Bishop Robert Brennan signs the Book of the Elect during the diocesan Rite of Election on Sunday, Feb. 21 at Columbus St. Catharine Church. Standing next to him is Deacon Christopher Reis.                                                                   CT photos by Ken Snow

Jesus brings order, bishop tells catechumens, candidates

By Tim Puet
Catholic Times Reporter

Bishop Robert Brennan told people who are planning to receive the Sacraments of Initiation at the Easter Vigil that uniting with Jesus through joining the Catholic Church will help bring order and meaning to the chaos of their lives.

“Jesus will go and find us where we are and accompany us through everything,” he said in his homily at the diocesan Rite of Election ceremony on Sunday, Feb. 21 at Columbus St. Catharine Church. “He wants to be intimate with us and be deeply a part of our lives.

“Life is messy. Your life is messy. Let me tell you, my life is messy. But in spite of that, Jesus wants to be with us. Because of that, he brings joy into the desert with us,” Bishop Brennan said in a reference to Sunday’s reading from St. Mark’s Gospel, which told of Jesus’ temptation by Satan in the desert.

“He helps us see what we might not be able to see so God’s plan for us can unfold. Maybe we might find our lives have a deeper meaning. Maybe we might find ourselves being light for others, or someone else might be healed” through our becoming closer to Jesus,” he said.

“Your journey of life has led you to encounter Jesus Christ in his Church. … God went into the desert of your lives to lead you to the waters of baptism, and all of us find ourselves renewed and inspired by your decision,” Bishop Brennan said to 92 people from 28 parishes who have stated they intend to be baptized and confirmed and receive the Eucharist for the first time at the Easter Vigil. 

These individuals, known as catechumens, have been taking part for several months in the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults (RCIA), a program of weekly classes explaining Catholic beliefs and practices.

Also participating in RCIA classes are candidates – people who have been baptized as Catholics or in another Christian denomination but who have not been confirmed or received the Eucharist. They will come into full communion with the Church when they are confirmed and receive their first Communion at the Easter Vigil.  

Until this year, catechumens and candidates were recognized during separate portions of the Rite of Election. Because of restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic, this year’s ceremony was limited to catechumens. At previous ceremonies, they signed the diocese’s Book of the Elect, which declared their intention to join the Church. This year, catechumens’ names were read by the religious education directors of the parishes where they are taking RCIA classes, and then placed in the book.

Many parishes did not conduct RCIA classes this year because of COVID-19. Last year’s Rite of Election, which took place just before the pandemic forced the temporary closing of churches, recognized 143 catechumens and 378 candidates.     

Catechumens for 2021 include Elaine Morris, who said the example set by Catholic schoolchildren ultimately led to a decision by her and her husband, Kenny Morris Jr., to become Catholics.

“Kenny used to sit at Starbucks and was impressed by students dressed in the uniform for (Dublin) St. Brigid (of Kildare) School, who would come in and be the kindest young people. They would hold doors for the elderly, let people go ahead of them in line and say ‘please’ and ‘thank you.’ Other children their age didn’t do that,” she said.
              (From left) Elaine, Kenny III and Ella Morris

“He really respected this. Kenny and I didn’t come from religious backgrounds growing up, but we had a friend whose children had gone to St. Brigid’s. Kenny said we had to figure out what it was about these kids that made them so different, so we started looking at what the Catholic Church teaches.” She said it has been about six years since the couple first decided to examine Catholic belief.  

Elaine Morris said her father was raised Catholic and was inactive in the Church while she was growing up but has resumed practicing the faith. “Mom and Dad raised us to be open-minded about religion,” she said. “But when Dad found out I was going to become a Catholic, he told me, ‘That’s exactly what I wanted, but I knew you had to find things on your own.’”  

Morris, 48; her 11-year-old daughter, Ella; and her 7-year-old son, Kenny III, will be baptized together during the Easter Vigil service at St. Brigid of Kildare Church. Both children attend St. Brigid School and are receiving instruction on Catholic beliefs as part of the school’s curriculum.

The children’s father, Kenny Jr., 52, delayed entering RCIA classes for a year. Elaine said that was because the couple runs two businesses, they decided she would take religious instruction first and that he would follow so that one of them could concentrate on workplace activities.

“There’s so much depth in Catholic teaching,” she said. “You hear people all the time giving the wrong ideas about what Catholics believe on subjects like abortion, homosexuality and capital punishment. Now that I understand the reasons behind Catholic teachings, they make sense. Another thing that surprised me is the emphasis the Church puts on marriage preparation. It’s awesome how involved it gets in helping engaged couples understand the real meaning of marriage.

“I feel I’m just now dipping my foot into something lovely, enlightening and beautiful that I’ll be learning more about all my life,” Morris said. “Getting ready to join the Catholic Church has changed the way I think of everything. It’s tapped into a part of my soul and brain that I didn’t know I had and made me think beyond myself and more about other people.”

Also joining the Church as a group at the Easter Vigil will be Beth Stevens and her daughters, Gabby and Gracie (pictured left). Beth, 42, baptized in the Methodist Church, is a candidate. Gabby, 12, a seventh-grader at Columbus Immaculate Conception School, and Grace, 7, in second grade there, are catechumens.

