The meeting began with a scripture reading and the Centennial Prayer.

Our new newsletter was distributed to the group and we thanked John Princiotti for the completion and delivery in such a remarkable timeframe. Discussion took place on the kinds of items that would be included in the newsletter as well as how often we would produce it. We discussed the possibility of quarterly delivery and needing to get a cost of production. We said it was a great start and asked everyone to get suggestions to John by email in order to keep making it better. Many suggestions were offered to attract attention for the readers particularly pictures or grabber headlines. We need to differentiate this from the regular bulletin. We were pleased with the inclusion of the Chinese material. Regarding the schedule of delivery of the next issue, we are hoping for a mailing on the 16th of March.

A discussion on material for the newsletter included whether or not we wanted to mention the book written by Father Chen . We were reminded that the purpose of the publication was to inform people in the parish of the activities within the parish since we are trying to encourage our parishioners to become more active. An example of an activity could be the work we do for the food pantry. A suggestion was submitted for some communication to be placed in the bulletin explaining the purpose of the newsletter.

Regarding the Adult Education initiative we do not have an update on the book club or our setting of dates with Cecilia Sirois. We did have a discussion on who might be interested in the book club and the possible evenings of Weds or Sunday.

Regarding the promotion of the Giving Tree, the Mannings did say that they would prefer adults for the work involved and we can probably focus on more planning and promotion for next year. We need more time for planning with them for better marketing and coordinating of the work involved.

Our next topic was the parish listening session and how often we should offer it. We need to reach out to people that have an interest in being heard and find a way of inviting them, such as a buddy system. We agreed that we need to plan and prepare for these sessions and decided to form a committee. It was suggested to call it a parish town meeting. Because our parish council meetings are held within a 90 minute period we cannot formulate all of the ideas and decisions for these listening sessions. A committee is now formed to include O’Brien, Kubera, Murphy, Kinsella, Feeney, Lotis and Rossi.

Father O’Brien discussed the Vicar meeting within the church which has not occurred for a long time. At that meeting they will discuss ?how to plan.? There will be opportunity for all of the priests to participate in the decisions that will be forthcoming. We all agreed that with our Listening session most of the participants were practicing parishioners and we are also aiming at other parishioners.

We once again reviewed what happened at the listening session. We have been working on chosen items and have communicated via the bulletin regarding the categories of work and the action items from those categories. At the next session we will give an update as well as notice in the newsletter. The committee for the listening session (or parish town meeting) will include communication to the parishioners as a primary goal. The committee can establish the timelines for the next sessions.

Meetings of the vicariate regarding cluster parishes will now continue As a cluster parish we will continue meeting with our other churches every other month. The serious planning is being superceded by planning on the vicariate level.

We discussed Father Robertson’s sabbatical leave for a six month period and we think that we will not have to change the mass schedule because of our other priests.

We spoke about a Brazilian population within the area and there is a worshiping community in East Boston. There is a gathering at our church on the 24th of December. Father O’Brien said this population is the 2nd largest group of immigrants in Mass. Most of the Brazilian’s are Catholics traditionally.

We discussed finances for our church and we heard our Grand Annual is down. On another note, a letter was mailed to parents today to ask for a tax deductible contribution. For the operating of the school, a donation is requested. Our costs over the last two years have increased—we are using reserves for operations and so we need to do all kinds of things to increase the income. We are at a deficit over the last two years. The cost of each subsidy per child at the school is $1200. Father asked for the council members to let him know how the letter was received if they hear anything.

Attendees at this meeting were: Kubera,O’Brien, Feeney, Lotis, Jae, Princiotti, Murphy, Rossi, Conway, Salenius, Riordan, Robertson, Kinsella

Our next scheduled meeting will be January 27, 2004.