PARISH OF THE SACRED HEART – PARISH PASTORAL COUNCIL
Minutes of the meeting held on Tuesday 25th NOVEMBER 2014
PRESENT: Father James Walsh, Deacon Ron O’Toole, Terry McIlwee, Teresa Butler, Michael Haughton, John Bolger, Hilary Bolger, Adrian Rudman, Carol Shippey, Mary Edmonds, Chris Falla
APOLOGIES: Jayne Randall and Agnieszka Gabriel
Fr. James began the meeting with Prayer
2. It was agreed to finish the meeting by 8.45 p.m.
3. THE MINUTES OF THE MEETING on 23rd September 2014 were agreed with the amendment of ‘St. Helens’ to ‘Sacred Heart’ under Item 6.
4. MATTERS ARISING
St. John of the Cross Roof Repairs – Fr. James explained that the authorisation from the Diocese had now been received so the repairs to the roof could now commence. The work will start early in the New Year
5. ELECTION OF CHAIR AND VICE CHAIR
Terry welcomed back Michael Haughton who had been re-elected from St. Helens and Chris Falla who has been elected from St. John of the Cross. Terry McIlwee was unanimously nominated to remain as Chair with Hilary Bolger also unanimously nominated as Vice Chair
6. NEW ORGAN FOR SACRED HEART, NORTH WALSHAM
Fr. James explained that the present organ was now over 25 years old and coming to the end of its useful life and we would therefore need to replace it with a new one as soon as possible. The cost of a suitable high quality digital organ would be in the region of £25,000-£30,000 and Fr. James was in discussion with the organists in the parish as to what would be the best buy for the needs of our church. Fr. James has already discussed the likely costs with the Parish Finance Committee and he would now like to involve the whole Parish and launch an ‘Organ Appeal’ in the New Year. He will set up a working group to organise the fund raising. The fund raising group needs to include experts in fund raising like Naomi Perowne, who is also one of the organists. Teresa said that the money from St Patrick’s Night Party she and Kay Roberts were organising could be given to the Organ Appeal, Carol suggested ‘sponsor a stop’ There will be a Garden Fete in the summer and some of the proceeds could also go to the Organ Fund. Fr. James suggested that the Garden Fete should be renamed ‘Fr. James’ Tea Party’ to make it sound much less formal, he would like the event to take place every year. A date for the Tea Party needs to be set and it will need to avoid clashing with the North Walsham Festival which is to be held during the last week of June 2015.
7. INTRA PARISH COMMUNICATIONS
Terry had been asked to raise the issue of ‘flyers’ for events which should have involved the whole Parish but which had not been included with the bulletins of all three churches. This had happened on several occasions recently, although the events had been advertised in the bulletin. It was agreed that there was limited space for events to be advertised well in the bulletin and that a review of the size and general layout of the bulletin was needed particularly in light of the next three years of ‘New Evangelisation’ There should then not be a need for extra flyers. Fr. James wanted to make the bulletin more personal rather than a list of activities happening in the Parish. There is now a New Evangelisation Working Party established in the Diocese and they will be issuing items which will need including in or with our bulletin. For example the ‘Suggested Reading for Advent’ and ‘Ideas for Advent’ which Fr. James will distribute this weekend. Over the next three years the Diocese will be leading us with Personal Evangelisation during the first year, Parish Evangelisation during the following year and Diocesan Evangelisation during the third year.
8. PARISH DIRECTORY AND WELCOME PACK
Fr. James, John and Clare had been working to update the directory and hopefully this is now ready for printing and distributing with just a few final amendments. Fr. James felt that Terry’s name and contact details as Chair of the PPC should be included and Teresa and Marianne would like to re-word the Senior Citizens entry. It was agreed that we would print enough for each family in the Parish to have a copy and use the Parish printer rather than having them professionally printed, this will enable us to do any alterations and updating ourselves. John will now update the Directory on the Parish website. It was agreed to only put the key phone numbers at the front of the directory on the website plus Terry’s details as PPC Chair. The last leaflet that still needs updating is the trifold Welcome leaflet. Teresa has the details of this on her computer and will do the necessary updating and Adrian will obtain quotes for printing the leaflets from local printers
9. HOPES AND ASPIRATIONS TREE
Fr. James said that what had particularly struck him was the word ‘Community’ which appeared consistently on the leaves and emphasised the unity of the Parish which was very important.
