The Journey Home: Marcus Grodi with Brandon Vogt

Interview with Tom Peterson – On Catholics Come Home

The following comes from Brandon Vogt's site:

Tom Peterson was a successful, award-winning advertising executive for almost three decades. But in 1997, he experienced a profound conversion at a parish retreat that set him in a new direction. He applied his advertising skills to spreading the Gospel and the result was two new media apostolates.

The first is called VirtueMedia.org, which helps promote the sanctity of life through commercials, websites, and more.

The other is the one Tom is probably best known for,Catholics Come Home. Featuring high-quality television commercials and a beautiful, dynamic website, Catholics Come Home models the New Evangelization. Dioceses and parishes across the world have used their materials to draw thousands of people back to the Church.

Here's one of their more popular commercials:

Here is Brandon's interview with Tom below:

Fr. Robert Barron: To Evangelize the Culture

New Evangelization Presentation by Fr. Robert Barron

The following comes from Aggie Catholics:

1 – Lead With the Beautiful.

Less threatening. We are a beautiful religion. Truth/Goodness make people defensive. You can come to learn to love from beauty. To the goodness of the faith, then to the truth. Look at what Pope Francis is doing by leading with the beauty of a holy life, then lead them to the good and the truth.

2 – Don’t Dumb Down the Message!

Doesn’t help when we keep the faith the one thing that is dumbed down in our society. Evangelize by being clear, articulate, and smart – with the full arsenal of our tradition. A dumbed-down Catholicism will not serve.

3 – We Have to Preach With Ardor!

We need some fire! People only listen to a really excited speaker. Muster up some excitement for the Gospel!  “I don’t think the purpose of Vatican II was to modernize the Church. The purpose of Vatican II was to Christify the world. Was to send us out as light-bearers to the end of the world.” The risen Jesus is the Good News! People don’t die for myths, legends, and literary devices – they do it for a resurrected Jesus! We need to be clear about that.

4 – To Be a Good Evangelist – You Have To Tell The Great Story!

There is a temptation to present a “pure Christianity” without the Old Testament story. This means the story is an abstract version, who is more of a “Gnostic guru”. There is something haywire in presenting Jesus without the Old Testament. He is an Israel. If we forget Israel, we forget who we are. The fulfillment of the story of salvation needs to have the story told from the beginning. Jesus can’t be understood without placing him within the history of Israel and the Messiah that all of Israel has always waited for. He is the new Adam, Moses, Abraham, David, etc. The New Eden is now established in the person of Jesus. If you de-Judaize Jesus, He becomes just another spiritual teacher. Evangelization is a subversive message there is a new King in town!

5 – God does not need us – and He loves us anyway.

Irenaeus understanding of God is perfect - What a great story! "There is no greater humanism possible than orthodox Christianity." His love is perfectly selfless. He is not a rival to us or wanting to get something out of us. He wants us to be “fully alive”. The bush that is on fire, but not consumed, is an image of God coming into man. He never destroys us when He comes into us. He enhances us. Jesus is the burning bush.

6 – We are Made For God.

We are wired to want a relationship with God. Everybody has a hungry heart (to quote Bruce Springsteen). We are all looking for God. We don’t just want truths or goods – we want truth and goodness itself. To evangelize is to tap into that desire. We all sometimes run after false gods, but The Church needs to be the new Elijah who publically and vigorously challenges the priests of the false gods (wealth, pleasure, honor, power). Only in giving yourself away in love is meaning found. The Church is meant to be a light to the world, so we can’t keep it to ourselves.

7 – Use the New Media

 Become very adept at old media of books first. Immerse ourselves and others in the tradition of the Church. But, yes, yes, yes to the new media. We would be horribly derelict if we don’t use the tools we have before us. We can’t allow others to control the world of new media. The majority of those that become atheists are doing so through new media, stats show.

Son of God: A Film Review by Brandon Vogt

Brandon Vogt from Motive Entertainment on Vimeo.
The movie looks impressive and opens on Friday, February 28.  For more on the film "Son of God" please go here.

Brandon Vogt Interview with Msgr. Charles Pope

The following comes from Brandon Vogt:

What if your pastor stood up next Sunday and said he wanted to double the size of the parish within one year? That's exactly what happened at Holy Comforter-St. Cyprian Catholic parish in Washington DC, a predominantly African-American parish. Monsignor Charles Pope made that bold challenge last September and then got to work.

He trained forty parishioners to evangelize door-to-door, had another forty stay at the church and pray, and then asked forty more to cook meals for everyone upon their return. The whole program was a success. They visited more than 1,500 homes and drew many people back to the church.

Msgr. Pope is known for more than his parish work, though. His popular blog at the Archdiocese of Washington website is read across the world and his dynamic preaching inspires countless others.

Msgr. Pope recently sat down with me to talk about blogging, preaching, evangelization, and the unique experiences of serving in an African-American Catholic parish.

