Parish Statutes and By-Laws
The ECR (Eglise Catholique Romaine de Genève) has been working several years now towards harmonising the administrative statutes for the over fifty parishes under its umbrella in Geneva. A special committee was assembled to gather feedback to better understand the current practices in the Geneva parishes, as well as to refine the statutes. The result was the development of statutes that incorporate current best practices and can be applied across the canton.
In 2022, we took this opportunity to modify our own statutes in line with the ECR’s vision. Our own statutes dated from June 2012 and already have a few areas that needed updating. Importantly, our parish name has changed to St John XXIII Parish, and the name of the Vicariate to the “Diocesan House of Geneva”.
Working closely with our contact at the Diocesan House of Geneva, we examined the proposal carefully and found that it was already quite close to our own. In a nutshell the most significant change is in the term limits for PAC and PPC members by one year. Additionally, there are a few language corrections and simplifications, a few minor variations in how we communicate before and after the General Assembly, as well as a few adjustments to reflect a digital world. We also made a further modifications to appropriately tailor the new statutes to our status as a linguistic parish.
The St John XXIII Parish By-laws were developed over a decade ago to accompany and give additional guidance in the application of the statutes. In 2024, we updated the By-Laws to reflect the modifications made in the Parish Statutes in 2023.
The St John XXIII Parish updated Statutes were approved by the Bishop’s representative in March 2023. On June 1 2023, these new statutes came into effect with the final approval of the General Assembly.
The St John XXIII Parish updated By-Laws were approved by the Bishop’s representative on October 31, 2023. On May 30, 2024 these new By-Laws came into effect with the final approval of the General Assembly.