It’s a wonderful Sunday! First, we hold our 20th parish picnic which begins with Mass at 12:00, celebrated under the tent. Then, the party begins. The committee has been working very hard to provide great food, lots of activities for the children and an opportunity to relax and enjoy a great day and one another’s company.

I write this Monday; it is my hope that Mass will be celebrated in church this weekend. As of today, everything is on track to meet this completion time. But construction and renovation do not always follow the proposed schedule, but I am a positive thinker. As I indicated earlier, you may not notice a great change in the carpet colors or pattern, but the church and narthex carpet looks fresher, brighter, and lies flat! And hopefully, the lying flat part will continue for a long time.

The carpet in the Great Room as well as the paint colors are a change.

As you can imagine, the carpet removal, installation, and the painting involved a lot of moving to give access to the painters and carpet installers. So, it may take a while to get everything back in place; a great deal of behind the scenes labor was involved. Thanks for your patience.

RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

This weekend is open house for Religious Education. The family packets outlining the schedule, faith room assignments and important information for the coming year are in the Family packets.

While this is an Open House for those in the program for this coming school year, it is open to all. So, if you’ve never been to the Center or don’t have children in the program, it’s a great chance to take a tour. I invite you to go up there for this open house – Saturday, 5-6:30 p.m. and Sunday, 8:15 a.m.-1:15 p.m.

We still have need for a few catechists. Please call Mary Kay at the Center, (708) 460-0155.

There will be a complete report on the results on the matching from the Archdiocese in our Annual Report. But I did receive a summary as of August 22nd. We are indeed blessed! St. Francis parishioners pledged $567,576. In these difficult times, this is overwhelming! St. Francis had the largest pledge response of any parish in the Archdiocese. I am proud and extremely grateful.

Currently, $532,836 has been paid; so, about $34,000 remains to be completed. If you have not completed your pledge payments, you may continue to do so. They will be accepted and matched until the end of the year.

The Archdiocese matches (not the pledges) but the amount actually received and so, $1,065,672

will be taken from our church mortgage; thus our target of paying the church mortgage will be reached by October 24^th. We plan to "burn the mortgage" to symbolize this milestone at Silver Lake Country Club on the 24^th, the day of our parish celebration.

On Friday, September 3^rd, Georg Bergner will be arriving from the diocese of Hamburg as a part of the Crossing Over project. St. Francis has participated in the Crossing Over Program for the last four years. This is a program sponsored by the University of Rhure in Bochen in conjunction with Loyola.

Priests, pastoral associates, from various dioceses in Germany have come to the Archdiocese of Chicago to reside and experience life in an American parish; it has also given us an opportunity to learn about life in Germany. I have found it to be very enriching. It opened my eyes to a different way in which the Church is experienced.

As always, your welcome has a positive impact.

The Archdiocesan Office of Assistance Ministry’s mission is to provide pastoral care, support, and resources to victims-survivors of sexual abuse and their loved ones in their efforts to achieve psychological, emotional and spiritual healing. The purpose of the therapy group is to provide participants with a positive and supportive environment that allows each individual to use his or her own experiences and personal support systems to take control of their journey toward healing. For information about the Office of Assistance Ministry, visit the office’s page on the Archdiocesan web site at www.archchicago.org.