cathedral - Weekly Memo June 11

Weekly Memo June 11

A fundamental Catholic belief is in the Real Presence of God in the Eucharist. We celebrate this central mystery of our faith with the feast of Corpus Christi. Before consecrating the Israelites to the covenant, Joshua asked them what other god had ever been so intimate or so present to his people? What true joy to be able to join with God at every mass!

The mystery touches us further in that we are transformed as well. Each of us becomes more Christ-like and less of our selfish nature. Through this conversion, we can become the real presence of God for others.

Our holy founder understood this clearly. His students lived in difficult and godless times. This is why he emphasized the need for personal conversion in those first teachers. They were to teach God’s love not with fancy words but by the power of their actions. By treating their students with firm love and respect, God would seem more possible.

May we recommit ourselves to our personal journey toward God this summer so that we might better reflect his Real Presence in our classrooms and homes.

PRAYERS REQUESTED for:

Families in mourning; especially the Talamantes; the Haggerty’s, the family of Gary O’Malley ’91 whose mother passed recently;
Those caring for their parents;
Those in need of healing; especially Tito Porras, Monica Alvillar, Gary Porras, Michael Stowe, Dan Haggerty; Brother Steve Armenta who has Lou Gehrig’s disease, and Brother Andre Lacoste;
Blessings on our development and admissions efforts;
In thanksgiving for our benefactors, friends, and alumni;
For the safety of our community during the summer.

KUDOS and THANKS to:

Mrs. Vega and her impressive summer school staff for a solid first week. There has been a good deal of communication with parents and students (with few exceptions) are definitely trying to turn it around. The morale is very high.

Kudos goes to the Early Admissions faculty for an impressive first week. You know that students love their courses when they run to class! All feel that they’re being challenged and appreciate this opportunity.

Many thanks go out to Fernie Sierra for all of his vigilance and money-saving work. Last weekend’s power outage damaged all of the motors in the MPB but he figured out how to solve the problem so that we did not need to replace all of them. In just this week he also completed construction of the gate for the blacktop and changed many of the locks in the building. He also set up the hospitality for the Westside parochial schools that did training in our auditorium.

As noted in an earlier memo, August Luhrs ’11 of USC was selected to play for the national Quidditch team. An excellent story on it ran in last Sunday’s paper.

http://www.elpasotimes.com/ci_20768529/el-pasoan-play-harry-potter-inspired-quidditch-game

Congratulations to Mateo Cisneros and Sean Leeper for being in making the

El Paso Times All City Men’s Tennis Team. Kudos goes to their coach, Sergio Acosta. Learn more at http://www.elpasotimes.com/sports/ci_20771184/el-paso-times-all-city-tennis-boys-team.

Thank to our good friends at Vemac Engineering for working on the Annex construction all week. Special thanks to David Venegas ’94 and his father.

NEWS and INFORMATION:

Alumni Annex update:

The site passed the initial plumbing inspection so all of the plumbing trenches were refilled and leveled.
All of the trenches for the walls are completed and are waiting to pass inspection before the concrete pour can begin next week.
Rebar work is almost completed for the foundation and the walls.
The first delivery of brick arrived as has sand/rock for concrete.
Interesting fact: For the slab pour, concrete will be mixed on the blacktop and pumped down to the construction site. Smaller truckers will drive in for the wall foundation pour.

The Religion Studies Department met with the superintendent and had the new curriculum which is aligned with the guidelines by the US Conference of Bishops approved. Much of the preparation work was done by Mr. Woznicki.

We are blessed with a very strong department and it’s gratifying to have the education office see CHS as leaders for the diocese.

Region XIX invites all Catholic school educators to a free Education Conference at the Plaza Theater on Friday, July 13, 2012 from 8:00 am - 4:00 pm. It is free but seating is limited so you must reserve a seat at http://www.esc19.net/Culture_Caring_Classroom_Conference.php,

Foreign Language Department: Mrs. Moreno and Mrs. Hernandez will both be taking the Advanced Placement training this summer at UT El Paso so that CHS can offer AP French and AP Spanish next year.