Dear Brothers and Sisters of Our Lady of Mount Carmel,
Our Church celebrates the Feast of Christ the King today. Our country celebrates our great national holiday of Thanksgiving this week. I would like to inform you about a development in our parish’s life for which I am most grateful.
You will meet in these bulletin pages and online, 11 parishioners who have accepted the call to join our Parish Advisory Board. Each one attended our Leadership Retreat in September and offered their services to a newly reorganized parish advisory board. These parishioners expressed willingness to serve and they each agreed to a regimen of monthly meetings and continued deep engagement in all matters of parish concern.
It is my view that we are now well positioned to get on with the mission of Mount Carmel at a heightened pace. Our finances are in good order and we have a Finance Council who keeps a watchful eye on all money matters. Our Academy remains high-powered and well-supported. Witness the phenomenal success of the recent Hall of Fame Dinner. The School Board also meets monthly and supports our new principal and our extraordinary Parent’s Guild. We are good to go!
In the recent decades of the post Vatican II Church, parish advisory boards were first called parish councils. All this grew out of the clear mandate of Vatican II to empower the laity and to harness the energy of every baptized Catholic. Parish Advisory Boards are the latest iteration of this spirit-filled movement. I view the Parish Advisory Board as a necessary guide to our direction and our mission.
Please take note of the Parish Advisory Board draft of our updated mission statement:
“We are the Roman Catholic community of Our Lady of Mount Carmel based in Tenafly, New Jersey. Our mission is the promotion of the holiness of life through the celebration of the Sacraments, the sharing of the Gospel and the promotion of Catholic values. We offer pastoral care through ministries that provide education, healing, spiritual growth and social outreach in the Carmelite tradition.”
We also have a very crisp motto:
“No matter who you are, no matter what you’ve done,
no matter where you’re from, no matter where you’re going,
no matter how good or bad things seem,
you are always welcome.”
Your feedback on all this is most welcome. Feel free to be in touch with me or with any of the Parish Advisory Board members. That is precisely what they are called to do. Hear the needs of the church and respond to them. By the way, the Parish Advisory Board has had two meetings already and, at both, concern for our youth and our ability to engage them in the life of our community has already surfaced as a deep and difficult concern.
Yes, Christ is the Lord of our lives and, yes, we are very blessed to be living in the United States of America. Thanks be to God for both blessings and have a happy Thanksgiving.
Sincerely yours in Christ and Our Lady of Mount Carmel,
fr. Dan