Friday 10:00 – 11:30 AM

Location: Grand Ballroom F

Reading Amoris Laetitia is a little bit like reading the letters of St. Paul. How do we make sense of all the different things it says? How do we avoid some of the obvious (and not so obvious) pitfalls that have caused misunderstanding and angst? And what direction can it give, not only to our faith but also to our professional lives as Catholic communicators?

Dr. Ed Hogan is a husband, a father, and a teacher.

He and his wife have been married 23 years and have six children, ages 19 to 7. Ed says: “it’s a glorious way to be overwhelmed.”

Ed loves to teach and has done so at the high school, college, and graduate school levels. He has taught men’s groups, parishes, clusters, dioceses, and formation programs. In teaching, he says, he always receives more than he gives.

Ed has a PhD in theology from Boston College. He has worked with the Institute for Priestly Formation and the Diocese of Saginaw. Currently he is Director of the Pontifical Paul VI Institute of Catechetical and Pastoral Studies and is Associate Professor of Systematic Theology at Kenrick-Glennon Seminary, both in St. Louis.

Friday 10:00 – 11:30 AM

Location: Gateway 3

Great photography can go a long way for telling stories, in journalism, fundraising and mission awareness. It takes commitment to telling the story of the human condition visually.

Target Audience: Photographers and communicators who want to improve their use of visuals to tell the stories of ministries for increased awareness and support.

Erik Lunsford documents the mission and relief work around the world as managing photojournalist of The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod. Before joining the LCMS, Erik worked as staff photographer at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The Palm Beach Post in West Palm Beach, and The Stuart News in Stuart, Fla. Pictures of the Year International, Joop Swart Masterclass of World Press Photo, the Southern Short Course in Photography, the Atlanta Photojournalism Seminar, the Florida Press Club, the Society of Professional Journalists and others have recognized his work.

Friday 2:00 – 3:15 PM

Location: Grand Ballroom F

Continuing the theme of “Using Media Humanly,” we will discuss how to help ourselves, our families, our youth, friends and colleagues to witness to Christ and the dignity of the human person by the way we choose to use these “marvelous gifts” of digital, new and social media. If we’re Catholic and connected? That makes us “Digital Catholics.” If “everything is ours and we are Christ’s and Christ is God’s” (1 Corinthians 3:23)–how do we make media work for us and not against us?

Sr. Helena Burns, fsp, is a member of the Daughters of St. Paul, an international congregation founded to communicate God’s Word through the media. She is finishing her M.A. in Media Literacy Education; has a B.A. in theology and philosophy from St. John’s University, NYC; studied screenwriting at UCLA and Act One, Hollywood; and holds a Certificate in Pastoral Youth Ministry.

Sr. Helena also studied at the Theology of the Body Institute, PA. She is a movie reviewer for Life Teen & The Catholic Channel–Sirius XM. She wrote and directed a documentary on the life of Blessed James Alberione  and is a co-producer on The 40 Film. She is presently writing Theology of the Body curriculum, and her daily book for young women is “He Speaks to You”. She is also a regional vocation directress for the Daughters.

Sr. Helena gives Media Literacy and Theology of the Body workshops to youth and adults all over the U.S. and Canada, and believes that media can be a primary tool for sharing God’s love and salvation. (She is a dual–not duel–citizen: AmeriCanadian.)

Friday 10:00 – 11:30 AM

Location: Gateway 1

Is it more than just format? Or it may not involve a format change as some newspapers have shifted their content to magazine style while still printing on newsprint. And vice versa, what does shifting to a magazine format and schedule, such as monthly, mean for messaging and reporting?

Panelists will also discuss planning strategically for such a shift in format or schedule.

Chris Gunty

A Chicago-area native, Chris Gunty is associate publisher/editor of The Catholic Review and CEO of its parent publishing company, The Cathedral Foundation/CR Media.

He has spent his whole professional career so far — 35 years — in Catholic journalism as a writer, photographer, editor, circulation manager and associate publisher, often performing many of these functions at the same time. He spent four years with The Chicago Catholic; 19 years as founding editor and associate publisher of The Catholic Sun in Phoenix, Ariz.; and six years at The Florida Catholic, a group of six zoned newspapers serving most of the dioceses of Florida. In July 2009, he joined The Cathedral Foundation in Baltimore.

Chris served as president of the Catholic Press Association of the United States and Canada from 1996 to 1998.

Thursday 5:00 – 6:00 PM

Location: Gateway 2

This session will spark new ideas for increasing value of your publication. By making small changes to things you are already doing and by taking advantage of new opportunities, you can open up possibilities for new streams of revenue while enhancing relationships with key constituencies.

