Parish Leader

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Is there a parish leader who is in charge of a Catholic church in your diocese?
 
We have several Parish Life Coordinators; they’re often Sisters or Deacons, but some are secular laity.
 
We have a self appointed “pastor’s assistant” who instructs the office staff what to do. Anyone who wants to talk to our priest has to go through her. Why our priest tolerates her, I don’t know.
 
Belshazzar said:
We have a self appointed “pastor’s assistant” who instructs the office staff what to do. Anyone who wants to talk to our priest has to go through her. Why our priest tolerates her, I don’t know.
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Isn’t there an easy way to …bypass her? Or does she lord it over the priest, as well?
Domineering types give me the horrors!
 
Hoosier_Daddy said:
The parish leader is the pastor. Period.
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Well, in some parishes there is no pastor - in fact, the majority of parishes in my diocese have no “Pastor”, they have “Administrators”. Those are still priests, but priests who don’t belong to our diocese and could be recalled by either their Bishop or Superior at any time.

OTOH, two of our parishes have neither Pastor nor Administrator: one has a Sister as “Director of Parish Life” and the other has simply “visiting priests”.
 
Hoosier_Daddy said:
The parish leader is the pastor. Period.
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Not so. This is happening in a diocese where I live.
This program addresses the chapter on administration, which calls for the diocese to “work with the parishes to identify plans and create creative models of parish administration to promote deacon, religious and lay leadership in collaboration with the clergy to prepare for the next generation of parish leadership.” Under Canon Law (517.2), the bishop can designate a qualified deacon, religious man or woman, or lay man or woman to participate in the exercise of pastoral care of a parish community when a resident pastor is not available. The person who leads a parish in this capacity in collaboration with the canonical pastor is known in our diocese as a parish leader.
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Parish Leaders are professional, diocesan-appointed ministers who oversee the day-to-day care of the parish, from administration to pastoral ministry. A priest is also assigned to the parish for the celebration of the Sacraments.…
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…Fifteen people are enrolled in the Parish Leader Formation Program, including six current deacons, one religious woman, four lay men, and four lay women.
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livingbreadradio.com/2017/02/parish-leader-alternative-form-parish-leadership/
 
Belshazzar said:
We have a self appointed “pastor’s assistant” who instructs the office staff what to do. Anyone who wants to talk to our priest has to go through her. Why our priest tolerates her, I don’t know.
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Shivver Those people do great damage to a great many parishes. I have the same question that you do. They probably tolerate such people because it makes their lives easier.

Thankfully we have plenty of priests. We have no “parish life coordinators” or similar in my diocese that I am aware of. We did several years ago though.
 
Belshazzar said:
We have a self appointed “pastor’s assistant” who instructs the office staff what to do. Anyone who wants to talk to our priest has to go through her. Why our priest tolerates her, I don’t know.
Click to expand...
HAHAHAHA. Common enough problem. 😉
 
Seriously though, a few parishes here have an Administrator, but they are all priests.
 
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