Towards a new paradigm for conferences
Something has been niggling at me for at least the last 10 years when it comes to conferences of all kinds, be they professional, community or church based. The prevailing model is that you get a well-known speaker, or group of them, and then get lots of people to listen to them. Up until the advent of YouTube and Livestream the prevailing model made sense. Now it no longer makes sense. Why gather a group of people together if you are only going to provide something they could access on YouTube?

Far too often we gather people together to listen to a well-known speaker, and the vast majority of people arrive and leave without ever making a meaningful connection with any other attendee or leader or member of the organizing team. Follow up beyond a feedback form is non-existent. As long as they came, and either paid for entry or gave a donation or offering, purchased books and merchandise related to the conference and thereby enhanced the reputations of the speakers and the organization putting on the conference (and their social media followings), that is considered success. Positive testimonials, healings and conversions would be a bonus.

This is a consumer driven model, not a participative or collaborative model.

It is definitely not tapping into the wisdom and experience of the people present, nor permitting connections to be made that could move careers, ministries and relationship networks to a whole new level.

This has to change, even though there are many vested interests that will resist such change.

And the change has to be well beyond the addition of a few discussion groups into the conference mix.

I believe that the Divine Renovation team are thinking along these lines, because when the DR20 conference had to be foregone due to the coronavirus pandemic, they didn’t rush out to replace it with pre-recorded video since they had been planning more ‘hands on’ experiences than guest speakers.

So here is my vision for how a conference could be very different:

At the time of registering for the conference, participants would need to fill out a reasonably detailed survey. The survey would require answers to where participants
* feel that God is most active in their lives (to get an idea where charisms might be, and there would be long lists to choose from),
* experience burdens or callings (eg Pro-life, mental health, evangelization, prison ministry, helping people with addictions, helping people in domestic violence situations, youth ministry, ministry to the homeless, political activism, etc)
* have creative, artistic and musical talents
* write about a project or ministry that is on their heart, but currently unattainable due to lack of funding, co-workers and prayer partners
* and provide their top 5 themes from the Gallup StrengthsFinder questionnaire

Each part of that survey will assist in the planning of the conference, and in developing groups with the greatest numbers of shared interests and experiences. If there is enough prayer in the preparation and planning parts of the conference, the groups will fall into place with the Holy Spirit’s fingerprints all over it.  
 
The conference facility would need therefore to have a large room where all participants can gather, as well as at least 6 smaller rooms for groups to meet in.

Each day of the conference participants will get the opportunity in groups to interact and collaborate with people with whom they have shared interests, callings or abilities.

As far as possible such a conference would be open to all age groups, and the more inter-generational the better.

The conference would start on a Monday, in time for lunch for those who have top 5 themes in the Influencing domain and in time for 5pm Mass for other participants. Day 2/Tuesday would be devoted to charisms, Day3/Wednesday to burdens and callings, Day 4/Thursday is a combined creative day and lectio divina day, Day 5/Friday is a vision day (or start up day), and Day 6/Saturday a half day to pause and reflect on the whole week, with time alone and with opportunities for free ranging conversation and swapping of contact details.

The idea is to have some basic structure to each day, and yet have plenty of opportunity for God to move as He wills.

A live-in location for the conference would be best, however a blend of live-in and 9am-10pm participants sleeping at home is possible if they live within an hour’s travel of the venue and have sufficient stamina.

The timetable for the full days would be something like this:
7.00am Morning Prayer, followed by personal prayer
7.40am Rosary
8.00am Breakfast
9.00am Praise & Worship, with outline of the vision/plan for the day
9.30am Break into groups, give more specific vision/plan for the day, and get to know each other
10.40am Morning Tea
11.00am Seeking God, what does He want to do with us, say to us today; praying for each other
12.00pm Mass
1.15pm Lunch
2.30pm Major work of the day
5.30pm Evening Prayer
6.00pm Dinner
7.00pm Team meeting
7.30pm Night session
9.30pm or 10pm Night Prayer and end of the day

Day 1 Monday
After lunch, special sessions with those who have top 5 themes in the influencing domain, because these people will be called on to lead at least one group during the conference. These special sessions will provide a vision for how we want the leadership of the groups to function during the conference, and a bit of additional leadership training. Before the others arrive to register, we will pray over these leaders asking God to help them.

Then the conference begins in earnest with 5pm Mass followed by 6pm Dinner and the first Night Session at 7.30pm. The Night Session will start with Praise & Worship, a short keynote talk of encouragement, followed by housekeeping information and guidelines for how prophetic words and words of knowledge are to be discerned, and only released when permission from the discernment team is given. That way there can be a small team of people assisting in the interpretation and praying about the best way to act upon and release the messages. As far as possible we need to avoid and discourage undiscerned messages of personal prophecy. In groups, the group leader will facilitate group discernment procedures. At the end of the Night Session participants break up into groups of around 4 people and pray for each other. Night Prayer ends the day.

Day 2 Tuesday
This Day is foundational, because the more the charisms of the Holy Spirit are activated in us, the easier it will be to co-operate with His leadings and promptings throughout the conference.

Today we want to group those who have similar charisms, so that they can share their experiences and learn from each other.

Ideally there would be a group for prophets, a group for intercessors, a group for evangelists, a group for those with the gift of discernment, a group for those with the gift of healing, a group for those whose charism doesn’t fall into these categories, and a group for those who have no idea what their charism is.

In the introduction part of the day, participants would be invited to share how they experience that charism (eg an urgency to stop and pray for a particular person or situation, tingling and warmth in the hands, dreams, changes in senses of smell etc), a story about a good outcome from the operation of that charism, and a challenge they are experiencing with regard to that charism.

Obviously if several people are experiencing the same challenge, then this is a sign that dealing with it is on God’s agenda. Before the next session starts do a bit of research, consultation and prayer for resources and wisdom on this challenge. This topic will then become the first thing the group does in the main afternoon session.

Then after Morning Tea each group spends time seeking God for what He wants them to do as a group. After a time of seeking such guidance, group members share any impressions they have received. There should be enough, ‘I felt that too’, to chart a course of action. Otherwise start with the first impression, give it ago, if it feels anointed continue with it; if not, try the next impression. Some groups may feel like God wants them to lead them in a time of repentance, or to seek God’s mind about a particular topic, or to pray for a particular group of people, or to just rest in stillness before Him for a while.

The main thing is to get a bit of consensus about what God wants to do with the group in the main session, (at least to start with) and then to pray for each other for deeper releases of the charism they already share. What to do is one thing, how to do it is another, so until the main session starts everyone should be seeking God individually for specifics. For example, if the general impression is to pray for Japan, is it for the leaders of Japan, is it for protection against natural disasters in Japan etc and how to pray, eg in song, in tongues, with the Rosary, with a map of the country etc. Where you start in the main session may not be where you end up, allow God to lead you step by step. It is OK for the leader to ask for feedback from time to time, eg should we go deeper here, or do you feel that the Holy Spirit is changing our direction? Is the anointing as strong as when we started? Or has it lifted? Remember to follow good spiritual hygiene principles before and after the main session.

At the after dinner team meeting, group leaders give a brief account of the day. Are there any common threads between the various groups? If so, then go deeper with that in the ministry part of the night session. Otherwise the night session will be a full on ‘whatever you want to do with us God’ prayer meeting, expecting God to give people practice in the various charisms.

