Church of St. Mary ...in Alexandria Minnesota

Justice Peace and Integrity of Creation

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The JPIC committee meets on the 3rd Thursday of the month at 5:30 in the Parish office.

If you have a passion for working towards helping the community of St. Marys to be more aware of issues related to Social Justice, please contact Rick Wagner for more information.  

 

Following are minutes from some of the meetings.

Church of St. Mary 

Committee for Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation

December 9, 2010  5:30-7:00 PM

 

Present:  Fr. Steve Binsfeld, Roger Johnson, Rick Wagner, Gloria Deick, Rita Von Holtum, Kathleen Lingor.

 

Abscent: Bruce Becker, Joe Beste, Lori McClintock (Lori has expressed wishes to participate in JPIC committee events surrounding ‘respect life’ and specifically the abortion issue so will be present when we address presentations and activities surrounding that issue).

 

November minutes:  Reviewed, no corrections or changes.

 

December agenda:  Approved.

 

Love, Inc.: Tammy Boushek is St, Mary’s contact person (760-5405).  Rick will contact her and invite her to attend one of our upcoming meetings.  Fr. Steve mentioned that a volunteer is needed to be a parish liason to bring back up to date information regarding Love Inc.  

 

Budget:  We need to submit our proposed budget for fiscal 2011-2012 by early March.  Using our personal expenditure data, each committee member will submit dollar amounts they have contributed to JPIC activities in the past and present them to Kathleen by February 1st.  She will put together a proposed budget for committee adjustment and tweaking at the February meeting.  The final draft will be submitted to Jim Boyle after the February meeting.  Our broad current proposal is $1500/annually.

 

Mission Trip Outline:  Rita provided a schedule for informational meetings (starting January 8-9th) for the last three Sundays in January as well as information about what people can expect on such a trip.  She has requested help in handling the financial end of the trip.

 

Committee education:  No specific plans were discussed at this meeting however several comments supported the necessity to have a specific time set aside from meetings to inform ourselves about issues that we are planning to present to the parish.  We can put this on the agenda for January.

 

Quarterly plan:  The summary and table of 2011 first quarter events that came out of the December 4th meeting was reviewed.  Pursuing the purchase of a TV monitor/computer set up for the purpose of education was discussed.  Fr. and Roger stated many church committee’s are having the same discussion.  Fr. said the funding is very tight and that is our inhibiting factor.  He is in agreement that we can pursue gathering information about the cost of such a system.  Roger suggested that in gathering that info we should also look at the purchase of a projector that can be shown on a wall painted with special paint.  The table of weekly publication of JPIC topics in the bulletin was reviewed.  Joan reminds us that there may not always be room so we need to be flexible; it will depend on the season of the church year as to whether there is space available.

 

Christian/Muslim presentation: Kathleen will contact Dr. Terrence Nichols and Dr. Adil Ozdemir after Fr. Steve and Rita provide feedback on those who critique these presentations.  A proposed date would be Tuesday, April 5th.  If we proceed with this, Gloria and Rita will contact ATCC Shari Maloney about assisting in getting the word out on the presentation. Also, if/when we proceed with scheduling this event and in an effort to get more parishioners involved, we will ‘advertise’ in the bulletin for a group of individuals to organize and provide a snack/refreshment either at an intermission or at the end of the presentation.

 

Peace Pole:  We chose 4 additional languages to reflect the peace message:  Korean, Norwegian, Swahili (Kenya & Tanzania) and Hebrew.  Rita will take care of getting this ordered.

 

Bulletin: With the likelihood of not being able to consistently have space in the bulletin, there was a discussion about asking those that are in charge of the bulletin to meet and discuss the effectiveness of the layout of the current bulletin format….looking at how the space is allocated now and is there room to modify some of the lengthier pieces to allow for others.  Kathleen shared a bulletin from Bemidji where key committees had boxed areas with logos to get their word out…it presents a very effective way to communicate and educate.

 

Other:  Fr. Steve emphasized the need for a “volunteer coordinator” in the parish.  Lack of communications between the various committees as well as the difficulties with coordinating activites between these committees and the school is less than good.  We are to give some thought to how we as a committee can do our part to enhance communication from JPIC to the other key committees.

