He was speaking after his installation as Bishop of Achonry in the Cathedral of the Annunciation and St Nathy in Ballaghaderreen, Co Roscommon on Sunday.
Bishop Doran receiving congratulations from the apostolic nuncio to Ireland Archbishop Luis Mariano Montemayor, after Bishop Doran was led to his chair during the installation Mass on Sunday. Credit: John McElroy
The 71-year-old is already bishop of the Diocese of Elphin and is taking up the Achonry role as part of the union of the two dioceses under a reorganisation of the Irish Church.
The two west of Ireland dioceses are small: Elphin has 38 parishes served by 60 priests and seven permanent deacons while Achonry has 34 priests and two permanent deacons serving 23 parishes.
In his homily, Bishop Doran emphasised that parishes are “not just service providers” and that structures needed to be reviewed “to make sure that they are appropriate to the needs of the twenty-first century” and the “new relationship” between the two dioceses.
He said parishes need to be “communities of welcome” and that continuing formation in faith was needed because people could not expect a lifetime of discipleship to be sustained “simply by what we have learnt at school”.
“We need to recognise the gifts of lay women and men, to invest in forming them for mission and ministry and to facilitate their full participation,” he said.
Bishop Doran said that since the Second Vatican Council, “we have tended to focus our whole energy on the Mass and some of the other forms of spiritual nourishment that people were used to in the past are not as present today. So, we have to rediscover other ways, alongside the eucharist, of nourishing people’s faith.”
One of the challenges of the Church at the moment, he said, is that “there are people who are one body through baptism but who don’t feel able to be one body in terms of their regular participation in the eucharist”.
He said funerals and weddings did not always have to include the Mass, particularly for those who were not regular in practising their faith.