CATECHISTS AND CATECHISMS
INTRODUCTION
The title of my homily is “Catechists and Catechisms.”
Today is the feast of St. Robert Bellarmine, the Patron
Saint of Catechists and Catechisms.”
What are your thoughts on Catechisms - Catechists - Religious
Education Programs - Learning our Faith as Christians and Catholics?
We’re adults mainly at this 12:10 Mass - so this morning
I asked myself what are my thoughts about Catechisms and Catechists - as adults.
Translation: how did I learn the teachings of my faith
and what did I learn?
FIRST APPROACH: USE
GOOGLE
A great adult approach - if you use the internet - is to use
Google for a Catechism Review.
Use Google or any search engine on a computer program.
They usually have that nice clean empty box - in which you can type in a word -
and come up with 100 hits - more or less - and they do that in seconds.
You can type in words like “catechist” or “catechism”.
That will give you lots of leads for other words to type into Google - and
you’ll be learning - by dabbling. Browse.
I typed in “St. Robert Bellarmine”. Instantly I had a life of Robert Bellarmine.
It gave me his dates [1542 - 1621]. I saw where he was born: Montepulciano, Italy, where he lived and
worked and where he died: Rome, Italy. I got background. I got facts. It brought me to questions about faith and
science. It gave me his struggles with Galileo as well as Giordano Bruno. Both were put on trial. Galileo
wasn’t; Bruno was burnt to death.
Check it out on your computer.
So Point # 1 would be to dabble on your computer about
this and that - when it comes to our Catholic Faith and about catechisms and
catechists.
Then you can make a folder and download articles about
catechism and catechists or any topic you wish.
NUMBER #2: A REVIEW OF YOUR CATECHISMS AND YOUR
FAITH
Next make a review of your catechism history
I’m 78 and received my catechism lessons from the
Baltimore Catechism and Catholic school - way back when.
Some of you would be converts and might have received
Catechism from Protestant churches etc.
Some of you went to Catholic Religious Education. We
called it CCD.
What were catechisms like in 1950; what were catechisms like in 1990.
The Baltimore Catechism was a paper back with Questions
and Answers. The next generation had drawings and pictures and images - topics
and chapters.
NUMBER #3” - MY PERSONAL HISTORY OF LEARNING TO BE
A CATECHIST.
I learned my Catholic faith in Catholic schools.
In the seminary we had a 1 year course on catechetic. It
was in our 1st year of theology - the year after we finished
college. During that year we went to local parishes near Kingston, New York and
taught catechism.
The idea was to put into practice what we were learning
from a text book in the seminary.
I have not one idea from that text book - but I have
memories of my first experience teaching little kids on Wednesday afternoons in
Presentation Church, Port Ewen, New York - right overlooking the Hudson River.
My class - maybe 3rd graders was in the choir
loft of the church. Jack Sherlock’s
class was right below us in the body of the church. That’s not a good idea for sound and sight.
My only memory from that year in the choir loft in
Presentation church was standing there teaching little kids and I begin to
notice they are all laughing and looking to their left - my right facing them.
A kid has a broom in his hand and he is reaching out with the broom and pushing
a hanging church light or chandelier back and forth and kids in the choir loft
and the kids down below are watching him and the lamp swinging. It could have
crashed into the choir loft or hit another lamp.
I quickly ran over and stopped him. That’s all I remember
from my first attempt at being a catechist.
After we finished the seminary, we had 4 months in
Annapolis. It was a transition time before our assignments. A Father Joe D’Acetis brought in speakers on
different topics.
We had a Sister Janann - who gave us a week of talks on
teaching kids.
I remember she brought in leaves and sticks, plants and
toys, and went from the known to the unknown. We were to feel water and see
green leaves and autumn leaves.
She was excellent. We learned the use of everyday stuff
as props.
Through the years I’ve heard priests and specialists
complain about how horrible religious ed was for a good 30 years of time. They
said there was a need for a new catechism.
For adults we got the big catechism from John Paul II’s
time.
In the meanwhile Sadlier and other religious ed books and
publications started to come up with
more content driven material.
In the early 1970’s I went for a Master’s Degree in
theology - I have 3 of them. This one was at Princeton Theological Seminary.
I took a course in religious ed and it was one of the
most difficult courses I ever took. Every Monday morning we had to have a book
report on one book. I was working big time in a retreat house so that was very difficult, but I finished that
course - with a C. the only C I got -
all the rest were A’s. I learned the
most at that C course.
Each week about 15 of us would discuss a different
approach to catechetic: sociology, theology, education theory, anthropology, biblical,
etc. etc. etc.
Then there were a couple of thousand classrooms I visited
on parish missions, parish work, etc. etc. etc.
I learned by time and practice.
CONCLUSION
That’s enough. I just ask you to consider your sources of
learning your faith.
The readings at Mass, Homilies, Parish Missions, Catholic
Magazines and on and on certainly helped you.
More.
