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Author: Russ Petrus

Conversations in the Spirit: FutureChurch Interim Stage Listening Sessions for the Synod on Synodality

Written on . Posted in Justice In the Church, Synod on Synodality.

Please Note: These sessions have now concluded
and our Interim Stage Synthesis was submitted to the US Synod Team
and to the General Secretariat of the Synod of Bishops in Rome
on April 8, 2024. 

Join FutureChurch as we engage together in “Conversations in the Spirit” to deepen our engagement with one another and continue our journey toward the October 2024 Assembly of the Synod on Communion, Participation, and Mission.

FutureChurch will host three stand-alone sessions at different times to allow for as much participation as possible. Each session will last approximately 2 hours. Pick the session that works best for you and your schedule:

  • Saturday, March 9 at 9 -11am ET
  • Monday, March 11 at 7-9pm ET
  • Saturday, March 16 at 12N – 2pm ET

Please note: Small breakout groups engaging in conversations with others will be integral to these sessions. If you are unwilling or unable to participate in a breakout group, these aren’t the sessions for you. Instead, we invite you to fill out our questionnaire. Your input, regardless of whether or not you attend a listening session, will be incorporated into our report, which we will send to the USCCB Synod Committee and post to our website.

In this interim phase, the USCCB Synod Committee has posed two questions which will guide our conversations and subsequent synthesis report:

  1. Where have I seen or experienced successes—and distresses—within the Church’s structure(s)/organization/leadership/life that encourage or hinder the mission?
  2. How can the structures and organization of the Church help all the baptized to respond to the call to proclaim the Gospel and to live as a community of love and mercy in Christ?

Resources for Preparation:
To prepare for these Conversations in the Spirit we encourage you to spend some time reviewing the following resources:

Please Respond to Our Questionnaire

https://futurechurch.org/interim-stage-questionnaire/

We have developed a questionnaire based on the questions posed by the USCCB Synod Committee. Your responses to the questionnaire will serve two functions 1. Preparing you to make your contributions to your small group if you are joining one of our listening sessions and 2. Providing data to us as we develop our written report, which we will send to the USCCB committee.

Reflection of stained glass on the ceiling of cathedral

How to Have a Conversation in the Spirit

Written on . Posted in Justice In the Church, Synod on Synodality.

The 2021-2024 Synod on Communion, Participation, and Mission has introduced Catholics to a way of discerning together called “Conversations in the Spirit.” This is the method was used by delegates at the October 2023 Assembly and is a method that the entire Church is being invited into, particularly during the interim phase of the Synod leading to the October 2024 Assembly. More than exchange of ideas, it is a spiritual journey to help discover and name convergences and overcome divergences and to uncover steps the Holy Spirit is revealing. The method is meant to draw participants closer to one another as they listen to one another and together for what The Spirit is calling forth from the Church.

Below are the steps in having a Conversation in the Spirit.

Step One: Personal Preparation

Each person begins on their own by entering into prayer to meditate on the question(s) being asked and to consider their own future contributions to the larger group.

Step Two: Taking the Word and Listening

The communal discernment begins with a silence, prayer, and listening to the Word of God. Then each participant takes turns speaking from his or her own experience and prayer while also listening attentively to the others. This initial exchange is followed by a time of prayerful silence.

Step Three: Making Space for Others and The Other

Then after having listened to what others have said and prayed with it, each individual shares what has resonated most with him or her or what has aroused the most resistance in him or her, allowing himself or herself to be guided by the Holy Spirit: “When, listening,
did my heart burn within me?” After each has shared there is another moment of prayerful silence.

Step Four: Building Together

Together we dialogue on the basis of what emerged earlier in order to discern and gather the fruit of the conversation in the Spirit: to recognize intuitions and convergences; to identify discordances, obstacles and new questions; to allow prophetic voices to emerge. It is important that everyone can feel represented by the outcome of the work. “To what steps is the Holy Spirit calling us together?”

