Message from Fr. Rick

Dear sisters and brothers in Christ,

I pray that you are blessed, healthy, and staying safe. Months ago as we entered the tunnel months of winter, who’d have guessed that we would be sealing ourselves in even more as Spring begins. As I write this letter I am sitting in our dining room looking out at Leonard Street, which has to be one of the busiest streets in all of Michigan (maybe the whole Midwest), and it is eerily quiet. The faith community across Leonard has been meeting up until yesterday. It will be interesting to see if they respect the new regulations or not. I pray they do for their own well being, if not for others.

While we cannot gather physically, we are trying to function as much like a parish as possible. While some things are still in the planning stages (we are still working the kinks out of others), there are a number of things that we are doing:

• 9:00 am mass each day
• OLPH Novena prayers on Tuesday after mass
• The Pantry is providing food (but not letting people into the building). Mon, Wed, Fri we are handing out bag lunches to the neighborhood (108 on Monday), If you’d like to volunteer to help with this please contact Michelle at 913-4415
• We’re posting various materials and videos at least every other day
• Maggie & Maureen are providing religious ed material for our youth. They are also working on activities (like a treasure hunt) to help parents keep their children busy.
• We are working on establishing a “phone-tree” so that we can stay connected, especially with our seniors and those who are alone. If you would like to be a part of this please leave a voicemail in the office. We are checking voicemails daily.
• All of the Redemptorists pastors are sharing ideas.
• IMPORTANT: to help us stay in touch we NEED your emails (and perhaps your cell phones). Even if you are sure we have it, please send a quick email to office@stalphonsusgr.org with your name in the subject line and we will add it to (or update) our new database.

If you have other ideas or needs, please do not hesitate to contact us. As I stated above, we are checking the voicemails and emails daily as we have set up most of the staff to be able to work from home. I would encourage you to reach out to loved ones and neighbors, especially those who are alone or elderly. If you have to go out for supplies, you might offer to pick them up items that they may need so they do not have to go out.

As our government tries to keep us from going into a recession, I know that many of you are anxious about your financial situation. While our financial resources are very limited, I did instruct Michelle to put our parishioners at the top of the list for what we can provide. If you are in need we can at least provide food. If you have other needs please do not hesitate to contact us and we can at least try to offer assistance.

As much as I hesitate to bring this up, I would be remiss if I did not mention the financial situation of our parish. I am very, very grateful for those who have sent in their offering and/or switched to electronic giving. I realize that it is a sacrifice and a gesture of great trust during this time. I also want to thank all of the volunteers (and the many young people) who helped with our last two fish fries, as well as, our faithful customers. It was hard to call it quits, but we felt it was the responsible thing to do. For those of you who are more financially secure, please don’t forget us for we still have bills to pay and most of our staff is still working from their homes. Our Finance Commission will be having a conference call later this week to look at our financial situation and how this pandemic is effecting it.

During this time that we are separated physically we need to remind ourselves more than ever that we are united spiritually as the Body of Christ, as The Community of Faith, as Children of God. If you believe those things then there is no “us and them,” there is only “we” united together by the love of The Father. So as we keep our “social distance” let us draw together spiritually. As we are restricted from holding hands, lets us join our hearts and souls together, as we remind ourselves that we are never truly alone. Please stay safe and God bless!

In the Redeemer, Fr. Rick

P.S. Keep an eye on our website for important information and downloads that will help us pray together as the parish of St. Alphonsus.