• Make a donation of recyclable paper to the Paper Retrievers in the parking lot. Acceptable items include newspapers, inserts, catalogues, magazines, and office/school papers (no phone books or cardboard). St. Anastasia receives a per ton donation for your trash – how cool is that?
• Shop Kroger and designate St. Anastasia on your Kroger Rewards account. St. Anastasia will receive a donation for each dollar you purchase – at no cost to you!! It takes a few moments online or at the service desk to make St. A the beneficiary.
• Use Good Search and Good Shop while searching and shopping online. St. Anastasia receives one-cent for each search; shop on Good Shop and St. A receives a percentage of your purchase. All at NO cost to you!
• Taxpayers age 70 1/2 or older can make a tax-free distribution from an IRA of up to $100,000. The distribution must be a direct gift from the IRA. These distributions are not subject to charitable contribution percentage limits since they are neither included in gross income nor claimed as a deduction on the taxpayer’s return. The IRA charitable rollover law may provide a very good charitable giving vehicle along with having other benefits. This is currently effective through December 31, 2011.
• Donations of appreciated stock also have positive tax effects. If you give appreciated stock directly to St. A. you avoid the income tax incurred on the gain from the sale. You will also be entitled to a charitable contribution for the fair market value of the stock on the day the charity receives it.

You will find additional information about the Kroger and Good Search programs on the St. Anastasia website (under the Stewardship – Treasure tab). Please consider the other options for year-end donations to St. Anastasia or other charities. You should always consult with your legal, tax and financial advisors before taking advantage of these benefits.

All of this is part of Archbishop Vigneron’s endeavors to eliminate inefficiencies and provide an air of transparency between the parishes, the Archdiocese, and the parishioners. The AOD has recruited accounting professionals within the Finance Department who have been charged with re-writing these procedures and policies and are doing so from an accounting perspective.

With all of this in mind, we are in the process of revising the 2011-2012 budget for St. Anastasia to better reflect the current conditions. Also, because so many of you are making offertory contributions electronically on a monthly or semi-monthly basis (again, this is a good thing), I will be providing a month end report in “The Good News” bulletin of offertory donations (as opposed to weekly reports). This should eliminate the weekly ups and downs that appear on the reports.

We want you to know that we take your generosity seriously and strive to be good stewards of the resources you provide on behalf of St. Anastasia Parish.

Brian Burgin, Ext. 130
Business Manager

1. Amy and I have been married 26 years in October. We have three sons: Justin (22) now living and working in Chicago; Mitchell (18) a freshman at Adrian College; and Collin (13) an eighth grader at Our Lady of Sorrows School. We have a mini-dachshund named Murphy who rules the house.
2. Amy and I met at the University of Michigan where we both earned Bachelors’ Degrees. I also have an MBA from Wayne State University. I think Fr. J.J. and I are going to have a lot of fun as the October 15^th Michigan/MSU game approaches.
3. We live in Farmington Hills and have been parishioners at Our Lady of Sorrows in Farmington for eighteen years. During that time I have served as an Extraordinary Minister of the Eucharist, served on Administration & Finance Commission, was the Stewardship Committee Chairperson for five years, and helped to plan and execute many retreats and capital campaigns including  currently serving on the Changing Lives Together Information Committee.
4. While I live in Farmington Hills, my entire post-college work life has been in Troy. I spent the last 23 years as Vice President of Operations for a family-owned (not my family) property management company located in the southwest part of Troy. I also handled the company’s human resource functions and was previously the Assistant Controller.
5. Everyone who knows me says this is the perfect position for me – and I agree! It blends my abilities and experiences with my desire to minister to God’s Church. I am truly blessed to be here and look forward to getting to know the St. Anastasia Parish family.

P.S.:  Contrary to Fr. J.J.’s comments in last week’s bulletin, I don’t think I looked all THAT confused. Perhaps it was the green and white in his blood that skewed his view.

May God bless you all……I remain humbly yours, Franz Hoffer

The pavers are in; they were installed just this past week. Be sure and find that paver you had done and encourage others to consider the paver program as a way to memorialize a milestone event in their lives or the memory of a loved one. I’ve actually spent time in the various areas of the walkway and read most if not all of the inscriptions on the pavers…it’s actually quite calming and promotes reflecting on your own life and loved ones.

We are not changing the CSA numbers for this week as we had very few pledges come in; we’ll get caught up on that next week. Please, please consider participating if you have not done so. Remember, the parish is “on the hook” for the total amount. Any shortfall must be made up from the operating budget which means less money for ministry. Also remember that any overage is returned to the parish 100% without the 7% Archdiocesan tax.

