The Community of St. Malachi Newsletter

· Lenten Opportunities
· Stations of the Cross
· Let Us Pray
· Lenten Prayer/Reflection
· Poverty And Prayer
· Retreat
· Men’s Breakfast
· Father Thomas P. Doyle, O.P.
· Health Department
· Special Prayers Roster
· Regular Weekly Collection
· Monday Night Meals
· Deadlines
· Cluster Planning Committee Update

· Social Action Committee
· Hospitality Committee
· Liturgy Committee
· Book Discussion
· Paul Farmer
· S.M.A.R.T. Friday Fish Fries
· KidSellabration
· Centering Space
· Human Trafficking
· Human Trafficking Programs
· Eucharistic Ministers
· 2008 Calendar
· Presentation by Thomas P. Doyle, O.P.
- “Sexual Abuse In The Church ...”

  The Community of St. Malachi – First Personal Parish of the Diocese of Cleveland
Celebrating Faith in God and in the Future! 

 First Sunday in Lent 

 February 10, 2008 

Stations of the Cross: Praying the Stations of the Cross -- Please join us for prayer and reflection on the Stations of the Cross in a contemporary way in Church at 6pm on Fridays in Lent.

Let Us Pray: A weekly women’s prayer group is resuming for Lent. Join us at 11:00am on Wednesdays in Church as we pray the Psalms and other Old Testament readings. Stay for noon Mass.

Lenten Prayer/Reflection: Anyone interested in praying daily readings and reflecting weekly, in a small group during Lent, please contact Jan Leitch at Ltch5@aol.com.

Poverty and Prayer: A Lenten Reflection with Gerry Straub on Tuesday February 19 from 6:30pm to 8:00pm at the Ursuline Motherhouse (Klyn Hall) at 2600 Lander Rd. in Pepper Pike. The founder of San Damiano Foundation will share film, stories and images of those living in poverty. Contact Betsy Nero (bnero@beaumontschool.org or 216-321-2954 ex. 364), by January 30, for tickets. Cost is $10 per person. If you are interested in car pooling, or riding to Ursuline in a van, please email jackierose@aol.com

Retreat: Fr. Bob Welsh, S.J, will conduct a retreat on Sunday, February 24 at St. Mary of the Assumption Chapel at St. Ignatius High School. It starts at 12:30pm and ends about 4:30pm. It includes talks, reflection, stations, benediction, and light refreshments. Contact Jackie Bluett to sign up at 440-590-0394 or jackierose@aol.com

Men’s Breakfast: All Community and Parish men (ages 16-90+) are invited to attend breakfast on Saturday, March 1 from 8:30am to 10:30am at Ascension Church (14040 Puritas Avenue/corner of W. 140th). Gary Pritts, Community member, will speak on “When All That’s Left is God.”The cost is $3.00 or $5.00 for two. About 30 to forty men usually attend, including men from Ascension, the Community and other parishes. If you are looking for something different for Lent, come join a gathering of men. Mike Graham (216-228-8815)

Please take note of the flyer attached to the Newsletter concerning our hosting a talk by Fr. Thomas P. Doyle, O.P. He is the author of eight books and he is widely recognized as an expert regarding the canonical and pastoral dimensions of sexual abuse in the church. He will speak on Friday, March 7 at 7:30pm in the Hall. Save the date! Mary Englert

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HEALTH DEPARTMENT –   

Please remember in your prayers for the sick these that have been added (or updated) since our previous edition: Ava Maslowski Dan Maslowski Eva Sierzputowski Kevin Domann Mark Miles Martha Ready Mary Laubenthal Rich Grunwald

If you need the previous list, go to the Malachi Community website at www.stmalachi.org/community.htm. Click on Health Department found under Newsletter or you may visit the “We Lift These Prayers” book on the St. Malachi side altar in the church.

