The excellent website Vocation Match, a service that seeks to pair those discerning Catholic religious vocations with various religious communities and other opportunities recently completed a survey on current vocational trends.Among the findings:• There has been a 62 percent increase in the number of inquiries into religious life.• There is a 30 percent increase in the number of people in the first stages of formation.• The majority of people considering religious life are under the age of 30.• There is an increased interest in inquirers who would like to wear a religious habit as an expression of the countercultural appeal of religious life.• Personal contact with a religious priest, sister, or brother is the most helpful source for those needing vocational information.Take some time to explore the complete results of the survey.Christian DiscernmentHelp your students to cultivate a spirit of Christian discernment. Begin by using the following reflection from Marriage and Holy Orders: Your Call to Love and Serve.
Discernment is the ability to chart a godly course through the maze of choices and options that confront us on our journey. Saint Paul put it this way: We do not cease praying for you and asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his [God’s] will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding to live in a manner worthy of the Lord, so as to be fully pleasing, in every good work bearing fruit and growing in the knowledge of God, strengthened with every power, in accord with his glorious might, for all endurance and patience, with joy giving thanks to the Father, who has made you fit to share in the inheritance of the holy ones in light (Colossians 1:9-12).Put simply, Christian discernment is a prayerful pondering or deliberation of the many options available to you in life. Christian discernment means striving to see things from God’s point of view. Steps toward Discernment1. Name the problem/decision to be made. (What’s happening here?)2. Name and claim responsibility for how you feel about the problem/decision. (How do I feel about it?)3. Through prayerful reflection, examine alternatives. (What is God inviting me to do?) 4. Make and carry out the best possible decision. (Do it!) 5. Evaluate the action and its consequences. (Was this the decision I could make?)
Objective:
Students will spend time learning the meaning of the evangelical counsels and the impact they can have on society if lived or not lived. They will then identify how others live them and discover ways to put them into practice in their everyday lives.
Procedure:
1) Give the students the three evangelical counsels: poverty, chastity and obedience, and the definition of each. Read over them together in class.
2) For each counsel, have the students make a list of ways how they may see lifestyles in society that contradict these counsels. Have them give examples wherever they can. The following examples may help if they are at a loss:
• For poverty – consumerism
• For chastity – intimate relationships between boyfriend and girlfriend
• For obedience – disobeying parents
3) Take time to discuss the ideas they come up with being careful to define any terms that might seem new or unclear. They may want to debate the ideas in class. This can be good if done in a respectable manner and for a limited period of time.
4) Next have them brainstorm about what can happen if the counsels are not lived in society and the repercussions. They should write down their ideas. Discuss their ideas and any foreseeable consequences.
5) Next have them write down how they can live each counsel in their own everyday life. This should be very concrete with specific examples. If time permits have them share them out loud with the class.
Media Probe
1) Have the students identify a billboard which is in contrast to one of the counsels. Let them re-create the billboard with a message more in line with that counsel.
2) Have the students identify a song is in contrast to one of the counsels. Let them re-write the song with lyrics more in line with that counsel.
This can lead into a wonderful discussion about the effects of media in our culture.
Have your students imagine themselves in a line-up prior to gym class. The teacher is really frightening, walking back and forth before everyone while marking down the grades of those not wearing the right color socks or those not standing in their assigned place. The scene is very dismal. Then, suddenly, from in the back someone begins to giggle softly. The giffling increases to full-scale laughter among everyone in that area. Soon enough the entire class is bent over laughing hysterically. then, surprise of surprise, even the mean gym teacher joins in. A dark and dreary time has been transformed to one of fun and joy.
A similar transformation takes place right in the middle of Lent. On the fourth Sunday of Lent the previously dreary church sanctuary may be decorated with flowers, and more upbeat music may be played. The priest may wear rose-colored vestments instead of the purple penitential ones.
Why the change? This midpoint of Lent is known as Laetare Sunday. Latare is a Latin word that means "rejoice." The reason for the rejoicing is that on this Sunday or shortly after those preparing for Baptism at the Easter Vigil receive the sacred text of the Apostles' Creed for the first time. The reception of the Creed by the catechumens signifies that the time of their full membership into the community of the Church is near.
For this reason, the Church an hardly contain its joy on Laetare Sunday. In previous centuries, as a symbol of this joy, the Pope would carry a golden rose in his right hand when leaving Mass. Later, the golden rose consisted of a cluster of roses made of pure gold that the popes would bless and then give to cities, churches, or shrines ad a memento.
