Start A Moms Group

We want to encourage Catholic moms everywhere to open your heart to the idea of joining or starting a group in your area.  It can be 3 women or 30.  It can be in someone’s home, in the parish hall, or at a local coffee shop.  It can be as simple as praying the rosary with little ones at your feet.  Don’t worry about the details yet.  Just pray about it, and ask our Lord to open the doors if it is His will.    

And if He does open the doors, Catholic Moms Connect is here to help.  

Read Our Story.

Visit these posts and hear some of our guest speakers/witness stories.

Register your Moms Group here.

How to start YOUR Catholic Moms Group

Thank you to the women at St. Gregory the Great in Williamsville, NY, 

who have shared all of their resources and ideas with us.

Listed below are some steps to form a Catholic Mom’s Group at your own parish.  Contact us for more support material..

1.  If you have decided you’d like to start a mom’s group, consider getting one or two friends to be leaders with you and help you get the group started.  (Jesus sent the disciplines out in pairs!)  I remember the first day of pre-school for my son last year when I met Sarah.  We were invited to stay in the classroom while the kids got acclimated, so she and I introduced ourselves and ended up talking.  I knew right away that I liked her and before I knew it I told her that I was thinking about starting a Mom’s group in the area.  She said she would love to help and from that day on we became friends and co-founders of our Catholic Mom’s group.  If you feel called to start a group, just start talking about it and God will bring the right people into your life to help you.

2. Decide what type of group you’d like to start. There are different types of Mom’s groups - some are social in nature such as a play group, while others might be a study group, prayer group, rosary group, or book club. Whatever you decide the purpose or "mission" to be, stick to it.  Don't try to be all things to all people who attend.

Once you decide, create a mission statement or even just a bulletin announcement.  This will help you get a clear vision of what you want your mom’s group to be, and then help you convey this to others.  

Here is a sample mission statement from a New York Mom’s group:

The Niagara Falls Catholic Moms group is designed to support and affirm women in the many roles that we have in life as mothers, wives, daughters, sisters, friends. It is a ministry about women bonded by their vocation and their Catholic faith who come together to share the joys and struggles of motherhood. Moms of all ages and stages are welcome to participate in our monthly meetings.

Whatever the format of the group, always be loyal to the Church and the Magisterium.  If you decide to start a study group, pick good, solid Catholic material.  If you start a book club, try to focus on books by Catholic authors.  If you have a social group, always keep the conversations pleasing to God. The point of the group is to encourage each other to grow in your great Catholic Faith and form friendships with your sisters in Christ.  

Our group is social in nature.  Our format is simple but fun.  We start with prayer and announcements.  Then we have a short presentation by a local ministry seeking support from Moms (Women’s pregnancy shelter, food pantry, hospice, etc.).  Next comes small group discussion when moms have a chance to talk with other moms about the topic of the meeting using questions that each table leader provides. During the next part of the meeting a mom gives a 15 min witness about their Faith Journey.  These are similar to what you hear in our Catholic Moms Connect interviews. We end with a song or video or short reflection and closing prayer.

We provide hot coffee and delicious breakfast food.   We like to tell people that we put ourselves in ‘time-out’ for the morning.  It’s a great opportunity to take a few hours for ourselves and to interact with other moms who face many of the same joys and challenges we do.  

Click the groups below for more information.
Social Group
Rosary Group
Play Group
Book Club
CD Discussion Group
Study Group

Here's a great article in the National Catholic Register.

For additional resources to use during your meetings, visit our "Know Him" page.

3.  Ask permission from your Pastor about forming the group.  Once you have a mission statement and the date and time set, consider drafting a tri-fold brochure or flyer with all the information so you can approach your pastor and then once approved begin to inform people that the group is starting soon.

Determine with your pastor

• Location: If the meeting is not in someone’s home, you will need to determine with your pastor which room you can reserve (church basement, social hall, or ministry center, etc.).
• Budget: Find out if you have a budget with which to work.  If your parish does not have the funds to support your group, don’t worry, the cost to get started is very small.  Many groups are financially supported by their members.  For example, some groups charge an annual fee of $10 or $20 while other groups pass around a basket and ask everyone if they could donate to help offset costs of supplies (i.e. name tags, copies, speaker fees if applicable).  Do try to always keep costs down so that anyone in your parish can afford to participate in your group.  
• Advertising: Ask permission to advertise your new ministry in the church bulletin and with other parish ministries.  Post information on your parish website.  
• Babysitting: If you are offering babysitting, start looking well in advance for adult babysitters approved by the diocese.  Many dioceses require 2 adults each meeting and they may have to be fingerprinted or approved by the diocese. Alternatively you can have one adult and then have the Confirmation students come to help as extras (this qualifies as service hours for our Confirmation students - and they love helping!)

