Catholic Schools Week

My Dear Parishioners,

Next week we celebrate our annual Catholic Schools Week.  This is a special time when we acknowledge and celebrate all the blessings we have at St. Joseph/St. Robert School.  This includes our terrific students, excellent principal, talented faculty, hardworking administration and staff, and generous volunteers.  Our School is a true community where we are, “Focused on Faith and Learning.” Our Mission Statement reads:  St. Joseph/St. Robert School (SJR), with Jesus as our foundation and inspiration, prepares students to live fully His message of love, courage, and compassion.  Our philosophy of academic rigor and relevance prepares our students to be contributing members of the Church and the global community. All are invited to check out the good things happening at our Blue Ribbon school by coming to our Open House, next week (Sunday, Jan 26^th) from 9:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.

Now would be a good time to remind everyone that you can help us in our efforts to provide a quality Catholic Education by buying and using our Scrip.  Scrip is actually a “gift card” that you can purchase after the weekend Masses or at the SJR school office. The cards can be used at local grocery stores, restaurants, and other area stores.  You get the full value of your purchase price and in addition, for most of the stores, you receive a $2.00 tuition voucher for every $50.00 purchased.  Those vouchers can then be used to help pay tuition, at our CCD program, SJR school, or any Catholic school including High School and college, or if you do not have a child in Catholic school, they can be donated back to a needy family who uses our parish programs – either school or CCD.  And as always, we are in need of scrip sellers after all the weekend Masses.  If you can assist with this, please contact the rectory and we will get you on the schedule.

At the start of a new year, every parish is asked to make a Pastoral report to the Archdiocese, and ultimately to the Church in Rome on a variety of Pastoral Issues such as the numbers of parishioners, attendance at Mass, Social Ministries offered, religious education (school and CCD), devotions, sacraments and sacramental prep programs administered during the previous year.  These reports are compiled every year.  We are now in the process of compiling that report.  This past week 19 of our young people experienced the love of God through the Sacrament of Reconciliation for the very first time.  Please continue praying for them, that they remain close to the Lord in this great gift of renewal and peace, and pray also for their families that they will help these children to stay close to the Lord.

May God Bless You,
Fr. Bordonaro