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The U.S. bishops have issued “a clarion call that suggests radical changes in the way we are doing catechesis in our parishes,” writes Maureen Shaughnessy (“Forming Adults in Faith,” page 17). As assistant secretary for catechesis and leadership formation for the U.S. Catholic Conference Department of Education, Shaughnessy should be in a position to know if the bishops are calling us to radical changes. You don’t have to work at the USCC, however, to know something is up.

I attended the National Conference for Catechetical Leadership meeting in Houston last May. I had hoped to find a few — maybe a dozen at most — catechetical leaders who could give me some input on what effect the General Directory for Catechesis was having in their part of the country. Having had some previous experience in seeking feedback about recently released church documents, I honestly expected some blank stares and shrugged shoulders. To my surprise and delight, almost everyone I talked to had read the document, and well over half of them had taken significant steps to implement it in their dioceses and parishes.

One of the “clarion” messages of the GDC is that we have to make adult catechesis a priority in our parishes. That message is the focus of the U.S. bishops’ document Our Hearts Were Burning Within Us: A Pastoral Plan for Adult Faith Formation in the United States. The bishops note that the catechesis of children has long been a priority for most of our communities. They are hard pressed, however, to identify parishes in which adult catechesis has had a similar emphasis. Without well-catechized, enthused adults, they note, even our best efforts at catechizing children are make-shift. We have been putting the cart before the horse. Well-catechized children do not necessarily make for well-catechized adults. Well-catechized adults, on the other hand, do make for well-catechized children.

ML readers will be especially excited by this “radical change.” A catechesis that places the formation of adults at its center is necessarily a liturgical catechesis. “[Adult faith formation] can be done specifically through developing in adults a better understanding and participation in the full sacramental life of the Church,” say the U.S. bishops on page 2 of the document.

If you are part of the radical change that is taking place, tell us what you have done to place adult faith formation at the heart of your catechetical efforts. If you plan to be making adult catechesis a priority in the coming year, tell us what concrete steps you are planning to implement. And if you would like to make adult catechesis a priority but can’t imagine where to start, share what roadblocks are preventing you from getting where you want to go. Send all your replies to editor@rpinet.com. Or use traditional mail: Editor, 160 E. Virginia St. #290, San Jose, CA 95112.

Year of Luke

In every December issue, ML begins to look at the Gospel for the coming liturgical year. This year, ML welcomes a new author to break open the Gospel of Luke. Robert Karris, OFM, comes highly recommended. After getting a taste of his Year of Luke column in ML (page 37), you will want to delve more deeply into his thought. You can read an in-depth discourse on Luke in his essay in the New Jerome Biblical Commentary, and you might want to see his recently published Prayer and the New Testament (Crossroads, 2000), especially the chapter on Luke-Acts. And don’t miss his coming Invitation to Luke, which will be published by Paulist Press in 2001.

Correction

The composer of By Flowing Waters: Chant for the Liturgy (Liturgical Press, 2000) was incorrectly identified as J. Michael Thompson in the October issue (27:8). Paul F. Ford is the composer; Thompson is the director of the choir that recorded the collection.
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