More Congress plans revealed

The National Pastoral Congress Committee issued proposals this week on how the 2,(XX) delegates should be chosen to attend the May 1980 meeting in Liverpool. At a press conference on , Tuesday the committee suggested that 1,791 delegates should be sent from the dioceses. As it is estimated that the Mass-going Catholic population of England and Wales is about 1,700,000, this means that there will be a representative for every 1,000 Catholics.
These delegates, it is hoped, will emerge from the parish discussion groups and then be chosen to represent their dioceses. Each diocese has been allotted places according to its site.
The National Catholic Consultative bodies, such as the Catholic Union and the Catholic Education Council, will send a further 20 delegates and the Bishops' Commissions will also send one representative each, The Colleges 01' Education and the university and polytechnic chaplaincies have been allotted 17 places and the seminaries 10. It is hoped that prisoners will he at least temporarily released to make up part of the delegation of 10 who will represent the prison service.
There will be 27 ecumenical observers, 12 delegates from the major religious superiors and a further 30 from Catholic organismions. Some places are also being kept for representatives from minority groups such as black Catholics, Poles and others who have not fully integrated into the British Catholic community.
Mrs fvlyrna Lubin, field worker with the Racial Justice Commission, said that black Catholics who did not involve themselves with their parishes at present were not being motivated to contribute to the Congress, but Miss Patricia Jones, the member of the Congress Committee with special responsibilities for youth, said that at the deanery meetings arranged for young' people all over the country they were responding well to tilt: offer to contribute their views on the future of the Church in ;Britain.
The press conference on Tuesday narked the halfway point in thi: preparation for the congress. Archbishop Derek Worlock said that in accordance with the See, Judge, Act principle, on which the Congress operated, the preparation was at the "seeing stage, He stressed that the conference agenda was not yet drawn up and that the distribution of a discussion paper on a particulen: topic did not mean that the topic: was on the agenda.
It is estimated that the Congress itself will cost about 00.000, hut the cost of the preparation work is being borne by the parishes and dioceses.