Collections and Welcome

Jan 13

Letter from the Pastor
January 15, 2023

Now that the Christmas decorations are all tucked away and the New Year has begun, we find ourselves in Ordinary Time. We follow the “order” for just over a month until we begin our Lenten journey to Easter on Ash Wednesday. This year it falls on February 22.

However, before we put all of the holidays behind us, I would like to thank you for your continued generosity to our great parish. As of Wednesday, January 11, the Christmas Collection is $123,262, and the 2022 Christmas Flower Fund collected $18,518. Thank you, Thank you! Both collections are a great reflection of your generosity and the goodness shared with our parish community.

You can find the 2022 Christmas Flower Fund Memorial on our parish website (Click here). This year we thought it more environmentally and economically friendly to post the memorial on our website rather than print copies.

I would also like to thank those who contributed to the Annual Catholic Appeal. This collection helps to fund the operations and initiatives of the Diocese of Trenton. At the end of the year, your generosity pledged $57,123.38 to the diocese. On behalf of Bp. O’Connell, I would like to thank you for your support of our diocese.

As you know by now, we do a lot of fundraising. We need the Festival of the Sea, the Car Raffle, and all the other fundraisers and collections to pay our bills. I am happy to share with you that Joana Schmidt will be joining the Pastoral Staff as our new Director of Parish Development. This position was created in 2021 to help coordinate all of our fundraising initiatives with the intention to review and evaluate what we are doing as well as explore other opportunities that can help advance the mission of our parish.

Joana is no stranger to the parish. She served as a catechist for over 6 years and has most recently served as the part-time Director of Religious Education at St. Theresa’s Church, Little Egg Harbor. I suppose it was through her working in religious education for so many years that she has also picked up some of the skills needed to create a plan for development and fundraising. She has a great love for our Franciscan Spirituality and for St. Francis Parish and Center. Joana will be starting her new position with us in a few weeks. As a great example of her dedication and determination, she will continue to work a day and half a week at St. Theresa’s as they transition to a new director. Welcome, Joana!

May God continue to bless you and your families with peace and all that is good. May the you hold onto the holy moments of 2022 as we all go forth to create new ones in 2023.