[00:00:00] Jim: How do you bring prayer, small groups, evangelization, and mentorship, teaching other people to teach other people how to pray? How do you bring that all together in one beautiful initiative? Well, it's called the Lampstand Initiative. And today I sit down with Father Pat McLaughlin, and we talk all about it. Take a listen. 

[00:00:20] Intro: Hey everybody, welcome to the EquipCast, a weekly podcast for the Archdiocese of Omaha. I'm your host, Jim Jansen. Now let's dive into some encouragement and inspiration. To equip you to live your faith and to be fruitful in your mission. Let's go.

[00:00:45] Jim: Father Pat McLaughlin, welcome to the equip cast. How are you? I'm doing well. Thank you so much. How are you? I'm great. I am looking forward to this conversation as often happens sometimes behind the scenes, you know, we just kind of start chatting before, uh, we hit record and. Before I know it, I'm like, Oh my gosh, this is an awesome conversation, but we need to stop and hit record because I am so excited to talk about, uh, the work that you and your parishes have done with this lampstand initiative to teach your parishioners to pray.
Before we jump into that, we kind of have a tradition here. I want to give you a chance to introduce yourself a little bit to people. Father, tell us a little bit about, about your, your faith journey. 

[00:01:23] Fr. Pat: I grew up in a holy name parish in Omaha. And was a third of four children attended Catholic school for part of my life and public school for the other part actually discerned my vocation rather late in life.
I was studying chemistry. In graduate school at Iowa State and had a profound encounter with Jesus and about halfway through my program, I, I really started listening to the Lord more and more becoming more active in my life of faith, becoming more rooted in prayer and the sacraments than I had. And, uh, eight days after I graduated, I entered seminary.

[00:02:09] Jim: That's great. With degree in hand for chemistry. 

[00:02:12] Fr. Pat: With degree in hand. Yes. Yes, I didn't quite leave my nets to follow Jesus right away. It was a discernment process through seminary It was a discernment process, but uh, I continually felt the Lord calling me to the priesthood and I've been a priest now, uh, I celebrated 20 years in June.

[00:02:33] Jim: Oh, that's awesome. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. So, give us a little bit of a glimpse of your parishes, you know, for those who are not from the orange dices and for those who are, and just don't know their geography, uh, Norfolk, Nebraska is close to right. The, the geographic center of a. not, you know, perfectly proportionally shaped, uh, archdiocese.
If we had a geographic heart, uh, you'd be there. Teach us a little bit about your, your parishes and the family that you shepherd. 

[00:03:08] Fr. Pat: My parish is comprised of five parishes. We have Norfolk, which is very much a city parish. Sacred Heart has a long tradition of having a strong Catholic identity in our parish family.
We have a K 12 school and have operated it for many years. We have a solid religious education program. And we are active in terms of, uh, a lot of things, parishes in the city are typically active in, uh, we have a vibrant Vincent DePaul society. Our Knights of Columbus do very well in, in many other groups.
And then we have four. rural parishes that surround Norfolk in the cardinal directions. We started off having Madison to the south and Stanton to the east and they were our first family of parishes that we joined together in 2019. A year later in 2020, St. Patrick in Battle Creek joined us, and they came on board and were a great addition to our existing family.
And then just this past July, St. Josephine Pierce joined us, and they are also an incredible parish with a vibrant life of faith in their parish. I'm still learning the ins and outs of Pierce because I've only been working with them as their pastor for a few months, but every indication is that they will enrich our family just as every child enriches life of a family. 

[00:04:58] Jim: You know, for, for context, for those who, who don't know, I mean, you kind of alluded to this, but Norfolk, although it's in the middle of.
Uh, and not exactly the middle of Nebraska, but that, you know, geographic center of the archdiocese, Sacred Hearts, a large parish, you know, by most standards, the others are much smaller. How has that been as they come together? I mean, you know, a number of our listeners within the archdiocese and outside have experienced pastoral planning.
They, they know, you know, this kind of necessity to come together in families or groupings.
You've experienced this a number of times and now there's, again, recent additions. We could talk all day about this, but what, what's that experience been like? What's the Lord doing in that? 

[00:05:40] Fr. Pat: I think that initially there was a lot of fear and apprehension that the smaller parishes would be absorbed into the larger parish, but that really hasn't been the case.
Every parish continues to... Operate some things on a very independent level. Our finances are separate. Our ways of implementing the pastoral vision might vary from parish to parish. There might be some things that we all embrace and some things that maybe will work really well in one parish. Because of the personality of the parish family will not work as well in another parish and so they will modify it or tweak something in such a way that it will really be effective for them.
And so, when we really started collaborating and saying that this is our reality and we are committed not only to our good, but the good of others. All of our Catholic brothers and sisters in service to the Lord for all of our communities and service to neighbor in all of our communities, people really came on board.
And I don't think that there is a large number of people in any of our parishes who don't see some benefits in terms of Being part of a family of the parishes. 

