Imagine that you are now pastor of your parish. What are the top three things that you would change about it?

[BSHoop96]

I started a “Did you know?” column in the bulletin and found out that ‘no they didn’t’ and, further more, they didn’t want to.

Really??? I think it would be great. How did you know they didn’t care. Did someone complain??

Not to hijack the thread but did you know that in Quebec the most common swear words are not vulgar but sacred? Words like Host, ciborium, chalice, are all used in everyday speech as cuss words. It’s been that way for generations to the point where most young people don’t even know why they’re wrong, they don’t even know the meaning.

Last year the Church in Quebec started erecting big signs with a word like “Tabernacle” on it in huge letters, then below, in smaller letters, the definition of the word. They figure that if people are going to curse using those words they might as well know the meaning of what they’re saying.

Very interesting! Do you mean like where someone here might say "oh hel*, there they might say “oh ciborium!” ??? How strange.

 

[Phemie]

Really??? I think it would be great. How did you know they didn’t care. Did someone complain??

Yes, it actually became a topic at the parish council meeting. They weren’t happy, because one such pointed out that something that the parish was doing wrong: reciting the doxology to the Eucharistic Prayer along with the priest. Although the column did put a stop to the practice, it was a few years before I tried that putting anything like that in the bulletin again.

But last year one column on Baptism produced positive results when a family who had left in a huff 5 years before after being told they couldn’t have 2 non-Catholics as godparents for their son (they were shocked because the godparents for their previous child weren’t Catholic – nobody had bothered to ask at the time). Although they continued to come to Mass, there was no further interaction with the parish until the day after the second column on Baptism appeared in the bulletin. Dad showed up at the office, son in tow, and asked to have the boy baptized. One refresher class later, child was baptized at the Sunday Mass and a family was completely reconciled with the parish.

I put in one on marriage, explaining the theology behind the rite based on the CCC and the rite itself, and one bride got all upset by it. It messed with her vision of her wedding. Luckily the pastor just said to let him know when I was going to put something in so that he could be prepared for any fallout.

Very interesting! Do you mean like where someone here might say "oh hel*, there they might say “oh ciborium!” ??? How strange.

Yes, that exactly what they’d say. Sometimes they string 6 or seven words together to better qualify what they are saying. Such cursing was forbidden in our household when we were growing up, with the admonition “No playing with the priest’s dishes!”

 

[Joannm]

I started a similar column in our bulletin called “Did you know.” I ask a question and answer it the following week. For example this summer I am focusing on those in ministry. One of the questions is “What does it mean to be in persona Christi?” Another is “What is the role of the deacon” (a good one for us since we never had a deacon unitl this year) I also try to fit it in with the liturgical seasons and feasts. This week’s question in “What is a solemnity?”

I also invite parishioners to send in questions but so far only one woman has.

 

[Cindy_Oliver]

Or you could give people the benefit of the doubt instead of assigning pews…

I think it’s important to continue to instruct your congregation. Remember the fallout Christ experienced when He said
“Take ye, and eat: this is my body, which shall be delivered for you: this do for the commemoration of me. In like manner also the chalice, after he had supped, saying: This chalice is the new testament in my blood: this do ye, as often as you shall drink, for the commemoration of me.”

The path of being a Catholic Christian is not easy. The thing is, we have only one chance of getting things right. I’d much rather get things right here, instead of not. Please keep up your instruction, people’s eternal lives depend on it.

 

[AliciaCL]

I would do whatever I could to bring adult education to the forefront…on matters of the faith, as well as liturgy, and the life of the parish.

Ditto. I would definitely try to get some adult education going, bible study, lecture series, topic classes, discussion groups, movies, EWTN shows with discussion following, topic inserts in Sunday bulletin, whatever. Our parish is simply a church with a basement and a school with a gym. There are few times and places where there can be any meeting. There are occassionally a few things going on but little participation – kind of an old world attitude that only stuffy people would go to such things. We need more education, simultaneous with our Protestant bretheran’s specialty of socialization, fellowship.

