Pastor's Corner
March 26, 2017
One aspect of parish life that most Catholics don’t think about happens behind the scenes, but is very important.
Administrivia: Paperwork; Filing.
Yet this work is not trivial. If you want to get married, you have to provide new baptismal certificates and if you don’t have your original confirmation certificate, that has to be supplied. Baptisms, Weddings, Confirmations get registered and entered into a data base, and documents have to be provided whenever a former parishioner is getting married in the Church. Every volunteer who has any contact with children or vulnerable adults has to go through VIRTUS certification and fingerprinting, and this information has to be filed, and volunteers reminded (hopefully by the ministry leader) to re-certify every three years. Finally, contributions to the weekly collection and the capital campaign have to be entered into our data base so we can send reports for your tax returns.
All of this is done by our wonderful receptionists Rosanna, Ana and Sadie, and Cecilia, our parish secretary. The difficulty is doing this while also responding to many phone calls, drop-in visits by parishioners with a variety of requests, tracking down priests, preparing the weekly bulletin, keeping the online calendar current, and much more.
It simply is not working well. They need some uninterrupted time to complete their work with accuracy.
Therefore, I have decided to close the office an hour earlier to give them an hour a day in which to complete some of these vital tasks without distraction. Starting Monday, March 27, the office will close at 7:30 p.m. The church will also close at 7:30 p.m. Monday, Wednesday and Friday, unless there is an event in the church. The church will remain open until after choir practice on Tuesday and Thursday until about 9 p.m.
Thank you for understanding. Please offer a prayer for our office staff. They work very hard.