For the group of people with less common charisms, the group times of the day should be very similar, just needing extra levels of open heartedness to listen to the experiences of others that are so very different from your own.

For the group of people who have no idea what their charism is, they will have more of an input day than a collaborative day. For them, bring in guest speakers who describe their own experiences with charisms, and growing in them. Some of the day should be one-on-one conversations about how group members have experienced God’s guidance in the past; from those conversations some nascent charisms might be recognized. If so, pray for them to become more manifest. By dinner time everyone in this group should be better equipped to recognize and respond to charisms, and have had a time before the end of the main afternoon session where everyone prayed for the release of God’s charisms within each other for the welfare of the church.

(For a conference made up of people mature in the use of the charisms, you could add a similar day breaking into groups of those with similar offices, viz, apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, teacher. We say people have an office if there is general recognition that a person has been used by God consistently in this area for several years, and with much fruitfulness.)

Day 3 Wednesday
This day is designed to bring people with similar burdens, callings and ministries together. The purpose is for mutual support and encouragement, the improvement of relationships between people with similar God-given passions, and the sharing of ideas. If at the end of the day people have been helped to avoid common pitfalls, if solutions to common issues have been shared, if a bigger vision for what God is doing in this ministry area is received, if mutual collaboration begins between ministries, then the day has been a success.

The break up of these groups will be determined by the answers to the registration questionnaire. Likely groups would be pro-life, youth ministry, ministry to the poor/disadvantaged; less likely but still possible groups could be catechists, prison ministry, drug & alcohol rehabilitation, social media apostles/evangelists, protection of religious freedom activists etc. The emphasis is on the burden of the heart more than where someone is currently in mission. For example, if someone goes to state schools as a catechist every week, but God wakes them up on a regular basis to pray for those tempted to suicide, then that person should be in a group with people sharing a passion for mental health rather than with the catechists.

The first group session of the day begins with prayer, and then time for group members to get to know each other through introducing themselves, how this calling or prayer burden first manifested itself in their lives, a story about a good outcome from this ministry, and the sharing of a challenge arising from the calling, prayer burden or ministry. Only if time permits, group members can share how they have dealt with some of the challenges the others are currently facing.

If there appears to be commonality among the challenges, then we see God’s hand in bringing people together with a common challenge, and the group leader in the break goes to seek out wisdom and resources through research and consultation with team members. This will be the first topic for the main session in the afternoon, and a videoclip for discussion starting, or role play, or bringing in an expert speaker, may be the way to start it off, but then collectively pray for God’s wisdom for the challenging situation, and share any impressions, ideas and scripture quotations that come. It could be as basic as producing a budget, or as nuanced as exploring ways of setting boundaries and saying no to those who are demanding more than can be given.

The second group session is about seeking what God wants to do with the group. So this will involve prayer. It could very well be that God would like to give the group a time of restful, soaking prayer to refresh and bring healing in this session, as a prelude to what He wants to do with them in the main session. It may become a time of collective repentance for the occasions that we failed to respond to His promptings, and/or failed to serve the people sent to us. If group members agree, it could also be about sharing solutions to challenges, and respectfully learning from each other. At the end of this session there should be general agreement as to how the main session will start. Before the session ends, pray for each other and for each other’s ministries.

The main afternoon session will start by dealing with all the things that arose from the previous group sessions. But this should take up no more than one third of the main session. Then the rest of the session is turned over to God, letting Him direct what happens next, with the group leader facilitating group discernment. It is likely that the various groups will be led into times of intercession for those for whom God has already given them a burden (eg youth, those who don’t know God, those bound in addictions etc). It is also likely that the various groups will be led to seek God for fresh vision and fresh strategies for their ministries, and for the deeper release of charisms with which to serve in those ministries. If a time of repenting for obstacles placed in the way of unity between ministries begins, flow with it. Allow God to share his heart with you, and to broaden your vision for what He wants to accomplish through you. Begin and end this time with proper spiritual hygiene practices, since the possibility of intense spiritual warfare is high. If God wants to use your group in prayer to help bring down spiritual strongholds that are holding back His floodgates of grace, do not resist and do not be afraid.

The group leader’s debrief after dinner is again crucial. If in the debrief and sharing you find that many of the main sessions prayed for the nation, or were led to pray for financial help to be released, then the night session should devote time to praying for these things as a whole conference body. On the other hand, if groups were led to pray for boldness, or for those in political leadership, then do more of that. So the night session starts off as a prayer meeting and covers those areas that came up as themes in the groups, and if time permits at the end, there will be a time of sharing of good outcomes from various ministries. To make that happen each group leader will go and invite the person who shared the best story in the group to share it with everyone, so that the evening ends with collective praise and thanksgiving to God.

There will be a group for those who have less common callings, for whom there aren’t enough to have a specific group for those callings. With extra patience and openness of heart to each other, there is every possibility that their group may be led by God in deep and amazing ways. Be on the lookout for any indication of being drawn together into new multidimensional or multidisciplinary forms of ministry. For example, it might be discovered on sharing, that while each has their own calling, many of those callings may have a ‘calling within a calling’ such as an interest in First Nations peoples or a tug towards South East QLD.

Then there will be a group for those who don’t yet think they have a calling, a prayer burden or a ministry. For them, at the first group session they will introduce themselves and share a bit about either the context for the strongest spiritual experience of their lives or about what they have seen God do in their lives recently, and then share something about what they are currently struggling with, be it having a regular prayer time or a fracturing relationship or a health battle etc. At the second session there will be input to help them understand how a calling, prayer burden or ministry begins to manifest itself. Group members will then recall and share about the top three intercessory prayers in their lives, about the kinds of charities that they give more willingly to, and why, and about the type of injustice that spurs them most to action. From the time of sharing in the first two sessions it might be possible to see patterns emerging in individuals and in the group. If so, work with that. The main session will be about asking God to reveal more of His plan for each of the group members, and lingering in prayer waiting upon Him to speak directly to each heart. Pray for each other, and over each other, and if all else fails use the remaining time to pray against the injustices shared and for any top 3 intercessions that some of the group members had in common.

Day 4 Thursday
By now conversations at break times and during meals should be well beyond small talk. Today is creative lectio divina day. For today everyone gets a copy of the Gospel passage for the coming Sunday, and groups are made up of people with similar creative gifts. So there will be a good of musicians (vocalists, song writers, those who can play musical instruments), there will be a group of artists/illustrators, there will be a group of wordsmiths (writers, bloggers, poets), there will be a group of dramatists (actors, playwrights, dancers), a group of digital artists (photographers, videographers, meme makers), a group of cooks/chefs, and if there are any who declare they have no creative talents, they will make up the intercessors for the day. Comedians can choose whether they prefer wordsmiths or dramatists. If perchance there are potters, sculptors, wood workers, people who create scenes with Lego, or anything else ‘hands on’ (eg knitters and those who can make amazing things come out of sewing machines) then they can form a group too – if they have brought their equipment with them.

For the first session of the day, group members share about the creative talent God has given them, and what they have been doing with it (eg hobby, volunteer, career, ministry), and a blessing they feel when they use that creative talent and a challenge they face (burn out, barriers to success, rejection, finding the time to practice/hone skills etc). Pray for each other.

