$5 Million Sought For First Phase—

St Rose Launches Facilities Expansion Campaign

By Kaaren Valenta

To cope with a growing congregation that includes 3,200 households, St Rose of Lima parish has launched a $5 million campaign to significantly improve and expand its facilities on Church Hill Road.

“When our parish was founded almost 150 years ago, no one would ever have imagined the growth we are experiencing now,” said the Rev Robert Weiss, pastor of St Rose. “We have 1,700 children in our religious education program alone.”

Although long-range plans foresee renovations and possible expansion of the church, the current $5 million campaign focuses on the construction of two buildings: a religious education center and a community center/gathering hall that would replace the existing parish hall. The building campaign also would add more parking spaces and reconfigure the traffic flow on the property.

A $1 million pledge by one member of the parish and $100,000 by another already have pushed the total pledges to nearly $2 million. “We have already met with over 800 people and they have been very positive,” Father Weiss said.

The building campaign organizers include parishioner Bill Wiemels, the general chairman, and Joseph Cascio, vice president of Trinity Fund Raising Consultants, a New York company that helps churches with building fund drives.

“The dream is to break ground in 2005, but we need to have one-half of the money in the bank before we can put a shovel in the ground,” Mr Cascio said.

In 1999 the church conducted a Millennium Survey, asking parishioners for their opinions on the needs in such areas as spiritual development, community development, Catholic education, and facilities support. For the past year a parish building committee has been working to develop a master plan with input from the pastor, the education staff, the church finance committee, and various parish groups and individuals.

“We are still in the concept stage and do not yet have building plans to show,” Mr Cascio said. “But we know that the religious education center would be two-story with a large first-floor meeting room and flexible meeting rooms on the second floor that would include some moveable walls.”

The community center/gathering hall would accommodate approximately 700 people for large church functions; parish, youth group, and religious education school, social and sports activities; and would provide a worship place during holidays and for all masses when the church is eventually renovated. The center will include a stage, a sound system, a multipurpose-use floor, bleachers, a cafeteria and kitchen area, restrooms with handicap access, and storage areas.

Father Weiss said this large building would be owned by the St Rose of Lima parish, which will have first use of the facility for all parish and church activities. When it is not being used by the parish, it would be available for community use, especially for organized youth sports.

The building would be managed by a nonprofit corporation that would be responsible for scheduling, upkeep, and all maintenance. Similar arrangements exist at other churches in the Bridgeport diocese including St John the Evangelist in Stamford and St Mary in Greenwich.

“It’s important to note that 46 percent of the youth in Newtown are from this parish,” Mr Cascio said. “But the [$1 million] donor wants this facility to be available for use by others as well.”

“It really will be a nice building,” Father Weiss said. “The Monsignor Conroy Room [in St Rose School] will be a connector to the new buildings and will have some additional office space.”

The pastor said one focus of the building campaign is to assure that the church is maintained as a sacred place for prayer, not a place to hold meetings and socialize.

“This is a major project. We are putting up major structures to accommodate our needs,” he said. “We want to get people into these buildings and leave the church for praying after mass.”

A smaller campaign, perhaps in 2008-09 when St Rose celebrates its 150th anniversary, would focus on renovating the church, he said.

More than 60 volunteers assembled in the Msgr Conroy room Tuesday evening to prepare to contact parishioners to gather pledges for the building campaign. Donations of all sizes are welcome, Mr Cascio said, and there are many leadership gift memorial opportunities available, including several that start at $5,000. Others range from $7,000 to $500,000.

“There will certainly be parishioners who will step forward and make leadership gifts, but in order to reach our goal of $5 million we are asking each family to pledge $125 a month over 36 months,” Mr Cascio said.

About 405 families attended information receptions that were held during the past two months and approximately 200 gifts and pledges already have been received, he said.

Father Weiss said he is confident that the parish can reach its $5 million goal.

“When I came here, I didn’t know we had a $1.3 million debt,” he said. “It took a couple of years, but we paid it off.”

Mr Cascio said a mailing to parishioners is being done this week with materials explaining the building drive. Volunteers will follow-up by contacting the parishioners, answering their questions, and collecting their pledges.

“We aren’t asking everyone to give the same, we are asking everyone to sacrifice,” said Mr Wiemels. “If people aren’t going to sacrifice, we will never get to our goal. Everyone has to buy into it for it to be successful.”

Volunteer Harry Dieck agreed.

“I have seven children and 11 grandchildren who live in places like Colorado and California, but I feel a need to provide for the children who live here, in our community,” he said. “We need to do the best we can for them. The more people we get involved, the better for the children and for the community.”