Dear Parish Family,
How is your Lent going? Have you been able to take time away from everything and be with the Lord? This Friday’s “Come, Let Us Adore!” evening of adoration is the perfect time to do that as
Friday, March 4 marks the halfway point of Lent this year. Begin this second half of Lent well by coming before our Lord Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament to have our symbolic time with him in the desert. He calls out to you to draw close to him, and this is a concrete way to respond to that call. If you have been to the one last year or the one during Advent, and you were moved by the Lord, think about someone you can invite. A simple invitation is how the Good News is shared.
Calling Forth Lay Leaders
Last Thursday, we had an open meeting of parishioners to discuss the pastoral vision for our parish and to get feedback on how we are planning to go about fostering an even more vibrant parish life through cultivating greater lay participation. We hope to do that by more formally instituting a body of “parish representatives” who will help foster parish life and welcome new parishioners.
We had a nice showing of over fifty parishioners come to the meeting, hear more about this idea of having parish representatives, and give their feedback, and many more who could not come to the meeting expressed interest. The fireside chats from last year provided the framework by which our parish households were grouped into twelve different areas or neighborhoods, thanks to Jeromy Alexander’s diligent work.
For each of these parish neighborhoods, we would like to have several parish representatives who would welcome new parishioners, get to know and be a personal parish contact of the current parishioners in their neighborhood, invite their participation to those parish events that may be of interest to them, and be on the lookout for those in their neighborhood who may be interested in becoming Catholic.
John and Jill Dullock informally have been parish representatives for the Pleasant Lake area got up and shared at the meeting how the fireside chat that they hosted has sparked interest in the neighborhood about coming back to church. People in the area know them as approachable neighbors that they can go to should they have questions about the Catholic faith. Several folks in the area have begun attending Mass again since then.
We would eventually like to have six representatives from each of the twelve parish neighborhoods, three men and three women varying in age. That would make up a body of 72 parish representatives. We would get together maybe twice a year or quarterly for faith formation and to get a pulse of how things are going out in the neighborhoods. Also, six (three men and three women) of the twelve members of the parish’s Pastoral Council would be a representative group of these 72 parish representatives. Let us know of your interest in becoming a parish representative, and we’ll send you more information.
Yours in Christ,
Fr. Chas