I attend a very family friendly parish.  We have great programs for our youth, a Catholic school, and super support for our seniors.  I’d like to see more help for brand new moms - including more readily available childcare options during parish educational events on weeknights.  I’d also like to explore an online discussion forum of some sort for working moms who are unable to attend weekday bible study.  As a whole, I’d say my parish does a wonderful job of supporting families, and individual parish members have really “stepped up” to take leadership roles in creating groups and studies for fellow parishioners.  We have a strong homeschooling community, and also a weekly moms bible study group that offers childcare and really does substantive studies.

A dear friend of mine leads a women’s bible study during the week for moms who stay home.  She offers it twice, once on Tuesday at her home when mothers can bring their kids (she has a toy box for them), and again on Wednesday which is also open to kids just no toy box as it is in the church library. This year we are focusing on mothering from the Mother of God.  My friend wrote an amazing bible study on how we can be better mothers through Mary’s example in Scripture.  Our Mother Mary is always an amazing example for mothers.

Lisa, I have been hosting a Mother’s Group out of my own home for well over 14 years! Women from a variety of different parishes come out to it ...  With our consumber culture, more moms working, fewer vocations to priesthood and being a religious, we as mothers need to reach out to other moms around us and catechize. PS. Mothering, Full of Grace is a fruit of my Mother’s Group—Please do watch that first episode, I promise you—you will be inspired !!

Hi Lisa, As mom to two boys away from home for college and now only my husband and I at home together, I would love it if our parish offered a Bible Study that was geared toward couples. A time that we meet with other parents & married couples to attend adoration, pray the rosary, read scripture, chat, eat…I know we could organize this on our own and we have wonderful married friends that we could invite, but it would be great to meet couples new to the area, couples that are possibly not Catholic but interested in our faith, most especially couples bound together because of their love for their faith, family, and friends. Good luck with your class next week. Blessings~

Our parish has a Mother’s Prayer group that meets one Thursday a month. The kids go to childcare and we share prayer intentions and pray a rosary together. Sometimes we share about a specific topic or have a speaker, but usually the intentions and rosary take up most of our time. When I first moved here this was the group that got me active in the parish and probably played the biggest role in making me feel comfortable coming back to Catholicism. We also have a MOMS mornings group that meets twice a month and is similar to MOPS in that there is breakfast, speakers, crafts but it is specifically Catholic. There is also a Moms group that gets together for park days, moms nights out, stuff like that. We have something called Living Matrimony that is like a Catholic Date night—dinner, drinks, entertainment (speaker, music) and that happens three or four times a year.

I have often been inspired by how many of the churches in our area, of other Faiths reach out to their moms, with craft sessions and talks AND babysitting included in neighbouring rooms!  Our Canadian Catholic parishes often aren’t equipped with the same facilities.

Looking for the much needed support of other Catholic moms…I have formed a few very small groups…online, through facebook ...and a new blog called iblogJesus. It is my hope that people would pass on the insight they receive from good spiritual reading, study of scripture and personal prayer…

Oh, one other thing I wanted to mention…I have found http://www.lightweigh.com/ to be very helpful.  It’s a solid Catholic weight loss program that builds on our rich Catholic Faith, showcasing the saints, teaching Catechism and studying scripture. It also offers a venue to grow in Faith, with the support of others.

My husband and I went to a Sunday morning introductory bible study session that was only 30 minutes long. We figured, hoped, our two kids, ages 3 and 5, would be content to draw and listen for 30 minutes. Being used to epic plane journeys and hourlong masses, that wasn’t unreasonable. While the session went well for both my hubby (who is a convert) and I and the kids, the entire bible study session is actually an hour long, once a week for 8 weeks and meeting Tuesday mornings. We both work that day. Sr. Mary who runs it is going to find out if there’s a way we can do an evening Bible study group with childcare, since they saw our predicament. We are still waiting on that. She also asked us if we could help plan ways in which the parish can provide more support for married couples, but again we would be dependent on child care. We would love to do all these things that we did before the children came along, but now we are tied to the nanny’s schedule and at $14/hr, cost is another factor. We figure, we want to do it, but maybe when the kids are older if things don’t work out.

