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Making Missionary Disciples
“I dream of a ‘missionary option’… a missionary impulse capable of transforming everything…”
Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium
Do you have the same dream as Pope Francis? Would you like to see your parish, apostolate, or family flourishing in Christ like never before? In Making Missionary Disciples, Curtis Martin, founder of the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS), explores how to build a vibrant culture of faithfulness and fruitfulness. He doesn’t just remind us how every disciple is called on mission to share the love and truth of Jesus Christ. He gives us practical ways to do this in our ordinary daily lives.
Experience the transformation for which we all long—through Making Missionary Disciples.
“Making Missionary Disciples is a small book … like a mustard seed or a grain of wheat; when these are planted in the earth they reveal a surprising explosive force … [It] shows us Jesus’ methods of evangelization.”
Daniel Cardinal DiNardo, President of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
“… these pages will be of great help for all those who are engaged in the service for the new evangelization, which is so urgent and needed in our times.”
Archbishop Rino Fisichella, -President of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization
“This groundbreaking book gives us an inside look at the process of forming disciples from the founder of one of the most powerful Catholic missionary organizations in the world.”
Jennifer Fulwiler, SiriusXM radio host
Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium
Do you have the same dream as Pope Francis? Would you like to see your parish, apostolate, or family flourishing in Christ like never before? In Making Missionary Disciples, Curtis Martin, founder of the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS), explores how to build a vibrant culture of faithfulness and fruitfulness. He doesn’t just remind us how every disciple is called on mission to share the love and truth of Jesus Christ. He gives us practical ways to do this in our ordinary daily lives.
Experience the transformation for which we all long—through Making Missionary Disciples.
“Making Missionary Disciples is a small book … like a mustard seed or a grain of wheat; when these are planted in the earth they reveal a surprising explosive force … [It] shows us Jesus’ methods of evangelization.”
Daniel Cardinal DiNardo, President of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
“… these pages will be of great help for all those who are engaged in the service for the new evangelization, which is so urgent and needed in our times.”
Archbishop Rino Fisichella, -President of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization
“This groundbreaking book gives us an inside look at the process of forming disciples from the founder of one of the most powerful Catholic missionary organizations in the world.”
Jennifer Fulwiler, SiriusXM radio host
60 pages, Hardcover
Published January 1, 2018
22 people are currently reading
117 people want to read
About the author
Curtis Martin
44 books11 followersCurtis Martin is the President and Founder of FOCUS, the Fellowship of Catholic University Students, one of the fastest growing movements in the Catholic Church. Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver stated,“No entity (or group) does a more dynamic job of reaching college students for Christ than FOCUS.”
FOCUS was founded in 1998 as a national outreach to college campuses, both to secular and Catholic schools.
FOCUS was founded in 1998 as a national outreach to college campuses, both to secular and Catholic schools.
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
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May 7, 2025Shoutout to that steel bar and fire analogy. Gotta be one of my favorite analogies.
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April 24, 2023For the longest time I thought Curtis Martin was referring to himself when it says “the method modeled by the master”
July 5, 2024
If only I had read this 3 years ago…
November 10, 2025
An easy, short read that sums up missionary discipleship. This book was great in providing practical tools on how to successfully live out mission!
February 3, 2022
REVIEW: Making Missionary Disciples, Curtis Martin
RATING: 1.5/5 stars
"I trust that, if you have read this far, you have a desire to see your parish, your apostolate, or your family radiate a culture of missionary discipleship."
How strongly you underestimate the will power of an English major with a grudge, Mr. Martin.
Having heard Curtis Martin speak prior, I went into this experience with the most open mind possible. Even after separating myself from most of this doctrine and practice, I wanted to review the material from an inside and outside perspective: on effectiveness of delivery and on information alike. The first portion of this short book is fine, although I did not learn anything new necessarily since a similar lecture was given on my college campus. However, the second half of this book was, in my opinion, quite problematic for a number of reasons. The pro-life propaganda thrown in there briefly was not needed, the "illustration" was cringey and again arbitrary, and from beginning to end, there seemed to be an intense lack of awareness about the actual flaws within the Church. Discernment is meant to be a critical part of faith, and there was an absence of the concept throughout Martin's whole text as he focused instead on modern culture. I would say personally that it's inadequate for any faith community to dismiss entire progressive movements, but if you're going to go hard against SocietyTM, you need to meet your own critics in the middle to admit to the Church's own complex history.
The metaphors in this book were also abrupt and unhelpful. I appreciated that the writing style was accessible, but there were many facets of this text that stood out and made me cringe just reading them. Conocer and saber? For Jesus? Really?
Finally, I take a lot of issue with the streamlined and external process indicated in this book. Martin implies that there is diversity in the Church, and therefore, evangelization should be treated on an individual basis. But he also knocks the "culture" of progressivism, so I feel like his insinuation here is mildly paradoxical. Furthermore, not everyone wants to be a part of the Catholic church even if they have a relationship with God; to state to your readers that not connecting someone with your faith is a "failure" along the way is really damaging. I take issue with the Church's attitude in general that everything in life should be done for other people, but I believe this approach takes it too far and that people of blended faiths are not granted as much of a space in religion if every Catholic were to act this way.
I think my review might be the only negative one on this page, but I sincerely hope that y'all reading this practice some critical thinking skills when viewing religious texts like this one. You are not a moral failure if you don't want to be a radical evangelist, and you're not a bad person if you find the incessant aforementioned evangelized to be too much and you want out.
RATING: 1.5/5 stars
"I trust that, if you have read this far, you have a desire to see your parish, your apostolate, or your family radiate a culture of missionary discipleship."
How strongly you underestimate the will power of an English major with a grudge, Mr. Martin.
Having heard Curtis Martin speak prior, I went into this experience with the most open mind possible. Even after separating myself from most of this doctrine and practice, I wanted to review the material from an inside and outside perspective: on effectiveness of delivery and on information alike. The first portion of this short book is fine, although I did not learn anything new necessarily since a similar lecture was given on my college campus. However, the second half of this book was, in my opinion, quite problematic for a number of reasons. The pro-life propaganda thrown in there briefly was not needed, the "illustration" was cringey and again arbitrary, and from beginning to end, there seemed to be an intense lack of awareness about the actual flaws within the Church. Discernment is meant to be a critical part of faith, and there was an absence of the concept throughout Martin's whole text as he focused instead on modern culture. I would say personally that it's inadequate for any faith community to dismiss entire progressive movements, but if you're going to go hard against SocietyTM, you need to meet your own critics in the middle to admit to the Church's own complex history.
The metaphors in this book were also abrupt and unhelpful. I appreciated that the writing style was accessible, but there were many facets of this text that stood out and made me cringe just reading them. Conocer and saber? For Jesus? Really?
Finally, I take a lot of issue with the streamlined and external process indicated in this book. Martin implies that there is diversity in the Church, and therefore, evangelization should be treated on an individual basis. But he also knocks the "culture" of progressivism, so I feel like his insinuation here is mildly paradoxical. Furthermore, not everyone wants to be a part of the Catholic church even if they have a relationship with God; to state to your readers that not connecting someone with your faith is a "failure" along the way is really damaging. I take issue with the Church's attitude in general that everything in life should be done for other people, but I believe this approach takes it too far and that people of blended faiths are not granted as much of a space in religion if every Catholic were to act this way.
I think my review might be the only negative one on this page, but I sincerely hope that y'all reading this practice some critical thinking skills when viewing religious texts like this one. You are not a moral failure if you don't want to be a radical evangelist, and you're not a bad person if you find the incessant aforementioned evangelized to be too much and you want out.
January 9, 2019
Game changer
July 16, 2020
This is an important little book - a very quick read - explaining the basic habits of missionary disciples and strategy for inviting others to be disciples. The three habits are: divine intimacy (being close to the Lord), authentic friendship (truly befriending others), and clarity and conviction about spiritual multiplication (knowing our efforts can contribute to more discipleship). The strategy, which the author calls the “method modeled by the master,” is: win:leading souls to encounter Christ, build:accompanying disciples, and send:launching spirit-filled evangelists and multipliers. If you are a committed Christian disciple and are not familiar with these concepts please work to change that, and this book is an excellent introduction to them.
January 6, 2025
Making Missionary Disciples is a little handbook on the Christian life. It is written by and for Roman Catholics but is thoroughly evangelical. It builds a vision of Christians who act like Christians, disciplined disciples, missionary disciples, and multiplying disciples in everyday life. The writing is theologically sound, accessible, inviting, and challenging. The book is excellent, but it will do us no good if we don’t live the life Jesus modeled.
February 24, 2021
Worthwhile read althought there is no new insight. TIn this short book Curtis Martin reveiws the process that teh FOCUS organization has used very successfully in the last 20 years to develop their campus missionaries. FOCUS has done some great work and the process seems intuitively sound. It is based on the model of Christ to develop his disciples.
June 23, 2025
This book does a great job specifically reminding the reader of the way that Jesus Himself does ministry. It emphasizes repeatedly that textbook education is not enough, but that others need to see some live daily in practical and radical obedience to God. Though written from a Catholic background, there are many valuable statements for evangelical Christians to learn and grow from.
March 19, 2019
Curtis Martin lays out a simple, easy to follow method of creating missionary disciples.
1) Divine Intimacy
2) Authentic Friendship
3) Spiritual Multiplication
And these habits have been models for us by Jesus Christ Himself!
1) Divine Intimacy
2) Authentic Friendship
3) Spiritual Multiplication
And these habits have been models for us by Jesus Christ Himself!
July 17, 2020
A quick read full of good information on how to become a missionary disciple. The only reason for my rating was that I already knew most of this information so I didn't learn a lot of new things. Still worth the read though!
February 5, 2021
This book was very short but a good primer on how to make missionary disciples. I got it for free at SEEK 21 and I read it in two brief sittings in a day. For people looking to evangelize but don't know where to start, this offers a good place to begin.
September 10, 2022
The principles of Divine Intimacy, Authentic Friendship, and the Little Way of Evangelization are more aligned with scripture than other missionary groups. I have never seen a FOCUS ministry in practice but their model is good. I particularly like their focus on Divine Intimacy.
November 13, 2018
An excellent book on how to evangelize by using the methods employed by Jesus during his public ministry. Curtis Martin is succinct and thorough. I highly recommend this book to everyone!
January 29, 2019
Very straightforward and well outlined. Succinctly summarizes the method modeled by the master
March 28, 2019
An engaging and practical blueprint for growing the Church so that disciples stay disciples.
December 29, 2019
Challenges you to live as an intentional missionary disciple!
June 30, 2021
Short book but so needed to hear
May 11, 2023
This what we've gone over in discipleship in a nutshell
February 5, 2025
Quick easy read, though I didn’t gain much new insight. Pretty basic in terms of the content, but I’ve had this book since I received it from Chris Martin at SEEK in 2019 and wanted to cross it off my reading list.
September 3, 2023
Very quick read but packed with important information. We can change the world by changing one heart at a time!
February 20, 2022
Really good, but not exactly a page-turner
March 20, 2023
Clarity of purpose,
Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews