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The Serra Leader Fall 2003

The Dues Increase | USAC President Jim DeNike

Discussions about money are never easy among family members, but there are some issues regarding dues that I think are important and that you, our leaders, should understand. As of the end of October, the accounts receivable from dues amounted to $68,917.00, of which $33,901.00 was due to Serra International and $35,016.00 was due to the USA Council. These receivables were for dues that should have been paid in September. This is an exceptionally high number and a part of the reason may be the dues increases for both International and the Council. This situation has created very difficult cash positions for International and the Council.

At the delegates meeting in July at the convention in Chicago, a $5.00 annual dues increase was approved retroactive to June 1, 2003. This dues increase was billed to all of the clubs in the billing received in August.

The Council submitted a request for a $5.00 per year increase to all clubs in April of this year which was approved by May 30 by 63% of the clubs that voted. (Surprisingly, 158 or 48% of all clubs in the Council did not cast a vote.) Because the Council bylaws specify that there must be a 90-day period before an increase can take effect, the $5.00 increase effective for September 1 through November 30 was only $1.25. This dues increase was also billed to all of the clubs in the billing received in August. The table below shows the effect of these dues increases:

Clubs Paying Twice a Year
June 1 to Nov. 30, 2003	International:	Council:
	[$23 + $5 = $28]	[$37 + $1.25 = $38.25]
	One half year $14	One half year $19.13
Dec. 1 to May 31, 2004	[$23 + $5 = $28]	[$37 + $2.50 = $39.50]
	One half year $14	One half year $19.75
Clubs Paying Quarterly
June 1 to Nov. 30, 2003	[$23 + $5 = $28]	[$37 + $1.25 = $38.25]
First quarter	$5.75	$9.25
Second quarter	($5.75 + $2.50=) $8.25	($9.25 + $1.25 =) $10.50
Dec. 1 to May 31, 2004	[$23 + $5 = $28]	[$37 + $2.50 = $39.50]
Third quarter	$7	$10.50
Fourth quarter	$7	$10.50

 

The invoices that your club received in November reflect these changes. If you have any questions, please call the Chicago office at 888-777-6681 and talk to Jan or Ed.

We are really challenged to continue to provide the services and programs from the Council office and committees in the face of decreasing income. As mentioned before, funding from the Serra International Foundation for committee activities has been significantly reduced, but more importantly, we have experienced a net membership decrease over the past 18 months. We reduced the budget for this fiscal year, and through October expenses were 10% below last year. We implemented additional cuts in November so that we can be certain to have a year where income exceeds expenses and where we can improve our cash position.

It is important that all clubs pay their dues on a timely basis and that we increase our membership so that we maintain the funds necessary to provide the programs clubs need to achieve their vocation objectives.

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Dear Peter... Sound advice from USAC Membership Coordinator Peter Cunningham  

Dear Peter,

    Some members of my club never received a membership card. Why?

    Wondering  

Dear Wondering,

Since November 2002, the USA Council has issued membership cards only to those members who supplied us (either personally or through their club) with the date they joined Serra. Collecting these dates is also how our office compiles a reminder list of those members celebrating 10th, 25th and 50th anniversaries in your club each year. (We send these lists out in August so your club can arrange to honor these members with an anniversary pin and/or celebration, if you wish.) Contact the USAC office with these dates, and we will send membership cards out right away. By the way, if a member can’t remember the exact date he joined, that’s fine -- an approximate year will suffice.  

Dear Peter,

    Can a priest or religious be a member of my Serra club?

    Thinking of asking my pastor to be a member

Dear Thinking,

No. Article 8, Section 1, paragraph (b) of the Serra International Bylaws states: “Members shall be practicing Catholic lay men or lay women or permanent deacons.” This excludes priests, religious brothers and religious sisters. According to Serra International policy, while the latter two are considered, under canon law, to be lay men and women, they are distinguished by their public vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. But the main point is that priests, brothers and sisters make up the group for whom Serra works, and are not a part of Serra. Serra International believes that a large part of its effectiveness is its nature as an organization of lay men and women working for vocations apart from those of its members. Therefore, priests and religious men and women are not eligible to be members of your club. We appreciate their counsel, presence, and prayers to fulfill our mission, however, so please continue to invite them to share with you your club’s Serran experience.  

Dear Peter,

    Are there membership initiation fees? If so, how much?

    New Membership VP  

Dear Membership VP,

Serra International Bylaws have set the initiation fee for new members at 25% of the Serra International dues. Therefore, the current initiation fee for new members is $7.00. These fees are payable when a Serra club submits the completed membership application to us. The fee is waived for returning members or for those transferring from another Serra club.

