[00:00:00] Jim Jansen: Everybody welcome to the EquipCast. So today I sit down with Father Dave Belt, and we talk about learning. Father Belt loves learning. Uh, he's been a lifelong educator, learner. We talk about the process of learning, the disequilibrium. Disorientation that people experience in the learning process, how good that is, how natural that is.

We talk about his efforts to bring his staff and his pastoral council and all of the members of his parish with him in the learning process of learning what it means. To go from a parish in the Christendom age to the Apostolic age, a parish moving from maintenance to mission. Uh, we have a great conversation.

We cover a lot of ground. You're going to love it. Take a listen. 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 better. And to be fruitful in your mission, let's go

Fr. Dave Belt, welcome to the equip cast. How are you doing today? 

[00:01:12] Fr. Dave Belt: I'm good. How are you, Jim? 

[00:01:14] Jim Jansen: I am really good. I mean, I'm actually maybe more than a little good. I mean, for all those who don't know, we just had lunch together and I'm like, I didn't eat too much, but I'm really, I'm like perfectly satisfied.

So, if I weren't so excited to talk to you, I might be tempted to want to go take a nap right now. 

[00:01:32] Fr. Dave Belt: But I'll keep you awake. I promise. 

[00:01:33] Jim Jansen: Oh yeah, no, we're going to have a great conversation. We're like. We are way set to nerd out here because we have a whole stack of books and conversations. We've been, we'll be talking about this for a while.

Just like, just things that you have learned along the way. And I know it's, this is going to be a fun conversation, but before we get ahead of ourselves, father, who are you? Tell us a little bit about your story. 

[00:01:56] Fr. Dave Belt: Well, I grew up in Emerson, Nebraska, which is up in the Northeast corner of the state. Went to the sacred heart grade school, Emerson Hubbard high school.

Um, I'm in the oldest of six boys. And we're all kind of here in this area. My mom is still alive and living in the house where we were all raised. 

[00:02:15] Jim Jansen: That's fantastic. 

[00:02:16] Fr. Dave Belt: Went to Wayne State, have a degree in education, um, actually taught music, uh, for a couple of years. Had a little public school up, up in Northeast Nebraska.

I was 24 when I just started to feel like the Lord was calling me to something different and People started to ask if I'd ever thought about being a priest and I would say no and ran away from that for a long time, but um, entered seminary when I was 25 and was ordained a priest in 1990. So I'm coming up on 35 years.

[00:02:49] Jim Jansen: Wow. Congratulations. What, what changed? I mean, you know, so many young people are finding their, their vocations maybe younger than that, or they would have some seeds or, you know, college or high school, whatever. What happened? 

[00:03:06] Fr. Dave Belt: So, hindsight is 20 20. And as you know, as I look back on my past, I could, I can tell that, that there were, there were thoughts.

Even as I was really young and I loved serving mass, I love going to Eucharistic adoration. I loved taking care of the cemetery, mowing the lawn and all that with, with father hazing our pastor. And so, I think, I think there were always indications that that's what the Lord had in store for me. But I. Of course, I always think that my ideas are better than his, so that was one of those times where I should have just given in, but our Lord's timing is perfect.

So, it's been a wonderful life as a priest. Many blessings, many, many people, lots of challenges and trials along the way as well. 

[00:03:56] Jim Jansen: Yeah. 35 years. I mean, that's a great jumping off point because you've done, I mean, just about. everything that you can kind of do as a priest here in the Archdiocese of Omaha.

The small rural parishes, big suburban parishes, you know, you've taken on some of the more challenging assignments. Maybe just as a context, because we want to talk about learning and some of the just the habits that you've developed yourself, your team, pastoral council of kind of ongoing learning and reading that learning, I think, is in response to just some of the challenges that parish life faces today.

Give us a little bit of the context, like what are, you know, what, what motivates your desire to continue to learn? What challenges are you turning to learning to help face? 

[00:04:48] Fr. Dave Belt: I love education and have been involved in education since 1983 when I started teaching. I just think it's important for us to always be receiving new information and listening to what other experts and people are saying.

So, I've been doing this, having different groups study. Since I was pastor at Sacred Heart in Norfolk, and I, I just finished my master's degree in administration and was named president of Norfolk Catholic and pastor at Sacred Heart and, uh, our administration and I did study every week when we met, we prayed, we studied, talked, and then we did our, our business meeting and, and so I've been doing this for 25 years.

It just gradually expanded into pastoral counsel and school board. 

[00:05:37] Jim Jansen: Yeah, and you know it better than I, but is that a common practice, just to devote some time for, you know, a pastor, again, in this case in a school context, but devote some time to ongoing learning together? I don't know how common that is.

[00:05:50] Fr. Dave Belt: I, I don't hear that from my brother Priest that that's a part of their, their meetings. 

[00:05:56] Jim Jansen: Yeah. Where, where do you think that came from? I mean, is it just, is it your educational background that you just, I mean, always had a lifelong love for learning and saw the, saw the value of it? 

[00:06:07] Fr. Dave Belt: Yeah, I think that was an important piece of it.

I think I had been at a National Catholic Educational Association conference and was going through their, their shop and there was what they called, I think, thumbnail series. So, there were little trifold brochures for school boards to, uh, to study a little bit of church law, civil law, reflection questions.

So, I think that's, was kind of the jumping off point was those, uh, those little brochures for school boards. so much. 

[00:06:37] Jim Jansen: Oh, that's great. Because as a school board, you don't need to be an expert in canon law, but you need to know just a little bit. You need to know a little bit of civil law. You need to know a little bit of those things.

[00:06:47] Fr. Dave Belt: And I think it helps, it helps us to understand the why and the how of, of how to. How to be a Catholic school or how to be a parish is just to have, have some, some documents from the church or church or civil law to, to rely on. 

[00:07:05] Jim Jansen: Yeah. Well, cause they, I mean, like it or not, they, they do shape what we do, but they also write the, what it, I think there's probably a, a Latin phrase, which I can't think of, but like the law teaches us the law that, you know, teaches us something about who, who we're supposed to be, not just the, you know, Lines of in, in and out and fair play.