Step Five: Final Prayer or Song of Thanksgiving to God

Additional Resources

Fr. David McCallum, SJ, Executive Director of Discerning Leadership and facilitator at the XVI Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod leads a webinar on Conversations in the Spirit

View

 

 

 

From Unfathomable Grief to Unsurpassed Joy: Women of Lent and Easter with Rev. Lindsay Hardin Freeman

Written on . Posted in Women Erased, Women In Church Leadership.

Rev. Lindsay Hardin Freeman joins FutureChurch to offer this beautiful time of reflection on the Women of Lent and Easter: Mary and Martha of Bethany; Mary, the mother of Jesus; and Mary Magdalene.  Accompany them as they each offer gifts: sheltering Jesus, standing with him at the Cross, and witnessing the greatest miracle of all — the Resurrection.

About our leader: Writer, storyteller, mother and Episcopal priest, the Rev. Lindsay Hardin Freeman is committed to freeing Bible women and other Bible characters from the dusty, dry literary caskets in which they seem to have been trapped for centuries. A North American Ministerial Fellow and Cox Fellow, she received her Master of Arts in Theological Studies and Master of Divinity from the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, and is the author/co-author/editor of ten books and over 100 articles on faith and church life. She and her team of researchers were the first to count and profile all the women whose words are recorded in the Bible, resulting in the publication of Bible Women: All Their Words and Why They Matter (Forward Movement). Learn more at https://www.lindsayhardinfreeman.com/ 

Chat Transcript: Rev. Hardin Freeman made use of the chat to interact with participants throughout our time of reflection. Women Of Lent And Easter Chat.

Co-Creating Beauty: Queer Bodies and Queer Love with Craig Ford, Jr.

Written on . Posted in Justice In the Church, Respect Women Series, Women In Church Leadership.

Dr. Ford’s presentation, “Co-Creating Beauty: Queer Bodies and Queer Loves Beyond the Anathemas” explores how our roles as co-creators with God allows for new ways to understand the truth revealed by sexuality and gender identity beyond the boundaries of heteronormativity. Such redeployment of this theological status as co-creator, Ford argues, may provide a pathway beyond the impasse currently experienced at the level of official church teaching with respect to these topics.

Craig A. Ford, Jr., Ph.D. is Assistant Professor of Theology and Religious Studies at Saint Norbert College, where he teaches courses in Christian Ethics, Ecclesiology, and on Race, Gender and Sexuality while also serving as Co-Director for the Peace and Justice Interdisciplinary Minor. He is also on the faculty at the Institute for Black Catholic Studies—hosted at Xavier University of Louisiana, the nation’s only Catholic HBCU— where he teaches courses on Black Theology as well as on Topics in Moral Theology from a Black Perspective. A graduate of the University of Notre Dame, Yale Divinity School, and Boston College, Dr. Ford writes on topics at the intersection of queer theory, blac studies, and the Catholic moral tradition. His most recent book project, All of Us: The Future of Catholic Theology From the Perspectives of Queer Theologians of Color is a co-edited volume with Bryan Massingale and Miguel Diaz, drawing scholars and activists from North and South America, the Pacific Islands, Australia, and Europe who seek to chart new directions for Catholic theology when the oppressive realities of racism, heteronormativity, and sexism within church and world are engaged equally and fiercely. This volume is currently under contract with Fortress Press.

How Americans (Don’t) Talk about Abortion with Tricia C. Bruce

Written on . Posted in Respect Women Series, Uncategorized, Women In Church Leadership.

FutureChurch welcomes sociologist, Dr. Tricia C. Bruce, Ph.D., to present on the findings of her qualitative study of American views on abortion. Using data from in-depth interviews with hundreds of everyday Americans, Dr. Bruce underscores the imperative of productive conversations about abortion in a post Roe v. Wade era. Her research exposes the limitations of available labels, assumptions, and boundaries separating Americans’ moral and legal views. Study insights help to forge pathways beyond polarization, making room for greater complexity, ambiguity, understanding, and cross-cutting collaborations. Learn more about and read the study here. 

