In the venerable tradition of the Roman Catholic church, firebrand preachers have not been received well. Case in point is Justin Fatica, the Catholic youth minister whose Hard As Nails organization is the subject of a documentary playing this month on HBO. Fatica marches into Catholic high schools bearing full-sized wooden crosses with his “Hard As Nails” legend painted on the crossbeam, boom boxes and rafts of marketing materials, all for the purpose of recruiting teens for Jesus.
Under 30 himself, Fatica has a good handle on to reach young people. The film, by David Holbrooke, catches teens weeping and roaring their approval as Fatica preaches. His methods are not subtle. He screams his sermons, lets teens pound him with folding chairs (to exemplify Christ’s suffering for us), puts his crosses on kids’ backs and shouts at them as they tote them up a hill. The message is brutal, but simple: avoid sin and find a better life in Jesus.
Fatica would be a bit drastic for the more demonstrative Protestant denominations. (He’s even a little drastic for home consumption: you don’t feel compelled to watch “Hard As Nails” as much as you find it hard to look away.) For the Catholic educators whose students he enthralls and enlists to lead local Hard As Nails chapters, he’s overwhelming. One school asks him to stop because the guidance counselors haven’t been prepped on how to deal with the fallout from his emotional style. The diocese of Burlington, Vermont has banned him outright from holding events in the state.
A prophet, Fatica tells the camera, is always rejected by the institutional church. The problem for Catholic enthusiasts like Fatica, is that the institution and the church are for the most part the same.
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posted December 22, 2007 at 11:17 pm
i am wondering if i am related to justin i just saw the hbo special
posted December 24, 2007 at 12:06 pm
This was an amazing experience it challenge me to love
posted December 27, 2007 at 1:02 am
I AM SORRY TO HAVE THE INTELLIGENCE OF CATHOLIC YOUTH SUBJECTED TO SCREAMING, AND COUNSELING BY AN UNTRAINED COUNSELOR… PARENTS BEWARE OF THIS PERSON.
posted December 28, 2007 at 8:21 pm
Justin is awesome! This is just what the catholic church needs! More “Spirit filled” Charismatic worship & preaching!Wake up!
posted January 4, 2008 at 8:10 pm
what a freak
seriously
posted January 25, 2008 at 5:58 pm
The simple fact is the man is unordained. I think his goal of trying to help teens is admirable, but the message becomes muddled and lost amongst his screaming, name calling, his borderline masochistic recreation of the crucifixtion, and having kids hit him with a folding chair.
Ordination not only helps prepare one to spread God’s word, but also how to effectively do so that children will not become upset, cry, or completely turned off by the message. I’m not saying ordination makes the minister, but it gives the them the tools to help spread their message. We wouldn’t let our children go to un-licensed doctors would we?
Screaming that a girl is fat, right to her face, while she silently weeps, is NOT an effective way to bring about change. Yes, she’s a member of his own group, but what happens if it goes too far? What if he calls out an emotionally unstable person and said person in turn hurts themselves or commits suicide?
I’m not trying to negate the good Justin Fatica and Hard as nails has done, I personally would not be comfortable with him coming to my child’s school, nor would I let my children go to his retreats. Not because I don’t believe in God, but because the safety of my children; physical, spiritual, and emotional is my FIRST concern.
posted September 4, 2008 at 9:32 am
For those of you that are a little scared of Justin and his ways. You really have to meet him in person, not just see the little tidbits shown on youtube or short trailers. He is an amazing guy. We were blessed to spend a week with him at Catholic Family land. Believe me if he was not the real deal, Mr. Coniker and Catholic Family Land would not go near him. Our kids heard him speak, and yes scream. They also saw him with his wife and kids during the week of the Family Fest at CFL. He cares, he knows who the kids are who need help, he does not just forget them when the week is over, he prays for them, and keeps in touch with them personally, they know they have him as a friend, and it makes them strong and they go on because of what he teaches them. He is wonderful and the kids love him and so do I.
posted March 27, 2009 at 5:10 am
I actually have met Justin Fatica, and he is far from wonderful. When Justin first came to Syracuse, I thought his message was respectable and his mission was admirable, so I gave him a chance and went to his first meeting. In the coming months, he became one of my least favorite people on the planet. He constantly emphasizes the need to “get real” — to be honest and yourself — so I don’t understand why he can’t tell his stories (if they’re true) without all the dramatics. He publicly humiliated many of my friends, asking them to speak at a retreat. When they decided they didn’t want to, he called them up anyway and told the entire school they had planned to say something which made them sound egocentric and self-righteous. He constantly berated us and belittled us. If he saw a group of students from my school at a restaurant, he would begin preaching about premarital sex and virginity for the love of Christ, accusing us of being fornicators despite whatever we said. He repeatedly told people that they were not beautiful on the outside. The worst came when a girl at our school died. Justin Fatica promised to stand by this girl’s ex-boyfriend through thick and thin, and then completely abandoned him, skipping both the funeral and the wake and ignoring all phone calls and text messages. Months afterward, he told our whole school that the only reason this girl had friends was because she was pretty and tried to tell us that nobody really liked her. Justin Fatica is a horrible person who exploits faith to turn a profit.