www.byzcath.org Forums News & Events Church News Door is open, Nun appointed "Parish Life Director" ?

Only in Los Angeles...a answer to the priest shortage or...

http://www.the-tidings.com/2006/0908/collier.htm

james

"She will work closely with a collaborative leadership team that includes Father Bill Axe, priest minister; Deacon Ricardo Recinos; Tere Amezcua, director of the Spanish Apostolate; and Sal Trujillo, business administrator. ...

" But the final authority is Sister Collier.She is the central leader of the parish, the one that makes the day-to-day decisions and empowers other people to use their gifts in the mission of the church, "

says St. Joseph of Carondelet Sister Sister Carol Quinlivan, director of the archdiocesan Office of Parish Life, which administers the Parish Life Director (PLD) program"

So she is above the parish priest ???

Time to apply again for transfer...or will this drift eastward ?

james

According to that article, the program in question involves installing female "parish life directors" to be, in effect, the pastors of Catholic parishes. This is taking place in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, supposedly in an attempt to deal with the priest shortage. (Cynically, I suspect that this is also a back-door attempt to get women ordained to the priesthood.)

I say "supposedly" it is an attempt to deal with the priest shortage: because the parish in question has a priest. He just doesn't want to be (or, he just isn't allowed to be) the pastor.





The director of this program for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles explained it this way: having "parish life directors" to run parishes is not to take away the power of the priest, but to free him to do the work for which he was ordained.




What the heck are these people talking about ?

I can understand hiring additional staff to assist the priest in administering the parish as the pastor. But not having a priest as the pastor ?

Are priests going to be reduced to some kind of sacramental technician and teacher, some kind of vaguely defined presider at worship services, on behalf of and as part of the "worshipping community" ?

Or, is the priest going to be allowed to be . . . a priest . . . called by Christ to pastor the community, in persona Christi, in all aspects of life, including and not limited to dispensing the sacramental Mysteries and teaching catechesis ?

Are Catholics going to be Catholic, or are we going to become Congregational Protestants of a liberal variety ?

-- John

I'm still puzzled by the "priest minister" title...and this is the Archdiocese newspaper.

This is way too Episcopalian...

james

This is becoming more common for sure. "priest minister"... well, priests DO have the power to take control if they wish. However, if they're of the ilk that believe women should have larger roles in the parish, such as the role of "pastor", then they're going to continue this practice.

I know a girl who gets PAID to be a youth minister. That's right, a whole salary from a Latin rite parish. It's her only job. They just toss money around over there, I guess.

Odd to read this, and then read objections from many that the (Latin) parish cannot afford to support a priest with family!

Michael

Was this not the original function of deacons? Why not use deacons for administrative tasks? The priest should be the pastor of the local flock, a deacon can count the collection and pay the bills.

Now I don't have a problem with women managing properties or "the campus" as such, these tasks can be delegated to paid professionals of either gender if the job is big enough and there is money in the kitty for it. (A Matushka could do it too.) But the supervisor of a priest is the bishop and none other, while the overall manager (the one with the final word) of the parish is (or should be) the priest and none other.

Now in some Orthodox parishes the parish council president has a great deal to say about the administration and expenditures, so it can work at some level. But these lay individuals are never functioning as pastors.

Michael

quote:
Originally posted by Marc Wisnosky:
I know a girl who gets PAID to be a youth minister. That's right, a whole salary from a Latin rite parish. It's her only job. They just toss money around over there, I guess.
-------------------------------------------------
What is your definition of a "girl". Do you mean a woman with the proper training to be a youth minister. A person with a M.RelEd or an M.Div. perchance.
I have read of women in Eastern orthodox parishes in the US who have been appointed as "youth ministers" or "Relgious Educations Ministers". These persons are fully trained to do the job.
The key word is minister not the sacramental priesthood.
It is significant to recall that in all of the conferences to discuss the revivial of deaconesses in the Orthodox church a distinction was made between a "minister" and the sacramental priesthood. A person who is a priest can celebrate the sacraments, while a person who is a minister can teach, instruct, counsel and be an administrator.
There are some theological schools that new offer diplomas or degrees in church administration. This trains a layperson to be responsible for the bookkeeping, the physical property maintenance and day to day operating functions of the church.
Team ministry is not the sacramental priesthood, it is ministry.

Welcome to the reign of Sr. Wanda B. Priest!

