Your Ideas Matter — And We Want to Hear Them
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April 26, 2026
Dear St. Benedict the Moor Family,
One of the great blessings of St. Benedict the Moor Parish is the depth of talent, experience, and faith our people carry. Many of you see needs in our community and already have ideas about how the parish might respond. That is the Holy Spirit at work, and I am genuinely grateful for it.
To honor that inspiration — and to be good stewards of the time, energy, and resources God has entrusted to us — I am inviting every member of this parish to participate in our ministry life in a new and more intentional way: the Mission Proposal.
Here is the idea. If you have a vision for something new at St. Benedict's — a ministry, an event, a program, a service — I am asking you to write it down. Not a term paper. Just one page, in your own words, answering four simple questions:
The Goal: What need does this meet? The Method: How will it work? The Resources: What (and who) do we need? The Fruit: How will we know if it was successful?
Why put it in writing? Because writing is thinking made visible. A spoken idea can sound exciting in the moment, but a written idea has to become definite: What exactly are we proposing? For whom? At what cost? Under whose care? When you take the time to answer those questions, you are already doing the first act of leadership. You are tilling the soil so that your seed can actually grow.
And if you make that effort, I make you three promises. Within four weeks of receiving your proposal: First, I will read it carefully. Second, I will give you a written response — "yes," "not yet," or "let's talk more." Third, I will thank you personally for the thought and prayer you invested. Your idea will never disappear into a void. It will be received, considered, and answered.
Now, I know that for some of us, writing things down feels like a barrier. Please do not let that stop you. If putting words on paper is difficult for you, we will gladly pair you with someone who can help you shape your thoughts into a simple proposal. The goal is not to test your writing; it is to give your idea the best possible chance to succeed.
Think of it this way. If you came to me and said, "Father, I think we should build a new room onto the church," and I just said, "Great — start hammering," I would be failing you. I would be sending you into a project without a plan. But if I said, "Show me a simple sketch; tell me what you will need; show me who will help" — that is not a roadblock. That is respect for your vision. That is how we help good ideas become real.
St. Benedict the Moor Parish has a mission that stretches across this entire diocese. Your ideas are part of how we fulfill it. So pray. Dream. Then pick up a pen — and let us build together.
Proposals can be submitted to the parish office or handed directly to me at any time. or sent to me at [email protected]. There is also an online option: sbtmparishpgh.com/mission-proposal
God bless you.
— Fr. Matthew