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Present:
Fr. Vincent Gallogley, Barry O’Halpin, Fr. John Kealy, Suzanne Christmas, Paddy
McEneaney, Yvonne Nielsen, Walter Huyghe, Horst Dengler, Yvonne Stausboll, Susanne Lehne and Brigid Alty
Apologies:
Judith Carr, Johny Van Der Bracht, Jeff Thomson and Brian O’Neill
Suzanne opened the meeting in prayer at 19.45.
Matters Arising from the January Minutes:
Fr. Vincent reported that the Farringtons were delighted with their farewell evening and they said Thank You.
Also, Joan, Fr. Edmund’s sister, was delighted with the 10th anniversary reception.
Fr. John pointed out that the St. Patrick’s Day Mass will take place on Monday 14 March and not the 16 March.
Fr. Vincent has received a lovely meditation on the cross from the Franciscans in Geneva. He has ordered 500 copies for the Parish for Palm/Passion Sunday to be given out to every adult in the congregation.
Also, both the families of Jo Binns and Guy Thiran said thank you and are grateful for the support and large turnout at Jo and Guy’s funerals.
The January minutes were approved.
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Mass Hymn Books:
Yvonne presented us with a draft hymnbook, almost completed. There will be one book, comprising the Children’s Liturgy, prayers used in Mass, hymns, both children’s and folk. The introductory pages will comprise self-portraits of the First Communion children and this will change each year. The book should be ready for Easter. Thanks Yvonne. We all agreed that it looked great. The blue celebration hymnals will be kept in the sacristy for occasional use.
A parishioner has kindly offered to contribute towards the cost of the new books.
Paddy will express our thanks to this lady and talk to her about the cost. The possible cost was discussed. ACTION: Paddy.
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Trip to Church: rehearsal 20.45:
A group of Baroque singers have asked to rehearse here with a view to holding a concert here in the future. They have asked for our comments as to what parishioners would like etc. We couldn’t obviously estimate how many people would attend a concert given here, but we’ll sit in at the end of the meeting, about 9.15 for 5 to 10 minutes and give our comments.
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Worship and Evangelisation:
There will be a reconciliation service at 5pm this Saturday 26 February.
The World Day of Prayer takes place a week on Friday 4 March at St. Paulus Church,
Vossem. There are flyers about and a poster up and this will be in Words this weekend.
There will be a Children’s Liturgy this Sunday 27 February.
There will be another reconciliation service later on. Susan Jacobs will be responsible with her young people from the sacraments class.
Susanne is preparing 2 sisters for baptism (one will make her First Eucharist in May) for the 16 April. Fr. John will celebrate the Baptismal service, and he agreed attend one of the preparation classes and anoint the girls.
RCIA: We welcome at least 4 catechumens into our faith community at Easter. One adult (and possibly 2 others) will be baptized at the Easter Vigil and be confirmed and receive First Eucharist. Three others will be confirmed and receive First Eucharist. Welcome!
This Promise Is For You! The dates will be Thursday evenings 14 and 21 April at 7pm, then 28 April, then a break for Ascension, then Thursday 12 May. The away day will be at La Foresta 20-21 May. Barry asked if it would be possible for Frs. Vincent and Philip to visit the retreat again this year and celebrate the sacrament of reconciliation? Fr. Vincent agreed to do this.
The pre-marriage takes place here this weekend. Fr. Vincent asked for a few volunteers to help set up tables for lunch, to be around during lunch and clear away.
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Christian Service:
Charity Appeals: Yvonne mentioned a request from EC-OC, Europe’s Children, Our Concern, an organization working with young people with dyslexia and learning difficulties and their families. They would like to hold a picnic, fun afternoon and barbecue in our grounds on a Sunday in June. The 26 June is available. Yvonne will let them know and ask about insurance. ACTION:
Brigid. To liaise with the BCT and find out if they are having their Summer Fun day here on the 19 June? If not, that weekend is available for
EC-OC.