So that's fantastic. 

[00:07:28] Fr. Dave Belt: Yeah. So that that's where all this started was those little trifold brochures. 

[00:07:34] Jim Jansen: So, you find yourself now again, 35 years is a long time to be serving as a priest. Quite a few of those as a pastor. What are some of the challenges? I mean, again, over, over your priesthood that you see parishes, particularly in the last year You know, a few decades that you see parishes facing.

[00:07:56] Fr. Dave Belt: I just had a conversation about this recently, just how, how parish life and priesthood have changed even in the last 10 years. But in, in the 35 years, If I would have known that I would be doing what I'm doing now back in 1990, I don't know what, uh, where I would be today. It's just a whole different vision and model of, of parish life and, and priesthood.

So, I, maybe it's a good thing that I, I didn't have the vision to, to see to 2025. 

[00:08:36] Jim Jansen: Yeah, well, and Not that you need to offer like the definitive, but how would you kind of compare and contrast like where you began, what you thought your priesthood would be like, what parish life was like, and just the experience today?

Again, we could talk all day about this, but I think a little bit of context could be, could be helpful. 

[00:08:57] Fr. Dave Belt: As a civilization, we were in a totally different place back in 1990, just in how we cared for each other and, and just attitudes and morals and we were in such a different place. And today it's kind of a scary world with, with everything that that's going on and for pastors then to, to provide care for their people.

Is, is going to be genuine and people are so, so desperate for, for security and, and I think, uh, to be a, to be a part of something larger than themselves, I don't know if people would be able to, to say what that, that hunger is that we all have in us, that hunger for God and the desire to be in community.

So, I, I think as our world gets. That's more difficult and complicated and scary. The, I think that hunger deepens even more to be a part of something larger than ourselves. 

[00:09:57] Jim Jansen: Yeah. But what's fascinating about it is, right, sometimes the one place where they actually could find that sense of belonging, that sense of purpose in the church, they look right past us, and they miss us.

Yes, you've talked about, okay, as a, you know, education is so deep in you, you're, you were looking right away to, to continue this ongoing learning practice. But then you, at one point it began to like spill over into your pastoral councils and staff. Talk about like, when did it start to become something that you were doing this ongoing learning with your pastoral councils?

When did that first happen? 

[00:10:42] Fr. Dave Belt: I had done that a little bit at Sacred Heart. The Archdiocese used to have a three-ring binder that was resources for pastoral councils, and there were all kinds of articles and different things to read, ideas for resources. So, we, I started to do that in, at Sacred Heart at Norfolk, got more into it.

When I went to, uh, St. Patrick Parish in, in Fremont and Archbishop Bergen Catholic School and started from the very beginning with pastoral council, staff, and school board, we were always studying something. The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, uh, was one of the first books we read as a parish staff. 

[00:11:25] Jim Jansen: What drew you to that?

Because you know, I can see the stack of books in front of us. I'm curious if that's the first one that, that you mentioned. What was it about Five Dysfunctions of a team? I mean, I can guess maybe, but, I'll let you tell your own story. What, what drew you to that resource? 

[00:11:42] Fr. Dave Belt: Various staffs, like families can, can truly be dysfunctional and yeah, so just to, to name that, that truth and but then to, to dig into it, to figure out.

The best way for, for the staff to, to cooperate. 

[00:11:57] Jim Jansen: Right. We're okay. Fine. We'll own it. Maybe, maybe all of our meetings aren't the best, maybe all of it, but like, we're going to, okay, let's fix it. Let's figure out how do we work together better. 

[00:12:06] Fr. Dave Belt: Because we're, we're, we're wasting our time. If we're performing our, the things on our job description, but if we're not, if we're not doing that together and doing that in love, then it's all, it's all worthless.

[00:12:20] Jim Jansen: Say more about that because I think. I don't know if there's anybody listening who would want to argue against that, but I think at a right at a subconscious level when we find loving difficult, right? And this is like a family member or in this case, you know, a coworker. In a parish setting, we tend to think if I just do my job and they do their job and we leave each other the heck alone, it'll be fine.

And you're like, no, it won't. It actually is worthless. Say more about that. 

[00:12:59] Fr. Dave Belt: So, it's easy for parish staffs to work in silos. And I would say that that's probably the norm that staff members Just come in and they do, they do what they're assigned to do. And there isn't a whole lot of interaction. And I've inherited staffs like that.

And I, that's just, I can't work that way. And, and our staff members can't work that way because we're not, we're not at our best. So, to do the, the hard work of, of knocking the silos down and, and really laboring together collaboration. It's really what I think that the church is all about. That's our, I believe that our, our staff should be kind of a microcosm of, of the parish.

[00:13:44] Jim Jansen: Yeah. I've always found it ironic that a lot of these tools, right, you know, like whether it's Patrick Lencioni, five dysfunctions of a team or any of the other kind of tools that we tend to, you know, embrace more readily in a nonprofit church setting, they're just business books. That in some ways, I want to oversimplify it.

They're just teaching us how to be Christian towards each other in a professional setting. You know, it's just about like deep listening and respecting. And when somebody does something that feels weird or offensive, beginning with curiosity, I mean, it, it might as well be right the, the advice of St. Ignatius. Why do you think that is? Like, why, why do we end up, why is it that we often have to turn to the business world to rediscover what Jesus said about human relationships? So, he seemed a little odd to me. I know that's a big question, but. 

[00:14:38] Fr. Dave Belt: Because it's all about human relationships. And that's really the foundation for us, of course, is the foundation with Jesus.

But built on that is the human element, the human relationships. That's how we're created. That's, that was God's desire when he created Adam and Eve was that we live in a community that were broken. It was just difficult for us to, to be preaching and teaching about unity and loving one another when, when the principal didn't get along with the religious head director and, and the liturgy director was fighting, it would never happen.

So, it was just, it was important for me to, to do whatever. Needed to be done in order for those, those silos to be broken down so that the people really talk to each other and enjoy each other's company. So especially now at St. Stephen's, but at St. Patrick and Fremont and at Sacred Heart, just the human piece of getting together and, and having, having meals together and doing fun things, going bowling or going out to lunch, we would close the office down and go out, just, just have lunch together.

