Minutes of Our Lady of Lourdes Annual General Meeting Sunday June 17th 2007

PRESENT
Fr. Tom Egan, Eddie Albert, Pat Bolger, Cecilia Webb, John Donnelly, Ramon Landi, Joe Sutton, Jane Landi, Brian Hunt, Clyde Webb, Tina Bolger, Frank Nolan, David and Frances Clarke, Pat Hunt, Norah Curtin, Libby Biberian, Peter Wurr, Irene Plunkett, Michael, Mary McMullan, Felicity Brown.

APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE
Jackie Reddington, Fr. Damian Cassidy, Peter Coleman, Aileen and Brian Adams, Joan Wurr, Harriet Albert.

MINUTES OF THE LAST AGM ON JUNE 11th 2006
Minutes were agreed and signed as correct.

MATTERS ARISING
Fr. Sunn’s Grave.  Eddie’s brother-in-law, Phil, has looked at the stone, and cleaned it.  It is a flat slab with the Ki-Ro symbol on it together with Fr. Sunn’s dates and those of his mother.  The inscription is worn and the dates are illegible.  There are three options:

1.    Leave it now that it has been cleaned.
2.    Add a plaque to the plinth with the dates on it.
3.    Take the stone away and get it cleaned professionally, which would need costing.

The meeting discussed how well Fr. Sunn is now remembered in the parish community.  He was the founder of the Parish, but is not commemorated in any way these days, and it was pointed out that whatever we do to the stone now, would have to be redone in the fullness of time.  On balance it was felt that although Fr. Sunn should always be remembered in the Parish, it was probably not worth a great deal of expense to recarve the slab, when we could have the brass plaque, which would be cheaper and easier to maintain.  The information would be the same and could still be read.

Knotweed.  The programme is on-going and the stuff is dying off.

MATTERS ARISING FROM THE ANNUAL REPORT
- We have been advised to have the church roof replaced in it’s entirety, by the Diocesan Surveyor.  Piecemeal repairs are not solving the problems of the leaks.  After this, we can consider new carpets and pews.  We are still awaiting quotes for the roof.

- The cloakroom in the Parish centre has been converted into a cupboard.

- The Parish Festival went well last year, and it was decided we could hold something similar every two years.

- All the volunteers who keep the Hall running were thanked.

- A Knights of St. Columba group has been founded and is awaiting official approval.  They will meet once a month.

FR. TOM’S REPORT
Fr. Tom began by thanking all the volunteers who keep the parish running happily and successfully.  Without them it is hard to imagine how the parish would function.  They are thanked officially each year at the Christmas party.  He is aware of how fortunate he is to have such a large body of support in this parish.

Fr. Damian has settled in well, he shows great initiative, works hard and offers valued support to Fr. Tom.  He is currently undergoing a three year exclaustration period from the Carmelites.

Fr. John is leaving in the summer to live nearer his university.  He will also resign from his position as chaplain to the Kerulan community.  He has worked very hard to get the chaplaincy up and running and his studies have suffered.  There will be a new chaplain, but it is not known if Fr. John will be replaced here at New Southgate.

The multi-cultural Mass at Pentecost went well, although bad weather kept some people away.

We have been using new catechism books for First Holy Communion – they went well and will be used again next year.  Unfortunately the new Confirmation books did not cover the course as we’d have liked so we may look for an alternative next year.  Bishop John Arnold was pleased with our Confirmation Mass.

Fr. Tom and Fr. Damian delivered some extremely successful Lenten talks during Holy Week.

Baptism:  We get a lot of requests from people who are obviously looking for a baptism certificate for schools, so we now have a rule that if the child is over 3 ½ it will have to attend our children’s liturgy sessions at the 11.15 am Mass, then join the Saturday class when it is six, and will be baptised at the end of that year before going on to the First Holy Communion programme.  This will encourage the family to consider a long term approach to church going.

Our Lady of Lourdes School.
This has been causing us some concern this year.  Following a successful SATS last year and a feature in the Evening Standard, the school received a record number of applications for places (60:30).  A new ruling that distance from school takes priority over the specific recommendation of the local parish priest meant that we had a number of good, supportive, local Catholics turned down because people living nearer the school than them had got their forms signed by a priest from a different parish.  If this continues we will have the problem of a school connected to the church, but with no relationship with the church, because the children are either at church regularly elsewhere, or they don’t go to church at all.  

Not only is this unwelcome from our point of view, it has caused an unbelievable amount of distress to good parishioners, whom we are unable to help.

The solution would be to insist that Fr. Tom’s recommendation takes priority over those of other priests, before distance from school is considered, but currently the Diocese is unwilling to challenge this direction and the government is not disposed to support “faith” schools.  If we were to unilaterally ignore the “distance” ruling, we would find ourselves losing appeals and we would be back where we started.

If there is a parishioner who would like to take on the diocese, and the government, they are welcome to offer their services to the School Governors.  