 

National Migration Week…January 2-8:  We will use last years bulletin board and update it with the 2011 poster from USCCB and their bulletin insert. Copies of our Prayer for the Immigrant will be available for parishioners to take.  Gloria and Rita will assure that it gets put up during the Christmas/New Year week.

 

MEETING DATE CHANGE: WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 12TH, 5:30 PM….Fr. Steve can come on Wednesday’s.

 

Respectfully submitted,

 

 

Kathleen Lingor   

 

November 11, 2010 …..5:30-6:45 PM

 

Present: Gloria Deick, Sr. Rita VonHoltum, Rick Wagner, Bruce Becker, Joe Beste, Kathleen Lingor; guests Shelby and Steve____________; Abscent: Fr. Steve Binsfeld, Lori McClintock

 

Review of October 2010 minutes:  Approved as written.

 

Today’s agenda approval: Agenda was approved however it is noted that it is likely that we will not address all the items on the agenda depending on the length of the presentation on Fair Trade by our guests Shelby and Steve.

 

Fair Trade Presentation:  Shelby provided a thorough presentation on Fair Trade, how it can positively impact our brothers and sisters living in 3rd world countries and living in poverty.  She shared many informational documents about the program as well as how we as a committee and parish could begin using items such as coffee, in particular, as well as chocolate and various craft items.  Copies of these documents were provided to each committee member.  There is a set filed with these minutes.  Shelby’s suggestion was to start small, for example, order and use the coffee for all parish functions.  If at a later date we wanted to expand what we make available to parishioners, that can easily be done.  A suggestion was put forth about the possibility of having a ‘booth’ at our block party, sponsored by JPIC, where we could display a selection of products available from Fair Trade and either sell the products or take orders for purchasing.

 

Parishioners interested in JPIC from Time and Talent survey:  Rick reported that there were two parishioners who are interested in joining our committee.  He will contact these people and set up a one on one visit with each of them.

 

Mission Trip to Guatemala meeting: Rita has done some more work on this. She provided us with an informational sheet on group volunteering at the San Lucas Mission (www.sanlucasmission.org/groups_volunteer.php). She reports that it’s a matter of just setting a date and let the mission tour group leader know (someone Rita has gone on many other mission trips with) and then do the informational meetings here at the parish.  All the logistical necessities will be provided on lists from this mission planner.  We will discuss this more specifically at our next meeting.

 

Immigration Awareness Series Update:  The October 27th brown bag immigration presentation was attended by about 25 people….discussion and participation was very good.  The materials provided by Rita were excellent.  Our last presentation will be November 17th.  John Keller, immigration attorney from St. Paul will be a guest speaker.

 

Other:  There was discussion about what dollars we have available from the parish relative to funding future events.  Jim Boyle happened to be in the office and was asked that question.  He reported that there are funds available to sponsor one or two events in the remainder of the current fiscal year (ends June 30, 2011).  There was more discussion about sponsoring the two St. Thomas profs to come and present on “Can Catholics and Muslims get along?”  Mr. Boyle wholeheartedly supported having them come.  The cost would be $250.  Also, if we wanted to invite a community audience for the presentation, Professor Nichols said that they could modify it to Christian/Muslim.  We will discuss this at our December meeting.  Mr. Boyle did say that we should let him know as soon as possible. Also, we need to let him know what funds we may be requesting for the coming two years (July 1, 2011 through June 30, 3013) by no later that January.

 

We did not address items 8 (JPIC Strategic Plan) and item 10 (Social Ministry Retreat Planning).

 

Next meeting will be Thursday, December 9th at 5:30 PM.

 

Respectfully submitted,

 

 

 

Kathleen Lingor   

 

 

 


Next meeting: August 12, 2010.

 

 

Respectfully submitted,

 

 

 

Kathleen Lingor  

 

 

 

July 8, 2010 

 

Present: Fr. Steve Binsfeld, Sr. Rita VonHoltum, Rick Wagner, Lori McClintock, Bruce Becker, Kathleen Lingor.  Abscent: Gloria Deick, Joe Beste

 

Respect Life:  Lori had contacted Chris Codden at the diocesan offices and obtained several pamphlets and other informational materials regarding key ‘respect life’ issues.  There was much discussion regarding how best to utilize these materials to get the message out to parishioners on this subject.  We all agreed that recruiting new members for just this specific purpose would be advantageous. At the end of the discussion it was undetermined as to how to proceed with that.  Also we discussed how best to display the materials.