So, it's just those, those basic human things that some might think we're wasting time, but we're really building up the, our community. 

[00:16:03] Jim Jansen: Well, and it makes a difference too, in terms of you're actually more effective. I mean, you know, maybe not, you know, for the whatever, for the four hours where, you know, having lunch and bowling, maybe not.

But what you spend in those four hours and the trust and the relational capital that that builds, that tends to smooth everything else along because it's the, you know, I mean, more and more in my own experience, it's the slow distrust that just kind of, it ends up being this like sand in the gears of everything that happens that slows everything down.

And when you take a little time offline, Off work hours to, to develop those relationships, the gain is way more than you actually spent, you know, like if you could somehow numerically quantify, you win by doing those things. It's actually better off for the overall efficiency and function of the, of the organization.

[00:17:06] Fr. Dave Belt: Oh, absolutely. So, one of the things that I expect to say Stevens is that our staff members leave their office and go visit other offices. So, there's, there's always this kind of milling around, uh, staff members are, we're in, we're in two buildings. And so, people from the, from the main building go down to the Perry center and, and interact with staff members down there and internally they're, they're coming up.

And so there, there's more than just the sitting at your desk and, and producing it, it's just visiting and, and sharing ideas. One of the biggest changes that, that we've seen is the, our Tuesday morning meeting that used to be an operations meeting, a standup meeting where we just talk about the nuts and bolts of our week.

And we've transformed that into a, we, we share, we have a question, the kind of an icebreaker question that, that we ask. And then whoever's in charge of the day offers a prayer and then we offer our intentions. And then when we're finished, people kind of hang around. It's like 15 minutes, but then the staff members continue to, to stand and talk and ask questions and, and, uh, share ideas and things.

And so that's everybody from our custodial staff to our parish office staff, up to the priests and the directors. So there's about 25 of us that meet every Tuesday for, for our prayer. 

[00:18:37] Jim Jansen: And you can see it's those little one-off conversations, two or three people hanging out afterwards. That smooth the way for a better budgeting process and fixing some some gap in, you know, a cleaning or reservation, et cetera, et cetera.

It's like it all. It's actually bearing fruit. 

[00:18:57] Fr. Dave Belt: And so, it's that trust for our clear path of our first. Uh, first step is around trust and, and people aren't going to, to really want to work with you or, or love you if they don't trust you. And so, it's just that establishing human relationships that's, that's so important.

[00:19:18] Jim Jansen: You mentioned, uh, the five dysfunctions of a team. What else has been helpful in that space? Just the, you know, just kind of orientating your staff. helping them kind of like get the vision for like, okay, this is how we're going to work together to serve the parish. What else have you found helpful there?

[00:19:40] Fr. Dave Belt: Two really come to mind. So, the one that we, we studied, it's been a few years ago, is a death by meeting by Patrick Lencioni. It's just the structure. Meetings can be deadly. 

[00:19:56] Jim Jansen: It's almost a self-evident statement. Like anybody listening, if they've ever been in a meeting, they're like, Oh yeah. 

[00:20:00] Fr. Dave Belt: I don't like unproductive meetings.

If we're going to meet, let’s have some, some real purpose to it and not just sit around a table and, and, and talk about how busy you are. And that's what it was, sat around a big conference table and we went around and everybody talked about just how busy they are in their full schedules. And so, I stopped doing staff meetings for, for quite a while because they were just.

They weren't, they weren't helpful. So, we, we studied death by meeting and we kind of used the structure that Patrick laid out for our own, uh, structure of, of how, how we have our staff meetings. 

[00:20:43] Jim Jansen: I mean, we could spend the whole thing, but just give like the quick, like couple of little like teasers of like, how's that, how is that kind of like design different than any other typical meeting?

What are some of the unique features? I mean, we don't need to go through all of it, just enough to give people a teaser. 

[00:20:57] Fr. Dave Belt: It's not really as much about the, how the particular meetings are structured as how, how our meeting schedule is. So, we, I have a leadership team of, uh, staff members and we meet weekly.

Uh, and we pray, usually pray Lectio together and, and do a study. And then we get into the, the business element of that. We have all staff meetings quarterly. And that's more about learning about, about our faith or about the mission of our parish. So that really isn't so much a business meeting, um, as it is kind of a bigger picture kind of a conversation. 

[00:21:40] Jim Jansen: Yeah, it's where you get to do some vision casting and help, help everybody see how they're connected to each other and the mission of the parish. 

[00:21:47] Fr. Dave Belt: Right. So, we have a monthly operations meeting, and I'm not involved with that. I'll let the operations director lead that.

So, I don't need to be involved with that. We also have then our Tuesday morning meeting, which was a stand-up operations meeting, and it wasn't productive, so that we transformed it into, into more of a prayer time for the whole staff. So, we have about 125 staff members at St. Stephen's, and we get together twice a year.

[00:22:15] Jim Jansen: And that's everybody, with the school, parish staff, the whole? 

[00:22:18] Fr. Dave Belt: That's school, parish staff, support staff, and we, we get together two times a year. 

[00:22:23] Jim Jansen: You know, as you're laying out this, like, okay, two times a year for everybody, the, the kind of operations stand up the, uh, the staff meetings and this is part of what, yeah, deaf by meeting talks about is like these different types of meetings and the cadence.

I couldn't help but notice how you're like, well, we did this and that didn't work. So, we tried this, and we did this, and it was just like this kind of on the fly, maybe not on the fly, but just this learning of, hey, we're going to try this. Okay, that's not quite right. And then we're going to adapt and try something else.

It seems like you've made these changes all the way, all the way through. You're kind of like just always recalibrating a little bit to try something a little bit different. 

[00:23:03] Fr. Dave Belt: I know how, how precious time is for people. And so, if, if something isn't working or something isn't helping us to, to have a, a good prayerful conversation then, then let's figure that out.

[00:23:15] Jim Jansen: Yeah. Talk a little bit about. You said prayerful conversation, you guys spend some time praying in your leadership team meetings, right? 

