PLAN EDUCATIONAL EFFORT

ON PASTORAL PLANNING

            Stating that “it is imperative that the lay faithful be fully informed,” Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio has announced the launching of an educational program on the Diocese of Brooklyn’s pastoral planning process.

            Beginning with the current Jan. 28 issue and continuing for the next eight issues until March 25, The Tablet will print articles in English and Spanish, produced by the diocesan Pastoral Planning Office, under the theme: “New Beginnings.”

            Bishop DiMarzio said the articles on the meaning, reasons and goals of pastoral planning will also be printed as inserts into parish bulletins on the same weekends that they appear in The Tablet. Translations have also been prepared in Polish, Creole and Italian.

            In the four vicariates of the Diocese next month, the planning process will be addressed at meetings for incardinated priests, the Bishop said.

The respective episcopal vicars will conduct the sessions, all at 4 p.m., to be held at St.. Bernadette’s Church, Dyker Heights, Monday, Feb. 6, for Brooklyn West; St. Nicholas of Tolentine Church, Jamaica, Wednesday, Feb. 8, for Queens South; St. Thomas Aquinas Church, Flatlands, Tuesday, Feb. 14, for Brooklyn East, and Resurrection-Ascension Church, Rego Park, Thursday, Feb. 16, for Queens North.

Bishop DiMarzio has asked the priests to invite parish staff members, including permanent deacons, pastoral associates and directors of religious education, to a “pastoral assembly” that will explain the pastoral planning process, to be held at the Immaculate Conception Center, Douglaston, Monday, March 6, at 7 p.m.

The titles of the nine-part series of articles are: “Pastoral Planning in the Diocese of Brooklyn”; “Mission of the Church-Structures of the Church”; Demographic Changes in Brooklyn and Queens”; “Finances and Pastoral Planning”; “Priest Personnel and Vocations”; “Communion and Collaboration”; “Parish Pastoral Councils and Consultation”; “What We Hope to Achieve”; “What Does This Mean to Me?”

In a letter to priests earlier this month, Bishop DiMarzio stressed that pastoral planning efforts “will only succeed if we are open and honest with each other, support and pray for each other and work together to find creative solutions to the challenges we face.”

The Bishop said he pledged “to do all that I can to work collaboratively with you to meet the challenges before us.”

1/24/05