Rebuilding Confirmation: Because We Need More Than Another Graduation

All too often, the sacrament of Confirmation feels like a graduation from religious obligation, according to Christopher Wesley, former director of student ministry at Church of the Nativity in Timonium, Maryland. In Rebuilding Confirmation, Wesley shares how to reimagine Confirmation preparation in new or existing programs so that teens will become active members of the Church.

At Church of the Nativity, Christopher Wesley created a Confirmation program that uses parish-selected mentors and small faith-formation groups to provide teens with an intensely transformative encounter with Christ and the Church. Instead of teens seeing the sacrament as the end of faith formation and weekly Mass attendance, they are becoming engaged in the life of the Church.

Wesley’s story, vision, and rock-solid advice will strengthen your existing program or help you create a strong framework upon which to build a new one.  He will show you how to create a ministry of witness and support to accompany youth as they prepare for Confirmation.

Rebuilding Confirmation is perfect for use with existing middle or high school Confirmation programs, including popular curriculum-based programs such as Chosen, Decision Point, and Called to Mercy.

You will learn:

• How to create a Confirmation program that is anchored by small groups and parish-selected mentors;
• Practical solutions to systemic problems such as having an unclear purpose and treating preparation for the sacrament as just more schooling;
• How to recruit and train adult volunteers;
• How to work with parents and win their support;
• How to screen and select Confirmation candidates who are truly ready to commit; and
• How to advocate for your program and youth within the wider parish community.

Wesley offers fixes for the structures and habits that fail youth in many Catholic parishes, shares his own successes and failures, and provides great ideas and practical tools to help the newly confirmed set a course for their future in the Church.

Christopher Wesley is a youth ministry coach and consultant with Marathon Youth Ministry (christopherwesley.org). He is the director of youth and young adult ministry at St. Joseph Catholic Church in Cockeysville, Maryland, and the former director of student ministry at Church of the Nativity in Timonium, Maryland. He also serves as the president of the unCUFFed Ministries Board of Directors in Baltimore, Maryland. The author of Rebuilding Youth Ministry and Rebuilding Confirmation, Wesley writes content for downloadyouthministry.com.

He and his wife, Katherine, have two sons and live in Pikesville, Maryland