[00:23:24] Fr. Dave Belt: We do. Yeah, that, that's a big chunk of our, our beginning. So, we usually get together and goof off and laugh at each other. And then we, we settled down and, and have some really good prayer time together.

And that just, that helps us, and it was so important, we just talked about this recently, actually, it was so important for us during COVID that we, we met, we still met weekly. But to have that safe place to come, um, and, and to talk about what we were going through or about what was happening in our parish or, or not happening in our parish, um, but just to, to, to share the, the moments of hope, but also the sorrow and the grief and anger and all sorts of things.

And so, our leadership team isn't just about coming in and doing the, the business. It's really about the, again, the human relationships and building that sense that we really are, we are a team. 

[00:24:28] Jim Jansen: Because I mean, they are, I mean, by, you know, extension, they're helping you pastor and carry this huge family. I mean, St.

Stephen's, you know, we didn't talk about it. We didn't give any of the data, but I mean, St. Stephen's is one of the larger parishes in the archdiocese, you know, large suburban community and it's a lot and, and the folks that are helping you, you know, carry that responsibility, they feel it too. And they need that support from you and from one another.

[00:25:01] Fr. Dave Belt: Oh, absolutely. And, and you know, my, you know, my style, I am not a micromanager. So, one of the books that we did read and discuss was the one-minute manager meets the monkey. 

[00:25:11] Jim Jansen: Yeah. Which is a great, for those of you who are listening, you did hear right. It is the one-minute manager meets the monkey. 

[00:25:17] Fr. Dave Belt: It is. So, we always refer to them as the monkey book or, or the chair, the chair book or the meeting book.

So, shorthand, we always have a nickname for each of the books, but. Yeah, the monkey is about taking people's responsibilities off their back and putting it on your own. So that's not my style. I like to share. We're in this together, um, there are things that my, my staff members are able to do that I'm not able to do.

Um, personalities are varied and so, so the leadership team just finished reading, uh, leading from the second chair. It has transformed the, the leadership team for, for them to, to understand that I, I want them and I encourage them to be leaders. They, they just don't do what I tell them to do, that, that they have the, the freedom and the responsibility of being leaders in our parish. I've talked to them one on one pretty much every day just to see how they're doing and But if they have questions, they can come to me. Otherwise, I just, I let them do what they, they've been hired to do. And they, they do it so much better than I do. 

[00:26:29] Jim Jansen: I love this book. I mean, I just, at your recommendation, I started to read it.

I just, just finished it leading from the second chair, right? The whole idea is that the first chair would be like the pastor or the CEO or, you know, whoever's in charge. And the second chair is some other leader who is not the final leader. but who is nonetheless called to be a leader. I love it. One of the things that it talked about, you know, there's like this deep and wide paradox that when you're in a second chair, you have this responsibility to go deep on your particular responsibility, you know, evangelization, youth ministry, whatever, operations.

But then you also have to have this, this kind of wide perspective, helping the pastor. Or the senior leader, the CEO, look at the whole parish of the whole organization. What have you seen, like in particular, what's, what's changed from you? Uh, your leadership style, what's changed for your second chairs as a result of their reading of the book?

[00:27:36] Fr. Dave Belt: We've had some really good conversations about how this How this could look at St. Stephen's. Um, but just, I think it helped those directors on the leadership team to just have permission to, to, to step into where the Lord has called them to be at this point in their life. 

[00:27:57] Jim Jansen: Yeah. 

[00:27:57] Fr. Dave Belt: We also had a conversation about them using the, the father Dave said phrase.

[00:28:04] Jim Jansen: Oh, that's great. Say more about that. I love that. 

[00:28:06] Fr. Dave Belt: So, it's not about, it's not about me. Or, or my authority. It's about, it's about them and their, their skills, uh, their leadership abilities, their decision making. 

[00:28:18] Jim Jansen: Well, and their ownership of the total vision, not just the Father Dave's vision. 

[00:28:23] Fr. Dave Belt: Yes. And, and, and parishioners will still talk to staff members and say, does Father Dave know that you're doing this?

Or does Father Dave approve of this? And it's not, in general, yes, I, I do. If I didn't, then I wouldn't. I wouldn't have them, the staff members doing what they're doing. It still happens. It's getting, it's getting better. And I think the leadership team is really more confident in, in their calling that it's not just the typical, I don't know, parish kind of set up where, where the pastor is the, the one who makes all the decisions.

[00:29:03] Jim Jansen: Yeah. I mean, I found this book just a little testimonial reading it myself. It feels a little bit like a pastoral counseling session where, you know, sometimes you're when you are a second chair leader. There is a real tension between the way you might want to do things and then the way your boss wants to do things And a tension between the responsibilities you have to help the first chair see the whole organization And the like yeah, but these are the things on my to do list These are all the things right in my on my specific job description and like how to live in that tension how to be in the best sense submissive right to have a In the root word to have a mission that is underneath the the mission of the organization to be a part of that to serve it.

Oh, it's so good because there's so much, I think there's so much of the Lord's sanctifying work that happens in our hearts and our minds when we're serving in that way that I feel like the frameworks and the, the way this book brings those out really helps you. I mean, I think bring the Lord into, uh, what is often a challenging work setting that we just sometimes don't even recognize that there's a, the, the Lord is really deeply at work in that.

Precisely in the, some of the challenges. 

[00:30:29] Fr. Dave Belt: Especially in the challenges. I think that's where the, the Lord is meeting us and, and if we allow him to, he'll guide us through those, those difficult times. Towards the end of the book, they, they talk about the, the vision of the, of the pastor. And so, I asked the leadership team, are, are you, are you able to articulate what, what my vision is for the parish?

And, and, and they were able to. So I, I think that, that they, they've got the big picture in mind and we have that in common. And so, I think the decisions that they make and the conversations that they have with parishioners really is shaped by. The mission statement of the parish and kind of the vision that that's been set for the parish.

