Are You a Question and Answer Catholic?
by Father Rob Carbonneau, C.P.
Catechisms and religious primers have offered Catholics answers to their questions about the Church. United States Catholics in the first half of the twentieth century often discussed the merits of the Baltimore Catechism. During the last decade the Catechism of the Catholic Church (1994) has received equal scrutiny.
United States Passionists have been participants in the question-answer catechetical tradition. The work of Father Xavier Sutton (1852-1926) offers an example from the early twentieth century. Father Mark Moeslein (1854-1946) used a similar style in the 1930s. Finally, former Passionist Father Cronan Regan, and brother to Passionist Cyprian Regan (1927-1973) and present-day Passionist Columkille Regan, answered a wide range of questions posed by readers of The Sign magazine, a Passionist national Catholic monthly. Born John Regan in 1925, Cronan left the Passionists in 1970s. He died in 2003 from Alzheimers.
Reading the following historical sketches might cause Passionists and all those associated with them in diversified contemporary ministries to ponder how much importance is given to the topic of catechesis. Likewise, one might wonder today if the era of the question and answer Catholic has really come to an end?
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