 

Peace Mass:  Our primary focus at this meeting is to plan this event.  It was decided that we would hold this on Tuesday, September 14 at the 5 PM mass with soup supper after.  Bruce and Fr. Steve will contact Craig Gould and ask his help in asking the students going on Mexican mission to share their experience with parishioners attending the event.  In preparation for that we came up with some specific questions that the students can respond to at their presentation that evening.

            What did you learn about yourself in relating to people of a different culture?

            How does the church in Mexico and the faith of the people you met tell you about their

            faith…..the living of their faith?

            How did some of the experiences you had change your attitude or your life?

            What would you like us to know about the Mexican people that you shared your time

            with…..or a specific person you shared experiences with?

Fr. Steve will take care of contacting Craig and also making announcements via pulpit and bulletin regarding the event.  Rick and Kathleen will organize the food.  (Nacho chips and salsa at the tables, chicken tortilla soup, tres leces cake).  Rita graciously agreed to donate an eight sided peace pole which will have the word “peace” carved/engraved into each of the eight sides in eight different languages.  This will be a gift from the School Sisters of Notre Dame.  Fr. Steve said he would contact a carpenter to build a base for it..

 

Kiosk (the Box):  It was agreed that ‘the box’ in its current form will be dismantled.  In its place, Rick agreed to look into building something of wood with a design that will enable us to display various printed/educational materials.  He & Fr. Steve will confer on this.

 

Other:  Again, there was much discussion on how to expand this committee.  As this was an abbreviated meeting to work on the Peace mass event, we will discuss this at our next meeting.  All were in agreement that an annual strategic plan would be very helpful.

 

 

Church of St. Mary 

Committee for Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation

May 13, 2010  5:30 PM

 

Present: Fr. Steve Binsfeld, Rick Wagner, Bruce Becker, Sr. Rita Von Holtum, Kathleen Lingor.

Abscent: Gloria Deick, Joe Beste, Lori McClintock, Dianne Watkins.

 

Prayer/Enrichment:  Sr. Rita shared the petitions for Ascension Thursday from the Franciscan Sisters daily prayerbook.

 

Recap of Long Prairie Immigration mass/meal and fellowship on April 18: We all shared our feelings of the experience. Some comments were: we noticed that the Hispanic families at mass were truly immigrants….there were no grandparents; we realized what it was like to be in an environment where we did not understand the language spoken….where we were the minority; behaviorally, we all sat together….”with our own kind”.  So when we flippantly make comments about people who are different from us not getting involved, not engaging in activities etc. made available to them, we were made aware of how and why the immigrant often seeks the comfort and security of “their own kind”.  For the remainder of the meeting we discussed how we can share our experience with our larger parish.

It was the consensus of those present that we would share pictures and a brief discussion of our experience with those parishioners who attend the coffee and rolls after the 8 AM & 10 AM masses on Sunday, June 13th.  We will contact those who attended the LP mass and ask that, if possible, they attend either of these social events to share their views. We will contact Craig Gould to invite him and the Mexican mission students to partake as well.  Prior to this event, Sr. Rita will put together a summary of our experience at LP and put this in the bulletin (and will also mention the presentations at the June 13th coffee and rolls).  Bruce will print off a few pictures to be displayed.  Rick and Bruce will put together a list of those who attended.  Fr. Steve reminded us that at any event we hold going forward we should have a sign up list to make this process easier.

 

JPIC kiosk….”the box”.  We had an idea gathering discussion as to what and how to use this make shift kiosk to educate our parishioners on the principles of social justice….we viewed the box and came up with a few ideas.  It was decided to make a concerted effort to think about a plan as to the lay out of the material to be put on it and bring this to the June meeting with the goal of getting it put together at that time. 

 

Other topics discussed: Rick shared that Brad Klinkner (a parishioner who attends the Thursday AM men’s Bible study group) was seeking a venue for a group of Calvary Lutheran men who went to Haiti after the earthquake to help with projects there.  They would like to share their story of the experience.  Our committee thought that involving them as a program with an event sponsored or coordinated by JPIC would be a good thing.  There will be more discussion on this at the June meeting.

