As We Grow Closer to Christ, St. Timothy Pa
Reflects on Five Y T
his spring, the global pandemic that began changing the way Americans live — and worship — was an unprecedented event. While St. Timothy, like all Catholic churches across the world, had to adapt to new ways of serving God’s people, one thing remained the same — the strong faith and active discipleship of our parish family. Reflecting on the last five years, it is evident that stewardship has truly become a way of life for our parishioners. We are blessed that so many of the faithful here at St. Timothy have chosen to “remain in Him” despite the various changes that come with social distancing. In 2015, parishioners made 1,878 prayer commitments during our stewardship renewal weekend. By last fall, that number had risen to 4,905, representing a 160-percent increase over just five years! While sharing our talents with our various parish ministries has been more difficult this year due to the pandemic, prayer remains a blessing that can never be taken away. In addition, an increase in prayer leads to an increase in faith. For these reasons, we are especially grateful for the growing prayer life of our faith family. “The increase in prayer commitments has been pretty miraculous,” says Julie Pope, Stewardship Council Chair. “As I see stewardship at St. Timothy, it’s a way to help facilitate our parishioners coming closer to Christ. We think of it as all starting with prayer, and then what comes from that — the sharing of your time, of your talent and treasure, all of which comes from God. Our goal is to help our parishioners increase their prayer lives and their relationship with Christ.” In the last several years, St. Timothy has initiated Eucharistic Adoration and has also become a tithing parish, meaning that 10 percent of our collection goes to local and state outreach. Without a doubt, these two changes have brought many blessings to our parish. Parishioners have also increased their commitments to serving in ministries by 48 percent over the last five years, and our offertory gifts have grown by another 45 percent in the same amount of time. While it is wonderful to look at our stewardship activity “by the numbers” and see how our parishioners are committed to living as intentional disciples of Christ, there are also other ways the faithful have continued to serve, even as COVID-19 has temporarily suspended the activities of many ministries. One example is our St. Vincent de
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