Please Pray for Haiti!!!!

The following is from the Partners in Health website, giving us an update on how the two hurricanes are affecting life for the poor in Haiti. Please remember our brothers and sisters in Haiti, and remember that when you support our Mission to Haiti at KCHS or through Sacred Heart, you are indirectly supporting PIH as well. Please keep reading for an update:

Dear Friends, Haiti needs your help.

This morning, after watching images of howling wind and torrential rain tearing through Haiti, I received a note from a colleague in Haiti explaining the devastation that Hurricanes Gustav and Hanna left in their wakes. Loune Viaud, our Director of Operations in Haiti, explained that the situation is dire and the suffering extreme. She estimates that close to 10,000 people have been driven from their homes by floodwaters in Haiti’s Artibonite Valley, where we have recently expanded our operations to six new facilities.

We’ve received reports of families, doctors, and patients are stranded on roof tops as water floods homes, hospitals, and health centers and reports of social workers wading through nearly four feet of water hoping to get patients and their families to safety. While the effects are hard to quantify so soon after the disaster, there is a clear and desperate need both for emergency relief and for long-term assistance to address the vicious cycle of poverty, environmental degradation and disease, which is guaranteed to intensify in the aftermath of this crisis.
In an effort to stem the suffering of our patients, their families, and the communities we serve, PIH has taken some immediate action:

Patients at the hospital in Gonaïves, who were sent to the rooftop as the wards filled with water, are being evacuated to Hôpital Saint Nicolas in Saint Marc.
Our social work staff is doing whatever it takes to find our patients and their families in the most devastated areas and to ensure that they have all of the support and assistance they need.
Organizational partnerships and community-level collaborations are underway to ensure that those who have been displaced or lost all of their belongings have food, water, housing, and a place off of the wet ground to sleep.
Our hospitals and health centers are preparing for thousands of additional patient visits in the coming weeks and are planning long-term reconstruction and support efforts.
We ask you, now, during this time of tremendous suffering, to take action with us. Please help us keep our promises to the communities we serve as we provide additional services and support in the wake of this unforeseen, and certainly unbudgeted, disaster.

Please Pray for Central High School...

Our hearts go out to the community of Central High School. To the students, teachers, parents, staff, and administration... know that we are praying for you all, especially for the MacDonald and Siler familes. (photo by J. Mies Cary-Knoxnews.com)

Welcome Back Irish!

As you probably already know, school starts promptly at 8:05 tomorrow morning, and as is the case each year, there are some new faces (about 150 of them) and some people that we'll miss seeing from last year. There are many new teachers that will bring new experience to Catholic, but many folks will be lost tomorrow so let's all be nice and help the newcomers out.

Please be sure to welcome any of our priests that will be coming and going each day, offering the mass for us in the midst of their already hectic schedules. This week, we'll have Fr. Bill McNeeley on Monday, Fr. Bill Gahagen on Tuesday, and Fr. Alex Waraksa on Wednesday; be sure to thank them when you see them and let them know we appreciate their presence.

Our First Mass of the Year at KCHS

Today, we celebrated mass for the first time this school year in the Holy Trinity Chapel during our annual Leadership Workshop. Monsignor Mankel came and offered the sacrifice of the mass. Some would look to the cheerleading squad to see an example of the greatest school spirit at KCHS, or to a member of one of our excellent sports teams. But to those who have spent more than four years on Fox Lonas or on Magnolia, our two Monsignors rank far above any cheerleader in showing their life-long support of our singular Catholic high school in Knoxville.

With the echo's of today's Gospel reading where Jesus hands the keys to Peter and proclaims him the rock of the Church, I sat and thought about Mnsgr.'s Mankel's tenure as student, teacher, priest, administrator, principal, superintendent, Vicar General, and spiritual director. Fifty-five years has passed since the day that then Xavier Francis Mankel entered KCHS as a freshman and a mere mortal. He has been standing watch ever since, participating in our growth through the years, and is steadfast as an icon of how to respond to God's call.

In an era when priestly vocations are down, and the crosses are being removed from classrooms around our country, we are growing. Statistically, our Diocese is experiencing a boom time as compared with the rest of the country, with multiple seminarians moving through their formation and towards ordination. KCHS now has it's first every priest become elevated to bishop just last year when our Fr. Vann became Bishop Johnson. Next week, there will be various pastors coming to offer the mass for us in the chapel; these priests will offer us over 150 years of preaching experience. Please continue to pray that we will receive a new bishop soon, and that he will assign us a new spiritual director to replace our learned Fr. Orr. -dpat

my favorite image from italy...

Of all the photos that I shot while in Italy this summer, and of all the beautiful things my wife and I saw there, this image trumps them all, and it should. It is St. Peter's at the Vatican and is the singular church on the planet that gives glory and praise to God with each nail, dab or mortar, frescoe, and piece of polished marble. We visited many churches while in Rome, but none even come close to compare with St. Peter's. This photo was shot in the evening around 7:30pm. The light only comes through the windows in the dome for a few minutes each day; it was a masterpiece to behold: God lighting His sanctuary for me. And so it's only appropriate to share it with you... Deacon Pat :)

Our hearts and prayers go to the Reyda family...

Our hearts are heavy this night as we pray for the repose of the soul of Ken Reyda, Mick Reyda's brother. Mick serves us all well in keeping us safe from harm as he handles Catholic's security throughout each school day. We join Mick and his family in praying for Ken, his wife Dina and their two children. It takes a special person to swear an oath to serve and protect total strangers, but that's what the men in blue do for us 24/7/365. When an officer leaves us like this, we all lose. Thank God we can have an ultimate hope in our Lord Jesus Christ, who lifts us up in hard times and gives us grace as we need it to make it through. Please join me in praying the rosary sometime this week for the Reyda family, who very much needs our powerful support through prayer. May God Bless Ken, in the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy spirit, Amen.

Deacon Pat is in Roma, Italy!!!

Yesterday, as Ellie and I visited different sites here in Rome, we visited one of the many churches here devoted to Mary but this one was special as it entombed St. Catherine of Siena who was a great mystic, and doctor of the Church. She was largely responsible for convincing Pope Gregory to return the Papacy to Rome from France. She was consulted by Popes, Kings, and great leaders about all kinds of issues because people knew her to be close to God. Funny thing is she was a Doctor of the Church who was illiterate. How much more could we do, being able to read and write? Something to think about...