ONE BREAD - Church Tours

The Church Itself as an Evangelization Tool

Do you have an historic or exceptionally beautiful parish church or cathedral? If so, your church building could offer an exceptional opportunity to evangelize. Does your church have beautiful stained glass windows, extraordinarily beautiful statues or stations of the cross? Turn that beauty that adorns God's house into a welcome mat for non-Catholics. Ask your parish priest if you can start hosting Church tours on Saturday or during the week. Then publish these times in the local newspaper and tell your city's visitors bureau about it. Post the times in the Church bulletin and on the Church marquee.

Before you conduct your first church tour, you'll need to do a little research. Find out the history behind the beautiful art and furnishings in your church building, who the artists and architects were and who donated the money or materials. Be prepared to explain what the significance of the altar and tabernacle are, the story behind the stations of the cross and what holy water is. We've provided this description of various parts of a Catholic church to get you started: Where Catholics Worship God. You'll want to write up your church tour presentation in a notebook or on notecards so that you'll be able to provide interesting details about the church while you're conducting your tour.

Check back with this Website often, as we plan to develop a generic script for conducting church tours that you can embellish with details about your own local church. Meanwhile, we provide a few links to some beautiful Catholic churches, some that provide virtual tours that are definitely worth taking.

Historical Churches

Modern Churches

For more information about Church tours:
churchtours@1bread.catholic.org