Saturday, April 11, 2015

Fr. Chuck's Column, Sunday, April 12



HAPPY EASTER!!! ALLELUIA!!!
Many thanks to all the RCIA team, musicians, lectors, fellow clergy, liturgical ministers, ushers and all who attended and participated and made our Lenten and Holy Week celebrations such beautiful and moving testaments of faith. We have real reason to celebrate, and thanks to so much hard work and talent from many people here, we had great celebrations! Thank you!
I also want to THANK all the volunteers and workers on the Faithful To Our Mission capital campaign. Thank you especially to all of you who have put your commitment to St. Austin’s parish into action and have contributed generously to the campaign. I am very happy to announce that we have reached our goal of Four Million Dollars! YAY! Much work, planning, phone calling, visiting and prayer went into reaching this wonderful result and I want to THANK all who participated in any way.
But we cannot rest on our laurels. While we have reached our dollar goal, we have not yet had 100% participation by our parish family. We have been able to dig deep with many generous gifts to be able to reach our dollar goal. Now we have to go wide to reach our goal of a high rate of participation by our parishioners. So far, 27% of our registered households (which could be a family or a single individual) have made a gift or commitment to our campaign. I am hoping we can do more.
For our campaign to succeed, we need not only the dollars but real buy-in by the parish. I want a very broad spectrum of this parish to have some skin in the game, to have ownership and a genuine sense of involvement in this campaign. I believe this campaign is very important for the future of our parish, and not just for the construction issues.
So if you have NOT yet made a commitment or gift to the Faithful To Our Mission capital campaign, I ask you PLEASE take a pledge card and envelope from one of the blue folders in the pews, pray over your response, and then make a gift to the campaign by returning the card next weekend. You may believe your contribution is not large enough to make a difference, but it does. And your participation is even more important. So no matter the amount, please join us in the Faithful To Our Mission campaign.
God bless you and Thank you! 

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