On a Tuesday night in a parish hall, the folding chairs are set in a circle, not rows. Coffee warms the room; index cards and pens wait on each chair. There’s no lecture, no slideshow—just an invitation: “Tell us what it’s like to parent right now. What do you wish the church understood?”
Robert’s interest in parents wasn’t trendy; it was pastoral triage. In conversation after conversation, youth ministers confessed that parental engagement was their biggest pain point. “Nobody wanted to do it, yet it’s the linchpin,” Robert says with a smile.
He points to a simple, stubborn reality: the faith of a child tends to mirror the faith of a parent. Youth ministry events can spark powerful experiences, but without a family or support network at home to nurture the spark, the fire cools. It’s a reminder of what the Faith Formation Framework emphasizes: lasting faith takes root when parents, mentors, and the whole church share responsibility for a young person’s formation.
This is one of the sacred listening spaces convened by Robert Feduccia, President of EQ Saints, a ministry that primarily equips Catholic leaders with practical formation and resources. The aim of these spaces, which were made possible with a grant from TENx10, was simple and audacious: before prescribing programs for families, listen to parents. Then, let their real needs shape the church’s next steps.
The findings have begun to reshape ministries across several parishes, including St. Patrick’s Catholic Community in the Diocese of San Diego. There, Pat Clasby, Director of Youth Ministry, tried a version of Robert’s approach at his own parent gatherings. With his experiment, the energy in the room shifted, and so did the outcomes.
Why Start with Parents?
Many parents feel stretched thin and spiritually unsure. In the listening groups Robert hosted across the U.S., one father admitted he longed for deeper conversations with his young person but kept getting one-word answers. “If the church can help me have a real conversation with my child, I would welcome that,” he said.
Another story revealed how shame can quietly keep families at a distance. In Chicago, a father blurted, “We just need to change all of Mass!” Instead of dismissing the frustration, Noelle, a ministry collaborator, asked gentle follow-up questions. Beneath the complaint was embarrassment: he didn’t know when to stand or sit; the responses felt unfamiliar; even the Sign of the Cross seemed different from his childhood. He felt like a bad example to his kids. His simple request? “It would be great if the church would give us a brochure on how to make the Sign of the Cross.”
Robert’s takeaway wasn’t that parents are disinterested in their teens’ faith. It was that many feel under-resourced, overwhelmed, and unseen. And that changes how churches should show up.
Listening as Ministry
The groups themselves were basic: a single evening, a simple gift card, a few open-ended prompts. Framed this way, parents spoke freely. Some admitted attending Mass less than they wished, pulled by weekend sports and logistics. Many said what they really wanted was community with other parents, a chance to laugh with their kids, and prompts that helped them talk about faith at home.
Robert noticed something else: the conversation itself was evangelizing. “People think the point is the result of the conversation,” he reflects. “But the conversation is ministry. Listening was an end in itself.”
This is relational discipleship in action: creating space for parents to be known, affirmed, and encouraged in their faith—in the very same way we long for them to create that kind of space for their youth.
Pastor & Author David Augsburger once wrote, "Being heard is so close to being loved that for the average person they are almost indistinguishable."As parents experienced that kind of care, their openness to God and to the church deepened. Parents asked for more nights like this, and several parishes hosted them again.
Listening prompted quick, practical fixes. After the session in Chicago, EQ Saints created a simple “Mass Movements” brochure—when to sit or stand, how to make the Sign of the Cross, basic responses—and shared it with that parish’s youth minister and EQ Saint’s national network. A felt need was met with a humble solution.
In another instance, a single mother shared how a disciplinary decision at church barred her son from reading Scripture at Mass—right when he needed support most. Saying it aloud in a safe space brought tears, and opened a door for healing. Churches can’t undo every hurt, but they can acknowledge and learn from it, choosing compassion in the future.
From Ideas to Practice
At St. Patrick’s, Pat took the listening posture to heart. A veteran youth minister, he was already gathering parents a few times a year for orientation and prayer nights. After participating in Robert’s focus group, he redesigned one of those gatherings as a listening space where parents could share openly with one another. Simple activities—a playful icebreaker, guided questions, and a prayer exercise—turned the evening into a formative experience of community and faith.
“I’m the one who had to say, ‘Okay, it’s time to come back [from discussion],’” Pat laughs. “They didn’t want to stop; they were sharing. It was really good.” The feedback echoed Robert’s findings: parents - like youth - are eager for relational discipleship.
Listening also softened Pat’s assumptions. In the past, he admits, it was easy to watch a parent’s disengagement and think, “They don’t care.” Now he sees something different - families doing the best they can in complex lives, often feeling behind or ashamed. “We can’t be quick to assume things based on what we’re seeing with our eyes,” he says. “When we listen, we discover they do care—and we learn how to meet them.”
One Dad’s Story: From “I’m Failing” to Sports Ministry
Perhaps the clearest fruit of this posture is Jason*, a father who joined the St. Patrick’s focus group. Jason was candid during the group about his concerns—especially how screens were isolating his son and peers. At one point he confessed, “Sometimes I feel like I’m failing as a dad.”
Pat recognized the ache and pulled him aside: “You’re not failing. Stay in the relationship.” They traded stories and ended with a hug. A seed was planted.
Listening also surfaced Jason’s interests—he’s an avid athlete. Pat had long dreamed of a youth sports ministry that would gather teens for activity and Scriptural reflection. Now he saw a path: Invite Jason to lead it. When he asked, Jason agreed. A new journey begins for a parent discipling teens alongside a youth minister—a small experiment with big implications.
Jason moved from a posture of self-doubt to one of leadership, all anchored by encouragement from a ministry leader who had taken time to listen. That’s the ecosystem churches need to help build lasting faith.
What Churches Are Learning
Robert’s listening groups revealed more than just practical insights—they embodied the same vision at the heart of the Faith Formation Framework. By creating space for parents to be heard, he was practicing relational discipleship with them: building trust, nurturing their faith, and reminding them they are not alone. And when parents grow in confidence and connection, the ripple effects reach their kids.
Simple steps made the gatherings accessible. But beneath each was a deeper truth: advancing parents’ discipleship is one of the most powerful ways to advance their youth’s discipleship.
It’s not about making youth ministry flashier. It’s about including parents in the web of care, helping them pray daily, surrounding each teen with multiple caring adults, and nurturing ongoing conversations about God at home.
A Parable of Hope
The impact of relational discipleship still lingers in these parents from the listening sessions. None of these are sweeping reforms. They’re human-sized acts of attention and courage. But they add up.
Pat has started closing some parent nights by asking families to write three prayers—one for their child, one for themselves as parents, one for their whole household—and then either placing them at the foot of the cross or exchanging them to carry home. It’s an activity that becomes a spiritual practice of care. The room gets quiet. People breathe. And you sense, for a moment, the invisible links between the Body of Christ.
That’s the promise of listening first. It restores relationship—and relationship is the soil where lasting faith grows.
*name changed to protect anonymity