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2013 Guidelines for Parish Councils

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2013 Guidelines for Parish Councils • TAble of Contents • 1 Letter of Welcome (Cardinal Wuerl) 2 INTRODUCTION 2 The Church our Spiritual Home 4 The Vocation and Mission of the Laity 4 The Establishment of Parish Pastoral Councils Diocesan Parish Pastoral Councils Code of Canon Law Responsibilities of Pastoral Councils 6 PASTORAL COUNCIL POLICY GUIDELINES 6 Officers of the Council 6 Roles and Responsibilities of Council Members 7 Role of Parish/School Employees 8 Size of the Council 8 Selection of Members Appointment by Pastor Selection of Representative by Parish Organizations Election of Members 8 Length of Service 9 Vacancy 9 Change of Pastor 9 Frequency of Meetings 9 Pastoral Council Procedure 9 The Nature of Consultation 10 Consensus as an Expression of Communion 10 Accountability and Transparency 11 APPENDIX 11 Indicators of Vitality and the New Evangelization11 11 A Parish Self-Assessment Tool 12 Indicators of Vitality Survey Questions 14 The Planning Process 16 Examples of Goals 18 Prayer and the Dissernment Resources 18 Resources for Pastoral Planning 24 GLOSSARY Dear Sisters and Brothers in the Lord, IT IS A PLEASURE to present and authorize the 2013 edition of the Parish Pastoral Council Guidelines for use in the Archdiocese of Washington. The archdiocesan Parish Pastoral Council Guidelines become effective Tuesday, April 30, 2013. IA Parish Pastoral Council is an important consultative body that comes together under the direction of the pastor to provide him advice and support for the good of the parish community. These guidelines reflect the experience of the Secretariat for Pastoral Ministry and Social Concerns and its collabora- tion with parishes over the past three years in the implementation of a pastoral planning process using the Indicators of Vitality as well as consultation with the Priest Council and the Archdiocesan Pastoral Council. They are intended to assist pastors and parish leadership in establishing a new or reviewing a current Parish Pastoral Council to see how it can most effectively function at the service of the parish. In this graced time, when we as an archdioce- san Church focus on the challenges of the New +•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+ Evangelization and do so in the context of our own archdiocesan synod, these guidelines provide …THE PARISH IS THE PLACE WHERE us an opportunity to reflect on the nature of the Church, our spiritual home, the call to a New MOST OF THE FAITHFUL EXPERIENCE Evangelization and the recognition that the parish is the place where most of the faithful experience the saving presence of Christ in the THE SAVING PRESENCE OF CHRIST IN ministry of the Church. THE MINISTRY OF THE CHURCH. All of us are mindful that the New Evangelization is not one specific action, but rather a way of see- +•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+ ing a whole range of activities carried on by the Church to spread the Good News of Jesus Christ. To be sure, this work is underway in our parishes. Yet, all of us recognize that there is more to be done. Our efforts at passing on the Gospel call us to look deeper into the vitality of our faith as it is expressed and lived in our parishes and in the homes of the faithful. The Synod on the New Evangelization affirmed that parishes, gathered in communion with their bishop and under the direction of the pastor, are called to be centers of the life of the Church. It said the bishops gathered in synod reaf- firmed that the parish continues to be the primary presence of the Church in neighborhoods, the place and instrument of Christian life, which is able to offer opportunities to dialogue among people, for listening to and announcing the Word of God, for organic catechesis, for training in charity, for prayer, adoration and joyous Eucharistic celebrations. My hope is that these Parish Pastoral Council Guidelines will assist pastors and parishioners alike in revitalizing and utilizing this consultative structure for a more fervent and vibrant experience of God’s love poured out in his Church. With every good wish, I am Faithfully in Christ, Archbishop of Washington ARCHDIOCESE OF WASHINGTON • PARISH PASTORAL COUNCIL GUIDELINES 1 • Introduction • The Church, Our Spiritual Home CHRIST IS THE WAY. When Jesus first came among us, he offered us a whole new way of living. In the Gospel we learn that we have been invited to be branches connected to the vine of the Lord, to eat the bread of everlasting life and to hear words of truth, words that endure forever. This is the mission of the Church in and through the ministry of the parish. In his pastoral letter on the New Evangelization, Disciples of the Lord: Sharing the Vision, Cardinal Wuerl Cnotes that Jesus gives his disciples, the people of God, the commission to evangelize that is, to announce this “Good News” to all the nations.” In Christ, we discover not only a new way of living, through Jesus we are invited into God’s family. In Him, we become adopted sons and daughters of God. Paul summarizes it so well. “As proof that you are children, God sent the spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying out ‘Abba, Father!’ so, you are no longer a slave but a child, and if a child then also an heir, through God” (Gal 4:6-7). The family of God has another name, and that is the Church. In his pastoral letter, The Church, Our Spiritual Home, Cardinal Wuerl writes, “The family of God is called his Church. Its members, those baptized into the Church, you and I, form a body with Christ as its head. “ This image of a body with Christ as it head is an important one to help us understand the life and vitality of our Church. In the Second Vatican Council, Lumen Gentium, the Council Fathers chose this biblical theme of the Church as family to speak of the Church as “the people of God.” They emphasized that the Church is “not an abstraction or a mere human institution.” In The Church, Our Spiritual Home, the cardinal noted that the new body of Christ is made up all the members of the family of faith who are blessed with the gifts of the Spirit and united as one body.” The Church is the home of the Good News. What the Church proclaims about Jesus Christ is true. We can have confidence in our faith that comes to us in and through the Church. Our efforts at the New Evangelization—that is deepening our own faith, gaining con- fidence in the truth of that faith, and then sharing it with others—must include a clear awareness of the Church and why Jesus established this sacred means to carry out his work, a point the cardinal underscored in his book, New Evangelization: Passing on the Catholic Faith Today. The Catholic Church is the enduring, visible yet spiritual, structured yet Spirit-led, human yet divine presence of Christ in the world today. The new Body of Christ teaches in his name, sanctifies with his grace and leads with his authority. One makes a free will choice to be a member of this Church and this choice should change our lives. InThe Church, Our Spiritual Home, the cardinal points out that such a decision is itself a gift of God’s grace. That pastoral letter also emphasized that Jesus established the Church on the Apostles and gave to Saint Peter a unique and enduring authority. Saint Peter and the other Apostles were mortal, but the mission given to them was to be carried out until the end of time (cf. Mt 28:20). Christ chose men as Apostles whom he would anoint in the Holy Spirit and guide as they taught and led his Church. They in turn chose successors through the laying on of hands and the imparting of the Spirit to continue this work. It is the Spirit, poured out in the sacrament of holy orders, who is the ultimate source of the bishops’ fidelity to the truth. Today, as in the past, a temptation exists to treat the Church as if it were incidental to salvation. This theory places the individual’s personal convictions and preferences at the center. The pastoral letter on the Church notes that we do not belong to the Church to set within it our own path to salvation. We are members of the Church because we want to be shaped by its teaching and gift of grace. Christ founded the Church to be the gift to lead us to eternal life, and we redesign that gift at our own peril. ARCHDIOCESE OF WASHINGTON • PARISH PASTORAL COUNCIL GUIDELINES 2 +•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+ Authentic Catholic faith is never partial or selec- tive; it is always universal. We say yes to the whole LIKE THE UNIVERSAL CHURCH, mystery of faith and to each of its elements, a point emphasized in Cardinal Wuerl’s book, THE PARISH IS NOT A MAN-MADE Faith that Transforms Us: Reflections on the Creed. We do this because of our personal faith in God. ORGANIZATION. IT IS A We believe the truth that God reveals because we believe God, and we believe that God is still teaching in and through the Church. When Peter EUCHARISTIC COMMUNITY. came to recognize that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God, he was prepared to believe +•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+•+ any word of Jesus, for it was clear to him that God is always to be believed: “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God” (John 6:68-69). For most Catholics the most immediate experience of the Body of Christ—the Church is in the parish.
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