This summer, CatholicMom.com is hosting an on-line book discussion group for Sherry Weddell’s Forming Intentional Disciples. Each session will focus on one chapter of the book, and yours truly is participating. Hit the link above to see all of the participants, and to find the discussion questions.

Chapter 9 of Forming Intentional Disciples is called “Break the Silence,” and it’s all about talking about Jesus in your parish and in your life. We Catholics tend to be willing to talk about the Church, and about doctrine, and about that nun in third grade, but we don’t generally like to talk about Jesus. And since discipleship is all about a vivid, life-giving relationship with Jesus, that’s a problem.

The chapter has a lot to say on the subject, but the core of it is the “Threshold Conversation”, which is a conversation you have with someone to find out where they are among the thresholds of discipleship. And the main thing, the most important thing, is that it’s all about listening. You might ask, formally, “What’s your lived relationship with God to date?” You might ask informally, “So where is God in all of this?” And then you have to listen. You might ask questions, just to encourage the person you’re talking to to keep talking, or to clarify a point, but other than that you listen.

There are a few rules, like “Never accept a label instead of a story.” If someone says, “Well, I’m an atheist,” or “We were very religious when I was a kid,” don’t take that as the final word: find out what they mean, because they might mean almost anything. Ask them.

And then, listen.

And then, listen.

This is not a time for apologetics, or argument, or teaching, or setting the record straight, or talking about your own experience. It’s a time for listening prayerfully in love.

This blew my mind when I first read it. When I was in college I was a member of Inter Varsity Christian Fellowship, which is big on witnessing and leading people to Christ. It was about telling people how Jesus had saved me, and how wonderful it was, and encouraging them to try it. I tried to do it, but I was no good at it. Then, while I was Episcopalian my parish was big on evangelism and leading people to Christ. It was more sophisticated than what I’d learned at IVCF, but it was along the same lines. I spent a long time on it, and tried, but I’m not aware of ever having successfully “led someone to Christ”. I might have planted a few seeds here and there, but no more than that.

It was all about talking.

And here, Sherry Weddell says, “Listen.”

Have you noticed that God is very good at listening? You can tell Him anything, and take as long as you want at it, and He’ll go on listening. Part of a Threshold Conversation—ideally, part of any conversation—is loving the other person with God’s love.

You have to listen.

This summer, CatholicMom.com is hosting an on-line book discussion group for Sherry Weddell’s Forming Intentional Disciples. Each session will focus on one chapter of the book, and yours truly is participating. Hit the link above to see all of the participants, and to find the discussion questions.

Chapter 8 of Forming Intentional Disciples concerns the last two thresholds: seeking and discipleship. A seeker is one who actively seeking Christ, but isn’t yet actively following Him. The seeker becomes a disciple by “dropping his nets” as Peter and Andrew did, following Jesus where ever he may lead. Becoming a disciple is a scary thing: it means saying, with Mary, “Lord, let it be done to me according to your word,” and meaning it. It means being willing to pull up stakes, leaving home and family and security and heading off into the unknown

Or does it? It did for Peter and Andrew, certainly. But what about you and me? Is Jesus going to ask me to abandon my wife and children and scoot off to Africa with a staff in my hand and only one coat?

The answer, I think, is “maybe, but probably not”. I’m married, a marriage sanctified by Christ in the sacrament of marriage; in Jesus’ own words, we have become one flesh. It’s not unheard of in Christian history for a disciple to leave his wife and kids, but it seems much more likely that I’m called to stay and live up to my familial obligations in all Christian charity.

And there’s the rub: even if I’m not called to leave everything and everyone I know behind, I’m still called to bring Christ to everyone I know—to everyone who knows me and sees me on a daily basis. And even if I’m not called to leave my home, I’m called to leave everything behind that separates me from Christ, especially my sins and my inordinate desires. Spiritual journeys can’t be measured in miles, and the most arduous spiritual journey might take place within four walls.

Discipleship should scare us: Jesus tells us to count the cost. But we should be scared about the right things.

And then, St. Thomas Aquinas taught that grace perfects nature. If you become a disciple, God will use you in strange and unexpected ways: but you will find that the things you’re called to do build on your skills and talents and will come to be the most natural things in the world to you. They may be strange ways, but they will the right ways.

