Parish Leadership Night - Council Minutes
October
6, 2005
In Attendance: Lindsey McCormick, Lynn Spinner, Fred
Bradbury, Tom Fleming, Greg Campbell, Megan Carmean,
Mark Daly, Christopher Spinner, Maureen Durner, Fr.
Carroll and Sandra Wood
Absent:Linda Ruskin, Deacon Bill Nickum, Flo Petroski, Joe
Amalfitano, Karen Gianninoto, Eric Fessenden, Joe
Doherty, Meredith Sides, Deacon Brad Taylor
Council Agenda
A. Approval Of September Minutes
* No additions, No corrections, Approved as written
B. Committee Highlights
Liturgy-
* 2 new team members were acquired through the
Ministry Fair
* There are 53 members of the church going to the
Eucharistic Congress.
* Adoration is 10/23- 10/28 from 6-9 p.m. There will
be 1/2 hour slots available. The sign-up is in the
back of the churches.
* World Youth Day is being celebrated the weekend of
10/22 and 10/23. Look for a special “something” at
mass.
Parish and Family Life-
* Donny Gallagher has been updating the web site for
our committee.
* The church picnic is well organized and scheduled
for Sunday at 2 p.m. at Tuckahoe State Park.
* Sodality Bazaar- Flo has been gaining ideas on
advertising and vendors.
* Family Support and Education- Tony and Kaken
Gianniato have offered to speak about PADD (Parents
Against Destructive Decisions)after the 8:30 mass in
the parish Hall
* Bill Wegener will be here Feb. 12-15 for a
Pre-Lenten Mission. We will help with hospitality on
different evenings.
* Katrina Refuges- Pearson Family- We will help pay
for the cost of the return trip to check on their
residence.
* The Senior Luncheon is scheduled for Nov. 11th.
Veteran’s Day- The King family, Cheryl Carmean and
others will assist in mailing postcard as invitations.
* All Soul’s Remembrance will be on Nov. 2nd - We will
help with light refreshments.
Christian Formation-
* Registration is now open Online for Ministries
Weekend (Jan. 20-22 ‘06) Catechists are encouraged to
attend.
* Super Sunday #3 will be November 6. The topic for
children will be the All Saints Fair.
* The bishop will host a meeting on October 17, 2005
at 10:00 a.m. at Holy Cross in Dover to discuss the
contents of the Pastoral Letter “ Go and Teach: Facing
the Challenges of Catechesis Today” The letter is
available on the Diocesan web site for review.
Social Ministries-
General:
* The 2nd annual Diocesan Ministries weekend will be
held at the Clarion Resort Hotel in Ocean City on
January 20-22
* Ministries Fair on Sunday 9-25-05 netted us one
possible new member.
* We are investigating if there are other ways that we
can help the victims of Hurricane Katrina. A list of
the parish that have relatives or friends affected by
the hurricanes is being compiled. Meanwhile, the
parish has committed to buying plane fare back for a
catholic family in Greensboro that were evacuated from
New Orleans.
* October 24th at 7:30 p.m. is the next proposed
meeting for Social Ministries.
Habitat For Humanity:
* The next breakfast is Saturday October 15th.
* Due to increased food cost and fuel surcharges
placed on our food orders, we will need to examine how
to make breakfast more profitable with the small
numbers that come out to support the breakfast. We
just made a little over our expenses at the last
breakfast. Two ways have been discussed , one is to
increase the cost by $1.00 and the second is to cut
back on food expense by limiting to one type of egg
selection and not buying Sysco french toast and fixing
pancakes instead.
* The Dover Race Cleanup Fundraiser brought out 11
people from the parish who spent Saturday 9-24-05
working at Dover Downs Raceway. We are estimating
that we raised close to $700 with this event. This is
down from last years $900 due to not being able to max
out our numbers at 15 like last year. Thank you to
all who supported this fundraiser.
* The Habitat Golf Tournament will be on Monday
October 17th. We are looking to be a Bronze Level Tee
Sponsor.
Human Dignity:
*October is Respect Life Month. There was an article
in the bulletin this past week on Respect Life issues.