 

Other comments:  June meeting agenda item:  Scheduling our annual Peace mass later this summer or early fall. Theology Day, April 28th, was not as well attended as the Theology day in February.  However those who attended felt it was very educational. All are looking forward to future lectures such as this.

 

Future meeting dates:  June 10th, July 8th, August 12th, September 9th, October 14th, November 11th, December 9th.  All meetings will be at 5:30 PM in the parish offices.

 

Respectfully submitted,

 

 

 

Kathleen Lingor      

 

 

 

Church of St. Mary

 

Present:

Fr. Steve Binsfeld, Rick Wagner, Lori McClintock, Sr. Rita Von Holtum, Bruce Becker, Gloria Deick. Absent: Kathleen Lingor, Joe Beste, Diane Watkins  

Prayer/Enrichment

: All recited the "Focus Prayer."

Review of Minutes:

March minutes were approved.

MN Foodshare

: The donated food was delivered to the Food Shelf. Sr. Rita suggested that we might want to do something on a more ongoing basis.

She also mentioned that some group in the church has a project collecting dental products. If we know which one it is, we might want to send them a thank you to acknowledge their efforts.

Long Prairie:

Rita met with Sr. Donna from Long Prairie on Monday. Apparently Sr. Donna was not at all aware of anything happening on 4/18. Sr. Rita is waiting for a call back from Mary at Long Prairie. The event will still happen. We may end up having to do some/all food ourselves. As soon as Rita finds out more she will let me know and I will e-mail those of you with e-mail. She didn’t know whether they would have people lined up who want to tell their story, but Rick thought they would. There is concern that some people may be defensive; we want to make sure that we come across as interested and caring and not put them in an uncomfortable position of wondering whether we have any hidden agenda. This coming weekend Rita will be at the hospitality desk before/after the 7:00 p.m. mass, Gloria the 8:00 a.m. and Bruce the 10:00 a.m. one to give out flyers about the Immigration Awareness Day.

Rita said the bigger issue is "What do we do next?" This needs to be considered a first step with some additional ones to follow. She suggested that once a month, we might try to have some programming around the broad subject of immigration—something simple, maybe Wednesdays at noon. She has several ideas of possible programs. Fr. Steve asked her to bring a proposal to the next meeting and, if approved, get it on the calendar.

Catholic Social Teaching Initiative

: The box has been painted and is ready to have items posted to it. It was agreed to try and work on it at the next meeting. Rick will e-mail something out to people.

Pro-life

: Lori got a list of legislators, representatives and senators with their phone numbers. Bruce said that this fall they plan to do a census of St. Mary’s parishioners and at that time they will ask for people’s e-mail addresses as well as topics in which they are interested. From that, they hope to set up distribution lists so that people who are interested in legislative advocacy can receive an e-mail when a topic comes up that they might want to pursue with their representative. We need to be mindful that we cannot tell people who to vote for. We can tell people what the positions of the Church are and provide links to parishioners so that they can educate themselves about candidates’ views.

Meeting adjourned approximately 6:45

The next meeting will be held Thursday, May 13, at 5:30.

Respectfully submitted,

Gloria Deick

P.S. Saturday, April 10, 2010

I talked to Sr. Rita this morning. Everything is a go! We do not need to bring food. We will probably be asked to make a financial contribution toward the food, but they will take care of preparing it. She said they have some high school students lined up to share some stories. She feels very confident that it will be a successful event and she encourages us to promote it.

 

 

 

Committee for Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation

April 8, 2010 – 5:30 p.m.

 

 

Church of St. Mary

Committee for Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation

February 11, 2010

5:30 PM

 Present: Fr. Steve Binsfeld, Rick Wagner, Gloria Deick, Bruce Becker, Lori McClintock, Diane Watkins.  Abscent:  Sr. Rita Von Holtum, Joe Beste.

Introduction of new members:  We welcomed our two newest members to our committee: Diane Watkins and Lori McClintock.  We each took turns introducing ourselves and shared what inspired us to want to be a member of JPIC.  We also took some time to share some of our efforts/projects that we've done with the parish in our brief history.  We reviewed our committee's philosophy, mission and purpose with Lori and Diane as well as the four main areas of parish social ministry.

