Dear Beloved Parishioners,
So, a few items on this windy Friday night.
The Christmas Mass Schedule is as follows:
Christmas Eve – 5pm and 10pm (not midnight as it says in the bulletin.)
Christmas Day – 9am and 11am.
Note – there are no scheduled confessions on Christmas eve from 4 – 4:45, but by appointment earlier that day only.
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If you have nothing better to do this Wednesday night, Dec. 21, and like to decorate, come and join us a 6pm in church as we make the transition from Advent to Christmas in our decor.
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Live Nativity – come dressed for the weather – Thursday night, Dec. 22 from 5-7p, in the lower parking lot… Enter the upper parking lot driveway, (closest to Robyn) and make your way along the left side of the front doors of church, past the school, rectory and finally to our manger scene. You will find everything from Angel Choirs to Santa to the Manger Scene with live animals, from 5 to 7pm…
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ALL THINGS NEW – several items here…
First, you may have already gotten an email from the Archdiocese with information about the survey sent to parents and guardians of our school age children. Here is a letter with the links, not just to the Archdiocesan survey results, but also to the St. Justin Martyr sub-results from that same survey. And here is the introductory letter from Fr. Martin about that survey.
Dear Parents and Guardians,
In this season of Advent, please know of my gratitude for your commitment to form and educate your
children in our Catholic faith!
As you know, as part of All Things New, the Archdiocese of St. Louis is examining our parishes, schools, ministries and agencies, evaluating our effectiveness in proclaiming the Gospel. Our goal is to “make all things new” by Gospel renewal and to enhance our evangelization to secure a vibrant future for our current students, as well as their children and grandchildren, by creating an educational model that is accessible, affordable, strong in Catholic identity, and more equitable towards our teachers.
As part of this prayerful discernment, Archbishop Rozanski recently sought additional input and feedback from current school families about their Catholic school experiences. More than 10,000 parents and guardians responded to their survey by answering both multiple choice and open ended questions.
Attached are the results of the parent survey specific to your school, as well as an Archdiocesan overview of all the parent and teacher responses across the Archdiocese. You will see graphs representing the multiple choice responses. We are not publicly sharing the responses to the open ended questions to protect the privacy of those who wrote them. We have shared them with your pastor and principal and, be assured; members of the All Things New Leadership team have read them all. They have provided excellent and important feedback to the Archbishop regarding your values and desires as they relate to the future of Catholic education in the Archdiocese of St. Louis. You can also find the graphs representing every school and the overview of all the responses throughout the Archdiocese of St. Louis at allthingsnew.archstl.org
For any questions pertaining to All Things New, contact allthingsnew@archstl.org.
Please know of my prayers for you and your families for a blessed Advent!
Fr. Chris Martin
Vicar for Strategic Planning
FINAL-ParentGuardian-Survey-Results-1022.pdf
Parent—St-Justin-Martyr-School.pdf
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Follow up from the Listening Sessions
As you know, the survey to give additional feedback following the listening sessions is live until December 31st. If you have not read the information posted about our parish and our planning area, and neighboring planning areas, it would be helpful to do so before you answer the survey questions. Go to Allthingsnew.archstl.org – search for Planning Process and then and then click on the link for Planning Area 5…
Once done, you can find the survey at the bottom of all that information, or at the link below:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/ATNPS1FeedbackForm
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The Song of the day is perhaps the iconic Advent song in many people’s mind. Technically, it highlights the “O Antiphons” which we begin tomorrow (Dec. 17th) as part of the evening prayer of the church. I thought it helpful to let you hear one of my favorite instrumental versions of that song. Each Antiphon highlights an Old Testament “type” of Jesus – Emmanuel, Root of Jessie, Rising Sun, Key of David, King, Lord and Wisdom. (In Latin, they are a reverse anagram of the words ‘ero cras’ – meaning: I will come tomorrow, a clever way to help one memorize the order and the antiphons.)
blessings,
fr. bill