Archdiocese of Agana

Pastoral Planning Basics

https://www.hprweb.com/2024/08/pastoral-planning-101/

some concepts to review as copied from the article:

[1] The shift underlying the current era is to ask different questions:

• We know the mission – What does that look like in our ever-changing current reality?

• What is a better way of being Church and fulfilling the mission given to us by Christ?

• What does the Church itself tell us about planning?

In other words, current thinking on pastoral planning is derived from Church teaching rather than corporate thinking or seeking command and control. This historical context lays the foundation for breaking open best practice for pastoral planning.

[2] Pastoral planning is delineating how the universal mission of the Church and signs of the times for the local Church interact and sets the overall direction and boundaries within which the local Church lives. Strategic planning is organizing and structuring how best to implement the pastoral plan and measure progress. Parish reorganization must be undertaken from time to time in dioceses, but only in the context of having used pastoral planning to establish priorities and direction. 

[3] Today, the starting frame of reference for pastoral planning is what Catholic teaching tells us about planning. We then take the tools of strategic planning that best apply in the Catholic context and use them as needed. Pastoral planning is Catholic, mission driven, and data informed, and directly related to the capacity to organize people and resources, and to establishing robust means for measuring progress. 

[4] WHY Why we engage in pastoral planning is based in the key concepts of synodality and evangelization. Done well, it is an intrinsically evangelizing process. It involves meaningful encounters with both Christ and each other. It involves accompaniment and witness to how best to be Church as well as the communio going out to do the mission given by Christ. The why of Pastoral Planning is that as a result of the process we have a stronger communio for missio. In the Catholic worldview communio exists for missio and missio flows from communio. 

[5] The key measure of SUCCESS in pastoral planning is the degree to which it has strengthened the experience of communio for the sake of missio. 

[6]In particular, the relationships strengthened by pastoral planning should be the relationships between parishes, between clergy, between clergy and laity and between bishop and clergy. Our unifying principle is Christ and the mission He gave us as Church. The notion of the People of God journeying together gathered around their bishop is core to being Catholic. ... co-responsible leadership, clergy, and laity together, that is described in literature on synodality provided by the USCCB. It is “synod implementation” in action. 

[7] How pastoral planning emerges from that synodal process is a “relational” process. The product of such a planning process is a set of two or three pastoral priorities and a set of boundaries based in the signs of the times, Catholic theology, canon law, Catholic teaching and traditions, and prayerful discernment of the will of God undertaking by the bishop, clergy, and laity. The prayerful, reflective, and patient interaction between the people of God and the leadership of the Church ensure that the priorities and boundaries articulated and authorized by the bishop are clear, concise enough to be remembered, and relevant to the mission given by Christ as lived by the local Church. What also emerges from the process is stronger relationships between parishes, between clergy and laity, between clergy and the bishop, all for the sake of the mission. 

[8] ELEMENTS

relevant data

available staff

Formation and catechesis of leadership is essential to success. There is a difference between training, education, formations, and catechesis. Training offers skills in operational practice. Education offers the “why.” Formation grows the spirituality of leaders. Catechesis aims at conversion to Christ. 

communication:

• • The capacity to listen:

  • to receive, synthesize, summarize, and disseminate information between deaneries, directly to both leadership and parishioners.

  • To receive, synthesize, summarize, and disseminate information between deaneries and the diocese — including the pathway for communications.

• The capacity to speak:

  • to provide guidance and encouragement to the deaneries from the diocese and to the diocese from the deaneries.

• The capacity to measure and share progress across the diocese.

[9] A new concept of a “diocesan plan”

In historical iterations of pastoral planning, the diocese produced a document that became the plan for all to follow. We know now that pastoral planning is relational in nature. The diocesan plan, then, becomes made up of the opportunities deaneries have to interact to share how they are implementing the themes of the pastoral plan, opportunities to showcase successes and share the narrative between parishes of successes, failures and what has been learned from both. The plan exists in people and may, at times, be committed to paper for the sake of effective communication between deaneries and parishes. The diocesan role is to encourage connection between parishes and between deaneries as well as ongoing formation and catechesis of leaders. The diocesan plan is a stronger communio for missio.

[10] CHALLENGES: re-thinking co-responsibility; re-thinking wider scope of impact; re-thinking communication