Monday Message, March 31, 2025
KNOW
From the Safe Environment Office – Please use this text to send out the emails this week to all your parents. That’s all you have to do – click the link, copy the text, and email all your parents (blind carbon copy please). This is covered in the memo sent last week.
Mass counts for faith formation students are due by April 15th please. Use the task in LEAD or email Carmela.
Reminder: Don’t forget to submit your JPII Fund for Faith Formation Grant Application by April 6th! For details and instructions, please visit this page or contact Carol Incarnacao-Schirm. Download the flyer here.
Re: New Confirmation Requests – If you have not yet submitted the paperwork, it’s probably too late. I have it on good authority that parishes that do not submit will not have confirmation celebrated in their parish during the 25-26 school year. Find the form here and the original memo from the bishop here.
If you have not yet put May 1st on your calendar and invited your pastor, you really should. All parish catechectical leaders and pastors will attend an Evangelization Summit to discuss how we can engage parents in the formation of their children. An invitation with request for RSVP will go out this week. We will be sending an official invitation this week that will require a response.
We are tentatively looking at August 10-16, 2025 for Catechesis of the Good Shepherd formation for year one (part one). We know these dates won’t be good for everyone, but if you have catechists you think would like to participate, please email Carmela. We only need tentative numbers at this point in our planning.
VBS GRANT
As part of the First Witnesses project, the Institute for Catholic Formation is delighted to offer a one-time $500 grant each year to help parishes kickstart and host a summer Vacation Bible Camp (VBC). This grant can be used for supplies like craft materials, T-shirts, and written resources to make your VBC fun and faith-filled. (Please note: the grant cannot be used for food or stipends.)
The application deadline is May 15, 2025. Priority will be given to parishes that have never hosted a VBC before, though all are encouraged to apply. Each parish is eligible to receive this grant once. Apply here.
REFLECT
At Mass on Sunday, most people heard the story of the Prodigal Son – the little brat who says, “Hey, Dad, can we pretend you’re dead so I can have my inheritance and go do whatever I want?”
You know the story. Dad says, “Sure” and the son goes off and soon finds himself destitute.
But put yourself in that first-century audience. The story is always told to Pharisees when Jesus is surrounded by tax collectors and sinners. Almost from the beginning of the story, we are in trouble. Not because the son asks the father for his inheritance – though we might find that absurd – the Jews would not have. Where the wheels fall off the wagon is that the son not only loses the money, he clearly loses his faith. After all, he becomes a swineherd. He takes care of pigs, which the Jews knew to be unclean. Not only does he care for them, he longs to eat from the food on which they feast. A swineherd, to the Jews listening, was beyond the pale of God’s forgiveness. There was no reconciliation available to such a person.
Continue reading here.
LAUGH
