Our parish, in collaboration with the diocese and Jesuit province, hosts various seminars and trainings to continually form our people:
- Catechist Training Workshops: At least once a year, we run a training for all catechists and any interested parishioners on topics like “Effective Catechesis Methods,” Bible study techniques, or updates on liturgical guidelines. In the strategic plan, engaging and forming catechists (SI#1) is top priority, so we’ve been increasing these trainings. For example, in early 2025 a workshop was held focusing on the new diocesan catechetical curriculum and interactive teaching for children.
- Liturgical Ministers Training: About twice a year, workshops for lectors, Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion, altar servers, and choir members are organized. These cover the spirituality of their service and practical skills (like voice projection for readers, or proper handling of Eucharist for ministers). Often our priest or an invited liturgist leads these sessions.
- Leadership and Council Workshops: The PPC and committee members periodically have training days. In 2023, aligned with launching the Strategic Plan, a facilitator from the Jesuit Hakimani Center led a seminar on “Servant Leadership and Parish Strategic Planning”, which helped the council to prioritize actions and work better as a team. We also foresee workshops on conflict resolution, project management (for development committee), and financial management (for finance council) to empower our lay leaders.
- Youth Skills and Vocational Trainings: We care about the holistic well-being of our youth. Now and then we partner with professionals for mini-trainings: e.g., a Career Guidance Day for Form 4 leavers, entrepreneurship training for out-of-school youth (a Jesuit NGO helped do one such 3-day seminar in 2022), and life skills workshops (covering topics like peer pressure, chastity, and goal setting). These equip our young people to face life with virtue and confidence.
- Marriage Enrichment & Parenting Seminars: As part of our family life ministry, we host an annual marriage enrichment day (open to all couples) which includes talks by experienced couples or priests on topics like communication, finance in marriage, and intimacy, followed by couple dialogue exercises. We also have organized parenting talks – for instance, sessions on “Christian Parenting in the Digital Age” (SI#8 about parenting skills), which was very well received by about 50 parents in attendance.
- Special Topics: When there are pressing social issues, we arrange awareness talks. We’ve had sessions on Drug and Alcohol Abuse prevention (with a recovering addict giving testimony), a talk on mental health (especially depression among youth, by a Catholic counselor), and workshops on trauma healing for those affected by various abuses or tribal clashes (the Jesuit Refugee Service facilitated one such training in 2019 for community leaders, including our J&P members).
All these seminars and trainings are usually advertised during announcements and open to all interested unless specified (like only catechists). We see them as a key way to fulfill the call to ongoing formation – we must continually learn in order to better live our faith. Participants often express how such workshops rekindle their zeal and give them practical tools to serve others. We thank our collaborators and the diocese for helping provide resources and facilitators for many of these programs.