The second session of the day is where each group seeks God and prays through the Gospel passage in a lectio divina way. Group members share what struck them afresh about this Gospel passage. Then members talk about how they could convey that message through the medium of their creative talent, and whether they want (or feel called) to do that solo, or in collaboration with others. It is time to brainstorm, and to help each other develop the initial ideas they have been given. The cooks will each be given an amount, say $20, to go shopping for ingredients with, in order to produce Gospel inspired nibbles to be enjoyed at the night session. By the end of this session everyone should have a plan for what they will be creating in the afternoon session.

In the afternoon session the intercessors will be praying while the creatives produce what they can in the time available, together with a written explanation if necessary (eg for art, instrumental music, nibbles).

Then in preparation for the night session, the creative work that can be displayed will be arranged around the room. Creative work that requires performance will go onto whatever stage-type arrangements can be made, like a variety concert, and the nibbles provide a celebratory feast afterwards. Those with computer/technical skills will be called on to help set things up for viewing where necessary, or to help get them printed. It should be an absolutely amazing night seeing the Gospel coming alive and depicted in so many various ways and mediums. Of course, someone will need to fill the role of M.C. for the night, and someone else will need to schedule the various performances into some semblance of order.

Writers can choose whether to read out their short story, poem, limerick, blog post, or article, or whether to print it and display it instead. It may even be deemed worthwhile for all of the displays to be photographed and uploaded onto a computer, and then projected onto a big screen while the artist/creator explains his/her work. If that is done, then you would need schedule a few displays followed by a few performances, and then a very short time for conversation and continue with that pattern until all of the creative individuals and groups had presented. No performance or display explanation should exceed 5 minutes. At the end, the intercessors should be called up to take a bow, because they were the powerhouse of prayer calling down God’s creative inspiration upon everyone and obtaining the grace of creative flow. Then God Himself should get a big clap for the gift of His Word and for the wide diversity of creative talents He has bestowed upon His people.

Day 5 Friday
This is Dare to Dream day, or Vision day, or Start-Up day. For today people will need to be able to set up their own computer technology in working groups. In preparation for today the team will have needed to contacted diocesan leaders, business people (eg lawyers and accountants), local political leaders and others who have links with entrepreneurs and large donors. These people are to receive invitations to the night session. The more that come, the better.

By now there should be a good level of trust and working relationships between the conference participants. The more there is of that, the more fruitful the day will be.
 
The first session of the day is the ‘Pitch it to me’ session. Anyone who wishes to pitch a project to the group has to notify the team the night before and be given some cardboard to write out the essence of the pitch upon. People can give multiple pitches if the ideas or projects are significantly different. Each person gets no more than 2 minutes to pitch their idea or project to the entire group. But they have to be ‘big’, ie they need to be well beyond the scope of one person to achieve (funding $10K+, require an ongoing team of at least 4 people, and prayer partners). Effective pitches generally present a community need and a solution to that need.
 
Some of the pitches will be pre-existing dreams that currently seem too far out of reach, others will have arisen out of the experiences of the conference. Catholic hospices, family-friendly retreat centres, initiating a new faculty at a Catholic university (eg Australian Catholic history), a project to translate a classic spirituality text into English, setting up a travelling troupe of dramatists to perform Passion plays are examples of possible pitches.

In the break between sessions, the cardboard pitches are set up around the room. Each person is given two red sticky dots and a green one. The red dots are to vote for pitches that you think are particularly worthwhile, and the green dot is to indicate which pitch you would actively like to work on. At the start of the second session, people go and place their dots. During this time of milling around, you can ask clarifying questions of the people who gave pitches.

The more dots a pitch receives, the more likely it is that a working group for that pitch will be formed. Hopefully this process of ranking pitches will take no more than 30 minutes, less if at all possible. The number of working groups will be determined by the number of smaller rooms for those groups to meet in, with one room set aside for those who have no passion for any of the selected working groups.

Once the top ranking pitches are chosen, people gravitate to the one they wish to work on and form working groups. The rest of the session is spent in the smaller rooms doing introductions, and learning about each other’s skills and professions. Each group will require someone with themes in the influencing domain if those giving the selected pitches do not already have an influencing theme. If any working groups discover that they don’t have all the domains covered, then they need to find someone who has themes in that domain to join them.

The main session for each working group begins with prayer, followed by a more detailed pitch from the pitch-giver. Group members ask questions. Then the group decides what needs to be done to improve the pitch, and works on that. Each group will get 7 minutes at the night session to deliver a better pitch, and 3 minutes to answer questions from the floor about the pitch.

Statistics, business plans, research, graphics, budget size, possible locations, any limitations via legislation and government regulations, staffing, legal and privacy restrictions considered, plans for how to attract both funding and clients/those in need of the project will all be required in preparing the better pitch. Also needed will be information about why this project is different to others already in existence, and whether or not it could be co-partnered or grafted onto an existing entity/ministry.

Since the 3 hours for the main session isn’t a lot of time for work like this, the group leader/s need to quickly set tasks for each member. They work as hard as possible for 30 minutes on those tasks, then the group reassembles and reports, and then refines what is needed, and sends members away for another 30 minutes. After the second re-group they will need to decide whether more information is needed, or whether the group has enough to begin preparing the presentation, or to let a few pursue more fact finding and the rest begin work on how to present the upgraded pitch. Allow enough time to practice the presentation. Prepare a handful of contact cards to give away to any invited guest who shows interest in the project.

Pitch-givers are encouraged to let the original vision for the project grow, be enhanced, and even be diverted. For example, a pitch might begin as a scheme to find employment for young people, but during the work the group discovers plenty of similar schemes for that age group, however there is almost nothing for the over 50s, and they decide to keep the basics of the idea and project but change the age group for whom it is targeted.

Remember to do due diligence. Contact actual people for whom you have the vision or project. Ask them whether it would actually help them, or whether they have more pressing needs. For example, the initial project may be to improve ramp access for wheelchairs and walkers at the local cathedral, but you may find that while that would be well, good and appreciated, what they really need is trained people to help them fill out National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) paperwork.

Groups may decide to continue working between dinner and the start of the evening session.

Simplicity of presentation is better than complexity. Include what the need is, what the vision is to meet that need, why that vision is unique, and then detail that vision with plans and rationales for those plans. Don’t forget to include estimated budgets for the whole project, for each section of a project, or year 1, year 2 etc budget projections. If time permits outline the risks you are aware of, and your plans to deal with those risks. Make the vision as compelling as possible.

The night session begins with prayer, and the introduction of the invited guests. Then the detailed pitch sessions and associated Q&A begins. It would be better to have a random order of the presentations instead of a lowest initial interest to highest initial interest order. When the detailed pitch sessions are over it is time for a celebration to begin, and for invited guests to mingle and ask further questions about the pitches that most interested them. At the end of the evening, conclude with prayer asking God to bring into being those projects that most align with His will.