4.  Coordinate a planning meeting.  The planning team should consist of at least 3 or 4 moms (the more the better) who each take on some responsibility and help plan throughout the year.  If you don’t know any Catholic moms, start with parish office. The secretary or the Faith Formation office should be able to give you some names of women in the parish who may be interested.  Also pray and ask for our Lord to bring women into your life who are interested in helping you get the group started.
 
Start the planning meeting with a prayer.  The first order of business is to decide on the format for the meetings.  As noted earlier, the format of the meeting will be different depending on your goal. If you are following our Mom's Group format, next decide on a theme for the year and topics for the first 1 or 2 meetings. You don’t need to plan the full year of meetings. As the group goes forward,  topics will come up and that you’ll want to add.  Let the Holy Spirit guide you.  

Encourage the Moms to take on different responsibilities throughout the year.  For example, one person can handle all monies, someone else can coordinate babysitting, another woman can focus on advertising, etc.  

You may want to let the group know early on how long the planning meeting will run and then stick to the allotted time.  Be respectful of people’s time and other commitments.  This will also help the host as she may not want a house full of women and kids all day. 

I held our first planning meeting in my own home so that moms with young children could come and not have to get a babysitter.

5.  Advertise your Mom’s Group. Start putting announcements in your church bulletin at least 2 months before the first meeting.  Many parish secretaries can email or fax other neighboring parishes and ask them to include an announcement in their bulletin.  Include information in Catholic school newsletters.  Send a note home with the children in Religious Education at the parish.  Ask every group in the parish to advertise with your brochure or flyer (Rosary Altar Society, Faith Formation Committee, Parish Board, Men’s Group, etc.)  Advertise on Facebook and your local Catholic radio station. Hand out brochures.  Put brochures in the church cry room. Ask local organizations to advertise as well.  Circulate an email and ask people to forward to women they know who may be interested. If possible, post a page on your parish website with basic information about the new Moms group.  

6.  Pray for your first meeting as often as you can.  Encourage all the leaders to say a nine day novena before the first meeting date.  Consider having a Mass offered.  You may even want to pick a patron saint and ask for his/her prayers.

More ideas to help Moms connect

Meet for First Friday mass together. Outside of the regular meeting, gather for nine consecutive First Fridays and learn about the promises of the Sacred Heart.

Coordinate nursing home visits.  Visit a nursing home around the holidays.  Before Christmas you can sing carols.  Before Easter the residents could pass out plastic eggs that the nursing home staff would give them.  At Halloween, the kids would wear their costumes and collect candy from the residents.

Adopt a needy family at Thanksgiving or Christmas. As a group buy all their gifts. Each mom can sign up to buy things off the list or contributing gift cards.  Our group is handing out stockings and asking moms to take them home and fill them with stocking-stuffers for our local Pregnancy Shelter.

Coordinate meals for moms in need.  This could be for moms who just had a baby, moms who suffer a pregnancy loss or moms on bed rest. It could also be for a family that has had a financial reversal or serious illness. Use www.mealtrain.com or www.takethemameal.com to coordinate which days meals will be brought in and by whom.

Plan a girls night out. Once every few months just the moms would meet in the evening at a restaurant for a good meal and holy conversation. This is a great way to have extra fellowship especially if your moms group is program oriented and doesn’t have a lot of time for fellowship. Ducks need other Ducks and Catholic Moms need other Catholic Moms!

Incorporate Service Activities. Service can be as easy as collecting diapers or other items for a local shelter. Another holiday is to send a Christmas card or postcard to retired priests in the diocese.
Plan a family picnic. Once a year have a picnic for the families. This is a great way for the husbands to get to know other Catholic husbands and fathers. Keep it simple. Meet in a park for a pot luck on a Saturday. Or during Lent, meet at the parish Fish Fry.

Marian consecration and/or a Scapular investiture. Offer the Total Consecration to Mary by St. Louis de Montfort. This is a 33 day period of prayer and spiritual reading ending in consecrating yourself to Our Lady. 
See www.myconsecration.org and http://33daystomorningglory.blogspot.com/
Join the Militia Immaculata, see www.consecration.com
To enroll in the Brown Scapular, see www.freebrownscapular.com

Start a Lending Library or Exchange Club.  Encourage moms to bring in great Catholic books, CDs, and movies to share. Similar to a book club, meet for coffee to discuss. Consider starting a Catholic Exchange Club.

Evangelize
- A Catholic Moms Group is a great way to spread the faith. By inviting new moms to join you, you will be giving them an opportunity to grow spiritually and also bring what they learn to their families.
- If you are using CDs or books for your monthly meetings, challenge each other to share the materials with friends or family members. Over 50% of people who return to the Catholic church do so because someone gave them a book or CD.

To hear some of the amazing witness talks shared at our Moms Meetings, click here.