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Church

0.2 Build and Assess Signs of Family Identity and Engagement

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Coming together as a community of faith takes time and relies on intentional processes that bring people into greater union with Christ and one another. There are many things your Family leaders can do to increase your parishioners’ sense of their identities as members of your Family rather than solely as members of their respective parishes. Engaging people within your Family as disciples who are journeying together creates a deep sense of belonging that leads to fuller participation in Mass and the sacraments, ministry, giving and evangelization, as members share their faith, time and resources.

Church Reversed

“Each of us is called to actively participate as a member of a parish, the Universal Church and our local Church, led by our archbishop. Parishes continually deepen the bonds of communion with other parishes.”

Your Family Leadership Team, Pathway Team and pastoral council(s) share in leadership as each group seeks ways to unify parishioners with one another, creating more robust engagement and helping people identify with your Family of Parishes as well as their own parishes.

To-do: Build and assess signs of Family identity and engagement.

0.3 Discern Future State of Pathway Planning Team

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In the early months of Beacons of Light, most Families of Parishes created a Pathway Team, sometimes called a Transition Team or Planning Team. Often, staff and parishioner representatives from each parish within a Family of Parishes comprised that team. They were tasked with advising the pastor about early steps to bring the people of the parishes together, seeking opportunities for prayer, social time and early steps toward building community in the Family. As Family Leadership Teams are now formed in many Families and staff and councils are more often focusing on the Family of Parishes (not a single parish within the Family), the question arises whether the Pathway Team is still necessary or advisable. Entering into Phase 2 and focusing on vision is an appropriate time to discern the future state of the Pathway Planning Team, where one exists.

Church Reversed

“By September 1, 2022, every Family of Parishes must form a Planning Team, led by the pastor, to coordinate pastoral planning geared toward the unification of the Family by June 30, 2027.” (Beacons Parameter 3)

Questions to Consider:

  • Does your Family of Parishes have a Pathway Planning Team?
    • If yes, what has been its role and contribution to date?
  • Has a Family Leadership Team (FLT) been identified?
    • If yes, how has its role been delineated from the Pathway Team?
  • Have you established a unified Family Pastoral Council, or do your parish pastoral councils meet together, at least occasionally?
    • If yes, how has its role been delineated from the Pathway Team?
  • Are there areas of pastoral life that could be addressed by the Pathway Team that are not within the purview of the FLT or unified Family Pastoral Council, for example, initiatives to build community, enhance common prayer or social time, connect parishioners with one another, identify potential parishioners for new or expanded ministries, etc.?

If your Pathway Team continues, clearly identify its roles and responsibilities. Consider presenting the team at the end of Mass, offering time after Mass for parishioners to share ideas and ensure the team is included in your Family’s website.

1.1 Church – Visio Day

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Visio Day provides an opportunity for your Family Leadership Team (FLT) to learn the importance of creating a vision for your Family of Parishes and how to best create, communicate and enact that vision within your Family. This one-day workshop will not create the final vision for your Family of Parishes but will jump-start that process and prepare you for the Family Visioning Process.  

Some Families of Parishes participated in Visio Day early in 2023. We encourage all other Families, not engaged in the Catholic Leadership Institute’s Next Generation Parish process, to attend one of the two sessions scheduled for fall 2023.  

Learn more.

1.2 Church – Family Visioning

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The Family Visioning Process follows Visio Day and is a comprehensive process to create a vision statement for your Family of Parishes. This process is designed to define your vision, build consensus around the vision with key leaders and assess the impacts of that vision for each Beacons principle within your Family. 

Refer to Leadership 1.2 for details on the Family Visioning Process.

3.2 Build Parishioner Sense of Belonging to Family

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Becoming a strong community of faith does not just happen. Doing so relies on intentionality on the part of leaders who actively seek to draw people to Christ and to one another. Engaging people in your Family of Parishes is a process of deepening people’s sense of belonging within your Family as a community of faith. Such belonging builds strong bonds between people, as they pray together, interact with one another and serve together.

Church Reversed

“Parishes continually deepen the bonds of communion with other parishes.” (Church principle)

The pastoral life within your Family of Parishes offers many opportunities for people to become more deeply united in faith and create a spirit of community. 

To-do: Consider these ideas as a springboard for discussions as you seek ways to build belonging within your Family of Parishes:

  • Host common seasonal prayer experiences, such as Advent evening prayer, Lenten penance services, Holy Week liturgies and Pentecost celebrations.
  • Unify parishes’ service and outreach initiatives.
  • Combined sacramental preparation, such as the Order of Christian Initiation of Adults (OCIA) and Confirmation preparation.
  • Host social gatherings
  • Think about ways you might spark conversations and relationships among parishioners. Personal connections make a real difference in the way people perceive their experience in your Family!
  • Start or expand small faith groups, and encourage participation across parishes in your Family.
  • Offer seasonal study or reflection groups.
  • Ensure that members of all parishes are invited to participate when new ministries are suggested. 
  • Initiate discussions among already-involved parishioners to discern future unified ministries.
  • Host listening sessions or offer time after Mass when people may share ideas or concerns.

You can find additional ideas in Phase 1 Church 3.1: Foster Belonging.

3.3 Publish Opportunities for Liturgy and Sacraments Across the Deanery

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Church Reversed

“Each of us is called to actively participate as a member of a parish, the Universal Church and our local Church, led by our archbishop. Parishes continually deepen the bonds of communion with other parishes.” (Church principle)

Part of understanding yourselves as Church is being involved with the other Families of Parishes in your area — your deanery. 

With the leadership of the dean, your pastor and parish leaders should look for opportunities to collaborate and communicate with all parishes in the deanery.

For example, you could compile and publish a full listing of all communal penance services in Advent or Lent, or even all confession times, throughout the deanery. If this information is published on the dean’s Family website (or even a new website dedicated solely to the deanery), it could then be linked on each Family’s site, social media, etc.

Even just having a collective schedule of weekday Masses, or links to all the Families within your deanery, could be valuable for those needing (or even just occasionally wanting) to worship outside your own Family of Parishes.

This also lays the groundwork for later meeting Parameter 10:

Church Reversed

Families collaborate with other Families within the deanery to provide coordinated pastoral ministry (e.g. hospitals, care facilities, young adult evangelization, high schools, jails, etc.) (Parameter 10)

I am convinced that Beacons of Light, born of great hope, will enable us to form stronger parishes, centered on the Eucharist, that radiate the love of Christ and joy of the Gospel… God has abundantly blessed our first two centuries and will certainly bless the next.

— ARCHBISHOP DENNIS M. SCHNURR