Dear St. Anthony and St. Mary Parishioners,

Our Bishop has completed the Rooted in Christ Pastoral plan, and one of the big takeaways that has come through this process is that we need the parishes of our Diocese to become centers of evangelization and a place where Catholics are formed as missionary disciples of Jesus so they may become vibrant witnesses of His Gospel.

After reflecting on our current weekend schedules at our parishes, I do not believe that we are currently oriented in a way to fulfill these goals. We are in a unique situation as we are two parishes sharing one priest. This presents unique challenges and limitations. It is important to both identify these and mitigate them to such an extent that they have the least impact on our mission. 

With the current schedule of Masses at each parish, this limits my ability as your pastor to be fully present to each community. When we try to have gatherings after morning Mass at St. Anthony, I am torn away to get to St. Mary in time for their Mass. I am also not able to be present at any of the Catechetical/Faith Formation experiences for our young people at both parishes. In addition, I have not been able to provide any adult faith formation opportunities on Sunday mornings while the children are in their classes.  To address these limitations and maximize our potential to fulfill the mission of our parishes, I have consulted with the parish council, our staff and ministry leaders to update our weekend Mass schedule. After this consultation, we will implement the following weekend Mass schedule at St. Anthony and St. Mary:

St. Anthony:  Sunday 8am (formerly 8:30am) 

Implementation: August 24th. Parish Festival weekend

St. Mary: Saturday 4pm (formerly 5pm)

Confessions now offered at: 2:30-3:30pm 

Sunday 10:30 am Mass remains the same.

Implementation: November 29/30. First Sunday of Advent

I am communicating this new schedule to both parishes both in this letter and in parish announcements. In each parish section of the bulletin, a rationale for how this new schedule aligns with our mission is provided. If you have any questions or feedback, please reach out to me. 

You can reach me at: Phone: 616-897-9820

Email: pastor@stmarylowell.org or pastor@stanthonyofsaranac.org

Yours in Christ,

Fr. Michael

+JMJ+

Rationale for St. Anthony:

1. It gives a block of time from 9am-10am for Fr. Michael to be present more regularly after the St Anthony Mass and before the St Mary Mass for children/youth faith formation.

2. Starting in late September, we are already planning faith formation opportunities once a month at each parish for adults.

Rationale for St. Mary:

 1. In the months with less daylight, people will have more daylight in their travels home after Mass.  

2. This would also offer an alternate Mass time to our neighboring parishes: St Roberts in Ada is at 4:30pm and St Patrick in Parnell is at 5pm, giving people an earlier option in our region.  

3. Finally, and most importantly, this earlier time opens up greater opportunities to host Saturday evening dinners, adult studies, and prayer and praise events following Mass during select dates throughout the year, which aligns with our parish’s values and vision.