Hardly a day goes by without someone asking me how things are going here at the parish. I can sincerely reply that God is being praised, people are praying, the sacraments are being dutifully administered and the grace of God is growing in the souls of His faithful. That is all absolutely true, but that is not what people are really asking, even though those are the most important things here at St. John Vianney Parish. Most people, when they inquire about the state of the parish, are really wondering about the temporal aspects of our parish. The answer is that we are blessed! Like everyone and every other parish in the country, we have our issues, and those issues are serious, but with God’s blessings, we are getting by and making progress.
For a perspective, I recently compiled a few metrics for the parish staff and the Pastoral and Finance Councils. Today, I will share them with you as well so that you, too, may see where we are with things. All of us see things through our own lenses. St. Thomas Aquinas famously described this in his Summa Theologiae – Quidquid recipitur ad modum recipientis recipitur (That which is received is received according to the mode of the recipient). Most of us now see things looking through the lens of a year of COVID. This “new normal” however is a distorted view. To see things more clearly, it is helpful to step back and see things from a different perspective by examining different points. To help put things in a clearer perspective of where we are, we need to look back and then we can look forward. Here are few metrics:
Hosts distributed at Mass
- Pre-COVID, average weekend: 10,000 hosts
- Last summer, resumption of Masses: 1,200 hosts
- April 2021, average weekend: 3,400 hosts
Contributions
- Pre-COVID, average number of contributing households: 3300
- Last summer, average number of contributing households: 1200
- End of March, average number of contributing households: 1700
Easter 2021
- Number of He Is Risen yard signs distributed: 3000
- Number of bulletins printed and distributed: 4000
- Easter collection with 5 extra masses was equal to a regular Pre-COVID Sunday collection or approximately 60% or a normal Easter collection.
Youth Formation
- Pre-COVID enrollment: 1749
- Spring 2021 enrollment: 1304
As you can see, we have a long way to go. We continue to work on our planning but it is going to take all of us praying and working together to reach out to others and reunite and engage them. Please continue to keep our parish in your prayers.
In pace Christi,
Fr. Troy