RENEW International featured in Liguorian Magazine

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Small Packages, Big Power: Small Faith Communities

Holy Spirit

Lumen Gentium

Moved by the

RENEW International

PROFILE

Managing editor Elizabeth Herzing interviews Sr. Theresa Rickard, OP, president and executive director of RENEW International.

Q What is the history of your organization?

AA RENEW was started in late 1976 by Msgrs. Thomas

Kleissler and Thomas Ivory of the Archdiocese of Newark, who shared a dream for a renewed Church. Inspired by the Second Vatican Council, they believed the whole parish community needed a renewal experience modeled on the small communities in the Christian-family movement and in the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA) program, the small-group process for welcoming and initiating new Catholics into the Church. They hoped that as parishioners gained a deeper, more personal relationship with Christ, they would live the Gospel more intentionally through charitable works and just acts, and the entire parish would truly be renewed.

The people of the Archdiocese of Newark were the first to experience the spiritual growth and unity the RENEW process engendered. More than 40,000 people in Newark, including those of twenty-eight languages and cultures, were involved in faith-sharing within small communities.

They were charged with the mission to live their faith more concretely in family, work, and community life. As word of this success spread around the country, other dioceses like those of Steubenville, Ohio, and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, invited Msgr. Kleissler to introduce their parishes to RENEW. Since that time, RENEW has spread to more than 160 dioceses throughout the United States and nearly 30 other countries on six continents, and we have satellite offices in El Salvador and South Africa. We are truly grateful for the vision and zeal of our founders.

our team also trains volunteer leaders to facilitate the small groups. Typically, hundreds of people in each parish participate—about 15 percent of parishioners who attend Mass. Still, at the heart of our mission is the ideal of our founders that each parish will eventually emerge as a “community of small communities” in which the combined spiritual and practical gifts of laypeople will invigorate the local church and the world outside its doors.

Q

Can you give specific examples of how RENEW has successfully carried out its mission?

AA Participants enthusiastically describe blessings and personal transformation—many report returning to the sacraments and making efforts to heal wounded relationships among family and friends.

A participant in our RENEW Africa program in Port Elizabeth reported that her small community helped her cope with the murder of her son. “I was angry with

Q What is your mission?

AA We foster spiritual renewal in the Catholic tradition

by encouraging and supporting the formation of small communities within the parish. Groups of eight to twelve people meet in a parishioner’s home, gathering to prayerfully reflect on and share the Word of God. The small-group setting allows individuals to make better connections between faith and life, allowing them to live their faith more concretely in family, work, and community life. These groups use resources created and published by RENEW International.

Pope Francis frequently challenges Catholics “to go out to the margins” to share the Gospel with those who are most in need. Our pastoral offerings encourage participants to live out their faith within their parishes and in the community beyond the walls of their churches.

At each parish, our Pastoral Services Team trains a core team to invite parishioners into small communities; 26 LIGUORIAN.ORG MAY-JUNE 2014

Participants of ARISE Together in Christ from St. Jude Parish in Fort Wayne, IN, gather for a faith-sharing session, and reflect on the spiritual theme “In the Footsteps of Christ.” Photo by Francie Hogan, courtesy of Today’s Catholic.

Used with permission.

People from the Archdiocese of Johannesburg celebrate the official opening of RENEW Africa, which was led by Archbishop Buti Thagali.

Participants in RENEW’s Jovénes para Cristo, an alternative to gang membership for at-risk youth, take to the streets in a joyful procession during Diocesan Youth Day in the Diocese of Sonsonate, El Salvador.

John Couto, an ARISE Together in Christ participant in St. Joseph Parish in the Diocese of London, Canada, helps care for patients and feed children in Tanzania.

Photos courtesy of RENEW International. Used with permission.

everyone,” she said, “even God. Members of my RENEW Africa small community would stop by and visit and pray with us. They helped start the healing process and supported our family. Eventually I was able to forgive the killer.”

This type of transformation and conversion motivates small-community members to look for opportunities to put their faith into action in their parish and beyond. Parishioners in Levelland, Texas, taking part in our process known as ARISE Together in Christ established a program that provides unmarked backpacks filled with food for children who don’t get enough to eat at home.

