St. Mary Catholic Church

DeKalb, Illinois

     

All parish volunteers need to complete Protecting God’s Children, undergo a background check, and read a few important documents. Please contact Mona O'Bryan at the parish office 815-758-5432 x 107 if you are unsure if you have completed all the requirements or to answer any questions you may have. Thanks for your prompt cooperation with this important US Bishop's initiative.

We need your financial support to complete future improvement projects! If you can help, please give what you can to our Capital Improvements Fund using the mailed envelopes or through our online giving system. God bless you in advance for your generous support! If you have questions, email Ann Hickey at annh@stmarydekalb.org.

Attention Volunteers!  An update to the Youth Guidelines (in sections E and F) requires all volunteers to sign a revised copy. You can do so by printing this document and returning a signed copy to the parish office as soon as possible. Please note that the Safe Environment protocol has been instituted for the safety of those most vulnerable. We appreciate your compliance as we work to protect our community.

From the desk of Pope Francis: On the Call to Holiness in Today’s World, 100-103…

I regret that ideologies lead us at times to two harmful errors. On the one hand, there is the error of those Christians who separate these Gospel demands from their personal relationship with the Lord, for their interior union with him, from openness to his grace. Christianity thus becomes a sort of NGO stripped of the luminous mysticism so evident in the lives of St. Francis of Assisi, St. Vincent de Paul, St. Teresa of Calcutta, and many others. For these great saints, mental prayer, the love of God and the reading of the Gospel in no way detracted from their passionate and effective commitment to their neighbors: quite the opposite. The other harmful ideological error is found in those who find suspect the social engagement of others, seeing it as superficial, worldly, secular, materialist, communist or populist. Or they relativize it, as if there are other more important matters, or the only thing that counts is one particular ethical issue or cause that they themselves defend. Our defense of the innocent unborn, for example, needs to be clear, firm and passionate, for at stake is the dignity of human life, which is always sacred and demands love for each person, regardless of his or her stage of development. Equally sacred, however, are the lives of the poor, those already born, the destitute, the abandoned and the underprivileged, the vulnerable infirm and elderly exposed to covert euthanasia, the victims of human trafficking, new forms of slavery, and every form of rejection. We cannot uphold an ideal of holiness that would ignore injustice in a world where some revel, spend with abandon and live only for the latest consumer goods, even as others look on from afar, living their entire lives in abject poverty. We often hear it said that, with respect to relativism and the flaws of our present world, the situation of migrants, for example, is a lesser issue. Some Catholics consider it a secondary issue compared to the “grave” bioethical questions. That a politician looking for votes might say such a thing is understandable, but not a Christian, for whom the only proper attitude is to stand in the shoes of those brothers and sisters of ours who risk their lives to offer a future to their children. Can we not realize that this is exactly what Jesus demands of us, when he tells us that in welcoming the stranger we welcome him (cf. Mt. 25:35)? St. Benedict did so readily, and thought it might have “complicated” the life of his monks, he ordered that all guests who knocked at the monastery door be welcomed “like Christ”, with a gesture of veneration; the poor and pilgrims were to be met with “the greatest care and solicitude”.

In Christ, Son of Mary,
Fr. Russell

2018 CONTINUING EVENTS @ ST. MARY

2nd & 4th Wednesdays - St. Mary Men's Group - "A Pope and a President"

Tuesdays - Teen Tuesday High School Youth Group 



SUMMER EVENT

Thursday, July 12th - St. Mary Ladies Night - Potluck, Games & Swimming (details on the Parish Facebook page) hosted by a parishioner at her home in Malta

EXTRAORDINARY MINISTERS OF THE HOLY EUCHARIST TRAINING
August 13 @ 6:30pm AND August 18 @ 10:00am - in the Church.
Please contact the parish office (815)758-5432 to volunteer to serve Our Lord as a Eucharistic Minister, prior to attending a training session.



SAVE THE DATES!
St. Mary Women at the Well RETURNS this Fall!  Please mark your calendars for September 13th and December 6th.  Watch the bulletin and parish Facebook page for details closer to the dates!