Pastoral Plan report nearing completion

Friday, Oct. 23, 2015

SALT LAKE CITY — In September 2014, the Diocese of Salt Lake City embarked on the process of creating a pastoral plan to establish the diocese’s priorities, goals and objectives through the next five years. People in the diocese were encouraged to provide their input in several ways, including surveys and listening sessions.

The initial stage of gathering information was completed in March of this year, and the Pastoral Plan Steering Committee began to analyze the data. However, the reassignment of the Most Rev. John C. Wester to the Archdiocese of Santa Fe, which occurred in June, “was the wrench in the works,” said Dominican Father Wayne Cavalier of the Congar Institute for Ministry Development, which facilitated the pastoral planning process. 

“It was clear that we would not be able to bring the planning process to the conclusion that he had envisioned before he knew that he was re-assigned,” said Fr. Cavalier, a member of the Pastoral Plan steering committee.

In one of his last interviews before being installed in the Archdiocese of Santa Fe, Archbishop Wester said he was disappointed that he would not be able to see the Pastoral Plan to fruition. 

“I was hoping to be here to roll out the plan, to affirm it and enforce it, and to set our sights on the next four or five years as we seek as people of God to achieve the goals of the plan,” the archbishop said in an interview that was published in this paper May 22. 

Archbishop Wester attended almost all of the steering committee meetings; he said he believed the information garnered during the Pastoral Planning process would be “a good road map” for the new bishop, when he is appointed, and added that his hope was “that it will be a great aid to him in giving him a wonderful sense of how the Holy Spirit is working in this local Church.” 

After Archbishop Wester left the Diocese of Salt Lake City, work on the Pastoral Plan continued even though “we can’t impose a plan on an incoming bishop,” Fr. Cavalier said. 

However, Archbishop Wester told him that he wanted the data from the Pastoral Planning process to be a gift for the new bishop, so “we’ve been both analyzing the data that we received and also prayerfully discerning where we think God is calling the diocese to at this time,” Fr. Cavalier said. 

In addition to prioritizing the concerns voiced by those who participated in the surveys and listening sessions, and analyzing other data collected, the steering committee members have been “articulating a vision of the Church in Utah,” Fr. Cavalier said, adding that, for Catholics in the diocese, “the least that they can expect is that the new bishop will hear the voices of the people that chose to speak up.”

The final Pastoral Plan Steering Committee report should be complete around the first of the year, Fr. Cavalier said.