V.O.I.C.E.

Brother Knights:

In a short while we will celebrate Palm Sunday, and as we approach Holy Week, the last week of Lent, Easter is on the horizon.  But let us not forget the traditions and teachings that we observe as Catholics during Lent of sacrificing and offering our “time, talents, and treasures” for the good of the Church and our brothers and sisters

This year during Lent, we were blessed with a perfect opportunity to serve the vulnerable among us when St. Mary’s hosted the hypothermia shelter for a week.  We did this in partnership with two Protestant congregations, St. George’s United Methodist Church and Burke Presbyterian Church. St Mary’s had many parishioners volunteering in different capacities.

We now have before us another opportunity to serve the vulnerable in our community, hose without a voice.  For more than a year, St. Mary’s has been participating in a regional, interfaith effort, which has recently been given the name V.O.I.C.E. (Virginians Organized in Interfaith Community Engagement, V.O.I.C.E.’s goal is to bring about positive change for poor and vulnerable members of our community.  This change will be accomplished by uniting hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people from faith communities throughout Northern Virginia to advocate for causes that we will choose and bring he forefront.   We want to create a critical mass that will make political leaders take notice -- for then and only then, can we expect change.  In the past, we have done many works of  charity; it’s time for us to get to the root causes of the problems  We all know the quote from Pope Paul VI, “If you want peace, work for justice” let us unite our voices with others and raise our VOICE so we can and will be heard.

We need to hear what issues YOU think are important for poor and vulnerable people in our community. Please join us in Farrell Hall on Sunday, March 16, at 2:00 p.m. (We promise to be finished by 4:00 p.m.!)  We will take the issues raised on March 16 to the V.O.I.C.E. meeting in April, where we will share them with members of the other faith communities and hear about their concerns of their communities.

For more information, contact:

John Enzmann at jenzmann@cox.net or (703) 425-1104

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