[00:07:06] Jim: You know, as you talk, I mean, I think about my own family. There's a number of things that all of the, you know, children and members of the family have in common, but there's large degree of individual personality and flavor.
And there's, you know, some things we do in common and there's some hobbies that one member of the family just loves and the others, uh, it was like, okay, more power to you, but that's not our thing. And that's great. Father, you referenced the vision and priorities. Our Archbishop, Archbishop Lucas, gave us that vision, you know, listening to the Spirit and gathering at various times with groups within the Archdiocese, came up with a beautiful vision, one church, encountering Jesus, equipping disciples, and living mercy.
From our conversations, you've personally embraced that, you found that inspiring. I think, if I'm, if I'm getting this right, it really was. part of the genesis of this desire that you have to really teach your parishioners to pray. Can you begin to kind of break that open for us? Like where, where the desire came from, how the vision was a part of that, um, just where this all began.

[00:08:12] Fr. Pat: We received this great gift from Archbishop Lucas after he spent many hours listening to the people of our archdiocese in terms of what they desired moving forward as a church and had a committee that prayerfully discerned and sifted through all of these responses that so many people gave and really summarized our vision in These four ways that we are one church, that we seek to encounter Christ, that Christ is alive, He is raised, and He is accessible, and that our Lord gives us so many graces and blessings that we can utilize in our everyday life, that we really are equipped to be an agent for change in our world, in our community, in our family, in our marriage.
Whatever the case may be in that, uh, above all, we're committed to sharing, uh, the mercy of God. Both the corporal works of mercy and the spiritual works of mercy that we can truly be a presence for Christ in the world and bring Christ to people. That was very exciting for me. And what really occurred to me was that people often will have encounters with Jesus in their daily life.
They'll have this experience. God will work in their life in some really amazing ways that are truly extraordinary, but it will also work in their lives in ordinary ways. And some people, as a result of that, become very faithful disciples of Jesus and follow him. And some people... Don't. And there was a thought in terms of what is the difference in, in these two scenarios, and I had taken a course when I was in seminary on the theology of Father Bernard Lonergan, who was a Canadian Jesuit, I believe, and just a really brilliant theologian, and he talked about The common meaning that a group has, and he said that a common meaning isn't something that is necessarily received, but something that has to be achieved and actually re achieved throughout the life of the group, and that applies to any group.
That is actually a cohesive group. There are some, uh, situations where a number of people are gathered together, but they're really not a group, a bunch of people standing in line at a fast-food restaurant. They all are there to eat, but you know what? They're not really connected. They just all want something to eat.
Whereas a sports team or a club or. A group of disciples, they're really gathered together for a common purpose, a common meaning. And what Father Lonergan said is that people will have an experience. But they need an environment in which to understand that experience. 

[00:11:49] Jim: Yeah. And a communal one. A communal environment.

[00:11:52] Fr. Pat: Right. And, and that that understanding will lead to some sort of judgment. And when, when people have an experience of Christ's love for them, and they are placed in an environment where they can really perceive the love that Christ has for them, Love that their brothers and sisters in Christ have for them.
They can't help but judge that it's good because they're overwhelmed and and then they commit to it. And then the process of conversion happens and the process of conversion. As described by Father Lonergan is being in love without limitation. 

[00:12:34] Jim: Hmm. Wow. Wait, say that again. That is so good. 

[00:12:37] Fr. Pat: Conversion is being in love without limitation.
Where, of course, our Lord demonstrates that beautifully in terms of His, His gift of Himself to the Father in love for us, where He holds nothing back for Himself and just pours out himself completely in love and obedience to the father out of his great love for us. And that is what the disciple is called to do, to have that kind of love for God in return, because he loved us first.
And I really think that the pastoral vision is really embracing of that because when people encounter Jesus, what we as members of the body of Christ in the church are called to do is... Simply to provide an environment where they can come and understand these, these tremendous encounters with Jesus that he's constantly providing each one of us in our lives.
And as a result, then they will say, Gosh, this is wonderful. This is so good. I, I want more of this and, and they'll commit themselves in their lives to it. And it's very exciting. We sometimes hear people talk about different retreats or different movements within the Catholic Church and they'll say, I went on this retreat, and it changed my life, or I was part of this movement, and it changed my life.
And I've always had a little bit of a problem because what really changed their life was Jesus. Jesus changed their life, right? Jesus came to them, but, but the retreat. The movement, the day-to-day life in a parish that offers an opportunity to create an environment where people can understand. That experience that they are having in a community of believers and that when you have a common experience, a common understanding, a common judgment and a common commitment, we really are one church.

