FACT
SHEET CONCERNING
THE
LAY MINISTRIES PROGRAM
DIOCESE OF FORT
WORTH
1977 – 2002
1976 – A group of diocesan educators, including the
chancellor, Msgr. Gene Witkowski, draw up tentative plans and curriculum for a
Diocesan Lay Ministry Program.
1977 – Spring: Diocesan-wide meeting held in Bridgeport, for the purpose of studying the Glenmary statistics involving the Diocese’s ministries needs. One person from each of the four deaneries were chosen to keep the dream alive: Dick McNally, Ruben Castaneda, Pat George and Sara Carey.
1977 – October: Lay Ministries program begins. Sisters Gabriela Martinez ssmn, Kay Kolb and Pat Miller, ssnd, are hired by diocese to teach/facilitate the program in Spanish and English.
Commissioners, two from each deanery are asked to take care of the logistics: contacting parishes and participants and pastors, providing coffee/tea etc.; collecting monies from participants and from supporting parishes. Units 1 & 2 are offered in the fall.
1978 – Sister Dorothy Powers, ssmn, joins “Gaby” as a second Spanish facilitator/teacher. Diocese splits the “central deanery” into East and Central Deaneries. Program is given in five locations, rotating parishes, on successive weekends:
Units 3, 4, and 5 in the spring and a summer retreat;
Units 6 & 7 and a Day of Reflection in the fall.
Commissioners meet regularly with teachers/facilitators in Jacksboro to keep all focused on same mission: an educated, committed Catholic laity who sees MINISTRY as the role received from Christ.
1979—Units 8, 9, 10 in the spring and a spring retreat;
Units 11 & 12 and Closing Ceremonies in the fall.
125 participants, from the five deaneries, complete the program in the fall. Closing Eucharist and presentation of certificates, candles and pins occurs at the Cathedral, Bishop John Cassata presiding.
1980 - Bishop Joseph P. Delaney is appointed to the growing Fort Worth Diocese.
1980 – 1982: Second cycle – follows same pattern in five deaneries. 225 participants from the five deaneries complete the program.
1983
– 1985: Third cycle - Sister Linda
Carmona, ssnd is hired to “network” and encourage participation in the Lay
Ministries program in the Southwest Deanery,
a large territory over many small rural parishes.
Sister
Anne Finnerty joins the Diocesan Staff as “overseer” of program as part of her
role as Adult Education Director for the Diocese. 325 participants complete the program.
1985: Bishop Delaney and Sister Anne Finnerty and
other diocesan officials meet with the facilitators’ team to announce that the
diocese can no longer afford the expense of the program. Sisters Gabriela and Dorothy take jobs in
other diocesan work, and Sister Linda moves to Mexico as a missionary. Commissioners meet at Catholic Center to
discuss possibility of surviving on the $40,000 Bishop Delaney would possibly
be available. Decision: continue the
program in English. The split with the
Spanish program and with the networking takes its toll, loss of the Hispanic
influence on the planning, the participants, and the facilitators, as well as
loss of hands-on Hispanic leadership.
1985
– 1987: Fourth cycle of Lay Ministries
Program, English only, still in five deaneries.
Commissioners
continue meeting with Kay and Pat in Jacksboro on a regular basis. 200 participants complete the program.
1989
– Bishop Delaney announces to diocesan staff that Lay Ministries Program will
close at the end of the 1990 program, so that diocesan energies and
participation will focus on RENEW, an integral part of the Diocesan thrust for
three years.
Past
participants meet at the final retreat at Glen Rose to decide if they can raise
the necessary funding to keep Kay/Pat in the diocese, and re-start the program
at the end of RENEW. Catholic Renewal
Center director, Gail Schatzman, meets
with Bishop Delaney to offer the “umbrella” of the CRC to the fledgling group.
1988
– 1990: Fifth and last cycle of Lay
Ministries Program, including closing
ceremonies in Glen Rose Retreat Center.
Father Peter Coughlan, head of the Vatican Pontifical Council for the
Laity, leads the retreat. Bishop Joseph Delaney presides at Eucharist. Gail Schatzman and Sister Anselma from the
Catholic Renewal Center announce to the assembly the plans for the transition
to Ministries Outreach which will depend on the past participants for financial
support, and on the Bishop for moral and spiritual support.
The
finance committee meets its goal of funding Kay and Pat’s ministry in the
diocese: workshops, retreats , writing
booklets for and working with RENEW, etc.
1993
– 1994: Partners in Ministry,
“offspring” of the Lay Ministries program, is born. A yearly program, PIM takes place in two parishes one Saturday a
month. Some 50 participants complete the program, which has 9 units, and closes
with a retreat at Glen Rose in the spring.
The
program has continued each year since 1994, gradually gaining in numbers of
participants. The “finance board”
becomes the Ministries Outreach Advisory Board, and assumes many of the tasks
that the former commissioners did.
Carmen
Garcia , Rosa Diaz de Miranda and Patricia Gutierrez offer the program in
Spanish during two of these years. The
“MOAB’S” continue to work to find a way to increase interest from the
Spanish-speaking as well as English-speaking members of the diocese.
By
2002, about 2000 persons have been a part of the program, either as the
Diocesan Lay Ministry Program, or as Partners in Ministry.
