MADISON On May 11, Joanne Ponnwitz of Our Lady of Good Counsel (OLGC) Parish, Pompton Plains, ascended the stage at Drew University to receive her Doctor of Ministry — a well-deserved moment for her to bask in the glory of her remarkable achievement. Her hard work — three years of rigorous academic research and writing — resulted in a boost to her level of personal satisfaction, but more importantly to the certification and ongoing faith-formation opportunities the Diocese offers parish catechists.
With the encouragement of Bishop Serratelli, her family, friends and colleagues, Ponnwitz drew from her in-depth research and her 28 years of experience as an OLGC religious educator to develop her 133-page thesis, which focused on the challenges parish directors or coordinators of religious education (DREs or CREs) and catechists face in gaining related certification or faith-formation. For the research, she surveyed 2,000 catechists and DREs or CREs in the Diocese, asking them to be candid about those challenges. From those results, Ponnwitz made numerous recommendations to the Diocese, such as offering more flexible online courses and webinars, scheduling classes in several different locations and on different days and times, and making catechists and parish catechetical leaders more aware of the certification process and the importance of formation.
Last year, the Diocesan Office of Catechesis, located in St. Paul Inside the Walls: the Diocesan Center for Evangelization at Bayley-Ellard in Madison, began using Ponnwitz’s research to improve its certification and faith formation. Last summer, the office offered more online courses and connected catechists and parish catechetical leaders to various online programs and podcasts, such as Word on Fire. So far, 450 people have participated. The Diocese has made efforts to offer a required course for parish religious educators, “Introduction to Catechesis” in other parts of the Diocese of Paterson, said Ivannia Vega-McTighe, coordinator.
“Catechists need faith-formation, because they can’t catechize themselves. The programs of the Diocese provide a good environment to develop catechists who will better produce young people with an improved ability to talk about their faith and grow in their relationship with Christ,” said Ponnwitz, a senior customer support analyst in the healthcare industry and facilitator of online education with 25 years of experience in market research. In 2015, she earned a master’s degree in religious education from Felician University, Lodi, prompting her husband, Jim, to suggest that she reach for a bigger goal: pursuit of a doctorate. “I thought Jim was crazy, especially for me, a woman in her 60s. I was planning for retirement. Then, one day, I saw Bishop Serratelli at a diner in Clifton. He called me over and I told him about the idea. He said, ‘What does God have to do to convince you?’ So I applied to Drew’s doctoral program,” she said.
Ponnwitz developed her thesis topic, “Catechist Certification: Challenges of Ongoing Faith Formation in the Diocese of Paterson, N.J.,” with Vega-McTighe and Father Paul Manning, St. Paul’s executive director and diocesan vicar for evangelization. Then, Ponnwitz crafted questions for her survey and emailed the online link to catechists and parish catechetical leaders who had attended diocesan events in the past. She compiled the data and presented the results to the diocesan Catechetical Advisory Board in 2018, prompting an “almost immediate discussion of next steps among the advisory board members,” said Ponnwitz.
“Joanne’s results made it clear to us that catechists are definitely interested and willing to work toward their certification; however the scheduling and location of classes needed to be more convenient. The other important impact of Joanne’s research is that her results indicated that many catechists were unaware of the catechist certification process or unclear of how to earn hours towards their certification,” said Vega- McTighe, who noted that the Diocese created a tab on its website with information regarding certification hours and a list of all the opportunities. The Office of Catechesis has been sending catechists and parish catechetical leaders a quarterly newsletter. “There are thousands of catechists in our Diocese and we count on the DREs and CREs to be a bridge for us in reaching the catechists and in helping us getting the best training to them,” she said.
Diocesan policy states that catechists must complete 52 hours of study — five years of instruction in Scripture and theology, catechetics and methodology and spiritual formation — for certification. They must complete 14 hours in the same subjects for re-certification. At the time of her survey, 30 percent of their catechists in the diocese were certified — a percentage that has improved greatly since, said Ponnwitz, who spoke earlier this year at a meeting of the diocesan Catechetical Leadership Association.
“I am optimistic the Diocese will continue to implement more flexible, catechist-centered opportunities in the future to encourage and assist catechists in their faith journey,” Ponnwitz, also chairperson for the diocesan Catholic Committee on Girl Scouting, writes in her thesis.
One of Ponnwitz’s advisers for the Doctor of Ministry was Father Peter Clarke, president of Morris Catholic High School in Denville, who earned a doctorate in educational leadership at the College of St. Elizabeth, Convent Station, last year. He helped her craft the questions for the survey and continued encouraging her. “What Joanne is writing is timely and can be valuable to religious education programs in the Diocese in how to grow and train better catechists to help young people learn the faith and grow in their relationship with the Church and God,” Father Clarke said. “Her beautiful academic research helps make the Church better.”
Ponnwitz will continue to work with the Office of Catechesis on upcoming initiatives, while plotting her next move. This summer, she is facilitating online courses for Felician University with 18 catechists, who are participating in four-week courses. Most of the participants come from the Paterson Diocese.
“I come to God like Samuel, saying ‘Speak Lord, your servant is listening.’ I look forward to the next part of the journey with God,” Ponnwitz said.