AMPJP AGM, Dinner and Forum 2024 – Quality presentations make for heavenly inspiration!: Executive Officer Report September 2024
What an AGM, Annual Dinner and Canonical Stewards Forum for AMPJP! Over two days this week an enormous energy was generated in the hearts and minds of so many involved with this Association.
Susan Pascoe’s studied approach belies an enormous intellect and an ability to distil what is most important and interesting to listeners. She then delivers that input with precision. Her talk at the AMPJP Dinner “The Synod on Synodality. What should we expect?” delivered, ironically, the unexpected! She kept us all enthralled through the complexities of the journey to the October Synod with clarity, a critical eye and and a loving heart for the flawed but beautiful Church to which we all belong. We were brought into the world of Pope Francis and the Vatican with all its quirks, and were left with a sense of optimism for the Synod and for the Church itself.
Associate Professor Jamie Calder SJ is quite the star presenter. His natural enthusiasm enlightened us on two aspects of the work of MPJP ministries which otherwise might seem to be in contradiction. His presentation, Canonical Stewardship of MPJPs: Theological Foundations, helped us to understand that a ministry can be both incredibly determined in its Catholic mission while simultaneously being embraced by non-Catholic staff and volunteers, who love to participate in a ministry that lives out the healing or teaching ministry of Christ.
We were so lucky to have short, sharp presentations by our newest MPJPs. Our new New Zealand member Whanau Mercy Ministries, our guests from Singapore and Malaysia Catholic Healthcare Asia, the Loretos and Marists entertained us with stories of success in joining the MPJP fold. Well actually the 1000 plus strong Marist Association has not quite achieved its aim of becoming an Association of Christ’s Faithful, but its presenters informed and amused us in sharing their inspirational failure to break through the Vatican resistance to their brand new way of being Church – so far!
Two big launches. The first, Chair Moira Najdecki’s launch of the AMPJP Strategic Plan, seeks to help MPJPs emerge from an essential period of initial development and settling in, to a new stage of life, where they also take their place as key leadership bodies in the wider Church. The size of MPJP ministries, led mostly by lay people, is now perhaps 50 times greater than that of the remaining religious order ministries. Secondly, Susan Pascoe has used the support she has gained in her role with the Synod on Synodality to launch a world-wide investigation into MPJPs, known as Inclusive Governance in a Synodal Church. Others want to learn from the story of these important lay-led ministries, which are central to the Church in English-speaking countries, and which provide an already existing example of synodal governance.
There were so many other outstanding presentations and facilitations. Could I also thank Lisa Buxton (wonderful acknowledgement of Country), Bishop Danny Meagher, Archbishop Charles Balvo, Richard Haddock, Marita Winters, Frank Malloy, Audrey Brown, Caroline Thompson (amazing prayer and facilitations) Jennifer Stratton, Liz Vinning, Sr Amy Hereford csj, Chris Jacobs-Vandegeer, Peter Steane, Neville Owen and the extraordinary Penny Wright? The staff at Mary MacKillop were also delightful. To everyone else in the huge team who assisted in some way and remain unnamed, an equally huge thankyou – and my apologies!
To our sponsors, the Catholic Development Funds of Sydney and Melbourne, and Brisbane’s ADF, and Makinson and d’ Apice Lawyers , a huge thankyou. And we are already talking about new partnerships. The CDFs too gave an excellent, mission-based presentation!
Of course the most important part of any conference are the informal meetings and conversations, getting to know others involved with MPJPs, and sharing the good times and the challenges.
According to the world’s largest event website, Eventbrite, ”most events have an overall Net Promoter Score (answering the question: would you recommend this event to a friend or colleague?) of 53.” So I am guessing a Net Promoter Score of 85 for this AMPJP event indicates that participants strongly felt the Forum met their needs for formation for their key leadership roles . This indicates that the quality of the presentations, the facilitations, the conversations and the learnings will inspire our MPJP Canonical Stewards as Leaders in the Catholic Church for another positive year of Mission ahead. Quality presentations make for heavenly inspiration!
