My job at the diocese is focused on forming Catholic adults. As St. John Paul II told us, adult catechesis is actually the principal form of catechesis in the Church, “because it is addressed to persons who have the greatest responsibilities and the capacity to live the Christian message in its fully developed form.” Many of our parishes spend most […]
Joannie Watson
About the Author
Joan Watson was born and raised in Lafayette, Indiana, but college and graduate school took her to Virginia, Ohio, and Rome. After graduating from Christendom College with a B.A. in History and Franciscan University with a M.A. in Theology, she moved to Nashville, Tennessee to be part of the explosion of Catholic culture in the middle of the Bible Belt.
She has been blessed to work for Dr. Scott Hahn at the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology and the Dominican Sisters of St. Cecilia at Aquinas College. She is presently the Director of Adult Formation for the Diocese of Nashville. When she’s not testing the culinary exploits of new restaurants or catching up on the latest BBC miniseries, she’s FaceTiming with her eight nephews and nieces and enjoying her role as coolest aunt. She likes gelato, bourbon, and the color orange.
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The Patroness of Television
There is a patron saint for everyone—accountants and authors, bankers and bee keepers—and everything—travel and toothaches, Kentucky and kidney stones. So it shouldn’t surprise us that as they became commonplace in homes, Pope Pius XII realized we needed a patron saint of television. He chose Saint Clare of Assisi, the famous female follower of St. Francis. On Palm Sunday in […]
Boiled Potatoes and Personal Holiness
Today is the feast of St. John Vianney, the patron of parish priests. When we look at the life of a saint like John Vianney, we might be tempted to believe that we can never be a saint. He certainly set the bar high for parish priests, spending almost his entire day in the confessional. He lived off boiled potatoes […]
The Power of a Habit
Last week my entire immediate family—8 adults, 8 kids—spent the week together on vacation. My sister is a Dominican Sister of St. Cecilia, or as they’re more commonly known, a “Nashville Dominican.” The Nashville Dominicans are recognizable by their full white habits and long black veils. When friends and family heard we were all going on vacation together—even Sister—we were […]
Lessons Learned from Hollywood about the Priesthood and Religious Life
What could Hollywood teach us about the religious life? It’s easy to get discouraged by how badly movies and television portray the Catholic Church. It was not always the norm, however, and I decided to host a summer movie series to remind everyone that “secular” movies can teach us something about religious life and even… holiness! For the series I […]
The Three People Who Require Patience
A few weeks ago, I was visiting friends on their farm, and their blueberry bushes were bursting with beautiful, sweet fruit. As we walked along the rows and picked the berries—more of them finding their way to our mouths than our buckets—the father of the family remarked that they had planted the bushes three years ago, and they were now […]
After the Convocation
I had the honor last weekend to attend the National Convocation of Catholic Leaders, an unprecedented gathering of diocesan, parish, apostolate, and institutional leaders from around the United States. The Bishops had been planning the convocation for years. Frankly, anticipation would have been high for me… if I had known what to expect. But I’m not sure anyone knew what […]
A religion of love or hate?
Each year after celebrating the Solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul, we follow up their celebration the day after with the feast of the First Martyrs of Rome. This feast honors all those unknown men and women who gave their life in witness to the Christian faith in the first days of the Church. The first martyr of the West […]
Ungrudging Hospitality
A few weeks ago, a friend reached out to me because she and her mother were looking for a place to stay while in my city for a week-long training. I offered to host them, since I had the space to offer and I was happy to have the chance to catch up. As I was preparing their bedroom, making […]
Help my unbelief: The lesson of Peter of Prague
This Sunday, we celebrate the feast of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, or Corpus Christi. As I wrote last year, the feast was established to strengthen belief in the Real Presence, to encourage people to draw close to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, and to make reparation for sacrilege committed against the Eucharist. While we remember and celebrate […]