The email she sent me was pretty blunt. A woman wanted to ask some questions about baptism, so she called her local parish. The parish worker who answered the phone was blunt and not very nice - NO! You can’t have your child baptized without being registered at the parish. There was no way around it. The woman was distraught....

When another person self-describes as "raised Catholic", what assumptions do you make about them? Many would assume they go to Mass. Others would assume they know Catholic teaching or that they pray regularly. It could mean...

She once worked in full-time ministry jobs, but stopped going to Mass 2 years ago and most of her family and closest Catholic friends don’t even know she stopped. She reached out to tell me her story after reading my previous post on lonely Catholics. But, that isn’t the end of the story.

Ash Wednesday is a good day to share your Catholic faith with others. In fact, Ash Wednesday Masses generally have more people attend that even Christmas and Easter - which shows a high level of engagement. Below are some suggestions on how to evangelize on Ash Wed.

When we entered the E.R., the waiting room was packed, but we didn’t have to worry about the line - they ushered right to the back, because my baby boy turned blue. He really did, he was blue. Dominic (who is now 17), was only a few months old and had RSV. He was having trouble breathing and by the time we got to the hospital, he had turned blue.

Waiting is hard. Waiting on God can be very hard. Some of the most common questions Christians are asked (or ask themselves) are about the seeming contradiction between God’s goodness and human suffering - the waiting on God.

For many years we have had the same plumber (George). He is no longer a young man and we have had several conversations through the years about the lack of young plumbers (and young people taking on other trades). In one visit to our house, George had a new apprentice, who had recently graduated from High School. I told George that I was happy to see he had a new apprentice, but he responded by saying...

Decline. Scandals. Confusion. Herein lies the noise which currently undergirds the Catholic Church in the eyes of our current Western culture. We certainly have problems. But all these problems (and many more) are merely the outward symptoms of a much deeper issue. The deeper issue is found in...

Trying to change the culture of an organization can be likened to the punishment of Sisyphus. If you remember Greek mythology, Sisyphus was a cruel and crafty king. Twice cheating death and getting the better of the gods, he was punished by Zeus to eternally roll a boulder up a mountain only to have it come rolling back down again every time. Trying to change the culture of a parish can feel similar to Sisyphus. Just when you think you have made some progress, the culture of the parish plows you under again.

If you want to be a saint, you have to be an evangelist If you want to be an evangelist, you have to be a saint. Holiness and mission are inseparable.

Think of the last time you visited another parish for the first time. Did you know where to park? Did you find your way around easily? Did you feel welcomed? Were you a bit nervous? What was positive about the experience and what was negative?

Think of the greatest evangelists (e.g. St. Paul, St. Francis Xavier, or St Teresa of Calcutta) who changed thousands (some tens of thousands) of lives in their lifetimes. Amazing isn’t it? But, it is also a bit overwhelming, because this kind of evangelist is not common and most of us won’t ever be able to live up to such fruitfulness in our lifetimes. But, that isn’t the way in which the vast majority of Christians are called to be fruitful. It is a bit simpler than that.

A Catholic tech entrepreneur recently told me that when a company starts to lose existing customers, they frequently try to survey them to learn why they no longer buy their product; and that he believes that is the wrong strategy. He believes the better strategy is to ask why your most loyal customers continue to buy your products and then to build on what your strengths are as well as what differentiates you. Then he said something profound....

Imagine building a house without a plan or even a piece of complex furniture without following directions. It is nearly impossible for almost all of us. We need plans and directions, because while we may know some elements of what it takes to build a house or assemble furniture - without directions or some kind of a blueprint we are much more likely to fail in our goal of ending up with something the way we want it. Yet, this is how most parishes operate.

When I was in college, I took several semesters of archery. I really loved shooting arrows at targets, but what ultimately won me over was the nature of archery; you immediately know how you are doing, based on where you hit the target. Still, there was one time that I hit a bulls eye, which scored a zero because I was aiming at the wrong target! In some ways ministry is like archery...

What would happen if we had massive persecution hit our country? What would you do if all the structures were taken away, priests/bishops murdered, resources seized? Would we grow or would we shrink? I would argue...

sometimes think the Apostles were complete knuckleheads. How could you watch Jesus raise people from the dead, heal the blind, change water to wine, walk on water, and more...yet doubt or be afraid? Then I realize that I have met the same Jesus and I do the same thing....

Jesus says, “you are my friends if you do what I command" (John 15:14). Which implies that those who don’t do what Jesus commands are not friends of his, that is they lack intimacy with our Lord. This is very important. Disobedience to God leads to a breaking in our relationship with Jesus. I don’t know many Catholic leaders or disciples who argue with this, but there are many who argue how obedience to God is lived out. As Catholics we do NOT advocate a blind obedience to human authority. Still...

"Well that might be true for you, but not for me.” I don’t understand relativism and that means that whenever I talk with someone who is a relativist, even in small parts, it is hard for us to connect. I realized this many years ago and had to switch my tactic in order to be more effective in my evangelization.

The reality of most Catholic parishes - we are stuck in a culture of comfort, ease, status quo, and administration of the decline of our numbers - will not be easy to change. No one program, event, new idea, tweeking of old ways, conference, gimmick, or online video series will change our parishes. Rather, it takes...