[00:31:13] Jim Jansen: Yeah. And I think they own it too. I mean, right, everybody's different. You know, it's hard to like, it's a, it's a pretty diverse group you've got there. But I think they would say things like we and our vision rather than just, well, father Dave or the pastor or like, I think, I mean, I think they feel some ownership in that too, because they have an opportunity to, to express how their particular temperament, their particular strengths, their, their, their geniuses contribute to that.

And I mean, that's half of like a developing ownership of a, of a vision is being able to express it in your own unique way. And I know they get a chance to do that. 

[00:31:55] Fr. Dave Belt: We make time for that. It's not just the business element, it's the, it's the big picture kinds of conversations as well. So, we also have the, our, our leadership cenacle that I forgot to talk about that we, in the fall, we have a dinner, we have a guest speaker.

A big part of it is just to enjoy each other's company and to celebrate who we are. 

[00:32:19] Jim Jansen: Now, who all's there at these Leadership cenacle? 

[00:32:21] Fr. Dave Belt: Leadership Cynical are our directors, so the directors of our various ministries and departments, pastoral council, school board, religious formation advisory board, finance council, mission team, and their spouses.

[00:32:41] Jim Jansen: Yeah. 

[00:32:41] Fr. Dave Belt: And so, it's a crowd. 

[00:32:42] Jim Jansen: That's a big group. Yeah. And it's noisy. I gives, gives a, I mean, over a hundred, right? 

[00:32:46] Fr. Dave Belt: It's over a hundred. We had, yeah, we had our gathering last fall at St. Francis Cabrini, and I think there were 120. 

[00:32:53] Jim Jansen: Yeah. 

[00:32:53] Fr. Dave Belt: People there. So just dinner and drinks and, uh, Father Damian Zer line was our keynote speaker and to give us a little motivation and encouragement and, and then we, we do one in the winter too.

That is more kind of state of the parish and more numbers and more of a kind of a working evening, but it's, it's the same group of leaders. 

[00:33:15] Jim Jansen: So, we got a whole stack of books here. Where do you want to go next? I mean, all of these has had a, had a place in helping you shape the vision, help form your staff, help form your pastoral council.

What's, where do you want to go next? 

[00:33:30] Fr. Dave Belt: There are three books that are, that are kind of connected, I think. 

[00:33:33] Jim Jansen: Yes. 

[00:33:33] Fr. Dave Belt: Yeah. So really what, what got me excited about, about this call to be church in a new way was the book Divine Renovation. We had received that. I was pastor of St. Patrick in Fremont, and we read this as a pastoral council.

I've got post it notes all over, um, and underlined all over. So, at the beginning of the book, it just gives documentation from, from different popes. And so, it just lays that foundation for how we're called. to evangelize how to be, how to be missional. It transformed my, my thinking about, about parish life.

Um, and it scared me to death. It was like St. Peter stepping out of the boat. You know, you've got to take that first step. And, and I wasn't ready to take that first step. It just really made me anxious to think about where do we even start to change the culture of our parish. 

[00:34:35] Jim Jansen: Because, I mean, if I can fill in the blanks here, you're like, it's scary because it creates this beautiful vision that's been really well cited as like, okay, well crap, it does seem to be what the church is, is asking for.

And that wasn't your experience at that point. 

[00:34:53] Fr. Dave Belt: No. It was a kind of the traditional parish life where we provided. Liturgies and services and Bible studies and people came to us and then they went back out and, and live their life. And this is calling us to, to really come to the, the parish to be fed and nourished so that you can go out on mission and, and to, to bring that presence of Jesus to every person.

I don't know why it was so revolutionary to me at the time, it unnerved me to think I could very easily just put this book away. And not think anything more of it, or I could really step into this with, with parish leadership and, and just to see what would happen. 

[00:35:39] Jim Jansen: So, what made the difference? Because I mean, spoiler alert, some people just put it away, because this was a gift, right?

That correct me if I'm wrong, Archbishop Lucas had sent it to all the priests of the Archdiocese for Christmas, I believe. 

[00:35:54] Fr. Dave Belt: It was a Christmas gift. You just have to believe that if the archbishop is, is giving you a book as a gift, he doesn't want it just to sit on your coffee table. 

[00:36:04] Jim Jansen: Yeah. There's no pictures in this book.

There's a purpose for him giving this to you. 

[00:36:09] Fr. Dave Belt: And I, I accepted that. 

[00:36:11] Jim Jansen: Yeah. I didn't even know how to like phrase this question, but like, what did you, what did it change in you? Thoughts, habits? What desires did it bring to the surface? 

[00:36:22] Fr. Dave Belt: Well, it sat there and stood for quite a while and and so what really motivated me to take the next step was a presentation by Father Jeff Lorig At a clergy conference and he was so on fire for this This I would say new vision, but it's an ancient vision of how to be Church And it was his, it was his passion for this that, that really kind of ignited the fire in me.

So just in talking to staff and, and to, uh, pastoral council at St. Patrick, it was like, well, let's embrace this and let's, let's pray about how, how this can look at St. Patrick and how the Lord is calling us to, to, to change the kind of the vision and the purpose of our parish. 

[00:37:09] Jim Jansen: And this is super, I mean, it's kind of nerdy, just mechanical, but like, you just, Gave them copies of the book and said, Hey, let's read this together and start to talk about it.

[00:37:17] Fr. Dave Belt: Yeah. And there's a study guide that goes along with it. So we, we just, we used the study guide and had conversations. And at first, they didn't, they weren't too enthused about this, that, yeah, that's what I wanted to ask. We have a reading assignment. Oh yeah. People didn't read it. 

[00:37:32] Jim Jansen: I was on the pastoral council.

[00:37:35] Fr. Dave Belt: They want to come make decisions about buying a new refrigerator, what kind of candles we use in church or things like that. And, uh, I'm saying I need to help. I need you to help me to think about, um, how we can affect the culture of our parish. 

[00:37:50] Jim Jansen: How did it go? I mean, okay. Resistant at first, did they come around?

[00:37:54] Fr. Dave Belt: They did. So, what it did was it gave us a foundation to, to just really understand that, that this is, this is the call of the church, um, from Vatican two down through our holy fathers, St. Paul the sixth and, and holy fathers down through Francis are calling us to. To be, to be missional, to be outward focused and I think that was kind of mind blowing for all of us.

