This week I had a great opportunity to spend the day with pastoral leaders in the Diocese of Camden, New Jersey (they’re a great group, by the way). One question that a number of people asked me in a variety of ways was, “Why are people leaving Church?” That’s a very good question and part […]
Category: Evangelization
This weekend we get to witness history with the canonization of Popes John XXIII and Pope John Paul II. I don’t have much of anything to contribute on Pope John (a little before my time) but Pope John Paul is a huge figure in my life. He was the Pope when I was discerning my […]
The year that is coming to a close was an interesting one from many perspectives. Personally it was one of the most consequential and fulfilling years of my whole life. And though there were some grave disappointments and set backs, I would say I enjoyed 2013 as much as any and more than most. Here […]
“Pope Francis’ blockbuster interview this week pointedly rejects a Church of “small-minded rules.” He said we cannot make the Universal Church a “nest for our own mediocrity.” He said a great many other things as well, including the comment that much of the Church’s civic discourse has become “obsessed” with homosexuality and gay marriage. And […]
“Since 2005 we have taken our celebration of Christmas to the Maryland State Fairgrounds, which happen to be here in Timonium. Last year we moved our Easter celebrations there too. We started out in a facility called the “Exhibition Hall” with about 1500 seats. Last year we moved to another building called the “Cow Palace” […]
Even though all is not well in the Catholic Church these days, we’ve been here before. One particularly low point came in the early 1200’s: Rome was addicted to intrigue, belabored by scandal, besieged by enemies, and plagued by intractable problems. Just about that time a young man, who desired greatly only to serve God, […]
It has been a little wistful to see the final days of Pope Benedict. I, of course, did not know him, though I did meet him on several occasions. When I was a student in Rome he was already a very famous theologian who worked at the Vatican. He walked to work every day and […]
In our upcoming book we devote a whole chapter to small groups, because that’s how important we think they are to parish life. And we acknowledge that they are a very hard sell in a Catholic setting (maybe they’re a hard sell in other settings too, I’ve never tried to sell them anywhere else). So […]
I have been reading Pastor Andy Stanley’s new book, out this week, “Deep & Wide.” He says it’s a book about “creating churches unchurched people love to attend.” My kind of book about my kind of church. The only time the word “church” is used in the four Gospels comes in the Gospel of Matthew. […]
On June 1st we posted a blog that generated more comments and questions than most. So much so, that I decided to return to the topic. The post looked at reasons churches don’t grow. There are reasons that churches don’t grow and it’s not just bad luck or bad karma or because of circumstances beyond […]
