Catholic Ragemonkey

Finance talk preview
A few posts ago I mentioned my concern about finances in my parish and my plan to eventually devote a weekend to discussing finances. This weekend I gave the people a very brief preview of the finance talk to come. I have noticed, especially among the two Spanish Masses, some confusion about how second collections work -- whether one's parish contribution, placed in the second basket, goes to the parish or not -- so I decided to use this weekend to explain the process. In explaining what second collections are for and that parish contributions can't be mixed with them, I also made a plea for each family to have envelopes and to use them. I mentioned my recent addition of the finance corner in our bulletin and our current year-to-date deficit. I also encouraged the people to have pride in their parish and reminded them that we are not a small parish (800 registered families) and we can do more. I was, oh, so pleased afterwards when a kind lady came up to me and said something like, "You know, you're not even asking for that much. If every family gave only five dollars we'd make our weekly budget easily." She had done the math and the message is getting out there.