Search
-
A very blessed Mother’s Day to all the women of the parish. We thank God and ask his blessings upon all of our moms, both living and deceased. These special women are life-givers. They give not only natural life, but also supernatural life through joining their children to Christ. We especially want to honor all of our moms and dads who have adopted children. They’re the example of God, Himself, who adopts all of us through the waters of baptism as His children.
Ten years ago, my saintly mother passed to her eternal reward one month before her 74th birthday. On her birthday that year, I was with some friends after the evening Mass at dinner in a Chinese restaurant. At the end of the meal, we each received a Chinese fortune cookie. The cookie fortune I received said, “Think of mother’s exhortations more.” We had just been talking about my mother and her recent passing when I opened this cookie’s fortune. We were all stunned and befuddled and concluded it was a message from my mom in heaven! I took the fortune and laminated it to my mother’s burial card. And I keep it on my bedstand.
On Mother’s Day, and in fact every day, I do think more of my mother’s exhortations. One of her words of wisdom to me was never to talk about things that you don’t know anything about. This is particularly true, she would say, when it comes to questioning others’ motives or spreading gossip!
This past year, amid COVID, I made an appeal to raise money to keep the school solvent for this year. My hope was that a major fundraiser would inspire parents to have more confidence and put more children in our school so that it could be more viable for the future. Some friends of mine, who are extremely generous, supported this effort with a matching-fund drive that raised over $ 365,000.00. Where does all this money go? Primarily to pay salary and benefits for our faculty and staff. It also subsidizes tuition for those in most need and for those who fail to pay. Every year the parish pays hundreds of thousands of dollars to keep the school afloat. In fact, over the past ten years, St. Vitus Parish spent a million dollars subsidizing the school! We will certainly put forth an accounting of all the funds regarding Holy Spirit Academy when all the bills are paid.
I am personally very grateful to all who supported the fundraising for the school whether you donated a dollar or thousands of dollars. Your good faith and trust are appreciated beyond words. I have also heard from many of the donors, including the anonymous donor who contributed the matching funds, of their overwhelming support for our endeavor to partner with Kennedy Catholic Family of Schools! Those who understand the realities of running a school applaud the wisdom of this as do our teachers—especially our teachers who have children in Holy Spirit Academy now. They know first-hand the importance of this partnership for our children and for Catholic Education to be available to our parishioners for many years to come.
My mother was right, as I would assume most mothers tell their children words of wisdom. Perhaps we should all, on this Mother’s Day weekend, follow the “God-wink” found in a fortune cookie ten years ago that says, “Think of Mother’s exhortations more!”
Let us rejoice on this glorious weekend and give thanks to God for his unfailing love and for the truth we find in Jesus Christ!
God love you,