For those who ended up in the group without a selected pitch, they will do a similar skills and professions introduction to each other that will be led by a group leader. As part of that introduction, people will also include what topic would have motivated them to take part in a working group. Should there be any group members who have the same motivation, they will work together for the rest of the day. The rest get divided up into smaller groups that have all the theme domains covered, and then get to choose which of the non-selected pitches they would like to work on. Before the end of the main session, each smaller group presents a pitch to each other. Of them, the one considered by the group to be the best pitch will be presented as a ‘wild card’ pitch at the night session.

Day 6 Saturday
This is the final day, which finishes with Mass and lunch. The primary task of this day is to provide a time of prayerful reflection upon the experiences of the week. So after the morning praise & worship there are only two sessions.

For the first session everyone gets a small exercise book to take with them and to write down what they want to remember from the whole conference. Of primacy would be everything that they felt God speaking to their hearts. Questions that people may want to answer in this time are: What did I hear? What did I learn? What touched my heart? Where was God for me in the experiences of the week? What is challenging me? What questions do I have that I need to follow up on? What do I feel God is inviting me to do as a response to the experiences of this week?

For the second session everyone returns to the main room. This is a time to mingle with the purpose of going up and saying a personal thank you to those who helped you during the week, and for saying words of encouragement to those in whom you see great potential, or whom you have seen grow throughout the week. It is also a time to swap contact details with those you would like to keep in contact with. At the end of the session we gather for 5 minutes to stand and pray for the person next to us, that what God has done in them during this week and begun in them would be brought to perfect fulfilment.
​
www.societyofsaints.net   
Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, 19 Jun 2020  

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A print friendly version is available below:
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​In my roving internet travels I came across a post that grabbed by attention. The gist of the post was that an intercessor wanted a seat at the leadership team table, and the response was 'No', with the major argument being all leaders are intercessors but not all intercessors are leaders.
 
It struck me that the situation was handled poorly, when it could have had quite positive outcomes if handled better. The context seemed to imply that the leadership felt a bit threatened and weren't too keen on the personality of the intercessor.
 
So I want to come at this situation from 2 angles. The first angle is where intercession sits in the body of Christ, and the second angle is 'Why would a request like this be made in the first place?'
 
Each believer in Jesus Christ who has been incorporated into His Body through baptism shares in the priestly, prophetic and kingly ministry of Jesus. The priestly ministry is offering up prayer and sacrifice for others, the prophetic is telling of God's good news of salvation, and the kingly is service of the needy and vulnerable (eg traditionally widows, orphans and strangers).
 
We know that Jesus is continually interceding for us. Heb 7:25 'His power to save is utterly certain because He is living forever to interceded for all who come to God through Him'. We know that we are to follow Him and to imitate Him, our leader and Head.
 
This means that intercession for others is an expected and normal part of being a Christian. But just as with the prophetic and kingly ministries of Jesus, we share in them in various degrees according to the call of God upon our lives.
 
There is the ordinary call as given in 1 Tim 2:1-2, 'First of all, there should be prayers offered for everyone – petitions, intercessions and thanksgiving – and especially for kings and others in authority so that we may be able to live religious and reverent lives in peace and quiet'.
 
To some the Holy Spirit gives a charism of intercession, which can take the form of a gift, ministry or office.
 
The gift normally manifests itself in an impulse or nudge from God to pray for a certain person or situation, and that impulse or urge lifts when the breakthrough is obtained. These tend to be short in duration and carry a degree of urgency eg You get woken up in the night with the need to pray for your nephew, you pray until peace comes, and the next day you find out he had been in a life and death situation. God can operate a gift like this in anyone at any time. You have a certainty that God wants you to pray for this person or situation, to pray right now, and even an understanding of how you are to pray – including what tools in your prayer arsenal you are to use in prayer. This is far beyond sitting in a circle and praying one after each other for your best guess at what the greatest needs are and your best guess at what prayers are aligned with God's will.
 
The ministry is the next level of charism where the Holy Spirit places prayer burdens upon a person, with some regularity and frequency, and involves responding with fasting and commitment and can include the experience of travailing in prayer. Generally the community catches on that when this person prays, God seems to answer quickly and powerfully, and those with a ministry of intercession get invited to intercessory prayer meetings.
 
The office is the next level of charism where it becomes increasingly obvious to the person and to the community that there is a special anointing upon their lives to pray for 'big stuff', think John Sanford and his intercessory metron for weather patterns and natural disasters. Other metrons could be for a city, a region, a nation or for particular groups of people (law enforcement, catechists) or particular situations or causes (cessation of abortion, conversion of teenagers, prayer partnering a ministry of the community). Those with an office like this usually develop mentoring and impartation roles to others less experienced in being used by the Holy Spirit with this charism.
 
If we recall the parable of Jesus about the persistent widow and the unjust judge, Luke 18: 1-8, then you can expect those with this charism to be people of perseverance, 'pester power', a bit intense at times, and maybe even a little pushy (think Abraham in Genesis 18:22-33). But if you remember that God made them this way for His special intercessory purposes, then you won't take too much offence at them, and give them a bit of leeway because you don't know just how heavy a burden God has placed upon them, and such a burden makes a person less able to see the big picture and wider perspectives. That is why they need good and understanding leadership which takes time to really listen to them - when the temptation is to fob them off at the first opportunity because they feel like an annoyance.
 
All leaders have a duty to intercede and pray for those who have been entrusted to their leadership. It is part of the job of a leader. Often those prayers are at the ordinary level unless there is a major threat or opportunity coming towards the community, when the charism at gift level will manifest. Leaders with prophetic gifts will have associated intercessory gifts because many times the promises of God require long term intercession in order to come to fruition.
 
Frequently a prophetic charism will lead to growth in intercessory charisms and an intercessory charism will lead to growth in prophetic charisms.
 
Why would a request like this be made in the first place?
 
It could be a genuine request according to the Will of God.
It could be a symptom of something lacking in the way leadership is conducted.
Or a bit of both.
 
A good leader will know whether the person claiming to be an intercessor has the charism of intercession and at what level he/she has it. If you don't know, then you will have to ask questions, listen carefully, and pray for discernment. It is part of the task of a leader to see the beginnings of ministry level charisms, to notice them, to nurture them, and to put boundaries, protections and communication channels in place to enable them to grow safely.
 
A wise leader will have communication channels in place so that regular updates of what God is doing in and through the prophets and intercessors in the leader's community are received. If independent reports from your intercessors show a shift to several intercessors praying for unmarried mothers, then that's probably a heads up from God about where He wants to develop the community's next outreach ministry.
 
If your leadership pipeline has stalled, and there have been no changes in senior leadership team in the last 5 – 10 years, then this request could be a symptom of not raising up the next generation of leaders.
 
If there has been a leadership emphasis and community culture of honouring those in visible positions of ministry leadership (preachers, pastors, worship leaders, youth leaders, administration) and not giving honour to the invisible positions of ministry (intercession, street evangelism, caring for the infants, sick and elderly, hospitality), then there is going to be various levels of frustration and not feeling valued among those in invisible positions of ministry and corresponding desires to be seen and appreciated. There is a human tendency for this imbalance to happen, and it has to be consciously fought against on a regular basis.
 
The request could be a disguised plea for help in discerning where God wants them to serve and/or the manifestation of a desire to be more involved and committed.
 
Therefore the first thing to do when a request like this comes to your leadership is to see it as a gift and opportunity, and not as a hassle.
 
