AMDG
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| Mike Aquilina
Crucial
to the success of our Men's Conference at St. Stephen’s Church in Caldwell off
of Exit 25 on I-77 on Saturday March 3, 2018 from 9 am to 4 pm is the Parish
Representative. The theme is “Being
a Cloud of Witnesses” (Hebrews 12:1) with St. Joseph, model of a true man of God, as the Conference’s
patron.
To complement the Mass presided by Bishop Monforton and the Penance Service, the featured speaker is Mike Aquilina, nationally known expert on the early
Church, author of over 50 books, and speaker.
His morning talk is titled “The Strength of Heaven”, which will show how
the angels were effective witnesses and can teach us much to apply to our daily
lives. In the afternoon, he will show
how the witness of the martyrs of the early Church can teach us to be witnesses
today in secular America. Mike Aquilina
will challenge the men to follow the example of the early Church Fathers and
martyrs and be effective witnesses in their homes, in their parishes, on the
job, and in their communities.
Drawing from his diverse experience as a
journalist, prolific author, conference speaker, and father of a family of six
children, Mr. Aquilina can speak to the needs of the men. This
background puts Mike Aquilina in a position to speak on the theme of this
year’s Diocese of Steubenville Men’s Conference, “Being a Cloud of
Witnesses”. That is through the power
of faith rise up to be the spiritual leaders of their families, to do their
part in renewing their parishes, be servant leaders in the community, and to
make a difference for Christ by applying the social teachings of the Church to
their professions.
If we can mobilize an average of 10
men from every parish in the diocese, this event would be a smashing
success! This is a hard sell for many
men, but the Lord will help us.
This is evangelization at its best
as we complete our God given mission in little ways in fulfilling Christ's
command to teach all nations. The priests
and religious cannot do it alone; we must help them and do our part, especially
considering the scarcity of vocations.
Evangelization today is more important than ever before, considering the
crisis that Christianity is in all over the world.......drifting and fallen
away Catholics, broken families, laxity in practice, poor knowledge of the
faith, the international spiritual/cultural war with secularism, and the
multitude of evils that our society must confront. Our country desperately needs a revival. Why not start in your parish with the
Diocesan Men's Conference and be on the front line as the Lord's
instrument? Don't just keep the faith;
spread it.......in little or big ways by prayer and example, word and deed.
You might want to consider the
promotion ideas below and then adapt them to your own personality and parish
culture. It and many other promotional
resources as well as articles on men’s spirituality are on our Men’s Conference
Blog at http://diosteubmen.blogspot.com.
· Word of Mouth is the most effective
form of advertising. This is especially
true in parishes since many go over the bulletin quickly with little thought or
simply put it aside for later and don't read it at all. You could get others in the parish to help
through an informal committee or simply enlist the help of friends. You may want to try to talk to every man in the parish one-on-one
with a little sales pitch and record their answer as: yes, no, or maybe. I'm getting mostly maybe's but that gives me
an appropriate excuse to ask them again.
Of course, be careful not to badger them, which I sometimes do without
realizing it. Ask the local K of C to
help & mobilize their men to attend.
After the initial conversation, give them a copy of the tri-fold
brochure to keep as a reminder.
They probably don’t even know where the bulletin insert is.
· Ask the Men to bring their teenage sons, thus making it a father
and son day as well for stronger bonding.
· Inform the men of the objectives and what
they can gain from the Men's Day of Renewal. The
goal of the Men's Day of Renewal is to focus on the spiritual development of
the men of our diocese. Having spiritually strong men of faith and character
translates into more solid families, more dynamic parishes, and better
communities. These are crucial to the Church, now and in the future, not to
mention the critical need of nurturing vocations. Hopefully, the men will become closer to God,
learn more about their faith with a deeper understanding and thus become
stronger Catholics. Life will then
become happier and more meaningful with purpose. It will be a day of enjoyable fellowship and
spiritual invigoration.
· Challenge the Men without rubbing them
the wrong way. The Lord's kingdom on earth
direly needs a few good spiritually strong men and too many of us are failing
in our special missions. Too
many of us are spiritual wimps and this conference attempts to attack that
problem. We have to be the pillars of
the parish, not only the older women. We
as fathers must take the spiritual lead in our families, in that way insuring
that our children will be faithful in their adult years. If only the mother takes the spiritual lead,
the probability of faithfulness in later life is about 40%. If the father takes the spiritual lead, that
probability increases to about 80%. This
conference will help to prepare us to fill that role more effectively by
becoming better husbands and fathers.
