It has been a little over 2.5 years since I wrote the blog-post 'Towards a Diocesan Social Media Policy'. In that time it has continued to be the most read post of this blog. Perhaps it tapped into a need, and perhaps it needs a bit of an update.

What you may not have known is that the aforementioned blog-post started out as a communication to my then bishop 3.5 years ago. Did I get any response? I think it may have been passed on to someone in the curia who still has it in an in-box somewhere.

But I knew that this wasn't just a local diocesan issue, so I scrubbed the communication of local identifiers and that's how the blog-post came to be.

Given that the blog-post has been read so often, and that there haven't been any comments or private messages about it, in all likelihood it has been read by frustrated social media apostles like myself and not by any movers-and-shakers at diocesan level.

So for you, dear fellow social media apostle in the trenches, this update is for you. I'll go through the original blog-post and update it, and then at various points I'll do the controversial thing and point you to examples of people doing a really good job of soft evangelisation via social media.
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I continue to believe that it is time that something was done to promote what I call 'soft evangelisation' at a diocesan level, as well as at local parish level.

'Soft evangelism' is using social media to provide reminders of God to the unchurched. The aim is to get trickles of good Catholic content into the Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and RSS feeds of people who live in the diocese; so that among the Aunt Acid jokes, pet pictures and holiday snaps would be an article about the Pope's latest homily, an image of the mother of Jesus, and a photo from a local parish event. Things that people can easily flick through, and opt in for a read if they wish, but which even for that very brief moment are reminders that God exists.

Soft evangelisation has the capacity to plant seeds of faith that one-to-one evangelisation or parish evangelisation can later reap.

Current Situation

By and large our social media reach is very poor. It doesn't help that the majority of people in the pews don't have a social media account. However it goes a long way to explaining the disconnect between those who actively practice their faith and those far out on the fringe of 'spiritual but not religious' or 'practical atheism' because they aren't rubbing shoulders together either physically or in cyber space.

Many parishes and dioceses have improved their websites over the last 2.5 years to make them more user-friendly for mobile devices, adding in Twitter feeds from Pope Francis (@Pontifex) and uploading parish bulletins, and including a page for new parishioners/visitors/inquirers. Mostly these necessary improvements are happening in urban areas, and sadly there are still many rural and outback parishes without websites.

Yet when it comes to Facebook, very few parishes have a presence, and much fewer parishes have an active presence.

However just about all the schools do have an active Facebook presence because it is such an effective means to get information about changes to routine into the hands of parents, teachers and students ( eg. the school excursion bus for Year 4 is running 30 minutes late; the Reds vs Greens soccer match for under 15s has been cancelled due to wet weather.) The good news is that the necessary expertise is available very close to just about every parish.

As I think Brandon Vogt once said, 'If St Paul was alive today, where would he consider to be the modern Areopagus?' Considering the global possible outreach for minimal effort, social media would be the answer.

This is no longer 'optional extra' stuff. In the world-scape we live in today, any entity that doesn't have an online presence does not exist. Bishops need to insist that parishes have online active presences to 'keep the digital light' on for anyone the Holy Spirit is moving along the path to conversion of heart and mind. That insistence needs to be backed up with resources; computer hardware, internet connections, people expertise, help desks, information how-to packs etc.

Some parishes have begun sending out parish bulletins by email, and this seems to be a very good innovation, as well as being very useful for building up a database of contacts for when urgent information needs to be sent out (think bush fires, road closures, rescheduling of Mass times due to emergency illness of clergy).

Why do Facebook?

Facebook is very good for getting out messages to local people. I really need you to hear that. These days it is even better than putting a press release in the local newspaper.

There are 2 ways this is true.

The first is that for a small outlay of money a parish can get Facebook to put prepared material in front of Facebook users by postcode. The average parish normally has between 1-3 postcodes within its borders. Where do the people most likely to respond to a 'Catholics Come Home' initiative or to an invitation to the next RCIA program? Yes, in those postcodes. Prepare the material well, get it proof read by a handful of unchurched people for like-ability and removal of churchy-jargon. Upload it shortly before the Saturday vigil Mass, and then invite parishioners over that weekend to find it, like it and share it.

To understand the second way you need to unpack how Facebook works. The average person on Facebook has over 200 Facebook friends. Some of these will be family, some will be friends, some will be co-workers, some will be influencers/celebrities/organisations and some will be other parishioners and people they play sport with or do hobbies with. Possibly a third of them will live within the parish postcodes or in nearby suburbs. The more people in your Facebook network who like, share or comment on the same Facebook post, the more you are likely to see it in your Facebook feed. Due to this, a single message about pre-Christmas Reconciliation times could have a large reach, especially in the target postcodes, if it was liked by even 10 parishioners; and it would get seen by well over a 1000 people who don't have access to the parish bulletin and who would never think of looking up a parish website.

Granted, many of them won’t act upon a message like that this year, but if you back it up with prayer, some will act on it next year when they see the message again, and more will act on it the year after, if you keep sending the messages, getting parishioners to like/share/comment, and backing it up with prayer. Even getting an extra five parishioners intentionally using Facebook for this kind of soft evangelisation could double the impact of that message in the parish postcode area.

Why do Twitter?

Because Twitter is where the thinkers, and the deep thinkers are. There are plenty of extremely witty people, too. Twitter is where people share well written articles that have the potential to change political policy and social opinion. If you are passionate about pro-life issues, God's plan for marriage and family, the freedom to preach and practice religion without compromise, and many other Gospel-based values, you need to be on Twitter to support those on the front lines with your likes, shares and comments.

Very early in the proceedings of the 2014 Proclaim Conference Bishop Ingham got up and shared what at the outset seemed to be an innocent ice-breaker, 'Tweet others as you would like them to Tweet you'. It was far more than that. Those words reverberated throughout the conference, and are the words people remember from that conference far more than any of the other content. Only after many months did the penny drop that the only way to do this was to actually have a Twitter account – and use it.

Apart from a great message, reliance upon team work, prayer and the Holy Spirit, what else do the Divine Renovation people from Halifax, Canada have going for them? Ministry team leaders who tweet, and who like, share and comment upon each other's tweets. It gives their ministries enormous global reach, and huge encouragement to those on the journey from maintenance to mission in our parishes and dioceses. Visit @MacLorik, @CoachRobinson1, @frsimoncc, @colautta, @ron_huntley, @FJMallon, @LauraORourke, @divreno, @Tanya_Noye, @K8Robinson and the rest of them to see what is possible if you have even 10 social media tweet-leaders in a parish.

Many urban dioceses now have a social media – photographer team that shares photos, and information about the bishop's activities (eg World Youth Day, ordinations, school openings, official statements etc). They tend to have an inward focus.

Even in social media we have to lead by example and be heading towards the right mix of inward focus and outward focus, because without outward focus we cannot be the missionary disciples we are called to be. The Archdiocese of Toronto is leading the way. @archtoronto produces very high quality infographics on topics like Lectio Divina, the seasons of Christmas, What is Advent? etc as well as simultaneously honouring deceased clergy and giving funeral details, sharing Prayers of the Faithful, announcing Days of Confessions, and all the regular stuff. They are worth studying. Consider liking and sharing their content.

Here's a list of people on Twitter who greatly impress me.
@frpatrickop He has a very good mix of story, images, articles, and video on life as a priest, with musings, blessings, encouragements, simple prayers and thanksgivings. He has hold of the kind of faith that gently attracts and doesn't forcefully proselytise.
@jkuebbing is a Catholic mother and journalist, sharing her experiences of living faith and trust in God in the midst of family life. What she writes and what she shares are always worth the time to stop and read.
@ArchbishopGomez of Los Angeles, his tweets are always worth reading
@BishopZubik of Pittsbugh is also well worth following
@Pontifex for Pope Francis's inspiring daily tweets
@DisabilityJ supporting faith and access to churches for disabled and abled alike

Why do Instagram?

Because Instagram is primarily where the young people are. If you want an insight into how young people think – you have to be there. If you want to have a hope of connecting them into your parish, deanery and diocesan activities, you need to broadcast it through Instagram as well as your other regular channels.

Instagram is also where many of the creatives are: musicians, artists, illustrators, photographers, craft-workers etc.

Instagram has advantages over Twitter because you can write a short article. It has advantages over Facebook because you can see posting history easier and there appears to be no limit for the number of hashtags you can use.

On Instagram you can post short video, multiple photographs, and text. Each post must have an image. Unlike Twitter and Facebook that work better on large screens than on small screens, Instagram is designed specifically for mobile devices. There is a growing trend of people posting on Instagram first and sending secondary versions of those postings to Twitter and Facebook.

It comes into its own particularly at World Youth Day time, when through hashtags you can follow several pilgrimage groups, and get real time coverage of major events from many different perspectives. For me World Youth Day is a major opportunity to discover new social media apostles and start 'following' and supporting them.

@archie.will (a.k.a Archbishop William Goh of Singapore) is very good, uplifting and inspiring.
@srjulia (a.k.a. Sr Julia Mary Darrrenkamp), is a wonderful example of sharing her joy in living a consecrated life and gently inviting us into how wonderful a relationship with Jesus and His mother is.
@frgoyo (Fr. Goyo from the Archdiocese of Los Angeles) shows us faith with a sense of humour, and gratitude for the ways God is acting in people's lives.
@frjasonsmith from New York is also impressive.
@ingamae is providing excellent content to help end abortion.
@litcatholicmemes for doses of humour that contain life giving truth.

Why blog?

Because that's where the longevity is. Have you ever tried to find that great tweet, meme or photo on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram? Even if you can remember who posted and a relevant hashtag, they are still very hard to find, and almost impossible if it over a week old. What's blogged stays blogged and findable by the browser search-bots. Your best content needs to be blogged to give it the longest and widest reach.

These days there are several places offering free technology to set up websites, (eg Weeby, Wix) that have templates to 'choose, drag and drop' and include blog web-page options.
With Weebly, and possibly with some of the others, you can have multiple editors. For parishes and dioceses this means you can give person A responsibility for uploading parish bulletins, person B responsibility for uploading accounts of recent parish events on the blog, person C responsibility for keeping the up-coming-events news up to date etc – and you don’t have to wait for a web designer to schedule time to do it for you.

To have a glance at what's out there, http://topcatholicblogs.com/ is a good place to visit. Aim to get on, and stay on, that site. It requires 6 months minimum of blogging, with a minimum of one blog post per month, staying true to Catholic teaching, be Catholic content, and have a link somewhere back to the TopCatholicBlogs website.

The better the content, and the more frequently and regularly you post to your blog, the more chance it has of succeeding. But it takes perseverance. It takes about 50 blog posts for the browser search-bots to flag you as worthy of notice, and it takes a minimum of 2.5 years to find your style, rhythm and audience, and often a lot longer.

Go for promoting the good, the true and the beautiful. Of course it is easier to grow using controversy or click-bait titles and lists, but that doesn't do much long term good to anyone. Ranting is better done elsewhere, if at all. Take Eph 4:29 as a sure guide, 'Let your words be for the improvement of others, as occasion offers, and do good to your listeners, otherwise you will only be grieving the Holy Spirit'.

You can bet that if you write something particularly good (and this applies to all social media), the first thing you will attract is not praise but a troll. A troll is someone who lurks online for the purpose of starting an argument. It is far better to ignore a troll than to 'feed' them by engaging with them. The only exception to this rule is if you sense that they are genuinely seeking truth, in which case you take the conversation private as soon as possible (eg email).

Connections

Apart from priests and deacons, who preach the Word of God mostly within church walls, those believers who are intentionally using social media for evangelical purposes are the front line troops in the culture war and battle for souls. They deserve the name 'social media apostles'. The vast majority of them serve God in this ministry without any monetary reward at all, despite the many hours it takes to produce and prepare content to upload each posting. These are dedicated warriors and it is more than time that they are recognised as such and publicly honoured, supported and protected at parish, deanery and diocesan levels. Now is the time for co-operation to increase between the bishop's communication team and these social media apostles who can get the bishop's messages into the ears of those that the regular media channels cannot.

Many of them have been lone rangers for a very long time, and they have the skills and the experience to get a worthwhile message out very effectively. It is time that they were officially commissioned by the church for this purpose.

It isn’t difficult to do; it just takes a bit of medium range planning and good communication. (Yes, I know that is hilarious, but with God all things are possible).

A bishop and his communications team should be in regular contact with his bloggers, just like a general should be with his captains. No blogger likes to be micro-managed, but give them a vision for what the bishop wants to achieve and themes for various times of the year together with cogent reasons for that timing, and they will astound you.

For example, if you know there is a political election up ahead and there are one or two topics that are important in that context (eg funding for schools, protection for the seal of the confessional, programs to reduce the incidence of domestic violence etc), get the bishop, his theologians and researchers and the bloggers together as early as possible to brainstorm together how to raise these topics for public conversation and how to share the wisdom of Catholic teaching on those topics in fresh and creative ways. Provide background documents to read, banks of images that are open source and relevant to the topic, and lists of online content for private research. Ask for one post of content a month, on which ever topic speaks to them, until the election is held. The same goes for other things that can be seen coming, eg referendums, plebiscites, Royal Commissions, legislation on pro-life issues coming before state and federal parliaments, diocesan year of Marriage and Family, Year of the Refugee in the universal church, whatever the next Papal document or Bishop's Conference document is to be about.

The more you get to know your bloggers and other social media apostles, the better you can tailor the prepared resource material. For example: A blog that normally does book reviews is going to need good books on the planned topics to review; a blog that usually does scripture meditations is going to need scripture references relating to the planned topics; a blog that comments on quotations from Pope Francis will need references to the planned topics from the speeches and writings of Pope Francis. Of course, your bloggers and social media apostles will still do their own research too, but it sure helps to know where to look, and to have a smorgasbord of excellent content to chew through rather than having to start the research from scratch. If the resource material is very good and the topics are compelling, your bloggers will catch the fire and spread it, and possibly write a whole series on the topic.

Many dioceses have graphic designers on staff. Grant your bloggers and social media apostles 2 hours a month each of your graphic designer's time. That's brainstorming time, idea wresting time and production time. So often the content is written and then a blogger spends just as much time trying to find an image to go with it, an image they have a concept for. Give that concept to the graphic designer and you will get a quality image in a fraction of the time spent previously doing fruitless internet searches. The graphic designer gets some short term wins, and a bit more variety in his or her day, and that's a win-win scenario for everyone. Your bloggers will soon learn that if they want to get an image produced within the 2 hours, then they need to prepare very clear concepts, and any associated text to be used in the image, and allow time for the designer to suggest better solutions or adjustments that will have the same impact but require less time to produce.

Bringing your social media apostles together has other benefits too. If you know someone personally you are far more likely to naturally like, share and positively comment on each other's social media content. I cannot stress enough how crucial this mutual encouragement is. Most social media apostles get so little in the way of positive feedback, particularly on the long lonely road before their content receives widespread recognition. Lack of encouragement is why so many give up before that wonderful moment of 'traction' is reached.

The other benefit is the sharing of technological information, 'tricks of the trade', helping each other bypass common pitfalls and increasing efficiency.

Most social media apostles will welcome topic suggestions, and will definitely welcome resources, as long as they are free to spin it their way, in harmony with the authenticity of their blog.

Good resources would also include access to diocesan image banks for images upon which copyright has already been paid, and information on effective ways of producing memes to go with the text on social media channels. Attaching a relevant quality image to a social media post significantly increases the number of clicks that post receives.

Plan – Step 1 Find your front line troops

One way is to use social media and print media (email, Facebook, Twitter, website, diocesan newsletter etc) get the word out that the bishop wants to connect with his social media apostles. A better way would be to pay attention to who has already been liking, sharing and commenting in useful ways on the existing diocesan social media channels, and who also have existing social media channels of their own, and sending personal invitations to these people. That won't catch them all, so also do some searches using relevant hashtags too (eg name of diocese, name of bishop, recent big diocesan event/conference; #YearOfMercy etc).

Plan – Step 2 Get them together

Initially a Saturday at the diocesan offices would be best, to enable the maximum number of social media apostles to attend. On Saturdays workers are usually at leisure and Mums can find someone to look after the children. Start the day properly with Mass, after registrations, a welcome and a vision for diocesan social media have been presented. First session is on using social media to evangelise. Second session is an overview of how various social media channels work, with a maximum 10 minutes per channel (just because you are proficient in one of them doesn't mean that you know how the others work or what the possibilities are). Third session is where your social media apostles each get 2-3 minutes to introduce themselves and their blog/Twitter handle/Facebook page etc and what they are trying to achieve with it. Some will be more focussed on apologetics, others more focussed on theology, bible study, vocations or family life etc. Fourth session is where people get split up into groups based on social media channel, (bloggers and tweeters, Facebook users, Pinterest and Instagram, Podcasts and YouTube) and learn from each other. Fifth session is re-presentation of diocesan vision, presentation of the diocesan media plan for topics, distribution of free resources, blessing and commissioning. NB Only get people who are actually proficient in evangelising through the various social media channels to lead sessions, and make attendance free.
This is the baseline from which you can build.

