The Next 100 Years

August 31, 2022

Dear Friends in Christ,

Greetings to you! Over the past year, Immaculate Conception parish leadership has been actively discussing the financial needs of our church and school – in particular those related to the preservation and maintenance of our buildings and infrastructure. In order to investigate ways of raising funds, leadership assembled a planning committee this past Spring and commissioned an outside consulting firm to conduct a Feasibility Study to assess your interest in participating in a Capital Campaign. The Feasibility Study consisted of a combination of in-person interviews, surveys mailed to parishioners’ homes, and in-pew surveys. The consulting firm presented its findings last month and I would like to share them with you. 

First, I want to set the stage by explaining, in a general way, the study methodology and response rates. To begin the Feasibility Study, 100 invitations were extended to target parishioners asking them to participate in an in-person interview. Fifty out of 100 parishioners responded and were interviewed. Next, 455 written surveys were mailed out to all of your homes. Of those 455 mailed surveys, 60 of you returned responses. Lastly, an in-pew survey was conducted at the Sunday Spanish Mass on two separate occasions. Fifty responses were received from the in-pew surveys. These three phases resulted in the gathering of a total of 160 responses. 

The consulting firm then compiled and statistically analyzed the responses and prepared a report and recommendation. In summary, the Feasibility Study Report concludes that there is sufficient interest among you to support moving forward with a Capital Campaign. That conclusion left the Planning Committee with a lot of information, a few questions, and some big decisions to make.

The primary question that the team asked was – How much do we as a parish need to take action above and beyond our normal weekly plate collections in order to raise capital funds?  And the answer here was unequivocal – that we have some major infrastructure repairs that simply cannot be covered by our historical weekly collections. This is not an exhaustive list, but here are the big expenditures facing our parish in the next several years: Boiler, School Roof, Street Assessment, Bathrooms in School, etc., etc. 

The next question was – What is the best way to raise these critical capital funds? And here, we had two options to weigh: one was to engage an outside consultant to conduct a Capital Campaign on our behalf, and the second was to design and conduct our own Capital Campaign. The planning committee decided that the second option with some input from professional fundraisers, to conduct our own Capital Campaign, is the right path for our church and school. 

Several factors led to this decision. Hiring an outside consultant is a time-tested method of raising capital funds. However, fees for a consultant to run a campaign are approximately $100,000. In addition, a consulting firm has specific processes and timelines that need to be followed in order to conduct a campaign in the most efficient manner – in other words, there is little room to customize the campaign to meet any objectives of the church community other than just raising money. I will explain why this was an important consideration. 

Immaculate Conception Church and School is a dynamic community that is about to embark on a year-long celebration in honor of our 100-year anniversary. In those 100 years, we have experienced many wonderful changes and we have a lot to be grateful for, and many reasons to celebrate. We have a robust school that has produced thousands of young Catholics who have gone on to make priceless contributions to our world. We have a strong faith community that continues to inspire countless disciples who are carrying Christ’s salvific message to the ends of the earth. And more recently, we have added a new dimension and depth to our community with the welcoming of our Hispanic brothers and sisters to a Spanish Mass. 

All of these are reasons to celebrate. We felt strongly that any Capital Campaign that was not tightly woven into this celebration would merely be a pitch for money. We don’t want to simply ask you for money. We want to ask you to join us in celebrating the last 100 years and to help us launch The Next 100 Years! Doing so will require a bit of customization and perhaps additional time to make sure the community’s need for unity is met as each of you are invited to contribute to The Next 100 Years. And we feel strongly that we can do this more effectively with an internal campaign designed around our Immaculate Conception community. 

I am grateful to be serving here at Immaculate Conception Church and School. We are all excited to get busy with our 100-year celebration. And we hope that you are excited to be on this journey with us. Watch for more information as we embark on our celebration of The Next 100 Years! Thank you very much. May the Lord bless you greatly!

Peace with Christ,

Fr. James Peterson