Start here.
I have written here since 2010 on evangelization, parish life, Scripture, apologetics, and the moral life. These six are the best place to begin.
Go Home and Live as Missionary Disciples
If your faith feels humdrum, you may not have entered the mission yet. A talk to men on what that asks of you.
Formed By Distraction
Eliot described minds pulled from one distraction to the next. We now carry that in our pockets. What is it forming in us?
What Is a Catholic?
A plain answer: who belongs to the Church Christ founded on the Apostles, and what holds that Church together.
Why You Need Your Men’s Group
Before asking whether men’s groups work, ask what problem they are meant to solve.
Why Protestants Are Becoming Catholic at My Parish
What draws evangelicals and mainline Protestants into the Catholic Church, as they told me in class.
How God Speaks in Human Words
The first of four articles on how the Bible is at once a human book and the Word of God.
why rage? we follow the Crucified.
Who raged when Christ was hauled away to be crucified, a monstrous death for an innocent man? Who fought back against it, against the injustice?
It was Peter with his sword, and it was Christ who disarmed him. Not only did Christ disarm Peter, but he went further and healed the man Peter attacked. Uncomprehending, the apostles scattered, and Jesus was led away in chains.
As long as Christians think with the logic of the world and not the theo-logic of God, we too will be uncomprehending. We too will raise the sword in defense of our rights. And we too will miss the point the Crucified One died showing us.
Examination of Conscience Using the Beatitudes
I lead a retreat for middle school students and formulated a way to do an examination of conscience based upon the Beatitudes. One of the things that I try to do here at LayEvangelist.com is to renew moral theology. What better way to stand on the ground of the Beatitudes in a truly Christian morality than to prepare the soul for Confession.
THE BEATITUDES EXAMEN
1. “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
Does my desire for poverty of spirit match my lifestyle?
When I pray, do I only ask God for things, instead of for a closer relationship with Him?
Do I contribute my time, talent and money to the poor of the world? Or to myself?
Like a Farmer, Cultivate Prayer
Developing a prayer life that is personal, intimate, and powerful takes time and attention. In fact, anything worth having in this world takes time and attention. Like a farmer approaching new, wild land, the soil of our hearts and minds must be cultivated for prayer to bear fruit.
There is a lot of effort on the farmers part to prepare for growth. The rocks must be removed. The trees felled, and roots burnt up. The soil must be tilled, broken, and irrigated. Fertilizer needs to be spread, pests fought, and then the seeds are sown.
Retreat Insights - Theme and Tone
So I figured that I have directed, wrote, and/or contributed to at least 50 retreats in the last six years. Some of those retreats were my own babies from top to bottom, and some were those where I was just plugged in to the speaking role of someone else's baby. To say that I love retreats is an understatement. Retreats are beautiful opportunities to tell the world to shut up so that God's voice can resound in your heart.
I like to tell the teens or young adults that a retreat is a unique time to withdraw from the world in order to hear more clearly three voices: God's voice, your own voice, and the devil's. Too often we confuse the three (usually I think I'm God).
Here are a collection of insights that I came up with for retreat making that I think are pretty important. And most of these are for high school students, which is the majority of retreats that I do. I will post on a variety of topics to keep the blog posts a little bit shorter for your consuming pleasure.