Pastor's Page: Feasibility Study on the Building of a Parish Center

Question: “I think that the building of a parish center for religious education, faith formation, parish festivities, ministry meetings and hospitality, is a good idea. But how can we afford it in these difficult
economic times?”
Answer: “The dream of a parish center can become a reality if every parishioner is willing to make a sacrifice. We have over 1400 families registered in our parish. Most of them, about 1000 families are not active. This means that we have no record of participation at mass on a regular basis. We can only track churchgoing through the use of our stewardship envelopes (currently 200 families use these envelopes) or through the writing of a personal check, contributing to our parish in the offertory.

The 200 envelope-using parish families contribute nearly 80% of our weekly collection, averaging $20 per week in the offertory ($4000). The remainder of the parish, for many reasons, is not fully engaged in our worship and our ministries.

The primary support of a fund raising drive to construct a Parish Center, will come from these 200 families if they believe in the project.
The biblical goal for giving to charity, found in Scripture and the Church tradition, is a tithe of 10%. This is understood as 5% of your income to the local parish and 5% to other charities of your choosing. For example, achieving this goal with an annual income of $50,000, would mean $5000 charitable giving, split between your local parish and other charities.

A good Christian steward plans his or her giving annually, and donates in proportion to what God has entrusted to him or her. That giving is done out of love; love for God and neighbor. The reward is in the giving. It is only in giving that we find happiness. It is sacrificial giving, because it does hurt while at the same time bringing great serenity and peace. The giver knows that the gift is a loving response to God's incredible generosity.”

Question: "Will we get financial assistance from our diocese or from the Pope?"
Answer: “Every parish in the country and in the world, is a small church within the larger church of the diocese (133 parishes) or the world. All of our ministries-liturgy and worship, outreach to the poor, religious education, youth ministry, etc., and the staff and administration to support this work of the gospel on a local level, comes from the parishioners in the weekly offertory at mass. We have no other source of income. In fact, because of our commitment to the church beyond our parish boundaries, more than 25% of our offertory supports apostolates in our diocese and elsewhere.

In other words, the diocese and the Vatican do not support us financially. We support the diocese and the Vatican
financially and spiritually. In the past, our diocese has loaned money to parishes at interest for building purposes. Parishes have essentially
taken a mortgage from the diocese and paid it back over the length of the loan agreement. This policy may not hold at the present time.”

Question: "Why are we not going with our original dream of building a new church to replace the temporary structure we presently have?"
Answer: "We have 600 to 800 regular massgoers, depending on the time and season of the year, using our church building for four weekend masses. Our church seats 300. Currently there are plenty of empty seats at all our parish masses. The need for a new church based on attendance is not there. Construction cost for a new church building, seating 500 would be in the $5 million range-$1 million for every 100 seats. The $5000 currently donated weekly in our offertory collection do not give us enough of a financial base to support a new church.

It is the hope of the Pastoral Council, Finance Committee and Pastoral Team that a Parish Center will generate more participation and build up our faith community both numerically and spiritually. This will make it possible and necessary for us to build a larger church to accommodate new participating parishioners."

A Vision for the Future
In an effort to provide facilities which truly provide the opportunity for us to grow as a parish community,
the parish council, finance committee and parish staff envision the construction of a new Parish Center.
This Center, proposed as a 6,000 square foot building, will serve the parish community of Ss. Peter and Paul
through our ministerial, social, spiritual, and educational services to grow in faith and friendship for many
years to come.
Our New Parish Center:
 Religious Education classrooms
 Adult Education classrooms
 New and necessary Parish Offices
 Appropriate space for Parish Dances
 Hospitality Greeting Space
 Ministry Meeting Space
 Large Group Gatherings
 Small Group Gatherings
 Food Pantry Storage
 Outreach Thrift Shop
 Senior’s Group Meetings
 Youth Ministry
Approximate Cost: $1,200,000

Click Here for
Parish Questionnaire

Mail the questionnaire to:

Lynch Development Associates,
74 New York Avenue.,
Suite 2, Huntington, NY 11743