Bishop Smith

About the Diocese

Administration

Office of Construction and Property

Office of Expansion and Restructuring

• Parish Restructuring

• Parish Study

Office of Pastoral Planning

• Led By the Spirit

Employment Opportunities

Personnel in Ministry

Public Relations

Radio and TV

The Monitor

Tribunal

Ways to Give

Northern Burlington Deanery Update

September 22, 2007

Bishop Smith announces parish restructuring, other initiatives following Northern Burlington Deanery Study

TRENTON, N.J. -- Nine parishes in Northern Burlington County will undergo some form of restructuring, Bishop John M. Smith of the Diocese of Trenton announced in a Sept. 21 letter to parishioners. Effective July 1, 2008, eight parishes will merge to become four, and another parish will be twinned with one of the newly-formed communities.

The decisions follow the 10-month-long study involving pastors and parish representatives from the 14 faith communities classified by the Diocese as the Northern Burlington Deanery. The study team's recommendations were presented to the Bishop in mid-July.

The merged parishes will have new names and new pastors, who have yet to be appointed. All church buildings will remain open under their current names and be used as worship sites for the new parishes. All 14 parishes that participated in have been called to continue ongoing discussion, cooperation and collaboration with their neighboring parishes through participation in one of three long-term cluster committees.

The merging parishes are: Holy Assumption, Roebling, with St. Clare, Florence; St. Paul with All Saints, both in Burlington; St. Peter, Riverside, with St. Joseph, Beverly, and Holy Name, Delran, with St. Casimir, Riverside. St. Andrew Parish, Jobstown, will move to Columbus as an independent parish and be twinned with the newly-merged parish in Florence Township. According to canonical guidelines, a parish merger means that two or more parishes combine to form one new parish, consolidating their membership, property and finances and having one new identity. A twinning means that two or three parishes share one pastor but maintain their own identities and memberships. Deanery parishes that will not undergo restructuring are: St. Mary, Bordentown; Assumption, New Egypt; Corpus Christi, Willingboro; Sacred Heart, Riverton, and St. Charles Borromeo, Cinnaminson.

In his letter, Bishop Smith outlines the realities that now face the Church in Burlington County and throughout the diocese: "There are major shifts in population, an increase in newly-arrived Catholics, a decline in vocations and a growing senior citizen population." He explains, "These factors require us to be proactive in our planning and restructuring of parishes to meet the responsibility to minister to all of our people in effective ways."

Existing pastors in merging communities will be transferred to other parishes in the diocese and temporary administrators will be named by Jan. 1, 2008. The merger transition will be facilitated by an Implementation Committee in each of the restructured communities. The committees will manage the details of the merger, as well as collaborate with parishioners to select possible names for the newly-formed faith communities. Bishop Smith is expected to consider the suggestions when selecting the four new names.

Conducted by the diocesan Office of Expansion and Restructuring under the direction of Father Joseph A. Tedesco, the Northern Burlington Deanery Study was built on the input and consultation of parishioners in the 14 communities involved. In June, 2006, parishioners were asked to take a three-page, in-pew survey during weekend Masses. More than 5,000 individuals filled out the survey, which asked respondents to look at six major areas of parish life, rating the importance of each. In September, 2006, parish leadership teams were brought together to look at the survey responses and begin to develop ministry goals.

The study was formally commissioned by Bishop Smith in October, 2006, and the study team, including three representatives from each of the 14 parishes, began its work. Meeting monthly over the next 10 months, the team navigated through four phases of the process – Discover, Dream, Design and Destiny – and concluded by developing its recommendations for parish restructuring and other measures to address the challenges identified in each cluster.

Members of the 14 parishes were informed of the study's progress through monthly UPDATE inserts into their parish bulletins, articles in The Monitor, the diocesan newspaper, and by visiting a Parish Study page on www.dioceseoftrenton.org. Parish leadership teams were consulted throughout the process, and all parishioners were invited to learn about the study and share their feedback at "town meetings" held in each of the faith communities.

The Northern Burlington Deanery is the second region within the Diocese to undergo study and restructuring. The same process is now beginning in the Central Monmouth Deanery in Monmouth County. All deaneries and counties of the Diocese will undergo this self-study process in the coming years in order to meet the challenges of a changing Catholic community and the needs of the future.

Bishop Smith concludes his letter with a hopeful message to his people. He writes, "We believe this plan will successfully preserve the wonderful work of the parishes in the deanery and will continue the ministry to all the Catholic people of Northern Burlington County . . . I ask that you join together with optimism, confidence, expectation and dependence on the presence of Christ who is always with us, so that our Catholic life will be vibrant well into the future.

Established in 1881, the Diocese of Trenton encompasses Burlington, Mercer, Monmouth and Ocean Counties with a Catholic population of over 804,000 in a total population of more than 1.9 million. There are currently 157 priests serving 118 parishes.

###

BACKGROUNDER/FACT SHEET

• Merging means that two or more parishes combine to form one new parish. Membership, property and finances are consolidated; new identity is given and new pastor is assigned.
• Twinning means that two or three parishes share one pastor. Each parish retain its own identity, membership, property and finances.
• Changes to become effective July 1, 2008.
• Church buildings will be retained to be used as worship sites for the restructured parishes. Churches will retain their existing names.
• There are currently 19 priests serving in the parishes of the Northern Burlington Deanery. Two of the 19 are members of the Franciscan community, which has staffed St. Casimir Parish, Riverside, for decades.
• Parishes involved in the study are served by one Catholic high school -- Holy Cross in Delran -- and three Catholic elementary schools -- Pope John Paul II Regional, Willingboro; St. Mary, Bordentown; St. Paul, Burlington, and St. Charles, Cinnaminson. No schools will be effected by the restructuring.
• Deanery is the term used in the Church to describe a geographic grouping of parishes. There are 10 deaneries in the Diocese of Trenton.
• Transition work will be conducted over the coming months by implementation committees made up of representatives from the merging parishes.

-----------------------------------------------------

Update is issued monthly to all parishes involved in the Northern Burlington study.

Director: Rev. Joseph A. Tedesco
609 406-7400 ext. 5635
Fax: 609-406-7444
E-mail: jtedes@dioceseoftrenton.org

Associate Director: Michael Fabian
609 406-7400 ext. 5636
Fax: 609-406-7444
E-mail: mfabia@dioceseoftrenton.org