Limit Break BMX

Limit Break is a web series about people who do extraordinary things, and how their faith inspires them. In this episode we meet Mike Stanek, a professional BMX rider and medical student. Mike’s tricks are amazing, but even more so when you realize that he is also a full-time medical student. Yet Mike remains humble. Why? It’s because he realizes that it is his faith that has allowed him to accomplish so much. Mike says that he can’t explain everything that happens when he is pulling off a trick. In the same way, he knows his knowledge of science can’t explain all of the world’s mysteries. He turns to his faith to answer these questions. It is through God that he finds the strength to fulfill on the high expectations he has for himself. It’s what motivates him to get back up after a nasty fall, and it’s whom he thanks when he lands a move. Check out his amazing stunts and listen to him discuss how his faith has helped him achieve great things.

From Spirit Juice Studios!

Interview with Dr. Ralph Martin: On the New Evangelization

Fr. Barron comments on CATHOLICISM: The New Evangelization

CATHOLICISM: The New Evangelization

Pope Francis: Social communications is for bringing others to Christ

From Vatican Radio: 

Pope Francis on Saturday addressed the participants in the Plenary Assembly of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications.

Pope Francis said the goal of the Church for its communications efforts is “to understand how to enter into dialogue with the men and women of today in order to appreciate their desires, their doubts and their hopes.”

The Holy Father said we must examine if the communications of the Church are helping others to meet Christ.

“The challenge is to rediscover, through the means of social communication as well as by personal contact, the beauty that is at the heart of our existence and our journey, the beauty of faith and of the encounter with Christ,” he said.

Below is the full text of Pope Francis' remarks

Dear Brothers and Sisters, good morning!

I greet you and I thank you for your work and commitment to the important sector of social communications – but having spoken to Archbishop Celli, I must change “sector” to the important “dimension of life” which is that of social communications. I wish to thank Archbishop Claudio Maria Celli for the greeting that he extended to me on your behalf. I would like to share some thoughts with you.

First of all: the importance of social communications for the Church. This year is the fiftieth anniversary of the Conciliar Decree Inter Mirifica. This anniversary is more than a commemoration; the Decree expresses the Church’s attentiveness towards communication and all its instruments, which are also important in the work of evangelisation. But towards its instruments – communication is not an instrument! It’s something else. In the last few decades, the various means of communication have evolved significantly, but the Church’s concern remains the same, taking on new forms and expressions. The world of social communications, more and more, has become a “living environment” for many, a web where people communicate with each other, expanding the boundaries of their knowledge and relationships (cf. Benedict XVI, Message for the 2013 World Communications Day). I wish to underline these positive aspects, although we are all aware of the limitations and harmful factors which also exist.

In this context – and this is the second reflection – we must ask ourselves: what role should the Church have in terms of its own practical means of communication? In every situation, beyond technological considerations, I believe that the goal is to understand how to enter into dialogue with the men and women of today, in order to appreciate their desires, their doubts, and their hopes. They are men and women who sometimes feel let down by a Christianity that to them appears sterile, struggling precisely to communicate the depth of meaning that faith gives. We do in fact witness today, in the age of globalisation, a growing sense of disorientation and isolation; we see, increasingly, a loss of meaning to life, an inability to connect with a “home”, and a struggle to build meaningful relationships. It is therefore important to know how to dialogue, and how to enter, with discernment, into the environments created by new technologies, into social networks, in such a way as to reveal a presence that listens, converses, and encourages. Do not be afraid to be this presence, expressing your Christian identity as you become citizens of this environment. A Church that follows this path learns how to walk with everybody! And there’s also an ancient rule of the pilgrims, that Saint Ignatius includes, and that’s why I know it! In one of his rules, he says that anyone accompanying a pilgrim must walk at the same pace as the pilgrim, not ahead and not lagging behind. And this is what I mean: a Church that accompanies the journey, that knows how to walk as people walk today. This rule of the pilgrim will help us to inspire things.

The third: it’s a challenge that we all face together in this environment of social communications, and the problem is not principally technological. We must ask ourselves: are we capable of bringing Christ into this area, or rather, of bringing about the encounter with Christ? To walk with the pilgrim through life, but as Jesus walked with the pilgrims of Emmaus, warming their hearts and leading them to the Lord? Are we capable of communicating the face of a Church which can be a “home” to everyone? We talk about the Church behind closed doors. But this is more than a Church with open doors, it’s more! Finding “home” together, building “home”, building the Church. It’s this: building the Church as we walk. A challenge! To lead to the rediscovery, through means of social communication as well as by personal contact, of the beauty which is at the heart of our existence and our journey, the beauty of faith, the beauty of the encounter with Christ. Even in the context of social communications, the Church is required to bring warmth, to warm hearts. Do our presence and plans measure up to this requirement, or do we remain mired in technicalities? We hold a precious treasure that is to be passed on, a treasure that brings light and hope. They are greatly needed. All this, however, requires a careful and thorough formation in this area for priests, for religious men and women, for laity. The great digital continent does not only involve technology, but is made up of real men and women who bring with them what they carry inside, their hopes, their suffering, their concerns, their pursuit of truth, beauty, and good. We need to show and bring Christ to others, sharing these joys and hopes, like Mary, who brought Christ to the hearts of men and women; we need to pass through the clouds of indifference without losing our way; we need to descend into the darkest night without being overcome and disorientated; we need to listen to the illusions of many, without being seduced; we need to share their disappointments, without becoming despondent; to sympathise with those whose lives are falling apart, without losing our own strength and identity (cf. Pope Francis, Address to the Bishops of Brazil, 27 July 2013, n. 4). This is the walk. This is the challenge.

