This month, for the first time since the COVID pandemic, we are once again scheduling liturgical ministers!  While our county is still in the midst of a surge in the delta variant, this is one step that we can safely take to get things a little closer to normal.

Until now, we’ve just been using volunteer lectors and MC’s who sign up month-to-month, and we have only been recruiting EMHC’s when there was no deacon at Mass.  Now you’ll notice that we have returned to having four Communion lines instead of two.  (No more making a huge lap around the church for those of you in the side sections!)  We still are not distributing the Precious Blood until we receive notice from the diocese that they are ready to resume this practice.  There are also certain ministries, such as sacristans and altar servers, that we won’t resume until we are able to move back into the sacristy.  (We’re getting closer…  We had been waiting on the new cabinetry to arrive for several months, but it’s finally here, and most of it has been installed.  We’re just waiting on a little more hardware in order to complete the installation, after which we can install the sinks and the flooring and then move in.)

We’ve done our best to update our ministry lists (adding new people who’ve filled out their Time & Talent Forms, while deleting people we know wish to retire from a particular ministry), but we need your help to make sure things run smoothly as we resume these ministries.  In particular, contact Teresa at the rectory (toross@christthekingonline.org) if you:

Don’t know whether or not you’re on the ministry list
Signed up for a ministry but don’t […]

I’m so excited that this weekend we’ve had our Parish Kickoff and Ministry Fair, in conjunction with our Time & Talent Weekend.  We’ve traditionally had a “Time & Talent Sunday” every year in order to highlight the many active ministries we have here at the parish, and to encourage folks to sign up for ways to get involved.  This year you’ll be able to sign up for ministries electronically, using a QR code that you can scan in the vestibule.  Of course, good old-fashioned paper copies of the forms will be available in the vestibule, as well.  Regardless of how you sign up, I hope that every parishioner will take a moment to complete a Time & Talent Form before the end of August. Many thanks to Linda Fitzpatrick for her work in organizing the Time & Talent process.

This year, of course, things are a little different, which adds both some importance and some excitement to the Time & Talent process.  Encouraging ministry signups is especially important this year because so many of our ministries have been dormant (or at least very scaled-down) during the time of the pandemic.  I’m really excited that we are in a position to re-start most of our parish ministries, but that also means that we need to start from scratch in terms of recruiting new volunteers.  A lot of these ministries will only be able to resume when we’ve got an adequate number of volunteers, so I’m hoping for a healthy number of Time & Talent forms!

But I also think this presents us with a golden opportunity, not just to get back to exactly where we were before COVID hit, but also to grow in new and exciting ways.  […]

As part of our long-term goals from what you told us on the 2017 Parish Survey, we are going to be assembling a new, custom hymnal supplement which will be in the pews along with the red Worship hymnal. This book (a small binder, really) will include a wide array of familiar Catholic songs appropriate for use at school Mass, weekend Mass, and other liturgical and devotional gatherings. The goal is to have it in the pews for November 21st, the Solemnity of Christ the King – think of it as a parish gift to ourselves for our feast day!  We are able to do this at a low cost due to the licensing fees we already pay with our current hymnal.

As part of this parish family who will be using it, you are invited to share your suggestions for songs that you would like to have included in this hymnal supplement. Not every single suggestion will make it in, due to copyright and other space factors, but all suggestions will be thoughtfully considered and evaluated. As we will continue to use the red Worship hymnal and not duplicate any hymns, there is no need to list your favorites in that. This will only contain suitable music from other hymnals which are not currently available to us, such as “Ah Holy Jesus,” “Be Thou My Vision,” “Hail Mary, Gentle Woman,” “Panis Angelicus,” etc. You may want to use the internet to search, or if you don’t own any other hymnals at home, you may make an appointment to come to the music office and look through some (appointments limited).

If you would like to participate, please email Jessica Roberts by September 15th with your music suggestions, or drop off […]

By now, I’m sure that you have all heard about the disturbing events of this past Sunday.  For those of you who might not know, we had someone break into the church overnight last weekend.  (More accurately, someone hid in the church before we locked up for the night.)  This individual then vandalized the church, most notably by setting off two fire extinguishers in the back of the church and in the choir loft, as well as kicking in a vent in the choir loft.  The individual was apprehended early Sunday morning as he attempted to vandalize another neighborhood business.  Most importantly, no one was hurt.

After moving Sunday Masses into the gym, we contracted with First Response (the same company that orchestrated the cleanup from our sacristy fire) to clean up the mess and get us back into the church.  (As I write this column, we are still assessing whether there will be any special cleanup required for the pipe organ.)   We may never know this individual’s motivations for doing what he did, but the Pastoral Team will review this thoroughly to determine how this incident might prompt us to take another look at our security procedures.

I am grateful for everyone who reacted so quickly to this situation, especially since I was away on vacation and unable to help.  Fr. Geoff took charge of the situation, and he and Jessica Roberts made sure that we were ready to celebrate Mass in the gym on short notice.  Deacon Joe, Abby Doyle, Leslie Burns and Amanda Jeffrey worked to identify the damage and provide the police with the information they needed.  And so many of our parishioners pitched in to help us set up for the gym […]

“When will things get back to normal?”  That’s been a frequent question ever since the COVID pandemic shut down so many things in March of 2020.  In 2021, we’ve thankfully seen many things return to normal here at Christ the King:  people have come back to Mass, some activities have resumed and people are reconnecting with fellow parishioners they didn’t see for a long time.  There are still some things about parish life that aren’t quite all the way back to normal yet, though.  But don’t worry, we’re getting there, and here are a couple of updates in that regard:

Parish Ministries:  Many parish ministries still aren’t quite up and running the way they were pre-COVID, but we are excited to be able to reintroduce them soon!  As part of the Parish Kickoff that we’ll have on August 21st, we’ll have a Ministry Fair that will reintroduce all sorts of ministries back to our parish.  All sorts of ministries will be represented:  liturgical ministries, service ministries, social ministries, formation/catechesis ministries, and many more.  In order to restart these ministries, we need people!  So whether you’re thinking of resuming a ministry in which you were previously involved, or trying something new, I encourage you to go to the Ministry Fair and fill out a Time & Talent Form.  (We’ll give Time & Talent instructions on the weekend of the Ministry Fair.)  We want things to get back to normal, and we need you to help us get there!

¨

Sacristy:  Of course, one of the things that has been out of the ordinary has been the sacristy renovation.  We’ve been using the Cry Room as a sacristy ever since the sacristy fire back in February.  Right now we’re just […]