September 2020 Dispatch
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September 2020 Dispatch Brother Knights, This serves as my second monthly dispatch to the council as Grand Knight… praise God for continuity and inspiration! It’s hard to believe that September is already here (Tempus Fugit, Memento Mori), but I pray that God has been present in your lives and that you are able to converse with the LORD daily and attend Mass in person or virtually as often as possible (see Good of the Order below). If you take a look at the summary of upcoming events below, you will see that we have another busy month. I would especially like to point your attention to the Silver Rose event. This has become a very important endeavor to me and I would really appreciate a good showing from brother Knights. Additionally, our monthly general meeting, which will be September 9 after 5:30 Mass, will be no ordinary meeting. There are two neat things happening, so perhaps you won’t want to miss it. I will be honest that I’m attempting to build up enough interest that we get to see a good number of new faces, which is always exciting. Fun fact: St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta, whose feast day is September 5, had an affinity for the Knights of Columbus. Although she was typically known to eschew worldly honors for her work, she did accept an award from the Knights of Columbus stating, “I accepted to come, and to accept out of sheer gratitude, for they (the Knights of Columbus) have done so much for our congregation and for our poor.” If I don’t happen to see you at any point this month, know that I will be praying for you and your family, asking the LORD to bless each of you abundantly! Happy birthday to Past Grand Knight Tim Mohatt and Terrence Rush today! Also, St. Giles, pray for us. Upcoming Events Summary 1. The Silver Rose – on Saturday, September 5, our council will be hosting the Silver Rose. This is a Knights of Columbus program dedicated to Our Lady of Guadalupe. We will provide a prayer service for the parish after 5:30 Mass where we will ask for Mary to assist us in ending the culture of death throughout the world. Our Silver Rose, along with seven others, is travelling from Canada, through the United States, and on through Mexico until it reaches the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe. The roses will be presented to Our Lady, which will carry the weight of all the prayers each council has contributed to them. Let’s make this a powerful contribution! 2. Pancake Breakfast – on September 6 (first Sunday of the month), we need volunteers for serving at our pancake breakfast in the Mainelli Center. These are a fun and easy way to help raise funds for our charitable council donations and hang out with brother Knights. See Sign Up Genius link. a. https://www.signupgenius.com/go/30E0C44AFA92CAAFB6-september/ 3. Special Donation Event and Juan Diego Anniversary Celebration – at our September general council meeting on Wednesday, September 9, following 5:30 Mass, the council will be hosting a special event to unveil a donated item for the Knights room and also enjoying a catered meal from the Juan Diego food bank. Juan Diego is gifting this meal to our council to commemorate the awesome service milestone of 15 years! Please join us for these events, but don’t forget to help us pray the Rosary before 5:30 Mass, if you are available! 4. Mater Filius Assistance – on Saturday, September 12, our council along with other councils in District 2 will combine efforts to complete tasks that Mater Filius needs assistance with. The scheduled activities include tearing out bushes, trimming bushes, cleaning out the daycare basement, and possibly digging out an egress window well. Please email me at [email protected] to let me know if interested and I will keep you informed of developments. 5. Soccer Challenge – on Sunday, September 20, we need volunteers to help with our annual Soccer Challenge, which will be held on the field west of St. Robert’s at approximately 1 PM. This is a fun and easy outdoor event. We will need volunteers who have gone through the Knights of Columbus safe environment training. If you are able to help, please let us know via the Sign Up Genius link below. a. https://www.signupgenius.com/go/30E0C44AFA92CAAFB6-20202/ Monthly Calendar September Upcoming Events Birthdays Holy Days / Feast Days 1 Tim Mohatt, Terrence Rush St. Giles Blessed John Francis Burté 2 Andrew Foxhoven and Companions 3 St. Gregory the Great 4 St. Rose of Viterbo Alexander Koch, Vern 5 The Silver Rose St. Teresa of Calcutta Ohlinger 6 Pancake Breakfast Daniel Podjenski Blessed Claudio Granzotto 7 Labor Day Richard Hautzinger Blessed Frédéric Ozanam Mary, Theotokos (God- Nativity of the Blessed 8 Bearer) Virgin Mary General Council Meeting, 9 James Kurzak St. Peter Claver Special Events (See Above) 10 Ryne Bessmer, Brad Riffel St. Thomas of Villanova 11 Mario Vasquez, Kyle Uhing St. Cyprian Matthew Boever, Richard The Most Holy Name of 12 Mater Filius Assistance Caruso the Blessed Virgin Mary 13 Grandparents Day Thomas McGuire, Jr. St. John Chrysostom The Exaltation of the Holy 14 Cross 15 Ryan Thurber Our Lady of Sorrows Dr. William Barnard, 16 St. Cornelius Michael Taylor 17 Maurice Maher St. Robert Bellarmine # Paul Floersch, Stanley Kurtz, 18 St. Joseph of Cupertino^ Tony Suarez, Sr. 19 Dan Miller St. Januarius St. Andrew Kim Taegon 20 Soccer Challenge Richard Jones, Steven Smith and Companions Michael Potthoff, Greg St. Matthew, Apostle and 21 Youell Evangelist Randall Lenhoff, Kevin St. Lorenzo Ruiz and 22 Autumn Begins McManus Companions 23 St. Pio of Pietralcina Nicholas Hannagan, Ed 24 St. John Henry Newman McCarthy, Pat Williamson St. Louis Martin and St. 25 Daniel Stolinski Zélie Guerin St. Paul VI , St. Cosmas, St. 26 Damian 27 Fr. Paul Vasquez St. Vincent de Paul 28 St. Wenceslaus St. Michael, St. Gabriel, St. 29 Mike Foley Raphael, Archangels 30 Officer Meeting Timothy Halbur St. Jerome *Bold Underlined Numerical Dates Represent Sunday – Don’t Forget Mass and Rest! *Bold , Italicized, and Underlined Dates Represent Holy Days of Obligation #Patron Saint of our Parish, Catechists, and Catechumens! St. Robert Bellarmine, Pray for Us! ^Read up on this interesting saint. He was reported to have flying capabilities! Good of the Order Brother Knights, I am dedicating the September 2020 Good of the Order to The Exaltation of the Cross, which is celebrated on September 14 th . The Cross is a sign of brutal torture, agony, and death, yet it is also the sign that Jesus chose to show us that He loves us unconditionally. It is the sign that life brings many challenges, but it also reminds us that we are able to face them with the LORD at our side and the LORD will get us through them, just as He conquered that terrible death upon it. It is the sign of new life in God’s infinite love that follows all death, spiritual and physical, and this is the primary reason we exalt it. But why the Cross? It is brutal, it is ugly. How can it actually be a sign of all those good things I previously mentioned? Why has it been able to inspire small and great works of charity, major life conversions, and even martyrdom throughout the history of the Church? We know that Jesus’ Baptism in the Jordan opened the gates of Heaven after they had been closed. His subsequent earthly travels and ministry taught us about divine love and mercy, that Jesus was indeed the Messiah, the powerful Son of God (that the Kingdom of God was indeed at hand), and about the need and importance of repentance. His Resurrection broke the bonds of death, promised an afterlife with Him, the Father, and Holy Spirit, and produced a faith in God and eternal life so strong that we no longer have to be fearful of death as the end. But the Cross, the Crucifixion of Jesus, is just some horrible intermediate event in between all the good things, right? Jesus’ death was just a necessity in order to prove that He had the power to reverse death, right? In a simple yet profound answer, the Cross is the holy altar upon which Jesus, the purest Lamb of God, the Spotless Victim, was sacrificed as an offering to the Father for our redemption from our sins, and then as a means for our salvation into eternal life. Recall that because of the Original Sin of Adam and Eve, sin entered the world. Sin against our infinitely good God separated humanity from Him by an infinite margin. The human race had turned away from God and the seeds of pride, lust, wrathful anger, greed, gluttony, jealousy/envy, and sloth were able to enter the human person and be passed on to following generations. Adam, Eve, and their descendants did not have the power to uproot these evils in themselves and could never repair/mend the infinite harm done as they were merely human themselves. Humanity needed a savior to repair that immense divide from God. Graciously, God so loved the world that He sent His only Begotten Son, Jesus, to redeem us. Jesus was fully God and fully human. Jesus is the human that is infinitely good enough to sacrifice Himself in reparation/expiation of our sins to the Father. It is precisely in Jesus’ humanity while being God that His Most Precious Blood provided reconciliation. I was prepared to attempt to explain the significance behind Jesus shedding His Most Precious Blood on our behalf in July, the month dedicated to His Blood; however, I did not have access to the email portal in time to send out my thoughts on it.