Father Rob Galea’s preaching strategies for reaching disengaged youth

 

Father Rob Galea recording “Preach: The Catholic Homilies Podcast” inside the William J. Loschert Studio at America Media in New York City, February 2024 (Ricardo da Silva, S.J./America Media)

“Explain the resurrection to me in two minutes without using any church language.” This is the challenge that Father Rob Galea sets for his staff to ensure they can easily relate to the young people they serve. “There’s so much church language that we use that we don’t realize that we’re using. So, speak their language as well. And that takes practice, and that takes hanging out with the kids and understanding the way they speak, the way they reason.”

Rob, born and raised in Malta, now serves as a priest in the Diocese of Sandhurst, Victoria, Australia. He has amassed a hundreds of thousands-strong following across social media platforms and is also a popular singer and songwriter who once auditioned for X-Factor Australia.

Today, Rob leads Icon Ministry—formerly FRG Ministry, a global media and outreach apostolate that significantly expanded its reach over the pandemic years.“We’d have 60,000 people at every Sunday Mass online,” he says. “And from there, we started creating resources for schools; we started teaching teachers online while they were in lockdown. And things started to grow and grow.”

His latest ministry initiative is an ambitious first. “We’re on Roblox, on a video gaming platform,” he says. “We’re building a church where there are 70.1 million users every single day. And what we decided was we need to preach the Gospel there.”

On “Preach,” Rob delivers a homily for the Fourth Sunday in Lent, Year B, also known as Laetare, or Rejoicing Sunday. He recalls playing with his sister as a child and turning over large rocks to find an infestation of bugs hidden underneath. Rob says that Jesus is like the light that dispels the bugs in our life—our sinfulness—leading us to freedom. “Yes, it is painful to lift up the rock,” he says. “Yes, it is shocking to come into the light; but there is no greater freedom than living in the light of Christ.”

Rob shares with host Ricardo da Silva, S.J., that even though he always preaches extemporaneously, it doesn't mean he simply wings it. “If you’re overprepared, it allows you to be spontaneous,” Rob explains. “Otherwise, you’re preaching the same thing over and over.”

When asked about effective preaching strategies to use when ministering to young people, Rob suggests preachers allow themselves to become vulnerable and share current, real-life experiences. “Story is so important,” he says, “But not a story about the saints that lived 800 years ago. Don’t start there. Start with you, with your struggle, with someone, or something that happened within the school, something that they know. And, for goodness’ sake, stop using church language.”

[Listen now and follow us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or on your favorite podcast service.]