Diocese develops program to support new parish pastors

A new Catholic pastors workshop will be held in the diocese Sept. 15-18. The workshop is geared toward new pastors or pastors new to the diocese.

Priests who are newly assigned as parish pastors this year, in 2025 and one from 2024 will spend four days learning from veteran pastors, accomplished lay leaders and diocesan staff.

“Becoming a pastor is one of the most important moments in a priest’s life,” Father William Hahn, vicar general and director of priestly life, affirmed. “I’ve heard a number of priests who have been ordained a long time wish they had had something like this when they first became pastors. I agree; I think it would have helped me and my first parish greatly.”

The Disciple Maker Index (DMI), a tool deployed by the Catholic Leadership Institute (CLI), affirmed a pastor’s impact on evangelization. The DMI, which was developed by CLI in 2014, has received more than 1,000,000 responses nationally.

It determined drivers for parish growth: forming parishioners as disciples, a positive Sunday Mass experience and welcoming environment. The most significant driver of growth, however, is a pastor. The survey concluded parishioners are 11 times more likely to recommend their parish if they are likely to recommend their pastor.

Many aspects indicate Catholics being likely to recommend their pastor: pastors who engage with parishioners, try to provide for their spiritual needs, are attentive to preaching – such as the Sunday homily – and a joyful presence. Parishioners, in turn, recommend their parish.

In 2021, the DMI was deployed in the Columbus diocese. More than 21,000 Catholics in central Ohio participated. In 2025, the tool was again used in the diocese and 10,618 responses were recorded.

“We are building a culture of support for pastors,” Father Hahn said, noting the workshop will offer pastors “formation, mentorship, fraternity and ongoing accompaniment during their first years.

“Through this initiative, we want every new pastor to know that the Church is committed to his success, surrounded by mentors and brother priests, and equipped to lead his people closer to Christ. Ultimately, this is about the salvation of souls.”

Bishop Earl Fernandes is eager to invest in new pastors.

“I’m very happy that Father Hahn and his team have put this in place to support our priests as pastors,” the bishop said. “In days gone by, priests may have had 20 years as a parochial vicar prior to becoming a pastor. That certainly has not been the recent history of the Diocese of Columbus.

“Too often a young priest was asked to take on a pastorate without sufficient training in leadership and administration. Often, these parishes had declining numbers, financial problems and deferred maintenance bills. We were setting our priests and pastors up to fail, adding to their already stressful lives.

“With this program, we are beginning to put those supports in place which will help them to succeed, which benefits not only the priests but also the parishes and parishioners themselves.”

The Columbus diocese built a workshop and applied for a grant from The Catholic Foundation to fund the event.

READ: Three-year process led to Real Presence Real Future results

The diocese previously sent new pastors to the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis for a one-week Catholic pastors workshop program. While priests reported the workshop being beneficial, they advocated moving to a local model that would include experienced pastors serving as mentors and a series of workshops throughout the year.

Several experienced pastors across the diocese are slated to speak at the first workshop Sept. 15-18: Father Hahn; Father David Young, Zanesville St. Thomas and St. Nicholas; Father David Sizemore, New Albany Church of the Resurrection; Msgr. Craig Eilerman, Lancaster Basilica of St. Mary of the Assumption; and Father Jonathan Wilson; Westerville St. Paul the Apostle.

Lay leaders will include John Bradford, founder of Wilderness Outreach; Joe Hamrock, former president and CEO of NiSource, parent company of Columbia Gas of Ohio; Joe Testa, former Ohio tax commissioner; Jonathan Kash, senior director of human resources for the Diocese of Columbus; and Jason Mays, the diocese’s senior director of communications.

Experienced pastors and accomplished Catholic lay leaders will present talks for new pastors on the essentials of running a parish: leadership, management, human resources, budgeting and delegating.

“Priests who have lived it – and the dedicated lay persons who see it in the life of their own pastor – know that pastors have an incredible weight of leadership placed upon them,” Father Hahn said.

“They are meant to be the spiritual leader of their parish, but they are also meant to oversee a complex organization with its own dynamics, human resource challenges, budgets – sometimes multimillion dollar budgets.

READ: Priest assignments will affect churches in diocese

“The goal of this support structure is to help equip a pastor to … handle the administrative side in a way that will free him more for the pastoral and spiritual leadership of his parish.”

Subsequential workshops are being planned for new pastors. A second workshop will be held Jan. 12-14, 2027, and a third, April 21-22.

New pastors will continue meeting with a mentor for a year following the workshops.