Excerpts from James Kroeger’s “The Parish: A Community of Missionary Disciples”

We seek to answer the basic questions: How can our parishes embody and concretize Pope Francis’ call for the missionary renewal of the entire Church? How does the parish become an agent of missionary evangelization?

First, evangelization requires a comprehensive vision. Christian presence and witness to life, i.e., living in harmony, living lives of integrity, fulfilling community duties, etc., by ordinary parish members is a primal, concrete and practical means of effective evangelization; in this way, the Good News is taken to the highways and byways of daily human activity. Living as good neighbors naturally means a commitment to social development and human liberation, e.g., serving the most unfortunate, witnessing to justice, peace building, promoting education and good health, advocating good governance, addressing social problems. Aside from living the faith, there is still the traditional role of explicit Gospel proclamation and catechesis. This includes preaching, catechesis on Christian life, teaching the content of the faith – in a nutshell, “telling the Jesus story”. The issue is finding out the various groups that are not being reached by the current parish evangelization programs. Finally, evangelization includes a liturgical life of faith, prayer and contemplation. Holy men and women who are on fire with love of Christ is a non negotiable condition for evangelizers.

There is now a new view of evangelization. Previously when evangelization was linked to explicit Gospel proclamation and sacramental life, laity found it difficult to define how they fit into the mission. Today, Catholic evangelization engages the entire church and all states of life, whether lay, religious, ordained, married, single. Fr. Kroeger then presents a long list of concrete initiatives that a parish could select from and implement to foster its growth as a ‘missionary parish’. He encourages the local parish community to add activities and initiatives that will transform them into a ‘missionary parish’ and an ‘evangelizing community’.

• Develop and sustain continuing programs of “faith formation”.
• Train the lay leaders, catechists and dedicated youth on how to evangelize effectively and invest in evangelization resources and materials.
• Promote a culture of “vocations” where, through homilies and ministry formation, parishioners are encouraged to view themselves as missionary disciples called by God to either holy marriage, the priesthood, or religious life.
• Foster a reverent sacramental parish life, with emphasis on the Eucharist and Eucharistic Adoration.
• Encourage regular charitable and social outreach activities so that parishioners, in the role of missionary disciples, can get engaged and serve the needy.
• Consider forming “discipleship circles” where members love one another as brothers and sisters in Christ, whether these be bible study groups, charismatic prayer gatherings, outreach social action teams, etc.
• Encourage the growth of the BEC movement in the parish
• Get as many laity involved, in as many kinds of leadership roles and services, e.g., lay leaders, catechists, youth evangelizers, etc.
• Survey the most pressing needs of the various groups that make up the parish – and don’t limit the survey to Christians. Then based on the findings initiate ‘reach-out’ teams to help address the identified pressing social needs.
• Search for practical ways to foster neighborly relationships with followers of non-Catholic faith communities in the parish and perhaps undertake partnerships for outreach projects.

Actively seek to make the parish a ‘joyful, welcoming and friendly community. Joyful evangelizers get their message heard.