Dear friends, the concern and the presence of the Church in the world of social communications is important in order to dialogue with the men and women of today and bring them to meet Christ, but the encounter with Christ is personal. It cannot be manipulated. In these times we see a great temptation within the Church, which is spiritual harassment: the manipulation of conscience; a theological brainwashing which in the end leads to an encounter with Christ which is purely nominal, not with the Live Person of Christ. In a person’s encounter with Christ, both Christ and the person need to be involved! Not what’s wanted by the “spiritual engineer”, who wants to manipulate people. This is the challenge. To bring about the encounter with Christ in the full knowledge, though, that we ourselves are means of communication, and that the fundamental problem is not the acquisition of the latest technologies, although these are necessary to a valid, contemporary presence. It is necessary to be absolutely clear that the God in whom we believe, who loves all men and women intensely, wants to reveal himself through the means at our disposal, however poor they are, because it is he who is at work, he who transforms, and he who saves us.

Let us all pray that the Lord may warm our hearts and sustain us in the engaging mission of bringing him to the world. I ask you for your prayers, because this is my mission too, and I assure you of my blessing.

Pope Francis called “social media phenomenon”

Hat tip to Deacon Greg on this one!  The following comes from Forbes:

During the tense crisis preceding the U.S. decision to pursue a diplomatic solution in Syria (at least for now), I noticed a strange phenomenon in my Twitter timeline. Sure, there were many anti-war tweets, and plenty of tweeps – on both sides of the political aisle – calling for a tough military response to the Assad regime’s attacks on civilians.

But along with dozens of  retweets from@barackobama to every political view on the spectrum, I noticed one major account that was surprisingly popular, especially with the American left. Pope Francis – or @pontifex to his Twitter followers – has quickly become a social media phenomenon, adding five million followers since his installation six months ago. He is gaining more than 4,000 followers a day and knocking at the door of three million followers for his English language feed alone. He’s got more than eight million total on Twitter, tweeting in Latin, German, Polish, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Italian and Arabic.

Small change, you say, for the 1.2 billion Roman Catholics worldwide? Perhaps in those terms – but I’d have to point out that what matters in social media isn’t just raw numbers, but influence and engagement – including among non-Catholics – and the new Pope has them both.

And social media experts are noticing.

“Though Pope Benedict initiated the Vatican’s use of social media, it is the new Papa that is taking on the mantle of Papal influencer,” says Hart Hooton, president of the New York digital media consultancy Marketechnique [note: an occasional partner of the author's own consulting firm].

“Pope Francis has been doing things his own way, especially on social media: we’ve seen the first Papal ‘selfie’ go viral, the papal Twitter account @Pontifex has risen by over five million followers in the past six months, the Pope’s tweets are retweeted some 22,000 times on average, he’s put news.va onFacebook FB +5.98%, and, even more incredibly, the first Papal promotion has seen the light of day — this Summer the Vatican offered ‘indulgences’ for followers of Papal social media and events online, this translates into time off in purgatory!”

That 22,000 retweets (across all the languages) for every short message the Pope sends out tends to get the social marketers and cause campaigners attention. That’s the kind of engagement with a wide audience of influencers that can help change opinion. Of course, the Pope’s widely reported remarks on gay people and atheists – and even the possibility of priests marrying – have shaken up the public perception of the modern Papacy, no small feat for a 78-year-old Jesuit. Unquestionably, Francis is a rising star on social media – especially among the politically active, social cause crowd.

And the Pope’s own Syrian “intervention” was both widely shared and obviously influential.

Says Hooton: “Other than talking about natural themes of love, hope, faith, Pope Francis has also recently used social media to advocate peace in Syria. Now that’s using social media as a bully pulpit, and it portends new things to come from ‘dot Vatican.’”

My Sister, Mother Teresa: An Interview with Colleen Carroll Campbell

The following comes from Brandon Vogt:

I first discovered Colleen Carroll Campbell through her excellent 2002 book, The New Faithful: Why Young Adults Are Embracing Christian Orthodoxy (Loyola Press). The groundbreaking book examined the growing trend toward religious orthodoxy among today's young people, Catholic and Protestant. I found it well-researched, lucid, and full of important insights.

