The Making Disciples Today Blog has reflections to help you grow in your journey of missionary discipleship, reviews on recommended Catholic evangelization resources, and practical insight on how to evangelize in your daily life.
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Diocese honors apostolates, retreat movements at Jubilee Mass April 8
OSHKOSH — Kristin Bird and her Burning Hearts Disciples are companions on the journey with those looking to renew or deepen their faith. “It’s the model that Jesus did,” said Bird, founder of Burning Hearts Disciples. “We walk with people.”
Kristin Bird, a member of Most Blessed Sacrament Parish in Oshkosh, is founder of Burning Hearts Disciples. The nonprofit apostolate was formed to “further the Catholic Church’s call to form disciples through the New Evangelization.” (Brad Birkholz | For The Compass)
This apostolate ministry will be one of many recognized at the April 8 Jubilee Mass at St. Francis Xavier Cathedral, Green Bay. Each month during 2018, the diocese marks the 150th anniversary of the diocese with a special themed celebration. April’s focus is Diocesan Apostolates and Retreat Movements.
Bird started Burning Hearts Disciples nearly four years ago with the help of her newly-retired parents, Steve and Maureen Anderson, and donors who promised funding for two years.
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When the Gospel becomes Assumed. The kergyma for Catholics who already know the faith, but have stopped announcing Jesus.
When the Gospel Becomes Assumed
What happens when Jesus is implied instead of named – and what it costs the people we're trying to reach.
Most of us didn't get into ministry to manage calendars. We came because something happened – a retreat, a conversation, a moment when Jesus felt undeniably real – and we wanted other people to find that.
Somewhere between that moment and this Tuesday's staff meeting, the Gospel can start to drift.
Not because anyone rejected it. Because we assumed it was already there.
Most Catholics don’t reject the Gospel. We just stop saying it out loud.
We keep the language and the sacraments. We keep the parish calendar moving. And somewhere along the way, Jesus becomes implied instead of named.
We assume people already know Him. They don’t.
The Catholic trap: familiar words, fuzzy proclamation
I’ve sat in parish staff meetings where everyone around the table was faithful, generous, and exhausted. When I asked a simple question – “How would you explain why someone needs Jesus?” – the room went quiet.
Not hostile. Not resistant. Just unsure.
What came next were good things: references to Mass, community, values, raising good kids, being Catholic in a complicated world. All true. None of it was the Gospel.
People are often far more moved by hearing how Jesus has actually changed someone's life than by abstract religious language alone.
The kerygma isn't a program or a framework. It's a proclamation. When we can't say that plainly, everything downstream gets heavier
The kerygma is the core proclamation of the Gospel: who Jesus Christ is, what He has done for us, and the invitation to respond to Him.
In Catholic life, the core message can fade into the background. Homilies turn into Bible studies. Religious ed can get focused on 'Jesus in the Eucharist' but miss 'Jesus is speaking to you.' Vocations efforts focus on young people "answering God's call in their life," but fail to take the time to help young people see, hear, and recognize Jesus speaking to them consistently.
Jesus is always present, but we find ourselves rarely naming Him. We talk about faith, Church teaching, prayer, service, and the sacraments, but we often skip the moment where we actually announce what God has done in Jesus Christ and invite people to respond to Him.
When the Gospel becomes assumed, we start acting like event planners. We manage and maintain. We avoid the clear proclamation of the one message that actually matters. Discipleship goes soft. Evangelization gets awkward.
How the kerygma gets replaced (without anyone noticing)
This isn't rebellion or defiance. It's a slow drift toward what's more comfortable, easier to measure, and less messy.
- Moral instruction replaces proclamation. Formation nights where every takeaway was about becoming a better Catholic spouse, parent, or volunteer. All good things. But by the end of the evening nobody had actually talked about what Jesus had done for us.
- Parish activity replaces encounter. One parish leader told me, "We have more programs than we've ever had, but fewer people are talking about Jesus than when I started twenty years ago."