[00:38:27] Jim Jansen: There's this word, the trained educator in you, you know, you, you love the disequilibrium that when people are going through the learning process and you haven't used the word, but you've talked about the experience where all of a sudden you learn something and there's this time in the learning process where nothing makes sense.

What you thought was true the way you thought you were going to, you know, approach things, you know, like, well, that doesn't seem right anymore, But the new way isn't as clear yet. How did you pastor people through the disequilibrium? 

[00:39:04] Fr. Dave Belt: Well, I talked about it, But this is this is necessary for us to go through these uncertain times And as we go through these uncertain times the Lord is with us He calls us into those uncertain times because that's where, that's where his strength and greatness is revealed.

It's not, it's in our weakness and our inadequacies that, that, that God wants us to, he wants us to enter there so that he can reveal who he is in that time. So, I guess my message was consistent. I was always encouraging. Saying that we can do this, uh, let's pray for each other. Uh, let's go here and see what happens.

[00:39:46] Jim Jansen: Yeah. 

[00:39:46] Fr. Dave Belt: So, disequilibrium, we do it to students constantly. That's, that is the educational process. Yes. Love. You know, you think about teaching a little one how to, how to tie their shoes. So that's gonna be disconcerting for them to, to have the motor skills to, to tie shoes. But then they master that, and then we go on to what, let's write your name.

That is the educational process that we, we introduce a new skill or a new concept to people who are learning. And that's how, that's how we grow and that's how we become truly the person that God's created us to be. 

[00:40:22] Jim Jansen: And you can see this. I mean, there's, you're, you're talking as a, as a trained educator.

But you're also talking as a pastor, you're like, this is what the Lord does with us. This is how he grows us. This is how he disciples us and pastors us and mentors us. He forces us into circumstances where we're uncomfortable. 

[00:40:43] Fr. Dave Belt: constantly. And it's up to us. Whether we'll go there or not. And a lot of times we want to, we want to stay in the boat and not be with St.

Peter to take that first step out to be closer to Jesus. And so there, I think that there's just that, that tendency to, to want to stay where, where it's safe. Yeah. But that's not where Jesus wants us to be. 

[00:41:06] Jim Jansen: I love it. Okay. So. You said three books. I can see him sitting there. Divine Renovations, like the first one chronologically that you encountered, you got two others there.

What do you want to go next? 

[00:41:18] Fr. Dave Belt: And there have been others interspersed in and out of these and documents from the U. S. bishops on evangelization. For sure, yeah. That have helped. So, the second one then was from Christendom to Apostolic Mission. And this was in my first days at St. Stephen the Martyr when this came out and, and the pastoral council was, was wanting to be a board of directors.

And I had a board of directors called a staff and they were, they were wonderful. And I, I wanted the council to be the ones who helped me think and discern about, about the pastoral care of our parish. And so, this, this was a wonderful book. So, leadership team and parish council both read this. There was a great study guide that we found just to have that conversation about how, how our parish will look, how, how our parishioners will live and it, and it isn't new.

So, the, the author connected the dots there to, to help us to see that how we're called to be church is how we started to be church. Apostle means one who has sent, and so we're, we're sent out by virtue of our baptism. To, to bring Jesus to others, not to just open the church doors and say, come here, come to us.

It is to be, to be sent. 

[00:42:42] Jim Jansen: Right. And I mean, without, you know, doing it injustice, I mean, the book could be summarized to like, Hey, you know, when the church began with, you know, acts of the apostles, we apostolic age and, you know, historians sometimes would cite it differently, but at a certain point there was enough, at least in some cultures, Western Europe, other places.

Where there was enough of the culture that was Christian that then suddenly the Christian worldview was the dominant, like, worldview. And so, we enter this age of Christendom where the culture, the institutions, the rhythms of life of the whole culture seem to be supporting the Christian faith. And now, because of, I mean, which is where we started our conversation, the changes in our culture and our world, we're reentering an apostolic age.

Where we can see the institutions, the cultures, rhythms of life of the culture around us aren't supporting our faith anymore. And that's disorienting, but it's not one that we can't flourish in, if we know how to respond. 

[00:43:47] Fr. Dave Belt: Because it happened already. 

[00:43:49] Jim Jansen: Yeah. 

[00:43:49] Fr. Dave Belt: So, in the early days of the church that the church grew, not because people came to Jerusalem is because the, the apostles went out from Jerusalem to the, to the various parts of the world and, and brought the gospel with them.

[00:44:06] Jim Jansen: Yeah. I feel like there's a lot of, man, there's so many lessons in this. How did people respond to this one, right? From Christendom to Apostolic Mission, because this just gives, I mean, it's a little heady. It gives them like a, just kind of a macro narrative to help people kind of make sense of what, uh, of what they're experiencing now.

And again, to, you know. bring back our old friend here, disequilibrium. It helps people make sense of it because it's really disorienting. I mean, for us to have so many friends who would, family members, who would call themselves Catholic, but whose lives and patterns of thought and values They really don't have much Catholic left in them.

[00:44:55] Fr. Dave Belt: So I think the people that, that were engaged in the conversation around this book were, we were all kind of in denial, you know, we, we just felt like if, if we just moved ahead and we, we put a little more effort into inviting people to mass or, um, having them come to a fish fry or Bible studies that, that everything is going to be okay and we're not in a time of okay.

Okay. And you just think about our world today. And you look back to the times in the early church, you had the Roman empire, you had the persecutions of all the Christians were, were rejected and mocked and laughed at and imprisoned. And it was a, it was a dangerous time to be a Christian and we're kind of there again.

And there are so many people that have walked away from, from their faith. 

[00:45:47] Jim Jansen: I mean, huge numbers. 

[00:45:49] Fr. Dave Belt: And that's overwhelming, isn't it? 

[00:45:51] Jim Jansen: Yeah. 

[00:45:51] Fr. Dave Belt: That's where our leadership got to in the conversation is, how do we even start? They finally just recognized the, The trials and the challenges that are, that are in front of us and, and to think, how are we even going to make a difference?