CSM SPECIAL PRAYERS ROSTER – 

Please keep in your prayers all the victims of warfare, both military and civilian, as well as these young people now in the armed forces, and their families:

Please remember to make checks out to the Community of St. Malachi. Bob Simoneau

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Chairperson contact: Joan Daly 440-333-1755 tisherself@cox.net

If a parish or community member could use a little bit of help during an emergency situation, please contact Helen Misener at 440-427-8023. The Social Action Committee has volunteers who could provide a ride, do light housekeeping, shop, or just home visit. If you have any questions about the service, please call Helen and discuss it with her.

Chairperson contact: Marie James 216-749-2604

A meeting to plan a fund-raiser to benefit the Special Needs Fund will be held in the school library after the 11:00am liturgy on Sunday, February 24. All are welcome. Any questions, call Marie James at 216-749-2604.

The Hospitality Committee is looking for volunteers to provide refreshments for the reception in the Hall to follow the Easter Vigil on Saturday, March 22. Please call Marie James (216-749-2604) or Nancy Mura (216-398-3276).

Chairperson contact: Mike Petit 440-884-9309 micheal.petit@uhhs.com 

Congratulations to the following Community members who recently completed training to be a Eucharistic Minister:

Anita Fox Kate Galo Marie James Stephanie Pritts

Book Discussion

• On Wednesday, February 27at 7:00pm, we will meet at the home of Ellen McIntyre 440-777-7724 to discuss Back When We Were Grownups by Anne Tyler.
• A look ahead. The March book is Middlesex by Jeffery Eugenides. The April meeting will be the movie “Amazing Grace.”

Reminder: Paul Farmer is at the Ohio Theater on Monday, February 25 at 6:00pm. Tickets are $45.00.

Join the S.M.A.R.T. (Saint Malachi Adults Raising Toddlers/Tweens/Teens) families for Lenten fish fries. We meet a 6:00pm. Bring your own high chair/booster and child’s beverage (most fish fries only serve coffee and soda).

• February 15: St. Adelbert Church, 66 Adelbert St., Berea. I-480 to I-71 to Berea Freeway (237) to Front St, right onto Adelbert St., the last right before Bagley Rd.
• February 22: St. Mary’s Polish National Church, 5375 Broadview Rd., 176 off I-90 to I-71 to Brookpark, west to Broadview, south to Broadview about two blocks. The church is on the left.

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The West Park Early Childhood PTA will be holding their annual KidSELLabration, an infant, toddler and children’s resale event, on Saturday February 23 from 8-12 noon at St. Joseph Academy on Rocky River Drive. Admission is $5.00 from 8-9am and $1.00 from 9-noon. There will also be a Scholastic Book Sale with the newest titles and a bake sale. If you would like a table to sell your items they are $20.00. Contact Beth at 216-476-7999 or visit www.westparkpta.org

The Centering Space on Lake Avenue is having a Lenten series: Mondays with Merton. The dates are February 11, 18, and 25 from 7:00pm to 9:00pm. All are more than welcome. Call 216-228-7451 for complete details. 

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Look Beneath the Surface—Human Trafficking: A Child’s Life May Depend On It!

The large, diverse crowd gathered on the evening of January 24 in the Don Umerley Auditorium at Rocky River’s Civic Center was quiet, intent on the words of a statuesque blonde woman speaking from the podium. Many participants carried the credentials of health care, teaching and counseling professions. An entire city’s police force in uniform filled a section of back rows. The speaker concluded her presentation, opening the floor for questions. For over an hour, questions exploded from the stunned audience; most participants portrayed their shock at the urgent message of this speaker as she related a story well beyond horrifying.

Theresa Flores (her married name) was fifteen, living in an upscale suburb of Detroit. “My family moved often, about every two years, because of my father’s important position with his company. Our house in Birmingham had four bedrooms and five bathrooms,” Teresa remembers. Oldest, in a well-off stable, churchgoing, Irish Catholic family, Teresa was obliged to make new friends, striving again and again to fit into the complicated social world of high school. This time, her need for acceptance, coupled with the trust of ethnic groups she knew little about, drew her down into a hellish world that no one saved her from. It was AND IS THE WORLD OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING.

Theresa defines “human trafficking” as compelling a person by force to go places against her or his will and to perform actions against his or her will. Human trafficking takes two forms, labor and sex, sometimes both. For two long years Theresa was taken secretly from her home at night, driven to hidden basement locations and forced to sexually service groups of men. They controlled her by fear and with threats to her and to her family’s safety. During the daytime she was watched continuously and stalked in her every move. The pretty, indulged teenager had been turned into a modern day sex slave. And no one asked. “Are you afraid?’ No one came to her rescue.

Today, Theresa is a survivor, mother of three and a licensed social worker. She repeats over and over that at the time of her abduction, into slavery, twenty five years ago, those who should have been alerted to act on her behalf failed her. She was just a child, trusting and unskilled in self protection. Her parents conformed so much to the formal social expectations of their class that they shielded themselves from uncovering evidence of their daughter’s plight. Teachers routinely turned their backs on a troubled, sleep-deprived student they should have known was being hideously abused. Medical personnel never inquired why a young student would need repeated treatment for sexually transmitted diseases. The police neither patrolled effectively nor investigate criminal activity which would have led to rescuing her.

Twenty five years later, the audience posed the question: “Is the same thing happening?” Theresa’s answer is a firm, “Yes, human trafficking is going on in the United States. It’s just not abroad or in Asia!” The group which cosponsored her appearance, The Collaborative Initiative to End Human Trafficking, along with the Sisters of the Humanity of Mary, is active in Columbus. Toledo, the city in Ohio where the most cases are presently being prosecuted, has nothing. Neither does Cleveland. Ohio, which is the fifth leading state in human trafficking, is in a group of states which do not presently have legislation making human trafficking a crime.

There are steps everyone needs to take to identify the presence of this hideous form of exploitation:

· Educate yourself about human trafficking in the United States. Theresa assures us that voluminous information is available on the Internet. I would be happy to share any information I have with you. My e-mail address is: frandec1213@netzero.com.

· Form a mindset that accepts human trafficking as possibly happening in your neighborhood, you children’s and grandchildren’s school and even a danger to your own family. This is the only way, similar to domestic violence and incest that this crime can be prevented and victims rescued.

· Demand that teachers, medical and law enforcement personnel become familiar with the signs of victimization. They need to learn the key questions and persist in asking them.

Theresa wrote in a poem describing her healing, a miracle in itself, “Don’t ask me why I am so spiritual, for only the angels accompanied me on my darkest journey.” Believe that we, as people of faith, are called to awareness, to concern and to action. Theses tens of thousands in our midst, so horribly systematically, abused, are truly the least of our Gospel sisters and brothers.

Fran De Chant, Member, Community of St. Malachi 

frandec1213@netzero.com

• On Tuesday, February 19 from 6:30pm to 8:00pm, Theresa Flores will share her experiences of being trafficked as a 15 year old high school student while living in an upper-middle class suburb of Detroit, Michigan. She describes her two year ordeal in the recently published book, The Sacred Bath. The program is free and open to the public at Notre Dame Educational Center (13000 Auburn Rd., Chardon, OH 44024). For more information: 440-279-1191 or lpetelin@netzero.com.
• Mark your calendar for Thursday, February 28 as Dana Vaughn-Mgunda will share her experiences with trafficking of children in Malawi at the Don Umerley Civic Center Memorial Hall (21016 Hilliard Blvd., Rocky River, OH.)

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Eucharistic Ministers:

• February 17: Sue Knize, Peg Connell, Marianne Kerr, Gene Kramer, Mary Carol Lucic, Paul Kunkel, Mary Ann Kunkel, Joan Majewski, Ellen McIntyre, Mary McNamara, Judi Shemkovitz
• February 24: Stephanie Pritts, Anita Fox, Kate Galo, Marie James, Marty Miller, Barb Pistillo, Pam Pulizzi, Casey Stangel, Kay Vine, Bob Rossman, Kathleen Rossman

2008 Calendar Refer to the information above for complete details.

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First Lay-Directed Personal Parish of the Diocese of Cleveland

Celebrating Faith in God and in the Future

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