Under Canon Law, a parish is the people who participate in the Eucharist.  As a parish school we would like the school to reflect the parish!

Could we build more classrooms?  We do not really have the space.  We need another Catholic primary school in the area.

FINANCE
Income 2006:  Offertory £197,000, total income £283,000.

Appeals are always well supported in this parish.

Figures from 2002 were compared with 2006 – high early expenditure was due to the new Hall.  In January 03 we were £200,000 in the red, by Dec 06 we had nearly £86,000 in the bank.  This extraordinary success rate is due to the efforts and generosity of the whole parish.

Gift Aid went up in 2006, compared to 2005, by £8,000.

Planned Giving is going down – 50 envelopes or standing orders have been returned as people have died or moved away.  This will have a knock on effect on the gift aid for next year.  The envelope collection went down by £3,000 in the first three months of 2006, whilst our Diocesan Assessment has nearly doubled this year (2007) after being held at 2001 figures whilst we were in debt.

Legacies are always welcome and should be encouraged.

We always need money – in a building this size there will always be work that needs doing.

It costs £3,000 a week to run this parish, from a weekly income of just under £4,000 a week.

The accounts are done by Brian and Jane, who prepare the figures on a quarterly basis for the Financial Committee to study, who then report to the Parish Council.

Next year the parish is 85 years old, and Lourdes in France celebrates 150 years.  This gives us a focus for celebration and fund-raising.  We are looking into holding a Dinner Dance at Penridge's in February.

ELECTIONS AND APPOINTMENTS
The Chairman, Secretary and Treasurer all agreed to stay on and were duly reappointed.

PARISH COUNCIL
All agreed to stay on except Patrick Madigan.

COMMUNITY CONCERN TEAM
The team have decided not to meet anymore as they feel that what they talk about is being done anyway.  They were thanked for all the work they do, and have done over the years.  Anne Wurr is very much missed, she was always willing to help and took communion regularly to housebound parishioners, as well as being instrumental in getting the Phones for Housebound idea on board.

It is important that parishioners let the priests know if there is anyone who needs a home visit.  The priests currently visit a number of Homes in the Parish, but would welcome volunteers to take communion especially on Sundays.

ECUMENISM
Fr. Tom has been meeting with other ministers for lunch for the first time in two years.  They hope to get together about four times a year.  Churches Together have not met very often lately.  It was felt that although the local Christian churches get on well together, we have reached a point where we don’t want “merge” any further.  Our differences are as important as our similarities.

CT Stations of the Cross was not very well attended.

Our joint carol service with St. Paul’s is still going strong, and we also meet up to sing carols at Arnos Grove at Christmas time.

Felicity Brown is our representative on the Compass magazine.

PRAYER AND EVANGELISATION
Mothers Prayers are still going well.

The Prayer Intentions book was filled, and a second one is now in use.

Website: prognosis was wildly optimistic last year!  A test site may be up and running soon.  It is hoped that the website will be useful.

Lent talks went well (see above).

Recent initiatives in Faith Sharing are popular, but they don’t go far enough in bringing in new people.  It was felt that they lack content and doctrine, they are not “educational”.  Is there a scope for our priests to give more talks that will inform as well as encourage?  Could we ask others, eg. Fr. McDade to give some?  If we did, would we offer payment?  Why not, they are giving of their professional time and expertise.

Eucharistic Adoration:  The Cardinal and the Pope are keen to encourage this.  Could we start a Friday adoration throughout the day?  The morning hour is popular but the evening one is poorly attended.  There must be people in the church at all times – can we ensure this for the whole of the day?  Should we look at holding it on a Sunday afternoon?  

We need to put up a list at the back of the church for people to sign for when they will attend.  Exposition needs to be promoted to church goers, especially the young, who are not taught about it these days.  It was agreed that we will start after the summer holidays and that the priests will promote it at Mass.

Male Eucharistic Ministers:  It had been commented on that our rotas are biased in favour of women, and that efforts should be made to encourage men to feel that they can be part of our services.  If they see women reading/ministering etc. are they feeling that they are not welcome, or that it is not a job for them?  Unfortunately no one had a copy of the rota so a proper assessment of the figures could not be carried out.  Most present felt that our rotas are fairly evenly balanced.

ANY OTHER BUSINESS
Apostleship of the Sea.  Why was the collection not held on the designated date?  We have a large number of collections during the year stipulated by the Diocese, so we have merged some of them – in this care APS was held on a different date and the collection was split with a second charity.

Can Mass Intentions be announced at the start of Mass?  No, because they are in the bidding prayers.

Next Saturday there will be a party for Fr. Tom’s Fortieth Anniversary.

Mobile phones are going off during Mass.  We need a notice asking people to remember to switch them off.  Also there is generally an audible buzz of noise in the church before and after Mass – should we ask people to be quiet?  There isn’t a place in our church where people can meet each other, the porch is too small.  Our church is informal, welcoming and friendly.  We don’t want a riot but some level of informality is pleasant.  It does stop when Mass starts.