Who Does God Want Us to Become?

Oct 11

October 11, 2026

Jesus Christ: Yesterday, Today, and Forever ~

Columbia River Catholic concluded phase one of Partners in the Gospel with an insert in the bulletin on September 6th. You can find that report, along with all things related to Partners, on our website at crcatholic.org/events/partners (or by clicking on the Partners tile on any of our parish websites).

We are now launching Phase Two of Partners entitled, “Who Does God Want Us to Become?” There are essentially two remaining phases beyond that: “How do we get there?” and “What should we be called?” Hopefully, we’ll have all this wrapped up before the end of 2027. I say hopefully, because we’ve been on this journey since we started holding townhall meetings about Partners in 2023. The priests started the journey in 2022. So, I, and many of you, and all the priests of the Archdiocese of Seattle, will be so relieved when this is finished. In the meantime, we still have work to do.

This next phase, “Who does God want us to become?,” will start in earnest this month with townhall meetings on October 17 & 18. There will be Mass announcements prior to that to remind you, and I hope you can participate.

“Who does God want us to become?” is not the same as “how do we get there?,” our phase three moniker. This isn’t the phase where we form concrete plans, but rather, we share ideas about the principles upon which those plans will be made. Therefore, it is important for us to articulate what our ministerial priorities are, or what we want them to be, to help us determine how to get there in the next phase.

Here I share with you my ideas about who I think God wants us to become. These ideas, my principles, may not be yours and I don’t share them here to dictate yours, which you’ll all get a chance to share at the town hall meetings. Rather, I share them with you as food for thought, as a spur to help you to articulate your own values. For example, when I sat down to write this pastor’s column, I read multiple other parish family phase two syntheses to come up with my own ideas. You can do that too by visiting any number of parish family websites where they are posted. As a pastor, I need to see the big picture and miss as little as possible, so seeing other “lists” of guiding values was helpful. I hope this will be for you too.

So, this is who I think God wants us to become, some of it I think we already are.

1. I think God wants us to become (remain) faithfully Catholic. Many parishes don’t teach, let alone live the harder truths of our faith. While this might result in more offended Mass goers, and therefore, fewer of them than we could have if the faith were watered down, it supports those that are trying to know and live the Truth of Christ’s Gospel. In a profoundly secular (godless) world, faithful Catholics need a refuge, a community that they can be part of that supports them and one they can support. Fidelity to the whole Gospel of Jesus Christ has so many lifesaving benefits, but it does come at a cost that I hope we will continue to weather into the future.

2. I think God wants us to be holy. This ties into my first item but takes it deeper. Jesus calls all of us to holiness. I want a parish that takes that calling seriously even if most of us fail miserably at it, myself included. To this end, we need to continue to live the Precepts of the Church, teach the Truth, grow in the virtues, live the Spiritual and Corporal Works of Mercy, and practice a devotional life--all this so we can be holy beyond Sunday Mass throughout our lives.

3. I think God wants us to worship and pray in beautiful and inspiring buildings. St. Thomas Aquinas’ church is a beautiful space for worship and prayer. It helps that it was built in a traditional straightforward design, with a choir loft behind the congregation. This, and Fathers Lappe and Oakland’s remodeled sanctuary and baptismal font, lend more beauty, focus, and intimacy to the space. For me, an inspiring place to worship and pray would ultimately mean having Holy Redeemer and Star of the Sea’s churches beautified. The fan shaped space is what it is, but so much more can be done, especially at Holy Redeemer, but it would cost millions and we have more immediate meeting space needs. Being intentional over time in this regard would be important to me.

