Following is a statement by the archdiocesan board of education on the practice of charging fees for catechetical instruction.

In 1967 the archdiocesan board of education passed a policy saying, “Each parish shall have an adequate, published budget for the parochial religious education program. A minimum of twelve (12) dollars per student is the ‘recommended’ norm to be budgeted”.

The responsibility for financing the parish religious education program is therefore one shared by the pastor, his financial committee, and the parish board of education. Some parishes finance their parish school of religion completely by parish funds. Others, perhaps most, charge a fee to help cover the cost of the program. Much depends on the size of the parish, its financial condition, the size of its religious education staff, and its facilities. Each case is different, and each parish board must decide on what is adequate to meet its particular needs.

Often boards charge fees in order to enrich a program with new texts or with audio-visual material. Some feel that the fee makes parents more aware of the cost of religious education, and therefore its value. Having invested in the program directly, they pay more attention to it.

Because each parish has different problems and different ideas about financing its program, the archdiocesan board has not set, and does not intend to set, a policy on the subject. It feels that the decision can only be a local one.

Parish board members are elected by the parishioners and represent them. Meetings are open and rules for bringing matters to the board’s attention should be published. The best interest of every member of the parish is the board’s goal, and they can know the mind of the people they represent, only if these parishioners will let them know how they feel on subjects such as the catechetical fee.