Yes - this kind of absurdity will become more and more commonplace, especially as "parish leadership" comes to replace "spiritual fatherhood." My issue is not that this is a situation where a woman is "in charge," but rather that the ordo of presbyter is almost viewed as replaceable.

Rome's overriding commitment to the ideal of a celibate priesthood has forced the faithful to suffer with nunsense like the situation detailed above.

So - no deacons are available? (Not that I favor a presiding diaconate...I do not!) Hard to believe...

As to the idea of paid "lay ministries" I do not see the issue. Quite frankly, I wish parishes could offer more paid FT positions for the laity.

Gordo

Regarding this topic, the Holy See has declared that:

This from the Vatican instruction "ON CERTAIN QUESTIONS REGARDING THE COLLABORATION OF THE NON-ORDAINED FAITHFUL IN THE SACRED MINISTRY OF PRIEST" released in 1997.

See http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/p...nts/rc_con_interdic_doc_15081997_en.html
for full text.

In article 4 of the document discusses this exact situation. It says that any use of "pastoral administrators" that are not priests should be extraordinary, based on real need and not for reasons of convenience or the "advancement of the laity".

Oh, and to respond to an above poster, it further says preference should be given to deacons to fulfill these roles.

By way of comparison, in my diocese, the diaconate program has been augmented to include training for deacons in business management so that should this situation present itself, they will be prepared to manage a parish.

In another situation that I am familiar with, the parish pastor has hired a trained business manager who takes the administrative burdens from his shoulders, though he is still the ultimate authority in the parish.

so it would seem that the situation described is something that does not have to be.

In Christ,

BOB

Dee, dee, dee.
Just ordain married men. Simple. Traditional. Apostolic. Logical.

I thought these comments from Pope Benedict were relevant:

With all due respect, I think people in this thread are talking about things without quite enough knowledge.

Yes, in several Latin jurisdictions, the concept of a non-priest parish life director is being explored. And yes, this position would be available to men and women. The men or women who are considered good candidates for these positions have to fulfill a rather strict criteria, but they could be lay people living in the secular society, religious or perhaps even monastics, if their order gives them permission to serve in this role.

Deacons could also be parish life directors, but it is discouraged, because the Deacon has his own role and function in the Church and we do not want to dig up a hole to cover another one. However, as it happens, the wives of Deacons have a huge head start, from the diaconate formation program, to fulfill the requirements, so we'll see in the near to mid future a good number of wives of Deacons as parish life directors.

Now, the idea of a parish life director stems from the shortge of priests, yes, but the idea might be a good one even with abundance of priests.

Also, the particulars of each parish where this role is implemented can be as varied as the parishes themselves are.

Yes, it is possible to have a parish life director and then a priest in the leadership team. In fact, you would hope that's the case because if there is actually no priest, then how could the liturgical and sacramental life of the parish survive without one. On the other hand, if there is a priest involved, you certainly want him on the leadership team.

However, that a priest is involved doesn't mean he can or should be the pastor. He might be impeded by health or by law. He might already be the pastor of another parish. He might, in addition to the parish for which he is the pastor, have the pastoral care of the souls of an additional parish, or more than one, and taking yet another one under his individual care is simply not going to work.

Here in LA we do have priests who were given the pastoral care of 3 parishes because there were no priests. Some of these priests are now dead or have very serious health issues, because the pressure is simply too much for ANY person.

Here is where the parish life director comes into play. The parish life director will take over the various responsibilities of a pastor that are not directly linked to the priesthood, in order to have the priests use their time and energy to do the things only they, as priests, can do.

That means the priests will loose a little bit of their authority, because they would have to ask a lay person for a budget for their ministry, like everyone else; they will have to request a room to have a meeting, like everyone else; they might have to ask for direction as to which themes to incorporate into this week's homily, if there are parish-wide happenings to be addressed that way.

Would that put Sister Whatchamacallher "over" Father Joe Moe? Yes, for some things, and both for this idea to actually work, all parties involved, Sister, Father and the rest of the parish need to be aware that this is the case and whenever there is a conflict, people should know when Father has the last word and when Sister has the last word (if it ever comes to that, remember both Sister and Father are members of a collegial leadership team, which should be able to make decisions without having to have anyone having the last word on anything).

I'd hope we could refrain our judgement of the idea of parish life directors until we can see some of its fruits.

Shalom,
Memo

I personally do not see anything wrong with that.

Perhaps the priest does not have the administrative skills to run a parish.


How many families are run by the wife ?

I suspect a number of posters here defer to their better half.