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Brooklyn Bishop at St Mark’s Parish
MASS — today at St Mark the Evangelist Catholic Church (in Southwest Ranches, FL), a visiting friend of Fr Whyte presided the Mass. Auxiliary Bishop Octavio Cisneros of the Diocese of Brooklyn celebrated Mass. Even though the Deacon did a good homily, I wish the Bishop shared his wisdom over the readings. There was also a long announcement encouraging involvement in ministries, especially Religious Education. The Bishop supplemented both talks with great insight into tapping into our Baptism to be instruments of the Holy Spirit evangelizing wherever we can. Catechesis is a critical part of our faith that we should all be involved in … whether on the receiving end to grow in our intimacy of our faith or the giving end as catechists to our own families or to others. He also shared gratitude for the parish to having the weekly tradition of families taking home a Vocation Cup to pray for the response to God call in all our lives, whether it be priesthood, the religious life, or marriage. He’s a very personable and holy man.
CCD: Christian music
APOSTALIC WORK — Today in 10th grade CCD class, we tried to review some things we’ve discuss so far by adding some discussion on application. We used some mainstream Christian songs and studied their lyrics to bring a Christian perspective to practical life issues. Here are the songs we used …
Life, sin, shame, forgiveness … “Dare You to Move” by Switchfoot
Heaven … “I Can Only Imagine” by MercyMe
Effectiveness of prayer … “This is a Call” by Thousand Foot Krutch
Dating relationships … “Gone” by TobyMac
Parable of the Lost Sheep (Mt 18:10-14) … “Leaving 99” by Audio Adrenaline
CCD + catechesis crisis
MINISTERIAL PRACTICUM – (Fr Michael) — since the weather was so nice, we had class outside in the grass and discussed the current state of catechesis in the Catholic Church. Whether you call it CCD or Religious Education or Christian Formation, it’s essentially teaching the Catholic faith to adults or children (either in private Catholic Schools or weekly evening for public schoolers). We started by sharing, comparing & contrasting our own experiences in CCD verses private Catholic Schools. We highlighted the good and bad areas that need work, including better textbooks, better catechist training, more challenging truth (and less warm & fuzzy emotion-only faith), and other issues.
I can identify with many of these issues, especially since I’ve been a Pre-Confirmation catechist for (mostly) 7th graders for about the last 15 years. Even when a catechist commits lots of time, effort & prayer to present catechist attractively, relevantly and challengingly, frustration stiffle your efforts that perpetuates generation to generation producing ignorant Catholics with a childish knowledge of their Catholic faith. Improvements are coming … through the Church … through a committed laity … through our perseverence … to share the Gospel message of Christ in words and lessons and, most importantly, a living witness in “me”, in order to fullfill my role and awaken all I encounter.
Despite the obstacles and frustrations, I recall a quote from Pope John Paul II about teaching the faith to young people that illustrated my approach to catechesis and youth ministry through the years. [I’m still looking for the exact quote and will post here … check back]
[related resource: CATECHESI TRADENDAE (On Catechesis In Our Time) 1979 by Pope John Paul II]
SJVCS Seminary Life Album
July '09 -- hospital chaplains @ IPF
Easter '09 -- Miami SJVCS friends
the Son always finds a break in let the clouds
Feb '09 -- school vocation talks @ AMHS
Feb '09 -- cold breakfast with brothers (Matias, Fenly & Randy), now at SVDP and Imad (at SJVCS)
Superbowl '09 -- eating great @ SJVCS
Sept '08 -- Worklist Coordinators?
St Raphael Chapel mural @ SJVCS
Sept '08 -- retreats @ SJVCS
"It's not easy being green"
Catholic Kermit 
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