Want to find out how you can be involved in the CROP Walk and help end hunger in the Charlotte region? We’ve got an organizational meeting on Tuesday, September 3 from 7- 8 pm in NLC 132/125.
Know you just want to register to walk? Details are below and you can click here to register for our team. Or, if you can’t make it to the walk and still want to help end hunger, you can donate by clicking here. Be sure to designate St. Matthew Catholic Church as your team, whether you’re walking or donating.
Sunday, October 20, 2019
1:30 PM – Walker Check-In
2:30 PM – Walk Begins
Charlotte CROP is a poverty-fighting organization that honors the call to improve the quality of life of people suffering from poverty and hunger. We educate, inspire, and empower the Charlotte community to become agents of change through fundraising events with local and international impact.
Christian Responders will be helping our neighbors in Lumberton, NC on September 13-15 and welcome your assistance and fellowship. This a great ministry for hands-on help and welcomes families with teens, and adults of all ages. Please check them out and get involved!
We invite families with children entering preschool through high school to join us for fellowship, playground time and pizza at the St. Matthew School Playground! Bring summer smiles and some school supplies to donate to the Missionaries of the Poor. Please RSVP so we will have enough pizza for all!
We welcome ladies new to the area and invite you to join our upcoming nine-week study of God’s role and love in the process of your moving transition. Meet other women new to the area, share challenging and funny moving stories, all while being encouraged and embraced by our team. The study is every Wednesday morning at 9:30am, beginning September 4th. There is a $20 class fee for the book and materials and childcare is available upon request. For more information, please email welcomeministries@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you!
We’ve got three different children’s choirs, and we need YOUR child to come join us for the fun! We raise our voices in praise of our God and sing at Masses several times throughout the year. For more info and links to each choir, see below .
Boys’ Choir (3rd – 8th grade boys) New this season!!!! Our Boys’ Choir welcomes older boys who love to sing, and who will thrive in a fun community of like-minded friends. The Boys’ Choir co-leads the congregation in song (with the Girls’ Choir) at 9 a.m. Mass every second Sunday of the month from October through May. Rehearsals: Every second and fourth Thursday, September through May, from 6 to 6:50 pm, in the choir room at the main campus. Just come to the choir room and get ready to sing! Time commitment: 50 minute rehearsals twice monthly, plus 1.5 hours for Mass once a month.
Girls’ Choir (3rd – 8th grade girls) Calling all older girls who love to sing and want to become part of a fun ministry of friends. The Girls’ Choir co-leads the congregation in song (with the Boy’s Choir) at 9 a.m. Mass every second Sunday of the month from October through May. Rehearsals: Every first and third Thursday, September through May, from 6 to 6:50 pm, in the choir room at the main campus. Just come to the choir room and get ready to sing! Time commitment: 50 minute rehearsals twice monthly, plus 1.5 hours for Mass once a month.
The Grace Notes Children’s Choir (K – 2nd grade children) This choir is a fun, uplifting, and positive way to introduce the young child to the church choir. Your child will strengthen his or her relationship with Jesus, while having a great time singing, dancing and playing through music. The Grace Notes sing a prelude to four Sunday Masses during the choir season. Rehearsals: Every first and third Thursday, September through May, from 5 to 5:30 pm, in the choir room at the main campus. Just come to the choir room and get ready to sing! Time commitment: 30 minute rehearsals twice monthly, plus 1.5 hours for Mass four times during the choir season.
It is time for an update!
How long have you been a member of St. Matthew? Our parish records are showing signs of age. Most of the information in our database was provided when you registered at St. Matthew. Much of it is outdated, particularly phone numbers and email addresses. We have reached out via email to as many households as possible, but if we have not reached you, please take a few moments to to complete the census electronically. Click here to access the census.
We want to stay in touch. Thank you!
The purpose of the Diocesan Support Appeal (DSA) is to help provide the annual funding necessary to carry out the mission of our diocese – namely to fulfill our call to “grow ever more perfectly into a community of praise, worship and witness, and to become a leaven of service and sign of peace through love in the Piedmont and Western North Carolina.” The DSA provides funding for the ministerial arm of the diocese.
The DSA provides support for more than 20 services that Catholic Charities of Charlotte offers throughout the diocese. The appeal also provides funding for the Housing Ministry, Education Ministries (providing over 30 different services), Multicultural Ministries, Eucharistic Congress, and Vocations. Some of these ministries provide services beyond the scope of individual parishes and some exist for the sole purpose of assisting parishes in their own mission to teach, evangelize and serve.
To the faithful disciples of St. Matthew Catholic Church,
I am pleased to offer for your consideration the 2019-2021 Parish Pastoral Plan for our parish family.
I was appointed as the pastor of this amazing community shortly over one year ago. In that time, I have experienced great joy in the fruits of the Holy Spirit that have been at work here since 1986. The vibrant liturgies, the sacrificial service, and the spirit of evangelization that is so evident here draws all who pass through our doors into a large, yet intimate, parish family, but most importantly, into a personal relationship with the Lord.
We are not unaware, however, of the challenges that we face in today’s world. Secular experts have declared the current times as the beginning of the “post-Christian” era. God is seen as no longer relevant in a culture that has determined truth to be subjective and the individual to be the only true god. Mass attendance is in decline, reception of the sacraments has become less common, and young people are leaving the Church in alarming numbers. Our parish community is no exception to this trend.
But we are not the first to confront a world that rejects Jesus. The first disciples, in fact, were met with skepticism, hostility, and seemingly insurmountable obstacles. Alone, they were powerless. And so they did what Jesus taught them to do—to seek an intimate relationship with the Father, who would fill them with the power that would transform the world.
Our 2019-2021 Parish Pastoral Plan, then, is based on that simple model. By fostering a deeper spirituality in our parish community, and by using the gifts we are given in our encounter with youth and young adults, we allow the Spirit to speak and act through us.
It worked 2000 years ago. With God’s help, it will work for us today.
Prayer is the key to all we do here at St. Matthew. If we are not praying for each other, and for our parish, we can’t hope to serve the Lord and his people to the best of our ability while drawing on his grace. I invite you to join in prayer for our parish and for each other every day at 3 pm. Set your cell phone alarm for 3:00 and stop…no matter what you’re in the middle of….and pray an Our Father for our parish and for intentions.
The release of the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report this past week reminds us once again of the terrible crimes that were committed by some members of the clergy, and reveals inexcusable instances of poor judgment, deception, and negligence in the pastoral care of the victims of sexual abuse. This, and the recent accusations against former Cardinal McCarrick, once again open wounds that cause many of us great pain, and have led some to question our faith and trust in the institution of the Church founded by Christ Himself.
I have had multiple discussions over the past several days with priest friends of mine, and also with the clergy here at St. Matthew. These reports cause us great pain and in some cases anger toward those entrusted with the authority to administer justice and to keep vulnerable children and adults out of harm’s way. The priests that I know well answered the call to the priesthood to serve you, to share with you God’s love and mercy, and to bring you the power of the sacraments, and we can’t understand how such abuse and injustice was tolerated by those with the power to stop it.
I humbly ask you to pray with us above all for healing and consolation for those who have been harmed, for justice to be done in each case of abuse, and that the hierarchy would decisively institute additional reforms to prevent this from happening again. While the Grand Jury report itself acknowledges that much good work hasalready been done in the last 20 years in responding to reports of abuse, much more is still necessary at the highest levels of the Church to root out any element of evil from among us.
I also ask that, as you pray with us, you also pray for us, the priests and deacons who serve you at this parish, and for all clergy, that we would always live up to our high calling of serving you, the people of God.