Then you do your due diligence and work out whether at what level of charism the person is experiencing God's action in his/her life. The higher the level, the more likely God is in the request.
 
Then you do your due diligence and determine whether there are other charisms of the Holy Spirit regularly active in his/her life. The more there are, the more likely God is in the request.
 
Then you obtain some objective assessment of leadership potential. The StrengthsFinder questionnaire is a very good tool for this. The presence of influencing themes means that he/she should be in some form of leadership. Your task is then to work out where that should be happening, and the other theme results will give good clues to that answer. For example if the person is high in empathy and harmony, and has a theme from the influencing domain, then leadership of a hospital visitation or aged care visitation group might be the answer.
 
However the absence of influencing themes doesn't let you off the hook. You then need to look at the mix of themes of everyone on your senior leadership team and compare them with your intercessor requester. If the themes of the intercessor requester fill in the domain weaknesses of your senior leadership team, then God is in the request and you need to at least give it a 3 month trial and see how it goes.
 
If there no influencing themes and the themes they do have will not bring greater balance to the senior leadership team, then that's not where they are called at the moment. But there could be other ministry teams in the community for which they are a perfect fit. Work out where that is and plug him/her into it, reminding them that every leader is only as effective as the team they have around them, and every 'supporting the leader' role is important.
 
The bottom line is that if a person comes to you with a request to join your leadership team, you do them, yourself and the community a grave disservice unless you help get them into the ministry role that God has uniquely equipped them for.

Here's the question: If God gave you access to $100,000 to spend on advancing His kingdom, what would you spend it on? How would your answer change if the amount were $1 million or $10 million? Assume that these budgets come with an administrative assistant, access to people with skilled talents and that diocesan approval is going to be easily given.

The $100,000 dreams

Pragmatically our parish hall, and our diocesan meeting facility in a rural locale, are both lacking air conditioning. They would both get far more use if they were air-conditioned. $100,000 would go a long way to getting both properties done. The parish hall already has the infrastructure for air-conditioning, it only needs the machines to be installed.

Get a StrengthsFinder based enterprise up and running. At least for a year's trial. $20,000 for office space rent, $40,000 to get 4 counsellors trained up ($8000 each plus airfares and accommodation), $30,000 for computers (6) and software, $5,000 for office fit-out (tables, chairs etc), $5,000 for StrengthsFinder books and questionnaires. However it really should be more like $55,000 for this last one to be able to offer the StrengthsFinder information free. So that's a $150,000 budget. Three pronged approach, business leadership, job placement and help for parishioners to find where God has gifted them and which teams they would be best suited to. Business leadership would be helping small business owners understand their natural leadership style and what gifts and talents they need on their teams. First consult free, second and third consults by donation, fourth consult negotiate a regular fee. Job placement, having worked out what is needed, if we know a person with those talents we ask the business owners to give them a go. Build up using the same free, donation, negotiate regular fee process. All parishioner consults for free, for both individuals and groups.

The parishioner based StrengthsFinder work could morph into a Monday-Friday training hub. Day 1 a modified Life in the Spirit Seminar, Day 2 doing the StrengthsFinder questionnaire and learning how the themes and talents fit together. Day 3 a silent retreat and writing in a journal; sorting it all out and praying day. Day 4 sharing the fruits of the retreat day with counsellors and in the group, with lots of brainstorming. Day 5 writing out a plan of action, sharing it, group prayer, celebration and sending time. Then 4-5 weeks later a single day of follow up, maybe on a weekend, with the group, to share experiences, to pray and plan some more.

Making 100 grants of $1000 available for young adults in our diocese to be able to go on week long silent retreats where they could take time away from the world to be with God and with the help of good holy experienced spiritual directors to be able to listen to what God is calling them to be, and work out how to discern that further and act upon it. Most young adults are unemployed and without the funds (personal or family) to be able to afford what such retreats normally cost. Do the legwork to find out where the most Holy Spirit led silent retreats are happening, and book regular places for the grants to be used at that place.

The $1 million dreams

Put an extension on our diocesan meeting facility in a rural locale: add a proper dining room with tables and chairs, add at least 2 additional smaller meeting rooms, upgrade the internet access, add on a full bank of easily accessed toilets (4 women's, 3 gent's, 1 disabled/baby change table). (To access the current toilet facilities you either have to negotiate a flight of stairs or take a walk to another building on the property).

Purchase a commercial property in one of the business hubs within the parish, and transform it into an interdenominational chapel, and invite faith communities from within the parish to man prayer for our parish and region on a 24/7 basis. We could keep the lights on and the rates paid with a small piety shop / information desk at the front and a donations box.

The $10 million dreams

Purchase several run-down properties in the same area, within the parish boundaries, and build a 12-20 bed Catholic hospice with a chapel and quarters for a live-in priest-chaplain. Currently you have to drive at least an hour away from our parish to get any form of Catholic aged care.

Back to that diocesan meeting facility in a rural locale: it has extensive grounds. Build a new accommodation block, with comfortable quarters for singles, married couples and families. By comfortable I mean pleasant, roomy, more home-like than motel-style, with air-conditioning, stable internet access, undercover parking, ensuites, and 2 or 3 communal laundry rooms. Set it up as retreat accommodation that is attractive, and set up an associated trust fund so that donations can keep the cost of accessing the retreat facilities possible to people and families on low incomes/pensions. Each parish in the diocese would then be allocated a number of rooms and days each year that were free, so that the parish priest could send those in need of retreat time as needs arose (to pray and seek God about a new project, to write new books or songs/music, to take time to pray about a big life decision, to find solace after a traumatic event, etc)

Purchase property, either to rebuild or to renovate, in order to establish a Study Centre for Christian Art. Run courses in Christian Art history (art, music, vestments, tapestry/embroidery, metalwork, sculpture, architecture etc). Have studio space. Have Gallery spaces. Have a coffee shop and book shop. Have accommodation for artists in residence and/or visiting national/international artists/experts. Run courses in developing Christian Art careers. Develop a reference library on Christian Art, where people can come and research (but not borrow). Have facilities for hands-on workshop spaces. It also needs to contain a Chapel, because true Christian art is founded on prayer, and leads back to prayer. Host and encourage travelling exhibitions. Once a year run a conference on Christian Art, with an associated Modern Christian Art exhibition with decent prize money. (Modern as is art made by living artists whose art practice helps people connect more deeply with God through the depiction of Christian images and themes). Have a minibus to assist transporting people to and from transport hubs to the Study Centre. Now what are the chances such a property could be sourced close to the diocesan meeting facility?

​..........................................................................................

Do I have more ideas? Of course I have. It is just that these ones are front and centre in my mind just now. Find the blog category 'Ideas', and read through the blog-posts associated with that category to locate more of them.

May the Holy Spirit blow and bring into being those ideas that are inspired by Him, and let all the others wither and decay. Amen.

Let's dream for a minute about what a diocese would look like if each of its priests was in a place of ministry that played to their strengths. Less burnout. More joy. More effectiveness.
 
This is possible.

It no longer has to be a 'seat of the pants, gut feel, let's hope the Holy Spirit is inspiring our choices' set of decisions. It will still require prayer, and pondering, and skill, but the chances of getting the right match of priest to place of ministry are dramatically higher with the following tools.
 