Youth and Liturgy – John and Bob Maidment are meeting with the candidates for Confirmation and in the New Year they will be involved in a ‘Youth Mass’. They will also be asked to man a stall at the ‘Tea Party’ in the summer. We still need to plan how we can keep encouraging and involving our First Communion children once they have finished their programme and made their First Holy Communion. The Diocesan Youth Service newsletter is very encouraging with lots of events planned for 2015. There will be an Ecumenical Service at the Sacred Heart Church during Christian Unity week led by David Ballard and taking the form of sung vespers.
People liked having the Station Masses in each Church during Lent would this be possible this Lent. There will be a Deanery Station Mass at St. Joseph’s Sheringham on the 18th March. We will also be having ‘40 Hours Devotion’ in our 3 churches over the weekend of the 19th April.
Teaching and Learning – The libraries are successful at St. John of the Cross and St. Helens and the librarians will be asked to ensure they have copies of the books on ‘Suggested Reading for Advent’ list.
Fr. Sean from St. George’s will be tweeting during Lent and details of how to access the tweets will be in the bulletin.
Parish Community – The idea of regular parish lunches, possibly every 3 months was discussed. These would probably have to be after the 11 a.m. Mass at Sacred Heart as catering facilities at both the other churches were not good. Sacred Heart Hall does not have a licence. These could be simply done by people bringing a plate to share. Councillors to take this idea back to the community forums. We already have the Annual Parish Meeting supper in place, which is always well attended.
As previously discussed we will be having a Fete/Tea Party this year and Teresa will approach Angela George to see if she is willing to co-ordinate this as she has done in past years
John will now compile a short report for the bulletin on the PPC’s progress with the hopes and aspirations in the form of a table headed “You asked …’ ‘We have done …’
10. PARISH PASTORAL ASSISTANT REPORT
Fr. James, Deacon Ron and John had met just prior to the PPC meeting and will continue to do so now on a regular basis.
11. PARISH PASTORAL COUNCILLORS REPORTS
St. John of the Cross – The Community is very pleased that the roof repairs are imminent
Sacred Heart – The First Communion preparation programme is underway and they had all met with Fr. James last week. There will be 7 children making their First Holy Communion this summer, for St. Helens and Sacred Heart this will take place on Corpus Christi weekend – 31 May/June 1st and for St. John of the Cross on the 7th June.
Cars parking in what should be the ‘loading’ area beside the side door to the Church cause an obstruction to drivers trying to access the car park and stops drivers needing to set down passengers. Fr. James will mention the problem to the community.
St. Helen’s – The Community were very grateful for the thank you letter from Peter Adamson on behalf of St. John of the Cross community for their donations to the ‘Roof Fund’ The Harvest Supper had been excellent as had the one at St. John of the Cross, Fr. James had been able to attend both. It was thought to be a shame that Sacred Heart didn’t have a Harvest Supper too and the suggestion was that next year they could organise a Harvest Lunch following the Sunday Mass.
12. A.O.B.
Fr. James showed councilors the various leaflets with Ideas for Advent and Suggested Reading for Advent which he will be distributing this weekend from the New Evangelisation Working Party and the Annual Newsletter from the Diocesan Youth Service
13. DATE OF NEXT MEETING
Tuesday 17th February 2015 7.15 for 7.30 in the Parish Room
Deacon Ron then concluded the meeting with a prayer and some thoughts from Pope Francis on ‘Meetings’
