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Written by ANGELA KESSLER, Chronicle Editor
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Friday, 06 June 2008 |
PAULDING—Three Catholic parishes in Paulding County are uniting into one new parish named Divine Mercy.
As of July 1, Antwerp St. Mary, Paulding St. Joseph and Payne St. John the Baptist will no longer exist, but all three buildings will become Paulding Divine Mercy — one parish with three locations.
All three church buildings will remain open under the new name and the one existing parish elementary school in Payne will open in the fall under the name Divine Mercy.
Father G. Allan Fillman, pastor of Paulding St. Joseph and Payne St. John for the past eight years, has been named pastor of the new parish.
A new Mass schedule begins the first weekend of July with liturgies at 5 p.m. Saturday in Payne, 8:30 a.m. Sunday in Antwerp and 10:30 a.m. Sunday in Paulding.
“We’re going to see if it works,” Fr. Fillman says of the new schedule, adding that it will be reassessed in the fall.
During the summer, work will continue and decisions will be made on other changes, such as consolidating the parish office, merging the finances of three parishes into one, developing one religious education curriculum for the three locations and deciding on duties of the deacons.
In the end, Fr. Fillman does not expect to make any staff changes at the parish or school. A three-year transitional parish council is also in place to help with merging the parishes, he says.
Making the decision
What’s unique about the Paulding County situation is the fact that the decision for unification came from a “bottom-up” process rather than a “top-down” decision made by the bishop, says Father Michael Billian, diocesan episcopal vicar and chancellor.
The official suppression of the three parishes and announcement of the new parish comes after three years of study and planning by stakeholders in Paulding County.
A committee of representatives from all three parish communities was formed to help decide the future of the local Catholic community.
With the assistance of the diocesan Office of Pastoral Leadership, the first year-and-a-half to two years were spent studying population trends and the physical structure of the three parishes and developing different ways in which the Catholic community in Paulding County might be served.
Three different scenarios were developed in the process and presented to the congregations for their input on each of the options.
“This is the one they came up with,” Fr. Fillman says.
As reported in the March 7, 2008, issue of the Catholic Chronicle, 70 percent of Catholics in Paulding County who responded to the survey favored the option of becoming one parish with three church buildings.
Other options presented were to build a new church in a central location, or to reduce the number of parishes from three to two, while keeping all three church buildings open.
Eighty-four percent of respondents said they believed closing any one of the three churches would “really hurt the local communities.”
Seventy-five percent said they thought the people of their parish were generally willing to make the adjustments necessary with their favored option in order to secure all three churches remaining open.
Making the transition
In anticipation of the unification of the three parishes in Paulding County, three pitchers with baptismal symbols were created for each location of the new Divine Mercy. The pitchers will be blessed during a series of vespers services at each location, and will remain there to be used for baptisms.
In a letter to parishioners, Fr. Fillman encourages them to attend a service at a location in which they are not familiar. Tours are planned at each parish following the vespers services. Services are at 7 p.m. June 18 at Paulding St. Joseph, 4 p.m. June 29 at Antwerp St. Mary and 7 p.m. July 1 at Payne St. John the Baptist.
During weekend Masses June 28 and June 29, water from each parish community will be blessed and used during the first weekend Masses at the three Divine Mercy locations.
Masses July 5 and July 6 — the first for Divine Mercy Parish — will feature several symbolic events.
Water from each of the three locations blessed the previous week, a new icon of Christ as the Divine Mercy, a 19th century reliquary from France and a relic of St. Faustina will be processed into the churches. The icon will be blessed and the water will be poured into the baptismal fonts. Parishioners will renew their baptismal vows and the combined water will be sprinkled on the congregation.
“It is to remind us of our baptism into the one church,” Fr. Fillman says, “because together we ‘embrace the faith.’”
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