Thank you for being part of the Friends of Saint Camillus! We celebrate another year of ministry and spiritual care, advocacy and hope in the midst of illness, trauma, death and injustice. We together continue to lift up hope and meaning, accompany people in the hospital and we pray for the many lives that were ended by gun violence.

We stand ready for another year of gratitude, service, healing and hope. Saint Camillus' team of chaplains, staff and volunteers wish you blessings of Christmas and all the many holidays in these sacred weeks.

A VISIT is taken from the serigraph of John August Swanson in the Saint Camillus Chapel depicting the Annunciation of the angel to Mary but John’s art also reflects all the angels of the Hebrew texts. Who are the angels in your life? May we be angels/friends of Saint Camillus in the coming year.

2022 was a year that included several awards that reflect the larger community's appreciation of what we do together as a “community of the beloved.”

Blessings and thanks for your donations that help us do this ministry and service. 

Fr Chris Ponnet
Pastor/Chaplain
 

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"Chaplain, you were there for us in the worst time of our lives when you came to Keck to give our parents their blessing. They are with blessed Jesus and the Holy Family in heaven and we are all better now, thanks to you. Thank you for being who you are, and doing what you do!

All the best,
Antonio, Jr, Joanne, Romero and family"
 

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All the truly great persons I have ever met are characterized by what I would call radical humility and gratitude. They are deeply convinced that they are drawing from another source; they are instruments. Their genius is not their own; it is borrowed. We are moons, not suns, except in our ability to pass on the light. Our life is not our own; yet, at some level, enlightened people know that their life has been given to them as a sacred trust. They live in gratitude and confidence, and they try to let the flow continue through them. They know that “love is repaid by love alone,” as both St. Francis of Assisi and St. Thérèse of Lisieux have said. 

In the end, it is not our own doing, or grace would not be grace. It is God’s gift, not a reward for work well done. It is nothing for us to be boastful about. We are God’s work of art, created in Christ Jesus. All we can do is be what God’s Spirit makes us to be, and be thankful to God for the riches God has bestowed on us. Humility, gratitude, and loving service to others are probably the most appropriate responses we can make.  

Adapted from Richard Rohr, A Spring within Us: A Book of Daily Meditations (Albuquerque, NM: CAC Publishing, 2016), 281, 134

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Fundraising Events in 2021:

Fundraising and Development:

During the first six months of 2022 we hired Phil Rappa as Development Director. We were able to complete a new Strategic Plan and engaged with around 60 new possible funding partners thru a series of lunch sessions. Since then we have begun a new Community Development Advisory Committee; interim chair is Yolanda Duarte White with Fr Chris Ponnet, Mike Birkholm and Ken Martinet. The Fundraising Event Committee will focus on making the planned events happen. Irene Recendez as chair and Gary Freeberg, Mary Baville, and Ron Sorenson as members. 

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Last November 13, the Church marked the Sixth World Day of the Poor, under the theme “For your sakes Christ became poor”, drawn from the words of the Apostle Paul to the first Christians in Corinth (2 Cor 8:9).

The Day was established by Pope Francis in his Apostolic Letter “Misericordia et Miser”, to celebrate the end of the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy. 

This would be the worthiest way to prepare for the celebration of the Solemnity of our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, who identified with the little ones and the poor and who will judge us on our works of mercy (cf. Mt 25:31-46). It would be a day to help communities and each of the baptized to reflect on how poverty is at the very heart of the Gospel and that, as long as Lazarus lies at the door of our homes (cf. Lk 16:19-21), there can be no justice or social peace. This Day will also represent a genuine form of new evangelization (cf. Mt 11:5) which can renew the face of the Church as She perseveres in her perennial activity of pastoral conversion and witness to mercy.

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