23. Supercharging Parish Stewardship
Published: July 28, 2019
This week we focus on Catholic Stewardship and ways leaders can educate and engage the time, talent, and resources of the faithful. Our guest is David Baranowski, the Director of Stewardship Education in the Archdiocese of St. Louis. Dave is a 30-year marketing executive recruited by the Archdiocese over seven years ago to develop educational and marketing materials to support the stewardship efforts of their 182 parishes. In David’s words, “Our goal is to help more people get to Heaven.”
David Baranowski is a frequent speaker at the International Catholic Stewardship Conference. During our interview, David shares his unique conversion experience, which sparked his career change. In 2007, Baranowski attended a retreat where the director encouraged participants to listen to God’s guidance — something he said he hadn’t earnestly done before. The experience convinced him to deepen his faith and focus on Christ.
While praying about God’s gifts in his life, “this wave of gratitude rushed over me,” Baranowski said. “It was at that moment that I decided that I wanted to get to heaven, and I want to take as many people with me as possible. My priorities had to change. I had to put God first in everything I did, and I had to put complete trust in God.”
This episode focuses on how we look at parish Stewardship and how we should consider challenging some of the traditional ways in which we describe it for others. For example, instead of referring to “time, talent and treasure,” Dave uses the terms “prayer, participation and generosity.” Dave hopes to use more accessible language that parishioners can understand. If you have any questions for Dave, please feel free to contact his office by clicking here.
We hope you find this discussion beneficial. We encourage you to like, share and comment on this episode, and we hope it will inspire your parish Stewardship Committees to advance the mission of our Church in the coming program year.
If you have any other questions about Catholic Stewardship, we encourage you to contact Jim Friend.
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