In England, a tradition around Laetare Sunday had the boys and girls who lived away at school returning home to their "mother church" wehre they had been baptized, bringing with them gifts to place at the altar. Adult children would visit their own mothers on this day. For this reason, Laetare Sunday also became known as "Mothering Sunday".
Soon after the catechumens receive the Creed, they also are given the text of the Our Father. These ceremonies are for those catechumens who have dutifully completed the long preparation process-today called either the catechumenate or Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults—and have passed the tests and scutinies of faith. While the catechumens currently are able to remain at Mass only until after the homily, on the night of the Easter Vigil they will be welcomed into full communion with the Church, receiving the Sacraments of Baptism, Confirmation, and Eucharist. Then they will be able to stay for the entire Mass. Laetare Sunday is celebrated in anticipation of that occasion.
Additional Lessons
* Have the students memorize the Apostle's Creed, and cover in more detail the meaning of each creedal statement.
* Review the signs and rituals of Baptism, Confirmation, and Eucharist as Sacraments of Initiation.
* Explain the stages of the catechumenate: inquiry, catechumenate, enlightenment, and mystagory.
Discussion Questions
1. When was a time when you experienced joy or happiness in an otherwise dreary or sad situation?
2. What is a creedal statement that you have a question about or trouble understanding?
3. If you could give the catechumens from your parish one piece of advice about belonging to your parish, what would it be?
Projects
Have the students write welcome notes to the catechumens at their school or parish or a nearby parish. Arrange for the notes to be delivered to them after the Easter Vigil.
Collect real flowers or spray artifical flowers with gold. Have the students give them to catechumens at a nearby parish after they are dismissed from the liturgy on Laetare Sunday.
The following prayer activity on the theme of justice and peace is taken from Activities for Catholic Social Teachingby James McGinnis.
Background
Scrpture records only three times when Jesus wept: over the death of his friend Lazarus, during his agony in the garden, and over Jerusalem before his entry into his beloved "city of peace," which is the meaning of the word Jeru-salem.
Visual Meditation
Read Jesus' words "If this day you only knw what makes for peace" from Luke 19:42 and ask the students to repeat those words several times to themselves. Then invite the students to look into the face of the weeping Jesus (see above) while praying the "Litany on the Nonviolence of Jesus" (below) and think about what those tears are saying.
Litany on the Nonviolence of Jesus
Let us escalate love
Jesus, you wept over Jerusalem and its humiliating occupation by the Roman Empire, and you weep today over the escalating violence in your Holy Land. Jesus, in the face of escalating violence,
Let us escalate love
Jesus, you wept over Jerusalem and is exploitation of the poor, and you weep today over the escalating violence of poverty in our own society and world. Jesus, in the face of escalating violence,
Let us escalate love
Jesus, you wept over Jerusalem and its disregard of women and children, and you weep today over escalating violence against women and children in our own society and world. Jesus, in the face of escalating violence,
Let us escalate love
Jesus, you wept over Jerusalem and its deadly use of weapons of violence, and you weep today over the proliferation of the weapons of violence, from handguns to nuclear bombs, in our own society and world. Jesus, in the face of escalating violence,
Let us escalate love
Jesus, you wept over Jerusalem where capital punishment was rapant, and you weep today over the escalating use of capital punishment in our own society. Jesus, in the face of escalating violence,
Let us escalate love
Jesus, you wept over Jerusalem where the forces of domination were everywhere, and you weep today over the escalating domination—all the "isms"—in our own society and world. Jesus, in the face of escalating violence,
Let us escalate love
Discussion
Ask the students the following questions:
* Why did Jesus weep over Jerusalem?
* What were some of the forms of violence about which Jesus was so upset that he wept? (see the Litany)
* What future did Jesus see for Jerusalem if the people didn't repent from their violent ways?
* What would Jesus weep over in today's world?
* What is a strategy for you to repent from evil and be a person of peace?
* How can your individual strategy apply to larger issues of war and peace taking place in the world today?
Final Scripture Reflection
Read aloud the conclusion of Luke 19:43-44:
" . . . but now it is hidden from your eyes. For the days are coming upon you when your enemies will raise a palisade against you; they will encircle you and hem you in on all sides. They will smash you to the ground and your children within you because you did not recognize the time of your visitation."