[00:14:43] Jim: Yeah, you know, Father, I am not familiar with Father Lonigan's work, but I mean, what you're saying rings so true to my own missionary experience. I mean, being blessed to have a front row view of the Lord's work, you know, with. Hundreds of, I mean, I don't know, maybe even thousands, but hundreds of, of college students who had encounters and those who were connected to the community knew what to make of that and that encounter tended to lead to a conversion of life.
And for some, if they weren't, if they were a little bit more peripheral to the community, that encounter did not always lead to a conversion of life. Sometimes it faded away. Some would return to the place of encounter, the retreat or the whatever it was, and maybe, you know, again, they would experience that and could be drawn in, but that the absence of the community to help them interpret the experience.
Made a huge difference in the overall fruitfulness.

[00:15:43] Fr. Pat: It absolutely does. The evil one is going to try to convince us that any profound encounter we have with Jesus is imaginary or transitory or simply a high that we have for a particular amount of time and it's not, it's not true, it's not real, it's not enduring.
Right. And when we are in a community that will foster that experience and say, no, I had that experience too and that experience is real and I know it's real, then people won't fall into the lies that the evil one wants to whisper in our ear, cause doubt to grow. 

[00:16:27] Jim: Yeah. And I'm intuiting here, correct me if I'm wrong, but that a part of your conviction to teach people to pray.
Is that, you know, regardless of the particular graced moment where you maybe had a first or a maybe a notably deeper encounter. The Lord is constantly laboring to meet us, and one of the privileged ways He does that is in prayer. And so, if we can just teach people to pray, the recurrence of that encounter and the deepening of that conversion really could be limitless.

[00:17:01] Fr. Pat: Absolutely. Lately, I've been sharing with my parishioners that we don't have to win Jesus over. He is already pursuing us. I love that. There isn't any convincing that He needs to love us. He loves us so incredibly that... Yeah. We simply have to stop and receive that gift of His love. We have to quiet ourselves enough to hear those words of affirmation, those words of encouragement, those calls to discipleship, which, albeit, brings us great joy, while at the same time commands us to pick up our cross and follow Him, all the while knowing that we have a solidarity with Him, because there is nobody...
Who will ever love us more than Jesus. There is nobody Who will ever want what is best for us more than Jesus and there is nobody as committed to our well-being as Jesus is. 

[00:18:05] Jim: Yeah, okay. So I love this and at the risk of turning our conversation here into spiritual direction for me I want to ask the question right when Jesus Does speak his words of affirmation, love, whether it is it a, you know, a sense of like, oh, I hear it in my heart or I hear it in the scriptures, or I just, you know, know, in some other way, you know, he's infinitely creative and how he communicates his love for us.
What do you say to people when they're like? I know it, but I don't feel like like I know it like they can feel the difference between when it has hit their, their head or their ears and when it doesn't seem to be filling their heart and changing their sense of peace and confidence in their daily life.

[00:18:56] Fr. Pat: Excellent question that. Brings us to some of the thoughts of St. Ignatius of Loyola in terms of discerning the voices that we hear there. There are voices at work in our lives. We have the. Good spirit, the voice of God, the voice of our guardian angel, the voice of our patron saint, the intercessions of our blessed mother, who are always leading us to the Lord.
And then there's the voice of the evil one that is trying to discourage us in terms of anything good and holy and beautiful and true and trying to give us illusory goods instead of the authentic goods that God wants for us. And we, we sometimes listen to that voice as well. And then I would suggest that our voice kind of fluctuates somewhere between those two voices.
And so, if I'm praying, how do I know if I'm hearing my own voice, or the voice of the Lord, or the voice of the evil one? Uh, I think that there are some just really, really simple ways in which to, uh, at least be sure that I'm not listening to the voice of the evil one. So, for example, what God tells me isn't going to be different from the Ten Commandments or from the teachings of the Church.
He's not going to tell me that it's okay for me. To drive recklessly in a residential neighborhood, even though it's not okay for everybody else, there is also. Uh, a sense that we are called to follow Jesus and following Jesus does mean picking up our cross and following Him as He leads us to Calvary where there is, there is a real death, there is a real passion, but there is most importantly a real resurrection where we are transformed by God's glory By the glory of His only begotten Son, uh, that, that is shared with us.
There, there's a growth in virtue. There are those, yeah, but I don't want to do that moments that we sometimes have. So, I'm thinking about how when I was a younger priest, there would be times where maybe me and, and different members of the parish wouldn't agree with things and Maybe I was in the right, but maybe even though I was in the right, I wouldn't present the material as Charitably as I could have and so I would I would call the parishioner and I would say hey I meant what I said, and I think I'm in the right, but you know what I didn't say it very charitably and because I didn't Say it very charitably.
I'm sorry and undoubtedly there would be some people who would I think that that meant that I was conceding to to their perspective to their point of view. And it's like, gosh, I almost don't want to make this call because they're going to think that that I'm waffling in terms of the position, but I know that.
Telling people, Hey, you know what I need it to be more charitable in this situation was the right thing to do. And even if it's hard and even if it might be misinterpreted as something else, there is something virtuous. There is something good and true and beautiful about doing that. And, and that's a sign that God's spirit is moving us.
But above all, there's a sense of peace that persists. and endures after the period of prayer, that's an indication that this is truly from God. 

