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OUR MISSION | The mission of St. Theresa Catholic Church is to share Christ with others through the sacraments, education, prayer, and service.

Welcome to St. Theresa Catholic Church! We are so glad you are here.

Dear Friends,

Over the course of the last several months, the Parish Pastoral Council, Parish Pastoral Staff and our Leadership Team have been having a conversation about the Sunday Mass times at St. Theresa.

We are in a blessed situation because we have four priests celebrating Mass here on a weekend, so while that can change quickly in the future, we are not currently in need of reducing Mass times because of a shortage in priest staff.

So why would we consider changing our Mass times?

Currently, our Masses on Sunday run an hour and a half apart: 7:00 am, 8:30 am, 10:00 am and 11:30 am. As we continue to focus our attention on evangelization and bringing more people to our faith through my vision for the future, we realized that having Mass times so close together, needlessly causes conflict. If one Mass goes even a little over an hour, cars coming to park for the next Mass make it difficult for people to leave from the previous Mass. If a special ritual, blessing or rite occurs during a Mass and causes it to run over, there is conflict. Our recent Masses on Palm Sunday and Pentecost are prime examples of this. If we want to utilize our Gathering Space as a place to encourage hospitality or welcoming, there is not enough time with the current Mass schedule to accommodate any semblance of welcoming or hospitality between Masses.

By allowing more time between Masses, we will allow greater opportunities for gathering, fellowship, hospitality and private prayer in the church. We want to create an environment where people feel comfortable “lingering” and spending time with their friends and family before and after Mass in the Gathering Space, or in prayer in the church, and we can’t accomplish that when there is a huge overlap of parishioners who are leaving one Mass and coming to the next. More time between Masses will also alleviate parking issues for the same reason.

I hope you can understand and appreciate the desire to allow more time between Masses and the positive influence this will have on all Mass goers. How do we proceed from here?

I believe every adult in this parish should have a say as to what our new Mass schedule should be, given the reasons I have just outlined. Therefore, from June 13 – 21 ONLY, you will have an opportunity to vote for your preferred Mass schedule between the following two Mass schedule options. They are:

The option receiving the most votes (simple majority) will be announced June 27 & 28^th, and the new Mass schedule will begin on the weekend of August 1^st & 2^nd.

A few details about the vote:

All parishioners over the age of 14 may vote.

Voting will occur both online and by paper ballot. You will be able to go the parish website for online voting when the time comes.

Only ONE vote per person – you will be on the honor system for that, so you will have to live with your Catholic conscience if you cheat! No deceased persons are eligible to vote either!

While I know change is never easy, and the Mass schedule has been the same for decades, I believe the time is right to do what we can to allow people to feel more at home at St. Theresa Parish. This past year, the number of people being welcomed into the Catholic faith through the OCIA process rose 38% nationally. We welcomed 19 new people through the Sacrament of Confirmation at the Easter Vigil – a huge increase for us! We estimated there were 1,400 people at the 10:00 am Mass on Easter Sunday – the largest gathering of people in our church since I became pastor 13 years ago. These are all signs of great hope! Please pray that this change will not be too difficult for people to adapt to, and that more people will call St. Theresa Parish their home in the future.

Thanks and God bless you all.

Love,

Fr. Tim

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St. Theresa Catholic Church  | 455 North Benton Street, Palatine, Illinois 60067  | 847.358.7760