…However you will still have to take into account musical and artistic ability, relevant hobbies, and attempt to match priests to socio-economic areas that they can relate to.
 
First Tool: Clifton StrengthsFinder – Catholic Edition. If you know the top 5 signature themes of your priests you will make better decisions. Think of them as transferable skill sets. 
 
Second Tool: Strengths based Leadership. The 34 possible signature themes can be split into 4 domains, Executing, Influencing, Relationship building and Strategic thinking. If all 4 areas are covered by a leadership team, then the place is going to hum. If one or more domain area is missing, the blind-spot areas will reduce effectiveness and cause troubles. For example, if you have two priests in a parish and neither of them has people skills (relationship building skills) attendance at Sunday Mass will fall and complaints to the bishop will increase.
 
Third Tool: Knowing how parish size impacts on the gifts the pastor in leadership needs to be effective. This gem was highly recommended by Fr Mallon in Divine Renovation. It is 14.5 pages long, but its implications are huge. A small parish will thrive with a pastor in leadership who is high in relationship building skills. A medium size parish needs a pastor in leadership with administration skills, who can do a bit of everything domain-wise. A large church needs a pastor in leadership with a drive for vision and mission, who will focus on preaching and strategy and do very little individual pastoral ministry. A very large church requires more of the same, with an emphasis on articulating vision.
 
This will make sense if we look at some mythical examples.

I grabbed a random number generator and found 5 numbers between 1 and 34, and then matched the numbers to the 34 signature themes in alphabetical order. This produced mythical priests A, B, C and D.
 
Mythical Priest A:
Harmony/R, Analytical/S, Empathy/R, Individualization/R, Developer/R
That's 4 themes in Relationship building. If this priest had to take charge of a parish, for both to thrive it would need to be a small one.
Empathy is the number one skill needed to be effective in pastoral care.
​Empathy plus Harmony means you would shine in hospital based pastoral care.
But this person has even more than that. He'd be absolutely in his element in prison ministry, and ministering to those with addictions or dealing with domestic abuse victims.
If you trained him up to spot the 34 themes, he would be brilliant at getting parishioners into the ministries that God made them for.
 
Mythical Priest B:
Belief/E, Responsibility/E, Strategic/S, Communication/I, Command/I
That's no people skills, but a powerful leader who could take on a large complex parish.
Sadly without the people skills he's not likely to ever get a pointy hat.
He would be a very good preacher. However dissuading him from erroneous beliefs would not be easy, so it would be important to give him good formation from people he can respect.
Belief, Command and Strategic are the building blocks for a good exorcist, so it would be worthwhile sending him to exorcist school in Rome to test whether he is called to that ministry.

Putting Priest A together with Priest B as an assistant would cover all 4 domains, and they could bond over analysis and strategy. They could make a very effective team, as long as it was explained to both of them that they were chosen to complement each other, and how they could best connect with each other.
 
Mythical Priest C:
Discipline/E, Connectedness/R, Learner/S, Communication/I, Maximiser/I
If this person wasn't a priest he would have the raw material to be a best-selling author.
Having a foot in all 4 domains he could lead a medium parish.
However he would shine as a faculty member of a seminary, and could write a book a year. The rhythm of seminary life would suit him, students would enjoy listening to him, he'd be the one to keep the Old Boys union going and maintain contact with past students, he'd be very good at social media, and his desire to learn would fuel the next book while the maximiser will ensure it will be full of excellence.
He has the raw material to become the next Fr James Martin SJ.
 
Mythical Priest D:
Includer/R, Maximiser/I, Analytical/S, Activator/I, Restorative/E
Having a foot in all 4 domains, he could lead a medium parish too.
But if you really wanted him to shine, you would send him into broken parishes to get them on their feet again. He'd analyze the root causes, delight in the hard work needed to make the healing happen, get parishioners involved in the process, get started quickly and enthuse people to aim for excellence and show how possible it was to achieve. It is possible that he would be frustrated in any assistant priest role, because he needs to make things happen
 
Do you agree that if these priests were given places of ministry like these, that the mythical diocese they belong to would be a couple of steps down the road from maintenance to mission?
 
Conversely, can you imagine the disaster if you sent mythical priest B as parish priest of a small parish?

​For a print friendly version....

On Monday 13 June and Tuesday 14 June 2016, the parish of St Benedict's Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, ran a 2 day conference to share their experiences of successful parish renewal. Using #DR16 will get you an overview of the conference via Twitter or Facebook.
 
I wasn't able to attend in person, but I was able to participate through the Livestream video of the plenary sessions which were uploaded to the internet. http://livestream.com/accounts/6379109
 
Here follows a rough transcript of that Plenary Part 3 and then my own response to it. Why bother? Not everyone likes getting their information via video, and going through the process of taking notes and typing them up enables the message to get internalized more and shared with others, and it also forces me to go looking for the background information and links to round things out. And there's no guarantee how long the Livestream option will be available for either.
 
This session could have been entitled 'Stewardship'
 
It was introduced by Fr Mallon with the quip; 'If you want to get Catholics to shut up, begin the Sign of the Cross. It works every time.' #DR16 was the No.1 trend on Twitter in Canada that day.
 
This was followed by some praise and worship songs with good lyrics:
'Open up the heavens, we want to see You. Lord unveil our eyes. Open up the floodgates, a mighty river, flowing from Your Heart, filling every part of our praise.'
'Our God is able. He will never fail us. He has done great things. In His Name we overcome. He defeated the grave.'
 
Rick Fersch then spoke to us, currently the Director of Evangelization and Stewardship for the Archdiocese of Seattle and formerly the CEO of Eddie Bauer (a clothing / outdoor adventure supplies store, Kathmandu would be an Australian equivalent)
 
My three aims for this talk are to
•Fan the flame of renewal
•Inspire and empower transformation in your parishes
•Give you the tools for growth/engagement
 
The Archdiocese of Seattle has 174 parishes and missions, and somewhere between 750k and 1 million Catholics. It is traditional in Seattle to begin a talk with a prayer and a joke.
 
St Thomas Merton's Prayer of Abandonment
My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself, and that I think I am following Your will does not mean I am actually doing so.
But I believe the desire to please You does in fact please You.
And I hope I have that desire in all I am doing.
I hope I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know if I do this You will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it.
I will trust You always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for You will never leave me to face my perils alone. Amen.
 
The joke was about how a wife knew that her husband had come home drunk. Plenty of evidence there was, but the most damning were the band-aids on the hallway mirror where he had tried to dress the broken-glass wounds on his rear end.
 
I am an intense kind of person, and I find that adding a bit of humour and laughter helps. I retired from Eddie Bauer in Jan 2012, after 16 years of Catholic education and a degree in sociology from Villanova Uni in 1971. I've been serving the church full time for the last 13 years. I'm 44 years married with 4 children and 5 grandchildren.
 
Is it just me? Peculiarities in the Church
•The concept that organizational charts, reviews and job descriptions are not inseparably linked (and not done either!)
•The concept that there is no need for timely decision making ; tomorrow, even next year, that will be fine enough
•Is the Church the earthly home for passive-aggressive individuals? (met with lots of laughing and nodding)
•Although it seems to have 'always been done this way', is it possible that another way may work better?
•Do you still get weird looks when you question something that doesn't make sense (or worse…silence?)?
•How about the concept of succession planning? All right…now I've pushed the envelope too far!
 