Hi Lisa,
FAMILIA is an awesome program that accomplishes several things:
*Gets women into small groups to learn what we’re called to as women, wives and moms.
*Helps women learn so much about their Catholic faith through reviewing the upcoming Sunday Gospel, getting familiar with the CCC and reading/discussing Pope JPII’s incredible encyclicals and letters on marriage and family.
*Women are able to share within their group, how they live their Catholic faith in their “domestic church”...this gives other women ideas to emulate in their own homes.
*If you have a group that has different age ranges of moms they learn from each other about the various developmental issues of their kids…the joys and the agonies!
*Becomes a way for newlyweds and young moms to get involved in a parish ministry right away without having to wait till their kids get old enough to enter the parish Catholic school…which is when most young families begin to engage.  FAMILIA gives young families a venue to engage in right away.
*For the parish it creates an instant “small group” that can pitch in on other apostolic projects at the parish level.  The group ends up wanting to do this because through FAMILIA they learn that serving the parish is one of the things families are called to.
*For the parish, FAMILIA provides great formation for the women who then feel equipped and called to volunteer for other parish based ministries…Baptism Prep, Marriage Prep, Parish Council etc. etc
* FAMILIA is Win-Win-Win for mom and parish and Church alike.  I can’t recommend it highly enough!
*There’s a FAMILIA for Men too!

I would like to find a group of like minded moms.  Thought I had found it in my old parish after we finished MOMS 8 week course and wanted to stay together for fellowship and fun.  We picked different books to read and share. During discussions it became clear that two members held some views which are contrary to some of the basic teachings of our faith.  One example is a member’s discussion that women should be priests.  Not sure how you can screen to make sure you are with women who agree with the church’s teachings and intend to support them and you.  Assumed because it was a parish group all felt the same about the fundamentals of our faith.  It was actually quite heartbreaking to quit the group after over a year of sharing and friendship.  I have stayed in touch with the few who do agree with the Church, but long for a group with like-minded women.  How do you test for that?

I so wish our parish offered more for young families, moms in particular.  There really is nothing until you enroll your kids in the school.  A friend of mine has a mother’s bible study at her church and a few of the moms homeschool so their teenage girls watch the younger kids while the moms are meeting.
At the parish we were at before we moved they were trying to start a moms group but it really was just a social thing - bring the kids and talk while they play.  No real depth to it - I would love something that actually address the spiritual needs of young mothers trying to live out their vocation.

We have three wonderful deacons at our church.  On of them along with his wife has started hosting marriage retreats at our church and they INCLUDE free babysitting!!  They usually have an adult volunteer along with a few of the high school students.  They keep the cost very low for the program as well.  They also have started hosting date nights for married couples in the church basement where they decorate the basement to look like a fancy restaurant and then cook up a fabulous gourmet meal for everyone that signs up.  They also include free babysitting on those nights as well, and the cost to attend is only $25/couple. 

I would love to see a better mom’s group at our parish though.  We only have one women’s group and it’s made up of mostly seniors.  I think it’s really hard to coordinate mother’s groups at church, though.  The problem is you don’t want to offend anyone but the reality is that there is a group of SAHMs and a group of working moms.  If you just start a general “mothers” group and have them meet in the morning or afternoon, you will offend and/or isolate the working moms, if you have them meet in the evenings many moms just won’t attend b/c, whether you’re working or not, kids are needy in the evenings and between dinner and family time there’s not much time left for anything else.
I think it would be beneficial to have an open “mom’s email list” at the parish though, where you can choose to put your name on it and maybe once a months someone hosts a function and then moms can network a bit and possibly form babysitting co-ops, etc.

Our parish has a wonderful group of moms that meet one day a week in the morning (so not for working parents - only SAHM) They provide childcare, start with an exercise program to get mom’s moving, then prayer/fellowship, and advice sharing - welcoming to new moms.  It’s a very strong, supportive group at our parish church and we hear great things from them.  The women of FORM even organized a “date night” movie night for all parish couples last summer.  The church provided childcare (!!) and we all brought something for potluck supper and watched Fireproof.  There was talk of starting a couples marriage bible study using the Fireproof guide, but nothing came of it.

