Strengthen your faith!
In these tumultuous times, we need to “stand firm and hold fast” to our faith, as St. Paul exhorts us (2 Thes. 2:15). Our faith is not in man, but in the God who judges, redeems, heals, and saves a fallen humanity from its own destruction and raises his people to the radiance of his glory. Our reception of that invitation to his divine life requires from us a response and a desire to enter into relationship with him.
Many of our parishioners have come up and said thank you for having the faith formation opportunities that we offer. These opportunities have opened their eyes to the beauty and truth of our Catholic faith and have facilitated their blossoming relationship with our Lord Jesus Christ. Our hope and desire for our parish family is that each parishioner comes to know the living God on a profound and transformative level, and so all our faith formation opportunities are directed to that end.
Those opportunities will be featured next weekend (Sept. 8 and 9) after all the Masses at the “Come and See Faith Formation Event.” So, please be sure to stop in and take a look! And have a homemade donut and cup of coffee while you’re at it! Thanks to the Fairchild family, we have those available again at least once a month.
Shayne Slough –
Coordinator of Parish Life
With our dear Fr. Brian Lenz going off to serve as chaplain for Lumen Christi, it left a big hole on our Senior Leadership Team. His level-headed input and spiritual wisdom will be missed. Thankfully, we have someone on our staff who has her own set of strong gifts who will round out our Senior Leadership Team (SLT).
Shayne Slough, as our Coordinator of Parish Life, temporarily had been frequenting the SLT weekly meeting during my absence, and the rest of the SLT (our Director of Parish Operations, Andy Bihl; our School Principal, Kristi Blair; our Director of Faith Formation, Todd Gale) were just gushing with praise! She has certainly been an answer to my prayers.
In spearheading our Alpha efforts, being the point person for all the Parish Representatives (we have over 50 now!), orienting our new parishioners, organizing our many special parish life events, and now overseeing the bulletin (she was a longtime English teacher at Lumen Christi), Shayne has been a vital contributor to our growing and vibrant parish life and to fostering that family feel that our involved parishioners are experiencing.
As a lifelong parishioner of St. John and her sensitivity to the pulse of the parish, I appreciate her perspective and insight that has already made her a valuable member of our parish’s Senior Leadership Team. Please thank her when you see her for answering the Holy Spirit’s prompting.
Yours in Christ,
Fr. Chas Canoy