St. Andrew's Parish Pastoral Council Consultation Exercise
September 2015
Introduction
In June this year we gave you an overview of the feedback received from parishioners during the consultation exercise held in April 2015. We let you know that the Parish Pastoral Council (PPC) would review all comments made and use this information to help shape our priorities and build a three year plan for the Parish bearing in mind the original aims of the consultation. That process is now complete and the PPC has signed off a plan with various areas to focus on over the next three years.
At this stage we’d like to give you a further update on some of the feedback we’ve already taken forward as well as sharing our intentions for other areas. Existing parish groups and individuals will take some suggestions and ideas forward. Others will need new individuals or groups in order to be progressed. At the most recent PPC meeting, it was decided to arrange a weekend asking parishioners to sign up to giving a little time to progress suggestions made.
Sign up Sunday
This will take place in the upper hall on 28th & 29th November after all Masses. This will be an opportunity to find out more and consider becoming involved in some of the areas highlighted in the consultation as important for our Parish. More detail will be announced in the bulletin nearer the time. Without your help, it will not be possible to take everything forward, so please think about coming along. All areas where extra volunteers are needed are underlined in this update.
You might remember from the summary in April that the main priorities for attention stood out quite clearly and included youth, music and faith formation. Further detail is set out below.
Pastoral
In the area of pastoral care, the PPC concluded the priorities are finding ways to encourage more parishioners who aren’t so involved in the life and mission of the church, to join us in the parish again, longer term support to those bereaved and increasing the availability of transport to Mass. Highlighting opportunities for youngsters to be involved in helping the disadvantaged through the soup run and SVDP in particular were also agreed for action. The content of Our Reachout, which is issued by hand to 1,100 homes in the parish, will be tailored with this in mind. We concluded it would be good to start a bereavement support group and will ask at ‘Sign Up Sunday’ for some parishioners to offer transport to Mass.
Youth
The impact of having no Catholic Secondary School in the local area was very clear and the PPC concluded that this area is of such importance that we should establish a group to look at the various possible ways of supporting and encouraging our youth given the absence of a Catholic Secondary. Already planned or taken place is
Catechesis
Feedback suggests the need to develop more faith formation initiatives and a Parish Faith Formation Group has been established with the remit of arranging talks to provide for ongoing faith formation. We’ve already had a talk and discussion on assisted suicide with John Deighan and dates in the diary include:
Liturgy
Our existing Parish liturgy group will progress the majority of feedback for liturgy. This includes passing on a wealth of suggestions on music at Mass for our various music groups to consider and so we concluded a meeting of all music groups would be useful. This is one area where there are some opposing views on what is wanted and that will be considered at the meeting. Given the fairly recent review of Mass times where the views of parishioners were sought and the commitment needed from parishioners to support an additional Mass, it was concluded that for the moment, Mass times will remain as they are. The Christmas Vigil will however be reinstated. At the most recent readers meeting, the ideas from consultation were passed on for consideration. It has also been agreed that the efforts of our altar servers could be better rewarded.
Social
The need to form a Parish Social Committee was agreed to fulfill the desire for more Parish social activities particularly for youth and families and to strengthen our Parish community. A social calendar to be posted on our website will be taken forward by that group as well as considering various suggestions for additional coffee mornings, and lots more!
Other
Work has started on updating our Parish directory to aid understanding of the various groups in the Parish, who they are, what they do and when they meet. This will help address the feedback about a lack of information and particularly help new parishioners when they join the Parish. Feedback suggested we could make better use of social media so we’ve established a Facebook page. If you’re signed up to Facebook, please go in and “like” your Parish!
There will of course be some areas where it will not be possible to take forward every suggestion made and there are various reasons for that. Where that’s the case, we’ll endeavour to let you know why that is but if you feel that doesn’t happen, please feel free to contact Parish Clergy or a member of the PPC for more information.
In June this year we gave you an overview of the feedback received from parishioners during the consultation exercise held in April 2015. We let you know that the Parish Pastoral Council (PPC) would review all comments made and use this information to help shape our priorities and build a three year plan for the Parish bearing in mind the original aims of the consultation. That process is now complete and the PPC has signed off a plan with various areas to focus on over the next three years.
