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Summer celebrations

This is ML's 25th birthday year, and we're finding lots of ways to celebrate. One exciting thing we're doing is taking the ML "idea" and expanding it into a couple of summertime events. The first of these is ML's Liturgical Art Adventure, which will be held at Holy Name College in Oakland on July 15-18, 1998. Before I try to describe the event, I have to tell you the premise. The planning group wanted to see if there was a way to take what ML does in magazine form and make it into a live, 3-D, multi-media event. What they came up with is a three-day exploration of all the different liturgical arts. Participants will be immersed in these arts -- which include music, movement, environment, word, and ritual -- and they will participate in a planning process that shapes these art forms into a liturgy. The liturgy they will shape will be the Easter Vigil. The "adventure" will culminate in a celebration of the Vigil to which hundreds of people from the surrounding parishes will be invited. What I am most excited about is the opportunity to get neck-deep in a pool of liturgical creativity with a couple of hundred other people who know in their bones that liturgy itself is an art form. While there will be lots of practical information handed on by teams of professionals in various liturgical arts, these few days will be a retreat for me and an opportunity to rejuvenate my enthusiasm for the liturgical craft we practice. I hope you'll be there, too.
Our second summertime event is a Liturgical Catechesis Conference. This also needs a little preface. I hear lots of liturgists and lots of catechists talk about liturgical catechesis. However, many times when I ask them to describe what they are doing in their parishes, I get the sense that we don't yet have a firm grasp about what liturgical catechesis is. Our planning team thought it would be a good idea to gather a bunch of liturgists and catechists together and develop a more concrete understanding of how liturgical catechesis works. The result is the Liturgical Catechesis Conference, which will be held in St. Louis on Aug. 6-9. The event is being co-sponsored by the worship offices in the Archdiocese of St. Louis and the dioceses of Kansas City, Mo., Belleville, Ill., and Springfield, Ill. These three days will be a hands-on experience of liturgists and catechists doing liturgical catechesis. Although the activity will be guided by a team of experts, the learning will happen primarily in the experience of working through the liturgical and catechetical process. The event is being planned and coordinated by Samuel Torvend, author of "Shaping the Ritual" in >ML's Planning Guide.
For more information about either event, click on the Event Series item on the rpinet.com home page, or] turn to the back cover of this issue.
The idea of linking the liturgy with catechesis is so fundamental to the mission of ML that we have also designed and launched a new publication: Liturgical Catechesis newsletter. While ML looks at the mission of the parish from the lens of the liturgy, Liturgical Catechesis looks at it from the lens of catechesis. Just as ML is not just for the liturgist, Liturgical Catechesis is not just for the catechist. Rather, it is for all those who have a stake in the catechetical ministry of the parish. The newsletter is currently published quarterly, and each issue is shaped around the four components of word, worship, community, and service.
If you would like to see a copy of Liturgical Catechesis, dial up our website at www.rpinet.com. For a hard copy, e-mail us at info@rpinet.com. Or you can write to Liturgical Catechesis Newsletter, 160 E. Virginia St. #290, San Jose, CA 95112-5876. Or you can call 408-286-8505.

Preaching

Every once in a while, editors have an idea that doesn't always bear the exactly-hoped-for fruit. Such is the case with the list of preaching websites that starts on page 26 of this issue. When the deadline was still comfortably far off for that piece, I did a quick search of preaching sites. My browser turned up lots of listings, and I figured it would be no problem to cull out those that would be of interest to Catholic parishes. It turns out, however, that not many Catholic preachers post their homilies on the web. Most of what is available comes from the liturgical Protestant churches and is usually based on the Revised Common Lectionary. I decided to publish the list anyway for a couple of reasons. First, the RCL and the Roman Lectionary overlap quite a bit so that much of the information on the web will be useful to Catholic preachers. Second, I hope this listing will spur those of you who are able to post your preaching on the web. When you do, send me the address, and I'll include it next time we do a listing.

Home church

In this issue, we welcome Vickie LoPiccolo Jennett as the new author of Home Church. Home Church will be a regular department that will help families deepen the spirituality of their domestic churches. Vickie is a co-author in Resource Publications, Inc.'s, Ministry of Mothers Sharing (MOMS) program. She is a professional writer from the Phoenix area. Turn to page 31 to see her first article, and look for good things to come in future issues.

Correction

The February issue (ML 25:1) featured the "Permanent Seasonal Icon of the Seasons" by William Schickel on the cover. We neglected to point out that the artwork was commissioned by the Congregation of Divine Providence and is placed in St. Anne Convent Chapel in Melbourne, Ky. ML regrets the oversight.

—NW