Faith: St Mary's Stewardship Program is inviting new and existing members to participate in the creation of the church’s future.
Photo by
Steve Huntley
Echuca’s St Mary’s Parish is inviting new and existing members to help create a vision for the future and reignite their connection with the church, through the launch of their stewardship program.
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Stewardship refers to embracing a common vision and putting together a plan for how to take care of the church for the future, resulting in a spiritually vibrant, highly engaged and financially secure parish.
According to St Mary’s Parish Priest Father Novie, St Mary’s, like many community groups and organisations across the world, has been significantly impacted by the pandemic, as they were unable to gather for their usual masses and events.
“St Mary’s has always been a vibrant, friendly and welcoming community but we understand after a couple of challenging years, some people have become disengaged,” Fr Novie said.
“Now, as we begin to recover from COVID, we have an opportunity to create a fresh start and plan for our future by looking for ways we can increase engagement and improve the stewardship of our parish resources. But we can’t do it alone.
“We are calling on all our previous and existing members, as well as any new or interested members, to help us reinvigorate the spirit of our community and have a say in how we can best serve the community moving forward.”
As part of this process, St Mary’s Parish is inviting people to complete a parish census, which was launched at mass on Saturday.
The census aims to gather information about who is currently involved in the parish community, who would like to be involved, what gifts and talents they have to contribute, what events, activities and services they would like to see in the future and how the parish could better support the community.
Census results will not be made public and any information gathered will be stored safely in accordance with the Privacy Act of the Diocese of Sandhurst.
To help inform the community about the type of services on offer, St Mary’s will also be hosting a parish expo evening on Friday, August 26, for ministry teams to showcase their work and invite people to join their teams.
As an example of the kinds of events the parish supports and hosts, the first Community Connect event will be this Saturday, July 23 at 6pm and will be a Sri Lankan celebration.
Christine Sebire, one of the volunteers with the church, said there was a large community of Sri Lankan people in Echuca-Moama, who will be leading the parish in a Sri Lankan-style mass and feast.
Interested community members will also have the opportunity to donate non-perishable pantry staples such as flour or sugar to be sent over to Sri Lanka to aid in recovery efforts.
“Due to the crisis in Sri Lanka right now, if we send money, people there might not be able to purchase these items because there isn’t any available,” Ms Sebire said.
“If we send them directly, we know they will receive it.”
Anyone interested in attending is welcome.
If you would like to participate in the census or to find out more about how you can connect with St Mary's Parish, phone 5482 1127 or drop into the parish office in Anstruther St, Echuca.
Steward: Father Novie Lim with the message stick.
Photo by
Steve Huntley
Messaging: “Just as the message stick was used by Aboriginal people to share news, for us it is a symbol of the world being brought to our communities,” church member Christine Sebire said.
Photo by
Steve Huntley
Census: The program aims to gather information about who is currently involved in the parish community, who would like to be involved, what gifts and talents they have to contribute, what events, activities and services they would like to see in the future and how the parish could better support the community.
Photo by
Steve Huntley