4. I think God wants our prayer and worship to honor His Glory. That means intentional and beautiful Masses.

5. I think God wants stable pastoral leadership. The Catholic Church changed canon law in 1983 to enable bishops to move pastors around every six years. Prior to that, all the way back to the Apostles, pastors had the kind of stability that bishops do. They could be asked to move for a good reason, and that happened reasonably enough, but the presumption was that they would be the “father” of a spiritual family for life. Just as dads are supposed to be fathers to their families for life (imagine how much damage there would be to families if fathers abandoned them every 6-12 years). As a rule, bishops love this six-year rule as it enables them to view pastors as chess pieces to be moved around to plug holes. The effect that this has had on pastors and parishes has been horrible. We learn after a move or two to stop bonding with our people, and they stop bonding with us. On a practical level, it is almost impossible to get big things accomplished in a parish because big things require years of relationship building, planning, and sacrifice. When a new pastor comes in, everything starts all over again. So, I think God wants us to become a place of long, stable pastorates.

6. I think God wants us to be a healthy place for priests. For the past 50 plus years, the Church in Western Washington has seen a dramatic decline in the number of home-grown priests, while not seeing any decline in the number of parishes and missions those priests are expected to serve. This has resulted in priests living alone in rectories, serving in multiple communities simultaneously, being moved every 3-12 years, being expected to maintain the same number of Masses everywhere with far fewer priests, and maintaining everything the people have come to expect everywhere. This is unhealthy, even evil. It’s also unappealing to a prospective vocation. So, let’s be intentional about being a healthy place for priests to live and minister.

7. I think God wants us to become a vocational font. We’re doing this Partners in the Gospel thing in large part because we don’t produce enough priests from our own homes and pews. When a priest or consecrated religious dies and stands before the Lord at their final judgment, they never feel guilty for having become a priest or religious, they do for not having done more with it. Let’s be intentional about promoting these beautiful vocations.

8. I think God wants us to become one parish. At least at this point. Given the profound shortage of priests who can effectively pastor, we need to consolidate parishes across Western Washington. We need to consolidate our three communities into one parish. For me, that means eliminating redundancy wherever possible. I don’t want to have to replicate the same thing twice or three times when it could have been done once. This applies to me personally – and to many of our groups and programs. A community consolidates to be a more effective community. Redundancy for the sake of preserving what is, for the sake of preserving a group or event, is not one community but multiple communities.

9. I think God wants us to be stewards of His Church. That means a culture of volunteering our time, talent, and treasure toward building up and maintaining the great thing that is Christ’s Church.

10. I think God wants us to be a welcoming community. Being greeted by smiling welcoming people when one attends Mass isn’t what the regulars necessarily need, although they appreciate it. It is however what strangers and Catholics weak in their faith need. We live in an anonymous society, and this robs us of our need for community, our need for family. We need to be intentional about being a community that welcomes the lonely, the lost, the searching, and the sinner.

11. I think God wants us to be an evangelizing community. Evangelizing to practicing Catholics, non-practicing Catholics, and non-Catholics.

12. I think God wants us to be fruitful and multiply. At least He says so in the Bible. To do that, we need to promote marriage among young adults. As long as those young adults have parents that will materially and morally support them, then they have the means for marriage. One should not think they need to be settled in life, or have their financial future figured out before marriage, or all the finances they want before having children (or more children) within marriage. Marriage has a way of helping people figure all that out. Furthermore, we need to encourage spouses to have more children and provide a supportive environment for them.

13. I think God wants us to invest in Catholic education for our kids. We need to pass on the faith in word and deed to our children and grandchildren. God is holding us accountable. For a parish family our size that already has a school building at St. Thomas Aquinas in Camas, I can’t imagine God saying don’t worry about it.

I hope this list of my “Who does God want us to become?” is helpful for you. What’s more, I hope you’ll take advantage of the town hall meetings to share your own ideas. These sessions will be asking us all to share our vision for our new parish family as well as brainstorming about the ministries we should be offering in the future support this vision. Those town hall meetings will be held next weekend:

· October 17, 5:45 p.m., Holy Redeemer Parish Center

· October 18, 9:45 a.m., St. Thomas Aquinas Parish Hall

· October 18, 12:15 p.m., Holy Redeemer Parish Center

· October 18, 12:45 p.m., OL Star of the Sea St. Raphael Room

May Almighty God and His Blessed Mother Bless You,