A Thriving Midwest Diocese's Secrets to Success

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Absolutely wonderful. A pattern to imitate. Love the Pink Sisters. 😃
 
Yes and yes. Prayer and catechesis. There are no short-cuts.

I’ve developed a moderate pet peeve when priestly vocations get brought up in parishes. I immediately think “Come on peeps! Vocations, period!”. If you can get regular families vibrant and well catechized then priestly vocations will take care of themselves. Among so many males in thoroughly Catholic families there’s bound to be a few here are there that are willing to hurl themselves under the grindstone of heading a parish. You’ll get sisters (and monk) too, and they produce priests in much the same way that biological mothers do.
 
When Bishop Conley was still a priest of the Wichita KS diocese, I had a chance once to hear him give a talk to a small group about how he came to be a priest. He started out going to the University of Kansas and was not even Catholic when someone made the offhand remark “you should be a priest.” He just laughed. The other thing that struck me was the influence of the KU Integrated Humanities Program and the great books. That had a big impact on him. A course involving the great books, ideas, music, architecture, and history of western civilization gave students a sense of joy and purpose.
 
Fascinating article-Thanks for posting!
I was especially interested in the project of separating Catholic social services from the state as a means of maintaining independence and also in the project of creating educational programs at Newman centers. Brilliant!
Here’s a bit of the conversation on the education project at the University of nebraska Newman center:
" CWR: Do you have any big news in Lincoln?

Bishop Conley: We’ve inaugurated the Newman Institute for Catholic Thought and Culture at the University of Nebraska’s Newman Center. It’s a program that studies the Great Books and the humanities and also has a lecture series. We had our pilot course earlier this year with more courses planned for the fall.

We also built a new church in the middle of the campus; it’s a neo-Gothic, traditional church that has the largest stained glass window installed in a Catholic Church in the past 100 years. It is a beautiful monument of faith, and is right in the middle of the campus.

Ninety percent of Catholics attend college at secular universities, which tells me I need to focus my resources there."
 
TK421 said:
Yes and yes. Prayer and catechesis. There are no short-cuts.

I’ve developed a moderate pet peeve when priestly vocations get brought up in parishes. I immediately think “Come on peeps! Vocations, period!”. If you can get regular families vibrant and well catechized then priestly vocations will take care of themselves. Among so many males in thoroughly Catholic families there’s bound to be a few here are there that are willing to hurl themselves under the grindstone of heading a parish. You’ll get sisters (and monk) too, and they produce priests in much the same way that biological mothers do.
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Don’t blame people too much: in the current society, the term “vocation” has become synonymous with becoming a priest, or, for females, with entering the convent.

The word needs to be restored to its original all-inclusive meaning.

ICXC NIKA.
 
Also, being a priest is not synonymous with “heading a parish.” There are parochial vicars.

ICXC NIKA
 
Great interview and what a great Bishop! He serves his diocese and the Church very well!
 
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