We all know that these are temporal issues. So don’t let them mask, overpower or sabotage the ministry to which you have been called.
 
What is my ministry?
On December 7, 2000 I had a serious stroke, which put me in Intensive Care at the hospital. I was surrounded by my wife Patti and the 4 kids, but I could not move, I could not talk, and yet I was totally aware of what was going on. Patti told me, 'You have to live, you have to hold our first grandchild.' The priest showed up to anoint me. That was the turning point, the miracle that saved me. Through it all I knew that I had to listen to God, and that He had a 'Step 2' for me. I did indeed hold our first grandchild, 2 years after the stroke.
 
God's life game plan for Richard T Fersch
1988 Eddie Bauer. What a great place to work, it was on fire, and I loved working there. We saw lots of growth, and I learned a lot about customer service and hospitality. We were ranked in the top 40 companies to work for.
1996 United Way. This was my way to give back to the community. I joined the board and learned how to ask for money – and discovered that I'm good at it.
2000 Sacrament of the Sick
2002 Archbishop Brunett of Seattle. He called me.
 
What can the Church learn from business?
Healthy things grow. Unhealthy things don't.
Between 1988 and 2002, Eddie Bauer's measures of success (sales etc) grew between 10 and 100 times.
While we measure sales, it is an outcome and not a cause. Only a cause is actionable.
The solution is to focus on the cause – usually a bad/unwanted product, maybe the weather (which usually masks the real cause, and we really shouldn't empower something we don't control.)
Identifying a cause allows you to acknowledge it, to accept responsibility, to identify a specific action plan, to execute a solution, and then to measure it again.
 
Let's look at the figures for the Church in Western Washington 2003-2016
Households 2013 131k; 2016 145k
Mass Attendance 2013 179k; 2016 145k
Income on plate 2013 72m; 2016 94.5m
 
Is it the case that we have less people giving more?
The sacraments are being received by less people.
 
These three things are the traditional ways of measuring the health of a parish.
Registered households (those who sign up)
Mass attendance (those who show up)
Ordinary income (those who cough up)
All three are outcomes, they are not causes.
Therefore they are not actionable.
 
What is the cause? Why is that the case?
Gallup's concept of engagement.
Gallup would propose the cause for a lack of healthy growth in Church is a lack of member engagement – a lack of commitment to community – a lack of a sense of belonging.
 
(Ed. Here's the link to the Gallup Member Engagement Survey : http://shop.gallup.com/faith/gallup-member-engagement-survey.html )
 
From Chris Stefanick's 'Real Life Catholic' http://reallifecatholic.com/
'The unchurched person usually doesn't feel welcome at church. It is up to us to help him or her lower their defenses so the Word of God can pierce their heart. If we provide a boring and unwelcome weekend experience, the unchurched believe the church has nothing relevant to say to them. Worst – they come to believe God is irrelevant.'
 
Engagement is how a parishioner feels about their parish.
•Engaged parishioners have a deep and strong emotional connection to their parish and are more fully involved in all aspects of the mission of the church.
•There is a direct correlation between engagement and an increase in the defined outcomes of a parish's spiritual health (inviting, serving, giving, life satisfaction).
•Research reveals that spiritual commitment is an ultimate result of active engagement – leading us to a new paradigm : Belonging leads to Believing.
 
'People will forget what you said and did – but people will never forget how you made them feel' Maya Angelou
 
The use of prayer partners at St Benedict's is building member engagement. I was very happy to hear when I asked someone 'Are we sitting in your pew?' to receive the answer 'We don't own pews at St Benedict's'. Think about how we treat people on Christmas Eve. It is more like, 'Where have you been for the last 51 weeks? I've earned the right to sit here, you haven't'. This is where we really need to be hospitable, and not just think we are.
 
In the church there is a critical need for measurement to assess our current 'status' and thus create workable and measurable action plans.
What is needed is a new approach – an approach leading to this new paradigm. An approach that is sustainable, scalable and transferable.
If you were asked how you parish is doing on hospitality, from 0 to 10, how would you know what to answer? If you can't measure it, then how can you manage it?
 
Engagement is not an end in itself. Rather it is a way to purify the 'soil', enabling a healthy church to bear fruit, the fruit of disciples ready for mission.
 
Summary
Increasing engagement is not the end – it is a means to help achieve the end.
Increasing engagement among parishioners is the KEY to increasing the spiritual health of the parish!
 
The Archdiocese of Seattle launched an initiative 8 years ago called ' Engagement – Empowering Stewardship as a Way of Life'. It has three parts: Leadership, Member Engagement and Strengths.
 
This grew out of an earlier initiative by Archbishop Murphy called 'Stewardship' which ran from 1992-2002. There were booklets, ministry fairs, etc. The take up rate was the same as similar programs you have done in your own dioceses, a lot of effort for not a lot of result.
 
In 2009 we began a new plan.
We could see that the Catholic Leadership Institute (CLI) was doing good stuff with its 'Good Leaders, Good Shepherds' and 'Tending the Talents' programs; and that Gallup was doing good stuff with the ME25, Q12, and Clifton Strengths Finder; but they weren't using the same language.
 
So we asked them to work together, and very generously they agreed, and a pilot program was prepared.
Bear in mind that our solution may not be your solution for your situation, and that we are happy to share details of what works for us in the hopes that you may find what will work for you.
 
Sower : Leadership and developing leaders
CLI provides leadership training for parish priests, and 'Tending the Talents' training for parish staff.
We noticed a lack of training for our priests in leadership. How can we get stuff done without leadership to make it happen? Good Leaders, Good Shepherds is a 2 year program. When the priest graduates we send his parish staff on the Tending the Talents program. It is practical, it works, and everyone is thrilled with the results.
 
Seed : Strengths and Talents
How well do we understand our hearts? How well do we know our gifts?
Once you accept the gifts you have, the gifts that only you have, a whole new responsibility t own, embrace and use those gifts emerges. Using them is the way we give our gifts back to God. Gallup has proved empirically just how unique we all are with our strengths. Some 4000-5000 people in the Archdiocese have gone through the StrengthsFinder process. What we need to do now is convert those talents and strengths into ministry, and give purpose to them. At the moment we are working on launching the Catholic Strengths Institute to help everyone connect their strengths with ministry pathways.
(Ed. The website for this still seems to be in pre-production mode : so keep an eye on it for a change in status : http://catholicstrengthsinstitute.tryradiuswebtools.com/ )
 
Seed : discovering talent
If we are to cultivate and share our unique gifts of talents we must first understand and embrace these gifts. When we do, we receive a 'personal awakening' of who we are called to be. The results are:
•Deeper understanding and respect of self
•Deeper understanding and respect of others
•Deeper relationship with God
 
A quote from St Catherine of Siena (Dialog 7)
God said to me, 'I could well have made human beings in such a way that they each had everything; but I preferred to give different gifts to different people, so that they would need each other.'
 
Soil : Member Engagement
We have been using member engagement surveys with great results. Some parishes have done the surveys multiple times. You cannot measure if you are not measuring.
 
