JANESVILLE — Currently, St. Patrick Parish in Janesville is in the midst of a capital campaign to restore the interior of its church. This renovation seeks not only to repair structures that were falling apart but to restore beauty.
Some might ask what this has to do with Go Make Disciples. Isn’t the church building some separate thing to evangelization and catechesis? Doesn’t the Church have many goals that can conflict with each other, and couldn’t a parish’s resources be better utilized in other ways?
I recently spoke with Robert Brajkovich, the director of evangelization at St. Patrick Parish, about this and other topics. Brajkovich, who has been with the parish for eight months, is a former seminarian who spent a period of his life as a member of a Religious Order before discerning otherwise and marrying.
“Major aspects of seminary and religious formation like daily Mass, regular spiritual direction, living among fellow seminarians and priests, and actively seeking the assiduous union with God and the contemplation of divine things over the course of about 10 years shaped and greatly influenced me in choosing to work within a parish setting,” he said.
He expressed that the project is “an exciting sign of revitalization of what was previously considered a dying parish.”
“As a parish family sacrificing to make the house of God beautiful, we are living our belief that God is present there,” he said. “God deserves the best. That is practicing our faith. It is showing what we believe.”
While not the whole, the renovation complements the other efforts being made in the parish.
“The renovation of the church is key,” he said. “The church itself will evangelize through that building.”
Teaching people to pray
At the heart of all this is helping people to enter into prayer, whether it is through the sacraments or in one’s own personal prayer time.
“We know that so many people struggle just to have a daily prayer life,” he said. “And because the daily prayer life is so important, we are trying to focus our efforts there. We are just trying to put them in a position to really succeed.”
At the center is the Mass.
“What we are really trying to emphasize is that when we go to Mass, it is so, so far from checking a darn box,” he said.
In addition to offering informative programs like Ignite and Inflame through FORMED.org the parish hosts small Lectio Divina-based bible studies and occasional spiritual retreats.
Clarifying what the difference is between a bible study and a Lectio Divina small group, Brajkovich said, “We are not looking at, say, what did the theologians say? We are reading the Word of God and reflecting on it with one another.”
In terms of the spiritual retreats, the parish is trying to offer them quarterly. For English-speaking parishioners, the retreats are held at Marytown, just outside of Chicago.
“It is really an exceptional setting to be on retreat,” he said. “They have a glorious chapel.”
Spanish-speaking parishioners are invited to go on retreat at Durward’s Glen in Baraboo.
“The theme is kind of simpler as far as the spaces and buildings, but it is set in a nice remote location where they are able to maybe experience God — not necessarily in things like sacred art per se but through nature,” he said. “Quiet and the stillness.”
The main goal
In terms of the overall goal, Brajkovich said that they are “looking for people to have lively faith, like a transformation from within that can’t help but show itself in the way that we live.”
As far as good works go, he said “If you are struggling with prayer, then we have to prep that prayer by doing good works. And if it is hard to do good works or live a life of virtue, then we need to spend more time in prayer. There is this constant inflow and outflow.”
“The best thing you can do to transform the world is starting with yourself,” he said. “Then we have something for you.”
As far as evangelization goes, he said, it “needs to be rooted in a spirit of prayerfulness and faithfulness. It takes a disciple to make a disciple. The faith must be integrated into your daily life and thus a natural expression of it.”
He also emphasized that it’s not about numbers. “If you bring one or two people to the Sacrament of Reconciliation, that may be more fruitful than 50 people for donut Sunday.”