Dear parishioners of St. Michael’s and St. Mary’s:

We have completed the great seasons of Advent and Christmas. It is a time of personal spiritual renewal and a time to focus on the many blessings our Lord has given to each of us. One of the blessings we all share in our community is a core of dedicated people staffing our parish offices, school and faith formation programs. These people work hard to provide a superior liturgical, educational, and social environment that builds our Catholic community. As you can see above, we face a serious shortfall in operating revenue. I have rejected the idea of immediately reducing staff to make up the shortfall with payroll cuts. The impact on service and operations would simply be devastating to our ministry and service programs as we already made cuts last year. Each parish, the school and faith formation has established a very reasonable operating budget to provide the support and programming that you expect. We were very careful in formulating these budgets and are confident that we have the potential to meet them. I am asking all parishioners to make an extra effort over the next six months to help each parish close the shortfall we currently face. I am particularly reaching out to those who have not made any donations to the parishes. It is critical for all of our members to participate as fully as possible in helping us to build God’s Kingdom here in Stillwater. Please prayerfully consider beginning to donate, if you have not been, or adding an additional 8% if you have already been supporting the community. We all have so much to be thankful for, and I am grateful for all of the support given to the parishes, School, Faith Formation, and Capital Campaign. Let us make 2010 a year of great thanksgiving through stewardship of time, talent and treasure.

With my prayers and blessings,
Fr. Michael J. Miller