Church of St. Joseph

Using a Dual Approach
The best way to conduct a church building project is to assess the ministerial needs of the congregation, make building designs that match those needs and then pray that the money will come to pay for that project. Another way is to project how much money you can raise, and then decide how to spend it. The Facilities Committee is doing BOTH approaches simultaneously. We have assessed the needs of our aging buildings and have made plans to upgrade them in such a way that our ministries can thrive, both today and in the future. But we also will be conducting a “Feasibility Study” to determine the amount of financial support we can anticipate. Even Jesus mentions this common-sense fact: “Which of you wishing to construct a tower does not first sit down to calculate the cost to see if there is enough for its completion?” — Luke 14:28

Please continue to use the Prayer Cards we distributed, so that our building project will meet with success. Extra Prayer Cards are still available at the Church entrances. Thank You!

Approval by the Archdiocese
St. Joseph Parish cannot spend any money for major renovation projects unless we first get approval from the Archdiocesan Director of Administration and Finance. Their task is to make sure parishes make sound, realistic plans within their financial means. They will take a close look at our “giving history” and operating budget, so they can forecast the project size they think we can afford.

The Facilities Committee appreciates all the prayer support you are giving this process. Please add this concern to your list of intentions. The success of this endeavor depends on the generosity of us all!

Thank You for Your Prayers!
We want to thank Fr. Jerry Dvorak, the head of our Prayer Committee, for commissioning the writing of the Prayer for the Facilities Committee Renovation Project, and for incorporating that prayer into the Sunday Masses, plus the printing of the Prayer Card for each of us to use at home for our daily prayers. [More Prayer Cards can be found at the Church Entrances — help yourself!]

The Facilities Committee drawings will continue to be on display in the Social Hall for you to study. We appreciate your continued prayer support, plus any comments or feedback you can give us.

Catholic Finance Corporation is an independent corporation created by the Archdiocese in 2000. Their consultants gave us a 10-page flowchart outlining the Archdiocese step-by-step processes required before our renovation project can begin. According to their plan, the Facilities Committee would become what they call the Building Committee. Future committees or sub-committees will follow and will include: Design Committee, Building Finance Committee, Development (Fund Raiser) Committee, and Communications Committee. We would like to add one more - a Prayer Committee. We are asking everyone to be on this Prayer Committee. There are no meetings and no dues. We simply ask that you pray every day for the success of our renovation project. Whether at Mass, Adoration, First Friday Nocturnal Adoration, or any other prayer opportunity, we Thank You for those prayers!

To Renovate or Build New?
This question about the convent building has faced the Facilities Committee for a long time. The more information we collect, the more obvious it becomes that we will get much more “building for our buck” if we renovate. The $2.5 million sketch we showed at November’s All Parish Meeting was a top-of-the- line, Grade-A plan. For the same amount of money, we could get an average, so-so new building. But because $2.5 million is still a LOT of money, we are exploring the possibility of trimming down a few features from the Renovation Plan, in hopes that we can have a Plan B on hand, in case the Archdiocese recommends a more scaled-down project. We continue to ask for your prayers as a comprehensive plan for our facilities is hammered out.

The process of assessing needs, imagining solutions, exploring options, gathering data, seeking bids, making plans, wondering about money and asking for advice has been a long one. One thing we recognize - we need a foundation of prayer for this complete project. We ask all our parishioners to lift up this endeavor to God in prayer.

With God’s guidance, we are coming nearer and nearer to a plan that will meet the needs of our parish, the approval of the Archdiocese, and be achievable for our parishioners. Our goal is to firm up a workable plan by this spring, so we can begin raising the money we need by next fall. Thanks again for your prayerful support.

“Society is continually changing. And in order to serve the needs of its people, the Church must not only be willing to change, but actively pursuing it” (Karen Butler, ‘Deconstructing the 2008 Church,’ Church Solutions, January 2008). The sub-committee of Mark Vetter (architect), Bill Johnson, Paul O’Gorman and Chuck Romportl are still “actively pursuing” an alternate plan for comparison. We are not changing the plans at this point… only creating new ideas for consideration. If you have any questions about the progress, please feel free to call me or any of your Facility Team members:

Scottie Bahr
Bill Johnson
Karen Totall
Paul O’Gorman
Joan Vesovich
Richard Stein
Chuck Romportl
John Jelinek

The Facilities Committee proposal presented at the All Parish Meeting on November 27 was merely preliminary — Following that meeting, we created a smaller sub- committee to delve deeper in order to develop an alternate plan for comparison. Members of the sub-committee are: Mark Vetter (architect), Bill Johnson, Paul O’Gorman and Chuck Romportl. Like freelance writer Lee A. Dean stated in a recent magazine article, “a church must balance economics, aesthetics and utility… and be keenly aware of their community and what its people need in new facilities (Your Church, Strategic Space, Jan/Feb 2008, pg. 14). We appreciate your continued prayers as we strive for this balance.

Last night’s all parish meeting was a success! The Facilities Committee presented their findings and answered lots of questions from parishioners. If you would like to know:

• What facilities needs do we have?
• What could we do to meet those needs?
• How much would it cost?

please download the Facilities Committee presentation (pdf) - and give us your feedback: Are there other needs you see? Other solutions? Different priorities? Let us know!

St. Joseph’s has always put people ahead of buildings. We invested time and money to keep our school and daycare going while letting many building improvements slip by in the process. The irony of that approach has unfortunately come back to bite us. John Ireland School considered remaining at St. Joseph’s, but left because our building needed more updating than those of our neighboring parishes. More recently, our aging convent building caused another departure and our daycare was forced to find a new location with better facilities. We now have to play “catch up” with our buildings so that we can continue to support our current ministries and eventually update and improve. Like our people, our buildings are our “treasures.” We hope to share some estimated costs and potential plans for improvements sometime next month.