Financial Sustainability

Parishes do not exist for their own sake. They are the home of sojourning Christians who, in community, celebrate and proclaim the Gospel and are sent forth in mission.

In some parts of our Archdiocese, our parish communities are large and dynamic whereas others have become diminished and may be struggling to survive. Take the Way of the Gospel is an invitation to work together to create or recreate vibrant, vital, and viable communities of mission across the whole of the Archdiocese.

Renewal of this scale will require financial investment. Accordingly, every parish is encouraged to examine their financial capacity and to make a plan for how they can best invest in missionary renewal.

This may entail one parish sharing their resources with another, or two or more parishes partnering to co-invest. In the parts of the Archdiocese where there are many small communities with less than 10,000 Catholics, good stewardship of resources may mean discerning an alternate parish structure to release resources for investment. This is a priority where a parish is no longer financially viable on its own.

Minimum criteria have been developed to assist parishes to review their financial viability.

A parish needs to have sufficient income (thanksgiving, collections and donations) to fund the parish priest, secretary and general running costs (insurance, utilities, IT church and office supplies) to be considered financially viable. Depleting capital assets to pay current expenses, reliance on the Archdiocese to forgive parish debts or an expectation of the waiving of financial obligations to the Archdiocese (Cathedracticum, Quota, Priests Retirement Fund or the Land Acquisition Fund) are all signs the parish is not financially viable. This must be addressed as a matter of priority, before considering any other aspect of missionary renewal.