Languages: Do You Speak Pastoral Council?

   This morning our Parish Pastoral Council will meet for its monthly meeting.
   When a person volunteers to go through the selection process possibly to become a Pastoral Council member, that person leaves behind a whole set of preconceived notions about how meetings work!
   To begin with, Pastoral Council members are selected, not elected. To many people, that process is unnerving since it is much more than a popularity contest or an agenda-wars contest. In the selection process, potential members come to discernment sessions to pray about and study what Pastoral Councils are all about and the type of person that should and should not be a member. Immediately, people recognize a radical difference. We pray and reflect as we invite people to discern whether or not they believe they are being called to be Pastoral Council members.
   After the discernment process, the candidates, on selection day, put their names on papers and those papers are dropped into a basket. At one of the weekend Masses, we ask the community to pray that God select the people He desires to be on the Council. Those names are drawn and those people are the new Council members.
   Coming to meetings, then, the Council member realizes that his/her role is different than at other meetings. To begin with, we start our meetings with prayerful reflection. At our parish, the Council members come to the morning Mass and the meeting begins immediately after Mass.
   Prayerfully considering the needs of our parish family, we discuss what we believe is important and pursue ideas that help us to "feel the pulse" of the parish community. We listen to reports from the commissions and we suggest ideas to the commissions.
   The Council realizes that it is not the "doing" body of the parish. Rather, the Council members are the thinking, praying, reflecting members of the parish. Their ideas flow from their prayerful consideration of topics.
   Being a Council member is not for everyone. A person that wants to accomplish something immediately and at every meeting would probably feel frustrated at Council meetings since the Council is concerned with visioning, long-range planning, and making ways for the needs of the parishioner to be met.
   The language, attitudes, and actions of the Council are different from any other group and this is one of the things that make Council members so special.
   So, if I may, I ask you, kindly, to pray for the members of our Pastoral Council today. Pray, also, for members of your Pastoral Council if you are from a different parish. They truly deserve a pat on the back and your prayers.