Catholic World News News Feature

Discovering a Catholic Men's Movement January 11, 2002

By Laurie Petrie

On a clear and windy Sunday in March--a day many might have spent watching college basketball teams contend for the national championship--some 2,000 Catholic men instead gathered near Cincinnati, Ohio, to rejuvenate their commitment to faith and family.

They sang and prayed. They shared knowing laughter about their own weaknesses, and threw arms over each others' shoulders in gestures of support. They promised to be better husbands, better sons, better fathers, and better Catholics. At the day's end, the worshipped together at Mass and promised to keep the momentum going.

Many of these men had been through similar experiences (albeit on a smaller scale) on retreats or Cursillo weekends. Some had attended rallies organized by Promise Keepers--the six-year-old movement, predominantly Protestant in its origins, which has been consistently drawing nearly 300,000 men to its annual events. But this was something different. Called "The Catholic Men's Conference: Answer the Call II," it culminated a year of effort for the Catholic Men's Fellowship, a burgeoning new movement in the Cincinnati area.

The rally--a new initiative for the Catholic Men's Fellowship, which had never before undertaken a project of this size--demonstrated the need that many Catholic men felt to share their problems and weaknesses, comfort and encourage one another, express their faith, and blend that faith with action.

"We give a lot of lip service to our faith. I'm as guilty of that as anyone," said Jim Dressman, a lawyer from northern Kentucky and father of three daughters. During a break in the conference, Dressman perched on a curb on the campus of Thomas More College, munching on a sandwich. "But I feel a renewed commitment to being a Christian in a non-Christian world," he reflected. "The message isn't that we should run out and try to save the world, but to take this back to your own family. That's where the saving has to begin."

GROWTH OF A MOVEMENT

For the four founders of the Catholic Men's Fellowship, the "saving" began ten years ago, at a meeting at St. Mary's parish church in Cincinnati.

"The vision was that we realized Protestant men would get together in fellowship readily, but it seemed Catholic men--at least as far as those in our circle--didn't do that," said Kevin Lynch, who founded the fellowship along with his friends Declan O'Sullivan, Tom Young, and Father Ken Sommer.

After their first meeting, that quartet sent out two hundred letters. Ten men responded, and the fellowship was off to its humble start. Lynch and his friends did not envision a massive national movement then, nor have they developed such ambitions today. Their goal has been--and still is--to help other men discover the spiritual riches they found for themselves when they sat down together to pray and share their lives.

So while the March rally was "on of those mountain-top experiences," as Declan O'Sullivan put it, the fellowship's main purpose is to help small groups of men--usually based in parishes--to meet regularly for prayer and fellowship.

"Ten years of doing this have told me that Catholic men are really hungry for close male companionship," Lynch said. "We've begun to realize that the back-slapping, everything-is-OK attitude begins to be a big lie. We realize we don't have the answers, but we want to pray."

In that respect, as well as in its traditional approach to faith and its call for men to re-examine their priorities, the Catholic Men's Fellowship bears a distinct resemblance to Promise Keepers. Lynch has grown accustomed to hearing the comparison, but is quick to point out that his group actually pre-dates its more famous cousin.

While Promise Keepers describes itself as a non-denominational group, only 2 percent of the men who attend its rallies are Catholics. In that respect, Promise Keepers follows the same pattern as many other men's Christian fellowships; although Catholic men are welcome, they do not participate in large numbers.

"We decided we'd do something different and make our fellowship denominational," explained Kevin Lynch. "And our approach is to have the Mass, so Catholic guys will feel more comfortable."

MAJOR LIFE CHANGES

Nevertheless, the Catholic Men's Fellowship arose in the midst of a massive "men's movement" in the United States. While that movement takes various forms, and appeals to different constituencies--from the Million Man March for African-American men last October; to poet Robert Bly's Iron John followers, beating drums in the woods--it shares some common themes. Participants typically feel a longing to reawaken themselves spiritually. They revel long-suppressed emotions, self-doubts, and fears. At the same time, they seek to reclaim their authority as responsible fathers, sons, and husbands. As women have prompted to do during the ascendancy of the feminist movement, men now want to move beyond stereotypes and realize their full potential.

"In our 20s and 30s, we are supposed to be the strive-for-success guys--no weaknesses, no sensitivites," said Lynch. "It's all hard-charging, and don't worry, your wife will raise the kids. That's certainly the paradigm I worked under for twenty years."

He continues:

Then all of a sudden, maybe in your 40s, you realize that your kids are having some problems, your wife is unhappy, even the job doesn't look so good... You have idols and distractions, and you ask yourself, "Am I doing this the right way?" Some say Yes and go on charging ahead, but we are the ones who have said No.

For some of the men in the fellowship, this realization has been the beginning of some very significant changes. Eight months ago, Lynch himself took early retirement from his position in sales and marketing fo Procter & Gamble, and now works full-time to run the fellowship and plan its rallies. "My single-minded focus in life has gone from wanting to go as far as I could at Procter & Gamble to wanting to lead my children to Christ," he said.

With the youngest of his four children expecting to go to college in another year, Lynch is sometimes questioned about the risks involved in his decision. But he is undeterred. "If anybody had said yeas ago that I would retire at 55, I would have said, 'Are you crazy?'" He admitted. But when the time came, he revealed, "it was so easy.... I'm not worried about money. I believe I'm answering the Lord's call."

For another founder of the fellowship, Declan O'Sullivan, faith played a key role in his decision to leave his banking position and start his own investment-consulting firm.