Hopefully, many men will leave the conference on fire to renew their
families and parishes. As a natural
consequence they will be better prepared to put Christ into their professions
and renew society in a small way one person at a time.
· Ask the pastor to announce the conference from the pulpit &
for weekly blurbs in the Church bulletin. These of course are
important, but it's the conventional way.
We need creative methods of promoting this important event.
· Ask the pastor to include in the Offertory Petitions……..that the
Conference will set the men on fire; that that it inspire the men to become
true men of God and the spiritual leaders in their families, to renew their
parishes, and to put Christ into their professions.
· Creatively use your
parish bulletin according to the wishes of your pastor with a short catchy
blurb every week during the six to eight weeks before the event. I have a collection of short blurbs that you
can use as is or as a starting point and adapt to your parish culture and
situation. If interested, please write
me at paulrsebastian@yahoo.com
or call me at 740-245-9404 if you have any questions. I'll be happy to send these blurbs to you by
e-mail or snail mail.
· Make copies of our trifold brochure that describes the Men's Conference
and includes the registration form. Use
it as a bulletin insert and put it on the parish website. You can also put in a more detailed write-up
with the registration form on the back as a bulletin insert. Then the men can personally give you the
registration form without your having to go after them. You can also adapt it. One year Fr. Wayne Morris of Corpus Christi,
Belle Valley and St. Stephen's of Caldwell, for example, creatively adapted the
official diocesan trifold to the needs of his parish without losing any
essential information and thus made it into his own parish publication in
color.
· Register
the men personally and submit the forms and money to the diocese all at
once. In that way you have better
control and know who is going and who isn't.
That makes follow-up and organizing car pools much easier. Most men
won't want to bother with sending the form and check to the diocese and many
would put it off. Waiting to register at
the door makes steering committee planning more difficult. If they pay in advance, it will be much more
difficult to back out with last minute inertia.
· Help those who cannot afford the $25 registration. Ask the pastor, the local Knights of Columbus
council, parish women's group, or other donors to provide some funding for
unemployed men and college students who may have financial problems. Economic circumstance should not prevent
any man from attending.
· Use a bus or organize car pools, preferably vans to reduce fuel
costs. Even better if the distance is
great; that gives a pilgrimage atmosphere!
The great benefit of this is fellowship which is another
selling point, especially if the distance and travel time is great. Distance gives a pilgrimage flavor and
sacrifice is what Lent is all about. In
the Middle Ages, people used to walk great distances to holy sites. The men can have a great time while having a
spiritually invigorating spiritual experience.
The enthusiasm generated by the conference can be contagious. This can result in greater friendships and a
more cohesive parish community. The local chapter of the Knights of Columbus
could also benefit through one-on-one opportunities to recruit new
members. The fellowship among their
members at the conference could strengthen their councils.
· Ask for the pastor's help and bring him along. We'll need confessors. His example is a big help! It will be a great opportunity for him to
know his men better and become closer to them as cohesion of the parish family
grows.
· Ask the pastor to allow you or another person to talk about
the conference at the end of the weekend Masses. A peer, whom the men respect, especially if
he attended before, can be more effective than the pastor whom people hear
promoting something all the time. Then
inform them that the brochure with the registration form is in the back of the
church.
· Enlist the help of those who attended a previous Diocesan Men's
Conference. They can relate the
experience by word of mouth, to their local Knights of Columbus council, other
men's groups, or with the pastor's approval speak at the end of Sunday
Mass as to how much they got out of it,
how much they enjoyed it. Personal
testimony makes our promotion much more authentic. Donations to help underwrite
the conference are most appreciated.
· Utilize the Power of the Woman. Perhaps discretely ask the women of the
parish through their parish group to lovingly encourage (not nag) their men to
attend......husbands, sons, fathers, relatives, friends. What woman would not like to have her men be
true men of God who would transform their families, the parish, and ultimately
society?
· Use the Social
Media (Facebook, Twitter) and the old fashioned telephone, both voice and texting to contact the men, one on one.
· Ask for prayers to God and to St. Joseph for his intercession for the
success of the men’s conference, arguably the best model in history of a
true man of God. We cannot succeed by
ourselves with our efforts alone.
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St. Joseph, model of a true man of God, pray for us and for the success of the Men's Conference.
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