By Thea Jarvis

Father Richard Kieran remembers a lesson in stewardship taught at his home parish in Ireland many years ago.

Donate “the equivalent of a cow,” Father Kieran’s pastor told his congregation, a community of farmers who related easily to the agrarian example.

The price of a cow is considerably higher these days, said a smiling Father Kieran, now a pastor himself, but the concept of sharing one’s resources is still sound theology.

“God expects us to use our gifts for the glory of God and the service of his people,” he believes. Stewardship, the generous management of time, talent and treasure, “is an attitude that should pervade all our thinking.”

Father Kieran, in his fifh year at Immaculate Heart of Mary Church (IHM) in Atlanta, a parish of 1300 registered households, said he has been advocating stewardship since he first became a pastor 12 years ago.

“In the old days, it was referred to as ‘sacrificial giving,’ ‘making a commitment,’ ‘tithing parishes,’” Father Kieran recalled, but the idea was substantially the same: returning to God a portion of the gifts He has given.

The advent of an archdiocesan-mandated stewardship program, in which all parishes participate at the same time each year,” has been helpful and is bearing results” at IHM, Father Kieran said. Organized support at the archdiocesan level reinforces and lends credibility to the parish appeal, offering a specific plan and time frame so that “momentum is gathered,” he said. The third Sunday in October is Commitment Sunday in many parishes.

Stewardship became part of the official fabric of archdiocesan life three years ago, the same time that Jane Enniss, assistant director of development and parishioner at the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, became an archdiocesan staff member.

Stewardship is not about money, Mrs. Enniss emphasized, but is “a way of life, a feeling you get from really participating in church, following the biblical teaching of caring for the church and for one another.”

Historically the Archdiocese of Atlanta has usually exceeded its annual fiscal goals, said Mrs. Enniss. For the last three years, when detailed records have been kept, the numbers of people contributing has risen as well, an increase she hopes can be credited to the archdiocesan-wide stewardship program.

National figures indicate that, on average, 33 percent of parish membership participates in local stewardship programs. In the Archdiocese of Atlanta, said Mrs. Enniss, “Our goal is to move (that percentage) up.”

At IHM, Father Kieran has likewise observed an increase in people involved in the life and support of the parish since stewardship became a “more intentional, better coordinated” parish priority.

A ministry of welcome evolved over the past year, drawing large numbers of parishioners who act as official greeters before and after weekend Masses. The welcoming committee mans a desk where newcomers can register and obtain information on parish activities, a practice that has in turn pulled even more people into the community.

“We’re doing better in educating everybody to return some measure of their gifts,” encouraging people to take responsibility and ownership in the parish, Father Kieran said.

IHM has traditionally been a parish where Hispanic families have been warmly received. Today, some 600 people from various parts of South and Central America are part of the parish population. Another 250 attend Our Lady of the Americas Mission in Doraville, for which IHM is responsible.

“They are very generous in giving their time and talent,” Father Kieran observed. Although a formal concept of stewardship is novel in the Hispanic community, where “more serendipity” prevails, IHM is making progress in encouraging consistent participation in the stewardship program, he said.

Catholics from South and Central America are accustomed to making gifts to the church, explained Father Kieran, but have emigrated from countries where the institutional church relies primarily on state funds, investment and property holdings to meet financial responsibilities.

On the whole, “It’s a year-long fomenting of a relationship with the church” that helps translate such notions of stewardship for newly arrived Hispanic families, Father Kieran believes. It is also the way he integrates stewardship into the continuing cycle of parish life.

“It fits in as part of the catechesis we have to give every year,” said Father Kieran, who feels sharing resources, using intelligence, respecting the environment, discovering talents are “baptismal consequences” for Catholics.

“Stewardship means changing people’s attitudes” over time, not sounding a financial alarm, he said. If appeals are made in a crisis mode, support often ends when the crisis is over.

Although he doesn’t hesitate to encourage participation – “I’d be failing them if I didn’t” – Father Kieran hesitates to suggest dollar amounts or percentages to his parishioners because economic circumstances vary so widely.

“Most realize the church can only survive with their help,” he said. “They expect us to ask. We’re serving them when we explain the spirituality of giving, but they expect us to do it.”

Recent national polls have shown Catholics to be the lowest givers of support to their church, Father Kieran pointed out, a fact that has created a “huge new awareness” about stewardship.

“We’d have more money than we’d know how to use, to care for others,” if Catholics gave on a par with their Christian and non-Christian brethren, he said. “There’s a need for us to upgrade our level of giving.”

Costs for operating the Archdiocese of Atlanta have escalated, Father Kieran indicated, due in part to a higher level of salaries paid to professionals working for the church.

“It’s right, it’s just” to give decent salaries and benefits, he said, but it can’t be done with “loose change.”

In general, the archdiocese is “in fairly good shape financially,” Father Kieran said optimistically. “There are parts of the country far worse than we are,” where parishes are closing, church property is being sold.

The church in North Georgia has “the right kind of problem,” opening new parishes, expanding older ones, meeting the challenge of a growing Catholic population. “But,” he emphasized, “we have to keep working at it to meet these increasing needs.”