…”Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy, and my burden light.” In these early days of July, this weekend’s Gospel offers us the perfect promise of Christ. For most summer is a time of rest and renewal. Jesus says to us, “Come to me….and I will be your rest.” Every day and always Jesus wants to renew us and refresh us with the love of God. How can we use these summer days to come to the Lord? How can we allow Christ to be the well spring of our peace? “Come to me….and I will give you rest.”
…Rest is well deserved for our parish after an amazing summer festival last weekend. It was an amazing gathering of our community. So many working together. So many joining us. One of our new members said on Monday night, “it was wonderful to see so many good people and good families coming together. The energy was amazing. And everyone was so kind and helpful.” Beyond words is my gratitude to God for you. It was truly a celebration for our entire community of the goodness of Saint Ambrose Parish. Thank you so much. Special thanks to Bob Cebula and Jake Bihari and their amazing committee who really worked hard and strengthened our summer festival.
…Today’s bulletin contains a complete list of all the winners of the raffles and Baskets. Truth be told – all of us are winners – as we came together in a wonderful spirit of goodness, cooperation, support and generosity. Special thanks to Bob and Lisa Hicks for leading our festival raffle. They did an amazing job for our community. We were blessed with your great support and some amazing prizes. Please join me in personally thanking those who provided GREAT prizes: Gary Panteck and his family at Brunswick AutoMart; Bill Coyle at Encompass the World Travel; Mike Strmac at Universal Windows Direct; along with our good friends at Marc’s and Brunswick Brunswick Power Equipment. We are so blessed.
…As you can imagine, making the decision to cancel Friday night of the festival was easy and hard. Easy in that I always want to make sure you/everyone is safe. Hard because you can never be sure if the weather predictions are accurate. Needless to say, your safety always comes first. God (and you) certainly blessed the right decision by the outpouring of people and support the other three nights. It looks like we made up the lost night and then some. Watch for a full report in a few weeks. Thanks again.
…The festival happens because of lots of volunteers. It also gets put together and cleaned up thanks to our Building and Grounds volunteers. They were/are simply amazing. And even as they packed up the festival they were already hard at work making sure our campus is put back together and in good repair for the upcoming school year. God bless our B/G volunteers. Thanks also to our maintenance staff. Nick Castro lead the charge to make sure everyone had what they needed.
…One of the highlights of the festival was seeing so many friends and neighbors from Saint Martin Parish. As you know, we are helping and serving their parish after the passing of Fr. Dunphy. We invited them to join us…and so many did. In that same spirit of mutual support, please join them at Saint Martin on Sunday, July 9 for their annual Chicken Dinner. It’s great food…friendly people….and a wonderful way to support our neighbors.
…Last week we again started morning Mass on Wednesday and Friday at 8:00 am at Saint Martin. Our goal is to make sure that everyone in our region has the opportunity for daily Mass. Our website has a complete schedule of daily Masses in our region. Given the summer schedules and lighter daily Mass attendance, there will be no Friday 5:30 pm Mass during July and early August.
…Our Vacation Bible School is coming soon (July 10 to 14). Janet Majka and her team are hard at work planning an amazing experience for our young members. We are planning for over 300 participants supported by over 150 volunteers. Simply amazing….a great blessing for our community. There’s still room for you, your children and grandchildren (neighbors and friends too)!! See today’s bulletin for details.
…This past Monday our parish staff had the opportunity to meet Matt Fodor our new music minister. After some refreshments, he and Tom Bonezzi were hard at work planning to make sure everything is set for the fall and a great start to the pastoral year.
…Although Saint Ambrose School doesn’t start back up for another eight weeks, it’s been a blessing beyond words to see so many of our faculty around the school working with Mrs. Cinadr to plan for an amazing school year. We are blessed. We also received word that six of our students have received Jon Peterson Scholarships. This program provides extra resources so we can more effectively respond to all of our students learning needs in our community of faith. If you would like to learn more about how we can serve your child(ren), please contact Breanne Logue 330.460.7318 , Mrs. Cinadr 330.7350 or Mrs. Mitchell (for Preschool) at 330.460.7361.
…Special thanks to Roger Nair and Bryan Billman and NEO Landscape Management for their great help for our summer festival. They joined our Gardening Angels in making sure that our entire campus was in great shape for all of our visitors. They are also taking care of our baseball field so it can be a safe and well-cared for place for our entire community. Check it out. See the improvements
…This past Friday was the end of our fiscal year (June 30). The Parish Finance Council met this past Wednesday for their monthly meeting. We always give thanks to God for your continued support for our parish community. From your weekly offering to our parish festival, your generosity and goodness to the work of the Lord is a blessing to our community. Thank you so much for all you do. God bless you.
…This coming week our Vision 20/20 planning team is meeting with several liturgical design consultants to help us address the needs in our Church. The process is moving a little slower than hoped. Watch for more details in the near future.
…”Come to me” is the invitation and the promise of the Lord. May these summer days give you much time to find rest and peace in God’s abiding presence. Thank you again and again for a great festival and more importantly, for all you do for our parish community. Have a blessed week.
