Fr. Amore will remain at St. Aloysius Parish along with leading Department of Evangelization and Missionary Discipleship
DETROIT ─ Fr. Mario Amore’s new title is director, but he sees himself more as an ambassador.
He began his tenure in the Archdiocese of Detroit’s Department of Evangelization and Missionary Discipleship on July 1, succeeding Fr. Matthew Hood, who will continue his responsibilities as chaplain of Detroit Catholic Campus Ministry.
Fr. Amore will still be the primary priest at St. Aloysius Parish in Detroit and will rely on his pastoral experience in his new role of being the connecting point between pastors and parish staff throughout the archdiocese and the archdiocesan curial offices, known colloquially as “Downtown.”
“As the archbishop says, he dreams of the day when someone from the Chancery can call any parish or pastor and say, ‘I’m with the Chancery, and I’m here to help,’ and people wouldn’t laugh when they said that,” Fr. Amore told Detroit Catholic. “If I could help bring that about, then I’m doing my job. “We are one church. We’re not meant to be at odds with each other. I am very excited about that part of the job, helping our chancery be that place of support and community that we are meant to be.”
Fr. Amore will oversee a department that includes the Offices of Cultural Ministries, Discipleship Formation, Engagement, Evangelical Charity, Family Ministry, and Sacred Worship, the outward-facing ministries of the curia that are meant to engage with disciples and encourage the lay faithful to go out and preach the Gospel.
“The primary work of the department has been to implement what was outlined in Unleash the Gospel,” Fr. Amore said, referring to Detroit Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron’s pastoral letter, Unleash the Gospel, written following Synod 16 on what it would take for the Archdiocese of Detroit to be an evangelizing church.
“Unleash the Gospel is still very much part of the mission of the whole entire department and how we help our parishes live to what’s in the pastoral letter,” Fr. Amore added. “Taking it a step further, we’re now bringing Unleash the Gospel and Families of Parishes together."
Families of Parish represents a significant restructuring of parishes in the Archdiocese of Detroit, with a team of priests managing groups of parishes that report to one pastor who oversees the team of priests.
Priest and parish staff recently discerned the way forward for Families of Parishes and the changes priests will face in the transition during the Missionary Renewal Assembly at the Novi Suburban Showplace June 27-29.
Fr. Amore has experience with that transition, going from being the pastor at St. Aloysius Parish in downtown Detroit to being the pastor of the In Solidum team of priests to now being a member of the team with Fr. J.J. Mech of the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament taking over as pastor of the Resurget Cineribus Family of Parishes.
Fr. Amore specifically asked to remain a priest at St. Aloysius, keeping one foot in parish life and another in the Curia.
“Part of what I had asked the archbishop is could I remain in a parish as well, albeit on a more limited level,” Fr. Amore said. “Celebrating the Mass and being part of the community, especially this community (St. Aloysius), is so much part of my priesthood and what I love, being able to gather with my parishioners every Sunday for the celebration of Mass. It’s really the high point of my week.”
Being the pastor of a downtown parish gave Fr. Amore a first-hand account of what it means to be an evangelizing parish. St. Aloysius has a robust ministry to the city’s houseless and is a parish that always has its doors open for travelers coming downtown.
“The first thing I learned is the best way for a parish to be welcoming is to open the doors,” Fr. Amore said. “The church needs to be a place that is present in the community, where anybody can stop in to encounter the Lord. Evangelization is first and foremost the work of the Holy Spirit. What we strive to do is use the motto of “setting the table,” providing opportunities for people to encounter the Lord and grow in relationship with Him.”
During his time as pastor of St. Aloysius, Fr. Amore said he and the parish staff relied on the Curia to connect the parish’s mission with that of the archbishop, utilizing the full resources of the archdiocese to make the parish a true field hospital of mercy in the community, as Pope Francis described the role of the church.
“The Curia helps to keep the priorities of the archbishop and his collaborators on the local level,” Fr. Amore said. “The curial offices provided the resourses we needed and gave us any kind of guidance we needed in terms of outward evangelization and ministry in the parish. The Curia offices are the backbone of everything happening in the parishes. They are the major support for everything we do in the parish.”
Collaboration will be of particular importance as the entire parish structure in the archdiocese is switching to Families of Parishes, where ministries will be coordinated by a single Mission Direct coordinator who will manage multiple parishes, combining ministries the parishes were initially doing separately.
Fr. Amore said his department will be instrumental in helping Families of Parishes share best practices of how these Families can best combine efforts while maintaining their unique parish identity.
“The emphasis on Families of Parishes and part of the direct oversight of the Mission Direct areas will fall to the Department of Evangelization and Missionary Discipleship,” Fr. Amore said. “Our department is here to provide guidance so that ultimately, our mission of evangelization can remain.”
Fr. Mario added the proper implementation of the structures surrounding Families of Parishes goes hand-in-hand with the evangelizing nature of Unleash the Gospel.
“It’s not stopping our focus on evangelization so we can look at structures, or the other way around, focusing only on evangelization and not looking at the structures,” Fr. Amore said. “But we need to look at them both at the same time, with Unleash the Gospel, as our guiding document, moving forward as strong communities of faith, strong parishes, strong Families, where Christ can be encountered and disciples can be made.”
Fr. Amore is joined by other recent hires in the Department of Evangelization and Missionary Discipleship:
- Tara Stenger has been named the new associate director of engagement after previously serving as the family ministry coordinator and engagement support.
- Deacon Steve Morello, the new Native American Catholic outreach coordinator, after previously serving as a missionary in the department of missionary strategic planning.
- Brenda Hascall, the Hispanic ministries coordinator, after serving as a missionary in the department of strategic planning.
Fr. Amore has expressed excitement about working with his new team in building disciples across the Archdiocese of Detroit and helping the local church in its transition to be more missionary-focused.
“To be a disciple means to follow,” Fr. Amore said when asked what it means to be a missionary disciple. “A missionary disciple is ultimately an apostle, one who is sent. You can’t be a good apostle if you are not a good disciple. So following after Jesus, receiving His love, encountering Him, learning from Him, growing in union with Him. That is what equips us to be sent on mission to bring the good news to the world.
“Missionary discipleship means taking on our identity as beloved sons and daughters of God and living this identity we’ve been given as a gift,” Fr. Amore added. “A gift of union with God, a gift of eternal life. And our mission is to share this with as many people as we can so they too can receive this gift.”
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