Plan – Step 3 Do it again regularly

Aim for four times a year, and make sure you achieve three times a year. Subsequent Social Media Days should have opportunities for feedback at diocesan level and individual level about how things are going (statistics, reach, followers, comments, trends, troll management etc). Take time to pray for each other too, and for God's blessing and guidance upon the development of this apostolate and for God's grace upon the followers of the social media channels and for whatever the next 'can see it coming' media challenges are.

If you start now, and get this moving, the next time an emergency situation hits, you will have a well-trained army ready and willing to spring into action at short notice.

Consider this hypothetical scenario: the bishop of a neighbouring diocese has been called to court to answer allegations of a serious nature. The secular press is having a field day, with op-ed pieces only considering guilt and not innocence, and spinning the story as darkly as possible. If the diocese can put together evidence for the innocence side of the story, or at least context to permit the benefit of the doubt, and then get it into the hands of your social media apostles, the chances of the positive side of the story being told to the community dramatically increase. The chances, too, of a fairer trial, should it ever come to that, dramatically increase as well. However if you don't gather evidence and context, and don’t have a prepared social media army, the community will only get to hear the sensational bad stuff and act on it.

I know I need more examples of lay people to follow social media-wise – I have them, I've just run out of time to include more of them here. I may get an opportunity to add them in later.

Let's pray

Lord Jesus, You know just how urgently teams of social media apostles are needed to spread your gentle yet powerful light one ray at a time. We confess that we have collectively been dragging our feet when it comes to these new ways of spreading Your good news. Please send Your Holy Spirit to encourage Your weary social media apostles, to refresh and reinvigorate those who were doing so well but gave up, and to connect them together for the greater and far more effective plans You have for them. Touch the hearts of bishops and their advisors that they may begin to grasp Your possibilities for this apostolate, and run with it in step with You. Please raise up intercessors who will specifically pray for and spiritually defend these front line troops of Yours. We ask You to inspire Your social media apostles to write words and prepare content and images that will touch the hearts of those who read them and impart profound encounters with Your love to them.
For You. Lord Jesus, nothing is impossible. Amen.
​
St Paul, missionary apostle, pray for us
Mary, Virgin Mother of all the children of God, pray for us.
St John the Baptist, whose cries in the wilderness moved the inhabitants of Jerusalem, pray for us
St Francis de Sales, patron of both bishops and journalists, pray for us
.......................................................................
Interesting lay people on Twitter to follow or study

@VanessaComninos
@Keithhinton8
@oranparkparish
@Lorraine_McCart
@mrslbright
@VermD10
@CatholicNerdy
@margaretfelice
@suzannewalsh
@ColletteBP1

Notice how individual they are, the themes about which they post, and how well their posts can be appreciated by insiders and outsiders alike.

​There's a lot to like about Pat Keady's book 'Spearhead: Reshaping the Church to Engage the Word'. But there's a dangerous 10% which concerns me greatly. Let's focus on the good stuff first:

When I first heard about this book I was excited because there has been prophetic word over the last 6 months about God releasing anointing upon writers and songwriters, and this book began when Pat Keady woke very early one morning with an impetus to write from the Holy Spirit. So I really wanted to read it.

The font is easy to read, the paper has a lovely glossy feel and the graphic design layout is beautiful.

The first half of the book is particularly good. For anyone wanting an easy to digest synthesis of what God has been saying through Pope Francis and various parish renewal movements over the last 3 years, it is brilliant, particularly if you delight in Australian idioms. If you are deep in the trenches of parish renewal, in the first half you won't be reading anything new, but you might be reading it from a fresh perspective.

However, as a book to invite someone from the sidelines into the trenches, that's where its true value is to be found.

Two insights I found particularly helpful. The first is the story of Jonathan, son of Saul, and his armour-bearer from 1 Samuel 14 about how the two of them trusting in the help of God made a daring foray into enemy Philistine territory and began a battle that inspired traitors to turn back to allegiance to God's people and eventually involved the whole army of Israel in victory. A few committed people doing something brave and unusual, but filled with faith, can have a very big impact.

The second is an insight into the story of Pentecost, Acts 1, about how God met people where they were at by giving His Apostles and disciples the gift of the languages of the people. It wasn't about various languages now becoming a single language.

Pat uses this story to make his case that we have to learn the cultures of the groups we wish to evangelise, so that we can build a bridge – mainly through music – with which to present the Gospel. Now Pat is looking at the inculturation possibilities in the liturgy through music.

This is where my thoughts diverge from his. Pentecost didn't take place within the liturgy, it took place out in the streets, in the marketplace. I think we do the liturgy a disservice if we try to make it into a vehicle for evangelisation. Firstly, the liturgy only makes sense once a person has been evangelised and awakened by the Holy Spirit. Secondly, for the early church an invitation to the liturgy was the last thing you did with a newcomer, and not the first thing. Even today when I read modern stories of conversion the majority of people darken the doors of a church as one of the last steps on their journey home to Catholic faith.

Therefore we need intermediate steps between the secular world and the liturgy. In such intermediate steps lay preaching, testimonies and contemporary music that engages the culture of the groups you desire to evangelise find their natural home.

It is worth trusting the wisdom of Mother Church on this one, when she insists that ordained ministers preach during the liturgy. They have been anointed and set apart for this purpose and have a minimum of 7 years of study behind them. While it is true that many of them don't have an obvious gift of preaching, we have to allow God to be God, knowing that a homily that does not engage you and me at all might contain the very words that someone else needs to hear. Instead of the satisfaction of complaining, our energies are much better directed to praying that our priests do receive the charismatic gift of preaching and praying that they preach according to the mind and heart of Jesus, in full harmony with the teachings of His Church and to the maximum spiritual benefit of those that will be present when they preach.

I've got no troubles with lay preachers if they exercise their ministry before or after the liturgy, but not during it.

My definition of culture is different too. Again we do a disservice if we only think about culture in terms of liturgical elements, eg architecture, music (eg African drums), decorative motifs on vestments and liturgical vessels, artwork (eg Our Lady of China).

For me culture is expressed primarily in public, private and family devotional practices. That's the fiestas, the processions, pilgrimages, special food for feast days, grace before meals, traditions passed down in families and nations, preferred spiritualities of prayer (people from exuberant cultures will prefer loud praise and dance, people from reserved cultures will prefer reflective silence and Eucharistic adoration) etc.

A cultural group votes with their feet about what is important to them. In Australia we seem to like setting off fireworks at major celebrations, gathering friends and family around a barbecue, Anzac Day touches us deeply, we like singing Christmas carols in big groups, and 'don't interrupt me if the footy, tennis or cricket is on'. These are the areas where creativity and Holy Spirit inspired ingenuity can take something naturally wholesome and elevate it to something supernaturally good.

On the very vexed subject of liturgical music, here's my two cents worth. While hip contemporary music for all songs at all Masses might seem like the answer, it isn't. Let me count the ways. Firstly if your average congregation is aged 70+, you are going to alienate them. Secondly, from my studies of conversion stories it is experiences of the historicity of the Church that make a difference. Thirdly, when people decide to come home to the Church (eg cradle Catholics returning after an absence), a familiar song really helps. Be a wise musical scribe and bring out from the liturgical music storehouse music that is both old and new. We need to sing new songs to the Lord, no question about that, but we need a mix; hymns that have stood the test of centuries of time, hymns that have stood the test of decades of time, hymns that have become favourites during the past decade and the new stuff. In other words we need to show our Catholicity (universality) in our musical selections and not narrow it down to one genre and era. The new is good, and the old is good; use both.

I was so hoping to read about fresh new ideas for spreading the good news of Jesus. That's what I was hungering for. So I'll contribute my own weird and wacky idea instead. Many Australians love going to live sporting events. There's plenty of God-loving-Catholics who rush home after Mass to watch the footy on TV. So if you have a youth group, a Cursillo group, a covenant community group etc, that has lots of sports loving members, consider this:

Make a group booking at a sporting event. Get yourselves matching T-shirts to wear (a slogan like 'Ask me about Jesus' on them or similar would be good). Sit together. Be clued up before you go as to how to act if unusual things transpire. For example, if a fight starts on the field, you all drop to your knees and pray for peace and reconciliation; if a player gets injured, you drop to your knees and collectively pray for the injured player, his/her family and the medical people assisting them; if the crowd starts boo-ing, you sit silently and pray for conversion of hearts; as you go from your seat to the toilets, to purchase merchandise or food and drink, silently beg God's blessing on every person on your path there and back, and if someone stops you and asks you the reason for the hope that you have (1 Peter 3:15), give it to them.

One thing Pat Keady does well is underline how all renewal has to start with us, with us taking God more seriously than we have ever taken Him before. Surrendering to His will; seeking the grace and power of the Holy Spirit; spending quality time in prayer and listening to Him; spending quality time reading from the Bible and studying His ways; making daily Mass and regular recourse to the sacrament of Penance a priority.

Another thing Pat Keady does well is talk about the difficulties faced by anyone who wants to try something new to further the kingdom of God. None of us like change, none of us are real keen on being challenged, so there's both this natural battle and the supernatural battle to contend with. Kick-back comes with the territory. This is true, but some kick-back is natural/supernatural resistance and some kick-back is 'hey, you are truly going the wrong way', and you need to pray for the wisdom and humility to know the difference.

He also speaks well about the times when everything just flows and the times when it is a test of grit and endurance through manifold difficulties. Lots of people in ministry need to hear his encouragement to keep on going.

In conclusion, yes it is a worthwhile book to read, however I personally would only invite someone to read it after first sharing the concerns I have about that 10% of content with them.

The impetus for this blog-post is 3-fold, a confluence of a prophetic blog-post, a dove-tailing episode of The Journey Home, and the frustration of an opportunity lost to talk out these ideas with a local social media apostle.

For this one you need to do a little homework.

Firstly read Patricia King talking about the connection between cyber evangelism and the long awaited great harvest of souls. An excerpt: "I feel the Spirit of God inviting every Believer and ministry who has access to the internet to use this tool with intentionality for reaching the lost. Every effort small or large can make impact!"

Secondly watch the Kandice Longsteth episode of The Journey Home, and pay particular attention to how much of her journey was done online before ever talking to a Catholic or going to a Catholic Mass. Pay attention too, to the questions she gets towards the end of the episode.

There was another Journey Home episode, a repeat episode, which aired recently, Kelly Nieto's maybe, that also contained internet browsing as the first step where her journey home to the Catholic church began to accelerate.

There are a multitude of good Catholic resources available online, but there's also plenty of less useful stuff.

Many Catholic parishes have reasonable websites, but few of them are user friendly for outsiders wondering about what life is like on the inside. It would take so little to have an extra web-page entitled, 'Investigating Catholicism?' or similar and to then have curated lists of good resources for topics like Who is Jesus?, Mary, Authority, Sacraments, Salvation, Church History, the Mass, the Rosary etc. Lists with links to video, podcasts, books, articles etc that provide useful answers.

Making those curated lists should be easy. Chat to those who have been through the RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults) over the past 5 years, and their team members and ask them which resources helped them the most. Write down their answers, make sure the links still work, and prepare lists and put them online.

But every path must intersect at some point with a person with skin on, a Catholic who can be the interface between the outsider and the local community of faith. This is where your Social Media Apostles come in.

Many outsiders don't know someone who is visibly Catholic. How will they find one? If they are already investigating the doctrines of the Church through online means, chances are they will either look for or stumble across someone online through a blog, an article, a comment, or a social media posting.

The primary way outsiders will find a local Catholic to connect with is through Facebook, because Facebook is the most locally connected of the social media sites. We need more Catholics who are willing to be visible Catholics to be online, particularly through Facebook.

What does that mean? It means posting and liking and sharing content that is more than holidays, pets and family gatherings. It means getting some Catholic content coming into your social media feed, eg from the Vatican, your local diocese, your local Catholic news service (eg The Catholic Weekly, The Catholic Leader) and international Catholic news services (eg Catholic News Agency, ChurchPOP), and then liking and sharing anything with quality.

Will you get negative feedback if you do? Sometimes. It is part of the cost of being a disciple of the One who died on the Cross for us.

Part 1 is get some curated Catholic content on parish websites for inquirers to find. Part 2 is getting parishioners active on social media. However, a part 3 is also needed, and that's a combination of regular training and encouragement: Training in helping people through the Catholic maze and encouragement to withstand the negative feedback: and encouragement to be patient and welcoming with any inquirers who make contact with them.

A monthly get together of parish Social Media Apostles would be enough.

At that monthly meeting you could pray for each other, and for all the inquirers who have made contact, (past and present) and you could also pray and ask God's blessing over your devices (phones, iPads, computers etc). At such a meeting you could also share any good content you found and discuss whether it should get added to the parish's 'Investigating Catholicism?' page. Obviously if the answer is 'Yes', waste no time in getting it added!

These three Parts can be begun now, and should be begun now, and with urgency, so as to get people positioned to welcome and handle influxes of inquirers as they begin to increase.

I'll finish with Patricia King's challenge…

'If 500 or maybe 1000 new believers were to come to the Lord in your church or area overnight, how would they be discipled? Your church might not be ready for this yet. In the coming harvest it is probable that hundreds of thousands and even millions will come to the Lord in one sweep of the sickle. Through the internet we can be assured that they can have access to all they need for foundational teaching, and through social media we can reach them relationally with pastoral mentoring and input.'
​
St Maximillian Kolbe, pioneer of mass media evangelisation, pray for us
Blessed Titus Brandsma, patron of Catholic bloggers, pray for us
Our Lady, Help of Christians, Star of the New Evangelisation, pray for us

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PS. When you curate your resources for inquirers, and find that there's a hole you can't fill - that's your cue to write some new resources or to commission some.

PPS. You are likely to have a lot of links to books on your inquirer's page, so investigate Amazon Associates. (links below). Small referral fees for promoted books could add up to a tidy income stream for your parish.
Beginner's Guide
Affiliate Link Tutorial​
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PPPS. I have added two new webpages, 'Could God be real?' and 'Could Catholicism be true?', and have begun to create lists of resources. You are welcome to use them as templates or starting points for your own personal and parish websites.

This is a transcription of parts of the jubilee celebration held in Rome on 1 June 2017 with members of covenant communities as part of the celebrations for the 50th anniversary of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal #ccrgoldenjubilee2017
 
This is the link for the video recording: https://youtu.be/HWuIfaAW0pU
 
This celebration brought together three networks of communities, the Catholic Fraternity of Charismatic Covenant Communities and Fellowships, the Sword of the Spirit, and the European Network of Communities. Michelle Moran of ICCRS gave some words of welcome and explanation. Gilberto Barbosa of the Catholic Fraternity gave a speech in Portuguese (not translated audibly into English on the recording).
 
Jean Barbara of Sword of the Spirit:
Good afternoon brothers and sisters. We are here gathered three networks of communities. And if we were asked to describe ourselves we would say that we are communities of disciples on mission, charismatic and ecumenical. But if you read Pope Francis' exhortation Evangelii Gaudium he would say the same of the Church. That the Church is a community of missionary disciples who are charismatic, and the Church is ecumenical.
 
So what is the difference? And the question is – Why did God bring us out of existence from the charismatic renewal? Cardinal Ratzinger in '98 gave us the answer and he said 'We have a place in the Church because it is the same working of the Holy Spirit, giving us a certain charism'. And what makes us communities in the Church playing a role is that as communities we are committed by covenant to each other, brothers and sisters, we are committed in good times and at difficult times. As disciples we are radical in following the Lord, radical in following His commandments, radical even if it costs our own lives. I come from the Middle East where Christians are persecuted and unless you are radical you are not ready to face death.
 
As missionaries we are evangelists, we evangelise in the streets, we evangelise at home, we evangelise our neighbourhood, we evangelise in the work, at work, we bring people by the power of the Holy Spirit to the Lord, but to a new and better life by helping them become disciples in a community, and we do all that charismatically by being open to the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
 
But we are also ecumenical. We live ecumenism, we do not only discuss it, we do not dialogue about it, but we live it, we love each other across churches and we do that in a co-operative and relational manner.
 
In brief, we are committed, radical, evangelists. Unless we live by the power of the Holy Spirit and be ecumenical we will lose the why that God brought us into existence. So may the Holy Spirit renew us, in loving each other, in following Him to the Cross, in renewing our zeal to evangelise people around us, to renew us in the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and to make us in our ecumenism a sign that we are the disciples of Jesus Christ. Amen.
 
Johannes Fichtenbauer of the European Network of Communities:
This is for sure. It was the Holy Spirit who called our communities into being. We are not the product of human thought and wish. We are the product, the fruit of God's creativity, meant to be a tool of the Holy Spirit preparing the Church for the second coming of the Lord.
 
The first communities appeared shortly after the enthusiastic beginnings of the charismatic renewal, already in the late '60s. It was an inspiring time, one Catholic, one ecumenical community after each other.
 
