Parish Pastoral Council Meeting – November 21, 2017
Present Council Members: Father Tony VanderLoop, Tim Davis, Renee Berens, Dick Frie, Nancy Maas, MikeMoran, Bill Renner, Tim Pauly, Paul Dehmer and Dean Flicker.

Parish Trustee: Les Wilmot and Jan Zaruba

Members absent: Carl Brakob, Pat Ray and Linda O’Donnell.

1)Opening prayer led by Tim Davis.

2)Presentation – Scheduled for Erica Farnsworth to talk about Baptism but she was unable to attend. Father Tony passed out some information about “letters to Parents” that could be used after Baptism in order to keep parents “connected” to Saint Henry. Questions was asked “do we require parents to be members of St. Henry?” Father responded he asks the parents who live in the area to become members, even if they were members with their parents so that the new family are registered here. Sometimes parents bring their children back to Saint Henry to be baptized. In that case Father requires they provide information stating they have taken baptism classes at their home parish.

  1. Open Forum –
  2. Dick Frie has been approached by parishioners regarding security. How do we respond when we have an intruder, what is our procedure? Should we get direction from Wright County Sheriff’s Office? Father plans to have a discussion with Dan and that perhaps the Ushers need a refresher on how to handle intruders. Do we need a formal plan for intruders? Do we need to refresh the “storm” signs to be more current? Father asked for volunteers to work with Dan on a formal plan. Dick Frie and Tim Pauly volunteered to help.
  3. Tim Davis was approached about having Coffee & Donuts in the Gathering Space. He was asked if the space was being used as designed,with proper reverence. Father stated that we have tables selling tickets, sign ups, sales of many kinds, it is a space where we share the life of the community. Father stated he requests we come prepared for Mass in silence, do everything else afterwards. The conversation will continue at the next meeting, council asked to think of how to properly use the space.
  4. Paul Dehmer stated that he was approached about wheat at the front door and also live advent wreaths. Some people suffer with allergies and have taken to enter at the administrative entrance to avoid the smells that aggravate their allergies. Father said we will use live wreaths on the outside wooden church doors and fake or false wreaths on the Administrative Entrance doors as well as the St. Ben’s doors and the inside. Paul will listen for more questions regarding the issue.
  5. Bill Renner was asked “why can’t Mass start on time?” Father responded that Mass on the weekend does start on time. Sometimes the Saturday night Mass starts late because he is hearing confessions but he is determined that Mass on Sunday will begin on time.
  1. Liaison Reports:
    Communication, Parish Life, And Stewardship: Paul - CCW is planning a Quilt Bingo in the Spring and have discussed holding it in the Gathering Space because there would be more room. Apparently they are expecting many more people than the Social Hall can hold. All funds from this event will go toward the Maintenance Fund. Tim – He talked with Marg about New Member Registration. Marg has concerns about how to keep newly registered members active. One of her biggest concerns is that there are people who come to Mass and send their children to religion classes but are not signed up as members. Marg will be presenting to the council next month so council was asked to be prepared to help her with ideas on how to reach out to the community, parents of children currently registered for Faith Formation that are not members, and how to let children know that once they become adults they need to register on their own. Should we expand the info currently placed in the bulletin when someone registers to include something more about them that could connect them to other parishioners – such as “he comes from Cold Spring and is an engineer?”

Faith Formation and Evangelization: No reports.
Sacraments and Worship: Renee reported that December 1st will be the environment changeover as well as replacing all the missals. Much help is needed.
Charity, Pastoral Care and Justice: Mike attended the Mission Outreach meeting last week. They have a $1000 budget, recently gave $250 to Great River Family Promise. SHARE currently feeds 130 families, the next SHARE is on December 2nd at the high school. The Sharing Tree is up and they will be sorting gifts on December 8th, wrapping and buying on December 9th and handing out gifts on December 10th. We were supposed to host Great River Family Promise families from November 19-26 but there are currently no families to serve. Diana will be on-call during the week in case a family presents. GRFP will be holding a fundraiser for the programs and are looking for baked goods and silent auction items. More details in the coming weeks. There will be an article in the upcoming newsletter about the success of the recent Free Store.
Hispanic Ministry & Collaboration: No report.
Maintenance Board (Building and Grounds): Meets quarterly, next meeting sometime in January.

  1. Old Business–
  2. Holy Water Stoups. Father took the council into the Worship Space and showed them the placement. He hopes that they can be installed before Christmas.
  3. New Business:
  4. Parish Visioning – Father handed out several sheets of information regarding his hopes for a new parish vision statement and how to proceed. See attached.
  5. Mass counts. Father Tony is asked by the Archdiocese to take Mass counts every year in October at all Masses. The question was asked “Is this a trend?” He said that parishes report the numbers are down in all parishes, all over. We are not alone.
  6. Father attended a workshop that talked about living out our mission in our time. We should focus our energy in one area, and he wanted to discuss models of visioning. He likes the idea of a Call to Mercy and focus on the “Second Greatest Story Ever Told.” He asked “does it make sense to focus on one area, in one direction, bringing folks in or back to the Catholic Church. “
  7. Small Groups – Father and Deacon Mike recently met with Jean Stolpestad from the Archdiocese on how to start the Small Group Program here at Saint Henry. They could be Open Groups that people can flow in and out of at different time, different days, at church, in homes. All group leaders could be trained by Jean.
  8. Deacon Mike talked about Mercy – in 1933 a small nun began to have visions of Christ telling her that confession is a Merciful Sacrament. Divine Mercy Sunday was established in 2000. Small groups that begin in January would end on Divine Mercy Sunday.
  9. Father Tony Updates: Father is of the opinion that the focus of the Parish Pastoral Council needs to change – focus less on reports and more on where our vision is taking us.

8. Next meeting will be December 19 at 7:15 PM. Next presentation subject will be New Member Registration with Marg Mass.
9. Closing prayer by Renee Berens at 9:30PM.

Respectfully submitted,
Susan Holmes, Secretary