Yet her latest book, dare I say, is even better. My Sisters the Saints: A Spiritual Memoir (Image Books) weaves her personal narrative of spiritual seeking, trials, stumbles, and breakthroughs with the stories of six women saints who profoundly changed her life: Teresa of Avila, Therese of Lisieux, Faustina of Poland, Edith Stein of Germany, Mary of Nazareth, and Mother Teresa of Calcutta.

The book has received rave endorsements fromCardinal Timothy Dolan ("an engaging spiritual memoir and the perfect guidebook"), Mary Ann Glendon ("this lovely and highly readable book will touch many lives"), and Archbishop Charles Chaput ("a wonderful, engaging personal memoir and a great witness of faith").

Drawing upon the examples of these extraordinary women, Colleen demonstrates the saints' liberating power for women and their continuing relevance today.

Colleen recently sat down with me to discuss one of the six saints in particular, Bl. Teresa of Calcutta, whose feast day is today. In the interview we explore the lessons Bl. Teresa has imparted, her insights on authentic womanhood, and tips on befriending the saints.

A Heart for ‘Evangelizing Through the Media’

The following comes from the NCR:

Colleen Carroll Campbell, an award-winning journalist, host of EWTN’s Faith & Culture show and author of the 2013 Christopher Award-winning memoir My Sisters the Saints, is taking on a new role: anchor of EWTN News Nightly With Colleen Carroll Campbell, which will debut Sept. 3.

She spoke recently with the Register’s associate editor, Amy Smith, about evangelizing through the media, her love of the saints, discernment and balancing motherhood and journalism.

What is the setup of the news program, and who would you like to see as guests?

It is an international nightly newscast — to be broadcast to the entire English-speaking world.

We hope it will have an international focus, as well as focus on national events. Our studio is on Capitol Hill — at the center of the action — so it will have a global and Catholic perspective on the top stories, with commentary and analysis from a Catholic perspective.

We hope it will be a show that encourages an understanding of the day’s events and the big questions of the day.

There is a wide, rich pool of guests in Washington and New York, which is not far, to draw on nightly, so I think we will have a broad roster. I have done 80 shows for Faith & Culture since it started in 2006. A lot of those folks are excellent … I’d like to bring them back. I hope to shine a spotlight on Catholics who are already in the trenches, even in situations where it is difficult to live the truth, experts who can help our viewers make sense of the day’s news.

How should Catholics approach the news?

Catholics should be careful about where they get their information. There are positives and negatives to the changes in today’s media landscape.

The idea of one media establishment — that’s fading way, which is positive. The downside: Sometimes what is called news is not news or no fact-checking or context is given. We’re all drowning in information, but it often lacks context and understanding — and understanding from a Catholic perspective.

Was covering the papal transition and election of Pope Francis in Rome for EWTN this spring good preparation for your news show?

It was a great couple of weeks. No one expected Pope Benedict XVI to resign. Most of us didn’t expect the conclave to progress so quickly or that we would have the first Jesuit, first Latin-American and first Francis as pope — or see someone elected who was counted out by conventional wisdom due to his older age.

It was an exhilarating surprise. It was an honor for me to be able to announce it to EWTN viewers. It was a wonderful way to prepare for the news show.

Has your past work as a speech writer for President George W. Bush and news writing prepared you for broadcast news? Did you think you would end up in broadcast journalism, or did God surprise you?

God is full of surprises. That truth has been a staple of my life and career. I am a print journalist by training, with a liberal arts background at Marquette University, where I focused more on humanities and liberal arts in my education.

I had on-the-ground training in journalism. My first job was at the Memphis Commercial Appeal. Then I worked at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, reporting and then opinion writing. Then I wrote the books and was a White House speech writer.

I see myself primarily as a writer. My TV work grew out of that. It’s Providence at work in my life.

It’s a delight to be able to present the news and the day’s most pressing issues and to help viewers understand the news. In some ways, this newscast is an extension of my work on Faith & Culture. It will be newsy, topical, fast-moving — all in one show.

I do think it’s part of the larger pattern that God has woven into my career and the mission he has called me to: evangelizing through the media — not necessarily always Catholic media, as I have worked in secular media.

It’s the fundamental idea of proclaiming the Good News and Catholic teaching that is close to my heart.

Do you think your book’s appeal is due to the timeless message of the saints?

The feedback I get the most is that readers connect with the stories — my personal story as an entry point into the stories of the saints.

I wrote the book the way that I did to have an entry point to deliver the message of the saints. They are very real: our friends in heaven and models for us in living on earth.

My Sisters the Saints is about how I experienced these wise and holy women and what they taught me about being truly liberated as a woman. My story is, in a sense, an introduction to the wisdom of the saints — their message for our own lives.

The riches of faith and experience of the saints are urgently relevant to our struggles, even if their lives seem worlds away from ours. They remind us to tap into the riches of the faith, and they help us answer timeless questions. I like to say that we stand on the shoulders of the saints, especially in our struggles to see the relevance of the faith to our lives. They can help us when we find ourselves asking a question such as, "How can a mom find a way to be active in public life while not neglecting motherhood and home life?" They remind us that we need to be in the world and not of it. We need to focus on work that uses our gifts while not neglecting our vocation. The saints can teach us a lot.

