Send Out Your Spirit Sponsor and Parent Guide

This concise guide helps parents and sponsors of Confirmation candidates understand the vital role they play in accompanying young people preparing for the Sacrament of Confirmation. As part of the Send Out Your Spirit Confirmation preparation program, the Sponsor and Parent Guide equips parents and sponsors to actively walk with candidates--supporting them as they learn the core truths of the Catholic faith, reflect on their baptismal identity, and prepare to claim the faith as their own. It also explores how the responsibilities and expectations of sponsors have developed over time and how they may differ from what parents or sponsors remember from their own Confirmation experience.

Part I offers insight into the vocation of being a sponsor or supportive parent, with sections on these topics:

• Confirmation Sponsors Then and Now

• A Brief History of the Role of Sponsor

• Qualifications to Be a Confirmation Sponsor

• Expectations for the Sponsor Role

• Understanding Today's Adolescents

• Communication 101

• The Role of the Sponsor at the Liturgical Celebration of Confirmation

Part II of this guidebook contains suggestions about what sponsors and/or parents can do during their meetings with their candidate. These meetings might include reviewing or finishing assignments from the catechetical sessions at the parish, as well as new assignments for the candidate and sponsor or parent to work on together. This part of the guide also offers suggestions for prayer and service experiences for sponsors or parents and candidates to undertake together.

An appendix offers additional resources to support the candidate's intellectual formation and spiritual growth during this important time of preparation for Confirmation.