Reports

Report to Fr.Don Webber, C.P. Compiled by Dan O’Donnell

 

Basic description of Community of Passionist Partners (CPP)

Mission Statement: We are a community of laymen and laywomen who, with vowed Passionists, seek to share in the charism of St. Paul of the Cross through: prayer, ongoing spiritual formation, and proclamation of the message of Christ Crucified.

Membership

We are a community of individuals on our own personal spiritual journeys who covenant to support each other as we strive to keep alive the memory of the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus in the world of today. We believe and firmly support our Professed brothers in the expression of what this means.

How report was prepared 

Survey was sent out to complete mailing list of 27 contacts requesting their participation. A follow up request for participation was published in the weekly e-newsletter. Nine members coming from four communities completed the survey, Chicago, Houston Nashville and Sacramento. All communities have monthly meetings always consisting of prayer, input from members and discussion. 44% of responders report they have guest speakers. 63% Percent the responders are happy with their community all the time and the other 37% most of the time. 67% of those responding say they are in touch with the larger Community of Passionist Partners and 37% say they are not. San Antonio reports 12 covenented members and Houston reports 10. Chicago and Nashville did not report numbers.

Accomplishments

High energy and high passion. I appreciate the many directions CPs are going even with less numbers,

 I follow the blog and love to hear what’s happening with other groups. Sebastian is a blessing to us and I appreciate his wisdom. I am enjoying involvement with the blog.

We have started to use the Blog as a conversation builder and have heard some interesting reflections come from this source.

Besides the many local meetings, we have published a weekly blog at passionistpartners.com since May of 2013. For July 2014 we had 378 views from 155 different visits

Challenges

 I am still fairly new with the partners but willing to be involved as much as possible.

Partners like the CP community are getting older and it has been difficult to find new members. We need to find a way to increase an interest in membership.

We don’t hear enough about other groups. Since the closing of the Harlem Avenue Monastery there is a greater distance and lack of communication both about Partners in other areas and what is happening with the Passionist Community at large.

Our diminished numbers tends to reduce the options available to us. We are a small group exchanging information with one another, and, while our exchanges are good, they occur within a fairly narrow area of concern. We show concern about our small numbers but seem unable to solve this issue.

The outline for what CPP does is too narrow. Need to develop a formal lay ministry with the Partners as a base with the inter-action of the CP community.

I would like to know what’s happening in the Community. We could get their newsletter; Partners could be invited to their Assemblies, etc. In turn the Partners need to invite their participation in our gatherings, the blog and other means of communication.

We have to decide on the kind of candidate we want in our group. While youth is always desired, we may have to settle for a group comprised mainly of older, “devout”, traditional types, if we are willing to seek them out.

I believe, regular (maybe annual) gatherings with local communities, and possible input from the Provincial (face-to-face) would allow for our connection to seem more palpable and important to the Provincial rather than little/no contact.

In two words, membership and collaboration.

 

For a full copy of survey online, copy the following link into your URL and press “enter”. https://www.surveymonkey.com/results/SM-TFQJLL58/

Future

I personally believe the Partners are on a good track for growth. I think the CPP Blog is the medium where this growth will take place. I further believe it will grow exponentially when existing communities begin to take ownership by writing “Comments” and “Posts” and then start sharing with their friends, relatives and acquaintances.

“In a democracy, we are all teachers and we are all students — and we’re obligated to search for common goals.”

(Ferguson Divides Us Less Than We Imagine | Commonweal Magazine

www.commonwealmagazine.org)

 

I would replace partnership for democracy in the above quote. If the Partners are to grow and ever become a true partnership, we must adopt the above attitude. Each and every partner brings their unique gifts and talents to the table and we all need to recognize this, but more importantly we must put these talents and gifts to work in accomplishing our mission.