 

Tricia C. Bruce, Ph.D. (University of California Santa Barbara) is a sociologist of religion with expertise in organizational, attitudinal, and generational change. Her award-winning books and reports include Parish and Place: Making Room for Diversity in the American Catholic Church(Oxford University Press, 2017), Faithful Revolution: How Voice of the Faithful Is Changing the Church (Oxford University Press, 2011/2014), and How Americans Understand Abortion (also forthcoming as a book with the University of California Press). She is also coeditor of Polarization in the US Catholic Church (Liturgical Press, 2016) and American Parishes: Remaking Local Catholicism (Fordham University Press, 2019). Her writing has appeared in Time Magazine, Science Advances, The Wall Street Journal, the LA Times, Religions, Journal for the American Academy of Religion, Review of Religious Research, and more.

She is an affiliate of the University of Notre Dame’s Center for the Study of Religion and Society and Director of Springtide Research Institute. Previous appointments include tenured associate professor of sociology at Maryville College and research assistant professor with Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA). She serves as President-Elect for the Association for the Sociology of Religion and as Past-Chair of the American Sociological Association Religion Section.

 

Retiring director of FutureChurch praised as woman of spirit, spunk, hope

Written on . Posted in In the News.

Excerpt:

Colleagues said the persistence, collaboration, creativity and passion Rose-Milavec brought to the “Votes for Catholic Women” campaign are qualities emblematic of her past decade at FutureChurch.  

“Deb has made her mark as a leader, as someone who is always willing to help widen the table,” said McElwee, who organized the 2018 protest. “She is a brilliant combination of spirit and spunk and a serious work ethic to advance the church.” 

Gospel Women of Advent Retreat

Written on . Posted in Women Erased, Women In Church Leadership.

FutureChurch welcomes award winning author and speaker, Kathy Coffey, who leads this beautiful afternoon of reflection to begin Advent. Using an ancient Midrash technique, we imagine the lives of women in the infancy narratives. They invite us to see the scriptures differently, with possibilities beyond the familiar. To what might they call us today?
Art Used:

About our Retreat Leader: 
Kathy Coffey is the author of many books such as Hidden Women of the Gospels, More Hidden Women of the Gospels, A Generous Lap: A Spirituality of Grandparenting (Orbis) and When the Saints Came Marching In (Liturgical Press).

She taught for fifteen years at the University of Colorado, Denver, and Regis Jesuit University. She has won sixteen awards from the Catholic Press Association, the Foley Poetry Award from America magazine, and several others. She has spoken at national conventions such as the LA and East Coast Congresses, NCCL, NCEA and many diocesan gatherings.

Her own spirituality has been shaped by 50 years of parenting and 12 years of grandparenting. A widow, the mother of four and grandmother of six, she lives in the Bay area, CA.

For more information, see her website: kathyjcoffey.com.

FutureChurch Thanks Deborah Rose for A Decade of Loving Leadership and Faith-filled Persistence; Board Appoints Russ Petrus Executive Director

Written on . Posted in Press Releases.

FOR IMMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact
Russ Petrus, Co-Director – russ@futurechurch.org | 216-228-0869 x2

In a November 29th email sent to FutureChurch members and supporters, co-director, Deborah Rose, announced her retirement at the end of the year, writing “I want you all to know that it has been the honor of a lifetime to work for FutureChurch and with all of you.”

Rose came to FutureChurch in 2013, succeeding co-founder and founding executive director, Sr. Christine Schenk, CSJ. “God truly sent a successor I only dared to dream about when Deborah Rose agreed to become FutureChurch’s second executive director ten years ago,” said Schenk. “Her passionate energy, creativity and worldwide connections helped fuel FutureChurch’s international expansion,” she added.

