Jan 3, 2026 / 08:00 am
For nearly 30 years, FOCUS has been known for its missionary work on college campuses. Earlier this year, the ministry began to expand its reach with a new branch — FOCUS Parish.
FOCUS Parish brings FOCUS missionaries into Catholic parishes to help revitalize the parish itself and the parishioners, and to form missionary disciples — laypeople who effectively spread the Gospel message in the local community and diocese.
Founder of FOCUS Curtis Martin and his son, Brock Martin, vice president of parish outreach at FOCUS, both agree that FOCUS Parish is a response to the need of sending missionaries to “where the people are.”
“If we’re trying to bring the Gospel to every man, woman, and child on the face of the earth, the vast majority of people don’t currently live on U.S. college campuses,” Brock told CNA in an interview. “The Catholic Church has amazingly already done this work — every inch of the globe is already mapped out into a parish structure. So, FOCUS’ move into parishes is really a response to the fact that we want to take this mission seriously. We need to send missionaries to where the people are.”
Curtis added: “Everybody lives in a parish, as Brock said, and evangelization takes root when there’s real transformation. It’s going to take place in families and in parishes. That’s where Catholics live. And so we want to be with them to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ with them in the midst, as Brock said, in the midst of friendship.”
Parishes who take part in FOCUS’ new ministry will receive two full-time missionaries who become part of the parish’s leadership team, help advise and lead parish ministries, and work to create small communities where the Gospel message is shared and spread to all parishioners.
“These missionaries are imbedding into the parish culture,” Brock said.
FOCUS Parish is currently in 25 parishes and plans to expand to an additional 25 parishes in 2026.
When speaking to the fact that FOCUS Parish has become the fastest-growing part of the apostolate, Brock credited the current “landscape of the parish in the United States.”
“Right now there’s about 16,000 parishes [in the U.S.],” Brock said. “I think the number of parishes who are waking up, the number of pastors who recognize that business as usual is not working, we have to, with new ardor and new methodologies, try to figure out how to live the new evangelization. I just think there’s a unique moment where as pastors and finance councils become aware of the opportunity, we’re seeing more and more people start to raise their hand at a faster rate.”
Curtis highlighted the retention rate of FOCUS Parish missionaries leading to the success of the ministry.
“We’re seeing greater longevity with our missionaries because they’re not walking with 18- to 22-year-olds, they’re walking with people who are of their same age, maybe older, maybe younger,” he explained. “The retention rate for FOCUS missionaries in Parish last year was 100%. Nobody left. By way of comparison, probably 25% of the missionaries left on campus; that’s part of our cycle. And so to be able to recognize, we can grow because of the longevity.”
With the growth to 25 more parishes in the new year, FOCUS is looking to hire an additional 50 to 55 missionaries — considering both moving campus missionaries to parishes and hiring individuals who have never been FOCUS missionaries.
As for his hopes for the future, Brock said: “My deepest hope in FOCUS Parish is that this would be a simple and repeatable gift that we can offer to the Church.”
Curtis said: “My hope for FOCUS in the parish is actually hope. I think a lot of leaders in the Church are good people but they’re discouraged and they’re kind of managing a slow decline. And that’s not the way Christianity works. Christianity has grown in every generation since the time of Christ. We’re living in a very abnormal time, at least in the West. It’s shrinking. That’s not the way it should be.”
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He added: “There’s a resurgence of faith — articles are being written about this all over the world — FOCUS is just participating in a little way. Millions of people awakening to Christ. We need to welcome them and to be able to recognize the Church ought to be growing. This can work. And when you have hope you start to make decisions based upon that and all of a sudden you see the Church should be a place of growth.”