How did you discern your new work in daily TV news in relationship to your role as a wife and mother to three little ones, a boy and two girls?

It was a discernment process. My top concern was how it would fit into my family’s life. I made that clear from the start. It’s a good schedule; it’s not 9-5. The job has flexibility, since it’s an evening show. I will have the daytime with my children. We have lots of time together, since they’re not in school yet. In so many ways, it has worked out. But it was not an automatic Yes.

In My Sisters the Saints, I share how becoming a mother was a long struggle, so I really appreciate the gift of motherhood and do not take it for granted.

Nothing is more important than following Jesus and raising little souls to heaven and living marriage with love and fidelity. I consider this newscast part of my efforts to build a better world for my children.

The call of God is surprising, in many ways. He likes to upend my plans, but following his plan leads to more freedom and joy. There can be a sense sometimes that "I can’t be called to x, y or z" because of whatever responsibility I may already have, but God has a different, unique call for each of us. I’ve learned not to create rigid rules on what is or isn’t work-life balance. Follow the call of Christ. Have openness to the Holy Spirit, and let God do the leading. Blessings will follow, even when you’re being led to unexpected places, even to a different state.

When it came to discerning this decision to accept the position as anchor of this new newscast, as with all of my major decisions in life, the support and encouragement of my husband, Dr. John Campbell, were crucial. John is my partner in everything, and I’m blessed to have a spouse who is so open to following God’s call, wherever it leads — and so intent on encouraging me to do the same.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that the discernment process for this job was very much a team effort between John and me, not something I did alone. And the move entailed a significant sacrifice for John, a physician, who is leaving his position as chief of geriatrics at a hospital here in St. Louis so we can move to D.C. He recently accepted a new geriatrics position at a hospital in D.C.

We both believed that this was God’s will for our family, and we’re excited about this new chapter in our lives.

But it’s not without its sacrifices, and it is, in some ways, a surprising development. God is full of surprises!

Any final thoughts on discernment or your book on the saints?

That book, in many ways, is relevant to discernment decisions. It takes readers through my 15-year journey and decision points, which were not at all clear at the time. I discerned step by step, speaking with the saints through prayer and seeking God’s will. It was not all black and white. I found that trust in him and attentiveness to God’s will are what bring joy.

From working at the White House while engaged to a medical student 800 miles away to dealing with my father in his struggle with Alzheimer’s disease to dealing with the moral and emotional questions of infertility, I came — with the help of the saints — to decisions that brought peace.

God is faithful if we are truly attentive and yearn to know his will. He eventually makes it clear, but sometimes he asks us to walk in trust. It’s a hard lesson. Learning that has helped me, and I hope my story helps readers.

My Sisters the Saints offers readers a glimpse of how one modern, believing woman struggles to do God’s will in the company of the saints.

Film is ‘how-to’ for Catholics to share Faith

The following comes from the OSV:

Calling all “Catholicism” fans: Father Robert Barron is back on screen starting Sept. 2 with a new 90-minute documentary, “Catholicism: the New Evangelization.”

Father Barron, founder of Word on Fire Ministries and creator of the 10-part “Catholicism” series, uses the film to explore how to put the Church’s call for a new evangelization into action.

Father Barron told Our Sunday Visitor that the documentary is based on Blessed Pope John Paul II’s call for a “new ardor, expression and method” of evangelization in the Church.

A matter of necessity

Through interviews with young, active Catholics as well as notable authors such as George Weigel and Brad Gregory, and New York Times columnist Ross Douthat, Father Barron said the film explores what’s new in the world of Catholic evangelization. It also looks at the factors that have played into creating an increasingly secularized culture, and it outlines specific action steps for Catholics who want to share the Faith with others.

Father Robert Barron with 2011 World Youth Day pilgrims in Madrid. Photos courtesy of Word on Fire Ministries

In a culture that has seen the number of people who do not believe in God triple in recent years, sharing the Faith with others — and doing it well — is not only a challenge, it’s a necessity.

“I think we’ve been exceptionally bad, we Christians, at articulating who God is,” Father Barron said. “(For) the atheists it’s open season. We’ve got to get a lot better at naming that God is not the enemy of humanity, he’s not the rival to us, but is the ground for our own glorification.”

The new series wasn’t planned, Father Barron said, but rather resulted from promoting his “Catholicism” series in Australia, England and the United States. He brought a camera crew to film his talks, and they also filmed what evangelization efforts are happening on the ground in those countries.

Joyful witness

Keys of effective evangelization include leading with the beauty of the Faith and simply being joyful, Father Barron said. In many ways, Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan, New York archbishop, is Father Barron’s shining example of new evangelization in action. With his omnipresent joyful attitude, the cardinal is the “happy warrior.”

Father Robert Barron, founder of Word on Fire Ministries.

