Beginning on the first Sunday of Advent, December 3rd and running through January 7th our parish will display our traditional Advent Giving Trees in the atrium and vestibule, decorated with red, green and white envelopes highlighting the two beneficiaries of our parish’s Advent Giving Fund: our Neighbors in Need fund and the Knights of Malta Mobile House of Care.

As in year’s past, I am asking our parishioners to kindly and generously support one—or a combination of both—of these two great Catholic outreach programs which have been a Saint Catherine of Siena tradition at Advent. Our parish has helped many local residents of Greater Hartford and the Farmington Valley with assistance for food, shelter, electricity and heat, emergency repairs to cars and homes, medical coverage, clothing and even assistance with baby supplies and more--all through our Neighbors n Need fund.

Since 2012 our parish has provided more than $154,375.50 to the Knights of Malta Mobile Healthcare vans through our Advent Giving Program—that’s more than $30,000 per year! That amazingly adds up to a total of 617 A1C tests, 257 vaccinations of the most vulnerable patients, or 205 diagnostic tests, and much more in a given year. Lets now look at these facts on Malta:
 

• Demand for Malta’s services is high and is growing, in Octo-ber they provided 462 free patient visits, higher than Sep-tember’s count of 364 patient visits, and in 2017 they expect to treat more than 4,800 patients. Since their founding in 2016, they have cared for more than 44,058 patients;

• Operating expenses run $1.6 million per year and each medi-cal van costs $75,000 per month to operate and requires many volunteers—doctors, nurses, physical therapists, and more;

• Malta House of Care receives NO funding from the local, state or federal governments and in fact all funding is from private gifts from groups such as Archdiocese of Hartford, St. Francis Hospital, private family foundations, and corporate gifts and from parishes like Saint Catherine of Siena; and,

• The Malta House of Care notes that even with the Affordable Health Care Act people still cannot afford the health insur-ance costs, co-pays and deductibles, and without an organi-zation like Malta House of Care and their supporting organi-zations such as St. Catherine of Siena’s parishioners many people would remain without medical care. Your support is vital and it remains one way to fulfill our Christian Mission-ary Discipleship in Jesus’ name.

Thank you in advance for your contribution.