General
USCCB Implementation Guidebook for Listen, Teach, Send
The USCCB Implementation Guidebook for Listen, Teach, Send: A National Pastoral Framework for Ministries with Youth and Young Adults, developed by the Secretariat of Laity, Marriage, Family Life, and Youth at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) in Washington DC, is a resource manual for the practical application and local consideration of Listen, Teach, Send (USCCB © 2024), available through this landing page: https://www.usccb.org/listen-teach-send.
The Implementation Guidebook was approved for public distribution by the USCCB Committee on Laity, Marriage, Family Life, and Youth under the chairmanship of Most Rev. Robert E. Barron of Winona-Rochester.
The suggestions contained within are not prescriptive, nor should they be interpreted as the exclusive means of understanding the particular dimensions of Listen, Teach, Send. Rather, the insights herein are meant to encourage and inspire pastoral leaders and families to consider various ways that they can put the lessons of the national framework into local practice for the benefit of youth and/or young adults.
This Implementation Guidebook is offered to provide concrete responses and strategies to the question “How?” that readers of the USCCB framework, Listen, Teach, Send, might have while reading it.
While this Implementation Guidebook offers strategies, it has also been developed at a nationwide level, so the application of its content is incomplete until those in the local church and among families and social networks, as well as unique circumstances inclusive of universities, hospitals, prisons, and military service, add their specific situations to the ideas offered.
Some caveats:
- The Guidebook does not attempt to exhaust every possible scenario when it comes to youth and young adults. To do so would be impossible and potentially endless.
- The Guidebook does not offer commentary and strategies for every sentence or phrase within Listen, Teach, Send. It provides a few key passages from the pastoral framework that cover multiple areas of concern as much as possible, but there is still yet to be explored.
- The Guidebook primarily offers principles of implementation, though suggests some specifics in a few instances. However, since it is written at the national level, most specifics will depend on the local circumstances of the person using this tool.
- The Guidebook is offered as an impetus for local creativity in implementation. Rather than looking at the text herein as prescriptive, it is best to view these ideas as catalysts for further reflection and springboards for pastoral action.
To read the full guidebook in PDF form (at 64 pages in length), please click on the resource link below.