 

[mercygate]

I started a “Did you know?” column in the bulletin and found out that ‘no they didn’t’ and, further more, they didn’t want to.

Um. Yeah. You probably said stuff like: "Yes. It is still a mortal sin to miss Mass on Sunday with out extenuating reasons.

For the last two bulletins I’ve inserted a list of common “Catholic” words that most people don’t know, words that we of a certain age take for granted: chasuble, chalice, ciborium, etc.

Good. Start 'em off with stuff that won’t threaten 'em. The ease on up to the good stuff, like contraception.

 

[tessi]

1. Teach and talk more about the Eucharist and the Real Presence.
2. Make the Tabernacle the center of the Parish with the appropiate lamp to know where it is.
3. Remove some images and insist that Jesus is really there and the statue is just a statue.

 

[ethelzguy]

Well, why don’t you concentrate on your own prayers and on the miracle that is happening in front of you, rather than on how everyone else is praying?

Well, sometimes when I have my head bowed in prayer, all I see is some big keester flopped back in front of me.

Whatever. Some of you just don’t know how to have a little fun.

 

[tiggeriffic]

I would immediately call a Town Hall Meeting and listen to the concerns of the parishioners and the wisdom of the parish.

I would work with local agencies to ensure homeless are fed, housed and taken care of - actually I would put a high importance on Social Justice across the board.

I build a youth program that was the envy of all around. Once you get the kids, its very easy to get the parents. You just gotta figure out how to get the kids.

 

[mercygate]

I would immediately call a Town Hall Meeting and listen to the concerns of the parishioners and the wisdom of the parish.

I would work with local agencies to ensure homeless are fed, housed and taken care of - actually I would put a high importance on Social Justice across the board.

I build a youth program that was the envy of all around. Once you get the kids, its very easy to get the parents. You just gotta figure out how to get the kids.

I’m listeniing.

 

[Phemie]

I build a youth program that was the envy of all around. Once you get the kids, its very easy to get the parents. You just gotta figure out how to get the kids.

We’ve found the opposite. You’ve got to get to the parents, they’ll bring the kids.

 

[Phemie]

Um. Yeah. You probably said stuff like: "Yes. It is still a mortal sin to miss Mass on Sunday with out extenuating reasons.

Good. Start 'em off with stuff that won’t threaten 'em. The ease on up to the good stuff, like contraception.

I don’t think the pastor will let me put anything as threatening as ‘contraception’ in the bulletin.

 

[mercygate]

I don’t think the pastor will let me put anything as threatening as ‘contraception’ in the bulletin.

OK. But on THIS thread you ARE the Pastor!

Would you put something “dangerous” like that in the bulletin? I would but I would do it in increments. Start with “tabernacle” and work my way up to marriage (one man, one woman, open to life, for life). The explain that *Humanae vitae *does not require people to have 14 children . . . Inch-by-inch.

 

[Eric_Olsen]

Currently we have baptisms twice a month outside of Mass on a Sunday afternoon. We are noticing more and more that people are acting irreverent and have no sense that they are attending a sacred ritual rather than a social event. They don’t know the responses, jump up and down taking with relatives and kids are running around,

that irks me too. If it were up to me, I would move the “office, storage room, confessional” out of the old baptistery and move the font back in there. If no baptistery, then I would create one off to the side in the foyer like the old churches have.

 

[benedictgal]

Actually, why limit it to three things?

This is what I would do:

1. Get rid of any vestiges of English OCP hymnals. Unfortunately, because OCP holds a monopoly on Spanish music, I’m stuck with them. However, I would be very selective and tell my choir and cantor what they can and cannot sing. For the English Masses, I would use either Worship III (prior to the new hymn translations–or Worship II) and for both English and Spanish start using Latin. I would also make sure that an organ is in the works for the new church and get rid of the guitar.I wuold also recruit Catholics from the Philharmonic chorale to form a schola for our parish. Our current talent is wasting away singing junk from OCP.
2. Retrain the altar servers, ushers, lectors and EMHCs on how to properly discharge their duties. I would lmit the use of EMHC’s, unless it was absolutely necessary. Extra EMHC’s would be used to help take Holy Comunion to the elderly, infirmed and homebound.
3. Buy vestments (chasubles and dalmatics) that are of noble and solemn beauty.
4. Provide faith formation classes for the entire family that are doctrinally sound and focus on what the Church teaches, rather than on someone’s interpretation of it. I would also include formation on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and augment this through catechetical blurbs on the bulletin.
5. Stop making it about “we” and more about “He” in the Mass.
6. Offer the Extraordinary Form of the Mass, although, in my church, we don’t have an altar rail, but, that can be resolved by making some necessary adjustments. When we build the new church, I would have an altar rail put into the sanctuary.
7. Restore the use of the bells and incense. This would mean puirchasing beautiful thuribles and boats, as well as bells.
8. Make sure my PV (although my PV already does this) reads both the GIRM and RS and doesn’t deviate from the documents. I would also make sure that anyone who performs any liturgical duty understands what they are supposed to do.
9. Implement the Corpus Christi procession.

 

[krazykatlady]

Bring back the bells and incense.

Offer the Extraordinary Mass at least weekly.

Lower the boom on irreverence and immodest dress at Mass.

 

[AMDGtoo]

Restore the use of the bells and incense.

In some places it never “went away”, so maybe your pastor can take sort of a “fieldtrip” to those places to see how it’s done, and you won’t have to fantasize about it anymore.

 

[mercygate]

OK, now we have a lot of “I would do X”. Let’s kick this up and figure out HOW we are gong to do “X”.

What would be the repercussions of introducing or elimnating “X”?

How can I introduce (eliminate) “X” in a way that will cause the least damage? What are my teaching responsibilities? Where do I need to do immediate smack-downs and where do I need to draw toward the goalpost by leadership?

 

[benedictgal]

In some places it never “went away”, so maybe your pastor can take sort of a “fieldtrip” to those places to see how it’s done, and you won’t have to fantasize about it anymore.

True. My PV (when he was rector at the Cathedral and pastor of another parish) always used incense and bells. Our pastor is not too keen on them, though. Incense and bells are also used when the bishop celebrates Mass at the Cathedral. However, it’s not SOP in many parishes.

 

[BSHoop96]

Originally Posted by BSHoop96
Did someone complain??

Originally Posted by Phemie
Yes, it actually became a topic at the parish council meeting. They weren’t happy, because one such pointed out that something that the parish was doing wrong: reciting the doxology to the Eucharistic Prayer along with the priest. Although the column did put a stop to the practice, it was a few years before I tried that putting anything like that in the bulletin again.

But last year one column on Baptism produced positive results when a family who had left in a huff 5 years before after being told they couldn’t have 2 non-Catholics as godparents for their son (they were shocked because the godparents for their previous child weren’t Catholic – nobody had bothered to ask at the time). Although they continued to come to Mass, there was no further interaction with the parish until the day after the second column on Baptism appeared in the bulletin. Dad showed up at the office, son in tow, and asked to have the boy baptized. One refresher class later, child was baptized at the Sunday Mass and a family was completely reconciled with the parish.

I put in one on marriage, explaining the theology behind the rite based on the CCC and the rite itself, and one bride got all upset by it. It messed with her vision of her wedding. Luckily the pastor just said to let him know when I was going to put something in so that he could be prepared for any fallout.

Unbelievable!! As long as you were simply explaining (which sounds like your were), and not condemning, why in the world would people not want to know what is proper and correct according to the Church??? On second thought, I can’t believe I said that…it happens all the time. I, for one, think that unless the pastor asked you to “stop”, you should have continued. Course that’s easy for me to say…the fallout can’t reach me!

As far as the wedding…a lot of them aren’t weddings any more…they are entertainments. AND people mimicing the gestures of the priest and speaking his parts are my pet peeve!

Very interesting! Do you mean like where someone here might say "oh hel, there they might say “oh ciborium!” ??? How strange.*

Such cursing was forbidden in our household when we were growing up, with the admonition "No playing with the priest’s dishes!"

I love that!