[00:46:11] Jim Jansen: That's huge. That's huge because it really is. I mean, here you're saying there's like this, at least two parts of the process. Part one is just, it's okay to admit it's not working and that we've got a challenge that we have to face. And then part two is like. Oh, my goodness. Now that we're facing the challenge, it seems too big.

[00:46:31] Fr. Dave Belt: Absolutely. And, and that, that was the disequilibrium, was that Yeah. Once we read the book and had a conversation about it, we, we can't go back to, to where we were comfortable. Yeah. Because that's not where, where the Lord wants us to be of. We're not called a, a life of comfortable, we're called to a life of, of, of service and of, of, of proclaiming the gospel of.

Just the person that way. 

[00:46:58] Jim Jansen: Yeah. All right. So, this leads us to the third book. This is one of my favorites. I think the title will need some, some, some explaining for, for people canoeing the mountains. Father, what's canoeing the mountains about? 

[00:47:09] Fr. Dave Belt: So, this was, this was a book that was, was life changing for me.

Yeah. So, the author Todd Bolsinger uses the Lewis and Clark expedition as kind of the framework for teaching about, about leadership in the church, uh, in the, in this era. He talks about how Lewis and Clark had their canoes, uh, their boats all ready to go and all packed. And they thought that once they got to the Continental Divide, that they would look over the mountaintops and there would be rivers that would flow then to the Pacific Ocean.

[00:47:44] Jim Jansen: They were going to coast all the way to the Pacific. 

[00:47:46] Fr. Dave Belt: They thought that this was going to be easy. They'll get to the Continental Divide, and they'll get their canoes in the water. And the water again and, and, and go, and they got to the continental divide and all they could see was mountains. And they knew that they, they had to find a different way to travel.

Either they stop and go home or they, they find a new way to continue on. He uses the Lewis and Clark expedition as, as the framework for, for teaching. And it, it was just so helpful for, for the leadership of the parish just to. That they have that conversation about how, how is this going to look different?

[00:48:31] Jim Jansen: I love this what I really appreciate about this book. And by the way, Todd Bolsinger, I don't know what episode number, but Todd was a guest on the equip cast. He gives some practical tools again, too many to list here, but just like one or two things. Again, maybe another a mental framework or a tool for like, okay, so how do you, how do you begin to lead when you're off the map when you're in uncharted territory, like Lewis and Clark, which is.

Where most of us find ourselves now, how do you do it? 

[00:49:04] Fr. Dave Belt: What he says is that if you want people to trust you off the map, they have to trust you on the map. Yeah. And so, it was just doing what I needed to do in order for the people to, to trust me, to be, be consistent, um, in my, in my, my message, uh, to to be a person of integrity.

To, uh, to be there to encourage them. 

[00:49:30] Jim Jansen: Well in doing the maintenance well, too, right? I mean, maintenance, the, you know, the basic, I love the rally cry. Let's go from maintenance to mission. You can't go to from maintenance to mission if you're not doing maintenance. Well, because nobody will follow you if you're not maintenance.

Faithful to those first base basic things. 

[00:49:47] Fr. Dave Belt: Oh, absolutely. So, if there are, if the staff isn't getting along and if the school is declining in enrollment and you're not able to take care of your buildings, uh, if you're not able to provide what the people are longing for, they're not going to take the next step with you.

So, it takes time to just really establish yourself. And Just to, to help the people understand that, that you're there to, um, to help them to grow and to help them find Jesus. 

[00:50:20] Jim Jansen: Yeah. I love, I really love this book. One of the things back to like the Lewis and Clark, one of my favorite things that he throws out is he talks about the importance of listening.

To outsiders, and he gives Sacagawea as a, as an example, you know, here's this, uh, Shoshone woman who, when everybody else in the core of Discovery, you know, under Lewis and Clark were moving into a place that they'd never had been before. She was going back home that that she had been there before and that, you know, then he kind of extrapolates as so, so as for many of our parishes, as we're trying to figure out how to, gosh, how do we reach the nones?

How do we reach the unchurched? I bet somewhere if you have the eyes to see it, there's someone in your congregation who used to be a nun. And Jesus, Jesus broke into their life and won them over. Let them be part of the expedition as you're as you're going after the nuns. Uh, Give them a voice because they've been there.

They know how that generation or that group of people hear the Lord's voice and, and they can be invaluable guides. So, I love it one because it's right. It's an extended metaphor and I love metaphors, Sacagawea, but also like it just rings so true to our experience and to me speaks of the Lord's providence that like he provides.

In this case, you know, Sacagawea and, you know, her fur trading husband, uh, as his gift for the Corps of Discovery. And then he provides other people as gifts to us, if we have the eyes to see it, to help us as we try and figure out, you know, how to How to pass the faith on to a new generation. 

[00:52:10] Fr. Dave Belt: We've worked at asking people what their experience was.

So, if there are members who are, who are new to the parish, we'll talk to them about how, how was your experience of registering in the parish and, and getting involved or question that we ask a lot is why, why, why have you come here? Why, why, why choose St. Stephen the martyr? It's not always. You're in the archdiocese in Omaha.

It's not always about being in the boundaries of the parish. People go all over the city to find a community where they're going to be fed and nourished. 

[00:52:48] Jim Jansen: Yeah. Zip code isn't, isn't necessarily the number one driver. 

[00:52:53] Fr. Dave Belt: No. People come to St. Stephen's because they, they've experienced community in a way that makes them feel at home or they felt welcome.

[00:53:02] Jim Jansen: I want to give you a chance here because our time is just totally flying. Just to talk about like some of the things. that you've seen God doing at St. Stephen's. You know, the, these books were all at the service of your own kind of ongoing conversion, transformation, uh, bringing other key leaders along. I was going to say, you're not running a school.

You are running a school, but the whole point wasn't just to like educate your staff. The, the reading, the learning, the studying, the disequilibrium, all of that labor to learn and grow is starting to bear fruit. Talk a little bit. What's the Lord? What's the Lord doing at St. Stephen's? 

