Nazareth Farm Trip
The past three years, we have been fortunate enough to be selected for the service trip down to Nazareth Farm( www.nazarethfarm.org), which is a Catholic community of laypeople dedicated to home improvement and repair in Doddridge and surrounding counties in West Virginia. Each year, six 11th& 12th graders are accompanied by two chaperones to the weeklong summer service trip. In 2009, we will be going “home” on August 9th-15th.
Nazareth Farm is a community based upon the four cornerstones of community, prayer, service, and simplicity. Throughout the week, the students learn the importance of the cornerstones and are encouraged to put them into practice upon their return home. It is a life changing experience for our youth and is made possible by the generous benefactors and people of our parish community.
College Care Packages
Each year, high school students come together to send out college care packages to our college students who are studying at various colleges and universities throughout the country. We also send the packages to our diocesan seminarians to let them know that we are praying for them as they prepare for priesthood.
The parish assists this pre-Lenten activity, which provides the different goodies and snacks for the packages, as well as daily Lenten prayer booklets. We are always looking for donations of healthy snacks to send and will be collecting them after all masses in February.
Clothing Drive
Every fall, students help collect and sort out clothing that is distributed at the Thanksgiving and Christmas food pantry distributions. We ask parishioners to donate any new to good used clothing the last weekend of October so that it can be collected and sorted.
Altar Server Basketball Game
In thanksgiving for their weekly altar serving, Fr. Kevin & several chaperones offer our servers the opportunity to go to a Syracuse University Men’s Basketball home game. Every December, twenty servers can sign up to attend the game and if they are not already, become instant S.U. fans!
Men-In-Black
One of the most energetic programs offered by the Office of Vocation Promotion is the annual Men In Black basketball game. The priests and seminarians, including Fr. Kevin & Fr. Joe, of the Diocese of Syracuse take on parish teams in a great game of basketball. Every December and January there are two games during the seminarians' break from school. For more information, check out the site: www.vocations-syracuse.org
CYO (Catholic Youth Organization) Basketball
The CYO basketball program at Blessed Sacrament promotes Christian values and offers kids the chance to be part of a team. CYO teams build a sense of community which nurtures and stresses positive social interaction, and an opportunity to play in an atmosphere where "sportsmanship and participation are the name of the game" as well as skill development. Parish students in grades 9-12 are able to participate on Junior Varsity & Varsity teams beginning each November.
