St. Joseph of the Lakes

Thank you to Maggie Arnevik who was the chair of the Parish Festival and to the countless volunteers who made last Saturday and Sunday some of the most fun and remarkable days of our parish calendar. I am especially grateful to all who helped chair the many different organizations that all come together to make the festival work.  As always the music was fantastic as both Java Soul and the Saints of Swing contributed so much to our festival day.  I hope you all were able to experience a bit of our festival and the wonderful community that we have all built together!

In just two years we will be experiencing an archdiocesan Synod. It will occur on Pentecost weekend 2021. A Synod is a canonical (Church) process of consultation to help a bishop focus on the needs of the community. As it is a consultative process and not a single event, all are encouraged to participate in some way. In fact, Canon 212 states the faithful “have the right and even at times the duty to manifest to the sacred pastors their opinion on matters which pertain to the good of the Church.” Now is that time. 

The Archdiocesan Synod process is expected to last two-and-a-half years and will have four distinct parts.

Fall 2019 – Late Winter 2020: Prayer and Listening Events. Prayer and Listening events, hosted throughout the Archdiocese, will provide the broadest opportunity for input from all Catholics. These events will be part prayer and catechesis, and part listening session. They are opportunities to discern together the pastoral concerns that may become topics of discussion (pastoral priorities) for the Synod.

Fall 2020: Parish Consultation Process. Each parish in the Archdiocese will be invited to discuss Synod topics in small group settings, in which parishioners are invited to participate. Winter/Spring 2021: Deanery Consultations. Input gathered from the parish small groups will inform a deanery consultation process. Each parish in the Archdiocese is part of a deanery based on geographic area (see details). During this process, representatives from parishes will gather as a deanery to discuss further and discern Synod topics.

Pentecost 2021 (May 23) – Synod Assembly. The Synod Assembly is a multi-day event where representative clergy, religious and laity come together to assist the Archbishop in determining the pastoral priorities of the Archdiocese.

The first part of this fall’s process for our parish is to build an “ambassador” team of about 12 parishioners who will help implement the synod at the parish level. Also each parish will have 10 people who will represent the parish during consultations at the deanery level, which will happen in the early months of 2021.  This is a very important time for our archdiocese and ultimately for our parish as the clear set of pastoral priorities will be established through this synod process.