We’ve put a new, secure, donation box in the chapel to help avoid some of the theft issues we’ve experienced in the past. This box should take care of the problem. We found out that the previous box was being accessed through the hole in the top (where you would put the money in) and via use of alligator clips attached to long thin sticks money was being taken out during the early hours of the morning. This new box prevents that and is bolted to the wall…hopefully this issue is closed.

God bless, Franz

We had a couple big invoices that we paid in the last couple of days. We paid the last installment on our diocesan assessment of $24,754 – it’s commonly called the Archdiocesan tax and all parishes in the diocese are assessed at the same rate of 7% (based on our weekly donations). We also paid the priest retirement assessment of $30,188 or $15,094 per priest (for Father JJ and Father Mark, we do not pay for Father VV). The money you donated for the priest retirement fund goes against the total amount. You generously donated $7,751 to that amount, the balance is made up from the parish operating budget. 

We will once again ask you to please prayerfully consider the CSA. As of 6/15/11 -  481 parish families have donated or pledged a total of $183,022.32 towards the assessment of $250,000. That leaves a balance of $66,977.68 that St. Anastasia must pay. We again ask where are the rest of you? We have over 2,000 (out of 3,300) cards that were not picked up in the Narthex and are now in the process of having to spend money to mail them out. So those that did not pick up their cards are actually hurting us in two ways….first, you have not yet made a pledge to the CSA and secondly, we have to incur the cost of mailing the forms to you. It’s not just the cost of the postage itself, but the cost of envelopes, the cost of the paper to print a letter, and the time staff will spend putting the mailing together. We can’t understand why you would not have picked up your card in all the time they were in the Narthex…even if it was to tell us that you are not going to participate. Please prayerfully consider participating once the letter comes to your home, or stop in the office and make your pledge that way. The CSA is not a profit generating mechanism…all the money is spent to support the ministries supported by the CSA. The allocation of funds from the CSA is under the strict supervision of a Lay Board.  

God bless, Franz

We are experiencing some air conditioning issues (go figure!) especially with the onset of extremely hot weather. We’ll get it under control shortly, but I once again want to implore one and all to leave the thermostat settings alone as we attempt to balance out the system. The air conditioning system is expensive to run and it’s not realistic to set the thermostats at 69 degrees or colder…we’ll use up all our funds paying for that. I guess a good analogy is that we’re trying to run the system as we would at our homes…at a moderate temperature that is comfortable and utilizes the efficiencies built into the system. We generally keep the thermostats (or try to) at between 73 and 76  degrees; the doors   being opened frequently causes a strain on the system to begin with, not to mention the instances when the doors are propped open for long periods of time – that’s a real issue. If the temps outside are in the 90’s, we’re still 20  degrees cooler. We appreciate your cooperation, we are doing the very best we can at keeping you comfortable and being good stewards of the financial resources you generously donate.

O.K…it’s still CSA time. If you look at the Sunday Offertory recap below, you’ll see we are just about at 70%, but that still leaves 30%, or $77,500 to go. These gifts to the CSA have been donated or pledged by only 460 parish families…we have just about 3,300 families…that leaves 2,840 that we’ve not heard from. The CSA and St. Anastasia needs your help and support achieving the assessment. 14% of the registered parishioners cannot be expected to carry the entire parish. I again want to ask you to think about supporting the CSA. Think about the things that it means to people facing challenges; think about what it might mean to you; no one expects the kind of economic catastrophe we’ve been through, but thank God there was a CSA to assist people in getting back on their feet, getting counseling, getting medical (physical and mental) attention,   getting food, gas cards….you name it. CSA supported ministries were the primary support system for many in our very area.

God bless, Franz

I’d like to talk about Religious Education. For this school year, it cost St.   Anastasia $350,029 to run the Religious Education program. The funds generated from the school fees, books, etc., brought in $92,920 for a difference or deficit of $257,109 that is made up via Sunday donations. If we take those  figures and whittle them down to a per student cost (about 941 students) then the average per student cost to St. Anastasia is $371.98, leaving a per student cost of $273.23 that is covered by St. Anastasia (from the Sunday donations). Our program is a signature program, we constantly have other churches call and ask us for advice and how they can improve their program. The cold hard facts my friends is to run a top notch program, it costs money. We’ve been able to hold the line through some tough economic times and have not raised our fees for a long time, but we cannot continue. Our program is the most cost effective (least cost) compared to our neighboring parishes. The cold reality of it is that we need to increase revenue if we want to continue to provide the best possible Religious Education programs to our children and those going through RCIA. To make a comparison…how much does it cost to allow your children to participate in organized sports, dance, or other club sports? Compare that to our current fee structure for Religious Education and we suspect you’ll see a disparity in those numbers. The Religious Education Department is looking at the numbers and will be putting something out in the next couple of weeks. We will of course never turn any children or families away due to difficulty to pay, but we can offer payment plans. If you find yourself in this position once RE registration starts, contact Maryann Brani or Marian Bart and they will assist you. All contacts of this nature are treated with the utmost confidentiality. Please prayerfully consider what religious education means to your children and your family.

