As I See It

by Fr. Vin

State of the Parish

I had a long report on our financial situation all prepared – about eleven pages – but I’m not going to give it.  What I’m going to say about the state of our parish can be much simpler, and shorter; but I need you to give me your full attention.  The financial report is in the Bulletin, and it’s not good.  You can look at it, and my comments about it there, after Mass.

But I want to talk about something closer to my heart, and I hope to yours: the future of Our Lady of Grace, and what it can mean in the lives of all of you, of the people you love, and the people of our community.  You’ve had several tough years here, and it shows.  The decline in collections is a mirror, I think, to something you can see looking around: the number of people coming to Mass has gone down, as it also has been for years.  These things are markers of something wrong – and I’m not blaming anyone for it.  It’s happening in parishes almost everywhere.  It’s a fact that we have to deal with, like somebody coming down sick in the family.  But we also have to see whether we can do anything about it – find a diagnosis, find a cure.  And that’s where I think I can help – I have some gifts and abilities for doing just that.  But I’m going to need the help of every one of you if we’re going to do it; we can only do it together.

We need a long-term plan to bring people back, to deepen the connection to Christ of those who do come, to make Christ a living force in the lives of the young people in Religious Ed (and of those young people who never even get to Religious Ed).  There aren’t any short-term fixes.  I’ve been talking with the staff, and the Pastoral Council, and the Finance Council, about some things that have been immensely successful in certain other parishes around the country.  Some of our leaders have been to visit one such parish on Long Island, and they’re excited about what they’ve seen.  I hope to be able to lay out some concrete plans for you after Christmas, but I want you to know now that some new things are in the works, and I believe they’re much more powerful than just any bright ideas I may have – these things are based on some of the best thinking about helping people and churches to grow that exist anywhere.  But back to now.

When we see people drifting away, or just sitting passively if they do come to church, the heart of the problem is evident: They’re not engaged, don’t feel much ownership of, and responsibility for, what happens.  The heart of what we need to do, together, is to help people to discover (or rediscover) that connection to Jesus in His church that makes people come spiritually alive.  Engaged people stay connected; they take ownership.   That’s happened for some of you – and if it’s happened, it’s probably changed your life.  We can help it to happen for others.  But to do that, so that we can keep going for a couple of years until longer-term plans bear fruit, we need to start doing a few things right now:

First, I need you to trust me, and trust one another, and trust yourselves, and (most of all) trust Jesus Christ.  Trust what’s been created here already; you’ve seen successes, seen that working together, we can bring people back to worship, and back to Christ.  But I can’t do that alone, just as you can’t.  Together, we can.  We need to get beyond superficial likes and dislikes so that we can discover the power of Christ’s Spirit working in each of us, giving us gifts and calling us to work together.

Second, I need you – every one of you – to become an apostle with me.  Begin to invite people to what you find good here, to what you anticipate coming to here.  Thanksgiving Mass, Christmas Mass, Taizé prayer, Bible study, sewing, Knights of Columbus, the food pantry…  Be an ambassador for Christ: Invite people to get engaged; trust that they will come to love what you have come to love here.  Don’t keep what’s good here to yourself.

Third, I need you to make some sacrifices.  Give up old hurts, resentments, gossip, and critical attitudes that hurt you and hurt your family and hurt the parish and the church. 

And make  a financial sacrifice for the sake of our work together.  I know some of you already do that, and you’re the lifeblood of Christ’s work here, for which we should all be grateful.  But if our parish is going to get growing again, rather than slide into decline, every single one of you is going to have to take financial responsibility to the degree that you can.  Financial sacrifice has amazing spiritual power.

Let me tell you my own story here.  I became a priest because I grew up in a Catholic family where priests were honored, and I wanted to be the best I could.  I was also fascinated by ideas about God, and by the mystery of ritual.  As I went through school I found that I could succeed, and after I was ordained people liked my pastoral work and my ideas and my preaching.  But there was a pretty big gap in my spiritual life: I was doing things that were easy for me – there was little of the cross involved, and little of the power of the cross.