But brothers and sisters, then slowly something dramatic happens. Only 10 years after the good beginnings, instead of enjoying the variety of charismatic expression, communities began to look down on parish prayer groups and parish renewal. Instead of mutual appreciation of the diversity of each of our communities, serving in different ways the same Body of Christ, we began to count, to compare, to value and to de-value. Many of our communities developed a certain pride in relating to each other. We valued our own community network higher than others.
 
Catholic communities and ecumenical communities followed contradicting ideologies. We felt as an elite, being stronger, more dedicated, better equipped and more radical. We didn't want to be behind and being hindered by the slower ones. So better to run the race alone. Instead of being allies, we became rivals. Instead of complementary work we ended in a competition. Instead of serving together, we began fighting for our own victories, our own profile, promoting our own visions.
 
And in the early '80s many of our communities were already isolated and our community networks were separated from each other. Brothers and sisters, this separation was a sin: a sin against God, a sin against the intentions of the Holy Spirit, and a sin against each other.
 
With this separation we missed the meaning of our commission. And this is why we have to ask forgiveness today.
 
Father of mercy, here we stand and here today we confess, we did not serve in unity as we should have. We did not understand the formula 'unity in diversity' which you have offered to us as the principle of unity. Father, forgive. Father, forgive. Father of mercy today we recognise our unity and we want to protect it again. We understand that this afternoon is a moment of grace. Today we are uniting in humility again in our diversity. We want to embrace the other communities and networks, in their different style and gifting. Father, we commit ourselves to learn again to trust, to trust each other. We want to serve as allies. We want to serve together the Church and the kingdom with the best we have. And we understand that each of us is only a part, and not the whole. Father of mercy, today, commission us again, for this common purpose. Father of mercy today grant us a new beginning with one another. Amen.
 
Then there was an extended time of praise and worship, followed by slide presentations from each of the three networks. Before Dan Almeter from the Catholic Fraternity gave his presentation, he gave this word:
 
'The anointing is all over me. The Lord says to us. This is a new day for the communities. Because of your repentance and My love for you, I have bound the demons of disunity and you will experience a new springtime working together. Amen.'
 
Introduction: Bruce Yocum will speak on behalf of the three networks, the Catholic Fraternity, the European Network of Communities and the Sword of the Spirit. We decided on him because he is one of the first witnesses of the charismatic renewal and founder of the first covenant community. His book on Prophecy remains a reference book for all charismatics who want to know more. He is a celibate brother with the Servants of the Word.
 
Bruce Yocum: Good afternoon brothers and sisters. This is a great moment. It's a great opportunity for us to take time together to thank God for a remarkable work of His Holy Spirit throughout the world. This is from Psalm 145:
 
'Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised. His greatness is unsearchable. One generation shall praise His
works to another, and shall declare Your mighty acts.'
 
One generation shall declare Your works to another and declare Your mighty acts. It is a tremendous blessing to be here and to be thankful first of all to 4 successive Popes who have supported and encouraged charismatic renewal.
 
First of all, Pope Paul VI, who in 1975 invited us to come to Rome for a celebration of charismatic renewal and to conclude it with the Mass together in St Peter's. He was a tremendous supporter for us. He gave us the opportunity.
 
Secondly Pope St John Paul II, who was also a great supporter of charismatic renewal. I can testify that St John Paul II supported charismatic renewal while he was still Cardinal of Krakow. He supported and encouraged charismatic renewal when he was bishop there.
 
Thirdly Pope Benedict XVI who in 1998 articulated in a very important way the relationship between what God does through movements like ours and the ongoing life of the Church.
 
And finally, of course, Pope Francis, who invited us here to celebrate this anniversary in Rome and who is going to be with us in person.
 
It's a remarkable sign of God's work in charismatic renewal. I also want to take the opportunity to thank those who worked in the International Catholic Charismatic Renewal Services (ICCRS) and in particular Michelle Moran the president and the Catholic Fraternity of Charismatic Covenant Communities and Fellowships and its president Gilberto Barbosa because they are the ones who organized and made possible this celebration we are having today.
 
50 years. It is a great time to look back on what God has done. We've been here long enough to have a real history and we are young enough to have a great future. So I want to look back at what God has done, to look around at what God is doing, and then to look ahead at what God is going to do.
 
We have a duty to remember what God has done. We have a duty to look back at God's remarkable works and to remember them. As the Church tells us in the liturgy, 'It is right and just, our duty and our salvation, always and everywhere to give You thanks, Lord Holy Father, Almighty and Eternal God through Christ our Lord.'
 
We get to proclaim that. It is our duty and salvation to proclaim what God has done. Again in the Psalms, 'Give thanks to the Lord, call on His Name, make known His deeds among the peoples', or again, 'Remember the wonderful works that He has done. Remember them and call them to mind'.
 
To proclaim the great acts of God is worship. To call to mind what God has done and to proclaim it is an act of worship, and therefore we can look upon the time we have, these days we have together in Rome as one great act of worship.
 
Where we are from all round the world can give glory and honour to God by recalling what He has done. But there's more than that. We have a duty to proclaim God's deeds to the generations to come. Now I am going to say something in a minute to the younger ones amongst us. In comparison to me almost everybody here is younger. But I want to say something right now to those of you who have greyed a bit. We're not, us older ones, are not going to be the ones who charge out of here and do great new things – at least most of us won't. But we have a role, and one of our greatest roles, is to proclaim to the coming generations what God has done, to let them know.
 
Again from the Psalms:
 
'We will not hide from their children but will tell to the coming generations the glorious deeds of the Lord and His might, and the wonders He has wrought, that the next generation might know them, that the children yet unborn might arise and tell them to their children, so that they should all set their hope on God and not forget His works.'
 
We are witnesses to what God has done. And what's the role and duty of a witness? It's to give testimony. So we older ones, we have a solemn duty to give testimony to what God has done amongst us.
 
And I want to thank Patti Mansfield Gallagher especially for her book, 'As by a new Pentecost', the new edition of it. It's a tremendous witness to what God did at the beginning of the Renewal. Read it, please. If it isn't available in your language, get somebody to translate it. She's been a witness to what God did in the beginning and she witnesses in particular to the extraordinary ecumenical grace that took place at the beginning.
 
At the very beginning of the 20th century, Pope Leo XIII prayed for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. A few hours later, literally a few hours later, some young Pentecostal students in the United States were baptised in the Holy Spirit. Let us in the Catholic Charismatic Renewal not forget that we are debtors to those in the Pentecostal movement.
 
Now I'm not a witness from the very, very beginning. Somebody asked me yesterday how long I had been involved. It's not 50 years. I've been involved for 49 years and 4 months. But I was there early enough, I was there early enough to see how quickly this all began to happen. The first prayer meeting I attended there was maybe 10 people. 3 weeks later, 3 weeks later there were 90. And a little while after that, a couple of months after that, we had 300. It was remarkable how rapidly this all happened.
 
I used to take vacations, holidays, in the mountains, in the Appalachians in the United States and there in springtime you see these mountain rivers racing down, and they're powerful. The speed and power of these rivers is amazing. You can't step into them and stay on your feet, you're swept away. That's what happened to me, and happened to us at the very beginning of the Renewal. We were swept away by what God did.
 
But you know, when that happens you are just caught up in this stream that you stepped into, you can't see anything else, you are fending off rocks as you go racing down, and when you are self-absorbed as the river gets further downstream. At the beginning I was caught up in this racing river of what God was doing with us and I thought that what God was doing with us was what God was doing.
 
When the river gets further down it gets bigger and more powerful, but more peaceful. When that happens you can get your head up and look around. Well we got our heads us and looked around, we realized that we weren't the only stream on the mountainside. There were many, many, many new rivers of God's grace in the Church.
 
I had the great privilege in 2007 of attending a meeting in Stuttgart in Germany of Together for Europe. Over 250 new movements and communities, all of which began within the last 100 years. Extraordinary, what God was doing! So when I looked around, and saw all of this that was taking place I realized what God is doing in the Church is much greater, much broader, than what God is doing with us. We need to look around and view where of the rich diversity of gifts that God is pouring out through His Holy Spirit right now amongst us.
 
We've had a little bit of an opportunity to witness it today, a little bit, as we've heard from representatives of these different networks of communities. But let me tell you there is far more going on, far many more works of renewal in the Church than are even represented here this weekend.
 
So we need to look back at what God's done with us and be thankful for it, we need to give witness to it and pass it on, we need also to look around and recognise what God is doing in the Church. Recognise one another. We need to be not only grateful for what God has done with us, but we need to be respectful, reverent toward what God is doing among others. I'll say something more about that in just a minute.
 
What does the future hold? I don't know. I really don't know very much about what the future holds. I used to think I did. Back at the beginning of the Renewal I thought I could see a little bit of what God was trying to do in and through the Renewal. But I couldn't. I never would have foreseen what we see here today. That at the beginning of the Renewal, one of the things that we commonly said was that the future of the charismatic renewal is to disappear. Why? Because charismatic renewal isn't a movement like other movements in the Church, it is simply a stream of grace that God is pouring out upon people and we should disappear because what God does through charismatic renewal should just become normal in the life of the Church.
 
You know what? It's becoming pretty normal. It's becoming pretty normal. When you have 4 successive Popes who speak about what God is doing in charismatic renewal. When you see seminaries full of young men baptised in the Holy Spirit. When you see many bishops who take for granted the reality and the exercise of the charismatic renewal, something's changing. This grace of the Renewal is becoming a normal part of the life of the Church. We spoke about that in a theoretical way, but I never would have recognised what we see here now. So I don't know.
 
I do know that we are going to experience more hard times and more days of darkness. 1975. I want to take a minute or two to tell you a little story. In 1975 we had that Conference in St Peter's in Rome and on the very last day we had a Mass together for charismatic renewal in St Peter's. And we had a group there, gathered together to be able to give prophetic words and sharings. After Communion when the time came for prophetic words, Ralph Martin came to me and said, 'I have a very strong sense of prophetic anointing'. At that very moment, at that very moment all of the microphones stopped working. All of them. They just stopped. As far as I could tell, the only microphone that worked was the one up on the main altar. So I said to Ralph, 'Well, Ralph, go up there'. I didn't know if I should do that or if I could do that. But I said, 'Ralph, go up there and give the prophecy'. And he did. And as a result of that, when Ralph prophesied it was in a very dramatic setting. And I think God was in that. I think God put him, because right after these prophecies, about darkness and hard times, the microphones came back on. There were other prophetic words but from down below the altar. But these words of darkness and hard times were given from that dramatic setting under the baldacchino near the main altar in St Peter's.
 
So I'm going to read from one of those prophecies that we received. I am sure many of you are familiar with it.
 
'A time of darkness is coming on the world, but a time of glory is coming for My Church. A time of glory is coming for My people. I will pour out anew all the gifts of My Spirit. I will prepare you for spiritual combat and I will prepare you for a time of evangelization the world has never seen.'
 
That's a remarkable word. Now I don't know what form or what forms days of darkness and hard times will take. Ask our brothers and sisters from Aleppo. Unbelievable what they've been through in the last couple of years. But that's not the only part of hard times. We, here in Europe, live in an era of deepening moral darkness. Deepening moral darkness, it's hard times, it's difficult times, but, so we don't know what form that the hard times will take, but we do know that it's a time of glory coming for His Church. Gilberto Barbosa from the community in Lebanon could testify to you the 17 years of war in Lebanon were terrible, but for the community there it was a time of tremendous spiritual fruitfulness. Great spiritual fruitfulness. And we can expect the same if we enter into times that are difficult times of trial, yet God says, in those times I will make you fruitful. So yes we are coming into hard times, perhaps some of us are already experiencing them but we will also see great works of God, very great works of God.
 
We also know that God will continue to pour out His Spirit and I'm going to read out to you a prophetic word that I received years ago but time and time again in gatherings like this I hear the same word from God. So this is from many years ago, but it is a promise of God for us now.
 
'When I poured out My Holy Spirit on you, how did I pour it out? Did I give it to you in small measure? No! I poured it upon you as the beginning of a river which I intend to widen and deepen and to grow in strength, in current and in volume. I am zealous for My people's sake. I am zealous to save them and change them, to restore them. I will pour out My Holy Spirit upon you more and more until this is accomplished.'
 
We have not seen the end of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit and I don't think we will see the end of it for quite a while. Count on that. Count on the promise of God that He will pour out His Spirit again and again and more and more.
 
And I want to say something to the younger ones amongst you. There's.. there's…I don't know what the average age is, but there are a fair number of us grey haired ones here. We experienced back in the beginning of this Renewal times of tremendous exhilaration. We can tell you about them, but we can't help you experience that. You have to go out and evangelise. You have to go out and tell others of the gift of God through baptism in the Spirit, of the gifts of God through the power of the Holy Spirit active in your lives, then you will see the same kinds of miracles, you will see the same power of God, you will experience for yourselves not the story of exhilaration in the past but the reality of exhilaration right now in your lives and in your groups. So go out, and be witnesses.
 
Just 3 points.
 
God has poured out His Spirit time and time again in the history of the Church for the work of renewal. Have faith and trust that what God is doing among us is not an isolated time but part of a great work of renewal. Trust in God for that. If you ask why God stood up, I mentioned 250 new movements and communities since the beginning of the 20th century. If you ask, why so many? It's because God wants to transform the Church. He doesn't want to do a small work here and there, He wants to transform the Church. So first of all, trust in the grace of God to continue, and live in it.
 
Secondly, stay clear and faithful to your call. It's been said several times today: we're not all the same. God didn't call us to be the same. It's unity in diversity. We're different from one another and we're different for a reason. Stay faithful to the call God gave you. That's where grace is for you. Don't look to someone else's call. Don't envy somebody else's call. Don't disparage someone else's call. Stay faithful to your call and live it out as well as you can. That's where grace is for you.
 
Finally, live out your call charismatically. We're charismatic renewal. We believe in the power of the Holy Spirit. We believe in the power of the experience of the Holy Spirit coming into people's lives. We believe in the reality of charismatic gifts of miracles, of healing, of prophecy, of revelation. We believe that. So live out your call, but live it out charismatically. Go back to the Lord and confess to the Lord your confidence, your trust, your belief that His Holy Spirit is active today and live it out. Then 50 years from now we'll have much more to thank God for than we do today. Amen.
 
Summary of the prophetic word collected from communities and networks prior to this celebration; delivered by Shayne Bennett.
 
Brothers and sisters of the charismatic communities, listen to the word of the Lord. Look around you, the Lord asks. Do you see what I see? Do you see the brothers and sisters whom I have called from towns and cities and nations. These are your brothers and sisters, and the people whom I have chosen to do a great work of renewal in the life of the Church, in the life of My Church. It is important that you see with My eyes, understand with My mind, and not be blinded by the divisions and fractured relationships of the past. This is a new time, a time of restoration, a time of moving forward in the power of the Spirit. The long winter is giving way to springtime. My Spirit is the Spirit of unity and your power is totally dependent on being united to Me, Jesus your Saviour and Lord. My Heart for you is that you seek a greater unity in worship and in mission. Distance will never separate you if you are united in Me. What will separate you and dissipate the work I have for you are hearts which are closed or hardened towards Me and to one another.
 
Today I would remind you of who you are and the purpose for which I have called you. You are truly My people whom I love. You are also a people I have chosen to reach out to My Church and to reach out to the world that has lost sight of Me. I have called you to be bulwarks, strong, fortified, and to be arks, places of rescue and safety. You cannot do and be these things without an intimate relationship with Me, without the power of My Spirit.
 
For those of you who are weary, weary in the journey, I desire to renew My vision within you. I want My people to dream dreams again. I want My people to experience overwhelming visions of My plans. I want you to be captivated and swept forward by the excitement that I have in renewing the world. I want you to have a new expectancy of victory and favour.
 
This is a time of moving outwards into the world that I love. Some of you have lived too long in the original containers and structures in which you were planted. This has led to fear and tepidity. You struggle to maintain what was previously planted but you must realize that it was only the beginning. There is much more that I desire to give you; more freedom, more capacity, a greater clarity of the mission I prepare for you.
 
Today I ask for a new response from you, a response which is founded in humility. Your character as individuals and communities must be a witness to a profound humility which claims nothing for yourselves. You are My people and I am the One who does great deeds among you and through you. You are not to claim My actions for yourself. You are not to place yourselves above each other or in opposition to the others I have called to fulfil My purpose on the earth. You are to honour and respect one another. You are to honour and respect My actions within each of your communities. You are to take your place and stand shoulder to shoulder with other brothers and sisters in My Church.
 
