Father Mike's Message - 08/14/2022

Dear Parishioners,

Welcome back to school!  Our focus now is on the beginning of a new and exciting school year.  Classes will begin on August 16th, but our teachers have been here preparing for school and getting ready to welcome back our students.  We are blessed with a growing school and a tremendous faculty and staff led by Mrs. Pahl who does an exemplary job as Principal.  

Today we are celebrating the 11:00 a.m. Mass with our school families and together we ask the Lord’s blessings on the ‘22-’23 school year.  After Mass we will have our Ice Cream Social where we can enjoy each other’s company and share the excitement of the beginning of another school year. 

You will notice links for 2 surveys in our bulletin this week, and here on our website: https://borgiaparish.org/all-things-new.  These two new surveys are now available for our parishioners as the Archdiocese of St. Louis continues with the All Things New strategic planning initiative. We encourage all parishioners to take the ‘Parish Voice Survey’ and all young adult parishioners ages 18-39 to take both the ‘Parish Voice Survey’ and the ‘All Things New Young Adult Survey.’

• Parish Voice Survey: https://bit.ly/SFBParishVoice
• ATN Young Adult Survey: https://bit.ly/YoungAdultATN

These surveys are meant to help with the strategic planning effort.  The folks who are conducting the planning need to hear from all of us.  Particularly, we need to hear from the young adult population.  So if you are in the 18-39 age group, please fill out this survey.  If you know anyone in that age group, please pass this information to them so they can take it.  Thank you for your help in spreading the word.

As you most likely know by now, we had some damage to some of our electrical equipment and appliances during the storm on Wednesday, August 3rd most likely due to a lightning strike.  We are in the midst of figuring out the extent of the damage, but so far we know that there was damage to our fire alarm system, some computer equipment, speaker system in the choir loft, live-streaming equipment, some security cameras, and some electrical outlets.  We will continue to monitor for issues and submit this for insurance assistance. Thankfully we have good lightning protection on the tower which will run a lightning strike to the ground, but the force and energy of lightning can skip around and spread in surprising ways.  There was no evidence of any fire in the tower or anywhere around campus, so we can be grateful for that.  I’ll keep you posted if there are any new developments in this matter.

As a point of interest, tomorrow is the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, a day when we celebrate Mary’s Assumption into heaven.  It is not a Holy Day of Obligation this year due to the fact that it falls on a Monday.  Our Mass time will remain at 7:00 a.m.

Please pray for our Grade School and High School and for all of our local schools as we kick off the new school year.

Have a great week. God Bless.

Fr. Mike Boehm