Section One: The Meaning of Stewardship

• “Each of us spends a brief time in this life, preparing for our eternal life with God. While we are here, we receive everything from God, even life itself, and are asked to make good use of what God has entrusted to us. We are invited by God to be good stewards of his gifts. It is no wonder that the idea of stewardship plays such a central role in the life of the faith.”
• “The bible teaches us that responsibility is inseparable from stewardship. We ultimately will be held accountable for the way in which we use what God gives us. In Luke 12:41-48, our Lord reminds us that we are like stewards who are placed in charge of the household while the Master is away.”
• “The prospect of the return of the Master should fill Christians with joy.”
• “Jesus will come at the end of time, whenever that will be, and each of us will stand before the Lord at the end of our life to give an account of our stewardship. That can happen at any moment and we need to be ready.”
• “If we truly have the spirit of stewardship, we will not let God’s gifts go to waste, and we will not selfishly cling to them, but use them graciously to serve others, and in doing so give glory to God.”
• “We need to think of the moment of death, but not wait until then to realize what is important in life, and how we can each be wise stewards of what we have received for this earthly journey.”
• “The secret of life is to realize our state of dependency upon the providence of God. We do not ultimately own or control the time, talent, or treasure with which we are blessed by God during our short sojourn on this earth. Everything is a gift. Life itself is a gift.”
• "It is interesting that we are often called "consumers". What a shame it is that we can be identified as people who are simply consuming the goods of the earth. Inevitably, if that consumption becomes the mark of a greedy life, then we will ourselves be consumed and possessed by the goods that we consume. It is far better to see all such things in a proper perspective. The time, talent, and treasure that we briefly enjoy are gifts to be accepted with gratitude and used generously. If we do so, then that posture of detachment allows us truly to be free.

Section Two: The Spirituality of Deep Stewardship

• “As we seek to enter into the experience of stewardship, it is essential that we avoid being short-circuited by emphasis upon its most obvious but superficial aspect, the sharing of material goods. If we start with that, with the fund-raising for apostolic purposes, we will go no further and stewardship will become just another program.”
• “We can only be satisfied by deep stewardship, which means a profound inner conversion as individuals and as a community in which we become committed to living generously in every way, as the Gospel calls us to do.”
• “At the end of life, we take nothing with us, except the life that arises out of generous love. If each of us is profoundly aware that life is a gift, then we are freed from possessiveness, and can be good stewards of what has been entrusted to us in life, sharing generously and so at the end of life returning all to the Lord with increase.”
• “There are two ways of discovering what is really important in life – of discovering who my Master is. The first is to look at how I spend my money, at how I am steward of material possessions. I spend my money on what I consider to be important…A second, and much more revealing way to discover my priorities, is to examine how I spend my time. Our lives are woven out of time, and my stewardship of the scarce resource of time truly reveals what I consider to be important.”
• “It is a deep spiritual transformation which we want to foster in all our parishes, and in the whole community of our diocese…That is vital, for we will be trapped in a dead end if we become distracted by a superficial vision of stewardship, such as the focusing on money. We must be satisfied with nothing less than deep stewardship, in which each of us resolves to make generous use of the time, talent, and treasure which God has entrusted to us.
• “Deep stewardship means individual and communal conversion, and involves living discipleship in a spirit of generosity and total engagement, as we are commissioned to do through our Baptism and Confirmation. Life is too short for us to waste it as half-hearted disciples.”

Section Three: Reasons to Become Involved with Stewardship

• “Stewardship is undeniably fruitful. Where, over time, more and more parishioners become engaged in committing their time, talent, and treasure to the work of the Gospel, the Church flourishes.”
• “Stewardship calls for nothing less than both individual and communal conversion, rooted in faith and fruitful in action.”
• “Many hands make light work, and as more parishioners are engaged, each can experience the joy of giving without being threatened with the danger of burning out.”
• “Stewardship is set on the very foundations of discipleship, it is harmonious with all of our other apostolic endeavours and organizations. It does not duplicate, replace, or interfere with them, but enhances them.”
• “What a benefit it would be for our whole society if more and more of the generous energy of all of the members of our archdiocese were activated, to bring the life of the Gospel to a world so desperately in need of it. Stewardship is a conscious and careful effort to activate that energy, and to focus it effectively on the service of God and neighbor.”

Section Four: The Way Forward

• "Stewardship is an essential dimension of the vision underlying our pastoral plan. The creative use as stewards of our time, talent and treasure will allow those who are gathered to form a community of Christians to be more fruitfully engaged in the life of the Gospel, and more inclined to reach out effectively to the scattered, and to offer them an attractive example of a vibrant Christian community."
• "Stewardship is intended to increase the active engagement of us all in the life of the parishes, as we are invited to become more involved in the numerous ways of serving others. Through our Baptism and Confirmation, we are called to be active participants in the life of the Church, not just passive observers."
• "It really is more blessed to give than to receive, and as we live generously we always receive far, far more than we give. Stewardship is not a new program, or some magic solution to the challenges we face. It means a change of heart for each of us, an "attitude of gratitude" that permeates the whole of our life as disciples."