'Therefore go and make disciples of all nations'
The ultimate goal of parishes is to develop Disciples of Christ – Catholics who are fully spiritually committed to the mission of the Church. This is the ultimate result of increasing engagement among parishioners.
 
In the hands of a leader committed to using the ME25 to its fullest extent, the ME25 becomes a powerful tool for helping to move your parish from maintenance to mission.
 
Please engrave this definition of insanity in your brain :
insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.
 
So what next?
•Will it be business as usual when you go home after the conference?
•Will you grasp and embrace a part of the new paradigm you were seeking when you signed up for this conference?
Be not afraid. Be bold. There are resources to help you on this journey. Take a step. Make a difference. The choice is yours.
Don't be overwhelmed. Remember the story of the boy finding an elderly man along the beach throwing starfish back into the sea. The boy questioned the pointlessness of it all, but the elderly man replied, 'I might not fix it all, but I certainly made a difference to the life of this star fish.'
 
Fr Mallon then introduced Gemma to us, after agreeing that 'Making a difference is what it is all about'.
​
5 years ago Gemma would come to the occasional Sunday Mass, sit in the pew, and think about other stuff. At that time a relationship with God was not at the centre of her life. The same was true for her mum and dad, sister, brother and grandfather. Spiritually her dad was the least likely to go to church. Her grandfather had struggles with alcohol addiction. One Sunday Gemma got shocked out of her daydreams by seeing the priest pull out an iPhone. It awoke her curiosity. She told her family, 'you have to meet this guy, he's crazy' (it was Fr Mallon, of course). He was talking about Alpha.
 
Her Mum wanted grandfather to go and do Alpha. During the prayer session at Alpha, grandfather had an amazing encounter with Jesus, experiencing within himself the light vs dark battle. After that prayer session he felt cleansed, saved, and his desire to drink was gone. The family was stunned at the change, especially mum and dad. So we went to Friday night family Alpha, the kids had their sessions upstairs and the adults downstairs. The sense of community and belonging we experienced there kept us coming back. We all encountered God in our own way. My sister and I felt called to do church activities, like bible studies and youth groups. My mum started praying every morning. My dad is now with us in the pews every week, as is my brother. My mum and I did the trip to HTB and encountered the Holy Spirit in a real and personal way, along with 5000 other people.
 
Then we moved to Toronto. On our final weekend the parish prayed over us and commissioned us to go out and use this chance to bring what we had experienced to Toronto. In Toronto we joined a parish and started a daytime and youth Alpha, but we encountered difficulties. The priest was not strongly supporting us, and was not involved. We realized we could not take it much further. So we switched parishes and found a priest who was hungry for something to help his parish. He got on board, promoted it, became a table leader, and invited his friends.
 
Gemma, aged 17, is now the Alpha coordinator in that parish, organizing the food, tables and dealing with the emails. Her sister had her big turning point at a Steubenville conference. In many ways Alpha is being run a bit like a family business. 'Jesus has made a huge difference to our family life. He has given us purpose, and a happiness in service. It is good to know that as a teenage I can be in the world but not of it.
 
This part of the session closed with prayer for Gemma and her family.
 
…………………………………………………
 
My own response
 
That's a lot to take in, isn't it?! But it is the pathway forwards, and we need to tell people about it.
 
Why are Catholics so passive-aggressive? Maybe because the direct route to getting things done so often gets blocked and we've had to become experts at getting things done by back channels.
 
It is encouraging to see that if God wants you somewhere, that He has the ways and means to get you there, like he did with getting Rick out of Eddie Bauer and into service for Him with the Archdiocese of Seattle.
 
The contrast between the high rates of growth for Eddie Bauer and the stagnant/almost recessive growth for the Archdiocese was staggering. The former is the kind of growth and health God would like to see in our parishes. To keep on the same path that got us to this lack of health, that's no longer an option.
 
It is going to take a while to process the implications of belonging leading to believing. We are so used to expecting things to be the other way round. It means that we have to be consciously choosing to draw people into our community of faith. It means that we need independent assessment on how welcoming our parishes actually are, maybe something similar to the mystery shoppers that retailers use.
 
Thinking about engagement…A few months back our parish had its first episcopal visitation in its history, and there was a meeting with parishioners and the bishop. He asked those present to name what it was about the parish that draws you here. Many of the answers hinged on engagement parishioners had with the community of faith present in the parish, and named the people who drew them into involvement (often a parish priest or a switched-on parishioner who called them into some kind of service or ministry). Those present at the meeting were already engaged, otherwise they would not have given up their time to be there. The ability of some gifted individuals to notice potential talent, and to give people gentle nudges in the right direction for using that potential talent, is what is needed. If we can locate those gifted individuals and help them harness and intentionally use those gifts in God's service, that would be a big step forward to increasing engagement in the parish. People with StrengthsFinder combinations of Developer and Individualization are most likely to be those gifted individuals.
 
I went investigating Clifton StrengthsFinder after an intriguing mention or two of it in Divine Renovation. There are 2 ways to do the StrengthsFinder questionnaire. Do it online for $15 US or around $20 AUS through this link, it is supposed to give you access to an e-book, but the process is long and convoluted. A better way is to get the book with the access code in the back, the Catholic Edition of 'Living Your Strengths' Because postage costs are a nightmare, order more than one copy – you are going to want others to do it too. If you have the money, get friends together and buy a full starter kit, which comes with workbooks and a seven session discovery process.
 
My top 5 signature themes are Intellection, Input, Connectedness, Deliberative and Learner. That meshes perfectly with my top 3 transferable skills, problem solving, using my brain and research. I'm still searching for a way to leverage those strengths to serve the mission of the Church as part of a team, and suspect that until enough leaders find value in StrengthsFinder and learn to build balanced teams I'll still be a square peg in a round hole and getting lots of those weird looks and silences that Rick spoke about.
 
I'm really interested in the work Rick is doing in matching combinations of strengths to ministry opportunities. (See, it's a problem that needs solving! :) The Living Your Strengths has lists of ideas for how to use your strengths in Christian service, but they only go so far. But it should be possible to work out which combinations of strengths are suited for particular ministries. For example, someone high in empathy and harmony is the perfect fit for a hospital chaplaincy role or pastoral care work with the sick.
 
Gemma's story needs to be shared widely. It breaks my heart that so often us lowly parishioners try and get something good going, and it falls flat because there is no active support from the parish leadership. Passive support, which is basically permission to run with something and rooms to do it in, just isn't enough and frequently it is a recipe for failure. Waiting to see if something is going to be a success before getting behind it might feel like the prudent thing to do, but it sure doesn't feel like the loving thing to do from the perspective of those who are risking it all. However if people see that the parish priest is giving something his full support, they do get behind it. It feels like they all watch him to see what he thinks before joining in or not. So much stands or falls depending on the parish priest, no wonder Our Lady is so insistent in her messages that we must pray for our priests.
 
Those Catholic Leadership Institute courses look like they are worth investigating. I hope they start getting students from my side of the globe soon. I really like that it there's some for parish priests and some for parish staff.
 
The National Church Life Survey is probably the Australian equivalent to the ME25. It certainly asks the engagement questions. It would be worthwhile comparing them properly.