I recently read Matthew Kelly’s book “THE FOUR SIGNS OF A DYNAMIC CATHOLIC” for the second time.  I really like all his work, but this book is one of my favorites.  The research his organization did for this book is eye opening and should not be ignored by Clergy, and in particular, us laymen!

The research reveals, among other things, that out of 100 percent of the people who are registered in any Catholic Church parish:

6.4% of them contribute 80% of the volunteer hours in the parish and

6.8% percent of those registered to the parish donate 80% of financial contributions.

Basically 7% of the registered parish members are doing almost everything in their faith community and paying almost entirely for the maintenance and missions of the parish.

This got me to reflecting on my own parish of St. Joseph and how much we could change the lives of our members if we could bring that up by just two percentage points to 9% of our parishioners being more engaged.  St. Joseph is a pretty good-sized parish and yet every one of our ministries is in desperate need of volunteers.

Every Mass I know there are many people who walk up to the doors and are struggling in some way.  If we could have 3 or 4 men greeting them at every door with a welcoming smile showing them the love of Christ is HERE for them, ushering them in and helping them in any way necessary, I wonder what that one thing would do for St. Joseph parish.

This is just one example of one ministry that could make a difference.  We are all called to do more.  We are called to be more PRAYERFUL today than we were yesterday, to STUDY more this week than last, to always to be evermore GENEROUS with our time and talent, and to always EVANGELIZE by our own life as an example.

So, I ask you, and myself, are you striving to do more.  Are you living what you are called to be and do by God or are you complacent just going through the motions, just doing the bare minimum?

I challenge you, are you a 7 percent-er or are you in the 93%. Can you do more?

God Bless, Pat Bordes