We continue to make progress on CSA (see Offertory Summary) and have collected pledges that represent 67% of our goal….but we need the     remaining 33%. The cards will be in the Narthex this week for the last time. Please go and take your card…even if you do not want to participate, please take your card and indicate “not participating” so we don’t waste money sending you letters. So far approximately 30% of our parish family has responded. What is going on with the remaining 70%…where are you? We need to hear from you. Remember, the key elements in CSA are the first two letters – CS – Christian Service. The CSA does not generate any profit for the Archdiocese, all money is spent right here in the Archdiocese of Detroit supervised by a Lay Board – none of it goes outside our boundaries. Seems like we have opportunities to donate via cell phone, TV, or internet whenever there is a national  disaster like the tornadoes in Joplin and that’s a good thing, don’t get me wrong. But the stark reality is that there is a huge on-going need every day in this diocese from your sisters and brothers in faith. Anytime a homeless person is fed or housed; anytime a spouse is saved from abuse; anytime  mental illness or addiction is treated; anytime a person is provided free medical care; anytime a person is counseled and led away from abortion; these issues may not be publicized like national disasters, but it’s you….you are the ones taking care of the people and their desperate needs. Please prayerfully consider donating to the CSA…it’s a good thing.

God bless, Franz

Art for God’s Sake covered all its own expenses through ticket sales and donations; no money was used from any St. Anastasia account to cover expenses for the show in any way shape, or form. A show of this type is expensive and as you can see from the list, complicated to put on. But art shows are just that…you have to create the proper ambiance or you won’t get top artists to participate. Look at the statistics in Father J.J.’s column to see who we attracted and from where they came as well as the amount of art work sold. In my wanderings around the AOD (St. Ronald, St. Michael, the seminary, the Diaconate Team) I can tell you that you should all be proud of St. Anastasia as the entire diocese is still buzzing about Art for God’s Sake. We have set the bench mark for 1^st class parish events that are supported by funds generated from the event itself…and of course inspires and spiritually impacts those that attend the event.

Please, let’s get the CSA behind us. It tends to stretch out for so long. Thanks to those that have already picked up their cards and generously contributed. If you found you could not contribute for any reason, we ask for your prayers for a successful campaign. There has been a change in the way CSA is being administered. We used to process your checks on site and then send one check from St. Anastasia to cover the donations. As of this year, the AOD is asking us to send your checks directly to them in weekly batches and they will process them from there. This may add a couple of days to you seeing your checks cancelled. If you are still considering your participation or your level of participation, we only ask that you do it prayerfully and consider all that you have been blessed with. It’s unfortunate in this, the richest country in the world; that hunger, abuse, addiction, crime, economic barriers to almost everything, unemployment and underemployment still exist. We are all tasked by God to do what we can to help our brothers and sisters facing challenges.

God bless, Franz

Speaking of final numbers…CSA. As you know we launched early this year not only to give us all a head start but to ensure that we didn’t impact any First Communions with appeals for financial assistance to the CSA. So as of this writing we are a little more than half way to our assessment and we need to   re-double our efforts to get over the hump. We have received $127,375 in pledges and have already received actual cash, checks, or credit card authorizations for $67,750. Our balance to achieve the assessment is $122,625.00. There are still many CSA cards that have not been picked up; after this weekend we’ll mail those out and possibly schedule some home visits. We did save a lot of money as the majority of you picked up your cards either in the Narthex or Social Hall. We thank you very much for your help in that effort…not sure why some choose not to pick up their cards.

Our parish budget was sent to the Archdiocese on Friday, May 13th, due on the 15th (actually the 16th as the 15th is a Sunday). We’ll share more info on that as the weeks go on. Our fiscal year ends on June 30th and so far it looks good. I can’t say we’re breaking any records and we are a little closer than we’d care to be, but for all intent and purposes St. Anastasia will put another successful year into the books thanks to the generosity and compassion of you, our parishioners.   

God bless, Franz