Charity Appeals: Last weekend’s charity collection is being investigated by Yvonne? Apparently, the 2 people who spoke were not from Broederlijke
Delen?
ACTION :Yvonne.
We had agreed to hold a collection for Fr. Max in Zimbabwe, but now the Knights of St. Thomas More have recently held the Pancake breakfast and will be shortly holding a Wine Tasting evening on 12 March. It was therefore, agreed to hold the collection later in the year.
Yvonne will contact our Rwandan twin regarding a collection.
It was suggested mentioning in Words the amounts received at the offertory collection. Recently, amounts received at the charity collections have been very generous but to the deficit of the offertory collections.
Horst suggested reminding parishioners of the preferential option of paying by bank transfer, to cover dips and troughs.
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Parish Life:
Susanne put forward a proposal by Helen McLaughlin to organize an Arts and Crafts Fayre in the Parish in December, for people to display and sell their art and craft work. A discussion ensued and it was agreed that we have decided not to have any outside commercial ventures on Parish premises, though exhibitions would be acceptable. ACTION Susanne.
350 Club: 62 tickets were sold last weekend. We must sell at least 107 tickets to cover the cost of the prizes. Yvonne appealed for volunteers to sell the tickets. She estimates they lost 6 or 7 potential ticket purchasers last weekend, as there was only herself and Lori selling tickets at the Vigil Mass.
Yvonne had a problem with the banking of the actual virements from various different banks, but this has hopefully been resolved. Volunteers must get people to mark the virement with the name of their bank.
Barry talked about holding a Karaoke Night to take place sometime in April.
Paddy informed us that there will be a Quiz Night before the end of April.
Daybreak will be performed on the 16 April and any profits will go towards the Tsunami appeal, via
Jenni.
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Website:
Website and Newsletter: Ferran is extremely busy, so he has not finished the newsletter but it will be out this weekend. A big Thank you to Ferran for all his hard work on the web-site. There will be a thank you in the newsletter. ACTION: Paddy.
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Maintenance:
No real decisions have been made to date regarding the sewage. A parishioner Gerry Kelleher, a builder, thought purification plants would be better? Gerry will talk to Liam
Breslin, Finance Committee, about this.
The Finance Committee has agreed to purchase a garden shed to go alongside the garages. Fr. John and Johny will order this from Macro as manufacture and delivery takes 5 weeks. Fr. Vincent was thwarted in his attempts to do this today!
Fr. Vincent was very pleased to tell us that 2 local people, friends of a parishioner, have agreed to donate a large (7.2m.) cross, for outside the church, to be placed behind the Parish sign on the street. The cross will be lit. The Council endorsed the gift gratefully.
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The Prayer Garden: This will be finished for the Fayre.
We discussed the outside altar and the fact that it has become a play area for children. Both safety and respect for a consecrated altar were discussed. It was asked to ask Catherine Sternemann if flowers or plants could be placed on the altar? ACTION: Paddy. We all agreed that it was fine for children to play there, but we didn’t want any fractured skulls!
The holding of an outdoor mass was proposed for the 29 May. There will also be a short procession from the prayer garden, if this is ready.
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A.O.B.:
Yvonne S. reported on 2 very positive meetings that have been held regarding future planning of the Parish. She will report back in May with concrete suggestions. At that stage, an experienced Lay Administrator from the UK will come and talk to us. Yvonne passed information round on this subject for our interest.
A big ‘thank you’ goes to Greg Kaufmann for all his hard work in the Parish. Greg and Kendra are leaving after Easter. A thank you will go in the newsletter also. ACTION: Paddy.
Fr. John wishes to thank the Parish for the response and turn out to meet Fr. Mathias, the Franciscan visitor, at such short notice, a few weeks ago. Fr. Mathias was apparently very impressed with the Parish!
Brigid closed the meeting in prayer at 9.20 p.m.
The next meeting will be held on Tuesday 8 March at 7.30 p.m.
We then proceeded to the church to listen to the group of Singers. The group will liaise with Paddy.
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