RENEW
For The Catholic Parish and School
Parish & School Renewal
John Paul II laid out his pastoral plan for the entire Church at the end of the year 2000. “At the Beginning of the New Millennium,” Novo Millennio Ineunte, lays out key steps to help the Church “renewed herself, in order to be able to take up her evangelizing mission with fresh enthusiasm.”
However, he left it up to each local church to apply this general plan and make it a concrete course of action.
Our team works with parishes and Catholic schools to implement JPII’s pastoral plan.
We currently do not have space to take on new parishes or schools, but if you are interested in discerning a partnership with us, please reach out to our team at [email protected].
The Plan
Our Responsibility? Pastoral Conversion of the Parish “Urgency of renewal, canonical norms that establish possibilities, limits, rights and duties of pastors and the laity, so that the Parish might rediscover itself as a fundamental place of evangelical proclamation, from which Christian witness can shine for the world.”
What is the Church? Lumen Gentium: Nothing less than the sanctification and salvation of the world. God does not save us or make us holy as individuals, but brings us together as a Church. (n 9)
What should a Parish should be? Christifideles Laici: Urgent need to rediscover and renew the parish. The place where the Church is present and at work in any concrete time and place. (n 26) Local groups of Catholics (family of families) integrally living the Gospel Church is the only way the Church can fulfill its mission in the world.
How do we accomplish this? Novo Millennio Ineunte: The only pastoral plan outlined in any document. It is a holistic approach to make a parish what it should be.
How do we apply it? It isn’t a universal recipe. We have to create a concrete adaptation of the plan (as it specifically asks us to do). We do what the Church has always done, build a thriving Christian community through discipleship.
What does success look like? The end goal is to build a parish culture and structure that forms and empowers lay people to live Christifidelis Laici and fulfill the mission of the Church according to Lumen Gentium. But at its root is the transformation of individuals through an encounter wih Jesus Christ.
Resources
Francis
- Pastoral Conversion of the Parish – Foundational document from Dicastery for the Clergy
- Audience – Excellent summary for evangelization
- Evangelii Gaudium – A new chapter of evangelization marked by joy
- Lumen Fidei – Faith, foundation of society
- Message – Church as Mission
- Ad Limina – Everyone an agent of Evangelization
Benedict XVI
- Porta Fidei – Year of faith
- Ubicumque et Semper – Pontifical Council for Promotion of the New Evangelization
- Address (2000) – “If the art of living remains unknown, nothing else works.”
- 2012 Synod: Lineamenta, Instrumentum Laboris, Address, Homily
St. John Paul II
- Novo Millennio Ineunte – THE pastoral plan
- Ecclesia in America – Encounter with the Living Christ
- Tertio Millennio Adveniente – Year 2000
- Redemptoris Missio – Missionary mandate
- Christifideles Laici – Apostolic exhortation on mission of lay people
- Catechesi Tradendae – Apostolic exhortation on catechesis
Paul VI
- Evangelii Nuntiandi – Apostolic exhortation, “‘magna carta’ of evangelization in the contemporary world”
- VII, Ad Gentes – Decree on Missionary Activity
- VII, Lumen Gentium – Dogmatic Constitution on the Church