Meeting Minutes
Parish Pastoral Council
November 8, 2001  

Members Attending: John Colonna-Romano, Marshall Cross, Deacon Charles Cornell, Paul Curley , Donne Cutting, Nancy Dome, Mike Holt, Richard Martin, Sharon McCann, Margaret Passafiume, Rosario Rizzo, John Slattery,

Members Absent: Rev. Richard Butler, Pastor, Jackie Downing, Patricia Noone, Shirley Ormsby, Domenique Sexton

Minutes:            Minutes of October 11th accepted with no corrections.       

Update from the pastor

                        There was no update from the pastor

Setting goals and priority for this year.

                        John Slattery passed out a list of goal categories taken from the past meetings as well as the Archdiocesan Pastor Plan for Mission. He then read the section on setting goals from the October 13 minutes.

Several questions were asked about the meaning of a few of the goal categories and these were discussed. Then the meeting was focused on narrowing down the list of goal categories to specific topics in a few of the categories.

The following categories generated the most discussion:

·        Youth – at first this was acknowledged by all to be an important category that has been in the forefront of the Council’s concerns over the past few years.

·        Commitment to the Needy – There was a discussion on the need to establish a formal structure rather than rely on a few individuals for specific seasonal efforts. Everyone recognized the likelihood that needs will increase in the current economic climate. Nancy Dome suggested that the most productive way to pursue this would be to form a St. Vincent DePaul society.

·        Ecumenical-Interreligious Affairs & Justice and Peace – after a small discussion did not produce any specific topics in these areas, John Colonna-Romano said the the Stewardship Committee was considering efforts in these two areas by working with other churches in town on social justice efforts.

·        Religious Education – Nancy Dome explained what some of the issues were.

After this cycle through all the categories, the consensus was that Youth really should be the focus and so a discussion evolved the specific topic as “Setting Up a Youth Ministry”. The discussion touched on various aspects of this topic, such as plugging into existing Archdiocesan youth efforts, increasing participation at Mass, and jointly funding a Youth Minister with surrounding parishes.

In a prioritization of topics, it was decided that setting up a St. Vincent DePaul Society was something to be explored but that this was a topic that could be dealt with in a more contained way. Charlie Cornell and Nancy Dome offered to investigate bringing in someone from St. Vincent DePaul, either in a neighboring parish or regional level to explain the options and support at a later Council meeting.

For Religious Education, it was decided that parish staff should gather more data before formulating specific topics for the council’s consideration.

Next meeting will be devoted to discussion of the considerations of the Youth Ministry topic.

Review of the meeting

            .            Comments included:

“Sounds like a good topic. Meeting productive”

“Providing a vision for youth is a serious need”

“More is needed for teenagers”

“Feel energized because these are realizable goals. “

Dick Martin shared that for the first time in the four years he has done the Sunday pre-school that every child knew the Lord’s Prayer.

“Lots of good ideas – youth is important to focus on”

“Lots of passion evident in the discussion”

“Good meeting. Stuck to vision not implementation”

“Like the idea of establishing teen youth ministry as a way of ‘trickling down’ involvement to middle school”

Next meetings:

Dec 13 2001  Jan 10, Feb 14, Mar 14. Apr 11, May 9 2002

Archdiocesan assembly of parish pastoral councils and parish finance councils  Mar 9, 2002