Pham, I need your help to graduate!

[Gabriela]

Pham, I will not graduate without your help!

As most of you know, I’m a doctoral student. For my dissertation, I’ll be interviewing priests about preaching. It’s now time to find the priests. I cannot do this alone, and if I don’t find ENOUGH priests, I cannot graduate! So I’m begging your help to find priests who are:

1. Diocesan, not religious

2. In the United States (whether they’re native born-American or not)

3. Active preachers (so, not working in an office somewhere they never preach, but retired preachers are okay)

I know that Phatmassers are a force to be reckoned with. If all of us contact all the diocesan priests we know and ask them to participate in this study of priests as preachers, I’m betting we can recruit enough priests very, very quickly. And that would be a God-send, because we all know that, once Advent hits, no one’s going to be talking to me for months, so if I don’t have enough priests by December 1st, I’m not likely to graduate! 

That being so, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE take the blurb I’ve written below and send it to all your diocesan-priest friends and acquaintances, and then “gently encourage” (i.e., MERCILESSLY NAG) them to participate!

Of course, if anyone—you or your priests—has questions, feel free to contact me (either by posting here, or PMing me, or emailing me, or whatever you prefer). I will of course, as usual, make the final paper available to any and all on Phatmass who want it (just as I did with my Master’s thesis).

Thank you all, and God bless you!

[Also, Boss, please don’t ban me for posting this in so many boards! I didn’t post it in any of the “sacred” boards, and I know some people only visit one board and none of the others. So, sorry if it annoys anyone, but I need as much help as I can get!]

 

BLURB FOR SENDING TO YOUR PRIESTS:

+ Hello, Father!

My name is Jenni Sigler and I’m a doctoral candidate in communication at Purdue University. I’m also a daily Mass-going Catholic, so for my dissertation, I’m interviewing priests about their preaching work. In particular, I’m interested in how busy priests balance all they have to do with “waiting on the Holy Spirit” in preaching. There’s very little empirical research on Catholic preaching at present, and my own past research has indicated this particular question is an important one. So the goal of the study is to add to what we know about how priests do preaching work, and hopefully find out some things that could help make that work easier, faster, and better.

If you’re a diocesan priest working in a parish in the United States, I’d love for you to participate in this study. Interviews will last about an hour and can be scheduled whenever they’re convenient for you and conducted via Skype or telephone. To get an accurate picture of what I’m studying, it’s important that I talk to priests from many different dioceses and seminary backgrounds, so please don’t hesitate to get in touch even if you’re in Alaska. And international priests: If you’re working in the United States, I’d like to hear from you, too!

If you’re interested in participating, or want to find out more before committing, feel free to contact me at jsigler@purdue.edu or (765) 441-2136 (texting okay). Or contact my advisor Patrice Buzzanell (technically, the lead researcher on this project, since I’m still a graduate student) at buzzanel@purdue.edu.

Thanks, and God bless you, Father!

Jenni

[Nihil Obstat]

Any interest in Canadian priests? I am friends with two younger priests on Facebook who may be willing to respond. Both very social media savvy.

Edited August 18, 2016 by Nihil Obstat

[Gabriela]

32 minutes ago, Nihil Obstat said:

Any interest in Canadian priests? I am friends with two younger priests on Facebook who may be willing to respond. Both very social media savvy.

Unfortunately, my IRB protocol requires Americans.  

Some day, I may make international comparisons. But for this study, the macro-cultural component is a factor that needs to be kept as "controlled" as possible for the argument to hold.

[truthfinder]

Gabriela, I know you're requirements say not in an order, but does this mean you're also excluding the societies for apostolic life?

[Gabriela]

2 hours ago, truthfinder said:

Gabriela, I know you're requirements say not in an order, but does this mean you're also excluding the societies for apostolic life?

Like who?

It would depend on the arrangement, basically. If a priest is diocesan, in a parish, and he that's where he works and preaches, I can interview him even if he happens to be a member of some society, "in his personal time". But if he's a priest in that society (like the SSPX or the FSSP or an oratory somewhere), and that's where he works and preaches, then he is more a priest of that society than of the diocese/parish, so I can't interview him.

Ask: Is the bishop his boss, or is some religious/other superior his boss? I can interview the former, but not the latter.

Thanks for asking, truthfinder!

[truthfinder]

20 minutes ago, Gabriela said:

Like who?

It would depend on the arrangement, basically. If a priest is diocesan, in a parish, and he that's where he works and preaches, I can interview him even if he happens to be a member of some society, "in his personal time". But if he's a priest in that society (like the SSPX or the FSSP or an oratory somewhere), and that's where he works and preaches, then he is more a priest of that society than of the diocese/parish, so I can't interview him.

Ask: Is the bishop his boss, or is some religious/other superior his boss? I can interview the former, but not the latter.

Thanks for asking, truthfinder!

Ok, I really hope you find enough priests. 

[Nihil Obstat]

5 hours ago, Gabriela said:

Unfortunately, my IRB protocol requires Americans.  

Some day, I may make international comparisons. But for this study, the macro-cultural component is a factor that needs to be kept as "controlled" as possible for the argument to hold.

That makes sense. In that case I know one, and I will contact him this evening. I forgot about him earlier.  

[Nihil Obstat]

If a priest from Elizabethtown Kentucky contacts you, you are welcome. Lol.

Edited August 19, 2016 by Nihil Obstat

[Socrates]

On 8/17/2016 at 7:09 PM, Gabriela said:

Pham, I will not graduate without your help!

Yes you will.

 

 

(This is the debate table, right?)

[Gabriela]

8 hours ago, Socrates said:

Yes you will.

 

 

(This is the debate table, right?)

I might not, actually.

[Gabriela]

Hey pham. My recruitment for participation in the dissertation study was rockin' for a few weeks. Now it's stalled. What I've learned is that if I can get a Catholic blogger to post a statement about the research, I'll get about 10 priests actually carrying through all the way to the interview. (I'll get a lot more making contact but not scheduling, and way more seeing it, of course.) In other words, Catholic bloggers are the bomb diggity. But I've emailed a lot of them, and only gotten four to post, and now I'm kinda' desperate. Here's who I've contacted:

Catholic Association of Teachers of Homiletics (sent out on their listserv)

Catholic Leadership Institute (no reply)

Fr. Z (he posted)

Phatmass ()

Anthony Esolen (he posted)

Fr. Dwight Longenecker (no reply)

Fr. Pablo Migone (no reply)

Fr. Michael Duffy (no reply)

Heather King (can't do it)

Dr. Scott Hahn (can't do it)

Bishop Barron (no reply; he never replies )

Deacon Greg Kandra (he posted)

Daughters of St. Paul (Sr. Theresa Aletheia Noble; no reply)

Elizabeth Scalia (she's on retreat)

New Advent (no reply yet, but just contacted him yesterday)

Monsignor Charles Pope (I think he's posting it today)

Homiletic & Pastoral Review (no reply yet)

First Things (about to contact)

Archbishop Charles J. Chaput (about to contact)

Who am I missing, pham? Who else can I ask? What I'm finding is that, if the person is SUPER famous, they just ignore me. If the person is well known with a large audience, but not hugely famous, they'll usually post, or at least respond. So, can you think of anyone else who might be willing to help me out with a short post?