www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Parish Life & Evangelization Growing a parish from scratch

I have friends in a UGC parish in the US who are looking for ideas on how to "grow" their very small congregation (established as a mission of a parish in the city and served on weekends and major feasts by the pastor of that parish who manages incredible feats of "liturgical bilocation"). The handful of people who attend the mission (presently worshipping in space borrowed from a Latin parish) want to plan realistically for the future and find ways of increasing their numbers.

The numbers of UGC faithful who live in the area of the mission and no longer belong to a UGC parish for one reason or another do not seem to be large and may be an unlikely source of new members. Melkite and BCC faithful seem to be reasonably well-served by parishes of their own tradition (although some might find a 'non-ethnic' UGC parish a congenial spiritual home, I suppose).

It comes down, it seems, to a question of focus. While I certainly expect that this particular parish will open its arms and heart to anyone seeking Christ and attracted to the various elements of the Byzantine tradition, it is constrained by size and by its location in borrowed space from presenting a visible Eastern "face" to the surrounding community. Its size and limited means preclude an "if you build it they will come" approach, even if they had the financial resources to do that.

What have other small Eastern Christian communities (Catholic and Orthodox) done to grow and to attract new members?

From experience I can say that what you want to get a chancery to notice you is enough people that meet regularly (it's a bonus if you have a lot of the ethnic group). Get vespers or similar services going weekly, meet for book discussions or bible study, have mothers get together with their kids for snacks and play to build a sense of community, and make yourself very visible with a website and by putting up flyers in places you think they'll get noticed.

I will point out that there is a difference in the responses I've experienced from Eastern Orthodox and Catholic chanceries to from-scratch mission efforts. The Eastern Catholic route is a much steeper trek at least from my own and anecdotal evidence.

The mission in Wasilla started with an occasional liturgy. It grew by word of mouth, especially from the Roman parish's pulpit.

One of the real ironies is that the best proof of "catholicity" is concelebration between priests of the two parishes, with each vested by Rite. It shows unity in ways that truly sink in.

One of the things that has been done in the past is to celebrate the DL as a special event at the Roman church's altar. That does require a couple of priests to cooperate (The celebrant and the pastor)... but it is of good educational value to the Romans, and it is of value for reminding displaced EC Catholics that the ECCs still exist.

Tim,

Is this still, technically, a mission or has a parish been formally erected?

If still a mission, is it listed on our Mission Page? If not, PM me the info or have someone e-mail it to me at EC_Parish_Webmaster@yahoo.com and I'll add it to that list.

We're also about to begin a concerted effort to get the parishes and missions of the Ukrainian Metropolia entered into the Directory itself. That will hopefully start in a week or so (the Directory is off-line for a few days, while we work out a few kinks resulting from upgrading the site.)

Many years,

Neil

St. Athanasius is a small Ruthenian Catholic Parish in Indianapolis. Although there are a number of persons of Eastern European heritage living in the area, our church only attracks about 25-30 to each liturgy. I travel 65 miles one way to attend. Fr. Sid and I have begun giving talks to Roman Catholic parishes that explain Eastern Catholicism. I have gone to Confirmation and RCIA groups. We show a DVD from the Eparchy of Parma and answer questions. This has brought some groups to attend our liturgies on occasion. We suffer the same problem as Richmond, Virginia. Many are not willing to change their liturgical habits, especially former Byzantine Catholics who now attend Roman Catholic mass.

Nothing wrong with anything your pastor is doing.

But there is only one way to attract people: good Liturgy.

I cannot say it enough. Everything flows from the Liturgy. Good worship is highly attractive. If you have good worship you don't need to advertise. People come because they see others are being fed and fed well.

As we have seen on this forum many, many times, people are supprised when they find out the are Eastern Rite. When something happens for whatever reason, and they have show evidence of their background in faith, they find their father and grandfather were east and never changed rites. It is always a fun supprise for people to find out they are eastern.

I have an acquaintance who recently discovered she is probably Eastern Rite. Last I heard, she was going to check with a canon lawyer on the issue. Her father was Anglican, her mother Byzantine Catholic. She was Baptized in the Anglican church as a compromise, but raised Catholic. She received her first Holy Communion and Confirmation in a Latin Rite church. Of course, the Latin Diocese canon lawyer told her that it doesn't matter, but she wants to pursue it.

