How are your parishes doing?

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ConstantineTG

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Its not a secret that Eastern Catholic parishes tend to have small congregations which makes them nice because everyone knows everyone, but also issues about funding the parishes arise. How does your parish make ends meet? Do you have anything to attract new parishioners/converts?
 
Not so good IMO. Mine is very small – one priest/pastor and a resident Brother. They fall short weekly in contributions. It takes $6,000 to run the parish but always fall about $1,000 short every week. Mass is about 1/2 full, but it’s a small Church.

We are now under review by the Bishop. I don’t know what that means. They are going to review finances, real estate, etc. Sounds ominous. Does not sound good, except it has a Catholic school and the next closest (larger parish) had their Catholic school closed – so this one is the only one close enough for the children to walk to. So, when the Diocese had the option to close the school, they did not, instead closing the school of the larger parish.

I wanted to add that my tiny parish was built in 1865 and it would be a shame if it were closed. It’s also in an industrial area, bordering on residential but still it’s not in an area where you get a lot of foot traffic and parking is not an option in NYC.

An odd thing happened many years ago. The Church is and was R.C. For a period of time the Church became Korean. I did not join as I went some distance to my mother’s parish. Now it’s R.C. again and Spanish. Though we have some Korean Catholic members, the outside board of the Church is no longer in Korean, as it was entirely for a period of time. This kept me in my mother’s parish. We have undergone a lot of changes.

However, they have a food bank and other ministries. They cater to the flavor of the neighborhood with Mariachi bands playing at Mass for Our Lady of Guadalupe. They have family Masses with coffee afterwards. The priest, all alone except for one Brother, does seem to try very hard.

I hope they don’t close the Church.
 
I am at a parish now that was once one a thriving community in many respects, rivaling even the rather large local RC parish. For reasons still not well understood by many (myself included), it was almost shuttered permanently. We now have a terrific priest permanently assigned and working fervently to rebuild, but the conventional wisdom is the parish will never be the same. That said, we’re happy we are still alive (for the time being …).

We pray for the health and welfare of all our Eastern Catholic parishes, both here in the US and in our lands of origin!
 
ByzCathCantor said:
I am at a parish now that was once one a thriving community in many respects, rivaling even the rather large local RC parish. For reasons still not well understood by many (myself included), it was almost shuttered permanently. We now have a terrific priest permanently assigned and working fervently to rebuild, but the conventional wisdom is the parish will never be the same. That said, we’re happy we are still alive (for the time being …).

We pray for the health and welfare of all our Eastern Catholic parishes, both here in the US and in our lands of origin!
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Where is your parish located? Do you have a website?
 
I am glad to report that the mission parish I belong to (Holy Cross) is growing like crazy! 🙂

We now have our very own deacon who does services with preconsecrated gifts 3 weeks
a month. Once a month our mission priest comes for confessions, DL, and to consecrate the Holy Gifts…

It has been tough, we have been holding services in an altar-less Presbyterian church, but next month we are breaking ground for our very own temple with the bishop coming in, Bishop Basil from Wichita.

I can’t wait. Already we are getting more and more liturgical items for our new church. New blessing hand cross. Torches which we never had before at all, and fans (ripidion).
 
andrewstx said:
I am glad to report that the mission parish I belong to (Holy Cross) is growing like crazy! 🙂

We now have our very own deacon who does services with preconsecrated gifts 3 weeks
a month. Once a month our mission priest comes for confessions, DL, and to consecrate the Holy Gifts…

It has been tough, we have been holding services in an altar-less Presbyterian church, but next month we are breaking ground for our very own temple with the bishop coming in, Bishop Basil from Wichita.

I can’t wait. Already we are getting more and more liturgical items for our new church. New blessing hand cross. Torches which we never had before at all, and fans (ripidion).
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All blessings, indeed! I’m confused, however. Isn’t Bishop Basil an Orthodox hierarch? You stated religion is Catholic …
 
ByzCathCantor said:
All blessings, indeed! I’m confused, however. Isn’t Bishop Basil an Orthodox hierarch? You stated religion is Catholic …
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I was a Roman Latin catholic when I joined. I had a stroke and don’t know how to change it.

Yes Basil is bishop of the diocese of the midwest Antiochian Orthodox archdiocese.
 
andrewstx said:
I was a Roman Latin catholic when I joined. I had a stroke and don’t know how to change it.

Yes Basil is bishop of the diocese of the midwest Antiochian Orthodox archdiocese.
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So sorry to hear - hope you have recovered well - we pray for you!

