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April 14, 2021
CDS Parish Update
Over the past three years, our parish community has been working to achieve a number of goals: the creation of a single parish for Monroeville and Penn Hills from the existing parishes in our neighborhoods, the reversal of the unsustainable deficits that all of our parishes had been maintaining in the past, and the creation of a unified Catholic community for us all.
When the pandemic hit, early last year, it hampered our ability to continue making progress toward these goals. At this point, as we look forward to a post-pandemic environment, we are again taking up the critical questions about our parish’s future: “what are the needs of our parish?”, “what is our ability to meet these needs?”, “what expenses can we afford to support, and how will those expenses serve our goals in ministry and evangelization for our community?”.
Last year, we formed a ‘task force’ of CDS parishioners from each of our five predecessor parishes and asked them to begin finding answers to these questions. Using a decision matrix provided by the diocese for this kind of deliberative process, they visited all of the buildings at all six of our sites. They evaluated our parish facilities from a number of perspectives: worship needs, impact on ministry, parish finances, and location considerations. Having completed their analysis and submitted it to Fr Larry and Fr Thom, they attended a joint meeting of our finance and interim pastoral councils, and a preliminary discussion on their efforts took place.
As part of our process, we would like to create opportunities for parishioners to gather at parish assemblies, in order to allow you to hear what we’ve learned and to give you an opportunity to respond and express your hopes, dreams, and vision for our parish. Due to the pandemic, though, we hadn’t able to schedule these kinds of meetings. In a sense, we were just ‘treading water’. Now, however, we have the opportunity to resume our efforts to plan for the future of our parish!
In May, we’ll ask the task force, the interim pastoral council, and the finance council to meet a number of times. They’ll review the work of the task force and share their perspectives. We’ll create a presentation for the parish assemblies, and they’ll review it prior to these gatherings. We’ll hold our assemblies, and then ask our councils to meet once again, so that they can discuss what you’ve expressed to us at these gatherings. Finally, once Fr Thom and Fr Larry have heard from the task force, the councils, and the parish at large, we will take all this input and create a proposal for our parish. This proposal will be presented to Bishop Zubik, who will discuss our proposal with his consultative bodies before creating decree(s) for our parish.
Our plan is to hold two parish assemblies:
- May 12, at 6:15pm, at St Susanna Church (following the 5pm Ascension Vigil Mass)
- May 13, at 1:15pm, at St Bernadette Church (following the noon Ascension Mass)
We also plan to record a video of one of these assemblies, and place it on our website for you to watch, if you are unable to attend one of the assemblies in person. We will also offer opportunities for you to respond via the website, so that all who attend the assemblies in person or virtually will be able to have their perspectives heard.
Please keep Christ the Divine Shepherd Parish in your prayers, as together we continue discerning our future as a Catholic community for Monroeville and Penn Hills!