Listed below are three short New Testament Scripture activities that can enrich Scripture or faith synthesis courses. These activities are taken from Our Catholic Faith: Living What We Believe.Have the students look up the following places where Jesus is called "Lord":
Matthew 8:5-9 (healing the centurion's servant)
Matthew 8:23-27 (calming the storm)
Matthew 9:27-29 (healing two blind men)
Matthew 14:25-33 (walking on water)
John 20: 11-18 (appearance of Mary of Magdala)
John 20: 24-29 (appearance to Thomas and the others)
Ask: In each case, do you think the person addressing Jesus uses "Lord" in the sense of a person of rank or earth authority, or are they recognizing Jesus' divinity.Have the students develop journal entries or illustrations for each station of the cross. Provide the following Scripture references:Jesus prays in the garden. (Mt 26:36-45; Mk 14:32-41; Lk 22:39-46)Jesus is betrayed and arrested. (Mt 26:47-56; Mk 14:43-52; Lk 22:47-53; Jn 18:1-14)Jesus is condemned by the Sanhedrin. ( Mt 26:57-68; Mk 14:53-64; Lk 22:66-71; Jn 18:19-24)Peter denies knowing Jesus. ( Mt 26:69-75; Mk 14:66-72; Lk 22:54-621; Jn 18:115-18, 25-27)Jesus is condemned by Pilate ( Mt 27:11-26 Mk 15:1-15; Lk 23:1-5; Jn 18:33-40, 19:13-16Jesus is scourged and crowed with thorns. (Mt 27:27-31; Mk 15:16-19; Jn 19:1-3)Jesus takes up his cross. (Jn 19:16b-17)Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus (Mt 27:32; Mk 15:21; Lk 23:26)Jesus meets the weeping women. (Lk 23:27-31)Jesus is crucified. (Mt 27:33-37; Mk 15:22-26; Lk 23:33; Jn 19:18-19)Jesus promises paradise to the crucified thief. (Lk 23: 39-43)Jesus cares for his mother. (Jn 19:25-27)Jesus dies. (Mt 27:45-50; Mk 15:33-37; Lk 23:44-46; Jn 19:28-30)Jesus is buried. (Mt 27:57-61; Mk 15: 42-47; Lk 23:50-53; Jn 19:38-42)Teach the students a simple way to remember the books of the New Testament by having them memorize the following poem. To extend the activity, have them either set this poem to music or develop their own simiilar mnemonic device.Matthew, Mark, plus Luke and JohnTell the story of our Savior,While the Acts of the ApostlesShow our early Church behavior.Paul wrote letters to the churchesThat he founded: one to Rome,Two were written to the folksWho claimed Corinth as their home.Then he wrote six more epistles;Galatians, Ephesians were his next.Philippians, Colassians followed after.The Thessalonaians got two texts.Paul had friends he loved to talk with,Friends like Timothy and Titus.Philemon he wrote to briefly,Then the Hebrews begged him, "Write us!"Others preachd of God's KingdomAlso wrote of God above:James wrote once, and Peter twice,But John three times said, "God is love!"Jude wrote also of the KingdomAnd the need to know God's Son.Last of all John's Revelation,And with that our list is done.
As part of an annual in-service day at Notre Dame, several high school theology teachers offered lesson plans to share. Presented below is the third of a series of lessons that will be offered from time to time on the Engaging Faith blog.
Adapted from a lesson
By Kat Morris
Chaminade-Julienne Catholic High School
Dayton, OH
Objectives
The students will be able to:
• define freedom and explain our Christian call to form our conscience and choose the most loving decision in a given situation.
• explain the responsibility that comes with freedom.
• recognize the authority of conscience.
Activities
(to be completed on a block day with a 90-minute period or over two days with 45-minute periods)
Freedom Simulation and Discussion
• Write on the board: “What is freedom?”
• Post signs around the room with this question printed on them.
Activity Stations
Set up five activity stations around the room as follows:
1. A TV monitor where the last 30 minutes of the film The Mission is playing.
2. A TV monitor where the last 30 minutes of the film The Shawshank Redemption is playing.
3. A CD player or something similar where the song Cry Freedom by Dave Matthews is playing
4. Desktop computers with instructions to do a Google search for the question “What is Freedom?
5. An area where several quotations on freedom are displayed. For example:
• “Freedom is nothing else but a chance to be better”—Albert Camus
• “History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or timid.”—Dwight D. Eisenhower
• “Freedom is like taking a bath—you have to keep doing it every day.”—Florynce Kennedy
• The average man doesn’t want to be free. He simply wants to be safe.”—H.L. Mencken
Put a “Do Not Disturb” placard on your desk and sit there without interacting with the students. Give the students “freedom” for the first 30-45 minutes of the class period to explore the stations, use the materials provided and work on a definition of freedom. If they “choose” to do nothing, let them be. The simulation is to see what they will do without teacher direction
Process the Activity
As possible, have the students arrange their chairs in a circle. Lead a discussion on the activity that just took place. Ask:
• What was the point of this activity?