Marie Graf, who served as chairperson at the time and is currently board secretary, recalls, “When FutureChurch transitioned from the founding director, we were delighted to hire Deb Rose. She came to us with experience in running a nonprofit organization while also bringing a passion for church reform.” Graf added that “under her direction, FutureChurch programming expanded, new audiences were reached; and the FutureChurch name and mission were taken to a higher level.”

Among the organization’s many accomplishments under her leadership, FutureChurch successfully advocated for greater and more diverse lay participation in worldwide synods; created engaging online programming spotlighting unheralded biblical, historical, and contemporary women; and founded the award-winning Catholic Women Preach which brings women’s voices and wisdom to the preaching ministry of the Church.

Board chair, Todd Ray, captures the consensus of his colleagues, saying, “Deb Rose has truly been a blessing to FutureChurch. She has been a delight to observe and work with for these ten years – a steady source of energy and creativity advancing the mission to bring meaningful change to the Church she loves.” Commenting on her indomitable spirit, he reflects, “Her resilience in sustaining her passion for the Church may be due to her irrepressible and playful sense of humor, and she was joyful in her work in the face of so much institutional resistance.”

During her time at FutureChurch, Deb became an Associate of The Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati. Linked by their common friend and mentor, Louise Akers, SC, she met Sr. Andrea Koverman, SC who later joined the board. “Deb is and has been a light in some times of great darkness for me and many Catholics,” says Koverman. “She takes seriously the Gospel message of embodying God’s love in our world. She has lifted up the voices of women, women of color, and those of all sexual orientations. For so many who felt the Church was telling them they don’t belong, Deb’s leadership has been a beacon that we can follow. Where doors are shut and hearts are broken, she flings them open again and says, ‘Come on in, this is your home and you are welcome!’”

Rose led the organization as executive director until 2019 when the board voted to approve a co-directorship with Russ Petrus who had previously served as program director and associate director.

“On behalf of the entire FutureChurch community, I thank Deb for her decade of service to FutureChurch. She has been an incredibly faithful steward of the mission and a true champion for all God’s beloved children,” said Petrus. “On a personal note,” he added, “she has been a caring boss and an empowering mentor, a trusted colleague and a steadfast partner – and she will always be my cherished friend. We will miss her daily presence, but we know the many gifts she leaves behind will continue to bless us and our work each day. We wish her the very best in her retirement.”

The FutureChurch board voted to appoint Petrus as executive director – effective January 1, 2024. “Russ is more than up to the task,” said Sr. Christine Schenk, celebrating the appointment. “His strategic, pastoral, and advocacy skills are extraordinarily well suited to the mission. His grounding in feminist theology, his pastoral experience, and his digital media skills along with his long-standing commitment to reforming the institution make him uniquely qualified to lead FutureChurch well and wisely into the exciting years ahead.”

Rose agrees, writing, “His compassion, vision, creativity, vitality, skill, and work ethic are a rare find. There is no doubt that he will continue to bless FutureChurch and all who are connected to this work with his bright mind, gentle spirit, and unrelenting determination to bring justice to the institution where it is lacking.”

“We have put together an outstanding team of talented, passionate, and bright people of faith who are deeply dedicated to our mission,” Petrus said. “And I couldn’t be more excited to continue working with Olivia Hastie and Martha Ligas on our staff; board chair-elect, Vickey McBride, along with the rest our visionary board; and our consultants, Ann Marie Nocella, Ariell Watson Simon, Tess Gallagher Clancy, and Ben Stegbauer to continue building upon the prophetic legacy of Sr. Chris Schenk, Fr. Louis Trivison, the founding communities and parishes, and – now – Deb Rose.”

FutureChurch will host an online opportunity for the community to come together and pray for Deb, Russ, and our community at this time of transition during its regularly scheduled virtual liturgy on December 17, 2023 at 7pm ET. All are welcome! Register here.

END