In the book of Matthew 16:18, Jesus said “I will build my church.” His reference to the church was not in the construction of a building but rather in creating a community of believers who have given their lives to the Lord. As we focus on the Catholic church, not just a single parish, but as a cluster, in this nation, and world-wide, we are called to be disciples and to build this church. Now, more than ever, this is greatly needed.
Focusing on building greater fellowship and unity, filling our pews to a greater capacity at Mass, and with many other goals and trends in consideration, we have concluded to change our cluster Mass schedule. We all have opinions on what would be the best time to offer Mass and we want to thank the parishioners who reached out—your support, concerns, and frustrations were heard and discussed with much empathy and compassion. Thank you also to all of the members of the Parish Councils for their work in communicating and deliberating a schedule that provides multiple options to our parish family to attend weekend services within the cluster.
Parish leaders and representatives were seeking the following:
To increase/maximize attendance at each mass being offered.
To eliminate the burden of acquiring musicians, readers, servers, and ushers for multiple services in a weekend at any one parish.
To minimize the driving route for the sacramental minister. When the current mass schedule was created, it was a circular route beginning in Chetek. As Fr. Chandra resides in Barron, he was zigzagging back and forth on Sunday mornings before we made the temporary changes.
To allow ample time for the priest to visit with parishioners before and after mass to create better and more meaningful connections.
To offer a convenient time of service for all ages, young, old and those in between, with a focus on the young families with children (the future of the church) and more traditional members.
Other points that were given consideration included the following:
Looking at our trends and numbers to determine how to best serve all of our cluster as a whole, we focused on where we are now and where we are headed (not where we were). Currently, St. Peter represents 41% of the cluster, St. Boniface 29%, St. Joseph 24%, and ABVM 6%.
Our pews are not full at every service. Though attendance has been rising post-covid, the number at every Mass has varied but is much lower than it was 10 years ago.
Multiple experienced priests of our diocese as well as the bishop suggested we try to move to four weekend masses.
It was noted that the Saturday evening masses at St. Peter were populated with a large number of Barron parishioners.
Though many feel very attached to their home parish (which is wonderful), our focus for a solid future must be for the entire flock of the cluster.
Given these considerations and more, the weekend Mass schedule starting October 1, 2022, is as follows: Saturday, 4pm at ABVM in Strickland, 6pm at St. Joseph in Barron; Sunday, 8:30am at St. Peter in Cameron and 10:30am at St. Boniface in Chetek.
This schedule, the possibility of a rotation of Mass times, and seasonal offerings will be reviewed again in the future. Each of our parishes has the ability to grow and fill to capacity. Wherever you are from, whatever parish you consider your home parish, we invite you—our family—to come to Mass, to come home, in our cluster, to build the church.