This summer, CatholicMom.com is hosting an on-line book discussion group for Sherry Weddell’s Forming Intentional Disciples. Each session will focus on one chapter of the book, and yours truly is participating. Hit the link above to see all of the participants, and to find the discussion questions.

Actually, I didn’t participate this week—I was on vacation—but you can go read everybody else’s ideas. I particular liked Jennifer Fitz’s take: when folks are open, they are open to a lot of different things. Let’s not leave them there.

This summer, CatholicMom.com is hosting an on-line book discussion group for Sherry Weddell’s Forming Intentional Disciples. Each session will focus on one chapter of the book, and yours truly is participating. Hit the link above to see all of the participants, and to find the discussion questions.

The second threshold of discipleship, per Chapter 6 of Forming Intentional Disciples, is a passive kind of curiosity. The individual, based on the bridge of trust he has formed, is interested to hear more. He’s not at the point to go out seeking that information, and he’s not yet open to changing his life, but he’s willing to listen, at least up to a point.

What interested me in this chapter was the discussion of what we as Christians can do to foster and encourage this kind of curiosity. Sherry Weddell emphasizes that it is specifically curiosity about Jesus Christ that matters; and that to awaken it and encourage it to grow, we have to be willing to talk explicitly about Jesus, Jesus himself: because the Christian life is first and foremost and essentially all about a living relationship with Jesus. And this seems to be tricky for us Catholics: we’re willing to talk about doctrine and about apologetics and about the Church, but to speak directly about the person of Jesus and our relationships with him is challenging.

It got me to thinking…how can I do that? How can I speak about Jesus to those I meet? My first conclusion was that simply introducing Jesus into a conversation that didn’t previously involve Him is going to be tough for an introvert like me: “Hey, you know, Jesus was telling me last night…” or “What’s up with you?” “It was so cool! I learned something new about Jesus! You shoulda been there!” But then, I’ve never been a dab hand at introducing faith into the conversation, even in more general terms.

So my second conclusion was that on those occasions when I’m already speaking of religion to someone else, I need to center my remarks on Christ rather than leaving him in the background. He is at the center of my life and my faith; I need to put him at the center of my speech. Just what would I say? That, I’m still pondering.

Over the last couple of days I’ve seen a couple of posts on Facebook about Pope Francis. One was a link to a blog post written by an atheist who has been impressed with what he’s seen of Francis so far: his simplicity, his frugality, his sense of humor, his willingness to reach out and touch people. Another was from a Facebook friend who is distressed that the Pope in his quest for simplicity seems to be pulling the beauty out of everything. The three natural paths to God are Truth, Goodness, and Beauty, and she is especially uplifted by the Beauty she sees the Pope as turning away from. (I sympathize with her, although I’d be more concerned if it seemed that the Pope was going to try to make his simple tastes universal in the Church.)

But back to the atheist. He is seeing something in the Pope that he did not expect, something that surprises him, something that he finds attractive. This Pope has done so many things no pope has ever done before, like washing a woman’s feet.

This is huge.

Yes, I know—the media delights in presenting Francis as something new, as though Benedict wasn’t simple and humble and had no concern for the poor. And many of the factual details that the atheist cites are not quite true, or not all true, or are true but misleading. But the core of it is that Francis is indeed humble and simple and frugal and loves the poor. And this man sees that, and is attracted to it.

And this, I say, is huge.

In Forming Intentional Disciples, Sherry Weddell says that conversion to Christianity always begins with a bridge of trust: some person, some thing, some fact, that the individual finds trustworthy. It can be big or small, vital or trivial (at least, as seen from the outside), but it has to be there. And it doesn’t really matter whether the person understands the thing he trusts in, or sees it clearly, not yet. What matters is that there is a channel through which the person might begin to be able to begin to learn more without discounting it out of hand.

The Christian faith isn’t a set of propositions to be learned; the Christian faith is a Person to come to know. And it all begins with a bridge of trust.

God is infinite, and so infinitely surprising. This is a good thing, because we are all so bound and determined to see what we expect to see that it takes surprise to catch our notice, so that we can see what’s really there. Those who know the Church only from old movies expect pomp and circumstance and robes and lace and candles and baroque splendor. They do not expect care for the poor and simplicity and humility, even though these have always been part of the Church. And so Francis surprises them with what they do not expect. They think it is new, and unusual; in fact, it is the simply the Stone that the builders rejected. Let’s not tell them that, shall we?

Not until they are curious enough to ask….