“It’s that affirmative orthodoxy approach,” Father Barron said. “You don’t say what we’re against, you say what we’re for, and we’re for allowing the love of God to surge into the world.”

Another example of the power of evangelical joy is Pope Francis himself.

“He has a real feel for how to do basic evangelization,” Father Barron said. “He’s joyful, but he’s a tough guy when he has to be. He also knows that the Church itself has gotten off the beam in some ways with clericalism and careerism. So he’s a very cool model.”

Leading with beauty was a strategy in “Catholicism,” and it continues through the many examples of evangelization efforts in the new film.

“The true and the good tend to put people off,” Father Barron said. “But if you say, ‘hey look at that, isn’t that beautiful?’ it’s a good way in. I think that’s part of the genius of Catholic evangelizing — that we have that card to play.”

Concrete examples

Brandon Vogt, author of “The Church and New Media” and founder of strangenotions.com, a website fostering dialogue among Catholics and atheists, worked with Father Barron to create a supplementary five-part study guide to “Catholicism: New Evangelization.”

Vogt said the new film is both practical and comprehensive, giving needed insights into what exactly the Church means by new evangelization.

“For too long the new evangelization has become this sort of nebulous buzz phrase that many people talk about and hear about, but don’t really have a concrete picture of what it is,” Vogt told OSV. “We wanted to present tons of examples. Father Barron travels across the Western world collecting examples of the new evangelization playing out on the ground.”

These examples, which include a robust Theology on Tap program for young adults in Sydney, Australia, can be helpful for emulation and inspiration.

“(For Catholics) watching these different examples, we hope … that these will act as sparks and seeds for their own ideas,” he said.

For Vogt, one of the most insightful elements of the film is Father Barron’s expertise as he traces the “philosophical devolution of God” over the last several centuries. Having this understanding is key to knowing how to evangelize, Vogt said. “For the new evangelization to be effective you have to understand keenly the context in which it’s operating. Once you understand the problem, then you’re able to choose the right antidote.”

New media tools

As a new media connoisseur, Vogt appreciates the inclusion of the role new media can play in evangelization.

Besides invigorating the Catholic faithful and enlightening fallen-away Catholics, Father Barron also hopes to reach others who see evangelization as their mission.“These new media tools feature very prominently in the series,” he said. “That holds one of the greatest potential for lay men and women: to evangelize through one of the most powerful tools the Church has ever had access to. Through these very simple and on-the-ground methods of the new media, that’s where each of us has some very serious potential to evangelize.”

“Derivatively I am also addressing fellow evangelists, teachers, writers how can we do this job better than we’re doing,” he said.

For everyday Catholics ready to start evangelizing, Father Barron urged greater catechesis in the tenets of the Faith.

“Make it a point to get to know it much better than you do,” he said. In that way, Catholics can “give a reason for the hope that’s in you.” 

CATHOLICISM: The New Evangelization

The following comes from the OSV:

Calling all “Catholicism” fans: Father Robert Barron is back on screen starting Sept. 2 with a new 90-minute documentary, “Catholicism: the New Evangelization.”

Father Barron, founder of Word on Fire Ministries and creator of the 10-part “Catholicism” series, uses the film to explore how to put the Church’s call for a new evangelization into action.

Father Barron told Our Sunday Visitor that the documentary is based on Blessed Pope John Paul II’s call for a “new ardor, expression and method” of evangelization in the Church.

A matter of necessity

Through interviews with young, active Catholics as well as notable authors such as George Weigel and Brad Gregory, and New York Times columnist Ross Douthat, Father Barron said the film explores what’s new in the world of Catholic evangelization. It also looks at the factors that have played into creating an increasingly secularized culture, and it outlines specific action steps for Catholics who want to share the Faith with others.

Father Robert Barron with 2011 World Youth Day pilgrims in Madrid. Photos courtesy of Word on Fire Ministries

In a culture that has seen the number of people who do not believe in God triple in recent years, sharing the Faith with others — and doing it well — is not only a challenge, it’s a necessity.

“I think we’ve been exceptionally bad, we Christians, at articulating who God is,” Father Barron said. “(For) the atheists it’s open season. We’ve got to get a lot better at naming that God is not the enemy of humanity, he’s not the rival to us, but is the ground for our own glorification.”

The new series wasn’t planned, Father Barron said, but rather resulted from promoting his “Catholicism” series in Australia, England and the United States. He brought a camera crew to film his talks, and they also filmed what evangelization efforts are happening on the ground in those countries.

Joyful witness

Keys of effective evangelization include leading with the beauty of the Faith and simply being joyful, Father Barron said. In many ways, Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan, New York archbishop, is Father Barron’s shining example of new evangelization in action. With his omnipresent joyful attitude, the cardinal is the “happy warrior.”

Father Robert Barron, founder of Word on Fire Ministries.

“It’s that affirmative orthodoxy approach,” Father Barron said. “You don’t say what we’re against, you say what we’re for, and we’re for allowing the love of God to surge into the world.”