And yet even as I pour out My Spirit upon you and renew you for the journey ahead, I warn you of great struggle and suffering. The anointing of My Spirit does not rescue you from the struggle and suffering which is to come. My Spirit is poured out upon you so that you can shine My light in the midst of pain and suffering. You are My witnesses. I call you to speak My life into the pain and suffering of the world around you. Be encouraged by the testimony of those who gladly suffer for My Name and who sacrifice their lives for My Name. Where ever I have placed you in towns and cities and nations, I call you to sacrifice your lives for Me and for the Kingdom which I have come to bring upon this earth. I tell you these things today as a call to action. I am shaping and molding you, so that you may stand in the time of testing. I am anchoring you in My Truth. I am anchoring you in a wisdom which is beyond your understanding. I ask for obedience in your hearts and in moving forward.
 
I would speak a word to those who are leaders among you. Know that the evil one seeks your destruction. The evil one seeks to sow the seed of disunity and destroy the work I have planted. Guard your hearts. Guard your hearts against disunity. Work for unity. Seek unity in your own communities and among your communities and today My word of unity extends beyond the walls of your communities.
 
Today I desire that you carry the burden of unity for My whole Church. Allow your hearts to be converted. The grace which I poured out at Pentecost is a grace of unity, a unity which can only be found in Me. Seek unity with your Pentecostal brothers and sisters, seek unity with your Protestant brothers and sisters, seek unity across denominational boundaries. Allow me to give you a deep love for your brothers and sisters which will witness to My presence and action among you.
 
My people I call you to receive the fire of My love, the intensity of My love which comes to you in the power of My Spirit. My love will burn away what remains of the fleshly and wounded motivations, worldly thought patterns and broken histories out of which you still react and operate. My love will give you a fiery passion for the Church and for the world. I want to share with you My desire for all My children. My love will bring a massive increase in anointing and power to the ministries I have given to you, going beyond anything you have seen to this point. Will you drink the cup of My love? Will you drink the fire of My Spirit?
 
Following this summary was a time of pre-prepared intercessions as a response.
 
Loving Father, we thank You for pouring out afresh upon us the power of Your Holy Spirit. We ask You to give us humble and obedient hearts to joyfully receive the power of the Spirit.
 
We pray for the gift of unity. We ask that our hearts would be opened to one another and that we would be one, that we would love one another through the loving gaze of our heavenly Father.
 
Father, we remember our brothers and sisters who are suffering for the name of Jesus Your Son. We pray that You would reassure them of Your love and in their moments of trial that they would know that You are with them and have not abandoned them.
 
We pray for the work of ecumenism, and in a particular way for our Pentecostal brothers and sisters. Father help us to be open to finding new ways to express our unity and love for one another and for a world which is longing for Your love.
 
Father, we pray for ourselves and for our communities that we would remain faithful to You, and to Your call. Help us walk each day close to Jesus Your Son in the strength of Your Holy Spirit.
 
Father, we pray for those who do not know You. May they come to know the saving power of Jesus in the fullness of life which He freely offers.
 
Father, we pray for our leaders, leaders in our communities, leaders in our Church, and for leaders of nations, pour out Your grace upon them giving them wisdom, discernment and a thirst for justice and peace.
 
Father, may Your kingdom come upon earth and may we be witnesses to Your kingdom in our midst.
 
Our Father….
 
This was followed by Mass at St John Lateran, for the memorial of St Justin Martyr, presided over by Cardinal Paul Cordes. He has been a great friend to the Renewal and to the communities. The homily, sadly, was given in Italian and without English translation on the audio recording.
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Below is a printer-friendly, slightly edited version of this transcript which runs to 8 x A4 pages. 

This is a transcription of the workshop held in Rome on 1 June 2017 with this topic as part of the celebrations for the 50th anniversary of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal #ccrgoldenjubilee2017
 
The speakers were Fr Dario Betancourt and Damian Stayne, with translations in English and Spanish.
 
Fr Dario Betancourt is a Colombian priest working in New York and active in the Renewal since at least 1977. There isn't much online about him in English. He does have a Facebook page.
 
Damian Stayne is a founder of the Cor et Lumen Christi community and runs Charism Schools. He too has a Facebook page.
 
This is the link for the video recording: https://youtu.be/PXLkeNGXa9o
 
(Ed. The translation for Fr Dario's talk wasn't as good as usual, due to a variety of factors, so the transcription for it won't be exact.)
 
Fr Dario Betancourt: Good morning. We are fighting against the time. I would like to share with you many texts from the Second Vatican Council, but we don't have the time. I would like to emphasize the second part of Lumen Gentium.
 
The Holy Spirit gives the gifts as He wills for the good of the Church, brothers and sisters, for the life of the Church. Jesus will infuse the healing gifts to those who believe in Him.
 
I encounter this in Chapter 9 of the Gospel of St Luke. The Lord Jesus sends His apostles to evangelise and to heal. It is important that Jesus did not send them just to evangelise, but to evangelise and to heal. And in the same Gospel of St Luke in Chapter 10 we see Jesus sends out His disciples to evangelise and to heal.
 
Let us not confuse apostles and disciples. Those are two different things. The apostles are disciples, but the disciples are not apostles. There were many, many disciples, but not many apostles.
 
It says in Luke 8, that Jesus had many followers including many women, including Mary Magdalene, Susanna and Joanna. It is very important that we understand what it means to be a disciple. It is a word, discere, that comes from Latin and discere means to learn. And to learn what? It is to learn the life of the Master, to live the life of the Master and to learn what the Master knows (eg about geography and other such things.)
 
But the most important thing is to live the life of the Master, not just learn what the Master knows.
 
This is a very important thing to note in the life of Jesus: He heals people. When He encounters people He heals people not to prove that He is God, but because He was God, He is God. What I find fascinating is that He didn't just talk and teach. He showed His power through charisms and wanted to give the power to His disciples.
 
What I find marvelous is that St John doesn't say that we have to be a reproduction, a copy, a continuation of Jesus, but that we have to be Jesus completely in our souls, bodies and spirits, completely Jesus.
 
Between the 1st and 4th century the Church preached, evangelised and practiced the gift of healing, as a normal part of the church. Then in the 4th century the Stoic ideal of ideology came about and talked about the life that is about suffering, a lot a lot of suffering. That God was the mind for His people, and their reason. That God was at peace with the idea of suffering because Jesus suffered much physically. The idea was that people also suffered.
 
The suffering Jesus received was from the outside to the inside, and not suffering from the inside going outward. The suffering He endured came from the outside, came from persecution, misunderstanding and people not following Him.
 
What Jesus does not want is that we suffer from within. What does it mean to suffer from within? It is cancer, paralysis and epilepsy. He does not want us to suffer. What are the illnesses of the body that Jesus healed? Blindness, deafness, paralysis and He was called to heal.
 
But the suffering from outside to within, that's the suffering Jesus wants us to suffer, from outside to inside.
 
But the sufferings from inside to outside He condemns and He sent them to heal all these sufferings.
 
Before the 4th century there were no problems. Problems started to occur after the 4th century. So what happens after the 4th century is that our holy Catholic Church really focuses on going to preach throughout the world and then healing was not so important, not so emphasized. What was emphasized was Eucharist, Reconciliation and Confirmation and those things.
 
The healing gift appeared in the last century up till now, mainly with the Catholic Charismatic Renewal. Now it is natural for us to preach and then to pray for healing – it’s a natural thing.
 
But until the Catholic Charismatic renewal, the Catholic Church, let us say the truth clearly, I want to be helpful, so that all can see that they have the gift of healing.
 
This from Jesus in Mark 18:18 That those who believe in Me will lay their hands on the sick and heal them. Raise up your hand if you believe in Jesus. Consequently if you believe in Jesus you have the healing gift. Alleluia!
 
In John 14:12 Those who believe in Me will perform the same things I do and even greater ones. Jesus! Jesus! John 14:13 Those who believe in Me, ask whatever you want and you will receive it. John 14:14 Ask and the Father will give you whatever you want. Alleluia!
 
In the Gospel of John it says, 'If you believe in My name I will give you whatever you ask for', so you have to believe in My name.
 
Acts 4: 3 shows the disciples conscious of the necessity of the charisms to evangelise and it says they performed miracles and extraordinary signs in the name of Jesus. Alleluia!
 
Damian Stayne: Alleluia. Jesus is Alive. Jesus is Alive. Are you Christians in here or Muslims? Jesus is Alive (Response: Jesus is Alive).
 
We have been asked to speak about growing and moving in the charisms and I am going to share with you very quickly some Keys that we have found to growing in the supernatural. Because we have been so privileged by God's grace to see so many miracles; in healing, in prophetic miracles, in liberation miracles. So we just want to share these keys with you so you can take them away. OK?
 
First Key. Absolute Conviction. What Fr Dario has been speaking about. We have to pray to move beyond the idea that the charisms are an optional extra, like having a sunroof in your car or tinted windows. Charisms are as essential as the steering wheel and the accelerator. OK. There is no work of God, so spiritual work of God among the people of God that is not a charismatic act. Without the charisms, the mission of the Church is over.
 
If you want the mission of men – good luck to you.
If you want the mission of God, you must have the charisms.
So we must pray for a revelation of absolute conviction that the charisms are non-negotiable.
 
Second Key. Bigger Vision. Bigger vision. Say that back to me. Bigger vision. We are getting little because our vision is little. You see small vision gives us small prayers and small prayers give us small answers. If you have a big vision then you pray big prayers. When you pray big prayers you get big answers. Amen? (Clapping)
 
Third Key: Faith. How many of you believe that miracles are happening in God's Church today? Hands up if you believe in miracles, in miracles happening in God's Church today. Now keep your hand up if you are performing miracles regularly. Ohhhh. So what's going wrong? You have faith that miracles can happen and you wonder why they are not happening. People come to me and say, 'Damian, I believe miracles can happen today but when I pray with people I am not seeing any miracles. What's going wrong?'
 
I tell you, it's very simple. Believing that miracles can happen today is an assent of the mind only. An understanding only in the brain. But the faith that makes miracles is an empowering of the Spirit and we have to pray each of us that God will give us the faith that empowers the Spirit to miracles. In my opinion this is the one single biggest confusion about the power of God in the charismatic renewal in the world. We thought that if we knew it, we had it. But as the Catechism of the Catholic Church says, we must beg the Lord to increase our faith.
 
Feed your faith. If you want to grow in the charisms, feed your faith. If you want to grow in the charisms, you must feed your faith. Read books about miracles, watch videos about Christian miracle ministries, listen to testimonies. Get alongside people who are seeing more than you are. Because often the experience is that faith is caught. You catch it from being close to it.
 
You know, if I want to see more miracles in an area of my ministry, like if I wanted to see more blind people healed, then I read and read repeatedly stories about the blind being healed, until my mind is full of the vision of the blind being healed. Then I pray and I pray until my spirit agrees with my mind. And then when I tell the blind eyes to open, the blind eyes are opening.
 
The same with the deaf and the lame. The same with cancers and tumours. I have seen tumours the size of my fist disappearing in 5 minutes. And I saw a man with a tumour like this (coming out from the area between the ear and the shoulder and sizeable) and I said, 'God, we've got to see victory over that!'. So I started reading stories of saints and early pentecostals who saw huge tumours disappearing and then I prayed and I prayed for that. Since that time I've seen tumours the size of your head disappearing in 5 minutes.
 
At one of our services 51 people, 51 people after the word of command to cancers and tumours to vanish, their cancers or tumours shrank, shrank or disappeared completely. There is always, there is always more. If you are here (below the knee), pray to  be here (above the knee); if you are here (above the knee) pray to be here (hip); if you are here (hip) pray to be here (shoulder); if you are here (shoulder), pray to be here (head); if you are here (head), pray to be there (above your head).
 
Fourth Key. Prayer and Fasting. We've got to become more holy. It is nearly impossible to become holy unless you are praying deeply. You see, people will not fall in love with Jesus if they only see His hand. They must also see His face. They will fall in love with Him if they see His character revealed in us when they see His hand.
 
Fifth Key: Purity. St Paul says, if you want to be used as vessels of silver and gold in the house of God you must purify. If we want that, Paul says we must purify ourselves from the impurities of the world. Don’t expect the privileges of the kingdom if you are playing with sin in the film, the television, in the internet, in the kind of music you listen to. You cannot be friends with the world and expect the supernatural anointing of the New Testament.
 
Sixth Key: Family. If we don’t put first in our lives what God has put first in our lives our ministries will lead to misery. Our ministries will lead to misery. What is it that you evangelise the whole world and your children go to hell? Jesus says there are those who take what should have been given to their parents and offer it to God and call it korban, so that they do not have to give it to their families. Many of us charismatics, we have done that with our time, our energy and our affection. We ran away from the duties of love in our family because we wanted to have a big ministry. Let me tell you. You put your family first, God will put your ministry first. Since my children were tiny, I'm a very busy man. I have 2 children. I spent an hour playing with each of my children every day of their lives since they were 2 years old. Playing, loving, saying 'you first'. After Jesus, you are my first mission. So when I go away, my children bless me and send me. Now they are both radically on fire for Jesus and both of them are performing miracles. Actually they have been performing miracles since they were little children.
 
Seventh Key: Humility. What can I say about humility? Yes, we're not very good at it. OK. There is no way in to humility, except begging for it, and letting your good friends tell you your sins and thanking them when they do. You see, love demands that I beg for humility because if I do not beg for humility God can't trust me with the glory. The quickest way into the glory is through the door of humility.
 
Eighth Key: Love. Make love your aim and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts. We desire the spiritual gifts for one reason, because we are aiming for love. Because I want to love like Jesus loved. And I want to tell you that if I had the gift of miracles I would be so happy. I can tell you from experience, miracles don't make you happy, love makes you happy. I could heal everybody in this church, but if I don't love any of you what joy would it give me? So when you are pursuing the gifts, pursue them for love. God's word says this: Earnestly desire the spiritual gifts. And if God's word is saying 'Earnestly desire the spiritual gifts' it must be that God is earnestly desiring to pour them out. God has a bowl of gifts tipped to the brim in heaven, just waiting for your faith.
 
So we are going to see some of the gifts now. We have been seeing lots of people being healed by getting the congregation to proclaim Jesus is Alive. Even big healings. How many of you here have got something wrong with your body? Put your hand up. The power of the name of Jesus has overthrown the power of hell. If you would believe that Jesus can heal you now when we make this declaration many of you will be healed in this church in the next few minutes. Say Amen if you believe that. OK. I'm going to break you up into 4 groups, 1, 2, 3, 4. When I point to your group, you stand up and you declare with your arms stretched, with the top of your voice and all of your faith, 'Jesus is Alive'. OK. And as you do. As you do many of you are going to be healed. And we will ask you afterwards – 'Who has been healed?'
 
This is not a game. When you say the name of Jesus with faith, the power of the kingdom is detonated. Are you ready? (It begins…a holy competition of proclaiming Jesus...can you do better than this?).
 
Now those of you who have something wrong with your bodies, try and move it now. If you had healing in your body, wave your hands at me. (He stopped counting at 18, but there were more). Alleluia. Jesus is Alive!
 
Questions and Answers
 
Q. When you talked about family first, then you will do God's will for you, right? But at which level do you put family first when you decide what you will do for your whole life, when maybe family does not approve it, in terms of vocation?
 
DS: If you are obedient to God, this is the way to love your family. But each day I am called to radical love, and if I want to inherit the land, if you want to take back your countries, what is the promise? Those who honour their father and mother will take the land. If we love our families, this doesn't mean to disobey the radical call of Jesus. It is a matter of working out priorities of time and not running away from our duties to do something a little bit more exciting. So I could go away every weekend of every year but while I have small children I made the decision to only go away once a month. And this purchased the loyalty of my children to Jesus. And in our community every child who is old enough to join our community has chosen to join the community because the community's discipline about family gave them brilliant parents. Do you understand what I am saying? Did I answer your question?
 
Q. Yes, but you talked as a parent. You already chose to be a parent. But when you haven't yet made that decision, how does family fit in?
 
DS: In your situation you must discern your calling with Jesus. Even if you are called to be a hermit, you never turn your back on your parents. So there is no vocation that says my parents matter nothing to me. Even if you are called to be a missionary on the other side of the world. Do you understand? OK.
 
Q. What should I do if in my family or community, if criticism starts?
 
Fr D: We must talk about Christ, as the centre of our lives. We have to be witnesses of Jesus Christ.
 
Q. When we pray for the healing of the people, how can we distinguish the leading of the Spirit?
 
Fr D: I believe the answer is when Jesus Christ healed our blind. Jesus asked the blind, 'Can you see?' 'Yes, I can see, but it is not clear, like trees walking'. So like Jesus, I have to pray a bit more. If Jesus had to pray twice for the blind, maybe you and I have to pray more, maybe 20 times, maybe 200 times. Maybe Jesus is also testing them. Remember Jesus also said to the blind, go and wash in the pool of Siloam – then we can see that Jesus put a test to the people, to see the faith of the people. I believe that we cannot be worried if the healing is now, tomorrow or afterwards. The most important thing is to pray, and God will do what He thinks is right, today, tomorrow or afterwards.
 
Q. Christ will see what is inside us, but sometimes we can have inside what is coming from outside, eg from curse or witchcraft.
 
