The goal of Family Faith Formation is that for each parent and child, there would be an understanding that he or she is a beloved child of God, a fruitful Sacramental life, frequent personal prayer, and confidence in sharing one’s own Catholic faith. None of these are accomplished through a program or meeting a list of requirements. They can only be accomplished by meeting a person – Jesus Christ. He brings us each to the love of the Father and imparts on us the Holy Spirit. In fact, this is already done in Baptism. For all those in Family Faith Formation, we desire a deepening of the grace and relationship that God has already established in you and your children.
The resources, programming, and tools we use are chosen only with the above goals. Both Church tradition and modern sociological research tells us the key factors (aside from God’s grace!) in successfully passing on faith from a parent to a child are regular practice of faith, regular conversations about faith, and an openness to questions and investigation of faith. For Catholics, this is done in the context of frequent celebration of the Sacraments, family prayer, and faith formation. However, unless each of these introduce a child to the divine person of Jesus Christ, they are misdirected.
We invite you to complete the pre-registration form linked below so that we can assist you in beginning or continuing your marriage and/or Baptismal commitment to raising your children in the Catholic faith. After completing the form, please create a booking for a Visit with either Maggie Agra or Jacob Doran.
A Visit is a fifteen-to-thirty-minute conversation about your experience of faith, family faith formation (or other program), how you can help our team, how we can pray for you, and what pathway might be most fruitful for your family this coming year. At least one parent must attend, but you are welcome to bring the whole family. These are conducted either in person at the parish office, by phone, or through a Teams video call. After the Visit, we will give you a registration link. The Visit is a mandatory step of entering this year’s Family Faith Formation program. In order to best support you and your family as you grow in your faith, we need to have a relationship with you and get to know your walk with God. There is no judgment or test involved in the Visit. Our goal is to be able to accompany and support you. We cannot do that if your family is just names on a spreadsheet or in the parish database. Visits will be held during April through August.
Our costs help to cover the cost of family faith formation programming at St. Brendan, which includes curriculum resources, at-church session materials, food, and more. Our department ministries also include middle and high school youth ministry, which are funded through the church’s offertory collection and individual donations. As a whole, we host an average of 220 individuals each week and are completely oriented to supporting families. In addition, we have a department staff of four, three of which are full-time. The Youth Evangelization and Catechesis Department relies largely on offertory to offset the full cost of programming, salaries, and benefits. Our income and expense numbers are always published as part of the financial snapshot in the bulletin.
We are committed to financially assisting any family that asks. Please let us know if you have any kind of financial need regarding Family Faith Formation or Sacrament preparation costs.
| Family with one child enrolled | Family with two children enrolled | Family with three or more children enrolled | |
| Full Cost of program | $450 | $600 | $750 or more |
| Parishioner Rate | $300 | $425 | $475 |
| Non-Parishioner Rate | $450 | $600 | $750 |
For Sacrament Preparation, we ask that families pay an additional $50 per child to offset costs associated with administrative time, materials, and gifts. This is payable on the sacrament registration forms.
After each at-home family meeting, please upload an image or text reply from your time together. You will find the prompt for each meeting under the course page for the box you are currently using at home. Use this link to find the Martha login page.
We need a team to make Family Faith Formation work! This year we are asking that one parent from each family SIGN UP HERE to choose one of the roles below:
