After attending classes every other week since last September, 31 lectors at St. John Baptist de la Salle Church in Granada Hills graduated July 11 from an innovative training program taught by Art Sharpe, a professional speech consultant and former radio journalist. During the training, lectors learned techniques for proper breathing and ways to improve enunciation, interpretation, phrasing and emphasis, among many other skills.

Starting in August, the parish will hold monthly lector meetings to foster further development of the lector ministry, to hone the current lectors' skills and to train new lectors. The model lector training program is one of the first comprehensive lector training programs adopted in the archdiocese.