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Our communal discernment work has largely been done in the context of parishes and dioceses when apostolic planning and big picture thinking needs to take place. This can look like discerning the parish mission statement or trying to discern where God is calling a faith community in five years’ time.
Communal discernments can be powerful as they are dependent on listening to God and each other. It always involves group members sharing what their sense is of what the Holy Spirit is saying.
We aim to design sessions for and work with whatever time constraints ministries have, but communal discernment requires time and space. A facilitator from our team helps to guide these sessions and gives an initial input on what discernment is and how to do it as a group. Then, it’s time to get going. Here’s how it works.
Our facilitator will provide participants with something to pray with between sessions. As with any discernment process, prayer is our foundation, listening out for what God is saying to us.
At the next session, people will share the fruit of their prayer and what the Holy Spirit has been saying to them.
Here, people have to trust each other and allow each other to speak truth.
Our facilitator notes all of this down, prays, and uses this synthesis to suggest prayers for the next session.
The steps repeat until the discernment process reaches its conclusion.
By the end, faith communities have a better sense of God’s acting and inviting in what is being discerned. With a real unity of purpose, they can make next steps in their shared mission together.
Our team accompany people on their journey with God through life and train others in the art of prayer, accompaniment and discernment.
We are passionate about working with local communities. In our work with parishes and diocese, we offer retreat days, weeks of guided prayer, communal discernment and more.