Samaritan House-United Concerned Christians
* October donations will be for Samaritan House and we
will be collecting Peanut Butter.
St. Martins Ministries-
* St. Martins is asking if we can provide people on
Wednesdays evenings to help sort food and clothing.
We are looking into this.
San Marcos Committee-
* The Free Trade Coffee sales started up again and
will be selling coffee, teas and coco at the Super
Sunday events.
Voice of the Homeless Committee-
* The committee continues at looking into how we might participate with
St. Luke’s to provide Saturday lunches for the homeless as well as
participate in refurbishing a dwelling that can be used as a shelter.
In addition, we will be investigating the grant process through
Catholic Campaign to help with the shelter expense.
C. Finance Report-
*In response to the presentation of the document-
the consensus was very well done.
Good that it was done before masses.
Good idea to have Ed Centofante present Bringing our
Vision
To Life.
Positives and Negatives to the Pastor presenting the information to the
parish.
+ It is good for hear the Pastor articulate the financial picture
- It is bad if ONLY the Pastor knows
* In response to the physical document-
M. Durner stated how pleased she was with how much
the parish has accomplished
Tom Fleming’s Report-
He spoke to over 50 families in the parish to see
their thoughts on the parish.
-Overwhelming response of Love for Fr. Carroll
himself and
his homilies.
-Many people thought the finance report was very
detailed- discussion was that too much detail can be
better than not enough. Lynn Spinner said people take
away what they can from a document like this.
-As a parish we hope we give the impression that we
do live
within our means, have no debt and are not
hiding anything .
-parishioners want to see more savings built up
- Parishioners asked about a new church in the
future
- Parishioners asked about the cemetery project and
how it is coming
- People like to see the happenings of the church-
The Vision of Life is actually seen by way of projects
being done. For example, parishioners can see the
railings have been put up using the funds given.
- Noone really negative although a few parishioners
don’t feel they know what is going on in the other
church.
Luncheon on Nov. 11th may help change this- The
entire building will be open for parishioners to see.
Last years luncheon had 85 people, looking for more
this year since it is a holiday.
D. Old Business
Ministry Fair
Liturgy Committee got 2 new members through the fair
and Social committee got 1 person.
A suggestion was made to do the fair more than 1 x a
year but not too often to make it routine.
Discussion came from this about how to get more of
the 500 parishioners active in the church even though
we have the most help we’ve had in 20 years.
Is Parish Leadership night a place for people to
come and see what they can do to help? Responses
varied
1. thought it was too overwhelming for someone not
already involved.
2. Might find someone who just needed the invite and
they will find their niche in the church
3. Open House for Parish Leadership night
4. invite people by word of mouth keep it on the
personal level. Some people would feel better having
the personal contact and feel they are wanted to be a
part of the church not just to do stuff.
5. Other suggestions were to do mass e-mails with
highlights of committees or Emil small groups of
people the same information to keep it more personal.
6. Highlight 1 committee each month to get
information out to all parishioners about what the
committees do and what committee commitment can be
since it varies.
This can be done by:
-taking 5-10 minutes of Super Sunday
-before/after masses
- NOT bulletin, people do not think it would be read
7. Father said maybe a -Help Wanted Ad- where each
committee will put out an ad looking for a specific
thing to be accomplished. For example: I am looking
for a person who can .....
* We all need to make a conscious effort to ask
someone to come to Parish leadership night - Dec 14th.
It will be open to anyone who has helped our church
in any way.
* Lynn Spinner asked that the council members NOT
present , who did not let someone know they would not
be here, be asked why they are not here.
E. Pastors Report
October Is Respect Life Month
*There has been and will continue to be bulletin
inserts this month.
Other Business
* October 13th Living Rosary
* We are actually counting the number of people
attending mass in the month of October
*2 youth going to the National Catholic Youth
Conference
* Over 18,000 youth gathering in Atlanta
* the council decide to donate $500 to sponsor a
youth from either Biloxi, Mississippi or New Orleans
to attend the conference. This is direct ministry to
people affected by Katrina
F. Closing Prayer
Successful Catholics are members of a faith community.
NEXT MEETING WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 9th.