Formation Tools

abundant hope

Dear Friends,

We are pleased that many of you are participating in our ministries and additional adult formation programs as part of Abundant Hope. It is a good sign that so many families have embraced the need for continued spiritual formation and outreach as we move into the twenty-first century.

We shared with the parish community that approximately 500 families made a pledge to Abundant Hope or offered a special gift to the Building Fund amounting to approximately $2.2 million for our capital campaign. We are grateful for these gifts along with the many hours that are volunteered through our ministries each year. Our business manager, Howard Fischer and the staff are working to ensure the proper accounting of these pledges. If you have any questions regarding your pledge, please call Howard at 847-223-0010.

Our main focus is to recommit ourselves to continuing Christ's mission through our ministries. With over 60 ministries, you have an opportunity to respond to God's call and use your time and unique talents to help others. Because we have over 1700 families at St. Mary, it is difficult to make a personal invitation to join a ministry. So please accept this as our invitation to get involved and join a ministry of your choice, introduce yourself and be part of our family. We'd love to have you share your time, talent and experience.

To support our ministries we are still planning to create an intergenerational learning center as the necessary funding becomes available. We recognize that many parishioners have not yet responded to our capital campaign for a number of reasons. Respecting their need for time to pray about their commitment, we will keep our capital campaign open throughout the year. In addition, we will invite new parishioners to prayerfully consider their support of Abundant Hope. All gifts that come to us in the "Building Fund Envelope" are now applied to Abundant Hope.

We will be providing the parish community with monthly updates in the bulletin along with updates on our web site www.stmaryabundanthope.org. Thank you again for all your prayers and support in continuing Christ's call.

In the Lord,

Fr. Ron Lewinski

The Abundant Hope video was sent to everyone in the parish along with an informational brochure in October 2008.

The video may take a few moments to load, depending on the speed of your internet connection. Please click the "play" button and be patient.