[00:22:43] Jim: Yeah. I love this. Like, what you're talking about, right, is, you know, the discernment of spirits, which I know you have made a real central piece of this effort to teach people to pray.
And if I can, I just want to set you up because, you know, if discernment of spirits is essentially learning how to tell the voice of the Lord, the voice of myself, and the voice of the enemy, you only need that. If you are intentionally trying to listen to the voice of the Lord. And I, I just, I love, like, it, it speaks to the, the type of prayer you're trying to teach in that, boy, I have to provide this tool as a pastor to people who are trying to pray to help them distinguish the voice they hear, because I am drawing them to a type of prayer where they will hear the voice of the Lord.
And then, of course, you know, the enemy is going to try and sabotage it. If you would give people a little bit of a picture of some of the principles of this initiative, uh, to teach people to pray, what are some of the, yeah, what are some of the kind of the goals and principles that, that have guided this?

[00:23:51] Fr. Pat: We started off, of course, In prayer, in terms of how do we take this great gift of the pastoral vision and make it accessible in the everyday life of our parishioners? How do we take this great opportunity to encounter Jesus and provide really a rich environment where people can achieve that understanding, achieve that good judgment, achieve that commitment, and really be transformed in their life?
And, uh, at the very beginning of this process, I had been teaching prayer to my parishioners based on a book that I received in the mail. Sometimes they will send priests free books to review for use in their parish. And right after we got the pastoral vision, I received a book in the mail called, Parish has a school of prayer.

[00:24:50] Jim: Yes. I know it. 

[00:24:51] Fr. Pat: Great book. It was a great book. And it said above all parishes should teach people how to pray. And I go, well, that's so obvious that we need to be doing more of that. Yeah. Yeah. I started working in terms of taking my formation. In the spiritual life and trying to share that with other people and I was having some success and then around the same time the office of evangelization and family life, uh was a Differently named entity but a lot of the same personnel and I came down to Omaha And I met with you and I met with Jen Moser who just got married and I don't know her married name. 

[00:25:34] Jim: Jen Stephensmeyer now. 

[00:25:36] Fr. Pat: Jen Stephensmeyer and Andy Dejka... and I explained my desire in order to take this idea that parishes should be a school of prayer and apply it in a wider sense and we had this wonderful three-to-four-hour discussion and 

[00:25:56] Jim: I remember it.
Well, it was so wonderful. Yeah. 

