Parish Renewal Team
| As
I began to present my rationale for preaching parish renewals/missions, I have
to first look back a bit in history. Most certainly the parish mission has
played a significant role in the history of the Oblates in the US Region.
When I joined the Oblates as a novice in 1964, parish missions were part and parcel
of what it meant to be an Oblate. We visited parishes in Lowell, Mass. during
my novitiate year to attend mission services and to come to better appreciate
this ministry. However, as I finished my studies and was ordained a priest
in 1971, the preaching of parish missions had already begun to taper off.
Other forms of ministry began to gain prominence such as rural parish ministry
and ministry with Hispanics. During the first 7 years of my priesthood I lived at Holy Angels Parish in Buffalo where several of these Oblates once lived. Holy Angels was considered a mission house from which many Oblates went forth to preach parish missions. However, since the world had taken on a faster pace and people no longer seemed to find a place of spiritual growth in the parish mission, this process of giving the parish mission in our Eastern American Province slowly died out. On January 21-23, 1991 a group of Oblates from the Eastern American Province met in Washington, DC in hopes of revitalizing the Oblate Mission Process. At that time four Oblates sponsored a process known as "The Diocesan Mission Team." The first proposal of this team called for three Oblates to join together, inviting laity and other religious to join them. When all was said and done, only two Oblates, George Knab and I, were able to begin this project in the fall of 1991. We spent the fall and winter of 1991-1992 giving 5-6 mission as well as exposing ourselves to a variety of parish renewal processes that were occurring around the United States at this time : Isaiah 43, Christ Renews His Parish, The New Your City Preaching Team and the Spiritual Development Process in the Archdiocese of Boston and in the Diocese of Fort Wayne/South Bend. When George and I began the process of searching for a diocese to accept their proposal, George Kirwin, the provincial at the time, mentioned his personal friendship with the Bishop of Allentown, PA, Bishop Thomas Welsh. George Kirwin contacted Bishop Welsh to see if he might be interested in such a project. Bishop Welsh wholeheartedly embraced this project and welcome as to the Diocese of Allentown in the spring of 1992. We then began a recruitment process to seek a woman partner. After interviewing over 10 women, both lay and religious, we approached Sr. Joan Daly, GNSH, with our recommendation and she agreed to work on this project beginning September 1992. This project began to take shape as we three collaborated in all facets of this ministry from the very beginning. We designed a process to offer the parishes of Allentown. We first met with their priests' council and then began to recruit parishes. In the celebration of each mission, we each had special roles to play. In the spring of 1994 George Knab moved on to parish ministry with an outreach to the poor in Florida. During that year Joan Daly and I completed our commitment to the diocese of Allentown. Having discerned with our separate congregational leadership teams that the preaching effort would move to the Diocese of Buffalo, New York, we relocated there in July of 1995. Bishop Henry Mansell, the new bishop of Buffalo, warmly welcomed us to the diocese. At this time we adopted a new name, The Parish Renewal Team, and continued the ministry of parish retreats on a parish to parish basis from September 1995 to the present. Over these eight years of ministry, several aspects of our original concept have continued while others have been set aside. The concept of obtaining diocesan financial support was seen to be one that just could not continue here in Buffalo or in any diocese we approached. We then decided to continue this preaching ministry by receiving financial support on a parish to parish basis. After eight years of giving parish retreats these values have become clear. The renewal of the parish mission will never be complete as long as the Gospel still needs to be preached, however, it has been my experience that such a collaborative approach to this ministry is truly effective. Submitted by Rev. Stephen Vasek, OMI |