And trust your experience among the reverent Antiochian Orthodox has been a faithful experience for you!
 
What a wonderful story. I pray that God leads you to a full recovery andrewstx.

I started this thread because I’m fearing my parish is headed the opposite direction. I am afraid that we are nearing that point that it becomes a slippery slope down hill. The most obvious way to sustain a parish is more people. But how do you attract more people?
 
ConstantineTG said:
What a wonderful story. I pray that God leads you to a full recovery andrewstx.

I started this thread because I’m fearing my parish is headed the opposite direction. I am afraid that we are nearing that point that it becomes a slippery slope down hill. The most obvious way to sustain a parish is more people. But how do you attract more people?
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At what kind of parish are you currently worshipping? Near any other churches? If so, of what denomination?
 
andrewstx said:
I was a Roman Latin catholic when I joined. I had a stroke and don’t know how to change it.

Yes Basil is bishop of the diocese of the midwest Antiochian Orthodox archdiocese.
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Andrew, you’re in my prayers.

Constantine, when you say downhill, do you mean financially? Thats fixable.
Ask your priest. Maybe he can ask the Bishop.
 
ConstantineTG said:
What a wonderful story. I pray that God leads you to a full recovery andrewstx.

I started this thread because I’m fearing my parish is headed the opposite direction. I am afraid that we are nearing that point that it becomes a slippery slope down hill. The most obvious way to sustain a parish is more people. But how do you attract more people?
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Frankly I am thinking we just are fortunate. I live in SW Tex, and with the "ahl"oil boom the area is growing like mad.

There have been attmpts at Orthodox missions here before, but they never seem to get of the ground. But they always held DL in rented or borrowed locations.

Now that we are building this one seems to be off to a good start.

It is hard here because nearly everyone is Baptist or in “non-denominational” denominations and are very predjudiced toward anything smacking of Cathlicism.

I would like to be Eastern Rite, but the nearest ER Catholic church is over 300 mile away.
 
ByzCathCantor said:
At what kind of parish are you currently worshipping? Near any other churches? If so, of what denomination?
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UGCC. There are a bunch of other parishes nearby, Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Baptist, etc. Its kind of a “worship belt” of the city.
 
John_of_Patmos said:
Constantine, when you say downhill, do you mean financially? Thats fixable.
Ask your priest. Maybe he can ask the Bishop.
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Yes, financially. Basically, peroggy sales and suppers and bake sales have sustained our parish for years. But our cook/baker is now physically unable to do the work and therefore the main source of income of the parish is in danger. Our collections are very small and wouldn’t sustain the parish. Most of our parishioners are seniors and a lot of them are retired, thus you can’t really ask much from them. The priest and bishop is aware. I’m just wondering if there are any ideas out there I could pitch to them to help.
 
ConstantineTG said:
Yes, financially. Basically, peroggy sales and suppers and bake sales have sustained our parish for years. But our cook/baker is now physically unable to do the work and therefore the main source of income of the parish is in danger. Our collections are very small and wouldn’t sustain the parish. Most of our parishioners are seniors and a lot of them are retired, thus you can’t really ask much from them. The priest and bishop is aware. I’m just wondering if there are any ideas out there I could pitch to them to help.
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God will call your parish to serving Him in a certain way.

What’s your church’s treasure? The unique way you come to know God.

What’s your church’s strength? It sounds like it is the wisdom and experiences of many wise elders.

With that combo, evangelization and catechesis which focuses on your unique traditions would be the obvious choice from my perspective. What does your gut say?
 
CDB1718 said:
God will call your parish to serving Him in a certain way.

What’s your church’s treasure? The unique way you come to know God.

What’s your church’s strength? It sounds like it is the wisdom and experiences of many wise elders.

With that combo, evangelization and catechesis which focuses on your unique traditions would be the obvious choice from my perspective. What does your gut say?
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I don’t know. We’re a heavily ethnic parish. We get a ton of people during the big religious-cultural holidays that Ukrainians celebrate. And people do come to the sales because its one of the few places to buy Ukrainian food.
 
We’re anything but ethnic, and growing. See my post on byzcath in a day or two, but we may be facing a situation where we could grow at a dangerous rate.

We do have a handful of actual ruthenians. I think we have a slight RC majority, and I’ve lost count of how many different kinds of ECOC, , EO, and OO. (come Otto think of it, the vigil may have a ru thhenian majority, but the average age is over 60).

hawk
 
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