The New Year is upon us, and we're fresh from that time of year when we turned our attention to preparing for and celebrating the great liturgical seasons of Advent and Christmas. Everyone knows how much time and energy was involved, especially for our Church community and parish leaders, in order to draw our attention to the important themes of Advent and prepare for the special liturgies of Christmas.
At the Catherine of Siena Institute, Advent and Christmas bring about a different change of rhythm. As you know, much of our work centers on providing programs for parishes, especially the Called and Gifted workshop. Understandably, parishes rarely schedule our programs during December (although those that do find their Advent workshops are quite successful). This reluctance creates a marked gap in our schedule, starting with Thanksgiving weekend and lasting until January. We get some much-needed time off from logistics and traveling, catching up on waiting projects and focusing our creative forces on new ones. However, there is another, not-so-welcome, consequence!
With the cessation in scheduled events comes a cessation in revenue, enough so that in the past several years, December has shown a significant shrinking in resources for the Institute—at least compared to the size of our budget! This year, we are expecting to have spent about $8000 more than we received.
But, the good news is that this happens only a couple of times a year (the other being mid-summer). For the past few years, you may have noticed that we haven't been seeking financial support for these times because other months have been able to cover the losses. Notably, the generous and faithful support of our monthly contributors has made much of this possible. But this year we would like to ask you for some help.
And so, along with Sherry and Fr. Michael, I would like to invite you to use the envelope included with this newsletter to support our efforts to provide lay Catholics with the formation they need to make a real difference as apostles.
Did you realize that almost all formation programs for laity focus upon church ministry or personal enrichment? One of the things that sets the Catherine of Siena Institute apart is its mission to provide a formation that is truly geared towards life as a lay apostle and its focus on providing it in the parish. The secular world is where 99% of Catholics live and the parish is likely the only place where they will have formation opportunities.
Sherry Weddell sends out each month a short newsletter to our family of regular contributors. You can stay in closer touch with the Institute and offer steady support through several options including checks, credit cards, and automatic debiting.
Please accept our sincerest wishes for a fruitful and joy-filled new year and give as generously as you can.
Mike Dillon is Program Coordinator at the Catherine of Siena Institute in Colorado Springs.