Why do parish CCW exist?

by Mary Ann Kramer

First of all, it seems to me that parish women’s groups in the distant past were formed to be of service - caring for the altars, cleaning the church, cooking for funeral dinners, serving teas, organizing pot-lucks, arranging flowers, and so on. Service projects are essential and will always be with us in one form or another. And praised be the women who did and still do share their talents in these ways.

But as time moved on, those groups added to their service the dimension of causes-raising money for band uniforms, gathering layettes for the Holy Father’s Storeroom, collecting soup labels for the audiovisual equipment for the CCD program, and packing clothes for the Thanksgiving Drive. Causes are essential and will always be with us in one form or another. And praised be the women who did and still do share their talents in these ways.

Now as growth continues, our groups are adding still another dimension, that of issues-the aging, drugs and alcohol, clean water, health care, poverty, responsible leadership, child care, parenting, housing, education and anti-pornography. And we call women to share their talents in these ways. Many times issues are not as easy to handle as service and causes. Maybe the reasons are that we are not as experienced yet at this, maybe because issues take a great deal of awareness raising and education, maybe because our comfort level might be disturbed. But the times in which we find ourselves demand that to be alive and growing, we, as an organization, must be tuned in to service, causes, and issues. And the manner in which groups combine service, causes, and issues can determine whether or not they are viable and how they hold experienced members and attract new ones.

Mary Ann Kramer is from Lucan and is the diocesan Council of Catholic Women Community Concerns Commission Coordinator.