• What did the activity teach you about freedom? (Discuss specifically each of the activity stations.)
• How were you free in this activity?
• What did you choose to do?
• Why did you make this decision?
• Was your freedom limited in any way?
• What limits people’s freedom?
Follow-up
Offer a definition of freedom:
“Freedom is the ability to make choices. As Catholic Christians we are called to choose the most loving thing in a given situation. We form our conscience to help us grow closer to the objective Truth and understand what is the most loving option. We must support our ability to choose and ensure that all others have the right to choose as well.
Have the students write their answers to the following questions:
• How does the Church promote freedom?
• How are we obliged to follow our conscience?
• How did you feel about this simulation activity?
February 14 is a greeting card holiday of "love" associated with a Christian saint, St. Valentine. How this connection was ever made is the subject of many questionable tales and lore.First of all, there are many St. Valentines and two are mentioned as being martyred for their faith on this date. One Valentine died in Rome, the other about sixty miles from Rome in Interamna. There is little information about either man's life, though tradition has it that the Roman Valentine was a priest who was persecuted by the emperor Claudius the Goth in about the year 269.More interesting is how this day became a day of courtship and romance, eventually marked by the exchanging of love notes or "Valentines." English literature mentions that around the "time of St. Valentine's Day" birds began to pair, the first sign of spring.The occasion is a good time in the school year to help the students take stock of their own friendships, sexual feelings, and the true meaning of love. So often teenagers confuse infatuation with love. Infatuation describes any kind of relationship that includes sexual attraction or sexual feelings. A person can be infatuated with many different people, including people he or she doesn't even know well or know at all. Infatuations come and go.Love is different. Love is a feeling that is long-lasting. It involves other feelings like commitment, compassion, care, truest, respect, and sacrifice. Most teenagers will already know this because they have been loved and have loved others, especially their parents and other family members.Romantic love combines the sexual feelings associated with infatuation with the deep and true commitment for another that can happen only after a person really gets to know another person well.Everyone—adults, teens, and children alike—can enjoy sending cards and notes to special friends and people they care about on Valentine's Day. They should just make sure that the notes and messages they send honestly express what they want to say and what they believe.Finally, encourage your students to think about sending a card or note to someone they know who might not otherwise get a Valentine. Also, this is the perfect holiday to express love for teens to express love for people who really do love them: parents, grandparents, brothers, and sisters.Additional LessonsPresent a more detailed lesson on the Church's teaching on sexuality and committed romantic love in the context of marriage. Two resources that can offer support are Sex and the Teenager: Choices and Decisions and Marriage and Holy Orders: Your Call to Love and Serve.Discuss how of the virtues of faith, hope, and love, only love remains unto eternity. Readand share 1 Corinthians 13:1–13.Using a biography on the lives of saints, present any other information or folklore on St. Valentine.Discussion Questions1. What is your favorite Valentine card you have ever received or given?2. Infatuations come and go. Cite an example from your own life or the life of someone you know that supports this statement.3. Why do you think true love always includes lasting commitment?Project Idea Divide the participants into small groups of four or five. Have them write letters of affirmation to each person in their group, addressing them by name and affirming their talents and gifts.
February 12 marks the 199th anniversary of the birth of Abraham Lincoln, the sixteenth President of the United States. The following speech is from Lincoln's second inaugural address. It is quoted here to encourage possible discussion on several different points:
The speech was given just months before the end of the Civil War. Encourage your students to note that Lincoln was not trumpeting the triumph of the Union in the war as much as he lamented the destruction the war had caused to both sides.
Nevertheless, have the students cite the President's strong words condemning the practice of slavery.
Finally, point out Lincoln's call to reliance on God's Providence, especially as the nation was about to undertake its Reconstruction.
Fellow Countrymen:At this second appearing to take the oath of the Presidential office there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first. Then a statement somewhat in detail of a course to be pursued seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the expiration of four years, during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, little that is new could be presented. The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well known to the public as to myself, and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it is ventured.On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it, all sought to avert it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war—seeking to dissolve the Union and divide effects by negotiation. Both parties deprecated war, but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish, and the war came.One-eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war. To strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the Union even by war, while the Government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with or even before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. 'Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh.' If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said 'the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether'.With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan—to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.
Additional Lessons
Research Abraham Lincoln's practice and views on organized religion.
Write a prayer for the unity of our nation today and for peace worldwide. Draw on some of the words of Lincoln.
Peruse other speeches of Abraham Lincoln for references to God and Divine Providence.