Committee Officers and define membership:  Next month we will elect a chairperson, a vice-chairperson and secretary.  Also there will be more discussion of the number of people we should have on the committee coming from the perspective of effectively formulating projects and getting the work done.

Minnesota Food Share Month (March):  We have posters for displaying in school and in the gathering area....also there are envelopes for those who wish to make monetary donations.  Rick will put together something for the bulletin for the next two weekends.  The food drive will be a coordinated effort with the parish and the school.  Some of the posters will be given to Troy Sladek for the school.

Long Prairie Status:  We are waiting to hear back from Don Rasmussen to get the names of contact people at their parish so as to go forward with our plans for attending a Spanish mass with the parishioners at Long Prairie in April.  Kathleen will be the contact person with Don and will keep other JPIC members informed.

Other business: Rick will f/u with Ken Howell regarding setting a date for a social function to celebrate the work and services of key ministries here at our parish.

We had a spirited discussion regarding the pro-life/abortion issue.  Father again stressed the importance of identifying a plan on what we want to do, activities, educational presentations etc and making it part of or get it into our strategic plan for the year.  This is an area that Lori is very interested in.  We discussed forming a "Pro-life" group.  We want to keep this discussion going but again from the perspective of developing a long range plan to assure the effectiveness of the message and our efforts in this area.

Next meeting: March 11, 2010   5:30 PM

 There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned.

Respectfully submitted,

Kathleen Lingor

 

 

Church of St. Mary 

Committee for Peace, Justice and the Integrity of Creation

November 18, 2009 

Parish conference room:  5:00 PM to 7:00 PM

 

Present: Bruce Becker, Sr. Rita Von Holtum, Fr. Steve Binsfeld, Gloria Deick, Rick Wagner, Craig Gould, Ken Howell, Joe Beste, Kathleen Lingor 

 

As pre-determined, tonight's meeting is to be an introspective look at our committee, our structure, what we've achieved, what worked and what didn't since our inception over a year ago.

Below are some summaries discussed by committee members sharing their views on what is needed in order to get our committee back on track.

 

            Importance of going back, looking at what ministries this parish is currently engaged in.           

Ask the question what is working?  Ground ourselves again then re-look at how we can

build and work with other parish committees and their functions/ministries.

 

Look to scripture to provide the "call" for each of us to do the difficult task of working for social justice.  Give consideration to the issues of today in choosing a specific issue to work on.  Use USCCB website and church documents/statements as likely resources.

 

The four key points of social justice are: Legislative Advocacy, Direct Service, Community Organizing and Global Solidarity.

 

The need for key people from parish committees, the parish administration and the school to sit down and brainstorm on functions/ministries that we can all work together on. Hopefully this would create a larger, more organized effort on specific topics/ministries that would have input and direction from all.

 

It might be helpful to look at our committee as one that informs, educates, gathers resources and organizes guest speakers on a specific social justice issue.  Again, the issue(s) or topic(s) would be ones decided on by the key people like Fr. Steve and various parish committee members as well as Craig from the school. We would be more of the organizers not the "doers".

 

Craig Gould reported on how he is working with high school age students on justice and service.  He is looking to re-structure the confirmation service hours component and to guide adolescents in moving from awareness to actions on issues of justice.  Our committee could aid him greatly by working together to support his efforts in this area.  Again communication and coordination are key elements.  He has two young people in mind to come to our monthly meetings to provide their ideas and advocate for projects and issues they see as important.

 

Ken Howell, the liason person from the Parish Council, was introduced.  He shared his support of the events we have done thus far.  He shared a news report regarding a decrease in the percentage of pregnant women in Minnesota who have access to health care coverage and the resultant effect this has on their health and that of their babies.  He pointed out that this too is a social justice issue and how important it is for us to be the vehicle to pass information like this on to the parish.

 

Fr. Steve commented on how relatively easy it is to be charitable but that working on social justice issues is difficult.  Changing systems is tough to do.  He agreed that going back and re-looking at how we began, picking apart what worked and why certain things did not work, would be helpful in re-focusing our efforts.

