Catechesis & Faith Formation

Catechesis & Formation
Diocese of Fall River, Massachusetts

Thursday, March 24, 2011

Spring-"Iam doing something new. Do you not perceive it?" Is.43:19

Happy Spring to you all!  I know it may be snowing but believe...spring is coming. Do you not perceive it?

It has been a few weeks since my last blog. I need to get better at this technology and faithfully keep you updated each week.

We had a tremendous crowd of  440 at the Roman Missal training in Taunton on March 5th. Bishop Coleman expressed his gratitude to those present for giving up a Saturday to take part in this important training. Msgr. Maroney was a tremendously interesting presenter and I remind you that more resources can be found on his blog:  dignumetiustum.blogspot.com . There are many websites to check out. Here are a few:   www.sadlierreligion.com/romanmissal  and www.usccb.org/romanmissal/index.shtml and http://www.osv.com/ and http://www.fdlc.org/.

The Fall River Deanery had a meeting in March for all pastors, deacons, and catechetical leaders. It was very well attended.St. Michael's parish hosted and provided the delicious meal. Claire McManus led us in a process to see what could be done more collaboratively as we explored the situation of evangelization of those families not really well connected to the life of the parish. Claire has created a blog for the Fall River parishes to followup to the meeting: frfaithformation.blogspot.com 

On the first Sunday of Lent we celebrated the Rite of Election at the Cathedral with 37 catechumens and 43 candidates for full communion. This represents only 26% of the parishes in the Diocese.  I ask you all to examine when was the last time your parish welcomed new members at the Easter Vigil? If you do not have an RCIA team in place then the chances of that happening are low.  I encourage you as the catechetical leader in your parish to advocate for creating a true RCIA process (not program) if it does not already exist in your parish. The Office of Faith Formation can help you to achieve this.

Are you registered for the Lenten day of retreat on Wednesday, April 13, at LaSalette Retreat Center? Come apart and pray with your friends in this catechetical ministry. We need to give ourselves this gift. Dorothy Levesque , on staff at the Center, will be leading us. Those of you who are free during the day please plan to be with us and those of you who can take a day off or rearrange your schedule please try to do so.  You can access the flyer on our website and call in to register. Hope to see you there.

HAPPY SPRING!   But don't put those boots away just yet.

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