What is Adult Faith Formation?

Until fairly recently, it was highly unusual for Catholic parishes to feature ministries like “adult faith formation,” “adult faith development,” or “adult catechesis.” Lay directors of religious education (DREs) commonly oversaw the religious education of children and teenagers, and the laity were often included in parish administration and management, but the ongoing faith formation of adults depended on the religious education they themselves received as children and their participation in the parish’s sacramental life. 

Sensing that these resources were perhaps not sufficient, parishes and dioceses over the past twenty-five years or so have begun increasingly to hire professional lay ministers whose job is specifically to understand and respond to the spiritual and religious needs of adult Catholics. Indeed, in 1999, the United States Catholic Conference of Bishops published Our Hearts Were Burning Within Us, a landmark document in which the leaders of our church committed to a renewed vision for adult faith formation. This document, which is worth reading in full, introduces a comprehensive plan for adult faith formation that, among other things, articulates the need for each parish to designate a leader who assumes responsibility for adult faith formation (this is my role at CTK), as well as a core team of parishioners who assist this leader in implementing the parish vision. (We don’t have such a team – yet.)

But what is adult faith formation? To understand what the bishops are talking about, we can reflect on what the church commonly means by faith. Faith is the word that we use to talk about our relationship with God. Unlike the various other people in our lives (parents, spouses, children, coworkers, neighbors), God isn’t immediately present to us. Our relationship with God is characterized as much by God’s absence as by the signs that remind us of God’s presence. As St. Augustine teaches us, God is closer to us than we are to ourselves.  But, as we all know so well, we don’t always feel God’s closeness as intimacy, or love, or protection. Often we experience God’s closeness as something missing, something we want and don’t yet have. “We walk by faith, not by sight,” says St. Paul.  So we use the word faith to describe the strange connection we have to God, who is hidden in plain sight, and who we come to know by sign and by testimony.

Faith is a gift, and God gives it in three ways. First, God gives us faith through a felt connection to Jesus as our priest, our teacher, and our leader. Second, God gives us faith by our belonging to the community of those baptized into the life of Jesus, crucified and risen. Third, God gives us faith as we encounter the world’s desperate need for justice and renewal.

The goal of adult faith formation is to promote and nurture these three avenues of faith within the lives of the adults in our community. As a ministry of the parish, adult faith formation works to foster within us a sense of belonging to Jesus both personally and as a community, with all of the obligations to ourselves,  to one another, and to the wider world that being followers of Christ entails. Adult faith formation creates opportunities for thinking new thoughts, for reflecting on old ideas, and for hearing the diverse perspectives of others. Adult faith formation makes space for meeting new people, for spending time with familiar faces, for finding moments of solitude. Adult faith formation grows from the life of the local parish and extends to those whose faith journey takes them beyond the parish grounds. There’s no single model for this ministry, because adult faith formation needs to meet folks wherever they happen to be in their relationship with Jesus, with the parish, and with the world.

As the director of adult faith formation here at Christ the King, my chief responsibility is to create a context for lifelong growth in faith and to make this context available to as many parishioners as possible. My goals over the next five years are (1) to promote at least three to five regularly recurring faith formation opportunities that are open to all the adults in the parish; (2) to work with invested parishioners to create faith formation opportunities for smaller groups that share specific needs or desires; (3) to build relationships with local organizations whose mission in service of the world converges with our own; and (4) to form an adult faith formation team.

A note on this fourth goal: Clearly, one person cannot adequately meet the needs of an entire parish. Adult faith formation is a collaborative effort, and over the next year, I will be working to establish an adult faith formation team of 4-8 trained and inspired parish volunteers. Given the overwhelming generosity and commitment of our long-time parishioners, together with the desires for the newer folks among us to find ways to get connected, I know there is no shortage of people here who will continue to make Christ the King a place where God’s gifts of faith, hope, and love are known for their abundance. Please check your bulletins regularly for adult faith formation events taking place on Sunday mornings and throughout the week, and find a way to get connected. I close with the final words of Our Hearts Were Burning Within Us.

Awakened and energized by the Spirit, let us strengthen our commitment and intensify our efforts to help the adults in our communities be touched and transformed by the life-giving message of Jesus, to explore its meaning, experience its power, and live in its light as faithful adult disciples today. Let us do our part with creativity and vigor, our hearts aflame with love to empower adults to know and live the message of Jesus. This is the Lord's work. In the power of the Spirit it will not fail but will bear lasting fruit for the life of the world.

--Jon Stotts