April 2016: Fr. Jim, Carol Arntz, Anne Cook and Deb Miller attended the Amazing Parish Conference in Detroit, Michigan. The first step in the process is to create a Parish Leadership Team of 3-5 members, but that wasn’t easy. A foundation of prayer began to build over the following year and a half.
November 2018: Fr. Jim creates the Parish Leadership Team by inviting Ron Ossovicki and Anne Cook to join him. The met every other week to pray and review the online Amazing Parish modules which included lessons on teamwork, vision, strategic planning, evangelization, hospitality, creating a healthy organization and so much more.
April 2019: The Parish Leadership Team announces a realignment of parish staff to better reflect the team approach to leading the parish. The 2 part-time Administrative Assistant positions were combined into one full time Secretarial Minister and a part time Office Assistant position is created. The titles of Director of Religious Education, Youth Minister, and Coordinator of Adult Formation & Evangelization were eliminated and would be replaced with a Pastoral Ministry Team to take on the planning and implementation of all those ministries.
May 2019: The new job positions were posted, and applications were accepted until the end of May. All existing staff members were eligible to apply for the new positions. In mid-May, Anne Cook and Amanda Smith attended a three-day Amazing Parish Conference in Cincinnati, Ohio with representatives from 28 other parishes in our dioceses, along with Bishop Daniel Thomas.
June 2019: Rosemary Munoz from the Diocese of Toledo human Resource department assisted the Parish Leadership Team with job interviews the first week of June. Four of the five new positions are filled following the interview process. The Secretarial Minister job opening was reposted to continue the search. In mid-June our Parish Leadership Team attended an Amazing Parish meeting sponsored by the Diocese of Toledo to continue our team development. At the end of June, the two part-time Administrative Assistants agree to stay on until we hire our new Secretarial Minister.
July 2019: New staff members begin building rapport. The new Pastoral Ministry Team begins working on a plan of formation and evangelization for the parish and community.
The Parish Leadership Team is available if you have any questions, comments or concerns and we invite you to take a look at the Amazing Parish website to learn more. We also ask for your prayers as we embark on this exciting journey to become an even more Amazing Parish.