St. Anastasia Roman Catholic Church
From the Office

   We have egg on our face…and no good excuses.  The CSA letter that was sent last week and has probably already arrived was sent to several of you in error.  It was supposed to only go to those members of our parish community that had not yet returned their CSA pledge forms.  The data-base did some funny things and took several parishioners that had already pledged as well as some children and sent them the “no pledge letter”…I had some very interesting conversations with several of you parishioners whose children had received the letter…“do you expect our kids to contribute to CSA?”  Of course we don’t (but I did ask how old the kids were and if they got allowance…only kidding).  Obviously, we made a mistake.  After careful review it appears that our information filters as well as the data categorization were both slightly off, but only in selected instances.  We are in the process of fixing that…I can assure you that all your CSA, weekly, and special donations have been and will continue to be recorded accurately; as a normal course of business we are always checking and double checking our records to ensure accuracy and to make sure we maintain a high level of professionalism and your confidence. 

Many of you generously donated to the Missionary appeal last week. We had indicated in previous issues of the bulletin that we were considering doing one collection for all Diocesan Special Collections instead of coming back to you every couple of weeks with those collections. We had asked for your feedback on that plan. Overwhelmingly, the feedback was negative, i.e. against doing that. The two biggest concerns were having all that cash on hand at one time and also not wanting to give to all the special collections but only selected ones. Based on the feedback, we will not put that plan into effect and will continue to put the envelopes out as the special collections become due. We do thank you for your honest and quick feedback.

I’d like to update you on last year’s CSA campaign here at St. Anastasia. As you may recall, our assessment was $237,334 and just like this year’s assessment, it looked insurmountable.  We just received our final tally for last year…amount pledged was $272,039; actual amount received was $261,657.93…so we exceeded our assessment for last year by $24,323.93.  We took that amount applied it against our June 30^th loan payment and actually made a larger payment of $49,323.93 due to the flexibility afforded by the large CSA refund.  The $261,657.93 amount came from 920 pledges out of a possible 3,376 or 27%.  If you extrapolate last year’s performance to this year, we should make this year’s assessment with room to spare if everyone that participated last year does so at the same amount this year; not sure if that is realistic. 

I hope you agree on how good the parking lot looks…it was done on Monday the 5^th and it was one of those 90 degree plus monster days which bodes well for us as the sealant absorbs into the hard black top surface just a little deeper.  We are all pleased with how good it looks and we should be set for at least the next 3 years.  At that point we will probably have to make a major investment in the parking lot as some areas (while now stabilized) will have to be replaced.  I think we can all be very proud of the way our building looks from the outside.  Now it’s time to turn our attention to the interior of the building, doing intense clean-up and fresh up, especially the restrooms.  We’ll have more to come on that in upcoming editions of the bulletin.

Well, fiscal year 2009/10 is closed and in the books and while the final numbers are still out, it appears we did just fine…thanks to your generosity. Our budget for fiscal year 2010/11 is pretty much a carry forward from this past fiscal year with a slight reduction in spending of about 2.5%. We’ll always strive to reduce spending, but never at the cost of ministry and you never know…there always seems to be some surprises. Remember the two HVAC units we needed to replace in the gym? Hopefully 2010/11 will hold only pleasant surprises for us.

CSA IS THE BEST FUND RAISING TOOL FOR THE PARISH EVER INVENTED BY MAN…o.k.…now that we have your attention and you probably think we’re nuts, let me explain. Once we achieve our CSA goal, any excess funds over that goal comes back to the parish 100%, free of the 7% archdiocesan assessment and is not counted in next year’s CSA computation. Even better than our Christmas collection which is not assessed the 7% archdiocesan tax but is counted in next year’s CSA goal computation. I’ve talked with several Business Managers and Pastors at other parishes, some in our own geographic area (some not) and they’ve indicated that a growing number of their parishioners cut back on their contributions during the year but contribute a larger portion of their yearly contributions to the CSA or Christmas collection. From our perspective, we’ll never turn down a donation regardless of when it is given, but giving extra or more at CSA time does benefit the parish directly to the largest degree…that is of course once we achieve our goal and go over it by a substantial margin. Think about it and keep it in mind when considering participating in the CSA if you haven’t already contributed or if you have contributed, there’s nothing to say you can’t increase that donation.

 A Little Different This Week

I’ve always felt that Father’s Day got second billing behind Mother’s Day, but as I reflect on my upbringing, the “Father” role I fulfilled in the life of my kids, Joy and Eric, and now add the role of “FFIL….Favorite Father-in Law” for Jackie and Tony, my kid’s spouses, I’m not so sure about that second place ranking. 

While our CSA campaign is doing well, we are running behind where we were last year (on a percentage of assessment achieved) after the first month; not by much but behind none the less. Usually at the 6 to 8 week mark, we traditionally hit a lull in the pledges, that’s about two weeks away. I only point this out as a source of information for you all and also to encourage those of you that have not yet pledged to please prayerfully consider doing so. Across the country, charitable giving (which includes churches) is down an average of 3% with Michigan slightly over that average so we fully understand that times are still tough…we appreciate everything you parishioners do to support the CSA campaign and never take it for granted. As in the past, Father J.J., Father Mark, Deacon Ron, I and the entire staff are on hand to answer any questions you may have. Please keep in mind all the good  hings the CSA does diocesan wide which come back to the individual parishes. I’d like to point out that there would be no Sacred Heart Seminary without the CSA and to take it to the local level, possibly no Father Mark, Father John (our former intern), Deacon Ron, Father J.J., and yours truly as we were all educated and formed at the Seminary. And it doesn’t stop there as our Religious Education group takes advantage of the many opportunities afforded at the Seminary. Many of you are aware that two St. Anastasia parishioners are currently enrolled in the Diaconate Formation Program at Sacred Heart with one scheduled for ordination in October of this year…another program funded to a large extent by the CSA. I will point out and explain other ministries / charities funded by CSA dollars that may be of interest to you in this article for the next couple of weeks.

I’d like to tell you about “Rolling Thunder”….it had a huge impact on me.  “Rolling Thunder” is the big motorcycle ride in our nation’s capital that seeks to call attention to our  military veterans, especially those of the Vietnam era. 

We just received our quarterly award from the Kroger Community Rewards Program and we’ll be receiving a check in the amount of $798.00 by May 31^st.  That gives St. Anastasia $1,797.78 for you  parishioners just shopping at Kroger. If anyone is interested in signing up, the information is on our website or you can write me and I’ll get it to you.  Remember, if you were signed up before, you have to “re-register” as of April 30^th of this year to keep the rewards coming.