 

We discussed Migration Sunday, January 3rd, with the week of January 4-10th focused on this topic.  Rick and Rita will be attending the migration/immigration presentation at St. John's tomorrow night and will bring back what resources, posters etc that the diocese will be using in raising awareness on this.  We agreed that at the very least we would be able to pull together something for a bulletin board display as well as educational pieces in the bulletin.

 

We discussed meeting times.  It was decided to change next month's meeting to Thursday, December 10th at 5:30 PM in the parish conference room.  We will hold the meeting to one hour only.  (Kathleen will check with Sonnie to assure that the parish conference room is open and reserve it.)There was also discussion about using technology as a possibility to conduct meetings.  More specific discussion is needed on this topic.

 

Even though there is an element of frustration regarding the events we have worked on up to this point, we were reminded that these efforts did make a difference to those who attended them.  Again, the importance of working with other's on the various parish committees and devising an overall parish plan to deal with the issue chosen would be a worthy effort.

 

 

 

Respectfully submitted,

 

 

 

Kathleen Lingor  

 

 

 

Church of St. Mary

Committee for Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation

October 14, 2009

 

Present: Gloria Deick, Sr. Rita VonHoltum, Rick Wagner, Kathleen Lingor.  Abscent:  Bruce Becker, Fr. Steve Binsfeld, Kay Stepan, Joe Beste and new member Ken Howell.  NOTE: Rick received notice that three of our members have resigned their position on this committee.  Mike Syverson, Joe Korkowski and Melinda Megel.

Enrichment:  Rick shared the CD he made and presented at the final soup supper on September 29.  It was very well done.  We discussed the possibility of sharing this with other parish committee's......maybe part of their beginning prayer/enrichment???  Rick will talk to Fr. Steve and Laurie about sharing the CD with a larger parish audience.

Review of September "Peace" events:  Our general consensus was that our evening and noon soup events with guest speakers were well received.  Verbal feedback primarily centered around attendees expressing that they had their views enhanced and/or changed from the presentation and material shared.

The cost of the September "Peace" events was $819.81.  The parish paid for the soup...$185 and the rest was donated.  Included in this total are donations to Wayne Whittman, Sr. Jeanne Wngentner, Patty Kaka and the School Sisters of Notre Dame for the loan of the wood sculpture "In Solidarity".

Discussion: With the resignation of three of our members, a discussion took place about the need to re-evaluate what we are about; what our goals and role should be relative to the broader picture of what is happening in the parish.  We expressed a need to have a discussion with Fr, Steve about readjusting our meeting times to possibly better accommodate his schedule so that his valuable input is more readily available when we are discussing and planning events.  Rick will get in touch with Craig and discuss possible student involvement on and with our committee.  When we set next months meeting, Craig will be invited to attend.  Rick will put a summary piece in the bulletin regarding our September "Peace" events/discussions.

Food Shelf:  We discussed that we as a committee will take the lead in organizing the parish in gathering items for the food shelf in the month of November.  Rita will put an informational piece in the bulletin the next two weekends.  Kathleen will take care of the poster and signage.  We discussed organizing a trailer to transport the food items at the end of November.  We will finalize that portion of it at our November meeting.

Ministry Fair: Kathleen will set up the booth and carry the banner at the 5 PM mass. Rick will ask Mike S. to carry in the banner at 8 AM, Gloria will man the booth at 8 AM.  Sr. Rita can do the 10 AM if needed.

October Domestic Abuse Awareness month:  Will display our poster in the commons area.

Next meeting:  Rick will get in touch with Fr. Steve and a meeting time will be determined.  He will notify the rest of the committee as to the time.

Respectfully submitted,

Kathleen Lingor 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Church of St. Mary
Committee for Peace, Justice and the Integrity of Creation
August 4, 2009
Parish conference room: noon to 2:30 PM

Present:  Rita Von Holtum, Kathleen Lingor, Gloria Deick, Joe Beste, Kathy Langer, (Catholic Charities), Ben Caduff, intern with Catholic Charities.

Rita led us in reflection and prayer.  Reflection: we focused our thoughts and prayer in remembrance of the Slave Trade and it’s Abolition and offered our input regarding our views of the many ways in which our world practices a type of slavery.

The agenda for our meeting today focused on the Peace liturgy and discussion groups we are planning to hold one day a week for four weeks in September.

