Recently the parish has begun a number of video projects. These are in varying degrees of production. The Mass Moments, for example, are quick and easy. They are posted within days of shooting. They are simple straight-forward teaching videos.
The other two projects, even though they are still in production, have taught me much. The children who were in our upcoming Altar Servers video were just great! They had a lot of fun. It was touching to see and hear their honest reflections on what they like about being an Altar Server.
The other Evangelization project was just as informative for me. We taped a number of parishioners sharing their love for St. Benedict's and inviting others to join them at Mass. They said amazing things! Some parishioners ad libbed briefly, others wrote out pages of material! Either way, their deep love for this place came through.
Our parishioners did all the work on these projects - organization, scripting, videos, audio. Everything was in house. People stepped forward to share their talents and to try new things. It's clearly a new apostolate, a new committee if you will, new people are doing things in new ways to proclaim our Lord "ever-ancient, ever-new." I think this is so important. We need to preserve all the effective things from the past and yet stay ahead of the communication curve too. It's not a choice between old and new, it's the great Catholic realization that both are necessary.
Throughout these projects I was reminded that the process is the result when it comes to evangelization, or spreading the Gospel. The Church gathered and Christ was Present. People spoke with one another. Our priests and seminarian were with us. Memories were shared. Folks reached out to others. Laughter and tears, joy and sorrow. Young and old, sick and healthy, new parishioners and pillars of the parish. Out of all this our hearts were burning to invite more and more people to join us around the table of the Lord! We're getting it now!
I believe that all people desire to belong to an authentic loving community.
And here we are! With Jesus! Reaching out!