Fr D: My experience is that I believe that Christ wants us healed from inside to outside. These are all the physical disease. But there are also the spiritual illness that are hate, fear, remorse and (something that wasn't translated). Difficult to explain, The priest sees many illness caused by external means like witchcraft. That's why it is very important to make a diagnosis. To do a diagnosis like a doctor does. The doctor will ask you questions, date of birth, family medical history and other information, and finally he will give you an answer, a medication or specific recommendation. Is it physical or spiritual? Possible causes of it. There can be many obstacles inside us, and when we pray away the obstacles, the healing happens. God can do it in a greater way, here and now, physically cured. It is very common to cure physical illness, but there are many that we cannot see – because if you hate someone you cannot see it.
 
We don’t have time to give the testimony of many of you. But I would like to see who has a medical brace because you couldn't move without needing this brace. You are here. The woman came forward and showed how freely she was moving.
 
Jesus is Alive. Jesus is Alive. We need to sing that Jesus is Alive.
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​An edited 4 x A4 PDF version of these talks is given below:

From many sources there is a prophetic expectancy that God will move in great power very soon. But He cannot do that unless we do our part and go deeper in our prayer, our trust and our surrender to Him. This talk of Damian Stayne gives very practical ways of doing this essential preparation for co-operating in what God wants to do supernaturally in our world.

This is a transcription of the workshop held in Rome on 1 June 2017 with this topic as part of the celebrations for the 50th anniversary of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal #ccrgoldenjubilee2017
 
The speakers were Dominique Ferry and Fr Dave Pivonka, with translations in English and Spanish.
 
Dominique Ferry is a Catholic deacon and member of the Chemin Neuf Community. This link will give you more background information about him, but you will need to scroll a bit to find it.
 
Fr Dave Pivonka is a member of the Third Order Regular (TOR) Franciscans. He has served in ministry positions at Franciscan University Steubenville and is now on his Wild Goose Project.
 
This is the link for the video recording: https://youtu.be/kPVGz08xDnc

(A printer-friendly, edited version of this transcript is available at the end of this blog-post.) 
 
Dominique: Well I am happy to be with you this morning, and if you don't mind I will speak standing because I can see you all. I am not an expert on everything and every part of the world, so I will speak from what I know, and I am just sorry for those left aside. My experience in the past 14 years have been mostly with students and parish life in the western world. So that is the place I will speak from.
 
If we want to bring the Gospel to the world outside we have first to open our eyes and see what the world outside looks like. Most of our fellow human beings live in large urban city areas and very far from their relatives without a sense of belonging, of being lost in an anonymous environment and when the life becomes hard because of unemployment, divorce, or any hardship of life, illness, loss of dear ones, then there is very few people to support them and faith tends to be a very private thing. So you can live next to other Christians and not even know you are sharing the same faith.
 
And for the generation of the young adults, let's say 20 to 30, either they have not been raised in the Christian faith or they have been raised in Christian faith in their family but the story is almost always the same: when they leave their family and go to university then things begin to dwindle down and more or less they lose contact with the faith – and so most of them have never had a chance to develop a personal relationship with Jesus. And in their world nevertheless the parish remains the place where you can knock on the door and just light a candle because your grandmother is very sick or after several years of living together with your partner you want to have a child and you think it is safer to be married in church or they want to have their child baptised or they bring a dear one to their last place on earth – but facing that most of the parishes are still living still as they were 50 or 70 or 80 years ago. So they are dealing with people within the walls and they are not worried about the great, great number of those outside the Church.
 
And today we should be like Jesus who said, 'I came to bring fire on earth and how I wish it would be already burning', and most of us, we are not burnt inside with that same desire Jesus had to make the kingdom of God known. And now there is such an urgent need for people to see our countries as places and fields of evangelization.
 
An interesting experience is the origin of the Alpha course in the Anglican Church. Years ago in a parish in the centre of London called Holy Trinity, Brompton, the vicar of the parish Sandy Millar and a team of his parishioners decided to set up a course for the members of the parish; a discipleship course to help people to deepen their faith and understanding of their faith. But then came a new curate in the parish called Nicky Gumbel, and Nicky Gumbel had not been brought up in any faith at all, he was a non-believer and didn't know anything about Jesus Christ until he went to university at Cambridge University and because of an experience of a friend of his who became Christian. His first reaction was I will lose a friend because now he will become boring. Nevertheless, he wanted to keep some kind of friendship so he started reading the Gospel and through that he was touched by the Holy Spirit and became a Christian because he met Jesus alive. And since then, as a student first, he had the heart for those who were not church goers. So when he joined the team of Holy Trinity Brompton he found interesting the discipleship course but helped re-design the whole thing to help people who had never heard of Jesus Christ. His heart and mind were turned to those in the street, outside of our church buildings, those who were not 'in the pews' as we say. And then the whole thing was redesigned with a purpose of helping people to have a real personal experience of the Holy Spirit, Who is the great evangelizer – and this is the important part – this became the vision of the whole team of the parish.
 
So you can say that the parish was targeting people outside and that the Baptism of the Holy Spirit was at the heart of their mission statement.
 
Now another experience would be the one that we have in our community- the Chemin Neuf – with the young people, teenagers and young adults. Because in the same way the Question is how can we reach out to those people: all those young people that consider that God is an old fashioned thing? And so they knelt together and guidance from the Holy Spirit and the thing is – you have to keep going in your listening to the Spirit. Because in 1993 they founded something they called the Festival for Young People in France. And it was a success, but in 2003 things were going down and down and down. 10 years later the need was different. The young people were different. They were not ready to abide by the same rules as the ones 10 years before.
 
But the core of what has to be announced is the same. It is the kerygma, because the kerygma has a power in itself. Isaiah 55, 'My word does not come back to Me without having done the purpose for which I sent it'. And the kerygma is that powerful word that has the power to turn the heart of the people, to work the work of God which is that they recognise Jesus Christ as the Son of God and Saviour of the world. And after that to accompany the people, you have to offer the Baptism in the Holy Spirit.
 
For instance, last year at the World Youth Day there was a big gathering organized by the Community (I'm not making advertisement for the Community – but it is the one I know). And after a time of reconciliation where people can come before God as their Saviour, there was a call for those who wanted to give their life to the Lord, and in order to give their life – to receive His Holy Spirit, and more than 1000 young people moved forward to be prayed for at the same time. And they managed to pray one by one, because it is not a group thing, it is a personal commitment to Jesus and a personal encounter with the power of the Holy Spirit. And you could find many other examples in various denominations of the same kind of experience where a team is looking outside to bring the Gospel in the streets, but the need for these is for a new pentecostal experience.
 
And maybe the difference between 50 years ago is that 50 years ago people were personally renewed by the baptism in the Holy Spirit they had, they would come together and be able to journey together as prayer groups, communities and other places. Whereas today my feeling is that there is a need for a pentecostal experience of the whole community, in the parish, or in another place, because it is the whole community that has to change their mindset from maintenance mindset to an evangelising mindset.
 
If you look at the Acts of the Apostles, well there is the first Pentecost that we all know and that we will celebrate in a few days' time. But then when there were threats from outside and they were facing opposition from the outside world and started to be persecuted they came again together in prayer and they said to the Lord, Acts 4:29-31, 'So Lord look at their threats and grant to Your servants to speak with all boldness while You stretch Your hand to heal through the name of Your servant Jesus. When they had prayed the place where they had gathered together was shaken and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit.' They felt they needed a common infilling of the Spirit to get the new pentecostal experience. So it is that Jesus' mission was overflowing from His loving Heart for the lost and the sinners. As we are His ambassadors, His envoys, we need of course to remain personally grafted to Jesus, but we have to share His Heart for the lost sheep. This is not only a personal conversion but a conversion of the community together; and that has to be of one heart and one soul as the Acts of the Apostles says.
 
And at the end of the day it is what we have seen and heard that we declare to others so that they may have fellowship with us. Thank you.
 
Fr Dave: Good morning. When we began we prayed for Dominique and myself – which I appreciate, but I believe the most difficult job this morning is with Patricia (our interpreter). So we pray for her, too. Jesus pour Your Holy Spirit upon her, that You would fill her with Your anointing, give her Your peace, and allow her to use the gifts You have given her. Amen? Amen.
 
If you want to know what faith is: faith is me believing Patricia is saying what I am saying.
 
And as was mentioned, I am a preacher, so for me to do this from a talk written is very difficult, but we will try. Amen? Amen. Good.
 
I had an experience a number of years ago that surprised me. In the middle of a talk a woman jumped up, she interrupted me and she said, 'Why have I never heard this before? I've been a Catholic my whole life and I had never heard this before'. She became increasingly angry. What was I talking about that caused her to become angry? I was talking about how the Holy Spirit wanted to animate her life: how the Holy Spirit wanted to fill her: that the Holy Spirit wanted to come in power: that the Holy Spirit wanted to heal her: that the Spirit of Jesus wanted to breathe life into her. She said to me, 'I have never heard this before. Why has no one ever said this before? And she is not alone. There are a tremendous number of Catholics who do not understand what it is to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
 
The first reading just a few days ago said, 'I had never heard of the Holy Spirit'. This is very sad for many reasons. But the main reason is that men and women are being invited to be disciples of Jesus Christ.
 
Often times Catholics hear us priests to tell them to love, to be patient, to be kind, to be forgiving. We invite them to share the Gospel. We invite them to live a life of purity, to follow the teachings of the Church, and for many of them they try to do that, and then they fail. So they make a decision, 'I am going to try harder'. And they try very hard, and then they fail. And this cycle happens time and time again. And it becomes a burden. What they hear from the pulpit, from the Church, becomes a burden for them. They don't feel they can live this life. They want to live a life of faith, but they fail. They get frustrated, they get angry, they despair, and they walk away. They try to live a dynamic faith, they try to live a life of faith, but it is impossible. There is the problem. We are asking them to do something, but we are not equipping them to do it.
 
I believe it is one of the reasons the new evangelization has perhaps not been as successful as we had hoped. Many people decided to follow a programme of evangelization, thinking that a programme would change a person's heart. Programmes do not change people's hearts. But the only thing that can change a person's heart is Christ. There must be something more than a programme. The individual must encounter Jesus. They must encounter Jesus and be filled with the Holy Spirit.
 
I am reminded what Pope Francis stated in his document Evangelii Gaudium 7,8. 'I never tire of repeating the words of Pope Benedict which takes us to the very heart of the Gospel. 'Being a Christian is not the result of an ethical choice, or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, with a person which gives a new horizon and a decisive direction.' Thanks solely to an encounter or a renewed encounter with God's love.' No doubt that this encounter is key to the new evangelisation. I have loved how Pope Francis continually speaks about this encounter. If St John Paul II spoke of a civilization of love, Pope Francis is speaking of a culture of encounter. As Dominique was saying, our parishes and our communities must create a culture where the possibility exists to encounter Jesus – in everything we do, everything. Amen? Amen.
 
The responsibility to facilitate/help with this encounter is not just my job as the priest. It is for all Catholics. This is a part of the new evangelization. No longer can we say, 'Father is going to do that' or 'Sister will do that', but you must do that. Amen? Amen.
 
There is only one of me, and only one of Patricia, but there are many of you – so the job is yours. So I am going to take a vacation for the next year, and you work. Amen? Amen.
 
Again, reminding us of the new evangelization; that this proclamation of the Gospel, the sharing of the Gospel, is for the people that you are in Church with. It is not merely for some foreign country, but for the people around you: the people who work in the office next to you. It is the proclamation of the kerygma which draws people into a relationship with Jesus, into a relationship with the Church, and into a life of holiness. It is not merely obedience. It is not merely obeying, but that is a part of it.
 
Understanding what this evangelization is causes me to reflect that perhaps that we should have spoken of the new Pentecost before the new evangelization. It causes me to think of the disciples, who had every advantage. I am going to ask you a question, and it is a very simple question. Who taught the disciples how to pray? Jesus. Who taught them how to forgive? Jesus. Who taught them how to heal? Jesus. They had every advantage. They spent time with Jesus. They saw everything that Jesus did, and yet it was not enough. That they needed more than an encounter with Jesus – they needed the Holy Spirit. The disciples were not able to evangelise until they had experienced Pentecost. I believe that we will not be able to evangelise until we experience Pentecost. Amen? Amen.
 
I mentioned at the beginning of my talk. I spoke of the woman who was so frustrated that she had never heard about the Holy Spirit or the transforming grace of the Holy Spirit. It is imperative that we share the message of the Holy Spirit. St John reminds us that it is the Spirit Who gives witness to Jesus. Pope Paul VI stated that it is the Holy Spirit Who is The Evangeliser. It is impossible to evangelise without the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen? Amen.
 
My father is a physician. If my father knew what was causing somebody's illness, and he did not give them a prescription he would be sued for malpractice. My fear is that we are doing the same thing in the Church. We know what the problem is: the people of God do not have power, and the prescription is the Holy Spirit. Amen? Amen.
 
To try to evangelise without the grace of the Holy Spirit is setting the Church up for failure. When the Holy Spirit is present in our evangelization we will see marks such as they will be filled with the love of God. Pope Francis has spoken about the connection between the love of God and the Holy Spirit. Pope Francis says, (Homily 9 Jan 2015) 'You can follow a 1000 catechism courses, 1000 spirituality courses, 1000 yoga or zen courses, and all of these, but none of this will be able to give you the freedom as a child of God. Only the Holy Spirit can prompt your heart to say 'Father'.' Only the Holy Spirit can open your heart to love. So Amen? Amen.
 
So people who have experienced the Holy Spirit should also experience the love of God. And then they begin to share that love with other people. Romans 5:5 It says, 'the love of God is poured into our heart by the Holy Spirit'. Amen. But only the Holy Spirit can do that.
 
Another mark of someone who received the Holy Spirit, they give witness to Jesus. John 15:26 Jesus says He will send His Holy Spirit and His Spirit will give witness to Him. So the more we receive the Holy Spirit, we are compelled, we are forced, to give witness to Jesus.
 
When they experienced the Holy Spirit they become aware that we are children of God. Romans 8:15 says that the Spirit makes us cry out Abba Father. The Holy Spirit causes us to cry out Abba Father. So the Holy Spirit comes upon us, and we cry out 'Abba'. So when we experience the Holy Spirit we give witness to Jesus, we cry out 'Abba Father', the Spirit brings us into the Trinity, that we understand that we have a relationship with the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and in that we have relationship with God. We begin to discover what it is to have a relationship with Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen? Amen.
 
The Holy Spirit also convicts us of our sin. We live in a world that does not believe there is sin. Now it is important to understand that it is the Spirit that convicts us of our sin. The purpose of the Holy Spirit convicting us of our sin is in order to convert us, not to condemn us. The evil one wants to condemn us. The evil one  wants to show us our sin so that we think we are horrible. We see our sin and the evil one tells us 'God will never forgive you', 'God does not love you anymore', ''He will not forgive you this time', 'Too many times you have committed this sin. That is the evil one. But the Spirit convicts us of our sin, and the Spirit tells us, 'You have a Father who loves you', 'That Jesus has looked for you', 'That He will always forgive you'. The Holy Spirit convicts us of our sin, and yet we live in a culture that does not want to talk about sin. The Spirit wants to show us our sin so that we might be purified, so that we might be converted. Amen? Amen.
 
We are just going to jump ahead a little bit.
 
What are some barriers or stumbling blocks to allow us to experience the Holy Spirit? Fear. Fear is the enemy of the Holy Spirit. Do not be afraid to share the grace of the Holy Spirit. The grace of the Holy Spirit is essential to the work of the kingdom. Stand in the power of the Holy Spirit, boldly proclaim the power of the Holy Spirit. Ignorance of the Holy Spirit. We must become familiar with the Holy Spirit. I have a relationship with the Father, a relationship with the Son and we must have a relationship with the Holy Spirit. It is important to understand that God does not ration His Holy Spirit. It is not just a little bit of the Holy Spirit, just a little bit. He does not ration his Holy Spirit. There is always more of His Holy Spirit, much more of His Holy Spirit, and we need to stand under the grace of the Holy Spirit, stand under the Holy Spirit and ask for more.
 
The other, is the Holy Spirit does not show partiality. But He uses the entire Body more and more in my ministry. I invite the people to pray with one another and I ask them to pray for the baptism in the Holy Spirit. It is not just me as a priest, but it is the body of Christ. And I think too often we look to me, or to the bishop or to somebody else, but the grace of the Holy Spirit is in you. It is in the body. The Scripture tells us that God does not show partiality. He doesn't love me more than you. He wants to give you the Holy Spirit, He wants to give the Holy Spirit to them and to me.
 
So a couple of weeks ago I received an email from a parish I had been working in and he said to me, 'Our community continues to be blessed by the Holy Spirit. We have continued to have people experience healings that are miracles; people are free from past sin and addictions; there is a deep desire for holiness and the things of God!' Amen? Amen.
 
