“Most Catholic Priests are poor public speakers and they don’t care!”

When the above words dropped from Rev. Fr Phil’s (not real name) mouth, a sharp clap of pain and joy flooded my being. I wanted to say a lot of things at once. The onrush of words congregated in my vocal cord and came out as a weak and belching exclamation: “Ah!” Many things were happening to me at once, but my dear friend, Fr Phil couldn’t see it. His words vindicated me, set me free and affirmed my fears.

Maybe I really needed a fellow catholic priest to say those true words about his brothers. I was born and raised as a catholic and we hold our priests in fear and awe. Even when a priest is manifestly wrong, we can’t talk. I started speaking professionally when I was 16, and that is about 15 years ago. As I get more training and mature in speaking, I started noticing that most catholic priests are very poor speakers and “they don’t care.” That last part was added by Fr Phil. But in this write-up I will show you why they don’t care.

A couple of days ago, I and Fr Phil, who happens to be a very fine speaker, were just having a friendly conversation when he dropped that bombshell. It confirmed my observation and loosen my tongue. Let’s talk about this.

I have noticed two categories of priests and how they speak in public or deliver their sermons. The first category goes like this: “Praise the Lord. In the first reading the prophet Isaiah told us about the coming reign  in the second reading Saint Paul also made mention of the reign that Isaiah talked about and in the Gospel Jesus took Peter, James and John to the Jordan in fulfillment of the reign” Jeez! We just finished listening to the readings. Why are you telling us about the readings? There is no Jordan in Nigeria. How do the readings relate to our day-to-day lives? What lessons can we pick out from the readings that we can apply in our businesses, relationships and purpose? This is what good speakers who have opportunities to speak many times a week to hundreds of people should be telling us.

The second group does a lot better than the first. Priests in this category know how to pick out lessons and nuggets of wisdom from the readings and relate it to some other issues. But the only issue this category of priest know how to relate biblical readings to is heavenly issues and some abstract virtues like patience, perseverance, faith, hope, charity. Now this is good, but it also raises the issue of the relevance of these virtues to relationships, businesses and other real life issues.

We all want to go to heaven but since we are still here we can as well succeed in our earthly endeavors. Please parish priest, show us how. We believe our secrets of success are somewhere there in the bible, which is why we come to church. Heaven is our ultimate aim, but it is not a sin if the church will organize programs for business people and professionals, for singles and married, to teach parishioners how to succeed in this areas. If the church don’t teach us these things, the world will, and ultimately lead us to hell, ruining all the church’s good work to see us go to heaven. By the way, if it’s only heaven that matters why don’t we die and go to heaven once we get born-again and baptized?

The beauty and the miracle of the Holy Mass is incontrovertible, and no matter how horrible a speaker a priest is, it will never detract from the miracle of the mass. But the priest need to realize that they have an awesome responsibility to shape the destinies of men with their spoken word each time they mount the pulpit to deliver a sermon or homily. This is a responsibility every priest should take seriously.

I don’t know whether public speaking is taught as a course in the seminary. But this is notwithstanding, every priest should acquire public speaking skills and keep them constantly sharpened. Attend speaking trainings; there are even free ones online. Get a speaking coach, learn to structure your speech, learn to wow your audience and sculptor lives.

Most priests don’t care because they have job security. I believe they will approach their sermon delivery differently if they were to be working in a private establishment. They don’t care because they think the church is big enough “Leave if you want, we will still have many members.” But this is sadly antithetical to the letters of the scriptures: if one sheep is missing, leave the other 99 and go look for the one our young people are leaving daily to other churches in the guise of attending one youth program, one singles and married event, one business meeting, one talent hunt show and we don’t care. God will hold us responsible for this.

Somebody has got to care. Our Parish Priests should begin this “care” by learning to be effective public speakers; you have the power and the platform to impact lives, transform the nation and improve humanity. Use it.

First Baba Isa (FBI), is a Speaker, Writer and Innovative Leadership Consultant

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