There are events you attend out of duty, and then there are events you simply cannot afford to miss. The Parish Renewal Conference on Saturday 18 July is firmly of the second kind and the clearest reason why, is a Texan named Marcel LeJeune.
For 11 years, LeJeune ran the day-to-day operations of St Mary’s Catholic Centre at Texas A&M University, widely regarded as the largest campus ministry in the world.
He inspired and guided a generation of young Catholics to move from the back pew to the front line of mission, and then he did something rare: he left to share with the world what worked.
Today, as founder and president of Catholic Missionary Disciples, he coaches parishes and dioceses across the globe to do the one thing every parish says it wants and few manage to achieve: to form, in his words, disciple-makers who make disciple-makers.
His latest book, The Contagious Catholic: The Art of Practical Evangelisation, has become a go-to resource for ordinary Catholics who want to share their faith without feeling awkward or pushy.
He has served on the executive team of the United States’ National Eucharistic Revival and sits on the Advisory Board of the National Eucharistic Congress.
What makes LeJeune such a compelling voice is that he refuses to read the secular age as a culture turning its back on faith, but as an opening.
“In a sense, secularisation is helping the Catholic Church regain her mission. There’s a new openness, the world feels so empty, young people are starting to come back to the church in droves,” observes LeJeune.
He is also refreshingly unwilling to let renewal stay theoretical. At the conference he will lead a keynote and a breakout session tackling a question that haunts every well-meaning parish plan: why do so many strategic plans fail to produce lasting renewal?
If your parish has ever launched a program with great hopes and watched it quietly fade, this is the session that names why and what to do instead.
Ask him how an ordinary Catholic actually begins, though, and the answer is refreshingly free of jargon.
“How do you go and make disciples? Pray, initiate, don’t be a jerk, and don’t be weird. And share your faith in a natural, organic way,” he advises.
“The conference is a great way to share ideas of how to be those missionary communities that we long to be, how to share our faith with others.
The best tip you pick up may not come from one of the plenary speakers. It might come over lunch, from a chat with someone while you’re waiting for your sandwiches.”
If LeJeune supplies the strategy, keynote speaker Sr Susanna Edmunds OP supplies the source.
A Dominican sister and dean of studies at the Seminary of the Good Shepherd, she came to religious life by way of a biomedical engineering degree. Sr Susanna will open the conference with a deceptively simple claim: that no parish renews itself by effort alone. Renewal begins, and ends, at the altar.
Her message cuts through every program and pivot table to the one thing the recent Sydney Synod named that our people are longing for: a deeper, living encounter with Christ in the Eucharist. Her challenge to delegates is one anyone can take up this very week.
“Just say: Jesus, thank you for being here. He waits for us in our churches,” said Sr Susanna.
To anyone wondering whether the conference is really for their parish, her answer is an open door: come as you are and be ready to be transformed.
Building preparation for the International Eucharistic Congress, Eucharist28.
They will be joined by a slate of breakout speakers who will help us focus our energy on our local parish’s renewal in light of Eucharist28, only two years away.
These are the director for the Sydney Centre for Evangelisation, Daniel Ang, who will speak on reaching “the missing middle”, the Catholics who’ve drifted from the pews but not the faith.
The Dominican Sisters will address prayer as the wellspring of mission, and Rev Dr Greg Morgan and Helen Wagner on discovering your God-given charisms.
Rev Chris Ryan MGL and Jacky Krsnik will share insights on cultivating a Christ-centred evangelising community, and Liberty del Rosario and The Catholic Weekly’s own Christina Guzman on the digital tools that extend parish outreach.
Sydney Catholic Youth’s Julian Vieira and Sofia Mifsud will speak on engaging young people with the truth, and Fr Mark Anderson on running a fruitful RCIA.
Keynotes are designed to inspire the heart, workshops to equip the hands, and there will be a hall full of people from parishes facing exactly what yours is facing. Few days offer that much, so close to home.
Registrations close this weekend. To register now, please follow the link.
There’s far more to the conversations with Marcel LeJeune and Sr Susanna Edmunds than we could fit on the page. Hear them both in full on Grace Abounds, available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