At this stage we’d like to give you a further update on some of the feedback we’ve already taken forward as well as sharing our intentions for other areas. Existing parish groups and individuals will take some suggestions and ideas forward. Others will need new individuals or groups in order to be progressed. At the most recent PPC meeting, it was decided to arrange a weekend asking parishioners to sign up to giving a little time to progress suggestions made.
Sign up Sunday
This will take place in the upper hall on 28th & 29th November after all Masses. This will be an opportunity to find out more and consider becoming involved in some of the areas highlighted in the consultation as important for our Parish. More detail will be announced in the bulletin nearer the time. Without your help, it will not be possible to take everything forward, so please think about coming along. All areas where extra volunteers are needed are underlined in this update.
You might remember from the summary in April that the main priorities for attention stood out quite clearly and included youth, music and faith formation. Further detail is set out below.
Pastoral
In the area of pastoral care, the PPC concluded the priorities are finding ways to encourage more parishioners who aren’t so involved in the life and mission of the church, to join us in the parish again, longer term support to those bereaved and increasing the availability of transport to Mass. Highlighting opportunities for youngsters to be involved in helping the disadvantaged through the soup run and SVDP in particular were also agreed for action. The content of Our Reachout, which is issued by hand to 1,100 homes in the parish, will be tailored with this in mind. We concluded it would be good to start a bereavement support group and will ask at ‘Sign Up Sunday’ for some parishioners to offer transport to Mass.
Youth
The impact of having no Catholic Secondary School in the local area was very clear and the PPC concluded that this area is of such importance that we should establish a group to look at the various possible ways of supporting and encouraging our youth given the absence of a Catholic Secondary. Already planned or taken place is
- A parish youth retreat took place in June,
- A further date organised in conjunction with a youth Mass and pizza for our 12- 16 year olds on 24th October to be led by the Archdiocese youth office.
- A retreat with P6 &7 pupils in St Andrew’s with the theme ‘ This is our faith’ will take place.
- At “Sign Up Sunday" we will highlight specific opportunities for youth to take responsibility such as J&P.
Catechesis
Feedback suggests the need to develop more faith formation initiatives and a Parish Faith Formation Group has been established with the remit of arranging talks to provide for ongoing faith formation. We’ve already had a talk and discussion on assisted suicide with John Deighan and dates in the diary include:
- Our parish retreat on 4th October
- A talk on the Synod and family life by Bishop Keenan on 28th October.
- A four week series of Advent reflections planned.
Liturgy
Our existing Parish liturgy group will progress the majority of feedback for liturgy. This includes passing on a wealth of suggestions on music at Mass for our various music groups to consider and so we concluded a meeting of all music groups would be useful. This is one area where there are some opposing views on what is wanted and that will be considered at the meeting. Given the fairly recent review of Mass times where the views of parishioners were sought and the commitment needed from parishioners to support an additional Mass, it was concluded that for the moment, Mass times will remain as they are. The Christmas Vigil will however be reinstated. At the most recent readers meeting, the ideas from consultation were passed on for consideration. It has also been agreed that the efforts of our altar servers could be better rewarded.
Social
The need to form a Parish Social Committee was agreed to fulfill the desire for more Parish social activities particularly for youth and families and to strengthen our Parish community. A social calendar to be posted on our website will be taken forward by that group as well as considering various suggestions for additional coffee mornings, and lots more!
Other
Work has started on updating our Parish directory to aid understanding of the various groups in the Parish, who they are, what they do and when they meet. This will help address the feedback about a lack of information and particularly help new parishioners when they join the Parish. Feedback suggested we could make better use of social media so we’ve established a Facebook page. If you’re signed up to Facebook, please go in and “like” your Parish!
There will of course be some areas where it will not be possible to take forward every suggestion made and there are various reasons for that. Where that’s the case, we’ll endeavour to let you know why that is but if you feel that doesn’t happen, please feel free to contact Parish Clergy or a member of the PPC for more information.