We all want to be better catechists, right?
Even if it’s just so we don’t look stupid in front of our students! 🙂
What if I told you there was one habit you could start today that would radically improve your catechesis? Would you do it?
That habit is prayer!
Your soul is like a rechargeable battery
Prayer is the soul of your catechetical ministry. It animates your teaching and gives it life. The life of God.
Lack of regular prayer is the fastest way to burn out. You have to fill yourself up with God before you can give him to others.
Think of your soul as a rechargeable battery and the energy is God’s grace. When you catechize or do any kind of ministry, you use up that charge. It’s like you give away that grace to your students or whoever you serve.
Prayer is how you charge your spiritual battery. If you work in catechetical ministry and never charge up, your battery will go dead. You won’t have anything left to give and you’ll burn out.
That doesn’t serve anyone–not your students or God and least of all yourself.
Prayer Habits
I want to call your attention to an great new blog by my friend Jared Dees called Prayer Habits.
This is how Jared describes his site:
Prayer habits are various actions that have become a part of our lifestyle that lead us closer to God.
This website is about practicing small habits to become better at prayer. All too often prayer and spirituality are placed so far up on a pedestal that we feel unworthy or unqualified to pray. We think our prayers aren’t good enough or that we’re not praying right. This is why it is so important to start with small changes to our daily lives to become men and women of prayer.
I think it’s important to set up a habit of prayer. It’s easy to get too busy to pray. Believe me, I know. Juggling work, family and other commitments along with your volunteer work as a catechist can be overwhelming.
That’s why it needs to be part of your routine, part of who you are. Jared says:
We have busy schedules that lead us away from prayer. We forget to pray. We pray, but we’re distracted. Or maybe we avoid praying all together.
This is where habits come in. Habits are things we do without thought. They are a part of us. They are intentional at first but become a part of our nature over time.
Catechetical Takeaway
As disciples of Christ, we take on disciplines–habits that train us for godliness. Prayer is one of the fundamental disciplines for spiritual growth. It’s the necessary foundation.
St. Bernard said, “If you are wise, you will be reservoirs and not channels…the reservoir is first filled, and then, without emptying itself, pours out it’s overflow, which is ever renewed, over the fields which it waters.”
Fill up your reservoir with a habit of prayer. Don’t go dry pouring yourself out to your students. They need you, the Church needs you to stay teaching for a long time.
It’s your turn!
- Did I leave anything out?
- Do you have a regular habit of prayer? Why or why not?
- Have you become a more effective catechist after praying regularly?
 I believe. I have had several very powerful experiences that have confirmed my faith in The Power of Prayer http://www.allisonwelch.com/myfirstyear/2010/11/the-power-of-prayer.html  .  This year during Lent I prayed a rosary daily, dedicating it to one of my students each time.  It really wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be – 15 minutes before I got out of bed (pray for the grace to wake up automatically, 15 minutes before your alarm goes off!), or the last 15 minutes before I went to sleep (The 3rd grade teacher says that the angels finish it for you if you fall asleep!  😉  As convinced as I am that praying for your students has very real effects I none-the-less stopped the rosary habit after Easter!  Why are some habits so hard to break and others so hard to keep?!!  Thanks for another great post. Â
I didn’t say it in the post but I was thinking it. One of the great benefits of praying for your students is that things generally go smoother. God often smooths the way and students just get it more. I’ve seen this happen over and over again. The years that I don’t have as much prayer suport for the class, or I don’t pray for them as much myself, often end up being much worse. They don’t get it as much or there’s problems.
That’s a good practice to pray a rosary a day for a student. I often took a class roster and prayed for them by name from the roster. Or, I would pray a rosary while looking at their names, or pray a decade for a specific student. It makes a difference.
Yeah, it’s hard to keep up that intensity though. I’ve found the same thing. It tends to get stale after a while. I like the vary the prayer methods and try something different after a while. I think that helps. Otherwise it becomes less enticing after a while.
Thanks for the comments Alison! Always great to hear from you!
Marc,
This is truly a great habit which will make an impact on everyone in the ministry of catechesis. I think what you said about prayer animating your teaching is so true. Expert catechists are less important than a catechist who is in love with God and desires to share Christ with others. Granted both are important but I truly believe one faithful to prayer and the Holy Spirit working in their ministry is more significant than good skills.  Â
Very nice way of saying this!
Funny how we’re in agreement on this huh? 😉
Marc, thanks for the shout out. I love the way you phrased the need for prayer in catechesis. Years ago as a first year teacher, I was completely burnt out. I was blessed to be in a teaching program where we went on retreats and prayed together as a community. I don’t know what I would have done without prayer in my life.
I hope that with the new site, http://prayerhabits.com, I can become better at prayer myself and help others develop prayer habits that do last beyond liturgical seasons. (I constantly drop prayer habits too, Allison!) It has really been a learning experience for me so far and I’m looking forward to new lessons about the power of prayer.Â
That’s a great story Jared! I believe you that community prayer really saw you through. I wish we could have more community like that in the catechetical world.
I’ve definitely got your new site in my reader and I’ll be visiting regularly!
Marc, I love your analogy of our soul being like recharable batteries! Great, great analogy that makes it easy to picture. Now, I am just a mom and not a catechist, but I do have a regular prayer time. I used to have it at night, after I had sucked the last bit of time out of the day. I tried to spend 15-45 minutes at night praying, but sometimes I would be too tired or forget. It is working really well for me now to have prayer in the morning. I am blessed to be able to go to daily Mass and then stay for 30 minutes to do morning prayer and then sit quietly with the Lord.
We should start a blog meme where you have to use a technological device in a spiritual analogy – I have the GPS and you have the rechargable batteries!
Thanks Amanda!
You know, I’m totally not a morning person but I do find that having my prayer time in the morning is so much better. It really does charge me up!
Ha! I didn’t think about that before but you’re right. You had the awesome GPS analogy. Yeah, we should do that! 😉