Another example of the power of evangelical joy is Pope Francis himself.

“He has a real feel for how to do basic evangelization,” Father Barron said. “He’s joyful, but he’s a tough guy when he has to be. He also knows that the Church itself has gotten off the beam in some ways with clericalism and careerism. So he’s a very cool model.”

Leading with beauty was a strategy in “Catholicism,” and it continues through the many examples of evangelization efforts in the new film.

“The true and the good tend to put people off,” Father Barron said. “But if you say, ‘hey look at that, isn’t that beautiful?’ it’s a good way in. I think that’s part of the genius of Catholic evangelizing — that we have that card to play.”

Concrete examples

Brandon Vogt, author of “The Church and New Media” and founder of strangenotions.com, a website fostering dialogue among Catholics and atheists, worked with Father Barron to create a supplementary five-part study guide to “Catholicism: New Evangelization.”

Vogt said the new film is both practical and comprehensive, giving needed insights into what exactly the Church means by new evangelization.

“For too long the new evangelization has become this sort of nebulous buzz phrase that many people talk about and hear about, but don’t really have a concrete picture of what it is,” Vogt told OSV. “We wanted to present tons of examples. Father Barron travels across the Western world collecting examples of the new evangelization playing out on the ground.”

These examples, which include a robust Theology on Tap program for young adults in Sydney, Australia, can be helpful for emulation and inspiration.

“(For Catholics) watching these different examples, we hope … that these will act as sparks and seeds for their own ideas,” he said.

For Vogt, one of the most insightful elements of the film is Father Barron’s expertise as he traces the “philosophical devolution of God” over the last several centuries. Having this understanding is key to knowing how to evangelize, Vogt said. “For the new evangelization to be effective you have to understand keenly the context in which it’s operating. Once you understand the problem, then you’re able to choose the right antidote.”

New media tools

As a new media connoisseur, Vogt appreciates the inclusion of the role new media can play in evangelization.

Besides invigorating the Catholic faithful and enlightening fallen-away Catholics, Father Barron also hopes to reach others who see evangelization as their mission.“These new media tools feature very prominently in the series,” he said. “That holds one of the greatest potential for lay men and women: to evangelize through one of the most powerful tools the Church has ever had access to. Through these very simple and on-the-ground methods of the new media, that’s where each of us has some very serious potential to evangelize.”

“Derivatively I am also addressing fellow evangelists, teachers, writers how can we do this job better than we’re doing,” he said.

For everyday Catholics ready to start evangelizing, Father Barron urged greater catechesis in the tenets of the Faith.

“Make it a point to get to know it much better than you do,” he said. In that way, Catholics can “give a reason for the hope that’s in you.” 

Fr. Robert Barron: Turning the Dream of Vatican II Into Reality

The following comes from the NCR:

New-media evangelist Father Robert Barron says the dream of Vatican II is still unrealized: that Catholics in every walk of life embrace the missionary call to proclaim Jesus Christ to the world outside their doorsteps.

Father Barron, a priest of the Archdiocese of Chicago, theologian and the founder of the media apostolate Word on Fire Ministry, has followed up his 10-part award-winning documentary series Catholicism.

The second part, called Catholicism: The New Evangelization, will debut this fall and addresses both the challenges the Catholic Church faces in bringing the Gospel to contemporary society and the innovative ways Catholics are helping others encounter Jesus Christ.

Father Barron spoke with the Register June 19 at the Catholic Media Conference in Denver, where he was the keynote speaker, and he shared his thoughts about the New Evangelization and why discovering the authentic spirit of Vatican II is the key to its success.

Father, one thing that’s been on the minds of many Catholics is the “New Evangelization.” We talk about it, but many of us really still don’t quite understand what it means. What do you think is the essence of the New Evangelization?

I agree with you. I think that term has been floating around for a long time, but it’s vaguely defined. What I’ve done is follow John Paul II, who, in 1983, said the New Evangelization is the Old Evangelization — meaning declaring Jesus Christ is Lord — but it’s new in ardor, new in expression and new in method.

The new ardor — I think [John Paul II] saw a new recovery of Vatican II’s missionary spirit. I came of age right after Vatican II, so I know the Church was not an ardent Church. It was dissenting, doubting, wondering about itself and unsure about itself. John Paul, I think, sensed that and said we needed a new ardor, a new fire, a new confidence: the Vatican II missionary spirit.

New in expression — and this is something I think about a lot in dealing with the secular culture, the New Atheists and all that. You have to find new ways to express the age-old faith: so certain areas like how to understand God and Jesus, how to express the Church and how to express salvation in a way that people today are going to find compelling.

What attitude should we have in order to keep the New Evangelization “new” or fresh?

We should have that confidence or conviction that we are entering mission territory whenever we step outside our own homes, even in the United States of America. We have to have this ardor born of the faith in the Resurrection and be finding new ways to express this age-old faith.

Like with technology?

No, that’s more methods. That’s the third step. I would say this one is more theological.

Really?

