Most Blessed Sacrament Parish Faith Formation and Discipleship Strategy

All (E/G/W)
Parish Function
Case Study

Audience: All

Publisher

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Most Blessed Sacrament is a parish of 1400 families in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Frustrated that their religious education program was not making disciples, the parish decided to stop the program altogether for one year so that they could restructure the program. Scroll down to read their story.

Strategy

Committed to Alpha as a way to begin the discipleship process.

Began with major Alpha initiative for adults and teens.
Most religious education parents went to Alpha

Eliminated traditional Religious Ed and replaced it with Discipleship Nights for families.

Designed to help everyone grow in a relationship with Christ. Includes praise and worship and gives everyone in the household the practical and spiritual support to live a faith-filled life. Discipleship Nights are open to people of all ages. We also offer free childcare. Nights are family-focused.

Remodeled Religious Ed for Next Year

Catechesis of the Good Shepherd
Flipped Classroom with MyCatholicFaithDelivered Online – Content delivered via video at home; class time spent with activities, application and support.

Leadership Formation: Identified a group of 20 or so people who had clearly had a conversion experience and could articulate their personal testimony.

Bi-monthly meetings help them explore their faith more deeply and discern their charisms. Group talked about prayer, charisms, spiritual warfare and other topics that are relevant to this stage of discipleship. This lasted for a whole year. In the following year, they repeated the process with a new group of people.

Results

Alpha: 79% of Adults said that their relationship with God has changed because of Alpha. 80% of Adults said they learned something new about their faith. 92% of Adults reported that the small group conversation was beneficial to them. 84% of Adults and 85% of high school Sophomores, Juniors and Seniors said that they would recommend Alpha to a friend.

Leadership Formation: many of the participants discerned their charisms and were sent forth to begin new ministries.