St. Mary Church

 Pastoral Council – August 16, 2011

Attendees: Ron Cruise, Liz Thorpe, Peter Hall, Steve Kluesner, Mindy Hart, Fr Mike Tauke. Also present: Dixie Jacobs.

Faith Sharing was led by Fr Mike. Minutes were approved.

Welcome New Members: We welcomed Steve and Mindy to the council and a brief overview of the council’s role and responsibilities.

Finance Report: See finance minutes.

Chair & Liaison Assignments: Tabled until Sept meeting due to lack of a quorum of members. Angie Beck has volunteered to be our Deanery Council Representative.  So think of leadership roles for next meeting.

Visioning: This will be a year of preparation for the transition of a new pastor. Each member shared how this may impact the parish. The #1 positive characteristic seen within the parish is presence and involvement of many young families and young people. It will be important that leadership know and speak honestly of our mission and vision for St. Mary Parish. The council will work with the Strategic Plan prepared two years ago and strategize on how to make the transition run smooth.  The Strategic Plan will be handed out in our Sept. meeting.

Question on how transition process works: Associate pastors get two year term assignments. Pastors get a six year assignment with an extension of another six years. If a pastor has reached his 65^th birthday within his second term he can stay until retirement at 70.  (Fr Mike missed it by one year). 

Next Meeting is Tues, Sept 20. Mindy will bring refreshments.



Pastor – Fr Mike Tauke, Sept 2011:

We are now in full swing with our fall schedule.  Activity within the parish begins to pick up after Labor Day weekend.

We are in the midst of lots of baptisms and we had one funeral this month.

I attended the Waterloo Deanery and Waterloo Pastoral Council meeting in August.  Angie Beck is our new parish representative on council.

We now have Phil Paladino in our homily cycle.  Eric Stromberg did a great job introducing our faith formation year.

Jenny and I worked on including a rite of welcome for two weekends and a special memorial to 9/11.  Jenny is doing great with NCYC.  You can feel the excitement growing.  The T-shirt and sweatshirt fundraiser will bring great PR for our parish.

I helped present at our Parents Sacrament Meeting.  I continue to see parents becoming more involved in their children’s faith formation and education.

I met with the local ministers this month for lunch and discussion.

Faith Formation Director – Eric Stromberg, Sept. 2011:

This year’s theme will be “Rediscovering Sacraments” as we devote our GOF sessions to an exploration of all seven sacraments.

Continuing with three sessions per month, starting in September after Labor Day and we just finished our first month covering our Catholic teaching on what a sacrament it.

Rolling out more promotion for Living Christ retreats this fall.  (New Commission members especially encouraged to attend!)

We just had our sacramental parents meetings August 28 and 31.  Distributed the “Growing Up Catholic” series and explained the new program and what we have to do to get ready for First Reconciliation in December

RCIA has three inquirers so far.  Linda Schnabel is getting them ready for our Rite of Welcome in October

Still actively working on the Archdiocesan Faith Formation Commission as Vice Chair as well as the Evangelization Task Force for the Archdiocese’ 175^th Anniversary celebration.  Presented evangelization plan to the Archbishop and Deans at St. Athanasius, August 10.  Attending AFFC meeting at St. Stephens, Saturday, 17.

Liturgist/Youth Minister – Jennifer Hulme, Sept 2011:

Continue to play at Masses and practice with groups and cantors.

Attended archdiocesan workshop on the New Roman Missal on Sept 14th.

Worship Committee met to plan the environment for the next several months. We will gradually be decorating for fall. Talked about the New Roman Missal and remembering the dead for November.

Involvement Fair on Sept 10/11. Will be training a few new liturgical ministers.

Created the “Who’s Who at St. Mary’s” insert for the bulletin Sept 10/11.

Fall Newsletters were mailed to junior high and high school students with the upcoming fall activities!

