Bulletin for Sunday, February 7

Annual Catholic Appeal
I invite you to spend some time this week reflecting on the Annual Catholic Appeal materials you should have received in your bulletin or in the mail. The Annual Catholic Appeal is much different than a one-time special collection: It is a pledged commitment to make a gift over time. Your pledge can be made payable in installments.

Each pledge makes a difference because all parishes participate in the campaign and the gifts of many enable our archdiocese to deliver needed ministries and services to answer the call of Jesus to “Come, follow me … and bring hope to the world.” 

There is an option to make a gift on mobile phones via a text-to-give number for this year’s Appeal. Here is the phone number and keyword:

• Text to Phone Number: 345345
• Keyword: ACA2021 (not case sensitive)

1. Using a mobile device, open your text message application.
2. Enter the text to phone number 345345 in the To: section.
3. Type the keyword “ACA2021” (not case sensitive) in the message of your text application.
4. Hit the send button.
5. A text reply to your phone will give you a hyperlink to a secure online giving form.
6. Complete your gift by filling out the form and submitting it.  
7. Gifts will be processed by the Annual Catholic Appeal. 

The readings begin with the troubling story of Job. Unimaginable suffering and loneliness descend upon this poor person for no good reason. Job’s friends are important characters and start well. They show up, mirror his distress but then veer off into victim-blaming and impose meaning on his circumstances by speaking for God and holding Job’s imagined bad behavior and impiety responsible for his losses and pain.

These were not healing encounters. We humans want and seek meaning, which is usually a good thing. But meaning often gets tangled up in the myth of meritocracy in a just world, which can’t allow for bad things happening to blameless people. 

In contrast, Mark’s gospel gives us Jesus beginning his ministry as a gifted healer. He heals Simon’s mother-in-law of a fever. Jesus meets her where she is, risks taking her hand, and heals her without interpreting her suffering or explaining God’s methods to her. Jesus brings God’s empathy and kindness, leaving blame where it belongs, outside the relationship as irrelevant and damaging.

Our country has been fevered. Many of us have been so angry and many more are grieving, bowed, or broken by illness, cruelty, poverty, and injustice. We have heard a compelling call for healing from our new administration. I pray we can answer it because we all need it. I pray we can practice the healing art of Jesus. I pray we have the courage and generosity to choose empathy over blame. I pray we choose to meet as fellow sufferers and not enemies. To bring kindness, not judgment, and to heal the grief we share.

~ KC Conway for Growing in Faith 

• PDF of readings for February 7
• PDF of lyrics, music, and copyright info for February 7
• Music planned and hymn numbers from Breaking Bread Hymnal:
  • Entrance: Healing River of the Spirit, #664
  • Gloria: Barker
  • Psalm: #147, Praise the Lord, who heals the broken-hearted
  • Gospel Acclamation: Alleluia from Mass of Endless Mercy
  • Offertory: Your Words are Spirit and Life, #592
  • Mass Parts: Mass of Renewal, #876
  • Communion: We Remember, #493
  • Recessional: Go Make a Difference, #499

This weekend, our cantors will be:

• Saturday, February 6 at 5:00 pm - Siobhan O’Neill Meluso
• Sunday, February 7 at 8:00 am - Jon Blake
• Sunday, February 7 at 10:30 am - Dana Sullivan

Please note, we ask that those attending Mass in person do not sing due to concerns that singing may spread germs further than six feet.

Our Eucharistic ministers are:

• Saturday, February 6 at 5:00 pm - Tim Harrington
• Sunday, February 7 at 8:00 am -  Barb Daly
• Sunday, February 7 at 10:30 am -  Patrick Robinson

Our readers this weekend are:

• Saturday, February 6 at 5:00 pm - Jayne Deiters
• Sunday, February 7 at 8:00 am - Marty McDermott
• Sunday, February 7 at 10:30 am - Troy McMillian

Our set-up/greeter team this weekend is:

• Saturday, February 6 at 5:00 pm -  TBA
• Sunday, February 7 at 8:00 am -  TBA
• Sunday, February 7 at 10:30 am - TBA

Our clean-up team this weekend is:

• Saturday, February 6 at 5:00 pm -  TBA
• Sunday, February 7 at 8:00 am -  TBA
• Sunday, February 7 at 10:30 am -  TBA

We still need other volunteers to fill teams for greeting/set-up and clean-up.  For safety reasons, volunteers should be between 18-64 years of age and not have conditions that would put them at risk for negative outcomes from COVID-19 infection (immunosuppressive therapy, heart or lung disease, cancer, etc.)
 

We still need other volunteers to fill teams for greeting/set-up and clean-up.  For safety reasons, volunteers should be between 18-64 years of age and not have conditions that would put them at risk for negative outcomes from COVID-19 infection (immunosuppressive therapy, heart or lung disease, cancer, etc.)

If you would like to participate on a team, please download this form and email it to Kevin Chears at kchears@stgertrudechicago.org and include your preferred e-mail and telephone number. 

Visit smile.amazon.com and select St Gertrude Parish as your charity of choice. From then on, connect to Amazon through smile.amazon.com and St. Gertrude will automatically benefit as your charity of choice.

We have set up a "Text to Give" option through GiveCentral. Parishioners are welcome to text the word Donate to 1.773.741.9505 to make a donation via phone.  

The Archdiocese has an online giving option via the Archdiocesan website. You simply click on the link and it takes you to the website. Once there, you determine if you want to contribute via a credit card or a checking account. You fill out the form, including selecting the parish to which the contribution is going, and the money will be electronically debited. The site offers options for amounts and the frequency of the contribution. 

To access our PayPal link, please visit our parish website and donate from there. 

For more information on text to give or to sign up for online giving, please email Art Blumberg, Director of Parish Management and Facilities, at ablumberg@stgertrudechicago.org. He will be happy to help in any way he can. 

• Jean Bautista
• Walter Bradford
• Sharon Brown 
• Connie Bueck
• Lilly Buie
• Maggie Callaway
• Aida Calvopina 
• Geraldine Clark
• Connie Cool
• Lois DiFruscio
• Lucia Hall
• Gina Heidkamp
• Maria Hertl
• The Hoynes Family
• Bernice Kiedysz
• Karey Myers  
• Braedon Rimpson
• Mickey Resch
• Charley Scantlebury 
• Richard Seitz 
• Peggy Stoffel
• The Sullivan family 
• Elinora E. Tolentino
• Norma E. Viray
• Ken & Vyes Yoza