Martha Drennan, director of faith formation at St. Bernadette
Church in Springfield, had a nightmare on her hands. Starting her job the week
after religious education classes were to start, she was faced with a shortage
of catechists. Knowing no one in the church and needing more than the 17
committed catechists to teach the 300 registered students, she asked for
prayers and volunteers.
Father Paul F. deLadurantaye, diocesan secretary for religious
education and sacred liturgy and executive director of the St. Thomas More
Institute, knows the importance of catechists.
“The best gift we can give to our children is the gift of faith,”
he said. “It comes first and foremost from parents, but the church also has an
important role. Catechists take up that mission to go and make disciples. We
need them and it’s not always easy — those who volunteer find it rewarding to
share their faith with children of different ages.”
Catechists are supposed to be more than warm bodies leading a
class, said John Knutsen, assistant director for the Saint Thomas More
Institute.
Knutsen said it is essential for anyone serving as a catechist to
be a committed and faithful disciple of Christ, someone who lives and breathes
the Catholic faith and has a real passion for witnessing to what the Lord has
done in his or her life.
“When a parish has a team of well-formed disciples serving as
catechists, it really can transform not only the children in religious
education but their families, too,” he said.
James Blankenship is director of religious education at St.
Francis de Sales Church in Purcellville. This year, has 38 returning catechists
for 42 classes but he needs one more catechist. He said the successful return
rate has to do with relationships.
“A few of my catechists have been teaching for more than 10
years,” he said. “I spend a lot of time cultivating a relationship with my
catechists and helping them to become better disciples of Jesus. A disciple
will live out his or her faith to the max and that is what I find in my
catechists.”
Joanna Willard has been a catechist for second-graders at St.
Francis for 16 years. She believes handing the faith to children is something
God called her to do. “The key is bringing in the personal dimension, showing
enthusiasm for God’s love and expressing it in a way that it becomes
contagious,” she said. “Children hunger for God’s truth and love.”
Willard, mother of Father Jordan M. Willard, was homeschooling
her children when she felt called. “I heard God’s voice tugging at my heart
saying ‘I want you to do this,’” she said.
It can be difficult to recruit catechists, but putting an
announcement in the parish bulletin is not enough, according to Kelly Wilton,
director of religious education at Precious Blood Church in Culpeper. “When
they feel personally needed and called by another person in the parish, they
tend to answer the call,” said Wilton. “People sometimes feel inadequate to
teach the faith or feel they are not a perfect Catholic. If you’re imperfect
and still learning, we are providing support.”
Drennan agrees. “It plants a seed in them. They might think, ‘I
didn’t think I had anything to offer and this person thinks I do,’” she said.
“I see my work for the parish as empowering them to become the Christians that
God has baptized them to be.”
Sometimes
we don’t know what that looks like until we are invited, she said. “It’s not
flattery but helping people recognize and discern the gifts that God has given
them and encouraging them to make use of it.”
