February Parish Council Meeting Minutes
Feb. 5, 2012
Opening Prayer – Father Tom “God’s Unconditional Love” – copy is attached.
Minutes from Nov. 8th – Correct minutes – Omaha Star was approved for an ad. Sue has tried to contact
twice and has not heard back yet. The issue that remained undecided was who was to be pictured in
the ad.
Balance of the minutes were approved.
Fiesta – was very successful. Kathy thanked all for their participation. Food and mariachi band received
rave reviews. Luigi only charged us for 262, 30 under the participation.
Sue – Religious Ed back in swing. Baptism for some will be on Holy Saturday. Prayer partners are
coming for participation. 1st graders visited HMC last week and were thrilled. Generations of Faith –
theme not decided yet.
Tim – Young adults – service trip to K.C. went well at Harvesters food bank. They will be returning again.
Youth group Creighton game coming up still. The Zoo trip at the pavilion overnight is coming in March.
All Saints Fundraiser is March 16th – they are part of CUES so we should support them. The first week of
June the youth group is going on a service trip to St. Louis for a week at Karen House. Sue and Tim
rotate groups at Sienna Francis House – 4th Saturday of the month if anyone wants to attend. 4:45 to
7:00 P.M.
Joyce – RCIA is the smallest group ever. Only 3 are participating. Sue is adding 3 more from school and
parish. Other parishes are experiencing the same decline. Generation of Faith – No spring gathering
planned and the Generations group has not met.
Lenten Faith Sharing Groups. – Last year the theme was living eucharist. This year the theme is
Stations of the Cross. More people coming are forward. More groups this year than have ever been
offered. 150 or more people are in it. Joyce and Jeanne Schuler wrote the materials.
Jon – Finance Committee meeting this coming Tuesady – will update after they meet.
Jeanne – OTOC discussion – Sacred Heart has been part of OTOC of since early 90’s. People work in
committees to address issues. They may call people in parish for 30 minute discussion to bring to light
issues. Housing demolition has been a great achievement. A copy of the OTOC bulletin is attached.
Have had very positive interaction with police, immigration, ICE to not incarcerate people that have a
place to live that are not in danger of flight. Program started in Omaha in August to release people with
monitoring or not. OTOC meetings are normally published in the bulletin. During the 1 on 1 30 minute
discussions the violence issue in the area is the most mentioned. Immigration committee, Refugee
committee, and Housing committee make up the organization.
Father Tom. Reported on progress with Archdiocesan annual appeal . Started really slow – picking up
at the end. Sacred Heart is short by about $1,500 of the $22,000 goal. Rainbow report came yesterday
that broke down results of campaign. There are many new donors this year. Kevin Thompson made
strong push. Hopeful that by the end of the summer the parish goal will be achieved. Total goal was 3.3
million and it has already been surpassed it. Larger campaign – kicked off 2 weeks ago. 8 couples from
the Archdiocese and 100 on the Executive team. The 20th of February is the next meeting – 3hours.
Capital campaign has collected a tremendous percentage of the funds pledged– it was the 1st one for
Sacred Heart. We are in dire need of a parish center. Permission was granted to run parish campaign in
conjunction with the Archdiocese campaign. There will be 3 phases to the campaign. Father Tom does
not think that we can go to the broader community – need to focus on the parishioners for parish
center. $5 million of the broad campaign is to come back CUES because of the age of facilities.
This year – lots of meetings to discuss expanding mission. Never had a year that ended in the red but
just getting by right now. CUES board decided Father Tom needed to be here to take on the plan. There
is a $250,000 shortfall for other 2 schools for this year that Sacred Heart has to make up. All Saints
getting structure and committees and momentum is building. There is now interest in the school that
has not been there in the past. 6 parishes downtown supporting the school. St. Peters and Mary
Magdeline are the biggest contributors. Exec Director for CUES was hired but he did not work out. They
are looking for referrals to fill the position. Administrative and Fundraising are the main qualifications
for the position. All 3 schools have over 95% graduation rate.
June 29th – Parish croquet/music festival. Finest Hour will again be the headliner. Michael and
Shannon Sands are the chair couple for this event. Father Tom emphasized the importance of the
events that become traditions that are not fund raisers for the social aspects of being together. Wants
to investigate the possibility of parish picnic.
CUES dinner on March 23rd.
Parish Reconciliation Service – Wednesday March 20th 6:30 P.M.
Holy Week - Thursday & Friday at 7 p.m. Saturday 7:30 p.m. Ash Wednesday 6:00 p.m. All school
mass at 8:00 for Ash Wednesday.
Kathy – close on old business
New Business
Meeting Schedule – March – 5th Tuesday 6:30, April 2nd 6:30 P.M., May 7th 6:30 P.M. June 18th
anytime after 3:00 p.m. at Father Tom’s cabin.
Plant sale - May 2nd through 6th.
St. Therese Merger meeting:
Tim – seem past anger stage, looking for a home now. Transition committee is Tim, Jane, Sue, Jim.
Need to form sub-transition committee in the parish council.
Closing date is between May 19th & 26th. All the sacramental, financial records come to Sacred Heart.
Large portion of congregation Hispanic. Most will end up at Holy Name due to mass in Spanish. Sacred
Heart is in charge of grounds to maintain and to sell building. The majority of the proceeds of a sale are
to go to Holy Name. Father Paul from Council Bluffs comes in to do the Spanish mass. Closest parish
boundary gets extended to closing parish so any new residents to the area have Sacred Heart designated
as their home parish.
175 in attendance at Sunday mass. Many are from South Omaha. Father Vitalis is encouraging them to
go to Holy Name. Set up
Need someone to handle phone inquiries at Sacred Heart Church office in Spanish. It was suggested
that a language line be set up and have someone else to translate messages and return calls. Their
bulletin is half Spanish.
Invite people to welcome mass. Holy Name has been working very hard to welcome them. All items
have been inventoried at the church. 3 sales occurring to sell items. Week of May 6th there is an
operational review of all 3 parishes. Mid march a draft of what the plan of action is will be due.
Plenary indulgences – certain churches designated as pilgrimage sites. See Jan 11th Catholic Voice.
Being offered for the year of faith. Parish could sponsor group to go to one or more of the sites.