{"id":6205,"date":"2025-03-07T08:00:40","date_gmt":"2025-03-07T14:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.stphils.com\/church\/?p=6205"},"modified":"2025-03-04T08:20:42","modified_gmt":"2025-03-04T14:20:42","slug":"pastors-letter-march-9-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stphils.com\/church\/pastors-letter-march-9-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Pastor’s Letter: March 9, 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dear St. Philomena Parish Family,<\/p>\n

Blessings to you all this day! I hope that you have had a fruitful beginning to Lent through prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. This week, I wanted to share with you about an additional almsgiving opportunity next weekend. As you may know, almsgiving comes from a word which means \u201cpity\u201d or \u201cmercy.\u201d\u00a0 Our Catechism <\/i>teaches, \u201cAlmsgiving is money or goods given to the poor as an act of penance or charity.\u201d According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, <\/i>\u201cany material favor done to assist the needy, and prompted by charity, is almsgiving.\u201d So, while almsgiving is certainly about caring for the needs of people in a material way, caring about people in a loving way is also a critical part of giving alms. We\u2019ll have such an opportunity next weekend with a second collection for Destiny for Women Health Center.<\/p>\n

Many are already familiar with the work of the Women\u2019s Care Center, which our parish has generously supported with a special collection for some time now, including last year\u2019s Trunk or Treat event entrance and the second collection at Masses that weekend. Of course, we will continue to support all the great work happening there. When I started here as pastor, Fr. David and I talked about having an additional collection to support another great outreach here in Peoria: Destiny for Women Health Center on Knoxville Avenue. No doubt, there is great need in our area for people in the midst of crisis pregnancy\u2014it is a good gift to know there are multiple options to help meet those needs. From info they shared with our parish about their work: \u201cDestiny for Women is a Christian women\u2019s health clinic that serves women experiencing a crisis pregnancy. We meet with women to determine their vulnerability to abortion. We then share that we care about the health of the whole person: social, physical, and spiritual, and we offer them a spiritual conversation.\u00a0 Over 95% of our patients welcome the opportunity to talk about something that really matters. As a result, women begin praying, attending church, dedicating their lives to Christ, and even becoming baptized.\u201d Continuing, \u201cwe began offering prenatal care in order to expand the opportunity to reach the hearts and souls of the women we serve as well as fill the gap in the availability of prenatal care for women who have Medicaid.\u201d<\/p>\n

Destiny for Women offers wide-ranging support for women in need, including pre-natal care, abortion pill reversal, a PhD counselor, medical clinic, STI testing, and ultrasounds. Additionally, Destiny for Women also offers needed items like cribs and strollers. At the heart of their work is an invitation to faith through spiritual conversation about God. Some highlights from a recent newsletter covering the last year:<\/p>\n