Course Topics and Presentation

Making a Difference: A Course for Those Who Minister includes lecture, group discussion, small group work, and daily periods of teaching and practicing Centering Prayer. Courses range in size from 10-50 participants and are open to women and men of every faith who minister to others.

The courses are conducted by a team of leaders, both lay and ordained persons, who are extensively trained in the course technology. No theology is presented or discussed by the course leaders, although participants are encouraged to discover where the ideas presented can enrich and empower their own theology and faith.

The workshop is normally offered as a residential program over two or three days. The points below are among the areas and issues commonly addressed.

Course Outline

PART ONE
Welcome, overview, and logistics of the course
Centering Prayer
The distinctions of what is important, unimportant and what makes a difference
The nature and concerns of ministry
Listening as a state of being rather than something one does
What is at stake in the matter of ministry

PART TWO
Centering Prayer
The nature of language and communication as the foundation for human experience, interaction, and effectiveness
The fundamental superstitions of human beings
Life (and ministry) as a conversation
A model for distinguishing categories of experience
What must be present for ministry to occur?

PART THREE
Centering Prayer
What is missing vs. what is wrong
The possibility of ministry being about what is missing
Who are you in the matter of your ministry?
The nature of creativity and the invention of new possibilities
Declarations: who you are is your word
Renewing commitment and vision
The operating principles of this technology

PART FOUR
Centering prayer
The nature of commitment, accountability, and leadership
Keeping commitment alive and in action
Enrollment and engendering the participation of others
Invitation to miracles and mastery
Speaking possibility to others

Participants at workshop in Ireland

Download Making a Difference Brochure

Download Making a Difference Registration Form

"There are many courses that offer new ideas, skills, and techniques. Often, however, when you come home you feel more frustrated. You have seen the possibility, but now all the more keenly feel your own inadequacy. You search for a course that will unclutter your mind and help you find that still space at the center where prayer and work coalesce and where lies true power to change. This course leads to new ways of listening, of seeing, of being in the world, and to the possibility and promise that your ministry will make the difference you want it to make."

Fr. Frankie Murray
Ferbane, Ireland