There are great new adult faith formation programs in our parish for women, but all are during the daytime working hours, which excludes working moms.  SAHM and older retirees are the majority in our area.

I’ve been attending a mom’s group at our parish for about 3 years now.  The group is actually open to all women of the parish (regardless of childrens’ ages or lack there of).  I actually started attending the group shortly before I had my first child.  Although I felt a little out of place at first since most of the women who attend regularly do have small children, I have really grown to value this weekly group which meets during the school year.  We meet in the church basement; there is a nice play area for the kids and another area with some tables.  It is a very informal group, and I have found it very nice to be able to have the kids in the same area—one is free to get up and attend to one’s child if need be.  We have a few potlucks together each year and take on a spiritual book of some sort as well.  One can read ahead and answer questions for the readings, but this is not a requirement—I like that “homework” is not required because sometimes time at home is busy.  One of the best “features” of our mom’s group is we get a chance to go to confession once a month!  Our parish priest makes himself available during our meeting time, and we each take turns going up the the church to go to confession.  It has really been a blessing.  Another positive aspect of our group (that was started based off a book series we’ve been reading) is we’ve taken on a group service project—we provide a meal to doctors who volunteer their time at a local free clinic.  Last year we provided a meal and this year we have again and plan to provide one more time before the year ends.  The only negative about this group I have is a personal one.  I have been the youngest mom to regularly attend the group for the past three years—While the moms I have gotten to know are great, I haven’t been able to get to know a mom my own age (mid-late 20’s); I’m not really sure why moms of this age don’t attend regularly—maybe most moms this age work verses staying at home—I’m not sure.

I feel like there are much fewer options for mother who work outside the home.  I’m blessed that my parish offers a women’s Bible study program (Walking with Purpose) both during the day and in the evenings.  However, I miss out on the play groups and mid-week prayer groups that help to build strong Catholic friendships and help with the spiritual development of children.  Since my daughter is only a toddler, we aren’t “plugged in” to the school yet, where it seems many of these relationships begin.  Having a Bible study option has been great for my spiritual development, but I still feel like I have very few friends through our parish, and my husband has even fewer.  So, to codify that as a concrete request: weekend and evening activities for families, both spiritual (ie: Rosary groups) and social (ie: play groups).

I, too, wish there were more options for working moms for Bible studies and times of fellowship.

I started a New Moms Group at our parish, modeled after a group in place at our former Seattle parish.  Moms and their babies gather to share “highs and lows” of the week, read from scripture or a “Mothers of the Bible” reflection book, and generally share our knowledge/ask questions/support each other.

Our parish has a Moms Group that is geared toward moms of preschoolers/school age children, and most of these moms have multiple children.  I started the group above because I felt I needed a bit more targeted help and mother advice and faith sharing opportunities with other first-time moms and moms of babies. 

Another awesome thing is our priest invited 10 married couples to go on retreat on Valentine’s weekend.  We shared food duties, several of us developed talks/prayer/activities to lead the group in.  It was so nice to get to know other married couples from our parish, and being the “youngest married” (only 3 years for us so far) we now know other couples we can turn to for advice and support in future struggles we may have.  There seem to be a lot of opportunities for “marriage salvage” I’ll call it, for lack of a better term; this was the first opportunity I’ve had to simply have a “build your marriage” weekend when there aren’t problems involved, which was nice.

Good luck - please blog back to us about the results from all the comments and what you learn as you endeavor on this project.  Thanks for taking it on, Lisa!

With any group you’re probably going to get people who are in all different stages of understanding church teaching. Maybe a longer time studying with them would help them come around?

We have an autistic child, so our family (and quite a few at our parish) would benefit from a respite program, or even a support group for families of special needs children. As the autism numbers grow, I would love a truly Catholic support system of these families. 
The respite program also makes me think of those who are caregivers for aging parents as well- caregivers could certainly use a break as well as a support group .

We have an amazing Moms group at our parish! We are called the Moms of Young Children” group because we all have young children BUT we are not all young moms (some of us are in our, ahem, mid-40’s).  We have a Monday morning Bible study (or Catholic topic study) which also has childcare.  Every Friday is a play group for those with kids not in school yet (in the summer we schedule outings that older sibs can participate in).  One Tuesday evening a month is MNO at a restaurant, and the last Tuesday evening of the month is game night with snacks at the parish.  Not many do all of these, and I certainly can’t make both evenings, but I try to get to one a month.  We have a Mom’s Weekend Away once a year too though I have only done one so far. 

