After more than four years of preparation, I am excited to introduce our new Pastoral Plan for our parish! Working closely with our Parish Pastoral Council for several years and especially its envisioning team last year, we are now ready to present it to everyone in the parish as we invite you to embrace our three priorities: transformative liturgies, parishioner engagement and faith sharing. We all know that the primary purpose of our parish – like every parish in the world – is to draw everyone closer to God through his Son, Jesus Christ. We do this through our worship of God, through our service of others and through sharing our faith. Our parish has already been hard at work in all three of these important aspects of our faith for many years but we need to constantly renew ourselves in our commitment and rededicate ourselves to this essential work of the Church.
The Second Vatican Council boldly proclaimed that the Eucharist is “the source and summit of the Christian faith.” Every other aspect of our parish is bound up with and oriented toward the Eucharist. In the Eucharist, Jesus Christ continues the work of our redemption through the Church and each parish is the local expression of the universal Church. Providentially, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) inaugurated a three-year National Eucharistic Revival on the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ this past June in order to draw all the faithful into an ever-deepening awareness of and appreciation for this great gift that our God has given us: the very Body and Blood of his Son, our Lord Jesus Christ present in the Eucharist. It is the clearest sign of God’s true presence in our midst, nurturing us on our life journey to our eternal destiny – the heavenly banquet! And, as we receive our Lord in Holy Communion, we become the Body of Christ, the living sign of God’s presence. Our parish aspires to provide transformative liturgies with engaging homilies and music and warm hospitality. In this way, we strive to help our parishioners grow spiritually as they encounter Jesus Christ in his sacred Body and Blood. If you are interested in assisting in this first priority, please contact Kate Mallach (215-858-9507; kpaul9507@yahoo.com) who is chairing the committee for this priority.
At the end of each Eucharistic Celebration, we who have received the Body and Blood of Christ are sent forth – in the peace of Christ – to be living signs of Christ’s presence in the world. We are his hands and his feet and are called to serve as he taught us, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting the sick, comforting the dying. Through the years, our parish has developed a very strong tradition of doing this through a variety of ministries, organizations and initiatives. Our second priority – parishioner engagement – leads us to increase involvement in all of these activities. In doing so, we make Jesus Christ present in our community and draw others to him. Our goal is to involve even more parishioners – and, in particular, our many new parishioners – in our ministries. If you would like to get involved in this second priority, please contact Kim O’Neill (610-688-4584; koneill@sksparish.org).
As our risen Lord prepared to return to heaven, he commanded his followers to “go to the ends of the earth and proclaim the gospel to all nations!” As Pope Francis has declared so clearly: “The Church exists to evangelize!” We who have been blessed with a strong faith and close relationship with Jesus are called to share our faith with others and draw them ever closer to our Lord. Our parish has embraced evangelization over the past few years and we are committed to continuing this important initiative so that more parishioners will experience the blessings of a personal relationship with Jesus. If you feel drawn to become involved in this third priority, please contact Laura Kerr (610-937-1094; evangelization@sksparish.org).
This is an exciting moment for our parish as we inaugurate our new Parish Pastoral Plan! I ask everyone in our parish to join in ensuring that the Eucharist is the center of our community, that we are responding generously to our call to corporal and spiritual works of mercy and that we are nurtured and willing to proclaim the gospel as missionary disciples. Let’s continue to work together to make sure our parish is an ever-brighter beacon of hope for all those who are searching for Jesus.