Fr. Simon's Letter - February 20, 2022

Our weekly bulletin goes to press on Wednesday at 3pm. So, this article was written before our Renew My Church ‘Town Hall Meeting’ got underway this past Wednesday evening. I want to highlight some of the important points that were to be shared at the meeting.

Both our parish and St. Mary of the Woods parish have passed the benchmarks set by the Archdiocese that determine the viability of a parish as it goes through the Renew My Church process. Two of the benchmarks for determining viability are that we have 800 or more people attending Mass each weekend and an operating budget of 750,000 dollars. Since the concern for viability does not affect us, our focus for Renew My Church is parish vitality.

The Grouping Feedback and Discernment Team (GFDT) participates in a series of meetings moderated by the Parish Vitality Coordinator of Vicariate II and another member of the Archdiocesan Renew My Church team. The goal for this group is to identify the strengths, challenges, and opportunities of a vibrant parish. The information presented by our parishioners at the Town Hall Meeting is an important part of this process as it will be incorporated into a report to be presented to Cardinal Cupich and the Archdiocesan RMC team. The report will focus on the ways in which we can collaborate with our grouping parish, Saint Mary of the Woods, so that together we are better equipped to bring Jesus Christ to the world today. Establishing a strong foundation for creating a vibrant parish and building a culture of evangelization within our parish ensures people can feel a deep sense of belonging as they experience a fresh encounter with Christ, and inspire them to boldly share their faith in our community and beyond.

All decisions regarding parishes involved in this phase of Renew My Church will be announced by the end of May 2022. We will then set about the task of Building a New Reality. The mission imperatives that will guide our efforts for Renew My Church are Make Disciples – Build Community – Inspire Witness.

Jesus is calling us to follow him more closely and seek out his lost sheep. As Catholics baptized into the life and love of God we are called and commissioned to discern our part in making disciples.

We must honestly look at how we engage people of all age groups and walks of life. Christ is calling us to discern what parish and school vitality means in today’s world and to build communities. To that end we must ask ourselves in what ways can we work together, across parishes and throughout the Archdiocese, to strengthen each other today and create Catholic communities that will be sustainable both now and into the future.

As Christians, we bear Christ’s light and hope in the world. Just as Jesus moved among the people, Pope Francis implores us to go out to the world and to those on the margins. How can we work together in new ways to inspire witness within a world that is numb to the real presence of God?

The journey ahead of us is filled with opportunities to re-engage with our own faith so that in the years to come Queen of All Saints parish will continue to be a strong faith community, a beacon of hope and an instrument that draws others to Christ. In the meantime, let us hold Queen of All Saints and Saint Mary of the Woods in prayer as we enter this time of rededication to our faith in Jesus Christ and plan for the future.

Blessings!!