Amy Kawula has served the Diocese of Green Bay the past 30 years and is currently the advertising and marketing manager at The Compass. During this time, she has served nearly every department of the diocese. This has allowed her to develop the relationships with staff, parishes, schools and the community that have contributed to successful marketing strategies and increased revenue for The Compass. In addition to being the only advertising sales person, she manages circulation, annual pilgrimages and several diocesan events each year. She has been instrumental in implementing and launching two new websites for The Compass by creating the advertising rate card, implementing online ad sizes and following through with sales. Revenue from print/online advertising sales and pilgrimages has increased annually over the 10 years she has served in her current position. She believes in honesty, integrity and genuine care for the unique needs of each person is critical to leading a successful team.

Thursday 3:30 – 4:45 PM

Location: Grand Ballroom F

Communication is who we are, but how do we deal with our daily stress? Lose it, use it, or diffuse it? It’s all in the beatitudes. In this session we will review the master plan for communicators as Jesus laid it out in the Sermon on the Mount.

Sr. Mary Lea Hill (aka The Crabby Mystic) is a Daughter of St. Paul currently stationed in St. Louis. She is a writer and editor for Pauline Books & Media who has worked in various forms of communication including filmmaking and animation. Sister Lea, originally from Lynn, Massachusetts, entered the convent in 1964 and has lived happily ever after. Her most recent publications are Blessed Are the Stressed: Secrets to a Happy Heart from a Crabby Mystic (2016); Prayer And You: Wit and Wisdom from a Crabby Mystic (2014); Saints Alive: The Faith Proclaimed (2013); Saints Alive: The Gospel Proclaimed (2013) both in collaboration with Sr. Marie Paul Curley, fsp; and Basic Catechism with Sr. Susan Helen Wallace, fsp (revised 2013).

Thursday 3:30 – 4:45 PM

 Location: Gateway 5

Podcasting is one of the fasting growing communications tools in the world today—and it happens to be one of the easiest and cheapest to produce. Not every (arch)diocese or organization has the ability to produce a radio show every week. The cost of traditional broadcast is incredibly expensive to start and maintain. The web offers boundless options for producing high-quality media that is not only available to literally anyone, but it is also easily shareable! Now that’s evangelization! Learn more about the theory behind podcasting as well as the practical tools you will need to podcast successfully. You’ll leave with all the knowledge you need to get started right away.

Billy Atwell is the Director of Communications for the Diocese of Raleigh, and Second Vice President and member of the Executive for the Catholic Academy of Communication Professionals. For the Diocese of Raleigh, he serves as the primary spokesperson for the Bishop, oversees diocesan media relations, video and audio production, the diocesan website, social media, and the publishing of NC Catholics magazine. He is featured on Raleigh to Rome, a 6-minute weekly video/audio podcast news brief in which he covers local and global Catholic news. He hosts a regular video/audio podcast called A Catholic Life, in which he speaks with guests about news within the Church as well as inspiring stories of faith.

He also hosts the Catholic Academy Podcast, which can be found on iTunes or SoundCloud.com/CatholicAcademy. He speaks with guests about topics such as social media, podcast production, strategic communications and planning, email distribution, business leadership, and more.

Find him on Twitter: @BillyAtwell

Wednesday

3:15 – 5:30 pm

Location: Grand Ballroom E

Come join “Miracle Hunter” Michael O’Neill as he explores the inner workings of the official investigative process of the Catholic Church into the supernatural. The workshop will include case studies and methodologies used by the Vatican for discerning claims of the miraculous and elucidate and unravel the complexities of the statements and other signals that are issued by the Church when recognizing a miracle as worthy of belief. O’Neill will also provide helpful tips on how to report all this back to the Catholic and secular public.

Target Audience: Communication Directors, reporters, broadcasters and aspiring miracle hunters!

Michael O’Neill is an author, speaker, and creator of the website MiracleHunter.com, the web’s top resource on Marian apparitions cited in news articles and blogs around the world and throughout renowned Mariologist Fr. René Laurentin’s comprehensive work “The Dictionary of the Apparitions of the Virgin Mary” (2010 Edizioni ART).

O’Neill, a graduate of Stanford University and member of the Mariological Society of America, has been interviewed about his research numerous times for features on Catholic television programs like EWTN’s News Nightly and Bookmark and radio like the Catholic Channel on SiriusXM and secular media outlets like “Fox & Friends” and Live Science magazine. He was a consultant for the National Geographic December 2015 cover story and map about the Virgin Mary “The Most Powerful Woman in the World” and was interviewed as the Marian expert on the corresponding television piece for NatGeo Explorer.

O’Neill is the host of the weekly Relevant Radio program “The Miracle Hunter™” and on December 8th, 2010, O’Neill served as the Marian expert for Relevant Radio on the live broadcast of the Mass in Champion, WI where David L. Ricken, Bishop of the Diocese of Green Bay, gave his official declaration on the authenticity of the 1859 Marian apparitions to Adele Brise, the first such approval in the history of the United States. He co-hosted the television special Miracle Hunters (UpTV 2014) and is author of the books “365 Days with Mary” (Salt Media 2014) and “Exploring the Miraculous” (Our Sunday Visitor 2015).