Yes. How do you say that God is worthwhile to a culture that thinks God is a medieval superstition or an afterthought? How do you say the Bible is the central book of your life to a culture that says the Bible is just old superstitions? How do you say that the Church’s sexual teaching is liberating when the culture sees it is as enslaving? So that’s the challenge: to read the cultural signs and, working with those, find a new way to say it.

How is it new in method?

That’s where the media come in, I think. We’ve had this explosion of media, the greatest that’s happened in 500 years. The Church has to be willing and able to use all these methods of communication to get the message out.

So in the video [Catholicism: The New Evangelization], I explore and present a number of those approaches.

You would say the Church ignores these new methods to its peril, right?

Oh, absolutely. We have to be on the cutting edge of it. We shouldn’t be just catching up, and for too long — even though Fulton Sheen was the pioneer — we got behind. I want the Catholic Church to be on the cutting edge of new technology.

It’s interesting. You’ve mentioned how the vision of the Second Vatican Council has not been realized yet, but being on the cutting edge of communications is exactly what Vatican II talked about in Inter Mirifica, the decree on social communications. Why are we so behind?

I think what happened is we lost the missionary verve of the Council and turned inward. Vatican II was an outward-looking Council. It was trying to get the Church to be a more apt vehicle for the “Christofication” of the world. But its focus was not so much inside, but outside. What happened though, in the wake of the Council, for all kinds of reasons, is that we tended to turn inward.

That self-referential Church Pope Francis has been talking about?

Exactly. When I was a kid, it looked like “unsure of this, unsure of that; we’re reassessing this; we’re re-examining that. What do we hold about sex, authority, Jesus?” ... That’s not what Vatican II wanted. If you read the texts themselves, you see this missionary élan, this missionary spirit. And I think that’s the new ardor that John Paul insisted upon.

What did you decide would make Word on Fire Ministries different from existing, traditional Catholic evangelization efforts?

I guess it was the use of the new media. There were some presence of Catholics on radio and TV — and, obviously, EWTN [parent company of the Register] made a huge contribution there — but the new media was not being exploited adequately, and I thought Word on Fire could do that.

How should we see the relationship between the bishops and the laity in the New Evangelization? If the old model was “pray, pay and obey,” then what does Pope Francis and the Council expect of laypeople?

To be a great Catholic businessman, to be a great Catholic businesswoman, to be a great Catholic journalist, a great Catholic doctor, a great Catholic nurse, a great Catholic politician. Not just in name, but that it informs everything that you’re doing.

Bishops and priests can’t do that. We’re priests, prophets and kings: We teach, sanctify and govern, but the governance, the teaching and the sanctifying is for the sake of sending: “Go; now you’ve been sanctified, taught and governed. Go into the world and change it.” But again, that, too, has been unrealized.

Who’s a good patron saint for the New Evangelization?

Ours is [St. Thérèse] the Little Flower. I think she is a saint for the New Evangelization. She wanted to be a missionary. She had that heart of love to carry it out into the world. Fulton Sheen — we have a picture of him in our Word on Fire office — he’s a great patron saint, obviously, for the use of the media.

At Mundelein [Seminary, where Father Barron is rector], we’re redoing our house chapel, which has never been named for a saint, and I’m naming it for John Paul II, and I’m going to fill the windows with 16 evangelists who have some connection to him.

So I claim those three: the Little Flower, Fulton Sheen and John Paul II.

You were appointed rector at Mundelein Seminary. How is that going so far?

So far, so good. I’ve liked it. I wasn’t expecting it at all. It was a complete surprise. We had just come out with the Catholicism series, we were planning this new video, and the office was going strong —  when the Cardinal [Francis George] asked me to come out and be rector of the seminary.

But I honestly have enjoyed it.

Any challenges?

Yeah, a lot of challenges. We’d actually changed a lot and done a lot the first year. What I’ve tried to do is give the whole seminary a New Evangelization focus. That’s what we’re about: We’re creating priests for the New Evangelization — so the formation program and the academic program I’ve kind of revamped to get them ordered that way.

The John Paul II Chapel has been a big priority of mine. We’ve also changed from a quarter system to a semester system to make it more contemplative. So (there are) a lot of things we’ve done to give it that New Evangelization focus.

We’ve talked a lot about truth in the New Evangelization, but what’s the role of beauty?

I think we should lead with beauty. It’s the Catholic strong suit, and it’s the transcendental that has the least offensive quality today. I think when you lead with the true and the good, people today tend to get defensive in a postmodern context.

But if you lead with beauty, it’s less threatening. It’s more winsome, and that’s our strong suit. We are a beautiful religion.

Thank you so much, Father. And good luck on the second Catholicism series on the New Evangelization. Do you have plans for a third in the future?

Thank you! We have one that we are cooking that I’m calling “the Pivotal Players.” This will take me around the world again to talk about the 10 or 12 key figures in Catholic history who have shaped the Catholic imagination. So that’s something we're thinking about, and we’re looking forward to it.