CV NEWS FEED // The United States Bishops awarded more than $10 million of its national collections to support pastoral and social ministries in the US and to the Church in need abroad, according to a December 4 press release.
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) made these decisions in their annual November meeting in Baltimore earlier this year.
“The generous contributions that Catholics put into the basket for these collections change lives and bring people closer to Jesus,” stated Bishop James S. Wall of Gallup, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on National Collections, in the USCCB press release.
About $1.2 million will fund missions in the US, but most of the USCCB’s charitable efforts will go abroad. Nearly $3.2 million will go to the Church in Latin America, $3.6 million to Central and Eastern Europe, and $916,400 to Africa. More than $1 million will go to Emergency Disaster Relief, which helps parishes across the world recover from regional catastrophes.
“On behalf of each person and parish community that will benefit from these grants, I thank the Catholics of the United States for their generosity,” continued Wall. “Millions of people here in the United States as well as in Latin America, Africa, and Central and Eastern Europe will experience God’s love through these gifts.”
The funding prioritizes different missions across the Church, from Eucharistic renewal to ministry for the elderly.
Missions at Home
Of the $1.2 million that will go to Catholic Home Missions, $100,000 will go to supporting vocation outreach in one of the poorest dioceses in the US, the Diocese of Las Cruces in New Mexico. Las Cruces has 86 parishes and missions, but only 56 priests.
Another $100,000 will help mission dioceses participate in national Catholic renewals such as the Eucharistic Revival and the Synodal process and aid their ministry to migrants and ethnic minorities. In addition, $120,000 will go towards safe environment training and disaster preparedness for church staff and leaders.
Missions Abroad
Of the $3.2 million that will go towards Latin America, $50,000 will aid the Archdiocese of Quito, Ecuador, which is hosting the 53rd International Eucharistic Congress next year. The Congress will take place from September 8 to 15, 2024 and according to the release, “1 million people are expected to participate in a Mass that Pope Francis will celebrate in honor of the 150th anniversary of Ecuador’s consecration to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.”
Victims of the war in Ukraine are still in need, the USCCB noted:
Faced with the ongoing need of war victims in Ukraine, the Subcommittee granted $35,000 to Caritas Ukraine to provide psychological and spiritual support to its employees, who are themselves suffering trauma and distress as they work to serve and comfort their neighbors.
Other nations in Eastern Europe also need support, including Romania. The release stated:
Among the 133 grants totaling nearly $3.6 million awarded by the Subcommittee on Aid to the Church in Central and Eastern Europe was one to the Diocese of Timisoara in Romania for $35,520 to send youth choir members on retreats that will help them grow in faith, to offer Catholic summer camps for children and young teens, and to provide pastoral care for families.
About $916,000 will go to 18 different episcopal conferences of the Church in Africa. $30,000 of that will go to the Episcopal Conference of Malawi to train youth “to recognize the dignity of the elderly and to end the increasingly common problem of elder abuse,” the press release read.
“The Committee on National Collections granted more than $1 million from the Bishops Emergency Disaster Fund – with an additional $453,000 from the Subcommittee on Catholic Home Missions – to help churches in Puerto Rico with continuing recovery from hurricanes and earthquakes,” the release continued. “The disaster fund provides pastoral support for people affected by regional calamities and will also support hundreds of churches for the costs of repair and rebuilding that are not covered by federal programs.”