In late 2008, the Diocese of Broken Bay started discussions about WYD11 in Madrid Spain. The question was raised "what if we could get pilgrims to serve their parish before they went to WYD as well as after the pilgrimage?"
After a few more meetings the idea of the Broken Bay Parish Internship was born. Bishop David Walker had agreed to fund the pilgrimage costs to WYD11 of any young adult (16-33yrs) who served 400 hours in parish based ministry by August 2011. After a recruiting campaign, the Diocese took on 150 Parish interns in all 24 parishes within the Diocese. Some parishes had 10 interns whilst others had 2. Some of the interns were still in school whilst other interns were in their early 30's married with kids.
Currently we have Interns serving in Youth Ministry, Young Adults, Children's Ministry, Music Ministry, Catechesis, Administration, IT and variety of personal ministry projects. All of interns are taking part in the Diocese of Broken Bay Theological Reflection Program.
So far the Broken Bay Parish Internship program has been a great success in our Diocese. This blog was created to support the ministry development of the Parish Interns.
Today people from across the world are reading the Broken Bay Internship Blog because it has ideas and principles for ministry that apply in a variety of settings. Please enjoy this blog and post your thoughts after each post.
More information about the Internship program is available on our website:
Blessings.
Mark McDonald
Internship Coordinator