Met with Wartburg professor and Catholics Knights president to plan upcoming activities on and off campus. Plans include: a table at the Involvement Fair on campus (Sept 5) as well as at St. Mary’s (Sept 10 & 11), Bonfire at St. Mary’s on Sept 18^th and Mass on campus on October 2.

Parent Sacramental Meeting held on Aug 28^th and 31^st for parents of confirmation students. Letter was sent out to students inviting them to begin the preparation with a meeting on Sept 21.

Was present at the WSR high school on Mon, Aug 29^th when students assembled and discussed the death of a classmate.

Students and chaperones are officially registered for NCYC! Egg Casserole Breakfast on Sept 11^th. Most students are very close to reaching their financial goal. We will have another Service Auction in October and possibly a Halloween party.  After that, the students will be paying the rest of the amount needed. T-shirts and trade items have been ordered. An archdiocesan chaperone meeting will be held here at St. Mary’s on Oct 3^rd for chaperones in this area.

Parish T-shirts have been created and will be made by Nancy Wright. These will be on sale until Oct 16^th. Proceeds will help the NCYC students.

Pastoral Minister – Theresa Buss, Sept 2011:

Throughout the month of August I went on 48 visits to St Mary individuals in their homes and care centers.  I made two hospital visits.  I went on walks with two of our ladies who enjoy the company and had lunch with one.  We had two individuals on Hospice, with one of them dying.  I brought food stamp papers and information to one of our ladies who is concerned that her Social Security check may not cover her needs.

I lined-up one of our gentlemen within the parish to help one of our shut-ins with a couple of projects around the house that one of our ladies had not been able to do. 

We had our monthly mass at Bartels.  Our North Star visit was a special visit in August as it fell on Fr Mike, one of the North Star individuals and my birthday.  It was their summer camp out experience at the Izaak Waltons, in which we provided and prepared s’mores!  Fun times and a beautiful day! 

I updated the (over 80) birthday list and deceased members list for a parishioner who offers a great ministry of sending cards to these individuals and their families.  I worked on helping plan the next year roster for Just Faith, and worked on preparing the reflection for one of the weekend masses in October.



Finance Council – August 16, 2011

Attendees: LuAnn Scallon, Ron Leibold, Emily Pawlak, Chuck Mashek, and Dixie Jacobs

Chair: Tabled until Sept meeting. Kevin King has agreed to join our finance council. (Note – since the meeting Carrie Beneke will be sitting in our Sept meeting as a potential member). Dixie has contacted several other persons, and will email when the vacancy on the council has been filled.

Parish Monthly Finances: We are only one month into the new fiscal year, so no large or unusual income/expenditures to report. Our fire alarm system was struck by lightning again. This is the second time in four months. However, since our insurance deductable was met, the replacement was completely covered. The repairman said we have taken all the precautions available to prevent this from happening again. Offertory is about $2,000 behind budget, but each week we are gaining a little. The finance council hopes this trend will continue. We continue to gain a couple new households in our automatic deposit program each time we mail these in July and January. As the popularity of auto-deposits grows, we are seeing less seasonal fluctuations in our offertory.

Generations of Faith Finances: It was noted fees are behind budget. However, Dixie explained the “kick-off” sign-up weekends are the end of August. We moved up the budgeted fees, because GOF begins a month earlier (Sept). However, registrations are still coming in primarily in Sept-Oct so the budget will be adjusted to reflect this. A couple finance members attend GOF and suggested donating supplies like potato chips or disposable dishes, which was done in the past to help reduce expenses. It may take a committee similar to Parish Life to organize this. Dixie noted these expenses are pretty “bare bones” already. A concern was expressed on the cost of VBS this year of $1,000. Dixie and Eric (faith formation director) have already discussed VBS leaders reimbursing all or a portion of their t-shirt costs, which was a significant expense. We are also looking at other less costly sources for shirts.

Next Meeting: Tues, Sept 20 at 5:15 pm.