[00:25:58] Fr. Pat: I just came back with all of these resources and then. In my scientific way, I systematically started putting together the resources in some sort of organized fashion. And I had, uh, also gone to school to be a teacher. And so, I started thinking, how would I turn this material into lesson plans to make it really accessible?
What would measure success in terms of outcomes from different people learning this? And I did that in Humphrey for Uh, a year or two and, and had some great things happen in terms of the parish. And then I was called to be pastor here in this family of parishes. And I worked with father Scott Schimler, who's currently our vocation director in the archdiocese of Omaha and Father Gregory Carl, who is one of our parochial Vickers here.
And I said, this is what I've been doing, but we can do more. And we started praying about it. Then we came to this verse in Matthew's gospel. You are the light of the world, a city set on a hill, cannot be hit, nor do men light a lamp and put it under a bushel, but. Understand, and it gives light to all in the house, and that's where this lampstand really came that that we need to put ourselves on a lamp stand so that we can draw people to Christ, not for our own glory.
But for, for Christ's glory, and not to draw people to us personally, but to be instruments to draw people to Christ, so that our light can shine before men, that they may see our good works and give glory to our Heavenly Father. That, that was our goal. And we went and we revised it, and we came up with this Lamb Stand Initiative, and, and we decided that we were going to focus on five different types of prayer.
We could have focused on. More or less, but we decided five and the first was going to be Lectio Divina from the bed and getting tradition And then there was this a our our prayer that the Archdiocese had presented to me when I met with you and Jen and Andy and that seemed very useful and of course Ignatian prayer is very rich and it's different a little bit from Lectio Divina, in that it employs the imaginative faculties a little more, and a little less of the rational faculties.
And then, after people had learned these three types of prayer, We wanted to revisit the Rosary of the Blessed Mother so that people could really meditate and contemplate the mysteries of the Rosary and the virtues associated with those mysteries on a deeper level so that they would really journey with the Blessed Mother through the life of Christ and on to our future glory that the Lord has for those who are faithful.
And then we wanted to do something really, really different with adoration. What we wanted people to do is we wanted people to really enjoy being in love in front of the blessed sacrament. There are a lot of people who will bring their Bible into adoration or prayer grocery in adoration, do Alexio Divina in adoration, and all of those are wonderful and, and they're good and they're holy.
You're a married man and, and, you know, sometimes it is just awesome to sit with your wife and be with her and enjoy the love you have for her and enjoy the love she has for you and, and rest in that and rejoice in that. And we wanted people to have that opportunity just to be overwhelmed by Christ's love.
And open themselves up and be totally receptive to that love and empty themselves of their love of God and give all of who they are to God. And so those were the types of prayer we decided upon. So that was kind of the first step. And, and like I said, we could have chosen other types of prayer, but these were the ones that really spoke to our hearts.
Yeah. And then we said, okay, what do we want this to do? Well, the first thing we want this to do is we want people to pray every day. And. That seems a reasonable thing. When you love somebody, you might want to talk to them every once in a while. And, and. If you really love somebody, maybe you want to talk to them more than, than less.
So, uh, kind of our first standard was a commitment to daily prayer. The second one is often the hardest because it involves us quieting ourselves and really developing.
Now, Jim, I can't speak for you, but when I first started praying, and started praying every day, this is, this is how my prayer would typically go. I would make the sign of the cross, and I would start off saying, hey Jesus, this is what's going on in my life. And I would tell him the things that were going on in my life, and then I would say, these are the things that kind of like, I need your help with, and I would list off the things.
That I needed help with or that other people needed help with and then I would say, oh, yeah Uh, you really came through with me in this way, and I just want to thank you and then I would say, okay Jesus it's time for me to go You have a great day, and I'll talk to you tomorrow. See you tomorrow. 

[00:31:49] Jim: You're not the only one, Father.

[00:31:52] Fr. Pat: And it wasn't until I started growing a little bit in my life where I realized, Gosh, Jesus didn't have any chance to speak to me. Wow. Oh, that's good. I didn't have a conversation with him. I didn't talk with him. I talked at him. And so, we decided that part of the listening heart is giving Jesus an opportunity to speak with us, and that we were going to be okay in the silence, and if the Lord chose to speak to us in words or in images, or in affect, or in some other consolation, that we would receive it with joy.
And if the We didn't perceive it. Then we would receive that with joy. I always quote Sister Bernie Mission, who was my religion teacher in grade school. And Sister Bernie told us one time, God gave you two ears and one mouth. So, you should listen twice as much as you speak. And I think that that's a good maximum prayer.

[00:32:58] Jim: Yeah. Oh, my goodness. Wow. I mean, I've heard that Sister Bernie didn't teach me, but I feel like she must have had important evidence. A few successors that she passed it along to because I've heard that too, but I've never, I don't think I've ever heard that apply to prayer, but that's brilliant, right?
Like you get two ears in one mouth and the same way we would approach a human friendship, let's approach the Lord in prayer. Let's let him speak. 

[00:33:24] Fr. Pat: The next foundation is that we wanted people to feel comfortable sharing the fruits of their prayer within the group that they were learning the prayer techniques.

[00:33:34] Jim: Yeah, say more about that because I don't know if we've mentioned it yet, the communal aspect of this, you're not just teaching people to pray in a classroom setting, you're creating little, small group communities where people are learning this together, really sharing the experience of this. Deeper form of prayer.

[00:33:55] Fr. Pat: They are a lampstand group is a group that is meant to exist for a certain amount of time and then not exist anymore and the reason that it's not meant to exist anymore. It's a lampstand initiative. It's not just about teaching people how to pray Which would be wonderful, but it's actually about teaching people how to teach other people how to teach other people how to pray So good.
So when when we start teaching these prayer techniques, we will certainly teach the content of how you Would go about praying the Alexio Divina or praying with the ARR method or praying in a nation way, but we're also teaching them how to help people understand what obstacles they or others might have in their prayer and how to overcome those obstacles so that as they share this technique with other people.
They can impart this wisdom so that we're really setting up dominoes so that each generation of BLAM! Stand groups will help the next two generations. They will help the ones that they're teaching, and they will help the ones who are taught by the ones that they are teaching and that it will be always forward moving.

