Nov. 7, 2021  – Announcement about Mass time Rotation

Greetings,

At the Linkage Pastoral Council meeting held Monday, November 1st, a major conversation we had was regarding long-term pastoral planning for the growth and vitality of our parishes.  It is apparent to me, one aspect that really helps a parish to grow and thrive is a stable parish community.  A major challenge in this has been (in the English Masses), the periodic disruption in changing the time of Mass every four months.

This Mass Rotation had been put in place to make it possible for one priest to do all weekend Masses in all the parishes.  We would then rotate those times so no parish was stuck forever with their least favorite time.

Now that we have two priests with Fr. Frantz (who will be with us AT LEAST until the beginning of July of 2022 (and perhaps longer, we will see), it is possible to offer every parish a Sunday morning Mass (which is the preference), and thus no longer need to change the time.

So after a thorough discussion with our Pastoral Councils, it has been decided that beginning January 1, 2022, the Mass Schedule will be as follows: 

Saturdays: 5:00 pm – St. Mark’s, Iowa Falls

Sundays: 

8:00am – St. Mark’s, Iowa Falls

8:00 am – St. Mary’s, Ackley

10:30 am – St. Patrick’s, Hampton

10:30 am – St. Mary’s, Eldora

5:30 pm – St. Patrick’s, Hampton – SPANISH (Espanol)

Hopefully, this will be the long-term Mass schedule, and we will no longer have to rotate Mass times.

(This is assuming this schedule works well AND assuming that we will still retain TWO priests in this assignment after July 2022.)

The hope is that this schedule will foster the long-term health, growth and vitality of our parishes.  This stability in Mass times will allow our communities to more effectively grow and develop, and to effectively outreach and evangelize, to live the mission and build up the Body of Christ and proclaim the Gospel to the world!

Please don’t hesitate to reach out to me if you have thoughts or questions on this.

Peace,

-Fr. Kevin