Got a membership question? USAC Membership Coordinator Peter Cunningham has an answer! Send your question to Dear Peter, USA Council, 65 E. Wacker Place, Suite 802, Chicago, IL 60601. E-mail him at pcunningham@serraus.org.

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Care, courtesy and common sense: Tips for keeping members  

Why do some members choose to leave?

For those leaving within the first five years we find the most common reasons to be: “club lacked purpose”; “did not feel welcome”; and “did not encourage younger membership.” Other exit surveys indicated that members resigned because they found the meeting times inconvenient, lacked the time to devote to Serra, suffered from declining health, or could not afford the club dues. (Note: Most clubs charge a local club dues in addition to the dues payable to the USA Council and Serra International — $70.00 per year effective June 1, 2004.)

While your club may not be able to amend the last four reasons stated above, you certainly can prevent members from resigning due to the first three. USA Council Executive Director Ed Verbeke offers these tips to help combat these complaints.  

Let members know you value their presence at meetings.

If a member didn’t show up at a meeting, call him the following day and say, “We missed you at our last meeting! Is everything all right?” If the member is under the weather, he’d probably be grateful to see your concern and pleased to know that he was missed. Or you may discover that his car is in the shop, which will give you an opportunity to offer him a ride to the next meeting. Younger members may need assistance with child care. If you know a good babysitter, or if your spouse does not attend meetings, perhaps you can make an arrangement with him or her. If your meeting takes place at church, arrange for child care there or find out if the parish offers it.  

Show personal interest in your members.

Many clubs print individual member bios in their newsletters. This is a good practice for getting members to know each other. But go further than that; ask them personally about their families, work and hobbies. You don’t need to limit your interaction to club functions; Serra makes a great stage for forming lasting friendships.  

Never let a member get away with being nothing more than just another dues-paying warm body.

Find out what her talents are and ask her what committees or projects she would like to join. Once she is attached to a project or committee, be sure that she has a concrete assignment. When a member becomes directly involved with hands-on club work, she feels part of a greater whole and may see her value as a member through the fruits of that work.  

Don’t be just another “knife-and-fork” club.

Reading aloud the mission of Serra International and our USA Council at the beginning of every meeting is an excellent way to keep members focused. While gathering for a meal may be a part of your normal meetings, merely eating together neither fosters nor promotes vocations (even if you are trying to hear a vocations-related presentation over the din of clanking tableware). People are motivated to join our organization by our work for vocations. If they feel that little effort is given to fulfilling the Serra mission, they may leave to offer their time, talent and money elsewhere. Every member has something to offer; don’t limit it to passing the butter!  

Encourage younger people to join!

Keep fresh ideas flowing into your club by seeking out younger members. These people may have more energy, new perspectives and a better handle on how to communicate Serran ideals in today’s culture. But while you do your best to attract younger members, don’t pile all the work upon them just because they have seen fewer winters. Some clubs have turned younger recruits off by instantly making them presidents (not a good idea, because if they are new members they lack experience) or by expecting them to be able to do much more than older members. Younger members have other sets of responsibilities – often a career and raising children. Be sensitive to that. Keep them involved and let them take on as much responsibility and leadership as they feel they can shoulder. (This goes for older members, too.)

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Mentoring: The Serra club buddy system  

Heads up fellow Serrans! You’re in for some sobering statistics. According to data from our headquarters on Wacker Place in Chicago, over half of the members you recruit today will resign within five years. Let me stress that this number does not include deaths; these are members who have chosen to leave Serra.   No wonder the USAC Membership Committee can’t stop talking about retention. What does “retention” mean? It means keeping members on our rosters by educating and utilizing them as active members so that they become involved and committed to the work of Serra, thereby becoming longtime Serrans. The good news is, mentoring can help us keep members.

According to a business publication I have just received, a mentor is one who gives guidance and helpful advice to a protégé. The mentor is typically more experienced than the protégé, and possesses the wisdom that only experience can provide. The pamphlet suggests that the mentor also benefits from the opportunity to strengthen his or her leadership skills. (I might add that a good Serran mentor would do well to become well-versed in the current events and general structure of Serra.) How might a Serran mentor function?

USAC Membership Vice President Gary Davis recalls that when he was new to Serra, his mentor walked with him to meetings, sat with him, and frequently introduced him to other Serrans.

