Collection aids U.S. churches struggling to serve Catholics

Catholics are familiar with annual collections that support evangelization, catechesis and social justice ministries in all corners of the globe.

This weekend, parishioners in the Albany Diocese are being asked to help those efforts closer to home.

The Catholic Home Missions Appeal (CHMA) supports the sometimes tenuous presence of Catholicism in areas where economic slowdown and troubles in the Church have eroded the financial position of already cash-strapped mission dioceses, according to Dr. David J. Suley, coordinator for resource development for the Committee on the Home Missions.

Bishop's message

"What is a home mission, and why should we support it?" asked Bishop Howard J Hubbard in a letter read at Masses last weekend. "You know the answer if you have ever visited eastern Kentucky or Tennessee; driven through rural Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi; spent time on the Mexican border; or passed through scattered small towns in Wyoming, Montana and Oregon. Those little brick or clapboard churches you see along the way, housing pockets of Catholic faithful, are home missions."

Funds from the 2004 collection will be used to provide ministries that Catholics in the Albany Diocese take for granted, including religious education, the sacraments and even the celebration of Mass.

Monies will be sent to the Diocese of Anchorage, for example, where only 19 priests serve all of central Alaska, and to Lubbock, Texas, where 33 priests are responsible for 62 parishes and other missions.

Seminary funding is needed throughout the West; there are only 72 priests in the entire state of Utah, 56 in Idaho and 47 in Wyoming. In remote island dioceses in the Caribbean and Pacific, as well as on the border between the U.S. and Mexico, funding supports religious education, trains lay leaders and gives small communities of 50 to 100 people the ability to teach their children about the Catholic faith.

Appeal

More than 92 cents out of every donated dollar goes directly to those missions.

"Helping satisfy the spiritual needs of our neighbors across the country unites all of us as a Catholic family," said Bishop Hubbard in his letter. "I invite you to respond generously to the Catholic Home Missions Appeal. Please help strengthen our Church at home."

(8/19/04)