The Paulist National Catholic Evangelization Association presents:

ENVISION: Planning Our Parish Future - www.parishplanning.org

ENVISION is a comprehensive, results-driven parish planning process that fully engages parishioners in developing and implementing a faith-based vision for their parish. ENVISION leads a parish to:

• Contagious enthusiasm for faith
• New energy, new skills, new people for parish leadership
• Research-based decision making
• Collaborative engagement in mission
• Short-term achievements; long-term success
• A life-giving pastoral plan

The Parish Evaluation Project founded by Father Thomas Sweetser, SJ, is a resource for parishes looking at both long and short range planning. With the assistance of Sr. Jean Marie Bishop, OSF, PEP provides a monthly newsletter on a variety of topics, e.g. how to run parish meetings, resources and links for planning, best practices and helps for pastors and for staffs. Click on www.pepparish.org to discover the wisdom and insights of these creative and helpful resources.

As we enter into a time when the upcoming changes in the Diocese of Toledo make it imperative that parishes are sensitive and welcoming to parishioners who may be searching for a community of faith to replace their own, Pastoral Councils, Liturgy Committees and Pastoral staff members may find the book A User-Friendly Parish: Becoming a More Welcoming Community, a useful resource. Author Judith Ann Kollar begins her introduction:

In parishes all over the country (and, I suspect, the world), parish staff members, pastors, lay ministers, and concerned parishioners are asking themselves some variation of these questions: how can we make our parish "better"? What can we do to engage more people in the life of the parish? How can our liturgies become more welcoming? Why are our programs not as successful as we want them to be? What - if anything - can we do about all this?

She then spends the next sixty-five pages giving practical advice founded on good principles.

Although her book was not written specifically for the situation the parishes of the Diocese of Toledo are facing, her common sense approach to being a welcoming community is appropriate and timely.

A User-Friendly Parish, Judith Ann Kollar. Twenty-Third Publications, P.O. Box 180, Mystic, CT 06355. 1-800-321-0411. © 1998

New Beginnings Curriculum Kit
A New Way of Living as a Catholic

by Paul Wilkes

If you've been looking for a simple, straightforward program to enliven your parish, to give a new and exciting vision of what it is to be a Catholic, to help parishioners find their unique ministry in the parish or community - New Beginnings 101, 201, 301 is for you.

In just three dynamic 60-minute classes, on three successive Sunday mornings at your parish, you can begin transforming members into disciples - allowing your congregants to: feel the power of their parish, discover or enhance richness in their spiritual lives, and joyfully find and embrace the ministry that God has already planted in their souls.

For more information, please visit New Beginnings at www.nbontheweb.com .