[00:35:20] Jim: I love that one. I mean, you've chosen, you know, expressions of prayer, particular methods that are very transferable, but also, I love how you built in like when the group comes to an end, there is a Uh, very significant signal. It's like, okay, now it's your turn that like it signals this, okay, now it's time to begin.
So, it's actually maybe not an ending. It's a beginning for many. Absolutely. Father, I want to go back to something you said. But way earlier, just when, and when you read the verse, the lampstand, I don't know if people catch this, but there is a very evangelistic dimension to this. I mean, Jesus's image, which you read, is a lampstand, that it's this, that he is lighting us up to be signs and lights and beacons of hope.
If you would, I mean, again, we could talk all day about this, but speak a little bit to the connection that you see between this formation in prayer and the overflow and evangelization. 

[00:36:28] Fr. Pat: When God gives us any good thing, he gives it to us, certainly, but he also gives it to the world through us. Mm hmm. And just as Being in love without limitation involves that self-emptying in love to the father When we receive the love of Jesus in our hearts We can't help but pour that out to others in our lives to our spouses to our children to our neighbors and That really inspires us to embrace those corporal and spiritual works of mercy in our daily life so that feeding the hungry becomes a way of life and praying for the living and the dead becomes something that we always do.
And We give clothes to the naked and we forgive offenses willingly. And there's just a real beauty in that. So, the more Jesus gives us, the more we receive, the more we want to share it with others, because we know that it's good. And we want to let other people experience that amazing goodness we have received.

[00:37:51] Jim: I'm reminded as you share that of a, uh, analogy I heard someone say that, you know, apple trees don't need pep talks to produce apples. If they're healthy and they're mature, they just produce other apples. And that the same thing is true of Christians, you know, that that Christians who are rooted in the Lord, if they are healthy and mature, there's a conviction here, even if unspoken, that prayer helps mature and and heal us that we're just going to produce other Christians, it just will be the natural and almost inevitable fruit of our life as we are deeply rooted and connected in the Lord.

[00:38:34] Fr. Pat: Absolutely. Provided we have that environment in which Christians can thrive. 

[00:38:39] Jim: Yeah. I want to give you a chance to talk about the fruit. I mean, we've been kind of like, you know, we're talking about apples now, but, but you know, like I, we've been nerding out a little bit on kind of the principles and some of the ways that this is structured and the methods of prayer, but you've seen lives changed and impacted.
You've seen kind of multi-generational fruit. I just want to give you a little chance to give glory to God for what he's been able to do. Through this. 

[00:39:06] Fr. Pat: It's absolutely amazing. I just want to finish up for completeness because sure, you can take the boy out of the science lab, but the lab out of the boy sharing the graces of our prayer with those in the land scan group is, is kind of the third pillar of this, but, but the most important pillar is sharing the fruits of one's Life of faith, but people not in the land scan group.
So, if I am encountering someone who is special to me, If I am encountering someone who is searching for the Lord in their life, As demonstrated by a lot of ways, If I encounter the least of my brothers or sisters, Then I want to tell them that I have something really incredible in my relationship with the Lord and that they can have it too.
And so, I shouldn't be afraid to say I was walking around Skyview Park the other day and I was praying to the Lord, and I was having this dilemma in terms of what to do in this situation or I was Walking around and praying and talking to the Lord. And I was talking about the, uh, sadness I had at, at the loss of my mother this summer, and the Lord really spoke to me and affirmed me.
And his love for me and his solidarity and all of that. And maybe he gave me direction, but maybe he just listened and let me know he was listening, and he was with me. And when you share an encounter with Jesus like that, then I think demonstrates The, the reality of Christ working in our lives. And what I can say is that people who are praying and listening to Jesus and receiving fruits of their prayer are sharing the fruits of their prayer.
This is true in our school. When, when I came to Norfolk Catholic and started meeting with the teachers, I let them know that we were going to be moving forward with the pastoral vision and I invited them to join us in this great movement in terms of the pastoral vision. In education, every I don't know, four or five years.
They have the latest innovation in education come out and and teachers are used to saying, hey, this is the latest and greatest thing and it's going to totally change your life in the teacher in the teaching profession and vocation and please embrace it. And, you know, they'll pick up something that. Uh, there's always going to be something that is going to be even better, even greater.

[00:42:23] Jim: Yeah, just wait five years. 

[00:42:25] Fr. Pat: Wait five years. Uh, but what we did is we said, you know what? What we really want is we really want you to grow in your life of faith and we want you to. Experience the love of God and Jesus Christ in your daily life. And once you start experiencing it, then you will not only want it for yourself.
You will want it for your family, and you will want it for our students. And so initially maybe there was a little, I don't know, uncertainty in terms of what we were doing. But now. The vast majority of our faculty and staff look forward to their weekly lampstand groups where they can share their life of faith with their professional colleagues and talk about how they're sharing the fruits of their prayer with their families or with their students or with their, uh, athletes, if they're coaches or, or with the members of their different activities.
And it's just amazing. 