It wasn’t until about fifteen years after I was ordained – about twenty years ago – that I learned about real engagement with Christ alive.  (That might sound funny from a priest, but it’s true.)  And the part of the Gospel I had to take seriously in order to meet Christ was what we heard today in the Gospel – giving not out of our surplus, but out of trust.  That made no rational sense to me – I think I only did it out of desperation, because I was “stuck” in my friendship with God, and didn’t know what else to do.  So I started holding myself to the Biblical standard, giving 10% of my income to charity.  Writing the first checks was frightening, they seemed so big.  But I’ve learned that in dry times spiritually my sacrificial giving – for me, giving of money even more than of time or talent – is what reconnects me to God’s love for me.

You may not be able to give 10% of your income; but you can sacrifice.  And you need to – for the parish’s well-being, yes, but mostly to become more in love with God, and learn more about God’s love for you.

If you’re already giving sacrificially, again, thanks; but don’t rest on what you’re now doing.  Ask what God is inviting you to now.  Each year I ask again, and a few years ago I realized I can give even more; so I set a 15% standard for myself.  Ask God what’s right for you, right now.  God’s answer will come only out of God’s love for you.

If you’ve been giving something, but sort of out of habit, take this as a wake-up call.  What do you give right now?  Is what your giving a message to you that you’re not really engaged, don’t feel that you’re much a part of our parish?  That can change: You can discover a sort of life you won’t now believe by letting God draw you in…and part of that is challenging yourself: Will you sacrifice, including financially, to take that step toward God?

If you’re a young person who’s been riding your parents’ coat-tails and not giving because “that’s what grownups do, and I have loans, and school, and car payments, and …”  Well, if you want to mature in your faith, you need to step into an adult style: If you have an income, you should be giving something each week.  (When I was a campus minister I used to recommend the “pizza standard”: Give the cost of one pizza each week.  Or consider giving what your cell phone costs each month.)  The point is not the money itself: the point is that, as Jesus says over and over, our money-choices and our values are locked together; we can’t separate them.  To get more connected to Jesus, sacrifice.  You can get started with envelopes on the way out, as the rest of us get ours.

If you’re not giving because you’re angry at the church and its leaders, I have a special message for you: Join the club.  I’m probably angrier than you are at some of the stupidity I deal with in church life – and I deal with it more frequently than you do.  But I know, and I’m telling you, that we cut our own lifeline to Christ when we let anger or cynicism get in the way of generosity. Don’t damage yourself.  Criticism and standoffishness are easy: trust and engagement are hard.  But we grow through trust, not through cynicism and anger.

Before this gets longer than the original talk I threw away, I’ll close.  But I want to go back to just two key ideas.

First, I believe Christ is inviting us on an adventure – to bring more people to Him through Our Lady of Grace.  Christ will guarantee we can do it – that’s what today’s first reading was about.  But we have to trust: Him, one another, and ourselves. 

Second, that trust has to show itself in sacrifice.  Too much more drift and the parish will be badly damaged.  Staff will have to be let go, programs ended, and the whole operation shrunk.  That’s no good foundation to do Christ’s work.  So go out of your way, starting today, to invest yourself more deeply in Our Lady of Grace.  Look for things to invite people to, for ways to invite people, for people to invite.  Let your enthusiasm out, and share it.  And when you leave here this week, make a plan to give sacrificially for your own spiritual benefit and for the holy work Christ calls us to together.

I believe Christ has a vision for what we can become – and we can discover that vision together, and make it real here.  I’ll be saying more after Christmas, or thereabouts, about how.  But you can see – in the financial report in today’s Bulletin, or just by looking around at Mass – that we can’t wait; we have to start rebuilding right now.

I’ll be at the doors if you want to talk to me, or you can write or e-mail during the week.  I invite each one of you, in the name of Christ, to take up this challenge, and I’ll do what I can to help us all to do just that.

Thank you for all you do for Christ each day; may God give you his peace.

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