About Renewal of Faith
"His master said to him, 'Well done, my good and faithful servant. Since you were faithful in small matters, I will give you great responsibilities. Come, share your master's joy.'" Matthew 25:21
Welcome
Welcome to Renewal of Faith. This is not a site designed to convert you. I started this web page to share my faith journey with others. I believe this is important to help others find their own faith. My own journey is not the "typical story" of the past, but it is beginning a more common story today. I was baptized into the Catholic Church as an infant and received First Communion, Penance, and Confirmation. After Confirmation, I did not attend church for sixteen years. There was NEVER a time when I did not believe in God.
As an adult, I found something was missing in my life and began searching. I found what I was looking for at church. God renewed my faith. And it happened in a rapid transformation. After sixteen years of not going to church, my return immediately led me to go every week. Church seemed to mean more now. After six months, I started volunteering at my parish (Schuyler Catholic Community). The more I did at church, the more I enjoyed it.
Through this, God called me to be a priest, and I entered the seminary in 2000. Through education, formation, and ministerial experience as a seminarian, I have continued to grow in my relationship with Jesus, being ever renewed in my faith. A Renewal of Faith is not simply a sudden and significant increase in faith. It may include a sudden change, but a Renewal of Faith is something we experience throughout our lives. It is not a singular event but an ongoing part of our spiritual lives.
Perhaps one way to think of it is as maintenance or mission. We can choose simply to maintain our level of faith, or we can seek to learn more and put new effort into our faith. What does this do for us? Let us use the analogy of a car. We drive a car, and we must have maintenance done on it from time to time to keep it running. But if all we do is basic maintenance, the car will deteriorate over time till, eventually, it no longer runs and cannot be fixed. If we take that same car and don't just do the basic maintenance but put some real effort into taking care of it, it will last us a much longer time. Likewise, if all we do in our faith is attend church most Sundays and perhaps Christmas, we do indeed have some faith and perhaps can find God in the big moments. But if we put effort into our faith lives, then we find God in the little things and the everyday things. From this, our faith is continually renewed.
Peace,
Fr. Jeff
What Faith Means to Me
When I became the Pastor of Immaculate Conception Church in 2012, I found an Evangelization Team that was eager for opportunities to evangelize both our regular parishioners and those who don't come to church very often. As Christmas approached, we knew we would have an opportunity to reach those who only come to church at Christmastime. So, we wanted something to offer them. It was decided that I would do a presentation on my own story of being away from the church, what brought me back, and the priesthood. This is a video of that presentation.