[00:43:21] Jim: What you're doing is, I mean, it really is changing culture. You know, I mean, there've been more than a few commentators who have talked about the terribly tragic irony that sometimes, even within a community of faith, it's hard to talk about Jesus. I mean, as a real person who I conversed with today, who met me in my confusion, or my sadness, or my need.
And you're utilizing prayer in these groups to create a culture where people can share that again. Uh, and it's safe to talk about Jesus. And it's amazing. 
[00:44:01] Fr. Pat: I know that you've had this experience, Jim, when you and your team members have, have shared Lectio Divina with large groups of parishioners, but you you'll give.
a room of 60 people a particular Bible verse to reflect upon. And you will start off asking the Holy Spirit to guide you in your prayer, and everybody in the room will make a similar prayer, and they'll all read an identical verse. We ask them to look for that word or that phrase or that image that really burns in their heart.
And it's different for every people. And sometimes it's not even the most important. Point of the passage, but it's something that that person needs to hear and then to go back and say, God wanted you to know this, and this is where God wants to start the conversation and this is the jumping off point for a conversation with God, because you asked him to point out what he wanted to talk about.
And he did. It's amazing. And so, the idea that God doesn't speak to us and that We can't hear God speaking to us, unless an angel from heaven comes down. 

[00:45:19] Jim: Right. Lights and trumpets not needed. Right. 

[00:45:23] Fr. Pat: It's just not the case. God is constantly pursuing us. He is constantly showing grace upon us. And we just have to put ourselves in the right situation in which to listen to what he has to say.

[00:45:36] Jim: Right. Well, and I love, I mean, we're kind of almost full circle now, how he's constantly doing that. But without the communal support, so often we fail to recognize or fully receive what he's done. And in the context of the community, we're kind of like, Oh, the Lord is speaking to me. And we're able to receive it more fully because we recognize, or at least we give ourselves permission to like, Oh, that's what's going on there.
In the context that I've had to be able to accompany people as they're learning to pray in a contemplative or conversational way, Sometimes the most impactful thing I do is just like, you know, I think that's the Lord and it's okay to receive that. And then suddenly as people give themselves permission that, you know, what has always been on offer begins to come to life.
So, Father, tell us some stories of just some of the experiences and the fruit of this initiative. 

[00:46:35] Fr. Pat: I've already shared the fact that it has been super well received by our faculty and staff at at Norfolk Catholic and also amongst our staff members at the parish offices here in Norfolk. Uh, I think that.
What is really amazing is that it has been really life giving in the life of our parishioners. We have a spreadsheet going and in the spreadsheet. 

[00:47:06] Jim: I'm just like back to the scientist, right? And never, never, never completely leaves. I love it. Sorry. Keep going. 

[00:47:12] Fr. Pat: Never completely leaves. So, we track the generations as best as we can.
So, there were a group of three or four staff members that I began with, and then not all of them, but some of them began their own lampstand group and shared everything that I shared with them with another group of people. And then the group that received from that person, maybe one or two. We'll share it with another group of people.
And, uh, we have for sure five, but possibly six generations that in the past four years have worked from this. And if you consider that in order to do. All of the five methods of prayer, it takes about 20 weeks of weekly meeting and, and practice and prayer throughout the weeks. That's a big commitment.

[00:48:10] Jim: Yeah. So that's the duration. A typical group is about, about 20 weeks. About 

[00:48:15] Fr. Pat: 20 weeks. But, but we realized that not everybody could commit to 20 weeks. And, and so what we decided to do just last year is we decided to break the units apart so that we could teach them a unit at a time. And so now we have a unit that focuses just on Lectio Divina.
And you can do the unit that focuses, focuses on Lectio Divina during Lent. 

[00:48:42] Jim: And how many would that be like four weeks, five weeks? 

[00:48:45] Fr. Pat: Yeah, four or five weeks. And then people can continue to practice and the group leader, then just tries to make herself or himself available. If, if people run into problems throughout.
So, I worked with a group of people last Lent. I think it was. Largely, our school board members with some other people, and we focused just on Lectio. When we have Lent again, I will make the offer to say, okay, we had a great time with Lectio. Now let's try Ignatian prayer, or now let's try our prayer. And the other thing that we want people to know is, once they learn the techniques, they in the guidance of the Holy Spirit to share a particular technique with a particular person in their life who might be going through a circumstance where that prayer technique would be really, really useful to them.
So, if you were going through a difficult time in your life and you just needed somebody to listen to you and somebody to really Be with you as you were going through that difficult time. What I might do is I might say, you know what? I think that bringing this to the Lord and ARR prayer might be really beneficial.
And I was in this situation in my life where I brought something to the Lord and ARR prayer, and it helped me. And if you'd like, I'd be happy to share. Kind of this new tool in our prayer toolbox with you to see maybe if it can help you. 

