Charisms are outward graces given to the faithful to build up the Church in specific ways

Kim Stanley often finds herself in the right place at the right time to lend a helping hand.

Once, it was staying late after Mass to help an older woman she noticed in a back pew, searching for a lost wallet.

Another time, she was on her way home from physical therapy, thinking about stopping for ice cream, when she felt a specific prompting to go to Dierberg’s to buy Bing cherries. She wasn’t sure why, but she listened. She then made one more stop at a store owned by a friend, who mentioned that it was her birthday and she’d been craving cherries.

“So I said, well, here you go, here’s your Bing cherries,” Stanley said with a laugh.

Stanley doesn’t see these as random acts of kindness; it’s how she lives out the charism of helps.

“You’re in the right place at the right time, and it brings you happiness that you’re able to,” she said. “You’re not complaining or saying, I don’t have time for this — it’s just, hey, that’s great, I can help you.”

Charisms on mission

Charisms are special graces given to the faithful by the Holy Spirit to build up the Church. They can sometimes be confused with the fruits or gifts of the Holy Spirit, but charisms are distinct, said Jane Guenther, director of the archdiocesan Catholic Renewal Center.

“Charisms, unlike the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, are all outward, meaning when we receive a charism of teaching or healing or hospitality, it’s for others,” Guenther said. “It’s not that we heal ourselves, or we teach ourselves, or we’re hospitable to ourselves — it’s always oriented toward another person.”

Several years ago, Guenther helped develop for the archdiocese a spiritual gifts inventory (similar ones also exist through other ministries and dioceses) to aid people in discerning which of 24 charisms they have been given. After someone receives their results, that knowledge can help them discern where to offer their time and effort, Guenther said.

“Let’s say you inventory for teaching and encouragement and service. Then, well, you’d be a great catechist, you would be great at baptismal prep, you would be great at RCIA,” she said. “These are all things where those charisms could plug directly in and be of good service.”

In these last several months of the National Eucharistic Revival Year of Mission, the Catholic Renewal Center is offering several workshops on charisms. In order to be effective evangelizers, it’s helpful to understand and harness the specific gifts that we’ve been given, Guenther said.

“All of us could do all of these tasks on our own natural talents, and that would be OK. I mean, it would produce something — we can go teach and do a fine job teaching people things because we have a natural talent to teach. But when we really have been given a charism from the Lord to teach and really give, our teaching is empowered supernaturally from the Lord,” she said. “The person who is receiving the instruction is also being given an empowered way to know the Lord’s presence through that teaching. And that would be the same with any gift.”

“In this mission that we have in our Church as disciples making disciples — to actually evangelize others into a belief in God, that happens better when I’m using my gifts, which actually show the presence of God to another person.”

For Stanley, finding out that teaching and helps were two of her top charisms confirmed that she was heading in the right direction. When she took the spiritual gifts inventory about 10 years ago, she was preparing to teach confirmation classes at Incarnate Word Parish — where, now, she guides her students in learning about charisms. She has also helped facilitate book discussions at the Catholic Renewal Center.

“They said, you should find out what your gifts are so you know what to say no to,” she said. “If somebody’s asking you to do something and you know that’s just not in your wheelhouse — like if anybody asked me to help with music, I know exactly to say no, right? But if you want me to help you with teaching someone, I can help you, because I know I’ve got a gift in that area.”

Working on the harvest

As part of his pastoral ministry, seminarian Jacob Price brings the Eucharist to residents of Mount Carmel Senior Living in St. Charles. He gives them Communion, prays with them and spends time visiting with them.

This year, he’s also started writing and printing weekly reflections to leave with them. It’s one small way he lives out his charism of writing.

Price, currently in Configuration (Theology) II, and his fellow seminarians at Kenrick-Glennon Seminary took the spiritual gifts inventory during a workshop with Guenther earlier this semester. A handful of charisms came up strongly for Price, including writing and teaching.

“It is a helpful way to summarize and to categorize the things that really give me life and energy and the ways that God wants to work His grace through my life and through my ministry,” he said.

Last year, Price taught at Incarnate Word Academy in Bel-Nor, teaching a scripture class to freshmen and vocations class to seniors. While he isn’t teaching full-time this year, he takes any chance he can to help out in schools, like a recent visit to Holy Infant in Ballwin to speak during Catholic Schools Week.

