In the third part of this wandering series on the Archdiocese's Pastoral Plan for Johnson County, I'm going to focus on the "Key Findings" section. Please turn to page 6 of your packet.

It's no surprise to any Johnson Countian to learn that our county is growing on its Southern and Western boundaries while remaining fairly stable (or declining!) in its interior and Northern boundaries. The growth is uneven. Likewise, the infrastructure, neighborhoods and people of the county are aging unevenly. While I think I live in a nice and decent part of an older section of the county, you don't have to go very far from my house to find some really crummy apartments or a suffering neighborhood. But my job shows me the growth and decline in a fairly exaggerated way, so I have to be careful not to overstate the growth, stability decline or revitalization of neighborhoods--I may have too intense of focus on that topic.

Years ago, I remember hearing someone say that it is a hallmark of a healthy parish if they span a wide range of ages. A parish should have plenty of baby baptisms, kids in the schools, young adults getting married and parents acting as den mothers and troop masters, they should have professionals on the committees and retired folks in the organizations, and sadly, funerals for their lifelong parishoners. If a parish only has funerals, they're in trouble. If a parish only has baptisms, they're going to be unstable. If a parish doesn't have either, they're incomplete. You've got to have it all!

I am heartened to read that the Archdiocese wants greater cooperation between the parishes in terms of Mass times. I actually think that we've got a pretty good range of potential Masses in Kansas City. Have you seen MassTimes.org yet? If you accidentally overslept on Sunday morning and missed church, it'll help you find a service that you can attend--and it's good for just about everywhere in the USA. I even keep a listing of Masses at different times around the city saved on my cell phone that I can look at if I'm in a pickle. I wish that parishes had greater variation in time that daily Mass was offered (only a few happen before most of us have to be at work or after the workday is done) and I REALLY WISH that there was a wider array of times that Confession is offered (Saturday afternoon is THE WORST time to hold confession) around town in accessible places. But that is worth a post all of its own. In any matter, I'm glad that the Archdiocese is considering coordination. That is a good thing.

Of particular note is the statements about Spanish Masses--three County parishes offer the Mass in Spanish, each around the same time on Sunday afternoons. I mention this principally because I think that this is continuing the trend in how parishes will approach their Liturgies in the near future. Think about your own home parish--if there are 4 Sunday Masses, it'd be pretty common to have one of the Masses be "atypical"--the vestiges of the 70's, 80's and 90's are still hanging around in the 21st Century in the forms of the "folk Mass", the "children's Mass" and the "LifeTeen Mass". Who's still going to the folk Mass these days? The children's Masses are on the way out. The LifeTeen debacle seems to be going strong. But in how many parishes were these types of liturgies added into the roster of Sunday Masses, and in how many replaced Masses that were suffering for attendance? I don't know. It is my amateur opinion that some of the parishes offering a Spanish Mass would benefit from offering the Spanish liturgy in the place of one of its ordinary Masses--and thus give the Spanish liturgy a conventional churchgoing time somewhere in the County. And hey, since we're on the subject, consider this a formal request for a Tridentine Latin Mass in Johnson County and to have it at a typical churchgoing time. Thank you in advance, Archdiocese.

But one of my favorite lines in the whole report is section 22 on page 7:

Several parishes will soon start a new chapter in their life as a parish. The vision and drive of these parishes has been raising capital dollars to build new facilities. Within five or ten years, a group of parishes will retire their debts and facilities will be basically completed. A compelling new vision with new goals is needed for the next ten and twenty years.

This is good news indeed! I worry about parishes strapped with debt from construction-eager pastors and committees. Maybe it's the Dave Ramsey show rattling around in by brain? Still, it's good news--thank God!

This section of the report also introduces the findings on Catholic Elementary and High Schools. Not every parish in the County has a grade school, but most of them do. I think there are a number of challenges facing Catholic education in the near future, most of which focuses on defining the purpose and identity of Catholic Schools. I mean, Johnson County has pretty good schools in its four public school districts. There are other places in the city or the country which are not in this situation. If the public schools are garbage, then families that can afford private schools often put Catholic education on the table--even if they're not Catholic families. Catholic schools carry a reputation of academic excellence. But if the public schools also have that reputation, then Catholic schools need to bring something else to the table for families to pony out the burden of private tuition. Catholic Schools need to be Catholic schools. That means more than hanging a crucifix in each classroom and going to Mass once a week. I'll get further into Catholic Schools in future posts. The Archdiocesan Pastoral Plan covers them more in depth later--and Catholic schools are a particular interest to me.

The Key Findings section of the Pastoral Plan wraps up with a subsection called "Pastoral Concerns" that briefly notes that parishes need to make sure that they are doing an adequate job of reaching out in their ministry to parishioners (agreed) and a further note that there is a greater need for "collaboration instead of competition". Perhaps there is some unfriendly rivalry between parishes? Perhaps. I know I'm guilty in pushing that too--I know that there are some parishes where I will decline to attend. But I'd say that it is not a matter of parishes as much as it is a matter of pastors--pastors are like little dukes in their duchies and build liturgies that appeal to different parishes (and I'm sure that newly re-assigned pastors take the opposite view). In short, the ordinary Mass is so customizable that there is a lot of variation between different parishes and different priests. It results in good liturgies and bad liturgies. I'll steer clear of the bad ones, thankyouverymuch. Is that parochialism? If so, then I am parochial. Confiteor!