Meeting Minutes 6/12/2007
 
St. Thomas Aquinas Parish Council Attending: Ed Wehrle, Jack Robinson, Paul Sullivan S.J, Sheryl King, John Caron, Eric Morton. Absent: Dan Ferro, Sarah Vincent, Joan Giannelli, Jill Dutton, Joe McLaughlin, Jeff Stickles.

Prayer requests: For Margaret, daughter of a co-worker of Sheryl.
Opening Prayer/Meditation
Please note certain additions to the agenda previously distributed. 

   1. Executive Session.

      1.1. Discussion related to the Building Committee’s concerns and plans.
  
   2. The Development of the History of the Parish.
 
      2.1. This has been discussed previously in relation to the upcoming 60th anniversary of the parish in 2008. 

      2.2. We should interview or otherwise record the recollections of parishioners who have been here the longest.
 
      2.3. Recordings, either video or audio, should be used whenever possible. These could be transcribed into written records as needed or/and displayed as they are.
 
      2.4. A timeline of St. Thomas parish might be constructed (extended?) that includes mention of personnel, building and capital efforts, what ministries existed when, and so forth. 

      2.5. Sheryl agreed to write a bulletin article regarding the 60th. Ed will contribute. 

   3. Parish Council Retreat 

      3.1. Fr. Paul reported that his inquiries at the diocese revealed no real resources specifically tailored toward building up a parish council in this fashion. He has made some other inquiries and is awaiting replies. 

   4. Follow-up on the Abuse/Healing Meeting. 

      4.1. General agreement seems to be that the meeting was helpful overall and that Sr. Sally was very helpful in particular. 

      4.2. Another meeting seems in order. A date will be booked when the Jesuit’s representative can be here (he was in Jordan at the time of the first meeting). It is hoped that the additional facts of the case that he will present will help this community better understand what has happened. 

      4.3. Questions about this case will remain unanswered, very likely, and possibly unaddressed due to legal considerations and due to the fact that some persons involved are not available for comment. We will have to learn to live with that somehow. 

      4.4. A healing ceremony, possibly with a mass, seems very important to do at some point. 

      4.5. It seems that some of the wounds of this community stem not from the alleged abuse itself but from other causes and earlier times. Details of this are unclear. It may be that something could be done to at least address those wounds as a community; perhaps in the context of another meeting. This needs further consideration. 

   5. Steering Committees. 

      5.1. We should contact our sub-committees to ask if there are things that the Parish Council might do to help them. One idea is to ask if they’d like to use our email notification system or web pages to help them in their mission. 

      5.2. Regarding the email signups, we should ask what other interest groups we might add to the signup. 

   6. Summer meetings. 

      6.1. NO Parish Council Meetings in July OR August. One caveat: should something emergent arise, we might convene for that purpose. 

      6.2. AUGUST 26, 2007, 5:00 PM  Save this date! Welcome back students. The Parish Council role is to set out items that have been prepared while students are in the chapel.  Sheryl will touch base with Marilyn Pinto and contact us with additional needs or requests. 

   7. Appreciation Event For Fr. Jim. 

      7.1. July 8, Sunday, after the 10:15 mass. 

      7.2. Sheryl will touch base with Lisa Wild regarding preparations and let us know how we might help.

Meeting Minutes 5/8/2007

St. Thomas Aquinas Parish Council Attending: Ed Wehrle, Jack Robinson, Paul Sullivan S.J., Jill Dutton, Sheryl King, Joe McLaughlin, Jeff Stickles, John Caron, Eric Morton. Absent: Dan Ferro, Sarah Vincent, Joan Giannelli.

Prayer Intentions: for Christopher’s healing, for a job, for the health and well being of Fr. Paul’ mom.

Parish Council Retreat Do we want to have one? If so, when and why. 

   1. There seemed to be a consensus that this is worth doing.
 
   2. When should be at a time to include our student members. Perhaps September? 

   3. Why? Topics included 

      1) increasing the spirituality of the PC, 

      2) increase the effectiveness of the PC, 

      3) increasing our familiarity with each other and our cohesiveness as a group.
 
      4) Where? Suggestions were proposed and individuals agreed to inquire about what might be available in the way of times, topics, etc. 

         a. Voluntown Peace Center –Jack to inquire.
 
         b. Immaculata Retreat House –Paul to inquire. 

         c. My Father’s House (in Moodus) –Jill to inquire.

Standing Committee Report 

      1. Jeff said “It was interesting to hear what was going on.” He found the breakout discussions informative as well. Also, the summaries shared when the committees came back into a large group offered insight across ministries. 

      2. Someone said that it was a very useful process as part of a larger parish planning process. It can help us do better what we do and possibly develop even greater ideas. 

      3. Paul sent a summary around by e-mail. 

      4. Ministry symbols/logos were shared at the Standing Committees meeting. Note that the Parish Council needs to develop one of these. 

      5. The budgetary process is just beginning. The Finance Committee is planning some activities –watch the bulletin- and hopes to make a difference over the long run. 

      6. Note: The stewardship meeting Fr. Paul emailed us about is June 4 and members need to RSVP to Paul …soon.

Stewardship Committee – What should we do about the Stewardship Committee being vacant? What needs did it fill?
 