- Sacramental preparation becomes a checklist. Parents who can tell you every requirement for Confirmation but can't answer why a person needs the Holy Spirit in the first place.
- Catechesis replaces the first announcement. We often assume people need more information when what they really need is an invitation to respond to the Gospel.
I once heard a well-meaning catechist say, “We don't need all that fluffy, 'Jesus loves you' stuff. These kids just need to know the Truth.” As if the Truth is a concept rather than a Person.
But I’ve also seen what happens when we keep the kerygma at the front and center.
My husband wasn’t Catholic when we got married. He was a powerlifting coach. The parish I worked for happened to have a pastor who was curious about lifting and asked Tony if he’d meet him at the gym to give him some pointers.
So they met there. Not in an office. Not in a classroom. At the gym.
Plates clanging. Chalk dust. Loud music. Short conversations between sets.
Over time, that relationship gave my husband enough trust to start asking questions about the Catholic faith – not because he was being “formed,” but because he felt safe.
Father didn't immeidately direct him to a class. He met Tony where he already was. He named Jesus clearly. And instead of funneling him into a program, he walked with him one-on-one through the RCIA book until he was actually ready for the sacraments.
The difference wasn’t content. It was timing and the refusal to assume faith had already taken root.
What that pastor did has a name: accompaniment. He didn't funnel him into a program – he walked with him until he was actually ready. The kerygma was present the whole time, but it was carried inside a relationship, not dropped on top of one. That’s often how testimony works too — not as performance, but as witness shared inside real relationship.
That's the sequence that tends to work. Presence →Trust → Proclamation → Response
When we skip steps – or assume they've already happened – we get a different story.
One middle-aged dad I know had been Catholic his whole life. He still went to Mass occasionally and he knew the language. After a profound experience at his daughter's First Communion, he realized he had been feeling empty and wanted to try again. But the only thing the parish knew how to offer him was an RCIA class that met weekly and studied the Catechism.
He was embarrassed every time the other people in his group were surprised at something he didn't know, and felt like he didn't belong whenever they discussed things he was already familiar with. So, he ended up walking away and going back to occasionally going to Mass with a vague feeling like something is missing.
If someone asked you right now, “Why does a person need Jesus?” what would you say — in one sentence?
Then another dad invited him to join a short term men's group. When they met, the men focused on who Jesus was and how He was working in their lives. They shared about the difference Jesus had made and was making in their lives. The conversations of that small group didn't solve everything, but they gave him a doorway he could actually walk through.
What changes when the kerygma is unclear
- Faith becomes abstract. I've met parish leaders who can explain transubstantiation in detail but struggle when asked, "What has Jesus actually done in your life?"
- Leaders default to management. In one parish meeting I attended, we spent forty minutes discussing easel checkout procedures and never once talked about who needed to encounter Christ.
- People stall at the same threshold. Again and again I've met people who knew Church teaching, volunteered generously, and loved their parish, but had never been personally invited to respond to Jesus and follow Him as a disciple.
This last one is worth sitting with. Discipleship stalls not because people aren't trying – but because the invitation to begin was never clear. What looks like a formation problem is often a proclamation problem wearing a formation problem's clothes.
I’ve watched parish leaders pour years into formation only to realize they were building on an unspoken assumption of faith. No clear invitation. No decision point. No moment where Jesus was actually named as Savior and Lord.
Quick self-check for Catholic leaders
- Could your leadership team proclaim the Gospel clearly in one minute — without notes?
- Do your formation settings explicitly name Jesus, the Cross, the Resurrection, and a personal response?
- When someone asks “Why do I need Jesus?”, do you answer with clarity — or Catholic trivia?
- Ask your team: “How would we proclaim the Gospel to someone who knows nothing?”
- Notice where you get vague. That’s your work.
- Pick one moment this week to name Jesus clearly and invite a response.
Why this matters now
Catholic leaders are tired. Parishes are stretched. Most of what we’re tempted to do next is just more weight.