[00:50:30] Jim: Yeah. Father, I'm just laughing as I hear you talk. Like, I mean, our time has just flown, but like you've literally managed to bring together like all of my passions into one initiative, right?
Prayer, small groups, teaching others to teach others, right? So, mentorship and evangelization. It's wonderful. And I think, I mean, no wonder it's been so fruitful. We could probably go on forever, but I want to give you a moment here as a pastor to those who hear this and their, their hearts are kind of conflicted as they hear this.
They see it's beautiful. They love this. They want this. But immediately there's this sense of heaviness, like we could never do this in my parish. What would you say to someone who, who wants this? They see this. But they're, they're a little overwhelmed and they don't know where to begin. 

[00:51:23] Fr. Pat: It is very easy to see something as daunting as trying to learn or share different ways to pray as, as an insurmountable obstacle, but it's not.
First of all, Jesus is ultimately in charge. And if Jesus wants something to be done, He is going to give you the graces to accomplish that which He wants to be done. There is nothing magical about these five techniques of prayer. These were just the ones that we chose. There is nothing magical about this initiative.
I think that it's founded on solid principles. I think that these prayer methods have stood the test of time. And I think that they're useful to a wide variety of people into a wide variety of states in life. But there's nothing specific about this. What, what is really, really important to do is to develop that listening heart to Jesus as one commits to daily prayer.
And not to be afraid to share the fruits of the prayer that you received from the Lord with those closest to you and with the wider world. If you're practicing that, you have the heart of lampstand already. If, however, people wanted to utilize this particular method. Everything that we've created is available on our website.
Anybody can access our website. A couple of our more recent publications have not been uploaded yet. Uh, we plan to upload our little, uh, booklet on Lectio Divina on our website soon. Our unit on, uh, Ignatian prayer is, uh, kind of... In the final editing phases. our unit on ARRR prayer is in the period of we're composing it right now.
It needs to be edited and then and then beautified. And then we have some other resources that that might be useful for people is in terms of like. Hey, you know what? I've never prayed out loud with my spouse other than using a traditional prayer like the Our Father or the Prayer Before Meals. You know what?
I'd really like to learn how to do that. We have little pamphlets on that. 

[00:53:50] Jim: Yeah. It's really a great website. heartofjesuscatholic.org And also, I mean, you're willing, if people have questions, those of you who are like, all right, you know, the, the nerdy types like us who, who want like, okay, I want to do this.
I want to build it. They can reach out right at parishoffice@sacredheartnorfolk.com. 

[00:54:12] Fr. Pat: Yes, and it is heartofjesuscatholic.org. If you go under Prayer Life, the first tab under Prayer Life on our website is the Lampstand Initiative, and that's where we're going to continue to do that. And yes, if you would like to talk with somebody about starting a lampstand, I talked with our, the leaders of our Family of Parishes Council, and they said that they were sure that members of our different parishes would be happy to help guide somebody who is interested in in lampstand, uh, in their parish. 

[00:54:56] Jim: That's fantastic. 

[00:54:57] Fr. Pat: We're happy to, through our coordinators of evangelization and discipleship, try to respond to, to inquiries. But again, the principles are basic. Pray daily, listen and don't just talk, and share the fruits of the prayer that Jesus gives to you and to the world through you.
And everything is. Incredible. 

[00:55:19] Jim: Yeah. We'll put the website and the email address, uh, and a couple of the, you know, resources that you referenced as we went through here. We'll put those in the show notes so people can easily access them. Father, thank you. Any last words as we close here? 

[00:55:34] Fr. Pat: I just wish everybody a really beautiful beginning of this, uh, new academic year.
We're fast approaching harvest time. I pray for safety for all of our farmers. During the harvest season, and as we begin the new liturgical year, a little later, a really blessed period of time as we prepare for this great celebration of the Eucharist, uh, upcoming in our country. 

[00:56:03] Jim: Amen. Thank you. Thank you for sharing so generously.
This is really, really fun and I think an inspiration. All right, those of you listening, you know, uh, somebody who needs to hear this. If you don't, I just want you to pause and ask yourself, Lord, who needs to hear this? Uh, and then once you get to your destination, done walking the dog, driving, whatever it is, I want you to share this out so you can be an encouragement and, uh, provide a little bit of this, this inspiration for others.
Again, Father, thanks for being with us. Thanks for listening to the EquipCast. We hope this episode has inspired you to live your faith and equip you to be fruitful in your mission. Stay connected with us by going to Equip.ArchOmaha.org. God bless and see you next time.