That's because the people of God prayed with one another and they experienced the Lord. I have seen the movement of God's grace. The Spirit of God is touching people's hearts and their lives. It looks different than it did 50 years ago. I think sometimes we expect God to do what He did 50 years ago and God is doing something new. God is doing something new. When Pope Francis spoke at Olympic Stadium (2014) he said 'Do not try to tame the Holy Spirit, but let the Holy Spirit be free'. I think that's what we as a community must do. We must let the Holy Spirit be free. We should not control the Holy Spirit, we should not tame the Holy Spirit, we should let the Holy Spirit control me, and the Holy Spirit tame me, and with that, the grace of that, the fruit of that will be a new evangelisation that will change the world. Amen? Amen.
 
A time of Questions and Answers followed:
 
Q. We have lots of difficulties to be able to live the experience of the Holy Spirit in the church itself. The priests themselves have not lived that experience and we do not know how to transmit/convey them this new life, so that the whole community can be able to live what you are talking about. Can you give us any ideas?
 
Fr Dave: The first answer is to pray for your priest. Be willing to serve him and the community. Sometimes we approach the priest with our agenda, and we need to be able to ask the priest, 'What can we do for you?' Be a witness of the kingdom of God in your life that other people in the parish community are seeing you change and that is encouraging other people to convert. Oftentimes when the priest begins to see a person who is willing to serve, to help in areas that need help, perhaps they become more open. I would love to say there is an easy answer that says if you do this your pastor will do what you would like, but that is not always the case. So for this, Jesus said prayer and fasting.
 
Q. My name is Jose…and I am a priest, because I came to know the Renewal. You have spoken about the new evangelization. Pope Francis has spoken about the new evangelization. In a Church where everything is done with the Holy Spirit it seems that the Holy Spirit is in a little box, where we don't let it free. Those of us who believe in Him and who want to transmit it – even our fellow priests and fellow other Christians are just pushing us aside. How to be able to continue to be working in that area? How to not get discouraged? How can we do that?
 
Fr Dave: Part of this, is that we need to be able to present the Holy Spirit in a manner that is more inviting. You stated that we put the Holy Spirit in a box. Recently I have been speaking of the Holy Spirit as a wild goose. That was the term that the ancient Celts used for the Holy Spirit. But why I like that image is that the Holy Spirit cannot be tamed. But we try to tame it because it makes us nervous, particularly priests, it makes us nervous because a priest wants to make sure that everything in his parish is controlled, and that becomes very difficult. So I think one of the things we need to do, is to try to present the Holy Spirit in a language and in an experience that can speak to the people today. Dominque Ferry mentioned very beautifully that young people today are different from those of 15 years ago. So it is incumbent on us to be able to pray and say, 'Lord, what do You want to say today?' and respond to that. And finally, if our peace is dependent on success we will always be frustrated. My hope is in Jesus, and Jesus alone, and hope does not disappoint.
 
Dominique: If I may add something. Is that the ground for everything to happen is a real sense of community which means brotherhood, where the priest and the parishioners are not the priest and the parishioners; they are brothers and sisters in Christ, and they are able to share their problems together, to pray for one another, because then, there is the one thing everyone wants, is love – and it is very good to be loved by God, it is essential, but it is quite nice to be loved by your fellow Christians and to find support in them and that is something people are well eager to receive.
 
Q. It is a great gift to be here. We spoke of freeing the Holy Spirit from a cage. Many young women feel that they are in a cage within the Church, and feel that their gifts as women are not affirmed, but they have a great love for the Church. How do we open this cage so that they can fly free?
 
Dominique: Give it a try and see of the fire is just spreading around. How do you open the cage? Give it a try and just see if the fire is just getting out and then let it burn and blow on it. Let the fire burn and blow on it.
 
Fr Dave: 2 Cor 3:17 'Where the Spirit of God is, there is freedom'. So to the degree that we encounter and experience the Spirit of God more, we personally experience freedom. Even in the midst of oppression we experience freedom. So freedom ultimately comes from the Spirit of God, not from outside and external things. But that's the other reason why I always speak about the Holy Spirit shows no partiality; that the Holy Spirit does not look at male or female as far as ministry is concerned, and anointing is concerned, obviously male and female we have different roles. So when I work with my staff, from a leadership position, with every conference we do, we ask how are we empowering women? How are we putting women in front, particularly young women. In the United States we have quite a few older women who have been involved for a long time, but not very many young women. And the other is for me as a leader, to ask young women and young men, Hispanics and Latinos 'What is God saying?' 'What is God saying?' But I believe that they can hear the Lord in a way that I am not able to. Amen.
 
Q. If someone comes to me and wants to receive the Holy Spirit and be baptised in the Holy Spirit for the first time, is there a particular prayer or way that you would pray for them to receive the Holy Spirit?
 
Dominique: Well the first thing is to be sure that the person understands that receiving the Holy Spirit means to hand over the direction of his whole life to God. Well now if the person is really knowing that what it means, well there is one easy prayer, 'Come Holy Spirit'.
 
Fr Dave: Very similar. First thing I would walk them through a prayer of commitment to Jesus, very quickly a time of repentance, a surrender like Dominique said and then 'Come Holy Spirit'. I have a small rosary, I say 'Come Holy Spirit' many, many times a day. It is that simple. Can we pray?
 
Let us stand. Come Holy Spirit. Come Holy Spirit.
Lord Jesus, Lord Jesus we come before You this morning and ask that You would fill us with Your Holy Spirit. Breathe life into our dry bones. Come with Your fire and Your power that we might proclaim to the nations that Jesus Christ is Lord. May Almighty God bless you, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
​
And I want to thank the interpreters very much.
 
Dominque: And as I am a deacon, I have the last word. Go in the peace of Christ.
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Here is the printer-friendly edited version...6 x A4 pages:

Please think for a moment of someone who would finding reading this to be the encouragement and inspiration they need, and share it with them.

Mary, Mother of Jesus, Mother of the new evangelisation and spouse of the Holy Spirit, pray for us. Amen. 

Some of you may recall that I took the plunge last year and began an Instagram account so that I could follow our young people through their World Youth Day Krakow adventures. This was in addition to our family Facebook and Twitter accounts. Since then there has been the Proclaim 2016 conference, the Ignite Youth Conference, the Servants of Jesus annual Share the Holy Spirit conference, Disciples of Jesus Summer Schools of Evangelisation in various Australian locations the biannual Light to the Nations conference over the Easter Triduum and the big gathering in Rome for Pentecost and #ccrgoldenjubilee2017.
 
At the Proclaim 2016 conference at Chatswood in early September 2016 (#proclaim2016), there was a spread of social media savvy types in attendance who did a reasonable job collectively of live tweeting memorable parts of the conference content and using the hashtag to enable them to be easily found. The benefits being 1) that those who attended and tweeted have the possibility of connecting with each other post-conference 2) bite sized reminders of the conference content became available to read later on and get re-energised by, and 3) those who were unable to attend the conference were able to take part in it and follow it through the social media postings – thereby multiplying the numbers of those who heard those messages well beyond the number of people the auditorium could hold.
 
Go to any writers (#CYA2016 early July 2016) or business conference (#SCBWISyd) and they will do an even better job of utilizing the multiplication effect of social media. However, it does pay to have a unique hashtag that no one else is likely to use – otherwise it all gets buried under later events that use the same hashtag.
 
Hashtags are your great helper in sharing good content, and in allowing others to find it. However, to be effective the hashtag for each event needs to be unique. #aussiepilgrim was not unique for World Youth Day because lots of other non-WYD travelers abroad used it. #sse17pat was more successful as a hashtag than #sse17 because any three letter acronym can have multiple meanings, for example #ccr can refer to both the pop group Creedence Clearwater Revival and to the Catholic Charismatic Renewal. #sse can refer to the business event called the Sweets and Snacks Expo and not just Summer School of Evangelisation.

Hashtags are powerful because search engines can find them across all the major social media websites.
 
Find a hashtag for your event that is no more than 12 characters long, and make sure it is unique. Test the uniqueness by plugging your hashtag options into a search engine like Google.
 
Print that hashtag on all your printed matter for your event, and in an easy to find place on your event's website. Flash it up on the sight screens for your event 2 or 3 times a day.
 
I've been at play in the social media world for a while now: Xt3 since 2008; Blogging since late 2011; Facebook since the beginning of 2013; LinkedIn since 2014; Twitter since mid-2015 and Instagram since mid-2016. So I have seen the power of social media at work to disseminate information, and know that it can be used for great good. That's why I get so utterly frustrated when I see it being used poorly.
 
In the last 12 months I have been paying particular attention to how big evangelistic events in the Catholic world are reported on social media. The report card says, 'Can do much better' and the surprising thing is that it is our young people - and those who lead them – who are the worst at it. Only those in diocesan curia's tasked with capturing and sharing episcopal photo opportunities seem to have a clue, and writers who have (or who hope to have) religious books published.
 
For example the World Youth Day Krakow 2016 report card goes something like this: Lots of happy pilgrim photos, lots of photos of beautiful pilgrimage sites and extraordinary churches, plenty of photos of WYD events but….poor hashtag co-ordination and if you were following a young person's pilgrimage and hoping for a snippet of teaching from one of the catechesis sessions, from one of the pilgrimage homilies or one of the Pope's speeches you were doomed to disappointment.
 
It was similar when I tried to follow the Ignite Youth conference in Brisbane. A single mention of something Sr Hilda OSB said in a workshop was the sum total of actual teaching content shared.
 
DOJ Summer Schools of Evangelisation at Bathurst and Paterson, and the SOJ Share the Holy Spirit conference were no different. There were lots of photos of happy people, but nothing at all about the teaching given.
 
Light to the Nations is a biannual event over the Easter Triduum that attracted over 1000 people this year. Again there were lots of photos of happy people and live action Stations of the Cross and candle lit Easter Vigil, but as to the teaching given? The homily on Holy Thursday night mentioned something about keeping in tune with the beat of Jesus. That is all I was able to glean - and I searched and searched.
 
The big weekend held for the 50th anniversary of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal was sadly no exception. A few photographs, and enormous difficulty locating a hashtag that people were using for it. Like WYD Krakow it was a mishmash of hashtags, and no real content. Thankfully the talks were livestreamed and I was able to watch them afterwards. I wanted to go back and transcribe them, but they were taken offline and now you have to pay to get access to them https://something-like-real-pictures.myshopify.com/ The talks were truly excellent.
 
Many of my friends were lucky enough to go to Rome for Pentecost and the preceding 3 days of conferencing and workshops, preceded by a retreat in Assisi. Several of them have had social media presences for many years, but did I find anything in their posts about what they learned or what inspired them? Nooooo! Aargh!! The most that was posted was that such and such a talk was very good, or how our souls should be like the magnificent churches in Rome as dwelling places for Jesus. It wasn't only them either, it is a global problem. Thankfully many of those talks and workshops were recorded and are available online http://www.vocepiu.it/GoldenJubilee/ Thankfully Zenit Francais tweeted some of the content from the Pentecost Vigil and Google translate did its best, but sadly they were the only ones doing it. The recording given in the Pentecost Vigil link above didn't come with any English translation voiceovers.
 
What a lot of wasted effort!
A) Because for the want of a few extra words the impact of your social media posts could have been so much greater and B) Think of the time and effort that went into preparing the talk you heard. If it was good it deserved to be shared among a wider audience than just those who heard it at the venue.
 
What a lot of very easy opportunities to share the good news of Jesus with social networks missed!
 
We often say that a picture is worth a 1000 words. That's true if you are trying to describe a scene, but many pictures lack value unless they are put in context with a few explanatory words about Who, What, When, Where and especially Why.
 
There may have been better content posted, but I wasn't able to find it because a relevant hashtag wasn't attached to it.
 
Let's look at some biblical principles
 
1 Cor 11:23 For this is what I received from the Lord, and in turn passed on to you.
 
The privilege of being at these amazing events of faith is not for ourselves alone, we need to pass the good stuff on to others. Social media is a non-threatening way of doing just that.
 
And it is so easy to do!
 
Eph 3:29b-30a Let your words be for the improvement of others, as occasion offers, and do good to your listeners, otherwise you will only be grieving the Holy Spirit of God.
 
Add some words and a hashtag to your images, words that will help you reconnect with that moment later on and words that will help your readers and viewers connect with it too.

For example, an early morning photo of the campsite says something on its own about beauty. But if you added words like, 'I woke up tired after the long Holy Thursday night session last night, but this early morning sunshine lifted my spirits. I feel it's a gift of God to me. It is like He is preparing me for the day, just like last night He prepared His disciples for the unfathomable gift of the Eucharist by washing their feet #LTTN17' it becomes something much more.
 
For the love of God don't post, 'My friend XX gave a particularly anointed talk today' and then not share some of what your friend said. It only needs to be a sentence or two. For example Damian Stayne's talk in Rome was so good it needs to be shared widely. One of the things he said was, 'The charisms are not an optional extra like the sunroof on a car, they are essential, as essential as the steering wheel.' The former is frustrating to anyone who comes across it, the latter is something worth pondering on and may even intrigue people enough to watch the video recording.
 
1 Sam 3:19 Samuel grew up and the Lord God was with him and let no word of His fall to the ground.
 
Get into the practice of taking a photo at each session you attend – usually as it begins is best - then spend a minute or two when the session ends recalling the part of it that meant the most to you. Write it down. If you have time, post it then, otherwise post it later when you can. We forget so much of what happened in a session like that, even 24 hours later most of it has faded. If you capture even a sentence that spoke to you from each session, collectively they will help you discern what God's message was to you from the whole event.
 
Even better if you are the MC for an event, or the person giving the verbal thanks after a talk, or the person giving the talk, help people to do it. It isn't difficult. Just say, 'Before we go off to morning tea (or the next session) let us pause for a moment. If anything struck you from this talk, write it down now. A single sentence summary of what you heard God say to you though it would be ideal. Or a single sentence summary of what you think is worth remembering from it. Let's do that now….Good. Our speaker is happy for you to take a photograph. If you are on social media, share what you want to remember using the hashtag (and remind them what the hashtag for your event is).
 
Sharing even one of those thoughts on social media could help someone else enormously.
 
For an event, I'm likely to pick the best one-liner of the day and Tweet that when I get home. After each talk I'm likely to do a quick summary on Instagram. If it is very good, I will take the time to write out my notes in full and share them in a blog-post. Then if the content warrants it, the blog-post gets shared via Facebook and/or Twitter. Using the event hashtag on all of them, of course.
 
Do what works for you, but do something to share the good teaching you have received.
 
The days of people who believe in Jesus not being on social media need to be over. Realise that more and more people are thinking that if you can’t find something on the internet or on social media, then it didn't happen.
 
Facebook is the best social media site for connecting with people in your own locality. Parishes and youth groups, and those seeking to run Alpha courses and RCIA courses, you need to understand this and use it for good. It is possible, if you pay a small fee, to get posts targeted to postcodes.
 
Twitter is where the thinkers are. Twitter is where you can easily share links to good blog-posts or newspaper articles, and where you can find the good stuff too. There are a lot of good and holy people producing excellent content that doesn't get the readership it deserves because too few believers are online, reading and liking and retweeting.
 
If you want to be able to find a particularly good bit of content later on, for Facebook share it, and for Twitter re-tweet it. That content will then show up on your profile page for whichever social media site you used.
 
Instagram is where the youngsters are. If you want to connect with them, you need to be using it. Instagram is where the creatives are. Mobile devices are what Instagram works with. Instagram access via computer has much less functionality. It is much harder to share a link on Instagram, but then you aren't restricted to 140 characters and can write as much or as little as you wish.
 
Remember your likes, comments, shares and retweets matter. The more a social media post gets, the wider it gets shared and the more likely it is via the various algorithms to hit your inbox and the inbox of your friends. Those who posted them need the encouragement, too. Even if you share a social media post, only a fraction of your friends will see it pop up in their social media feed. However if both you and a friend share the same post, a higher number of both your friends will see it. The increase is lesser for likes, but they still make a difference, and comments are somewhere in the middle.
 
Trolls. Yes, they exist. Don't be one. Don't feed them attention. They roam around the online sphere looking for something they disagree with and then let it rip. The better your content is, the more likely it is to help someone towards conversion to Jesus, the more likely the first comment will be from a member of the trolls. Reading 'One Body, Many Blogs' will help.
 
But if you are called to be a social media apostle, then you really should be blogging. Of all the social media options, the work you do on a blog is the most long lasting, posts on Facebook and Twitter will eventually get buried by new content, and that happens even faster with Instagram and SnapChat.
 
If this sounds like you (and heaven knows we need social media apostles and many more of them), view this interview with Brendan Vogt on The Journey Home program back in 2011. Get a vision for it from him.
 
Hint: If you don't leave home without a notebook and pen, and always take notes when listening to a talk, then you should definitely consider a ministry in social media. It doesn't have to be much of a commitment, just a regular one; like 30 mins once a week reading and liking and sharing, and 30 mins once a week writing and posting about something that matters to both you and God.
 