Upon learning that a new member of his club felt he was having trouble being accepted, one Serran volunteered to mentor this new member. In addition to making it a point to sit with this new Serran, he offered to attend a Serra function at the seminary with this new member, who promptly accepted. The new Serran was introduced to the mentor’s friends, was warmly received, and made to feel welcome.

A club Membership Committee should focus on ensuring that someone in the club is assigned to making each new member feel welcome. This mentor should guide the new member for at least a year, introducing the new member to established club members and making sure he or she knows about the club’s special events and programs. The mentor should make sure that the Serran gets personally invited to all these special events and should offer to accompany him or her. If it is not possible for the mentor to attend a given event, he should find another club member to accompany the new Serran. If possible, the new member should be part of the same committees that the mentor is on.

So far I have mentioned only the social aspects of mentoring, those things done out of courtesy for the new member. It is equally important for the mentor to make sure that the new member receives material explaining Serra, its traditions, structure, and history. The mentor should help him or her understand all of this material. The mentor should also make sure that the club schedules an orientation meeting (preferably using the recently produced “Spirit of Serra” video presentation and accompanying guide available from USAC), and gives the new member a copy of the Handbook for Serrans and a membership pin. The mentor should share his/her Serran magazines and other mailings until the new member is on headquarters’ mailing list.

Could the sponsoring Serran also be the mentor? Certainly and perhaps ideally, but the sponsor’s schedule may not fit quite right and it could be appropriate for someone else to do the mentoring. These are things that can be discussed by the membership committee. One service organization, Rotary, actually formalizes the mentor/new member relationship.

It is equally as important to keep a member as it is to get a new member. A club membership committee with an active mentoring system will do well in maintaining their membership rolls. ---Fran Feyereisen, USAC Membership Committee

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Coming Soon: New Program Manual Part II  

In order to promote vocations to the priesthood and religious life, Serrans must be well grounded in their own faith. A primary goal of the USA Council is to ensure that the programs offered by the local clubs are based on the principles of adult learning theory so that we may facilitate the sharing, understanding, and living of our Catholic faith.

The Program Manual Part II contains program themes designed to help Serrans gain a greater understanding of God’s love and the commitment to our mission. The USAC Programs Committee is proud to announce that all 36 programs in the manual have been rewritten to reflect a consistent, user-friendly format. Our committee is confident that the club programs vice-president or any club member can successfully lead a club program. We’ve made your job easier by providing ready-made programs for you.

Every program includes the following components: An opening prayer A scripture reading An introduction to the program topic Documentary tradition Questions to facilitate discussion A closing reflection Bibliography (as appropriate) Prompting notes are also included to aid program presenters. A program schedule for each month through 2006 matches the monthly programs to the liturgical calendar for easy planning ideas. Watch www.serraus.org for the new Program Manual Part II!

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Emblems tell a story

Every November, our North-Minneapolis Serra Club has a candle lighting memorial service. Quoting from our service:

“This candle lighting ceremony recognizes the deceased members of our club as part of the Communion of Saints. Surely our Serrans in heaven join with us in praying for vocations. In addition to remembering them in prayer, we invoke their intercession for our Serra mission.”

Often while perusing the obituaries, we see emblems of such organizations as the Knights of Columbus, Rotary, Masons, Shriners and military service displayed, showing that the deceased person was proud of his or her affiliation with these groups.

In pre-planning my own funeral, I was shown the possible emblem choices I could have in my obituary. There was no “Serra” emblem available. That put me on an inquiry journey to find out why. Simply put: the emblem has not been made available to the local papers. After a few effortless phone calls to the local newspapers and by forwarding the Serra emblem artwork provided by USAC to them, the Minneapolis Star Tribune and the St. Paul Pioneer Press now offer our emblem as one of the choices for obituary use.

You can do this in your own area newspapers. It is a simple way to identify the importance of the work of Serra in your own life or the life of an active spouse member. Why not make this a communications project and help increase awareness of Serra today?

by Norma Swanson, North-Minneapolis Serra Club

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VOCATIONS PROJECT ALERT: Parish Contact Program  

The Parish Contact Program is the primary vocations thrust of USAC at the present time. It has been developed and is managed by the USAC Vocations Committee. Through it, the committee is determined to help American bishops achieve their goal to “build a culture of vocations” in American families. Also, this program will fulfill our council’s long-range goal: to see that there are vocation awareness activities in every parish in the country.  

