Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

      We welcome everyone to St. Maria Goretti Parish this weekend, especially our newest members and all of those who are visiting our Parish for the Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary time.  It is indeed good to be together as Church.

       In a special way, this weekend, we welcome Fr. Thomas R. Maikowski, a priest of the Diocese of Gallup, New Mexico.  The Diocese of Gallup has been assigned to St. Maria Goretti this year, through the Church’s missionary cooperative.  This means that the Diocese of Gallup is the missionary activity of the Church that St. Maria Goretti is being called and invited to share in this year.  This is somewhat unusual, because many times we are used to hearing from a religious order about their missionary efforts.  In this case, the Diocese of Gallup and its ministries have missionary status.  This is a chance to pray for and help another diocese right here in our own country, in promoting our Faith and building up the Church.  St. Maria Goretti Parish has “traditionally” had our annual missionary appeal in early August.  That was not possible this year, and so we are very happy to welcome Fr. Maikowski this weekend to our Parish.  We are not all called to be missionaries in the formal sense, but all of us are called to pray for and support those who are in the Church’s missionary fields every day.  This weekend gives us a concrete opportunity to do just that.  Please give whatever you can to help out in the second collection.

      Last weekend, both Fr. Dale and myself were in Atlanta with our young people for the National Catholic Youth Conference.  I must tell you how awesome it was to see nearly twenty-thousand Catholic young people from all over the country, come together as one Church.  The speakers were inspiring.  The music was uplifting.  And the Faith and love that we witnessed was over-flowing in the Georgia Dome. I have been to several of these in the past.  I would have to say that I thought that this one of the best ones yet.  Ever since I was a seminarian many moons ago, I have always thought that going to these NCYCs was an important way of supporting our youth in the Church.  Last weekend about 250 other priests from around the country must have felt the same way.  They were also not in their parishes last weekend, joining Fr. Dale and I in Atlanta and trying to do the same thing: Support our Youth!  I applaud and congratulate each of the sixteen youth delegates from St. Maria Goretti who represented us very well at the Conference, as well as the two St. Maria Goretti students who were part of the Blessed Theodore Guerin High School delegation to the Conference.  Your Parish family is very proud of all of you, as we are of all of our high school students.  It is our sincere hope that you will take what you learned in Atlanta, and put it into effect here at St. Maria Goretti.  The next National Catholic Youth Conference will be held in November of 2007 and will be held in Columbus, Ohio.  It will be nice to have it closer to home, and hopefully, even more St Maria Goretti youth will be able to participate.

      This weekend we are also extraordinarily happy to congratulate Fr. Dale on his incardination into the Diocese of Lafayette-in-Indiana.  As at least some of you have known, Fr. Dale was ordained a member of the Crosier Fathers, or, more formally, The Canons Regular of the Order of the Holy Cross.  Fr. Dale has been “on loan” to our Diocese for these past two years assigned to Blessed Theodore Guerin High School.  Two weeks ago, we received word from the Vatican that Fr. Dale has been granted permission to join our Diocese as a Diocesan priest.  This process for a priest to transfer from his religious order to a diocese is called incardination.   And the great news for all of us is that it is done for Fr. Dale.  Bishop Higi signed the necessary documents as soon as they arrived.  And we are very happy to welcome Fr. Dale to our Diocese as one of our priests!  Congratulations, Father!  We are blessed to have you with us.

        Today, the Holy Name Society, the men’s club of our Parish family, is having their first Parish Brunch following both the 8:00 AM and 10:00 AM Masses, in the Parish Hall.  Everyone is invited to come over after Mass and have some delicious food with some really good people.  It will be fun.  Thanks to all of the guys from the Holy Name Society who have worked so hard to get this started.  Hopefully, this can become a new tradition here on select Sunday mornings.

         We are very blessed!  May we never fail to give thanks to God for all the good that He is doing in our lives!

In Christ,
Fr. Kevin

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