Well, there's a surprise

The Mission in question meets only on Saturday at 6:30 p.m. Among the many other obstacles to growth, this seems to be the biggest. We have had people leave because of this. No need to expound on the reasons why, but anyone with young children, businesses to run, and even a minimal a social life can understand the problems this presents in promoting growth. I am very interested in the response from ARAMIS. I have often thought that the RC parish that rents us space might be open to a similar arrangement if approached. I know for a fact that there are Eastern Rite Catholics who attend this Latin Rite parish and who might be very open to coming to a GC Liturgy if offered on a Sunday. We would need a UGC priest who is available on a Sunday. Where do we begin, who do we approach, what lines of authority are we crossing? I do not want to offend our priest with this suggestion, he has a parish with a 10:00 a.m. Sunday Liturgy, however if something does not change, I do not see a future for this mission let alone it ever becoming a parish.

While staying down in the TN I visited a BC Mission that met at a LR parish. They built a full size PORTABLE iconostasis. When I walked in it looked like an ER sanctuary, then I saw the wheels. The Latin parish priests were both dual rite and the members all did their ER "by the book". They knew how to enter a church and reverence the iccons, they knew when to bow, when to cross, and when to do a metania. They participated in the liturgy with enthusiasm.

That said, the priests serving the community were there for the Liturgy, but not really involved outside of Sunday afternoon. One might show up for Vespers, otherwise it was a reader's service. The latin parish was accomodating, but not ideal.

Growing a parish requires vision, dedication, leadership, and joy. It's tough when you don't have a priest who can focus on building a mission. But it's not all the priest's job. There needs to be a dedicated core that enjoys being together.

My friends down in TN are the only Eastern Catholic anything for hundreds of miles. It's tougher when you have a Melkite parish a few blocks away, a Byzantine parish within ten minutes and several Orthodox parishes nearby. Why should anyone come to your little Ukrainian mission? Figure that out and you're on your way.

How interested is the LR parish in the UC Mission that you are referring to? Are the priests entusiastic about it's presence and interested in promoting simple knowlege of the Eastern Church to their own members? Where we are, the Pastor of the RC church has expressed definite interest and willingness to listen to us. He has demonstrated in his sermons and his classes that he has a knowlege and understanding of the Eastern Church. Several of our people have joined his church for reasons such as it being able to provide a Christian education for their children, a rich outreach and education program for adults, RCIA, Sunday and daily Divine Liturgy. Aside from our own Mission members who have joined his parish in the last few months, there are UBC families who have been parishioners there for years because of locality and convenience. A more visible presence of our Mission might cause them to join us for services from time to time. I am not suggesting we do this to take families away from the RC parish, but simply to give those who love the traditions of our church and were Baptised in the Eastern Church to experience it again. Another idea that has been nagging at me is, can a person be BI-Ritual in any official way. Priests can but can a person be an official member of two churches of two different diocese, of two different Rites? For those of us who take advantage of the services offered by the Host LR parish on a daily basis, it seems that some sort of official status would be appropriate. I do not want to turn away from my Rite and just go to a Latin Rite church without supporting it in financial and other helpful ways.
Todays empahsis on evangelization could very well begin with us,(our Pastor and our members), reaching out to our host parish, educating them to who we are, inviting them to experience our liturgy,and hopefully feel more at home worshiping in their facilities.

I want to thank everyone who has contributed to this thread and ask that you keep the ideas and suggestions coming. I have encouraged those in this mission parish to log on to the Forum and benefit from the varied insights being offered. I pray, as I hope you will, that, with God's help, this mission will develop into a vibrant parish community. Meanwhile, my impression is that the RC parish where they have been rented a worship space has been most gracious and supportive.

On the "two parish/two rite" question raised in the last post, I would offer the thought that there seems to be a readiness to accept that one can belong, canonically, to one Catholic "Church" but be welcomed, at least to some extent, into the life of a parish of another Catholic Church. Certainly that has been my experience as a UGC who found himself, of necessity, attending an RC parish because there was no English-speaking UGC parish anywhere near. My RC pastor raised no difficulties with my becoming a lector and the RC school welcomed the opportunity to host a celebration of the Divine Liturgy by our visiting UGC priest friend. The converse was also my experience when, as a matter of choice, I attended a BC parish for some time. In the latter case, however, I did discover that the Oriental Code was construed to compel the BC parish to set limits on the extent of my participation in its life. There were apparently positions in the parish structure that I could not occupy (although, fortunately, I was unable, for practical reasons, to do so) and the parish priest said he was unable to administer the Mysteries of Initiation to my daughter, so we had to find a UGC parish some distance away where this could be done.

Yeah, well, Tim, we all know certain canon lawyers justify what Shakespeare wrote in Henry IV Part II. That's why I never encourage them.

We have a biritual mission going up on Mt. Charleston. Originally, our priest was to have run it, but when he was suddenly put in charge of our parish, it was put on hold (it's moving again, we understand).

hawk