St. Jude Church and Shrine

Dear Parishioners:

Through your continuing contributions and support, our St. Vincent de Paul team was able to help 233 people this fiscal year (ended September 30th), including family members.  That added up to over $36,000 in direct payments, plus $6,500 in in-kind donations of food and clothing.  Nearly two-thirds of the direct payments were for a place to live:  temporary housing and rent accounted for 64% of our assistance.

Most of that financial help came from you.  Your contributions to our poor boxes in church, our two second-collections each year, our fundraisers, and other donations equaled 60% of our receipts for the year.  Plus, your help with our food pantry and our clothing drives play an important part in our efforts.

Our members also made generous donations to the cause.  But their larger contribution was in the person commitment they make.  During the year, they made 97 in-person visits to neighbors in need, logging 762 hours and traveling 1,664 miles in the process.

We receive assistance from other groups and individuals.  These include our youth groups, the Knights of Columbus, the Ancient Order of Hibernians, other St. Vincent de Paul conferences, and agenices and organizations in the area, as well as matching contributions from corporations.  To all of them, we extend our sincere appreciation, too.

Our St. Jude team is one small part of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, founded in 1833, now with over 800,000 lay Catholic members in 150 countries.  We try to live our mission:  A network of friends, inspired by Gospel values, growing in holiness and building a more just world through personal relationsips with and service to people in need.

To all who support us in this miission, thank you and God bless you.  We ask you to continue that support.  Please contact us at 267-903-4884 or svdp.saintjude@gmail.com for information or to join us in our work.  If you know of someone needing assistance, please call us, or ask them to call us.

What a wonderful parish! God bless you.
Bill Tavani, president, St. Jude Conference of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul
Our email address is: svdp.saintjude@gmail.com 

About the St. Vincent de Paul Society

The Society of St. Vincent de Paul is a worldwide Catholic lay organization through which men and women grow spiritually by offering person-to-person service to the needy and suffering.  It was established in 1833 by Frederic Ozanam and named for our patron, St. Vincent de Paul, the patron of all works of charity.  The people that we in the St. Jude Conference serve do not need to be parishioners or Catholics to request assistance, they just need to live within or near our parish boundaries.  The vision of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul is to embrace the world in a network of charity.
 
Our conference has been present at St. Jude Parish since 2016.  The central and most basic activity of conferences is the visitation of the needy in their homes.  This is the clearest symbol of our Vincentian charism, which dictates the highest respect for the people we serve.  Vincentians always visit in pairs, emphasizing our status as a community.  We go as neighbors to listen, offering prayer, hope and support.  Sometimes we provide advice, sometimes we help them utilize community or parish resources, sometimes we provide rides, sometimes we provide assistance with bills, but we always offer hope and prayer.  Since formed, our Parish Conference has helped hundreds of neighbors in need. 
 
Our conference meets twice monthly, on the second and fourth Thursdays.  We typically help our neighbors with small financial assistance but also provide food from our pantry and often link people with other charitable groups who can team with us to provide further help.  Most of our members contribute a few hours each month to our conference. 
 
If you would like to join us in our work, we welcome you!  We have a Board that meets twice a month and Associates who help us with projects as needed.  Some of our projects include:

• Twice a year, we arrange for a Green Drop truck to visit the parish for donations of clothing and/or housewares.
• Providing Thanksgiving meals for some of our neighbors in need.
• Helping to fill Christmas wish-list requests for the people we serve.
• Assisting the Aid for Friends committee in our Parish to make meals for the isolated homebound.  The meals go to local folks and to neighboring areas where they are needed.

President: Bill Tavani
SVDP email address: svdp.saintjude@gmail.com