From Archbishop Mitchell T. Rozanski, Archbishop of St. Louis:
ST. LOUIS – “Thank you to the tens of thousands of people from across the Archdiocese of St. Louis who have participated in the All Things New surveys and provided data and feedback over the last few months, including priests, deacons, religious, Archdiocesan and parish employees, parishioners and community members. The information has been enlightening, educational and fruitful as we continue to ask ourselves what our parishes, ministries and institutions need to look like in order to effectively share our Catholic faith in a way that is suitable and sustainable for our children and generations to come.
The next step in this multi-year process is to hear more robustly from parishioners about their specific parish. The Archdiocese of St. Louis will host over 350 listening sessions throughout our 178 parishes between October 8 – November 19, 2022. Parishioners are invited to register for their parish’s listening session beginning mid-September at https://allthingsnew.archstl.org/Ways-to-Engage/Listening-Sessions.
Parishioners must register in order to attend a Listening Session. Registration will close once the designated room’s seating capacity is reached. There will not be additional opportunities for Listening Sessions other than the ones scheduled for each parish.
Each listening session will be facilitated by volunteer parishioners from a different parish. These trained facilitators will share pre-recorded messages from me and Fr. Chris Martin, Vicar for Strategic Planning, with an overview of All Things New, a planning area overview and multiple DRAFT model options to consider for the respective planning area. A brief time will be allowed for small group discussion and facilitated large group feedback.
The goals of the listening sessions are to engage as many parishioners as possible in understanding the current state of our parishes and diocese and to solicit feedback from as many parishioners as possible about the DRAFT models options for their planning area.
After the final listening session in each planning area, the Archdiocese of St. Louis will make public the content presented at all the parish’s Listening Sessions in that planning area and will offer an additional opportunity for parishioners to provide open-ended feedback through an online survey. The survey will remain open until December 31, 2022. Parishioner feedback to the models is critical as it will be used to help shape the future of the Archdiocese of St. Louis. In order for parishioners to be fully prepared with accurate information before their parish listening session(s), we will be providing parishioners with access to their Parish Workbook.
The Archdiocese of St. Louis has created Parish Workbooks as a supplementary resource to help parishioners prepare for the listening sessions. The workbooks are meant to equip pastors and parishioners with data about the Archdiocese of St. Louis, their local planning area, and their specific parish. The Archdiocese of St. Louis is releasing the Parish Workbook of each of our 178 parishes several weeks in advance of the listening sessions to ensure parishioners receive their parish’s Parish Workbook in plenty of time to review before their specific listening session.
Each Parish Workbook will be posted on allthingsnew.archstl.org for anyone to view. Please continue to pray for the gift of true discernment so that we may continue to do the Will of God in all things.”
The Archdiocese of St. Louis was established in 1826. Comprised today of nearly a half million Catholics and led by the Most Reverend Archbishop Mitchell T. Rozanski in communion with His Holiness Pope Francis, we are called by our Lord, Jesus Christ, to be His Church and live His Gospel. Learn more about the Archdiocese of St. Louis at www.archstl.org, and on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn.