Scott W. Schutte
State Deputy
StateDeputy@IndianaKofC.org
Home Council : 16305 - SAINTS FRANCIS AND CLARE GREENWOOD, IN
Home Assemby : 245 - BISHOP CHATARD INDIANAPOLIS, IN
My Worthy Bother Knights,
As I write this article, I am thinking of the Apostles and how Jesus selected 12 men to work together to lead our Church. Those men selected others to help them. The main point of this is that these men, had each other to accomplish the Goal that Christ laid before them in creating the Catholic Church. We need to keep this in mind as we work our way through is fiscal year to achieve the goals laid before us by the Order, and the Church.AS the Apostles we need to work together to achieve our goals and charity.
Membership
Our Goal is 1265. We are behind the pace that we need to meet this goal within the fiscal year. We can meet our goal, but I need all councils to be active in welcoming new members. To accomplish this the State Leadership met in October to consider options to help Councils to meet the statewide goal.
We discussed that if each new member last year invited one friend to join the order, we would be very close to our goal. This is the goal of the Shining Armor award. Have you offered this to your new members.
Secondly, we discussed a new program that I hope that your Councils will embrace. This new program will involve us reaching out to high school aged you men to create roundtables at the diocesan catholic high schools. For those Councils that do not have a Catholic school nearby, I am suggesting that you reach out to the parish religious education leader. So that program will consist of creating a roundtable for these young men. 18-year-olds, become Knights and are the leaders of the roundtable. I would anticipate an older member to be a mentor. The roundtable would participate in the COR initiative. High school boys younger than 18 can participate in the roundtable and its activities. The roundtable would also complete service work in the name of the Council and their School or parish. Results, younger members; young men engaged in learning their faith and Knights that can move to college Councils or remain in their local Council.
I ask that you work to make this new program work at your Parish.
Gibault
In late September the annual Gibault Envoy conference was held in Terre Haute. It was a great day with lots of opportunities to learn more about our number-one charity. Gibault remains an incredible place for youth to recover from abuse, mental illness, and trauma. We expanded earlier this year to include the Campagna facility in Schererville, IN. We make a significant difference in the lives of these children and their families. Gentlemen, all our Councils need to be active in this cause. Please make sure that your Council has an Envoy and that your Council is involved in supporting Gibault.
Women’s Care Center Endowment
We set a goal of $10,000,000 in the endowment within 10 years. We need to put forth our best efforts this year to make that amount a realization. We were able to get a good start last year and were able to magnify our contributions with the ASAP program. Let’s keep up the great work and make this endowment pay it forward for years to come.
K of C Retreat
We again missed our goal of attendees for the Knights retreat. This is truly saddening to me. Brothers, we need to make sure that our members’ faith is maintained. Supreme has asked to be first in Faith as in Charity. The COR initiative is a major step in that direction. This was an opportunity to start that effort among our membership. We will look for another opportunity to help Councils to provide for the faith development of members. We are looking at the State Convention. Please encourage your brothers to be active in this effort. WE can only evangelize if we know what our faith consists of. Remember, the Apostles spent three years learning from Jesus and then he sent the Holy Spirit as a further guide. We need to pray that the Holy Spirit provides us with that same guidance.
NCYC – FOOD FOR FAMILIES
NCYC will visit Indianapolis in November. We are supporting the food packing efforts again this year. I need your Council to donate to that effort. We need $10,000 for this to be a success. We are making headway in meeting our goal. I ask that your Council step up if you have yet to submit a donation. Pass a hat if you don’t have it in your budget. We want the youth visiting Indiana to know that the Knights care about their faith opportunities.
Eucharistic Congress
There are four pilgrimages to Indiana from around the Country as well. We are working with the local Dioceses to determine the needs of these pilgrims so that our Councils can aid as they pass through your local area. Please be prepared to welcome these pilgrims to Indiana. I will be sending out the list of volunteer opportunities soon. Please prayerfully consider how you can help.
Closing Thoughts
I am working to make Indiana a great place for Knights of Columbus to be recognized for all your efforts. As I noted at the beginning of this article these goals require more than one man to accomplish. I want to thank my Directors and Chairmen, the District Deputies and all of you who are making a difference in peoples lives through your Charity. I am going to be very busy with the National Eucharistic Congress this year so I will need more help than last year to make Indiana a premier Jurisdiction in the Knights of Columbus Order. I ask you all to help me to accomplish our goals.
Let’s keep inviting those new members. We have some huge projects, Eucharistic Congress, coming up and we will need lots of volunteers. Plus, we want our fellow Catholics to keep the faith, COR Initiative. Keep dreaming big and be ready to Evangelize Through Our Works.
Vivat Jesus
Scott Schutte
Indiana State Council - Knights of Columbus
State Deputy
statedeputy@indianakofc.org
webpage HERE
Vivat Jesus