Beth said her husband, Matt, is not a Catholic but supports their decision to enter the Church. “I have a lot of friends who decided to send their children to Immaculate Conception,” she said. “We decided to join them because we wanted the children to be in a private school and have a religious-based education, given the way the world is at this time. But we left it up to our daughters as to when or whether they would be baptized.”

Gabby attended Catholic Youth Summer Camp (CYSC) in Knox County in 2020 and said that throughout her week there, she heard Jesus calling her and saying He wanted her to join Him. She felt especially drawn to Jesus during Eucharistic Adoration as He was carried around the camp lodge in the form of the Eucharist displayed in a monstrance. At that point, she decided to become a Catholic.

“I shared my experience with my parents and sister, and we decided as a family to begin this life-changing journey together,” Gabby said. “God spoke to me during Adoration and asked me to follow Him, and I have never looked back. I love helping my mom in her faith journey and answering her questions. RCIA has guided me on this journey.”

“The faith community at CYSC and in the parish has brought our family closer together and strengthened the bonds we have,” Beth said. “It’s also been an interesting role reversal, because, in this case, my kids are teaching me what they already know.”  

Caroline Edwards of Westerville, a catechumen who is 21 and studying veterinary science at Columbus State Community College, had what she described as “a two-part conversion” – first to Christianity in general, and then to Catholic teaching.

“All through middle school and Westerville North High School, I had problems with depression and eating disorders. I was a very self-deprecating person,” she said. “In high school, I became involved with a small Christian group which gave me lots of support in helping me struggle with my problems. The group was connected with Heritage Christian Church in Westerville, and I began attending services there.

“I went there for about three years, then last year, for the first time, I heard about this thing called Lent, which I understood was a 40-day period of spiritual growth. The church I attended didn’t have this, and it was something that appealed to me because I wanted to be a more spiritual person.

“As I learned more about Lent, I came to realize that it was primarily a Catholic tradition,” she said. “I had an aversion to the Catholic Church because I was put off by some things, such as confession and the role of the pope, but I felt something nudging me to observe the Lenten practices and to be devotional and thoughtful while keeping an open mind about the things that concerned me.

“Most people fast during Lent, but for me, the problem was different because of my body issues. What I needed to do was to eat when I should. I brought the problem before God and decided one way to observe Lent would be through better eating habits.”

Edwards said her continued investigation of Catholic teaching deepened her understanding of the church and answered her questions. She attended Masses at several diocesan parishes and said she was particularly moved by Eucharistic Adoration at Columbus St. Patrick Church, where she started RCIA classes in September.

“At that point, I felt ready to take a leap of faith and be formally educated on what it means to be a Catholic,” she said. “I just needed some fellowship with others to get to the finish line.

“One thing I didn’t realize is how central the sacraments are to the Church, especially the importance of the Eucharist,” she said. “Its meaning as the Real Presence of Christ, the center of everything, is something I couldn’t have imagined.

“It was hard to get used to the idea that the Mass is the same every time in its essence, but I realize now how important this is. I also thought some of the Church’s social teachings were antiquated, but now I realize the wisdom in its position on abortion and same-sex marriage.”

Shelley Ralstin-Tackett, a candidate, was baptized at a Methodist church and said her father was a non-practicing Catholic. She will receive her first Communion and the Sacrament of Confirmation during the Easter Vigil service at Portsmouth St. Mary Church. 

While growing up, she was part of a congregation affiliated with the Church of Christ in Christian Union but also attended Masses at Otway Our Lady of Lourdes Church at Christmas, Easter and other Catholic feast days. As part of a consolidation of Catholic churches in Scioto County, the Otway church no longer is a worship site, and its parishioners mainly attend Pond Creek Holy Trinity Church.

“An aunt lived next door to Our Lady of Lourdes, so I spent many an afternoon there,” said Ralstin-Tackett, 60. “When she passed away several years ago, I went to the funeral, and Father David (E. Young, pastor there at the time) said that in her heart, if there’s one thing Betty (Tackett’s aunt) would wish, it would be for a member of her family to become a Catholic. I think he was referring to me.”

Ralstin-Tackett said she frequently attended Our Lady of Lourdes after that and decided to go to RCIA classes at the invitation of a friend. The classes for what is now the Scioto Catholic Consortium have taken place for the past several months at Portsmouth St. Mary, with Ralstin-Tackett among those attending in person and others taking part via Zoom videoconferencing. 

Ralstin-Tackett is married, with two sons and a daughter. She and one son raise cattle on a 400-acre farm near Otway whose principal crop is hay. Her husband works for GE Aviation in Waverly. She was a teacher in Scioto County’s Northwest Local School District for 31 years and continues teaching there as a substitute.

“My biggest surprise in learning about the Catholic Church is the one-on-one experience with God it’s brought me,” she said. “I feel I can take anything to him in prayer. I’ve learned so much about how the church survived centuries, about all the saints. 

“I’m so excited with each RCIA session and amazed at what I’ve learned. It humbles you to hear the stories of the martyrs and the persecutions the Church has gone through. I may think it’s hard to give up something for Lent, but the martyrs gave up their lives.”