“Praise God, I’ve seen a lot of fruit in leaning into those gifts in the people I serve,” he said. “I saw a lot of great progress in my students last year, a lot of growth in their spiritual lives. I’ve seen a lot of joy in the residents I visit with at Mount Carmel, that they seem to really appreciate these little handouts I give them with my reflections.”

“But I think a lot of the fruit has been in my own heart — getting to see the fruits in others is itself a fruit for me,” he continued. “Like, in many ways, I though I was not the best teacher, but my students expressed appreciation. It was all these kind of surprising moments that really gave me confidence that the Lord is planting seeds and working on the harvest.”

Bringing the Church life

While Jay Davila has been familiar with charisms since childhood, he took the spiritual gifts inventory for the first time during a silent retreat offered as part of a course with the archdiocesan young adult ministry.

A few of his top charisms were giving, administration, leadership and mercy. The results “affirmed and encouraged,” he said. “It’s kind of like when you have kids, and as they grow up, you tell them: ‘Oh, you are so resourceful,’ right? They’re going to take that and be like, ‘I’m resourceful. I’m going to go be resourceful.’ And so it just confirms that in you and gives you more confidence.”

Knowing he had the charism of leadership helped him discern taking on his current role as president of the Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of St. Louis Young Professionals board, he said. He and his wife, Olivia, prayed about the decision a lot, especially since they were about to have their second child.

After taking up the helm as president, he and the rest of the Catholic Charities Young Professionals board members took the inventory together to help guide where each person’s gifts could best be used. A new charism popped up for Davila: service. Perfect for his new role.

“Your charisms are God’s — they’re not yours. They’re given to you by God according to what He needs to build His kingdom,” he said.

While some of Davila’s charisms seem more natural to him — his charism of technology fits perfectly with his career as a systems engineer, for example — one charism he was surprised to find he’d been given was encouragement. “I’m not a words of affirmation person,” he said with a laugh. “I don’t give them very well — my language is limited, as English is my second language.”

But he’s discovered that the gift of encouragement can still flow through him, as he lifts up his CCYP board members in their roles. He also uses his charisms in his role as a husband and father to two small children, serving them in middle of the night wakings, encouraging them as they learn new skills and leading them with mercy.

He’s also seen how complementary charisms work together in a group. He was part of the first small team putting together the Catholic Art Festival back in 2022. None of them had ever put on an event like that before, but with the help of the Holy Spirit’s specific graces, they leaned into their roles and moved forward in faith, leading to a successful annual event.

Davila hopes to see an increase in awareness of charisms in parishes and ministries around the archdiocese, especially as new projects or efforts are starting.

“If somebody hits me up and is like, hey man, do you think you can provide some leadership and mercy for this thing we’re starting up? Yeah, I want to. I know I have this — I want to give it. It brings me life. God gives these to us because they bring us life, because it brings the Church life,” he said. “It’s just so perfect how it all works.”

Charisms in the Catechism

Whether extraordinary or simple and humble, charisms are graces of the Holy Spirit which directly or indirectly benefit the Church, ordered as they are to her building up, to the good of men, and to the needs of the world.

Charisms are to be accepted with gratitude by the person who receives them and by all members of the Church as well. They are a wonderfully rich grace for the apostolic vitality and for the holiness of the entire Body of Christ, provided they really are genuine gifts of the Holy Spirit and are used in full comformity with authentic promptings of this same Spirit that is in keeping with charity, the true measure of all charisms.

It is in this sense that discernment of charisms is always necessary. No charism is exempt from being referred and submitted to the Church’s shepherds. ‘Their office [is] not indeed to extinguish the Spirit, but to test all things and hold fast to what is good,’ so that all the diverse and complementary charisms work together ‘for the common good.’

—Catechism of the Catholic Church 799-801

Charism workshops

In conjunction with the final months of the National Eucharistic Revival Year of Mission, the Catholic Renewal Center is offering workshops on charisms twice a month through June. The workshops are held on Thursday evenings from 7-8 p.m. at the Cardinal Rigali Center, with a video call option available.

Upcoming sessions will focus on these charisms:

Feb. 27: Leadership

March 13: Mercy

March 27: Healing

April 3: Missionary

April 17: Teaching

May 1: Worship

May 22: Writing

June 5: Faith

To RSVP for a session, email alicerodriguez@archstl.org or call (314) 792-7414.

For more information on the Catholic Renewal Center and its events, visit archstl.org/about/offices-and-agencies/catholic-renewal-center.