You don’t think there are enough hours in the day for laypeople? Try being a parish pastor.
There’s all the spiritual and sacramental ministry the position entails, plus the work that goes along with being, quite often, the only priest in a sizable suburban parish with plenty of staff and even more demands.
How does a pastor handle it all? This summer, in an effort to help answer that question, the International Institute for Clergy Formation at Seton Hall University in New Jersey joined with the Washington-based National Leadership Roundtable on Church Management to offer a “best practices” seminar to 28 parish priests — most of them from New Jersey and Pennsylvania, which constitute Region III of the U.S. bishops’ conference, but also from West Virginia, Florida and Louisiana.
The idea to conduct such a seminar had been in the mind of Father Paul Holmes, a Newark, N.J., archdiocesan priest, since 2000, when he taught at the Pontifical North American College in Rome. But different assignments — and his own “busy-ness” — kept him from actively pursuing the idea for several years.
I am actually impressed at how busy Roman Catholic priests are. My own not only pastors a 23,000 member parish who speak 3 languages, has daily mass, daily responsibilities in the parish K-8 school, weekly middle school and teen bible study groups, twice weekly reconcilliation, once weekly mens discipleship group, once weekly young (male) adult “hanging out eating pizza, and talking about vocations” group, plus weddings, baptisms, quinceneras etc that occur at least weekly.
He does have a competant staff who manages finances, stewardship, other bible studies, the parish school of religion (for 7,000) the various ministries including a 4day/week food pantry, and he has 2 deacons, a spanish speaking priest and a nun who handle hospital/nursing home visitations (unless somebody is dying, in which case he does it).
However, for 24,000/year + housing and expenses, I would say that he is seriously worth his keep…
Dunno how he does it.
My parish priest is 84 (!) years old – a Jesuit. He is outstanding in every way. The liguries are beautiful. His pastoral care is outstanding. His teaching is superb. He is deeply loved. I do not know how he continues … but he does. We are blessed while we have him.
I attended a huge parish for 5 years. The priest was in constant motion for dawn to dusk. (Priests have only one day off … no housekeeper or any personal assistance of any kind.) I have encountered him regularly in hospitals at all hours (I have a big staff … and there will always be medical emergencies). He is a deeply compassionate person although a bit reserved. He will get up at any hour to attend to any need … including those in other parishes. He also could have retired along ago … but continues on.
Oops “liturgies” … terrible typist.
Please, please, please can we have a seminar like this on best practice over here in England? More and more I am an administrator; the pastor gets squeezed out too often. Challenges include:
– keeping the eye on the bigger, strategic picture while meeting the pressing needs of the moment
– juggling availability against the need for time to pray, study, reflect
– allowing autonomy while building up a parish team
– drawing upon the skills, talents, and discernment of the People of God, while keeping a light hand on the tiller
Finally, the changes I could never have foreseen in seminary revolve around IT: storage of data, communcations via internet, etc. Some very large parishes in the US have part-time or even whole-time IT managers. I know only of one here in the UK.
Which leads me to think of the most important juggling task of all: balancing trust, faith, simplicity, on the one hand; and finance, planning and programmes on the other. Hopefully we can follow Christ our Master in both aspects. But too often one predominates. You can guess which one.
Since some above have been generous about RC clergy, may I pay tribute to some of my Anglican confreres? The evangelicals impress me with their innovative ministries. Their ability to create new and exciting ways to reach into the community leave me impressed and sometimes envious. I have at least one catholic-minded Anglican neighbour whom I enormously respect as a man of prayer and pastoral wisdom. And his parish is thriving too.
Clueless, wow, 23,000 member parish! I’m in the Archdiocese of Louisville where, I believe, the largest parish is about 4500 members. How many masses do you have on Sunday?
#6 I learned that I misspoke. There are “only” 15,000 current active parishoners, after the church spun off another church (Anglo only), 3 miles away. That church is now independant with 8,000 folk, but send their kids to our parish school. They have a single pastor and a single administrative assistant (no deacons or associate pastors).
There are 7 “Sunday” liturgies, with Sunday beginning at Sundown on Saturday.
Saturday Evening
5:00pm Vigil mass – English
(conservative – organ music/incense)
Sunday 8am – Bilingual Spanish&English; 10am Vietnamese (They use a smaller chapel)
10:30am – English – mostly young families – (with children below first communion age (age 7) taken out for the lessons and Gospel to study the lessons in an environment geared for young children)
1PM – Spanish
4pm- Youth Mass (English) Mostly middle school, high school college and young adult, with ChristianRock band
7:30pm Spanish
The Vietamese use the “old” church building seating 650 people, while the English masses are full (in main chapel, seating 1,600), but you can find seats, the Spanish massess are standing room only.