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On the Catechetical Sunday, please join me in thanking all of our catechists and catechist volunteers as we begin this new school year. Of all the things we learn, learning of our salvation is of eternal value! All other knowledge is temporary and passes away.Read More -
On September 19th, we will begin hearing confessions at St. Vitus Church instead of St. Camillus parking lot. When you enter St. Vitus Church from 11:00 am until noon, you will celebrate the sacrament of Reconciliation, not in the confessionals, but in the cry room, the priest sacristy or the main entry where the original baptismal font is.Read More -
Welcome to September, a month of great transition. We will begin our school year at Holy Spirit Academy on September 8th. Please keep our students, teachers and faculty in your prayers. A very grateful shout-out to all of you in our community and beyond who assisted in raising much-needed revenue for our school. As you can see from the thermometer report on our matching fund drive (Page 9), we have far exceeded our goal of $250,000. God has blessed us tremendously through the amazing generosity of many individuals and we are now at $ 298,574!!!!Read More -
On September 12th, we will have our first weekend liturgy at 4:00 pm in both the St. Vitus and St. Camillus worship sites. There has been a lot of preparation for this and we ask for your help and patience.Read More -
On Monday, August 17, the New Castle News pictured the Distinguished Young Woman 2021 winner, Zoey Elaine Ondako of Holy Spirit Parish, on its front page. Of 18 finalists, Zoey was one of six who were from Holy Spirit! They were Adriana Marie Antuono (David & Lena Antuono), Alexandra Marie Columbus (Nichole & Doug Columbus), Alyssa Irene Cumpston (Lorine Bish & Timothy Cumpston), Morgan Kate Jones (Stephanie Jones-Covelli & John Covelli), Alexa Rose Vitale (Jeff & Heather Vitale) and winner, Zoey Elaine Ondako (Larry & Bess Ondako). Distinguished Young Women combines the chance to win college scholarships with a program that offers Life Skills training to prepare young women for the world after high school. Congratulations to Zoey Ondako and the other young women from Holy Spirit.Read More
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August 4, 2019 Holy Spirit Parish in action
This week, beginning on August 7th, the first major festival of Holy Spirit Parish will begin and continue for four days! A huge thank you to everyone who has donated, volunteered and assisted in any way in making our first festival a reality! Special thanks to the festival committee which has worked for many months pulling this all together. It is a wonderful event of fellowship and fun for the entire community. None of it would be possible without many hours of volunteer help and organization. We give thanks to God for his many blessings and also for the gift of each other. See the schedule on our cover page which highlights the food special of each evening as well as the entertainment.
This past week, Sr. Annie led a summer work camp for girls in the parish of Holy Spirit. Three sisters of St. Francis and nine young teenage girls spent the week doing service projects at the parish sites of Christ the King and St. James. They also helped at the wonderful, young people’s and families’ picnic at St. James site this past Sunday. They washed tables down at St. Vitus for the upcoming parish festival and they hosted a pro-life baby shower with over 100 women and girls who came with gifts for Alpha & Omega and Catholic Charities. They ended their week visiting the Franciscan sisters in the Wexford area.
There was a fabulous family picnic for the young families of the parish hosted at St. James site this past weekend, Sunday, July 28, from 1 to 5 p.m. Thank you to Rose Butch for organizing the Holy Spirit Family Gathering and its activities, and all her volunteers, especially the core crew of Ilana Ilongo, Heather McCosby, Amy Chornenky, Jean Pascale, Joe Mercurio, Pete Pascale, Doug Butch, Lorrie Millette and Chris Baker, who got drenched in the dunk tank. See page 12 for pictures and more information. We look forward to having many such celebrations to get the families with children to know one another! Look out for their next adventure. Rose is already planning for a September 29 event from 5:00 to 9:00 pm.
God love you,
Fr. Mac
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July 28, 2019 Strategic Planning has begun
A few weeks ago, I invited all the interim Pastoral Council and Finance Council members, and some folks who have expressed interest in participating on these councils, to come to a very important strategic planning meeting on Saturday, July 27. This meeting took place from 9:30 am to 1:30 pm in McGurk Hall at St. Camillus. Facilitating this endeavor was consultant, Tom H. Murray.
Mr. Murray, founder and principle of Wexford Run Consulting, assists executives and senior managers with strategic planning, marketing, product management, and M&A activities. He leverages his expertise, structured approach, creativity, and coaching style to help executives and their teams create and implement growth initiatives.
Tom is a proven executive with over 20 years’ experience in high tech strategic planning, marketing, and product management. He has worked for high growth firms, both domestically and internationally, ranging from start-ups to multi-billion dollar organizations. His accomplishments include identifying and justifying strategic acquisition and OEM relationships, developing over 40 strategic analyses/proposals, managing over 15 product lines, conceiving and developing a $100M+ product line, and establishing the marketing foundations for two start-ups.
Mr. Murray is also an adjunct professor of Strategic Planning and Product Management courses at CMU's Graduate School holding a BSEE from the University of Notre Dame and an MBA from the University of Pittsburgh.
Over several hours, he guided us as we studied what it means to be a parish, developing our purpose and our goals as a parish community. In addition, we explored and examined all of our resources and how best we could use them to achieve our goals.
My hope is that after going through this process together and refining it with the leadership team, we will be able to come to all of you as a whole and go through the same process together to glean your input, insights, wisdom, and suggestions. We will host town hall meetings to ensure transparency. Please watch the bulletin and the Holy Spirit Parish website (see note below) at www.hsplc.org for announcements of these upcoming meetings.
God love you,
Fr. Mac
