The Diocese of Madison and the Catholic Church have undertaken a massive effort in the history of our parishes - to use God's gift of human reason, directed by inspiration of the Holy Spirit and the gift of faith, to identify where the work of the Lord has been straining and failing to bear fruit, and to realign our efforts and reources to most prudently and faithfully renew and live the mission that the Lord is calling us to accomplish in His name.
Recall that we gathered the data and looked at the statistics for the whole Diocese of Madison, and that data gave us clear conclusions about eight areas of Catholic life in the Diocese:
1. The total population across the Diocese is growing.
2. We are losing Catholic people, expecially our younger people; and we are aging.
3. Fewer and fewer people are attending Mass.
4. Significally fewer people are receiving Sacraments.
5. Faith Formation enrollment is in a free fall, while School enrollment is holding relatively steady.
6. We have significantly fewer priests than in the past, but - praise God - we project to be relatively stable into the future.
7. People who donate about 2.00% of their income; with fewer older people giving more these days.
8. At present, we are facing financial challenges impacting our mission and our employees.
While the specific take aways for our parishes might differ slightly, we have all experienced these trends in one way or another.
This next year can be summarised in the following:
Summer & Early Fall 2023: Begin meeting with parish leaders to look at the current state of he parish, assess needs, and begin formulating a plan for moving forward.
Fall 2023 & Winter 2023-24: We will begin formulating a concrete plan for the merger of the parishes under one new parish.
Spring & Summer 2024: The merger plans will be finalized and we will be one parish. We will continue to implement our most important aspects of parish life - to worship the Lord, to bring the message of faith, hope, and love in Jesus to all people in our area, and to all live as a community of those who know and trust the Lord.
Throughout this process there will be ongoing communication, means of asking questions, and giving feedback, and opportunities for input on how we will move forward.
We ask for your patience in this process.
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