According to the Catholic Courier, the Diocese is considering the possibility of applying a tax on the more wealthy parishes of our diocese to help support poorer urban parishes within the city of Rochester. Below are the relevant passages from the Courier, with emphasis:
“Generate funding through new assessments on parishes throughout the diocese’s 12 counties, based on their level of income. The assessments would be levied on parishes with assets greater than $200,000 or collections totaling more than $200,000. If this proposal were to be approved, parishes would have until the next fiscal year to determine how to pay for the new fees, Grizard said.
Father Robert Schrader, Peace of Christ’s pastor and head of the diocese?s Presbyteral Council, said one of the key points in the recommendations is that the diocese as a whole must work together to maintain a Catholic presence in Rochester.
“Just because we are not having enough money to support a traditionally structured parish or church presence (in the city) doesn’t mean no parish or church presence is needed there,” said Father Schrader. “We need to find what?s the best way to be church in and for the city … with support from amongst ourselves or with support from the suburbs.””
There are probably a variety of opinions on this proposal, but I for one am in favor of helping out the struggling city parishes. This is something we should have pursued a long time ago, before the diocese swept through the city closing a number of savable parishes. We have some parishes in our diocese that are bringing in a sizable amount of money each week; far more than is necessary to maintain their parish and services. For example, St. Joseph in Penfield brought in, I kid you not, over $32,000 in the November 15th weekend collections. You can’t tell me with a straight face that this parish needs ever dollar of that $32,000+ for St. Joseph church (I do realize that they tithe, though this probably is only 10%). The wealthy parishes in our diocese could, and I think should take up the burden of helping our poorer churches to survive. The message of our Lord Jesus Christ deserves to be heard and felt by all, no matter whether they are rich or poor, and the wealthy parishes should do whatever they can to help in this cause. Hopefully the diocese will consider this proposal.
See also: DoR Catholic.
Tags: News and Media
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If the "Catholic presence" you refer to is represented by the losers in the articles you posted above and below this one, it isn't worth preserving because it isn't Catholic.