All new babies, whether a first or a fifth child are welcomed with a shower, and meals are brought to the family to help a bit during those first few weeks.  Even as we have added older children through adoption, I have experienced the blessing of a “welcome shower” and meals.  It’s a huge blessing!

To best illustrate how our group supports each other though, I’d like to share with you a story.  Two and a half years ago, one of our mom’s was diagnosed with fibrosarcoma and began chemo.  There’s not a good survival rate for this rare form of cancer.  She was 32 at the time with three children 5 and under.  We moms set up a rotation for meals during chemo weeks, and provided childcare as needed.  4 months ago, her treatment options ran out and it became “just a matter of time.”  She passed away February 11, 2011.  Between the Fall and then, we had a rotation of house cleaning, meals, visiting and childcare.  All the moms contributed pictures and stories about Shannon for a scrapbook for her husband and children.  As she passed away, there were five women surrounding her bed, holding hands, loving her, and praying.  Now, we are still ready to do whatever her grieving husband needs, to love on he and the children as they try to discover what their new normal is now.  This is what I have always imagined a parish community would be (it was not our experience when we lived in another state).  This is what it means to be Christ’s hands and feet in this world.  I am so incredibly blessed by this group of women and know that we all have each other’s back and will lift each other up in life during times of need and crisis.

If there were one other thing I could want from my parish, it would be more help for families with Catholic school tuition.  It’s pretty expensive for most families with more than one or two children.  On the other hand, our parish does so much to support families in other ways, I can’t really complain.

I was asked at our parish to lead a “Women of Grace” study by Johnnette Benkovic and found it very enriching.
The ladies that came ranged in age from 20 -81.  We all learned from each other!  It was a great blessing to each of us and several of us still meet to support one another in our ever changing lives.

Hi Lisa, I think this is a very important topic.  As a young mom, I was blessed by a parish with a great mom’s group with a space for babysitting.  When I moved, I tried to begin a mom’s group, but was told there was no space for a mom’s group.  So, I formed a rosary group of moms with kids who met twice a week.  I moved to a new parish 6 years ago and am so thankful for the many opportunities for moms.  We have a mothers for children group that meets twice a month during the day.  The format includes a speaker and discussion with babysitting.  Babies are always welcome to stay with mom!  In the evening, there is a MOMS group that gives moms a chance for fellowship.  Our parish also has a Bible study program that meets in the fall and the spring.  The morning session provides babysitting.  I love the Bible study because it helped me to learn more about scripture and meet even more members in my parish community.

Lisa, I posted earlier to second Claire’s suggestion about having mothers’ groups where kids are welcome to stay WITH the moms.

My second suggestion is to connect the generations.  As a young mom, I really wanted mentors.  It was hard to find any.

I think if I were starting a parish moms’ group, I waould start by recruiting moms who had already raised adult children. I would have a “grandma” or two in charge of children’s activities, in the same room as the moms.  I would have something to attract the active kids, such as one of those collapsible play tunnels, and a grandma in charge of kids taking turns with that.  I would have something for quieter kids, such as a craft table, with a different grandma in charge of that. I would not force any children to do any of these things, just have them available, and let the kids go back and forth between these fun activities, and their moms.

A third grandma would give a brief presentation on some mothering topic to the moms lasting maybe 20 to 30 minutes.  She would begin the presentation about 20 to 30 mintues into the session, to give the moms time to play with the kids at the beginning, and the kids time to adjust to being there.  She would then be available after her talk as a resource for moms who have questions.

If I were doing this, I would have a coalition of like minded “attachment parenting” types of moms.  I would leave it to someone else to organize a different set up for moms with another type of child rearing philosophy. 

Also, i would have the whole thing start at 10 or 10:30 AM, so moms would not have to rush the kids to get there.

Baby changing stations that are in full working order, in every bathroom.  That may sound trivial, but it really irritates me when my own parish is pretty pro-life, but needlessly makes a diaper change into an ordeal.

so true!