If you are a grandparent and you believe that Jesus is the Son of God, then you most definitely need to be on social media in order to connect with your grandchildren and to provide some occasional online reminders that God is real and active in people's lives. You don't have to be on all the social media sites, just the one your grandchildren use the most.
 
For those who have waded through all my rants and pleas, a reward is in order.
 
Towards the end of the Pentecost Vigil at the Circus Maximus in Rome, gathered together with the Pope and some 30-50,000 others, Patti Mansfield one of the two earthly protagonists of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal was inspired to give a prophetic word. It is about 15 minutes from the end of the video recording, just after everyone say, 'Spirit of the living God, fall afresh on me'.
 
'Lift up your eyes and see that the fields are white for harvest and if you would obey Me and if you would obey the prompting of My Spirit you will yet see infinitely more than you can ask or imagine you will yet see power of my Spirit descend upon the human race. I tell you the fields are white for harvest but I need your obedience, I need your docility and I need your faith and you will yet see marvels that will astound you infinitely more than you can ask or imagine for the glory of My name.'
 
Everyone needs to hear this, and act on it…but I am still waiting for those who actually were there to share this prophetic word and mention in online. We have a duty to share the good stuff. Please join me in doing it.

Our Lady, Queen of the Apostles, pray for us.
St Paul, Apostle to the Gentiles, pray for us.
St Maximillian Kolbe, Media Apostle, pray for us.  
 

Workshop 5G – Who do you say I am? Parishes proclaiming Jesus Christ: Opportunities and Challenges.

This workshop was led by Shane Dwyer, the new director for the National Centre for Evangelisation. 
https://www.facebook.com/evangeliseaustralia/

Shane has lots of theological, teaching and public speaking credentials, but he is difficult to locate on social media.

He provided a booklet containing the source material for the content of this workshop to participants, but it didn't make it onto the resource list at the Proclaim Conference website.

NB. These notes are rough, they do not contain everything said, and will lack his particular emphases and probably mismatch some of his thoughts.

Shane started with a quotation from Archbishop Christopher Prowse, 'We are all called to go out to all people with all of the Gospel message all of the time.' That is our mission!

The degree to which our parishes are beacons of light, peace, joy, mutual support and integrity is the degree to which they are places to which those responding to the invitation to walk with Christ can find the formation and support they need.

The call to evangelise is not meant to be a problem. It is meant to be an invitation.

We are not called to wait for a parish priest to tap us on the shoulder, and think that we can ignore serving the body of Christ until that happens. We are not living in an easy time, but there have been terribly tough times for the Church before during her 2000 year history. Those truly rough patches testify that is it the Holy Spirit who has kept the Church going – and that it is not a human work. Miraculously God keeps bringing something to be, and that is the cause of our hope.

Our families may be a bit shabby at times, especially when we have a black sheep, but we still love each member in their imperfectness. In ministry we often get to hear about people's disappointments. But if we think about how wonderful and beautiful the gift of faith is, and focus on that, then those difficulties get put into perspective and it becomes easier to cope with family members not on the full path.

Before having time with members of our extended family it is worth doing some preparation. What would be the best approach to speaking about Jesus with each relative? If there was a positive response, where would I recommend they go? Would their local parish be wonderfully welcoming and well equipped to help someone come back to the faith or into a deeper relationship with Jesus? What could you invite them to that would be beneficial to where they are at right now?

Our parishes and homes are called to be oases of mercy.

Our vocation can only find meaning in the context of the real world in which we live. A high school student once asked, 'How is the Catholic Church not a cult?' The answer is that we look to our leaders and teaching for truth, but we each decide how to live it. We are free sons and daughters of God, each with our own vocation, each called to take responsibility for how the truth we have received is incarnated in our daily lives.

For this reason we can say that our vocation as baptised Catholics breathes with two lungs: personal holiness (relationship with God) and mission. We need both. If either is missing we are ineffective. Mission without holiness makes us become a real nuisance. Holiness without mission, means that we are not sharing the gift we have received for others.

Sometimes it is easier to be told what to do. But each of us will be called to account to God for how we have lived our life. We each have to respond to His call. There are no back seat passengers in our faith. None.

'Simply reverence the Lord Christ in your hearts, and always have your answer ready for people who ask you the reason for the hope that you all have.' 1 Peter 3:15

It doesn't have to be rocket science. We get overwhelmed and give up. Don't start with the end point, start with this advice from St Peter, and the rest will follow.

The Church exists for one reason only – to reveal Jesus Christ to the world. That we may participate in this mission, the teachings of the Church are directed towards the transformation of every aspect of our lives so we may become more like the One into whose life we have been baptised.

For example one of the teachings of the Church is the rule about attending Mass on Sundays and Holy Days of obligation. Many complain that this is their only day off, and can't be bothered doing something someone else wants them to do. That rule is a nuisance until I am called to proclaim Jesus wholly in my heart, and realise that I need Him fully, that I have a hunger for Him, and that I need to receive Him in my heart in order to be able to live out this mission and to accept all that He is offering me. It is only then that I realise that if I don't receive Him that my spiritual life will wither up and die. Now I understand why the rule is there, and I experience sadness for those who are no longer in the pews and did not persevere until this rule became alive for them.

We are called to become 'as Christ Jesus' Phil 2:5, that we may proclaim Him to the world. He who emptied Himself to became one of us. We are all called to this mission of the Church. Resting safe and secure as we focus inwardly on the trappings of our faith may help us to feel good and holy – but it is not the mission to which we are called.

Holiness is for us the laity, not just for the clergy and religious. We the laity are the vulnerable front line of the Church's mission to the world. We are to be in the world, witnessing to our faith and our personal relationship with Jesus Christ in everything we say and do. That front line is experienced at every water cooler moment when I have to decide whether to speak up or not.

At times we will come across leaders who have taken on false teaching, eg 'Don’t worry if you don’t get to Mass. Nobody believes that the Eucharist is the body of Christ any more'. Remember that they are good people who are confused, good people who have been misinformed. In these cases it is better to say, 'Let's talk about that' than to shout out, 'That's a heresy!!!'

When we want to start discussions, having a good quotation to kick things off with is very helpful. Pope Francis has been providing lots of good quotations. We can share a quotation and say, 'If this is true, then it means we need to do something about it. What could we do?' And we need to allow everyone to contribute to the discussion, not just those with the best English and the best egos.

Evangelii Gaudium 27. 'I dream of a “missionary option”, that is, a missionary impulse capable of transforming everything, so that the Church’s customs, ways of doing things, times and schedules, language and structures can be suitably channelled for the evangelization of today’s world rather than for her self-preservation. The renewal of structures demanded by pastoral conversion can only be understood in this light: as part of an effort to make them more mission-oriented, to make ordinary pastoral activity on every level more inclusive and open, to inspire in pastoral workers a constant desire to go forth and in this way to elicit a positive response from all those whom Jesus summons to friendship with him. As John Paul II once said to the Bishops of Oceania: “All renewal in the Church must have mission as its goal if it is not to fall prey to a kind of ecclesial introversion”.'

Evangelii Gaudium 49.' Let us go forth, then, let us go forth to offer everyone the life of Jesus Christ. Here I repeat for the entire Church what I have often said to the priests and laity of Buenos Aires: I prefer a Church which is bruised, hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets, rather than a Church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security. I do not want a Church concerned with being at the centre and then ends by being caught up in a web of obsessions and procedures. If something should rightly disturb us and trouble our consciences, it is the fact that so many of our brothers and sisters are living without the strength, light and consolation born of friendship with Jesus Christ, without a community of faith to support them, without meaning and a goal in life. More than by fear of going astray, my hope is that we will be moved by the fear of remaining shut up within structures which give us a false sense of security, within rules which make us harsh judges, within habits which make us feel safe, while at our door people are starving and Jesus does not tire of saying to us: “Give them something to eat” (Mk 6:37).'

Evangelii Gaudium 120b: 'Every Christian is a missionary to the extent that he or she has encountered the love of God in Christ Jesus: we no longer say that we are “disciples” and “missionaries”, but rather that we are always “missionary disciples”. If we are not convinced, let us look at those first disciples, who, immediately after encountering the gaze of Jesus, went forth to proclaim him joyfully: “We have found the Messiah!” (Jn 1:41). The Samaritan woman became a missionary immediately after speaking with Jesus and many Samaritans come to believe in Him “because of the woman’s testimony” (Jn 4:39). So too, Saint Paul, after his encounter with Jesus Christ, “immediately proclaimed Jesus” (Acts 9:20; cf. 22:6-21). So what are we waiting for?'

Evangelii Gaudium 127. 'Today, as the Church seeks to experience a profound missionary renewal, there is a kind of preaching which falls to each of us as a daily responsibility. It has to do with bringing the Gospel to the people we meet, whether they be our neighbours or complete strangers. This is the informal preaching which takes place in the middle of a conversation, something along the lines of what a missionary does when visiting a home. Being a disciple means being constantly ready to bring the love of Jesus to others, and this can happen unexpectedly and in any place: on the street, in a city square, during work, on a journey.'

Beginning in an encounter with the living Jesus Christ, Who fosters in us an attitude of conversion and the decision to follow Him, by our living in communion with Christ and being called by Him within the communion of the Church, a sense of ecclesial belonging is strengthened and generates life.

Conferences like these help us learn that we are not alone. We get enriched by different perspectives. Sometimes we will get it wrong, but if we are not alone, then we can work on solutions together. With God we can find unity in diversity. It is easy to love in theory, it is more tricky in practice.

Let us understand that the mission has a Church: not the Church has a mission.

God is already active in people's lives, even in the absence of the kerygma proclamation. If we can get people to reflect on their own life experience, and affirm them while seeking the right moment to say, 'This is how I make sense of …….. – with Jesus'. How to pick that moment, and not too soon, is the big question. Calling on the Holy Spirit will help. We remember that Jesus is always looking for His lost sheep. With that help we can see how to look upon each situation in a positive way, and to promise that you can have all this and more with Jesus in your life.

When speaking with those who have different belief systems from our own we can ask, 'Do you believe in a supreme being? It is the same One we acknowledge. Let's talk.' Points of contact and similarities are what we need to find, and it is an art to find and express them.

Talking to lapsed Catholics is more difficult. By comparison atheists and agnostics are much easier. It is tough talking with lapsed Catholics because they think they know all they need to know, they will be defensive, and will want to tell you what's wrong with everything and won't want to listen to anything that causes them to re-evaluate their position. The integrity of how you live the faith, your prayer for them, and your willingness to answer their questions, is all we can do.

As the saying goes: 'If you can find the perfect church, go and join it – but be aware that as soon as you join it, it will no longer be perfect.'

It takes prayerfulness, confidence and boldness to bring Jesus into a conversation, but it's worth it.
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My response

This workshop was additional reinforcement to the previous talks and workshops at the Conference. The consistency of the message, 'Evangelisation isn't as hard as you think, yes you can do it, no it isn't optional, it is essential, and here's some more ways you can do it' was rather amazing.

The real test, of course, is whether we are alert for the opportunities to talk about the impact Jesus has had in our lives, whether we use those opportunities, and whether we are actively on the lookout for more opportunities.

I am reminded of a holy parishioner from decades past. He was a retired journalist, and poet, with a deep love for the mother of Jesus and at daily Mass until his health began to fail. He had been hospitalised and I had gone to visit him. Thinking that this was just one more of his short hospital stays, I launched into local news. But he was wiser than that, and he stopped me and said that he needed to be still and to put all his attention on Jesus. As it turned out, he only had hours left to live. However, his lesson has stayed with me. The older we get, and the wiser we get, the only thing that matters is Jesus, the rest is distraction. So increasingly any homily that brings Jesus alive for me is a good one, and anything less is a wasted opportunity.
We have a mission, to bring Jesus to others, and we won't be pleasing to Him unless we do.
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May He help us fulfill that mission and purpose. Amen.
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The next issue will be the last in the series, with notes from the panel discussion session that closed off the conference.

Before the keynote address began, conference participants were introduced to the new National Director for the National Centre for Evangelisation, a new entity bringing together the former Catholic Enquiry Centre and the National Office for Evangelisation. Shane Dwyer was very surprised to be considered for this role. 'The task in front of us is daunting. What to do? How to do it? But I don't see that as a problem, rather as an invitation to be responded to. Everything will go right if we stay close to Him, and allow Him to lead us in this task of calling people to come close to Him. Part of this role will be supporting bishops in this ministry. Sadly we often don't support each other in ministry effectively. Yet we are all on the same side. None of us have all the answers, but we can still work towards them together.'

This final keynote address of the conference was given by Bishop Nicholas Hudson, auxiliary bishop of Westminster. You won't find him on social media, but a few YouTube clips of his speeches can be found online.

Bishop Hudson is the 4th of 5 boys, educated at Jesuit schools and studied history at Cambridge. He then studied in Rome and obtained a licentiate in Fundamental Theology. In 1986 he became chaplain to the L'Arche communities. In 2014 he was made auxiliary bishop of Westminster.

His keynote address was entitled, 'Oases of Mercy: Parishes which radiate Christ'.

NB. These notes are rough, they do not contain everything said, and will lack his particular emphases. The full text of his keynote is available at http://proclaimconference.com.au/doc/resources/281016/2016%20Proclaim%20KeynoteBishopHudson.pdf but might not be available online for longer than 2 years.

Good morning. Thanks for the warm welcome
Some parishes are truly Oases of Mercy. The parish of St Egidio in Rome is a good example. Some parishioners back in the 1980s started a prayer group, and over time felt a desire to assist the poor. They began with soup and offering shelter at night. Later on they worked out that the need for literacy and education was just as big as the need for food and shelter, and did something about that too. These days they are feeding around 200 people a day.

Pope Francis used this phrase first when he said 'Wherever there are Christians, everyone should find an oasis of mercy' : Misericordiae Vultus 12

St John XXIII spoke about a parish being like a village fountain to which all have recourse in their thirst.

In Evangelii Gaudium 28 Pope Francis said that a parish is 'a community of communities, a sanctuary where the thirsty come to drink in the midst of their journey, and a centre of constant missionary outreach.'

In Evangelii Gaudium 24 Pope Francis shared this vision of Church, and by extension of parish:
The Church which “goes forth” is a community of missionary disciples who take the first step, who are involved and supportive, who bear fruit and rejoice. An evangelizing community knows that the Lord has taken the initiative, He has loved us first (cf. 1 Jn 4:19), and therefore we can move forward, boldly take the initiative, go out to others, seek those who have fallen away, stand at the crossroads and welcome the outcast. Such a community has an endless desire to show mercy, the fruit of its own experience of the power of the Father’s infinite mercy.

Blessed John Henry Newman spoke about radiating Christ, and penned an inspiring prayer to explain it better:

Dear Jesus, help me to spread Your fragrance everywhere I go.
Flood my soul with Your spirit and life.
Penetrate and possess my whole being so utterly that all my life may only be a radiance of Yours.
Shine through me and be so in me that every soul I come in contact with may feel Your presence in my soul.
Let them look up and see no longer me but only Jesus!
Stay with me and then I shall begin to shine as You shine, so to shine as to be a light to others;
the light, O Jesus, will be all from You; none of it will be mine: it will be You shining on others through me.
Let me thus praise You in the way You love best: by shining on those around me.
Let me preach You without preaching, not by words, but by my example, by the catching force, the sympathetic influence of what I do, the evident fullness of the love my heart bears to You. Amen

The way to proclaim Christ in the 21st century is to make our parishes oases of mercy, radiating the face of Christ. When Pope Francis calls us to be missionary disciples, he wants us to be missionaries of mercy. This, in turn, calls for a new way of doing things, and each of us individually and collectively have to ask, 'What more must I do?'.

At the beginning of the millennium St John Paul II invited us to 'put out into the deep'. Now Pope Francis asks us to enter into a 'resolute process of discernment, purification and reform' EG30 in order to find 'new paths for the Church's journey in years to come' EG1.

The first step in this process is to celebrate what we already do that is having a positive evangelistic impact. Discover what you do well, and then ask what more the Lord may be calling us to do.

The next step is to review the evangelistic potential of what we do under 5 headings, Prayer, Caritas, Faith Formation, Marriage & Family Life, and Evangelistic Outreach.

For example, if Prayer is going well, how do you deepen it? How do you unlock its possibilities for evangelisation? What are the prayer needs of our young people? Does the parish have opportunities for genuine forms of popular religiosity, eg processions and rosaries?

'Genuine forms of popular religiosity are incarnate, since they are born of the incarnation of Christian faith in popular culture. For this reason they entail a personal relationship, not with vague spiritual energies or powers, but with God, with Christ, with Mary, with the saints. These devotions are fleshy, they have a face. They are capable of fostering relationships and not just enabling escapism.' EG90a

Under the heading of Caritas, we might be doing well with our care for the elderly and food for the hungry, but how are we doing in the area of inclusion of people with disabilities? You might like to look into setting up a monthly Faith and Light group: a mix of intellectually disabled people, their family and friends, parishioners and young people gathering together for friendship, sharing, prayer and celebration.

