Christian Initiation at Easter: For “Joiners,” Not “Switchers”

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size

Notes

David Yamane and Sarah MacMillen with Kelly Culver, Real Stories of Christian Initiation: Lessons for and from the RCIA (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 2006), 119.

See Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst, Der Erwachsenen-katechumenat in den Vereignigten Staaten von Amerika: Eine Anregung für die Sakramentenpastoral in Deutschland, Münsteraner Theologische Abhandlungen 28 (Altenberge: Oros Verlag, 1993). See also Archdiocese of Chicago, The Catholic New World (April 23–29, 2000). It must be stressed, however, that particularly in Germany after the recent reunification of the country, the pastoral situation is often that people in former East Germany were baptized but had received very minimal catechesis or formation and are now approaching the church for various pastoral reasons. Hence, the situation is radically different from the kind of church switching that often occurs in the United States under the auspices of the RCIA.

Aidan Kavanagh, “Critical Issues in the Growth of the RCIA in North America,” Catechumenate 10 (1988): 13–14.

See Dale J. Sieverding, The Reception of Baptized Christians: A History and Evaluation, Forum Essays 7 (Chicago: Liturgy Training Publications, 2001), especially 102ff.; and Paul Turner, When Other Christians Become Catholic (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2007).

The Rites of the Catholic Church (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 1990), vol. 1, par. 2, 341.

Ibid., par. 33, 347. While the following paragraph makes a concession “for pastoral reasons,” it asserts, nevertheless, that “a clear distinction should be maintained during the celebration between candidates for sacramental initiation and candidates for reception into full communion, and ecumenical sensitivities should be carefully respected.”

Paul Turner, Confirmation: The Baby in Solomon's Court (Mahwah/New York: Paulist Press, 1993), 129. Turner, of course, is being too nice. Too often, in fact, candidates for full communion do sign the book of the elect, are scrutinized, and so forth. Unfortunately, this particular quote no longer appears in the revised edition of Turner's book, from Liturgy Training Publications in Chicago.

Gordon Lathrop, Holy People: A Liturgical Ecclesiology (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1999), 146–47.

Maxwell Johnson, “Let's Stop Making ‘Converts’ at Easter,” Catechumenate: A Journal of Christian Initiation 21 (1999): 10–20; revised version in Maxwell Johnson, Worship: Rites, Feasts, and Reflections (Portland: Pastoral Press, 2004), 83–94.

Reprinted from Celebrate! vol. 46, no. 1 (January–February 2007). Used with permission. Celebrate! is published six times yearly by Novalis. For subscriptions call 1-800-387-7164.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Maxwell E. Johnson

Maxwell E. Johnson is professor of liturgy at the University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana. He has written extensively on the rites of Christian initiation and his books and articles are widely used in courses on Christian initiation in North America and elsewhere. This article first appeared in the January–February 2007 issue of Celebrate! and is reprinted with its editors' kind permission.