An ARISE small community from Hardinsburg, Kentucky, collected diapers, bottles, formula, and other baby items for young parents with limited means.

On a larger scale, during the long civil war in El Salvador, the director of RENEW programs in San Salvador worked with thousands of children and teenagers who were at risk of falling into a dangerous gang lifestyle, helping them become reacclimated to civil society and again taking up their Catholic faith. The Archdiocese of Ibadan in Nigeria, a country we worked in for twenty years, established the RENEW School of Evangelization to train lay leaders for parish ministry.

We’re not claiming the actions for our own, but we’ve been a catalyst for these actions. It’s the work of the Holy Spirit, and I feel blessed to be part of it.

Q What is the reach of your efforts?

AA RENEW has brought its programs to more than

160 of the 178 Latin-rite dioceses in the United States. We’ve provided faith-sharing resources in English, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Vietnamese, Lithuanian, and other languages as well as largeprint editions to meet the needs of our diverse, multicultural Church. We recently introduced ARISE Together in Christ in English and French to several dioceses in Canada. We have an expansive program in South Africa that uses resources in English, Afrikaans, and Xhosa, and a program in El Salvador and in Venezuela. We offer spiritual renewal to service members and their families on bases in the United States and Germany through the Archdiocese of the Military. And as the organization responsible for Theology on Tap, we encourage local teams to invite young people to share faith in places they feel most comfortable— bars and restaurants—and we reach out to college students through Campus RENEW.

MAY-JUNE 2014 LIGUORIAN.ORG 27

Q What are your long-term goals?

AA Our ultimate goal is for Catholics to see

Indiana University’s Campus RENEW small community considers how to apply Christ’s message to their daily lives.

themselves as missionary disciples. For that reason, all of our faith-sharing resources invite participants to apply their faith in concrete ways within the parish and the community and at home, work, and school. We encourage men and women who participate in our programs to continue sharing faith and gospel action in ongoing small communities. We have resources for faith-sharing year-round, including during Lent and Advent.

Later this year we will introduce a new pastoral resource—Be My Witness/Sean mis testigos—which will encourage participants to see themselves as missionary disciples. In today’s digital world, with even the pope tweeting, we’re making it easier for people to share best practices by integrating multimedia elements into our faith-sharing processes and using social media to spread the Good News.

Q What are your biggest challenges?

AA RENEW has been a salmon swimming against

Sr. Theresa Rickard, OP, meets with young people from RENEW El Salvador.

Q Do you partner with other organizations?

AA Our primary partners are the parishes. From the

beginning, RENEW’s goal has been to engage as many parishes as possible, and our primary pastoral processes—Why Catholic?, ARISE, and their Spanish-language counterparts— are introduced on a diocese-wide basis with the endorsement and support of the local bishop.

Once our staff starts working in a diocese, we work to also engage local campus ministries, prison ministries, and nursing homes. We’ve partnered with Catholic Extension (which has helped us bring faith-sharing processes to mission dioceses), Holy Cross Family Ministries, and Catholic Relief Services on key initiatives.

Photos courtesy of RENEW International. Used with permission.

28 LIGUORIAN.ORG MAY-JUNE 2014

the secularization tide, but that tide is growing stronger. RENEW is countercultural, just as Christianity has always been countercultural, and that is Pope Francis’ constant theme. You could say that RENEW has anticipated many of the things our Holy Father has been saying—particularly his summons to every Catholic to be a missionary disciple who “goes out to the periphery” to find people in spiritual, emotional, or material need.

We see this new era in the Church as a window of opportunity for our ministry.

Additionally, RENEW has made it a priority to serve all parishes who want to renew their faith and build the Church regardless of their economic situation. Accordingly, we rely on foundation grants and the generous support of individuals who value our mission to supplement what we earn from parish stipends and the sale of our faith-sharing resources.

Q How can people get involved?

AA If your parish has small communities, join one. If it doesn’t, talk to your pastor about starting one. To learn more, find RENEW International on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, or visit renewintl.org. c

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