There is always a danger that we focus our Evangelistic Outreach inwards instead of looking outwards. While there is some evidence that people with Christian backgrounds are finding their way  to the Catholic Church, our track record with the unchurched is very poor.

Have you heard about Night Fever? The idea behind Night Fever is simple: open a city centre church at night, fill it with candle-light and prayerful live music, and invite passers-by inside.

(Ed. Read about what has happened with Night Fever at Chicago, Saskatoon, Blackpool and Dublin:
https://nightfeverchicago.org/
http://saskatoonrcdiocese.com/news/nightfever-offers-outreach-conversation-prayer
http://www.castleriggmanor.co.uk/faith-and-life-stories/2014/12/13/nightfever
http://irishcatholic.ie/article/nightfever%E2%80%99s-simple-invitation-reaps-huge-response )

We need to think about how to reach out to those who come nowhere near the church threshold. Do you have a Welcoming Group set up to greet those that do cross the threshold?

In your parish communities it is good to make 3 year plans for outreach, and to have a mission activity to focus on in the next 18 to 24 months.

Form evangelisation teams. Discernment about how to evangelize as a parish/team can happen before or after the team is formed. Having an evangelisation team is essential. Do not walk alone, walk together under the leadership and guidance of the bishops. Jesus did not walk alone, He had a team. Like His team, ours should ideally have 12 members.

Again, like Jesus, prayer is essential before choosing the members of the team, and once the team is chosen. You want people with solid prayer lives in the team. You also want the diversity of the parish reflected in its team members, across age, occupations, ethnicity etc. You want membership of this team to be their primary parish role, and not a secondary one.

The purpose of the team is to keep the parish mission-focussed, and to become the 'mission conscience' of the parish. It is their task to discern how to evangelise and how to resource those initiatives.

What exactly do we mean by evangelisation? Just like there is a multiplicity of ways of praying, there is a multiplicity of ways to evangelise. Evangelism is about communicating a relationship with Jesus in word and deed in such a way that people ask, 'Who is this Jesus you love and worship?'

Pope Francis reminds us that the spiritual and corporal works of mercy are the criteria upon which we will be judged. We will be judged on the basis of love, as St John of the Cross puts it.

The corporal works of mercy are:

To feed the hungry
To give drink to the thirsty
To clothe the naked
To shelter the homeless
To visit the sick
To ransom the captive
To bury the dead

We don't have to reinvent the wheel, look at some of the ways others are already doing them:

Mary's Meals https://www.marysmeals.org.uk/# feeding the hungry
Water Aid http://www.wateraid.org/au giving drink to the thirsty
Read http://www.clothingpoverty.com/ about the hidden world of fast fashion and second hand clothes.
St Mungo's http://www.mungos.org/ helps the homeless
Little Sisters of the Poor http://www.littlesistersofthepoor.org.au/ looking after the sick and dying
Prison Fellowship https://www.prisonfellowship.org/ assisting those in prison
Catholic Funeral and Cemetery Services http://cmsmission.org/solutions/cfcs/ burying the dead
(Ed. This last one is best guess, CFC were the initials I wrote down and the screens flashed quickly)

When considering the works of mercy, we are encouraged to look at them by Pope Francis in the context of the story of the Good Samaritan. Jesus told this story to answer the question, 'Who is my neighbour?' and through it we understand that our neighbour is not just someone in a far-off land; our neighbour is more often the person we meet close at hand and whom we find to be in need. The Latin word for mercy is Misericordia, having a heart (cor) for the poor (miseri). Mercy needs to be not only affective (touching our hearts), but effective (bringing real relief). In order to make our parishes oases of mercy, they must become places which have a heart for the poor.

A pathway for discernment could go like this:
Take one of the five headings for evangelistic initiatives eg Marriage & Family Life.
•Ask, what do we already do well in this area?
•What more could the Lord be calling us to do in the light of Evangelii Gaudium?
•Then prayerfully consider each of the works of mercy in the light of that initiative (eg Marriage & Family Life) and the light of Evangelii Gaudium and see what possibilities those considerations lead to.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has very good material on their website about the New Evangelisation http://www.usccb.org/beliefs-and-teachings/how-we-teach/new-evangelization/ . In particular there is a practical and feasible list of ways of suggestions for putting the Corporal Works of Mercy into practice http://www.usccb.org/beliefs-and-teachings/how-we-teach/new-evangelization/jubilee-of-mercy/the-corporal-works-of-mercy.cfm
These are the suggestions for Visiting the Sick:
•Give blood
•Spend time volunteering at a nursing home – Get creative and make use of your talents (e.g. sing, read, paint, call Bingo, etc.)!
•Take time on a Saturday to stop and visit with an elderly neighbour.
•Offer to assist caregivers of chronically sick family members on a one-time or periodic basis. Give caregivers time off from their caregiving responsibilities so they can rest, complete personal chores, or enjoy a relaxing break.
•Next time you make a meal that can be easily frozen, make a double batch and give it to a family in your parish who has a sick loved one.

Many of these suggestions are already being done by individuals and families in parishes. Have a think about how they could be organised better, to help more families and give a louder proclamation of mercy.

My father taught me about how acts of mercy are meant to be part of family life. He was a school teacher, working Monday to Friday and Saturday mornings. When he came home from work on a Saturday he would take me – and a hot shepherd's pie – in the car to visit old Mr Flood. His flat was so bare, but he would sit day in and day out at his window and smile and wave to us boys. That smile of his, I realise now, radiated Christ to us. We met Christ in Mr Flood. We always receive more than we give. I think what Pope Francis would say is 'Yes, that's what I am talking about. Do more of it.'

The L'Arche movement was founded by Jean Vanier. He spent 10 years in the Navy and then studied philosophy and later taught philosophy. He met a priest who invited him to befriend two men who lived at a local psychiatric hospital. Jean felt a deep call to share his life with these two men, and bought a little house and called it l'Arche (The Ark). He had no idea he was starting a movement; he began just by doing it. The best way to proclaim mercy, is to start doing it. The easiest way to evangelise, is to start doing it.

The vision of L’Arche is found in Luke's Gospel:
'Jesus said to His host: ‘When you give a lunch or a dinner, do not ask your friends, brothers, relations or rich neighbours, for fear they repay your courtesy by inviting you in return. No; when you have a party, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind; that they cannot pay you back means that you are fortunate, because repayment will be made to you when the virtuous rise again.'' (Luke 14, 12-14)

Soon after Jesus says, “Do this and you will be blessed.” Jesus doesn’t say they will be blessed. He says you will be blessed. Why? Because in the poor person, to whom you give a welcome, you welcome Jesus. When you reach out to the poor, you touch the wounded body of Christ. In assisting the poor you both meet and proclaim Christ.

But we need to also talk about our faith, and to add words to the mercy. Telling people who the Lord is for us is vital. When visiting Mr Flood we never talked about our faith, we never even said Grace with him. If we had, maybe it could have opened up a gentle conversation about God; either by inviting him to more prayer, or by asking if he minded us praying.

The spiritual works of mercy are:

To instruct the ignorant
To counsel the doubtful
To admonish sinners
To bear wrongs patiently
To forgive offences willingly
To comfort the afflicted
To pray for the living and the dead

The spiritual works of mercy are about expressing our faith in words. Pope Francis speaks strongly about them in Misericordiae Vultus 15:

'We cannot escape the Lord’s words to us, and they will serve as the criteria upon which we will be judged: whether we have fed the hungry and given drink to the thirsty, welcomed the stranger and clothed the naked, or spent time with the sick and those in prison (cf. Mt 25:31-45). Moreover, we will be asked if we have helped others to escape the doubt that causes them to fall into despair and which is often a source of loneliness; if we have helped to overcome the ignorance in which millions of people live, especially children deprived of the necessary means to free them from the bonds of poverty; if we have been close to the lonely and afflicted; if we have forgiven those who have offended us and have rejected all forms of anger and hate that lead to violence; if we have had the kind of patience God shows, who is so patient with us; and if we have commended our brothers and sisters to the Lord in prayer.'

We need to focus on both the words and the deeds of mercy. With both we need to proclaim Jesus, and we definitely need words in order to evangelise:

'There is no true evangelization if the name, the teaching, the life, the promises, the kingdom and the mystery of Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God are not proclaimed.' Evangelii Nuntiandi 22

The early church used the kerygma to announce the Gospel to others. Kerygma means proclamation. It is the core proclamation of the Gospel. The key to evangelisation is proclaiming who Jesus is for you in a way that leads others to Him. Pope Francis says that it’s simply telling people, 'Jesus Christ loves you; He gave His life to save you; and now He is living at your side every day to enlighten, strengthen and free you.' Evangelii Gaudium 164

Pope Benedict XVI told the Bishops of the Philippines on 18 Feb 2011 : 'Your great task in evangelisation is therefore to propose a personal relationship with Christ as key to complete fulfilment.'

Listen again to St Peter's proclamation in Acts 2:22-24

'Men of Israel, listen to what I am going to say: Jesus the Nazarene was a man commended to you by God by the miracles and portents and signs that God worked through Him when He was among you, as you know. This man … you took and had crucified and killed ... But God raised Him to life … Now raised to the heights by God’s right hand, He has received from the Father the Holy Spirit, who was promised, and what you see and hear is the outpouring of that Spirit.'

How do we share this core message with people? Sometimes opportunities take us by surprise. In Rome I was asked to look after 3 young women, aged around 19. On the way to visit St Peter's Basilica I talked to them about St Peter and the major events of his life with Jesus and his life with the early church and his martyrdom. By the time we got to the Confessio I was just about finished telling the story and said, 'And this is where he was buried. Right here, but about three levels down'. This profoundly affected at least one of these bright young women who said, 'I just don't understand why no one has ever told me this before. How come I've never heard this? I wish I'd known it before!'

Another time the English World Cup rugby team were visiting, and one of them decided that he wanted to play on the College's organ. The music attracted other team members to the College chapel. On the walls of the college were frescoes of martyrs from the time of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. It wasn't long before someone asked me who these people on the walls were, and I started telling them about the stories of the ways they heroically stood up for the truths of the faith and refused to be a part of a church that had broken away from unity with Rome. One of them, with tears, spoke on behalf of the others, 'I don’t understand why no one has ever told us this before. This is all news to me.' Many of our young people could say the same to us: 'You never told us. There's so much about Jesus and our history that no one ever told us.'

This proclamation of who Jesus is, and of how others have testified to that, needs to be present in every homily, every class and every talk we give. When I meet young people preparing for Confirmation, I challenge them, and remind them that when you make these baptismal promises for yourself, you are saying you believe Jesus is who He says He is:

You are saying you believe He was God made human; that He was a historical person; that He was born a little over 2000 years ago in Bethlehem; that He grew up in Nazareth; that, at about the age of thirty, He was anointed by the Holy Spirit and began a ministry of teaching and preaching and healing; He worked many miracles which proved He was divine; but, after three years, His people rejected Him; they had Him put to death by crucifixion. But He had promised them He would rise from the dead. When He returned to the Father, He sent the Holy Spirit upon His disciples. And it is this same Holy Spirit who comes upon you and leads you into the fullness of life.

Now, that’s the kerygma, the core proclamation. It’s what we mean by kerygmatic catechesis.

Every time someone comes along, adult or child, for sacramental preparation dare to ask, 'When you say the Creed at Mass on Sunday, do you believe in everything we say there; or are there some parts you wonder about, would like to discuss, or know more about?' After all, if we can't talk about these things in formal catechesis, then when can we? At all the different stages of faith development we need to revisit this core message of a relationship with Christ, in word and in deed, in such a way that makes people ask, 'Who is this Jesus whom you love and worship?'

Ever thought of changing the world one heart at a time? That's how Jesus began with Peter and Andrew, Matthew, John and James. I do believe it is one heart at a time that we begin to radiate Christ – showing every person whom we encounter not just that our parish is an oasis of mercy but that they will find an oasis of mercy in us, in each of us. To be able to embrace individual hearts this way comes from years of meeting the Lord daily in prayer. Then you begin to radiate Christ. And it is where we need start too: on our knees. As more people do the same: giving themselves daily to the Lord in prayer, giving themselves daily to their neighbour through acts of generosity, self-sacrifice, charity and loving kindness – then, little by little, our parishes will become oases of mercy which radiate Christ. And we will find our Church becomes missionary in ways we never imagined possible.
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My response

It is some months now since this talk was given, but I do remember how after this talk everyone tumbling into the area where food and drink could be found had this upbeat sense of 'Yes, I can do that' about these ideas for evangelisation, or 'now I understand what this kerygma stuff is and how to do it'. We were all grateful for these very practical ideas and explanations.
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What these words cannot convey are the video-clips and photographs Bishop Hudson showed us. We were all deeply moved by a little girl with intellectual disability praying the Our Father and the photographs of parishes including people with all kinds of disabilities in their activities.
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In the next issue will be notes from the workshop on the opportunities and challenges for parishes as they seek to proclaim Jesus Christ.

The principal celebrant for this Mass at Our Lady of Dolours, Chatswood, was Cardinal Donald Wuerl, Archbishop of Washington.
 
The readings were mostly taken from Saturday Week 22 Ordinary Time Year II, with the Proper for the feast day of St Gregory the Great.
 
Opening hymn: Sing a New Church (to Beethoven's tune of 'Come Sing a Song of Joy…')
 
Cardinal Wuerl : We gather together for the Eucharist, our source of faith and energy, our purpose and our reason for all that we do.

The first reading was from 1 Corinthians 4: 6-15, a passage where St Paul asks us to keep to what is written, and to remember that all we have has been given to us so that there is no cause for boasting. He reminds us that as apostles poor treatment is expected, and that we are to pay back with a blessing.
 
The responsorial psalm was part of Psalm 95(96), which includes 'Sing to the Lord all the earth, sing to the Lord, bless His Name.' taken from the readings for St Gregory the Great, with the sung response 'Proclaim, proclaim, proclaim His marvellous deeds to all the nations.'
 
The Gospel reading was from Luke 6: 1-5 about Jesus walking through the cornfields with his disciples on the Sabbath, and getting into trouble because the disciples were doing 'work' on the Sabbath by picking the ears of corn and eating them.
 
Cardinal Wuerl
My brother bishops, priests, religious, and brothers and sisters in the Lord, I want to express to you my gratitude for participating in this Conference with you, and for the intensity of your commitment. Today we celebrate the feast of St Gregory the Great, Pope and Doctor of the Church, a great inspiration for his day and age. His Book of Pastoral Rule written to help bishops in their ministry still inspires us today. He was the Pope who used the title Servant of the Servants of God for the first time. How do you carry the Gospel into the world in which we live? In the Gospel we hear Jesus say that 'The Son of Man is master of the Sabbath', helping His disciples understand who He is. What does Jesus ask of us, as He reveals who He is? That we place our faith in Him. The Eucharist is the agent and power of our faith. We come to Mass to be renewed every day, praying to be open to the powerful influence of the Holy Spirit. Faith, great as it is, is meant to be shared. Jesus says to each one of us, 'You will be My witnesses'. Grateful for the gift of faith, St Gregory the Great sent missionaries out. We are particularly thankful for the missionaries he sent out to the English speaking world. St Paul tells us that we are born to faith through those who have proclaimed it to us, and in turn we become Gospel reflections to others. We hear the words of Jesus, 'You will be My witnesses', 'Proclaim, proclaim, proclaim', 'You will be My disciples'. When we respond through the act of faith we become active participants in the transformation of the world. St Gregory the Great challenged his missionaries to engage in the announcement that Jesus is Lord. How do we in turn bear witness to the people around us who are in need of the faith, love and presence of Jesus? That is the great task of the New Evangelisation. Firstly our minds and hearts must be renewed in the faith, continually, over and over again. Then in confidence stand, and calmly and serenely offer to others the words of everlasting life. Live it. Go Out. Share it. Pope Francis encourages us not to stay locked up in the comfort of faith, and to go out and share it. What does it take for each one of us to invite someone to Mass? A true witness will recognise that it is our turn. The same power of the Holy Spirit is with us to quietly, persistently, consistently live in the joy of the Gospel in such a way that invites others to share that joy. He is the Lord, we are His witnesses and the power of the Holy Spirit is His gift to us.

Communion Hymn: Take and Eat
 
Recessional Hymn: Go To The World (with the tune of 'For All the Saints' Sine Nomine)
 
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My response

For me this homily contained the key thought for this third day of the Conference: 'In the power of the Holy Spirit, quietly, persistently and consistently live the joy of the Gospel in a way that invites others to share that joy.'
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This homily brilliantly distilled in a few sentences all that we had heard God calling us to do throughout the Conference. The hard part, of course, is actually doing it. May God help us.
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In the next issue will be notes from the keynote speech of Bishop Nicholas Hudson about how to make our parishes oases of mercy.