      1. Stewardship is about creating an experience/attitude to evoke a response from a sense of gratitude NOT from a sense of obligation. 

      2. Some spoke of the Stewardship Committee as having served its purpose well enough over the years but that it may have faded out because it no longer needs to exist. 

      3. Some specific things usually done by the Stewardship Committee that seem to need to be continued in some form by someone or some group(s) were mentioned: 

         a. Conducted regular Ministry Survey each Fall. 

         b. Reached out to newly registered parishioners (in different ways over the years) to welcome them and help them become more connected within the parish. 

         c. (I’m not sure I have this right) Created a list of existing ministries, descriptions of existing ministries and some contact information. This, too, has been handled in different ways over the course of a number of 

      4. We should all prayerfully consider how to deal with this issue. John and Paul will meet to try to clarify the needs at issue.

The E-Mail System is UP and running. 

      1. All Parish Council members are encouraged to sign up according to their interests. 

      2. We need to figure out how to introduce in to the rest of the parish.

The Parish Anniversary Is This Year. 

      1. What, when, where, how shall we honor this? Who will? Ideas anyone?

FYI Regarding the Recently Reported Abuse Settlement 

      1. Fr. Paul reported on efforts underway to put together a panel to meet with parishioners/interested parties. Plans are still firming up and details are not yet certain. Paul has been advocating strongly for a representative from the Jesuits in addition to the diocese. 

      2. Special mention to one woman (whose name I don’t have in my notes) regarding the assembling of this panel. She has been very active. 

      3. It seems somewhat surprising that such a panel (or potential panelists) does not already exist nor does it seem to have been done before. 

      4. Much discussion ensued regarding the whole situation. Some expressed dismay, bewilderment, shock, and/or betrayal. Many wondered aloud at the fact that we heard the news literally from the News. 

      5. Special thanks to Fr. Paul for stepping into the gap created by this shocking news. His promptness in genuinely addressing this matter at each Mass last weekend is highly commendable. His efforts to create the panel to meet with us are also very commendable. The next meeting will be June 12 at 7:00 pm.


Meeting Minutes 4/10/2007

Standing Committees. Questions and discussions about where the SCs are coming from, where they are, where are they going. 

      1. The hope is that the various ministries coming together to hear the report summaries of all the other ministries can/may foster collaboration and connection. The connection is what is important right now. Communication is really useful. 

      2. There used to be a book around with the known ministries . This has been replaced by a pamphlet system to more easily accommodate changes that occur. 

      3. Note: the stewardship committee, which used to maintain these pamphlets, is down to zero members.

Tech report: e-mailing interested parishioners, other related questions. 

      1. John reported looking into the issues related to emailing parishioners (following up on this issue from an earlier meeting in Dec or Jan). The past practices were stopped as they constituted spamming. Unless people sign up to receive such emails it quickly becomes spamming given the number of parishioners. 

         a. Currently there is available the technology to allow parishioners (and others) to opt into an email notification system that is part of the company that hosts our Parish Council website (thanks John). 

         b. In the current culture, selective presentation of information is the key to getting the attention of people who, in general, are overwhelmed by information that is often not of interest to them. 

      2. Do we want to set something up to see if it works? Much discussion ensued. 

         a. Some of the categories might include: Mass changes, death notices, reminders of scheduled meetings, announcements, daily prayers, faith formation, TLC/University ministries, Minutes. 

         b. The web page would exist on the Parish Council web site, at least for now. 

         c. People could fill out an online form on the web site, check the boxes of the areas they want notification about, and then respond to an email message confirming their intent to subscribe to the notification service. 

         d. Would the site get enough traffic? Would the email service be worth whatever the cost might be? How much Staff time would this take? 

         e. The key to using such a system is conciseness. Communications like this need to be limited to one subject, major points only, no lengthy or general comments. The research seems to suggest that newsletter type notices do not work well as people only really want to know about one or two specific areas. 

      3. Fr. Paul suggested that we might try it and see how it goes in a month or several months.

Summer Activities. Generally activities go down during the Summer. University students are mostly gone, families go on vacation, and so on. Ought we try to do some things to draw us together? 

      1. Ideas from last year: 

         a. A festival day offering a variety of things people might share or join in. 

         b. Alter weekday Mass schedules to fit staffing and hopefully elicit more visits. *This will change this year based upon attendance patterns observed last year. 

         c. Tuesday Night Conversations were some informal talks about spiritual/religious themes. 

      2. Some ideas and plans for this year. 

         a. Ignatian Spirituality Workshops to be offered by Staff to the diocese. 

         b. No plans for vacation bible school. 

         c. Perhaps a monthly, after-mass pot luck. There is already some interest in doing this. 

         d. Camping. Some parishioners already go to Ross Hill and Hammonasset. Perhaps we could do more? Feedback On Holy Week. 

      1. The Holy Thursday sermon seemed well received. 

      2. The Vigil was lovely, meaningful; the bells were beautiful. 

      3. There were some behind the scene struggles pulling liturgies together. Some ministers were tardy while some were no-shows. This happens already at some regular Masses but was even more pronounced.