Preaching for Encounter Program
Connecting preachers with the resources and support they need to take their homilies to the next level.
Bring Preaching for Encounter to Your Diocese
Contact us to talk about how to get your diocese involved in the program.
We’ll provide you with coaches and resources.
Witness the Holy Spirit transform your diocese.
An Ambitious Program to Renew Catholic Preaching
Priests and deacons meet in groups of eight to encourage and build each other up as preachers.
Participants commit to two years of formation. They work together to improve their preaching skills, grow spiritually and discover new ways God wants to speak through them to His people.
To learn how Preaching for Encounter can help your homilies flourish, let’s talk.
Four Keys to Unlocking Your Preaching Potential
Peer-Learning
These groups of clergy are the beating heart of the Preaching for Encounter program. Preachers come together monthly in their home dioceses for spiritual renewal and homiletic support. They will view each other’s homilies, pray, and offer constructive feedback in an environment of fraternal encouragement.
Lay Support
A group of laity called the St. Joseph’s Preachers will encourage each preacher through prayer and constructive feedback on homilies. They will give their priests and deacons insight into how the laity encounter God in their everyday lives.
Personalized Coaching
A coach will be assigned to each participant to help him improve his homilies. Preachers will upload their homilies online for their coaches to watch and reflect upon. Coaches will then share their thoughts and offer pointers for strengthening the messages.
Teaching Moments
Priests and deacons will come away from their parish and diocese five times in the two years. In the summer, they go north. In the winter they go south for focused moments of homiletic instruction.
Contact us today to find out how to join a Preaching for Encounter cohort.
“(The preacher) needs to be able to link the message of a biblical text to a human situation, to an experience which cries out for the light of God’s word.”
POPE FRANCIS,
EVANGELII GAUDIUM 154
Spiritually Renew Yourself and Your Listeners
After completing Preaching for Encounter, you will:
- Know more about how your listeners encounter God and what they’re looking for in a homily.
- Feel spiritually refreshed by the retreat-like atmosphere and the support of your brother clergy.
- Let God speak through your homilies more powerfully than ever before.