[00:53:44] Fr. Dave Belt: Well, first and foremost, I think just the, the culture is, is different and among the leadership team, I think that the study and the prayer have helped us.

To grow as a, as a team, pastoral council, just the transformation we talked, we had pastoral council last night. Um, we're reading Sherry Weddell's book. 

[00:54:07] Jim Jansen: Uh, forming intentional, forming intentional disciples. 

[00:54:09] Fr. Dave Belt: The new edition. 

[00:54:10] Jim Jansen: 10th anniversary. 

[00:54:11] Fr. Dave Belt: Yes. And just looking around the council table last night and recognizing the change that has happened in individuals as they perhaps came on thinking that they were going to be a board of directors running the parish and now talking about.

How can we embrace this call to be, to be a missionary disciples? 

And it's just, so it's been amazing to watch the change in people's lives. One of our goals for, for a couple of years, was to equip those who are already on fire. To stoke the fire even more. And it's a business concept called the tipping point.

It's also in a divine renovation that instead of focusing on the laggards, which we like to do, we want to do what we can to, to calm our disgruntled members. Instead of focusing on them, focus more on those who are already engaged so that they're so on fire that they're sharing their love of the Lord and their why, their story.

With people that they, they meet in their homes and neighborhoods and places of work. So, we talked about that last night. How close are we to the tipping point? Are we getting there? And they, and we were able to talk about that because we, that's been a part of our conversation. And so, it was just fun to, to, to listen to them and how they answered that.

[00:55:39] Jim Jansen: Yeah. That's so good. You're having fun at your pastoral council meetings, aren't you? 

[00:55:43] Fr. Dave Belt: Oh, yeah. 

[00:55:44] Jim Jansen: Which is great. Now, I mean, behind the scenes, some of you know, it's like, that's not always the universal experience of pastoral council. So, 

[00:55:51] Fr. Dave Belt: Oh, I, I'd rather have my fingernails pulled then, then go to council meetings for many years in different places.

So, sorry about that. But, and it was that way early on. 

[00:56:03] Jim Jansen: Yeah. 

[00:56:03] Fr. Dave Belt: People would come kind of with their own agendas and we don't, we don't have that anymore. We laugh, so, so we always have a beer and munchies, and we gather and, and talk and laugh and then we, we pray. Council members are in charge of prayer every month.

We do our study and then we, we do our, uh, our action agenda, but we're usually done within an hour. It was 45 minutes last night. So, the, the heart of the council work should be apart from the council meetings in, in the, the, the working groups and out in the community. 

[00:56:41] Jim Jansen: Yeah. Cause you really have them work, uh, working and doing stuff.

Father, there's so much of this. You know, we've talked about a lot of books. We've talked about a lot of, a lot of different things. I think there's a simplicity to, to what you've done here. Just in a few words, what would you say to those who, they're, they're kind of waking up to the challenge in front of them, which could be in parish life, it could be another context.

What, what advice would you have for those who maybe just haven't thought about learning, reading, Maybe they're facing disequilibrium. What advice would you have for those that are just starting to kind of feel the, the challenge? 

[00:57:27] Fr. Dave Belt: Well, there, there are all kinds of wonderful resources out there. And so, we, we started with, with a document from the U S bishops called to evangelize.

So, there are some, some wonderful documents of the, of the church that, that are available and, and really kind of helped to set that foundation. So there, I would say two things. So, on one is, I think we, we've tried to focus on the large group. We just need to offer more programs so that more people can come and learn and get on, get be set on fire.

We're doing things a little different at St. Stephen's. Instead of, instead of the crowd, we're, we're focusing on the one. So, if we can make, Uh, a difference in, in one person's life, we are making a difference in the world. So instead of focusing on, on the crowds and we still offer liturgies and Bible studies and all the kinds of things.

[00:58:29] Jim Jansen: You get, you get a crowd. 

[00:58:31] Fr. Dave Belt: Our crowds are growing. We're, we're setting up chairs in the gathering space again for masses. So, it's a, it's a great blessing. But to focus on the one, to pick one, one person and pray about them and, and befriend them and grow in friendship and build that trust and then invite them. We have tailgate parties that are, that are perished in the summer.

We don't do festival anymore. Um, we, we do tailgate parties where we just get together and listen to music and, and share drinks and a burger and laugh. So invite, ask them to come to a social gathering, fish fries, uh, come to a talk. A Bible study, but one person at a time. And I think that then that, that goes into the second piece and that's my leadership team, the staff and, and counsel are always quoting this back at me.

And I had it quoted back at me yesterday, um, as the, the tear Desjardins quote, um, above all trust in the slow work of God. And so, I was not being, I was being impatient about something yesterday and I had a staff member throw that. Bowed at me, so I, I need to trust in the slow work of God, so show me right now.

Above all, trust in the slow work of God. We are quite naturally impatient in everything to reach the end without delay. We should like to skip the intermediate stages. We are impatient of being on the way to something unknown, something new, and yet it is the law of all progress that it is made by passing through some stages of instability.

And that it may take a very long time. And so, I think it is with you, your ideas mature gradually, let them grow, let them shape themselves without undue haste. Give our Lord the benefit of believing that his hand is leading you and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself in suspense and incomplete. 

[01:00:31] Jim Jansen: Amen.

[01:00:32] Fr. Dave Belt: So, this, it's slow work, but it's God's work. So, if it's, if it's being done fast, It may not be the work of God. It might be just our discomfort at it being in one of those intermediate stages. 

[01:00:47] Jim Jansen: Mm, man, that's good stuff. Father, thank you. Thank you for being with us. Thank you for sharing these. We will, we will cite all of the amazing books and maybe also this low work of God in the show notes.

Yeah. Thanks, father. Thanks for being with us. 

[01:01:04] Fr. Dave Belt: You're welcome. It was good to be here. God bless you, everybody. 

[01:01:07] Jim Jansen: All right. You guys know somebody who needs to hear this, or maybe you're going to like go online and like buy these books and start sending them out to friends. Uh, great stuff. So, all right. Thanks everybody.

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.