The program What we’re trying to do is convince all Serra clubs in the U.S.A. to send a Serran volunteer into every parish that the club can reasonably reach. This includes even those parishes that don’t yet have Serra members. This volunteer, better known as the parish contact, is challenged to: represent Serra to the parish assist the pastor in increasing vocations awareness in his parish become a catalyst for vocation awareness activity in the parish.  

The USAC Vocations Committee has put a tremendous amount of effort into implementing this ambitious program. First, the program was developed and coincided with the 2001-2002 USAC theme, “Building a Culture for Vocations.” Second, the committee introduced the concept to district governors and regional directors at the spring leadership training sessions, stressing the vital role these leaders play in the success of the initiative. Third, Vocations Committee members made special trips to district/regional conventions to present the specifics of the program and its benefits to local club leadership.

Finally, five new training tools were developed to help clubs train their parish contacts to feel comfortable in this ministry. These materials are available from the USAC office.   Success stories The Parish Contact Program has been tested and is currently being used successfully in certain clubs/districts throughout the country.

All eight clubs in District 10 actively participate in the Parish Contact Program that covers all 150 parishes in the Diocese of Galveston/Houston. "We use our Serran parish contacts to help us do our share to build a culture of vocations by taking vocation awareness activities into our parishes, and ultimately into families,” says District Governor Cliff Petersen. “Our diocese vocation office uses us a lot. We . . . publicize in parishes two of the diocese’s annual vocation development programs -- Life Awareness (ages 20-45) and Explorer (junior/senior high). I don't know how we'd get this job done without the structure of the parish contact concept."

The Santa Clara, Calif., club covers 12 parishes assigned by its district. A Serran is assigned to encourage vocation awareness activities at each parish. "Many of our parish contacts function as a communication bridge between the diocese and the pastor,” says Santa Clara club president Art Swain. “They also serve as the link between our club and Catholic schools, especially for our monthly Vocation Awareness Program at the schools which includes an essay contest and vocations talk."

The Serra Club of Boulder, Colo., assigns two parish contacts to each of their nine parishes, and the club Parish Contact Program coordinator, Sue Husler, regularly follows up with each contact person. "This program increases the awareness issue in the club and in the parishes, and we are confident that it is helping to improve the 'vocations environment' in families," she says.

Southwest Denver club president John Gebhardt reports, "Our Parish Vocation Program is necessary for us to fulfill our club's vocation awareness vision. One thing we do is use our parish contact relationships to set up local ‘vocation panels’ in each of our 16 parish religious-ed programs and/or schools."   Interested in getting your club started?

Ask your district governor to show you Exhibit 5-4 of his Governor Training Manual. It lists six simple steps your club can take to get the program off the ground. Additionally, order a copy of the green covered "Parish Contact Program" from USAC ($1.00).  

Welcome aboard! "We encourage all Clubs to get an early start on the Program,” says Richard Schwappach, USAC secretary and past Vocations Committee chairman. “We're excited about it, and feel it will have a major impact on Serra vocation activities for a long time to come. Let's all get behind this initiative as soon as we can, so that together we will help our bishops in their goal to build a culture of vocations in our parishes."

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What in the world is “Super Weekend”?  

After we published the registration form for the September Super Weekend in the Summer issue of the Serra Leader, we got several calls from confused Serrans. “What’s Super Weekend?” said one. “I might register to go if I knew what it was!” said another. That was a big “OOPS!” for which your editor takes all the credit. To make it up to you, below is a brief but comprehensive description of the mysterious “Super Weekend,” just in time for the January meeting (Jan. 16-18, 2004):

The USA Council Board meets three times during the Serra year. The first meeting takes place at the Serra International Convention. The second and third meetings occur at “SuperWeekends” in September and January in Chicago. In addition to the board meeting, 14 standing committees meet to discuss, plan and develop the programs and resources used at all levels of Serra in the USA.

Through their efforts, they hope to bolster the council’s image as a vital national Catholic organization and to stimulate the club participation and success so essential to fully realizing our mission. Super Weekend has become an integral function of the USA Council. It provides opportunities for organizational as well as personal growth and new ideas. Throughout the course of the weekend there are formal and informal opportunities for Serrans to better understand what Serra's work is all about.

All Serrans are encouraged to experience Super Weekend, and every Serran who attends is encouraged to share his or her talents. The committees would be delighted to welcome you as a new member. Registration is $50.00 per person, and an optional dinner on Saturday is $40.00. The room rate at the Marriott O’Hare hotel is $79.00 a night. You can register for Super Weekend online at www.serraus.org, or contact the USAC office in Chicago at 888.777.6681. We hope to see you there!

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