In the early 50’s.School Sisters of Notre Dame, Pat Miller
and Kay Kolb, met while attending Notre Dame College in St. Louis. Through the
years, as a result of their mutual interest in Scripture, their friendship
blossomed. They continued to teach in various schools, Pat in Chalmette,
Corpus Christi and Tyler; Kay in St. Louis at Rosati Kain and Rosary High. They obtained degrees in theology
from St Mary University in San Antonio
Their
desire to teach the message of Vatican Council II, especially the role of the
laity, led them to answer a call in 1971. Father Joe Schumacher, in Denton, was
in need of pastoral assistants to help in the growing parish.
In1977, the
Diocese of Fort Worth began looking for directors of a Lay Ministry Program.
This new program was to be for adults eager to enrich their faith lives
and become more active in their parishes. This is when the Lay Ministry
Program began in the Diocese of Fort Worth 30+ years ago.
The response to the original program was heartwarming, and the participants
committed themselves to a Friday night through Sunday afternoon, once every six
weeks, in their respective deaneries
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Sister
Linda Carmona (1983), Sister Kay Kolb, Sister Dorothy Powers, Sister Gabriela
Martinez, and Sister Pat Miller became a team of directors and made possible
for sessions to be presented in Spanish and English. The other component of this team as called “Commissioners” – three or four from each deanery – who set up the rotating host parishes, notified the participants before each session, and kept in touch with the pastors |
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Although the programs varied in length during the years, the message was always there and very strong, being enthusiastically received by those who completed the three, then two years of the Lay Ministry Program. It enjoyed continued success for thirteen years increasing from 125“graduates” in 1979 to 325 in 1990 In1990
the Diocese of Fort Worth began a diocesan-wide program called RENEW.
At that time the decision was made to no longer fund the Lay Ministry
Program, since the thrust of the Diocese was to make RENEW the focus of
diocesan ministries. |
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Many of the thousands of participants who saw what this program had done for them individually and the leadership in their parishes were reluctant to just let it die. Enzo and
Margarita Giustino brought together a group, and formed a committee, which
would request financial support of past participants and the Lay
Ministries Program was “reborn” as Ministries Outreach at that retreat.
Gail Schatzmann and Sister Anselma (directors of the Catholic Renewal Center)
also attended the closing services of this retreat, and at this time offered
to take the fledgling “MINISTRIES OUTREACH” under the umbrella of the
Catholic Renewal Center. Although
no longer monetarily supported by the diocese, the program continued to have
the blessing and encouragement of Bishop Delaney and now has the same from,
Bishop Vann. |
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Partners
in Ministry, as a division of Ministries Outreach, continued the thrust of
The Lay Ministry Program. With an emphasis on the one-ness of
spirituality, flowing from their faith to their lives of home, family and
work, the program evolves with each new group. On July 11, 2004 Pat and Kay celebrated their Golden
Jubilee friends in Denton held an elegant party and hundreds of friends from
all over Texas attended. (See Golden Jubilee on the main menu). The
Finance committee was gradually replaced by the Ministry Outreach Advisory
Board (MOAB) and many past participants have served.
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The
program has always offered periodic retreats, often at Glen Lake Methodist
Camp. A wonderful array of speakers have gifted us through the years:
Rev. Peter Coughlin, Rev. Richard Weaver, Rev. Peter Phan, Rev. Ben
Wren, Rev. Charles Curran, Dr. Toni Craven, Brother Wayne Teasdale, Rev.
Vince Donovan, Dr. Robert Fastiggi, Brother Joseph Kilikevice, and Rev. Jim
Conlon, Sister Kathleen Drilling, Sister Ann Roddy, Sister Miriam Therese
Winter and many others all of whom have enriched our lives The
weekend retreats have taken us to several church camps in different areas,
some very nice and comfortable and some not so comfortable. We have
enjoyed beautiful warm, sunny days, and have suffered through some not-so-warm
and not-so-sunny times. In
addition to the inspirational speakers, we have all enjoyed the wonderful
fellowship of each other, the years-past members who return each year.
The exuberant spirit the “new graduates” bring, the happy mealtimes, the
time for prayer, singing and dancing…all have bonded us in our common
mission: an active Catholic laity. |
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In
addition to Partners in Ministry Pat and Kay do workshops and retreats on a
variety of themes in parishes and schools. On-going classes like the “Tuesday Morning Seminar”
have endured through some 15+ years. For about 15 years a group of about 40 open and spiritual people have been meeting in the Catholic Renewal Center on Tuesday morning in a completely safe and open atmosphere from 10am to12pm to discuss their faith and how to live it in their everyday life.
The basis for discussion is usually a book, tape or a video that often takes a year or more to complete. Some books we have used recently are:
Jesus and the New Universe Story by Cletus Wessels O.P. Tomorrow’s Catholic by Michael Morwood Religion in Exile and Quantum Theology by Diarmuid O’ Murchu In Search of Belief by Joan Chittister Evolutionary Faith by Diarmuid O’ Murchu “Arise, My Love…” by William Johnson Video: Canticle of the Cosmos by Brian Swimme Ph.D. Which often slips in again when it relates to the book we are reading |
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In 2010 Facilitators Sisters Pat and Kay
and Ray and Christy decided, while keeping the foundational aspects of
Scripture, Church History, Vatican II, to add a more spiritual and retreat
like atmosphere to the Partners In Ministry Program and PIMS was born |
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