To live in community is not a question of option, but one of vocation. Christianity, by its very nature, demands the formation of community.

Archbishop Oscar Romero


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• Letter from the pastor describing small church communities and inviting parishioners to join.
• Inserts in the weekly parish bulletin.
• Presentations in church before or after Mass.
• Posters at entrances to church.
• Discussion at coffee hours after Mass.

The most powerful means to market small church communities to prospective members is personal invitation. We have asked each small community member to invite one person to an information night to consider joining. Personal invitation has consistently proven to be the most powerful marketing tool available.

Here are some of the lessons we learned from our mistakes.

Be honest; be clear - In our initial recruiting for small church communities using Come As You Are, a beginning experience for small groups, we asked parishioners to join for six sessions. We did not intend to mislead people, but some felt misled as soon as they realized that Come As You Are is twelve sessions. Our intent was only to ask for a limited commitment initially. So, while the limited beginning commitment is a good idea, we learned that we should let people know that we are asking them to commit to a part of the program with the option to continue.

Offer a view of the future - It is extremely difficult to communicate the small church community vision to all prospective members in a short time. However, it is important that people understand that Come As You Are is just the first phase in the development of a small church community. We lost some members because they did not feel that this first phase did much for them. They felt it did not go deep enough into their faith. If we had explained that this first phase is more for beginning group development, a chance to develop the sense of trust that is needed for faith sharing, we likely would have retained many of these members. That is, after all, what they wanted. And that was what was coming in the later phases.

Maintain multiple Core Team contacts with beginning groups - The responsibility for beginning groups lies with the Core Team. In our first round of recruiting, we learned it was not enough for there to be a Core Team member in the group. We each have slightly different understandings of the small church community vision. We now make sure that more than one Core Team member contacts several members of each group over the early weeks to make sure things are on track and that no issues are arising that are not being addressed. We think we lost a beginning group because issues arose and we were not vigilant enough to address them early.

Keep small church communities in front of the general parishioner - Small church communities are not just another program in the parish. They are part of a different way to be parish. If the only time that small church communities are mentioned is during a recruitment drive, then they will appear to be just one more program. We have developed a small community newsletter that we attempt to have in the parish bulletin quarterly. There is a banner for small church communities that hangs in the front of our church. We have sponsored some general parish activities (Breakfast with Santa, Nature Walk, Stations of the Cross, etc.) that allow us to regularly witness our connection to the larger parish and to mention small communities. This is an area where we can't do too much. The more active small communities are in the parish, the greater the attraction to participate.
Clearly, we have identified things that we would do differently given the opportunity to do them over. However, we are not disappointed with the progress that has been made at St. Patrick's. It is just that there is so much we have to offer. We know that there are many parishioners who want to join, but we just have not reached them yet.