"When I ran into ethical problems at work, I was able to stay on top of that because my faith level was higher," he said. "I had more courage. I wasn't depending on my own power, but on my relationship with the Lord."

While many colleagues thought he "was nuts" to leave his position, his friends in the fellowship understood perfectly, and their support strengthened his will, O'Sullivan reported.

SLOW BEGINNINGS

As the numeral in its name implies, Answer the Call II was the fellowship's second rally. The first, held last September, drew about 450 men.

While interest in the fellowship has picked up speed recently, the entire project had a slow beginning. In 1988, the fellowship sponsored a rally for FIRE--a charismatic group whose name is an acronym fo Faith, Intercession, Repentance, and Evangelization, based on a model developed at the Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio. They rented a Cincinnati fieldhouse and drew an audience of 6,000--including both men and women--to hear several speakers and celebrate Mass with Cincinnati's Archbishop Daniel Pilarczyk.

Fired up themselves, the leaders of the Catholic Men's Fellowship wanted to go public with their style of prayer and sharing among men, but they were not sure how to go about that project. Instead, as Lynch put it, they "went into hibernation" until last year.

To draw 2,000 men for this year's conference, the leaders used a method learned from political campaigners. They chose 140 parishes in Cincinnati and the nearby towns of northern Kentucky, and in each parish they recruited either the pastor or another interested man to promote the conference. They wound up with commitments from 85 parishes. As it turns out, men from 200 of the 275 Cincinnati-area parishes attended the March conference.

"I'm very excited about this," said Bishop Carl Moeddel, a Cincinnati auxiliary bishop who celebrated Mass at the conference. "I'm even more excited about the growing network of men's prayer groups in the parishes. It's exhibiting a growing hunger for spirituality. They're looking for support and commitment to faith and finding it in other men."

The fellowship's leaders envision a series of annual rallies, growing larger each yea until they gathe 50,000 men together--presumably in a football stadium, since few sites could accomodate that crowd--to celebrate the Christian jubilee of the year 2000.

NETWORKS OF PRAYER

Meanwhile the fellowship wants to continue to create and support small prayer groups. About 25 such groups are already affiliated with the Catholic Men's Fellowship today.

Typically the groups meet weekly, alternating between a large-group format which may involve 30 men or more and sometimes include an outside speaker, and a small formt of splinter groups made up on four to eight men. The small gatherings are designed to encourage open discussion and honest sharing of experiences, thoughts, and problems. Meetings usually include scripture reading, prayer, singing, and sharing in conversation.

The two topics that literally and figuratively "bring the men to their knees" concern relationships with their fathers and with their wives, Lynch reported. He explains the first category:

Men break down and cry over the realization that their father never hugged them growing up, and that they're doing the same with their kids. So many of us were raised by absent fathers, substitute fathers, or fathers who showed no emotion.

Many of the women whose husbands are active in the fellowship find that, although as wives they cannot participate in the meetings, the group helps them to build closer relationships with their husbands.

"It has made Declan more aware of me as a person, instead of someone who is just always there," said Rosemarie O'Sullivan. "I respect the need that many men have for a safe place. The [prayer groups] are where they can go with their brokenness, and some men don't share that brokenness even with their wives."

The fellowship's leaders are nevertheless aware that some may view their movement as an attempt to thwart an advance of Catholic women in the Church. But Lynch insists that the group has no special agenda relating to either political or ecclesial affairs. He points to the mission statement of the Catholic Men's Fellowship: "We gather in Christ's presence in an atmosphere of trust, equality, and anonymity to share personal feelings and experiences."

"What we're about is really pretty simple," said Declan O'Sullivan. "It's about getting men to grow spiritually."

[AUTHOR ID] Laurie Petrie is a reporter for the Cincinnati Post, specializing on issues concerning children and families.

[SIDEBAR]

PROMISE KEEPERS

In 1990, Bill McCartney was a college football coach, a committed evangelical Christian, and a man with a vision. While his squad at the University of Colorado was an annual contender for the coveted national championship, McCartney was beginning to look beyond football.

Like many participants in the pressure-packed world of intercollegiate athletics, McCartney had paid a heavy price for his success. His obsessive concern for football--recruiting new players, scouting new opponents, and devising new strategies--had left little time for family life. When his teenage daughter became pregnant (the father was a star on the Colorado football team), McCartney began to reassess his life.

In 1990, McCartney disclosed a new ambition: Week after week, he had seen the stadium at the University of Colorado filled with cheering football fans; one day, he hoped to fill the same stadium with men praying together. That was the vision that inspired him to found Promise Keepers, "a non-denominational, Christ-centered ministry dedicated to uniting men through vital relationships to become godly men who influence their world."

Attacking his new task with the same energy that had made him an athletic success, McCartney organized meetings for Christian men--first in Colorado and then elsewhere across the United States. The movement quickly caught fire, and within three years McCartney had seen his vision realized: 55,000 men gathered at the University of Colorado stadium for a Promise Keepers rally in July 1993.

By 1995, such enormous crowds had become almost routine for Promise Keepers. The latest mass rally, held in Atlanta last September, drew another 50,000 men. The group has a simple and clear goal:

Promise Keepers believe God wants us to be a spark in His hand to ignite a nationwide movement calling men to reconciliation, discipleship, and godliness. With God's grace and direction, Promise Keepers is seeking to fill stadiums in at least 50 major cities across the United States by the year 2000 and to assemble one million men in Washington DC in 1997 to worship and honor Jesus Christ.