A few years ago, after yet another planning meeting, a parish leader said to me, "We're doing more than ever, but it feels like we're pushing a boulder uphill." I think many leaders recognize that feeling.
Another series. Another push. Another initiative we hope will finally move the needle.
Sometimes the problem isn't effort. Sometimes it's that we've stopped naming the reason for all of it.
When Jesus is assumed instead of named, everything else gets heavier. We compensate with activity. We manage decline. We fill calendars. And quietly, the Gospel becomes one more thing we orbit instead of the center we return to.
Clarity is lighter.
Naming Jesus out loud. Saying what He has done. Asking for a response. Not everywhere. Not all at once. But somewhere real – one meeting, one conversation, one moment where you don't let the assumption stand in for the announcement.
You don't need to do more. You need to name Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, say what He has done for us, and explicitly invite a response – instead of hoping people connect the dots.
If you're not sure you could say it clearly right now: Spend some time with the Kerygma Hub and sit with it. Not as a resource to skim – as a place to steady your own proclamation before you ask anyone else to make one.
If your parish has the language but not the movement: It might not be a formation problem. Why Mission Stalls might be the more honest next read.
If you're walking with someone where trust has to come before proclamation: Accompaniment in Action shows what that looks like in practice – not as a method, but as a posture.
If you want to examine yourself: The Examination of Conscience for Evangelizers isn't a checklist. Pick one section and pray it honestly before you do anything else.
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Life makes many demands on today’s families, and lives are often full and hectic. Finding the time for prayer can seem difficult - especially if you aren’t sure where to begin or how to pray as a family.
Prayer is a Gift
One reason many of us don't pray more often or more consistently is because we have questions and uncertainties about prayer. We worry that we’re doing it wrong or that it’s not really working. One of the best ways to combat the neutralizing effect this doubt can have on your prayer life is to remember that prayer is a gift.
“[Prayer] is not what we do but what God does in us, how God loves us, addresses us, looks at us, enlightens us, forgives us, heals us, purifies us and eventually transforms us.” Dominican Nuns Ireland Family Day Address (www.dominicannuns.ie)
God is constantly seeking us. Like the father who daily scanned the horizon for his prodigal son, God waits patiently for us. Prayer is the gift, given to us by God, to respond to His call and to seek him in return. Every moment of prayer begins, not with us, but with God’s call to us - the desire for union with him that he has placed deep within our hearts.
Our prayer is a response to that call. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church says,
“Prayer is both a gift of grace and a determined response on our part. It always presupposes effort” (2725).
Make an Intentional Plan
John Piper, in his book Desiring God, says that a main hindrance to prayer is our lack of planning:
"If you want to take a four-week vacation, you don't just get up one summer morning and say, 'Hey, let's go today!' You won't have anything ready. You won't know where to go. Nothing has been planned."
Take the time to create a plan for your own personal prayer life. It doesn’t have to be rigidly followed, but can serve as a grounding reminder -- a thriving, regular, consistent time of worship of and communion with God in prayer.
Tools to Help
We have developed four tools to help you get started developing your personal prayer routine...
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Accompaniment and Lent
The forty days of Lent can seem like a long time, especially if one is giving up a favorite food or video game. It's helpful to have a friend to keep us going. He or she can encourage us, challenge us, and pick us up if we falter. In fact, that kind of accompaniment - a holy friendship developed out of mutual love for one another and a desire to walk with one another into deeper relationship with Jesus - is the heart of evangelization and discipleship.
This year, consider finding an accompaniment partner and approaching Lent as a team. That doesn't mean you have to give up—or do—the same exact things, although that's a possibility. It does mean sharing your Lenten resolution(s) and asking for each other's prayers and active support. People often find that they're much more likely to keep their resolutions when they hold themselves accountable to another person. Knowing that someone walks with us, even if it's not exactly the same path, can be a great comfort and motivator.
If you're thinking about Lenten resolutions, consider the traditional practices of prayer, fasting and almsgiving (works of charity). Here are some ideas to get started.