We reviewed our proposed plan with Kathy and Ben and they actively participated in lending their expertise, knowledge and suggestions. The following items are ones we, as a committee, thought beneficial.
    Change the time and re-look at the brown bag lunches.  Kathy’s experience said that if
    we want to get people to attend on their lunch hours we need to include food and reduce
the time to 50 minutes (12:05 to 12:55 PM).    We thought this was a good suggestion.  Food would be Subway sandwiches (enough for about 25 people) and on the first lunch/discussion, we would buy the ingredients for additional sandwiches until we have a better handle on the numbers attending.  Either a free will offering will be advertised or will just ask for a specific amount.

Also, two things happened since our last meeting that will change the schedule and format somewhat.
      
    Rita contacted a Wayne Whittman, who is a well know speaker with the Veterans for 
    Peace in St. Paul.  He is willing to come out and do a presentation for our opening
    event on September 8th.  Rita will do his bio and get the info to Fr. Steve for putting 
    in the flyer. September 9th, Joe Beste and Rita will use a segment from the DVD
    “Soldiers for Peace” to guide the discussion.
 
September 16th:Discussion: “Our Heritage of Justice not Just Us”-The Church in the World.  Kathy Langer is available to come out to lead the noon discussion group. 
She will present statements from key church documents relating to  peace with a focus not only on the last 50-100 years but will present the Church’s response for several hundred years on civilization conflicts….give the attendee’s a perspective on how the Church has responded throughout it’s history.


September 23rd:  Discussion title: “See with New Eyes”…discussion led by Sr. Rita.
To include the shifts in our vision of the world and the prophetic mission given by
    Jesus Christ. 

    September 29th: “In the breaking and sharing of Bread, the people of St. Mary’s will be
    peace builders in our lives, our community and the world”.  5 PM mass with soup supper
    to follow.  Place the prayer cards with the flags of the nations of the world on them at 
    each place.  The prayer cards will have instruction on the back of the card to pray for
    specific people and needs of the particular country each day for the following week…..
    same as last year’s card. We discussed putting tent cards on each table with one or two
    key questions pertaining to how each person there views themselves as peace 
builders.  Sr. Rita will compose the questions and we will talk to either Joe K.,, Bruce, 
Rick or Mike to lead the group in sharing their input.  Also, Sr. Rita will compose a 
prayer, like the petitions portion of the mass or a litany, where printed copies for all are not needed. Our response will be “O God of peace and justice hear us”. 

One exciting piece is that Sr. Rita has borrowed a wood carving entitled “In Solidarity” from her mother house in Mankato.  The wood carver is Mary Anne Osborne.  She has it on loan for 2 months.  She and Fr. Steve are working on where and how it will be displayed and how we can get its message out to our parishioners. 

Kat will be responsible to coordinate getting the food for the events.  Anna Solheid from the Parish Life committee called and said some of their committee would like to help with the two evening’s that we are serving soup suppers.  I will get the soup, bread, butter, coffee and will let people know where we will need help to serve or “go-for” duties.

Rick, Bruce and Joe K. will be asked to take charge of the PA system which will be needed for September 8th,  16th (noon presentation by Kathy Langer) and 29th.  

We discussed a schedule for getting the word out on this event.  Here’s the suggestion:

    August 15-16 weekend:  The Flyer as a bulletin stuffer.

    August 22-23 weekend:   Rick to do a bulletin JPIC piece.  Sr. Rita suggested something
                        she put together on the slave trade.

    August 29-30 weekend:   Hand out peace prayer cards after weekend masses.  Kat will 
                         get volunteers for the 5 PM mass…will need a committee 
                        member to get volunteers for the 8 & 10 AM masses.
                        Notice in the bulletin announcing the program for September 8
                        and September 9th lunch discussion.

    September 5-6            Notice in the bulletin repeating the September 8 and 9th events 
                        and also announcing the event for the 16th.

    September 12-13            Notice in bulletin repeating the September 16th event and 
                        announcing the September 23rd event.

    September 19-20            Notice in bulleting repeating the September 23rd event and
                        announcing the September 29th event.

    September 26-27            Notice in bulleting repeating the September 29th event.    

Next meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, August 19th at 5 PM, parish office.

Respectfully submitted,

Kathleen Lingor            

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