Coming Home program welcomes back Catholics

Calling lost sheep

Like a sheep that has wandered from its flock, a Catholic who has left the Church often feels lost and alone, according to a retired diocesan priest who now devotes many hours to helping such individuals find their way back into the fold.

And in keeping with the example of the Good Shepherd laid out in the New Testament, Rev. Francis Gilchrist leaves few stones unturned in his search for such "lost souls."

He and Dr. Kathy Menard are co-founders of Coming Home, a ministry that offers support and encouragement to Catholics who have become separated from the Church. They use everything from newspaper ads to flyers to seek out such individuals for the purpose of guiding them back to the faith. To date, their innovative outreach ministry has helped some 300 inactive Catholics across the Albany Diocese find their way home.

Listening first

The first step back for non-practicing Catholics is a Coming Home workshop at which they are invited to bring forth not just questions but also complaints and concerns they may have about the Church.

According to Father Gilchrist, those who come to the sessions are often angry, hurt or just plain curious about whether things in the Church have changed since they ceased practicing their faith.

Often, those who show up have been "away" from the Church for 20 or more years, and have many questions that need answering, stressed Father Gilchrist.

Care-ful

The sessions take place "in an affirming, caring atmosphere," he emphasized, and there are "no obligations" afterwards.

"The approach is gentle and non-judgmental," said Father Gilchrist. "Our goal is simply to help inactive Catholics come to terms with the Church, and -- if they wish -- help them return to the practice of their faith."

One of the things Father Gilchrist feels makes Coming Home so special is that many of those who help co-facilitate sessions were themselves once inactive Catholics. "Because they've been there, they can truly empathize," he said.

Tugged back

In fact, Coming Home owes its very birth to "a lost sheep." Dr. Menard, who was recently appointed coordinator of the Diocese's RENEW program, had been an inactive Catholic for about 17 years until she returned to the Church in 1987.

Looking back, she said there was "nothing dramatic either when I left the Church or when I came home. It was fairly abrupt, just a change in me. I just left and went on with my life with my husband."

As the couple's two children grew, however, Dr. Menard began to experience occasional bouts of nostalgia involving the Church.

"At first, I viewed them as just a part of my life that was over," she recalled. "But gradually, I began to feel what you might call little tugs back to the Church. Those little tugs became more frequent and more insistent with the result that I went to see a priest I knew from college. Still, I was very tentative. I said I wanted to consider going back to church, and I was almost surprised that I found it so hard for me to say even that much out loud. He made some very constructive suggestions -- among them that I go to the parish where I live and attend Mass. I did that and was so moved by the experience that I cried."

Coming back

In retrospect, Dr. Menard believes the decision to return to the Church wasn't truly her own. "It was God as my Father reclaiming me," she explained. "It was almost as though it was a call because there was such a strong spiritual conversion, a rediscovery of my faith. It was pretty overwhelming."

Despite what she felt was a call to some sort of lay ministry, Dr. Menard hesitated to come forward in a leadership capacity.

"Having been away so many years, I did not want to be perceived as presumptuous," she said. "Who was I to offer counsel or advice?"

Two factors, however, would not allow her sit back and do nothing: "One was a sense of gratitude to the Church that had been there all those years I was away and sustained by others in my absence. Because of them, there was a Church for me to come home to. The other thing had to do with the fact that being a Catholic entails ownership; there is an obligation to use our God-given gifts and make a contribution to our faith community. In other words, being a Catholic demands more than being a consumer of religious services. It also means being a contributor."

Giving something back

Recalling that "We Are God's Priestly People" had been a very strong theme of Bishop Howard J. Hubbard's message around that same time (and the title of his pastoral letter), Dr. Menard vowed that she would find a way to answer her baptismal call to service. It wasn't long before God provided the way.

"After I came back home to the Church, I found others I encountered in secular life would be intrigued," she said. "They'd ask how I did it and what it was like. The interesting thing was, of course, that our paths would cross at school reunions, parties, water coolers. The one place you would not find these individual was at church because they no longer felt at home there."

It was then that the seed for what was to blossom into the Coming Home ministry were planted.

Enter Father Gilchrist, whom Dr. Menard met while participating in a program involving issues of diocesan stewardship in the early 1990s. The two had a similar goal.

"I had tried a program reaching out to inactive Catholics in Hudson in 1983," the priest noted. "I thought it sounded pretty good at the time, but it didn't work out so well. Then when I met Kathy, I thought: `This is really something! I felt the Lord had sent her to us for this very reason.'"

Beginnings

Inspired by a book by Carrie Kemp and Donald Pologruto titled "Catholics Coming Home" (Harper Collins), Dr. Menard and Father Gilchrist developed Coming Home, a lay ministry supported by the Diocese.

"This is an exciting time for people who want to come back to the Church, and I look forward to their return," reflected Dr. Menard. "The Church is enhanced by their presence and diminished by their absence. It is so important that this message reaches them."

(The next Coming Home series begins at 7:30 p.m., Sept. 23, at the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Schenectady. For more information, contact Father Gilchrist at 463-4817.)

(09-04-97) [[In-content Ad]]