St John the Baptist PPC Minutes - 28Th March 2017

St John the Baptist –PPC Minutes - 28th March 2017

Agenda

Attendees: Father Martin, Brian Murray, Margot Donoghue, Mark Kernberg, Sofia Valente, Valentina Simeone, John Moore, Mary Strachan

Apologies: Dennis Boyle, Tracey Boyle, Vimal D’Souza, Emma Mullen

Actions from previous minutes

We collect almost 90 email addresses at Mass on 25h / 26th February. Dennis typed them all up in Excel, and some address may be wrong as difficult to read. Action:Mary volunteered to create and maintain the email distribution list. Also, with Mark’s input, send a message by email with link to website Bcc all recipients.
Website has now been revamped and has all Cluster information and the Parish calendar. Thanks Elaine for the great effort
David Topping will be serving Mass with the Pope on Easter Sunday. Action: John will include a paragraph (in 3 parts) and a photo in the website. Note: David may be here for a few weeks after Easter.
Father Martin visited Fox Covert (St Andrew) Primary School. Father Martin and Father Tracey will go to the school for Confessions last week in March. Revisit connection with the school in 6 months –Action : PPC

Minutes

There are no envelopes available for Special collections, however the Parish can still claim Gift Aid due to the Archdiocese’s charity status. We could create our own envelop –Action: Brian to check on Amazon/Ebay if these could be bought.
Cluster report is now with the Archbishop; however it may take some time before we hear back. Thanks to Mark for taking the lead on this. Action: Elaine to post the final version of the report on the website.
John took the lead and we discussed the Parish Charity project. John recently visited the Food bank run at St John Ogilvie in Wester Hailes, and Fresh Start in Pilton. He talks about these as very sobering visits. General consensus is that we should support Wester Hailes monthly. We need to have a plan to kick this off. Project to be called “Closer to Home”. Action: John to organise to launch this initiative at Masses on 22/23 April. We talked about other fundraising opportunities during the year:

St Andrews evening, Saturday 25th November, International dinner after Mass –donation on the night for food and drinks.
One Saturday in the Spring after Mass (exact date TBC). Talk on Camino from Mary and Guy, including cinema night: donation of minimum £5 pp Action: To be discussed further at next PPC
Late August (date TBC): 3rd World meal. Action: To be discussed further at next PPC

During his visit, the Archbishop made several comments around the layout in the Church. He would prefer the tabernacle to be in the centre, and the ambo not to be at the back. We could move the ambo, however there is a logic to the current layout, and we cannot change the position of just one thing. No action at the moment.
The Parish Calendar is working well. We went through the upcoming events and made some amendments to the calendar.
At the Open PPC on 27 August we should invite Olga back to talk about Parish finances and Gift Aid. Also, we need to promote Gift Aid in the newsletter. Action : Margo to ask Olga
Balance sheets should be prepared for the Open PPC. Action : Olga
We need more passkeepers for Saturday Mass. Action: Fr Martin to make an appeal at Mass.
Father Martin said that Fr Piotr had asked to put radiator covers (wooden shelf above) to stop blackening of the wall. Also, the back wall of the Sanctuary needs repainting. We have a good quote and the work can be carried out by the same person who made improvements to the rest of the Parish house last year. We agreed that work must be completed before 8th April, otherwise it needs to be postponed to after Easter. Painting to be prioritised. Action: Mark to arrange

Next Meeting –In the Parish house at 7pm on Tuesday 30th May