Finance Council
-
-
The Finance Council is an advisory and consultative body to the pastor in matters pertaining to the ordinary and extraordinary matters of financial administration. The Finance Council shares with the pastor the responsibility for the prudent administration of financial affairs and the formation of its policies and procedures in service to effective management of the parish assets.
Remember that money is a resource for ministry. Thank you for making ministry possible at St. Bernard!
The members of our Finance Council
Bernie McElroy, Chairperson
Brian Curtis, Business Manager
Rev. Msgr. Randall Vashon, Pastor
Mike Dibianco
Philip Parayil (Trustee)
Greg Elia
Edward Fagan (Trustee)
Sal Longo
Paul Rippas
The contact person for the Finance Council is Bernie McElroy and he may be reached at 908-923-4160.
-
-
-
-
St. Bernard of Clairvaux Church asks you to consider utilizing the many benefits of Electronic/Automated Giving. E-Giving provides you the opportunity to make prayerful, consistent gifts to our parish without using checks. Much in the same way you may use the Internet to pay your mortgage, car and other bill payments, you can now use the same technology to help you fulfill your stewardship intention to our church using electronic checks or credit cards.
E-giving is completely safe and simple to use. We are pleased to be able to offer our parish family a greener, more convenient way to give. Click here to enroll.
-
-
-
For information about the Scrip Fundraising Program for the parish, see below:
-
-
-
Also learn about the Parish Paver Program which supports the Church and graces the beautiful Alpha Omega Prayer Garden:
-
-
-
On a regular basis, the Finance Council prepares a newsletter to report the financial health of the parish to the parishioners. Following is the most current financial newsletter.
February 2018 Financial Newsletter
October 2016 Financial Newsletter
October 2015 Financial Newsletter
April 2014 Financial Newsletter
November 2013 Financial Newsletter
-
-
-
Parish Increased Offering and Goals
-
-
In my letter of October 2nd, I asked you, our parishioners, to review your contributions to St. Bernard and consider increasing your parish giving. I am making this request so we can continue both our current parish mission and also to work on improving our mission to the youth of our parish.
1. Strengthen our Religious Educational offerings & Adult Educational Offerings
The three goals I have set for our parish of St. Bernard for the next 2 years are as follows:
St. Bernard Parish has a good history of providing religious education (CCD) to our children and their families. In past few months we have reviewed what we offer and, due to the pandemic, have prepared appropriate lesson plans for teaching our children remotely and built the infrastructure to be able to provide the remote program until we are able to once again gather in our school building for classes.
As you are no doubt aware, remote learning is quite a skill set in and of itself so we have reached out to our local Catholic schools and asked qualified teachers who are already experienced with remote learning to help us. This will increase our costs but I strongly feel our children and their families are worth the extra expense. Moving forward, I would hope to retain some of these teachers to continue after we are back in the class room.
Secondly, I would like to provide more options for our parish families to increase their knowledge of our faith. We have a rich history of good Bible Study programs which, of course, I see continuing however with the recent advances of remote learning, there are now significantly more opportunities for us to provide some excellent speaker series programs where we would seek out noted scholars and theologians to provide St. Bernard with programs for us. Because there would be no travel expenses and extra time for the speakers, the cost of these programs are reduced. I envision we could have those who are comfortable meeting in one of our large spaces (e.g. cafeteria, church, etc.) with the speaker being remote. Of course, it could also be open to some who want to take advantage of this from home. While there are certainly costs involved, they are much reduced and the content of these sessions still excellent.
2. I would like to strengthen our youth ministry program and help our young members become stronger in their faith.
Our Youth Ministry at St. Bernard is a good program of spiritual growth and social gatherings for our high school teens. Under the direction of Mr. Sean O’Brien, we have provided many of our youth with life giving knowledge of Jesus Christ and how to integrate this in daily living. Having said this, and for some of the same reasons we can do more programs with our adults (goal #1), we can also provide more for our youth through noted motivational speakers, etc.
Further, I have asked Mr. O’Brien to increase the student involvement in our parish through various events where families can be involved.
3. I would like to continue to strengthen our financial position for the future and, in particular, our Upkeep Reserve account so we are well prepared to maintain the beautiful facilities we have.
Just like you with home ownership, there are always things that are in need of repair or replacing. There are six major buildings (church/office, pastoral center, rectory, 2 separate mausoleum buildings and cemetery office) on our 34+ acres plus a few smaller structures. With each of these we are managing the useful life of things like roofs, heating/cooling systems, appliances, windows, etc. Knowing when we expect to have to do these projects determines our budgets and financial needs for each year and your finance council and I have worked to save these funds and make the repairs and/or replacements when needed.
This fund is crucial to our future and it is prudent for us to build up these savings accounts so we are prepared when the expense hits us.
As your pastor, these are my goals and I hope you agree with this pastoral direction and find a way to help me see them accomplished. Through all of our efforts we will be able to continue to promote Christ’s saving message of hope and love.
To accomplish these goals, I need your help. At this time, I would ask you to prayerfully consider increasing your financial support to the parish, and if you are able to do so, complete the reply card that was with your letter and return it by mail or drop it in the collection box when you come to Mass.
As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to let me know.
Peace,
Msgr. Randy
-
