendations for prayer will help you to hear him say, “Follow Me.”

Songs and poetry are an integral part of prayer throughout the Scriptures. Likewise the Psalms have been an integral part of prayer throughout the history of the Church. This workshop will examine the different themes found in the psalms and their importance as expressions of divinely inspired prayer, which for centuries God’s holy people have uttered “from the depths of the heart.” A few of the 150 Old Testament psalms will be examined to illustrate how they reflected a wide range of prayer, emerging from deep emotion and experience, all centered on the faith in the centrality of God’s presence and action in the life of the nation, the community and the individual.

This session is rooted in the formula: When the Holy Spirit moves at the will of the Father, the Word becomes incarnate. It will begin by exploring this Trinitarian dynamic at work at key moments in salvation history (the Incarnation, Pentecost, creation) and in the sacramental life of the Church. It will trace how in the Eucharist we enter into this dynamic in the movement of the prayers from epiclesis, to consecration, to communion, and how it carries over from the Eucharist into the lives of Christians. Quite simply we will explore the thesis that we live and pray within the dynamics of the Trinity.

8-22 Discipleship for the 21st Century: The Global Dimensions of Serving Our Neighbor

Who is our neighbor in a world of instant, global communication? How do we respond in faith to the reality of suffering around the world? Can we be true disciples without responding to those needs? In this workshop, we will reflect upon these questions, share stories of the great work the U.S. Catholic community is doing to serve our brothers and sisters around the world, and identify ways individuals, parishes and schools can participate in our call to global discipleship.

Joan Rosenhauer serves as Executive Vice President for U.S. Operations for Catholic Relief Services, based in Baltimore. She is responsible for leadership of the agency’s mission to help Catholics in the U.S. live their faith in solidarity with their brothers and sisters around the world. She has spoken in dozens of dioceses across the country on topics related to the Catholic social mission. Rosenhauer was formerly with the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops as Associate Director for the Department of Justice Peace and Human Development.

The feminine voice of Scripture appears in many places, but one of the most interesting is the voice of “Lady Zion,” or “Lady Jerusalem,” about whom prophets speak (Hosea, Jeremiah, Ezekiel) before she quite strikingly speaks for herself in Lamentations, and is heard and replied to in Second Isaiah. What is the nature of this dialogue? Why is it so important that we learn to listen to her voice in Scripture?

We often hear that lay ministers are necessary to the Church because there are too few priests – the implication being that a lay minister is a sort of inadequate priest. We will explore why lay ecclesial ministry has an essential role to play in the Christian community in its own right, and why the Church’s mission would be improbable without lay women and men in ministry.

The third edition of the Roman Missal has introduced some changes to the celebrations of Holy Week. How can we celebrate Good Friday and the Easter Vigil with renewed fervor? What changes are there to the music, words and rubrics of these important days?

This workshop will look at the elements of witness, proclamation, dialogue and reconciliation as Jesus’ model of planning. Participants will explore this model in evaluating the effectiveness of ministry in their present location or ministry site. Participants will also develop a new pastoral plan based on this model.

2012 RECongress Period 8

Religious Education Congress
Sunday, March 25, 2012
1:00 - 2:30 pm

2012 RECongress Period 8

Religious Education Congress Sunday, March 25, 2012 1:00 - 2:30 pm

Religious Education Congress
Sunday, March 25, 2012
1:00 - 2:30 pm