St. Jude catechist Catalina LaCuesta prepares for online catechesis. (Photo courtesy of Jayne Ragasa-Mondoy)
By Jayne Ragasa-Mondoy
Special to the Herald
The brain likes familiarity. Familiarity is safe, effortless, easy. Unfamiliarity takes effort, is cognitively demanding, and can be stressful. Yet in their commitment to evangelize and catechize parents and children of their parish during the pandemic, the catechists of St. Jude Church in Kapolei, Oahu, are courageous missionaries venturing into new and unfamiliar territory.
Catechist Socorro DeGuzman’s prayer began with, “Lord, we are eager, nervous, but willing …” thus setting the stage for the latest of the intensive two-hour training sessions taking place at the parish over several months in preparation for online delivery of religious education lessons. The teachers are using FlipGrid, a computer platform that delivers lessons designed to strengthen faith in the home by encouraging parent-child interaction through prayer, discussion and family-based video responses.
Although the catechists were seated at a distance from one another and wearing face coverings, a spirit of joy, collaboration and camaraderie permeated the meeting space. There’s a high level of trust — in God; in their pastor Father Khanh Hoang; in religious education director Bonnie Boquer; in the technical expertise of Linda Mazzulla, a catechist and financial systems support manager — and each other.
Every catechist in the room formed a collective will to become competent with uploading and personalizing their grade-level lessons on FlipGrid. The air was peppered with statements like, “Wait, how did you record that video?” and “I can’t find that tab on my iPad” and “Oh, that is so cool — how did you do that?” and “Praise the Lord, I did it!”
Catechist Catalina LaCuesta, a computer systems analyst, played “wing woman” to Mazzulla, jumping in to guide anyone who needed help.
By the end of the session, every catechist was feeling more comfortable as missionaries in this new territory of virtual teaching. The new “Directory for Catechesis” describes the following goal of catechist formation: “making catechists aware that as baptized persons they are true missionary disciples, meaning active participants in evangelization, and on this basis are enabled by the church to communicate the Gospel and to accompany and educate believers in the faith.”
And St. Jude catechists are committed to doing just that.
Ragasa-Mondoy is director of the diocesan Department of Religious Education.