The collection for CCHD this year is on Nov. 20-21 (the weekend before Thanksgiving - as always). Collections were significantly down last year due to COVID so we need lots of help promoting this mandatory collection. Please check out our local CCHD website and the national CCHD website for resources, encourage your parish to participate, and request that information be included in communications from your parish (e.g. bulletins, emails, etc.).

All parishes should have received materials from the USCCB National Collection Office. If they didn't, please let us know and we'll try to get them out asap. (We do have in our office additional posters in English and Spanish, and there are LOTS of digital resources.)

If you'd like to have a speaker from one of our local grantees for Appeal Weekend (11/13-14), please contact our CCHD intern, Mickey Townsend.

Our CRS fair trade sale is back! This year's sale will be open Nov. 8-22. 20% of the sales will be donated to CRS, and there's free shipping on orders over $50 (with promo code SE4SERRV21).

Please check out the website, spread the word, and shop early and often! This is one of our best tools to be in solidarity with our brothers and sisters around the globe, and we want to support them well.

(FYI - these dates were chosen in the hope that anything ordered will arrive prior to Christmas. There's no guarantee, but obviously the earlier you shop the better the chance of a pre-holiday arrival.)

As you may have seen in our last couple of newsletter, the Vatican has launched a new, global initiative to address the existential threat of climate change. (For more info, click here.)

Our Care for Creation Task Force is looking for people to join the ad hoc committees we're forming (one for each of the seven constituencies: families, parishes, schools, hospitals, businesses, organizations, and religious orders) to promulgate these ideas. If you're interested in joining this effort (or know someone who might be), please contact Andrew.

MARCC is one of the key partners in our interfaith work. We've partnered with them on several projects, including the MARCC ID and advocacy on multiple justice issues.

Many of our representatives have worked on this initiative for year and years, and we're now looking for a couple new folks to represent the Archdiocese with this group. If this might be of interest to you, please let Andrew know.

As we're sure you're all aware, the draft plan for families of parishes was released at the beginning of the month.

Our office is working with the other offices in our department on how we can support families of parishes as they make this journey, and we're going to need strong partners within those families to offer guidance, feedback, and support.

No need to do anything now, but please be on the lookout for future communication where we'll be looking for a couple of people in each family to be conduits of information to help us help the families.