St. Ann's to release survey seeking input

There are plenty of ways to figure out what people want or feel. There’s guessing, assuming, statistical comparisons and history – or there is, simply, the tried and true method of asking them directly.

The Pastoral Council of St. Ann’s Catholic Church in Bethany Beach is ready to send out a survey, more than a year in the making, aimed at determining how parishioners feel about belonging to the church community and how their sense of belonging can be improved. It further tries to determine what new ministries the parishioners feel should be considered and how their sense of participation could be improved.

“St. Ann’s Pastoral Council has prepared a survey to determine the parishioners’ interest in ministries, spiritual life and the social life of our church community,” explained Jack Walsh, former Bethany Beach mayor and a member of the Pastoral Council, who produced the survey.

He added that, sometimes, it’s easy to think the church is very stable, but it helps to see where the parishioners actually are.

“We sometimes think we’ve got our act together and everything is in place, but we wanted to get a sense of what our community wanted and how they felt about it,” he explained.

Since November 2008, the council has been working hard at perfecting the survey, making it user-friendly and easy to use. They have even produced the survey in both English and Spanish.

“We looked at other parish surveys and did a number of versions and revisions,” explained Walsh, adding that they even did a mini-pilot with 25 parishioners to test the survey, and took some information from that trial run and modified the final version.

Walsh said he wants people to know that the survey was not a once-size-fits-all automated survey. It was made by people in the parish, tested by people in the parish and is designed to be user-friendly – all in hopes of gathering the best information possible for the parish.

“We wanted to humanize it a little bit, make it personal,” he emphasized. “We want people to get a sense of what went into it. It was done by people who belong to the parish, and it is parish-oriented.”

The surveys will be inserted as a one-page insert in the March 27 and March 28 church bulletins and will also be available online starting on those dates. The council is urging those who can do so to use the online version, as there is software built in to the system that will automatically tabulate the results. For those that do use the hard copy, there will be collection boxes at both St. Ann’s and Our Lady of Guadalupe, St. Ann’s mission church on Route 17. Walsh added that it should take about 10 minutes for parishioners to finish taking the survey.

The council hopes to collect the surveys by around April 25, to give their seasonal visitors a chance to view them, as well, and they have a goal of mid-May to have looked at the results and have some kind of summary complete.

Walsh also added that they hope parishioners will take the time to let their voices be heard.

“St Ann’s is a faith-filled parish, but we are always looking for ways to improve our spiritual journey and encourage participation in this very important endeavor.”

For more information on St. Ann’s or on Our Lady of Guadalupe, visit www.stannsbethany.org online.