Bishop Kevin Doran was speaking at his installation in the Cathedral of the Annunciation and St Nathy in Ballaghaderreen, Co Roscommon yesterday. Dr Doran is already bishop of the diocese of Elphin and the union of the two dioceses is part of a reorganisation to streamline the number of bishops in light of the decline in the number of clergy and mass-goers. Calling for parishes to become “communities of welcome”, he told the congregation that the church needs to invest in the gifts and formation of lay women and men for ministry because what is learned in school is not sufficient for a lifetime of faith. He said that the church will continue to need priests for the eucharist and for the celebration of the sacraments. The bishop spoke to the Irish Independent after his installation about recent concerns expressed by Bishop Donal Roche over priests feeling “demoralised” by those who don’t understand the mass, and ask for things like golf balls and fishing rods to be presented at a funeral. Dr Doran said: “We all need to think outside the box a little bit while remaining true to what we believe.” Asked if he thought the church should be offering a funeral service without a mass to non-practising Catholics, he said: “I don’t think anybody in the church would be saying to people that you have to have mass for your wedding or funeral. But what happens is that sometimes granny says you have to have mass.” He said, in the past “people didn’t have mass all the time”. “So we have to rediscover other ways, alongside the eucharist, of nourishing people’s faith", he said. “The church is not just a place where committed Catholics go to get served. It is a place where committed Catholics gather and welcome others who come, whether they may be people who are a little more distant from the church.” In his homily, Dr Doran cited the parable of the Prodigal Son. “As you will appreciate, the image of the father who has two sons, has a particular resonance for a bishop who has two dioceses,” he told the congregation of religious and civic representatives, including the papal nuncio Archbishop Luis Mariano Montemayor. He said the two West-of-Ireland dioceses have been called into a new kind of relationship and they have spent the past 12 months working closely together and “getting to know one another”. Referring to the challenges of the union, he warned that it is easy for relationships to be undermined by selfishness, lack of gratitude, petty jealousy, thoughtlessness and a sense of entitlement. “These things surface wherever people gather and there is no point in pretending that they are not sometimes part of the experience of life in our church,” he said.