OUTSIDE THE BOX

SUMMER 2018

REACHING FAMILIES

PARENTS LIFE WITH STRESS THAT SEEMS ENDLESS. Frazzled by the demands of work and school and supposedly essential extracurricular activities, many families drift away from participation in their faith community. Who has time for another commitment?

In this context, pastors must find new ways to deliver an old message: that it’s important for you to show up. That the Church welcomes and supports families; that finding time to attend Mass and participate in a parish community will add meaning and focus to your life – and make stress more manageable. Here are a few parishes that are breaking the mold to offer fresh experiences for parents and children.

A WIDE EMBRACE

“It’s so important to welcome children,” says Fr. John Duffell, pastor of Blessed Sacrament parish on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. At Blessed Sacrament’s weekly Family Mass, kids take on many of the usual adult roles, serving as greeters, ushers, singers, musicians, gift-bearers and passers of the collection basket. “One parishioner accuses me of using this to get him to put more in the basket,” Fr. Duffell says, “but it’s really about bringing all the families to Mass.”

Blessed Sacrament also sponsors a young-adult group that has become like “a nuclear family” and a monthly moms’ night out that gives mothers a chance to compare notes while someone else watches the kids.

SUPPORT FOR PARENTS

“When you’re home with children, it’s easy to feel isolated,” says Michelle Horver, who leads the Morning Out and Parents Connect programs at Immaculate Conception / Our Lady of the Assumption parish in Tuckahoe along with fellow volunteer Regina Thomson. With support from the pastor, Msgr. Anthony Sorgie, and the director of religious education, Sr. Cora Lombardo, Horver and Thomson manage a weekly program that offers childcare in one room and hosts mothers and other caregivers for  an adult discussion in a room across the hall. Subjects range from the mundane, like teaching good dental hygiene, to the spiritual, such as how to explain evil to a child.

Every fourth week, the focus shifts, targeting parents of older children and becoming a book discussion group. “There’s a real bonding among the people who have gone to these meetings,” Sr. Lombardo says.

ALL TOGETHER NOW

A decade ago, the archdiocese called on parishes to provide five hours per year of family catechesis at each grade level. At St. Martin de Porres in Poughkeepsie, Msgr. James Sullivan asked, “How do we engage the parents in their children’s religious education?”

One volunteer catechist’s answer was to reach busy young parents through technology they are already attracted to – so the parish started hosting group Skype sessions, offering instruction and discussion opportunities to parents who can then teach the lessons to their own children. In a couple of years, it has gone from pilot to popular program at the parish.

Fresh ideas are blossoming everywhere. As part of a renaissance of youth ministry at St. Augustine in New City, young parishioners created an outdoor Stations of the Cross. In Tuckahoe, a one-day retreat for families with children preparing to receive First Communion included a tour of the Holy Land staffed by students preparing for Confirmation. And at St. Anthony’s in Nanuet, teens staged a “virtual pilgrimage” to Lourdes in the parish center, bringing together not just their own families but also other members of the community around the contemplation of the miraculous. As Sr. Lombardo says: “Strengthening family life is strengthening parish life.”