Saint Frances Cabrini Parish

Father Kleppner - March 2, 2008

In order to prevent my being misquoted and or misunderstood, I share with you what I said at our State of the Parish talk on February 24, 2008. As always, I talked about our Parish Share Program as well as the temporal, spiritual, and pastoral aspects of St. Frances Cabrini Parish. I told our people that diocesan officials and Bishop Zubik informed us that we should continue with plans for our church building. At present, L.D. Astorino is doing the schematic design. When all drawings are completed, and we can show everyone what the church will look like inside and out, we will begin our capital campaign. I am hoping that this can begin in the fall of 2008.
With regard to Envisioning Ministry, I made the following remarks. When we began the Envisioning Ministry process, every priest was told they were to meet with their pastoral councils and pastoral councils in a given cluster were to meet with each other. They were given the task of imagining their parish with one less priest. Parishes with three priests were to consider having only two priests. Parishes with only two priests were to consider only one priest and parishes with only one priest were to consider having no priest. In light of this, we were asked to come up with recommendations for the bishop as for how, in the future, with less priests we were going to meet the spiritual and pastoral needs of the people in our cluster with special emphasis on the centrality of the celebration of the Eucharist. We were also asked to consider how parishes in a given cluster might more effectively share programs, personnel, and resources. Our cluster consists of Our Lady of Fatima, St. Titus, St. John the Baptist, St. Catherine of Siena, and St. Frances Cabrini.
As you know, we have a declining number of priests who are getting older. If every priest who were eligible to retire at this time did so we would have approximately 30 parishes without a priest. Given the fact that now priests are being given the responsibility of two and three parishes, more priests are opting to retire at 70 rather than at 75. What will be some of the possibilities for the future? One possibility will be the closing and merging of more parishes. This is already being done and more will follow. Some parishes may be led by a deacon or a lay ecclesial minister, such as a parish life collaborator (as is being done in Penn Hills), or a pastoral associate. If available, a priest would come in to celebrate the Eucharist and other sacraments.
When Bishop Wuerl began the reorganization in our diocese, he said that he had two choices. He could watch some parishes slowly die or he could undertake the reorganization and breathe new life into our parishes and schools. Our merged parishes and schools are now finding themselves more vibrant and better off. Our parishes that have merged are more financially sound and able to carry out needed ministries. With regard to our merged schools, they are able to provide a full curriculum and keep tuition costs down. More and more we are seeing the reality of regional elementary schools. Given the costs of schools today, this seems to be the way of the future.
As I said, pastoral councils are supposed to be meeting together and talking about the future ministry in order to make recommendations to the bishop regarding the future of their given area. I must be perfectly honest with you and tell you that parishes in our cluster have not been meeting and are not meeting at the present time. At the last meeting of the diocesan consultors I asked Bishop Zubik how he intends to address such situations. He said that he prefers recommendations come from the bottom up, i.e. from parishes themselves. However, if parishes do not participate in the Envisioning process, then decisions will come from the top down that is from the diocese and ultimately the bishop himself. Bishop Zubik made very clear to the consultors that the ongoing Envisioning Ministry process is not optional. Please keep Bishop Zubik in your prayers because in the future he is going to have to make some difficult decisions for the spiritual and pastoral welfare of all the people of our diocese.
So that you might understand that the information you have received is not coming just from me, I share with you the discussion that took place at the December 3, 2007 meeting of the Priest Council.
Envisioning Ministry: Mr. Flaherty, Associate General Secretary of the Diocese, reported that consultants were being used to facilitate planning groups in pilot projects in our Diocese (this is happening with parishes in the Northern area of Beaver County, i.e. Christ the Divine Teacher, St. Rose, and St. Philomena) and that interim guidelines for parish pastoral councils had been developed and promulgated. He also reviewed the criteria that had been emerging from envisioning ministry. The criteria include: 1) Make the parish the priority; 2) Affirm the role of the ministerial priesthood; 3) Maintain an effective linkage between parish vitality and clergy vitality; 4) Create the greatest good with the least disruption; and 5) Practice fiscal responsibility, maintaining the current equilibrium between income and expenses by reallocating resources rather than growing the diocesan budget.
Bishop Zubik said that he has many questions about the Envisioning Ministry program such as where it is headed and whose vision it is. He noted that this is a very important process and that that the Bishop’s vision must be a part of it.
The discussion of this issue raised many concerns such as: 1) Our pastors need stability; 2) We need to watch over our priests and diocesan projects more carefully; 3) We need to monitor approved diocesan policies; 4) Priest should be informed about changes affecting their ministry; 5 ) We need to review how priests are prepared to become pastors.
Clergy Distribution and Parish Reorganization: Mr. Flaherty proposed the following questions for consideration by the Priest Council: 1) Should the preference be to reduce the number of parishes to be served in order to reflect the present and projected number of priest available, or should parish communities that are viable and vital be allowed to continue while some alternative form of pastoring is found?; 2) What constitutes a viable parish? What steps can and should be taken if a parish is determined not to be viable?; and 3) Given the experience of parish reorganization when multiple church buildings remained open when parishes were combined, does the Diocese prefer the “one parish, one church building” model?
The Priest Council observed: 1) This issue is not about the number of priests but the number of people; 2) The present has become the future; 3) One size does not fit all; 4) We cater to the divisions among parishes; and 4) Our concern has been too much on buildings and not enough on people.

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