Overview of District Activities
DISTRICT WIDE
- All West District conferences have submitted their standards of excellence / minimum standards report sheet.
- The 2022-2023 Indianapolis West District Council annual report has been completed.
- The (West District) Consolidated Conferences report is being worked on.
Conference Reports
Click on a conference to view their report:
Annunciation:
Everything is running smoothly. They have a great volunteer staff and everybody works together as a team. They are holding some budget meetings and are updating their strategic plan. They know this will be a challenging year, as income from grants and donations can be a big unknown when planning the budget. (Though the conference’s grant writer, Brenda Stallcop, is always looking for funding and has a high success rate.)
The conference feels that their leadership situation is good; Mike Robinson is president, Ed Burt is treasurer, past President Pat Hardman assists and Father Newton provides guidance.
Holy Angels:
Planning a “Blanket Sunday” collection in February.
They are putting together a group of volunteers who will help at the Distribution Center once every 4-6 weeks during the next 6 months. At the end of that period, they will then volunteer for another 6 months at the 30th Street Food Pantry.
The conference is eager to get news about safeguarding background checks and training.
St. Ann:
The conference completed a successful giving tree and Christmas baskets distribution. They served 28 families with food baskets and food gift cards and 72 children received a $50 gift card. They also co-sponsored a ‘Random Act of Kindness’ event through which another 86 children received Christmas gifts.
The conference has consulted with the police about the Mars Hill area of their area and have been advised not to do home visits there due to gang and criminal activity. So, they are working out a plan on how to assist neighbors in that geographical area.
The conference has scheduled a Blanket Sunday drive for the weekends of April 20 & 21 and 27 & 28.
St. Anthony:
St. Anthony served 24 families, including 73 children, during Christmas.
The conference’s finances are fine.
The conference is having difficulty finding new members. The parish is mainly Hispanic; there has been difficulty in getting that demographic interested in the Society.
St. Christopher:
St. Christopher was happy to receive some generous donations at the end of 2023 and the start of 2024.
The conference’s home visitors have visited 2 Haitian/Creole families this month. Those visitors had to be creative in communication by texting with one family who would then use their phone to translate. The other family was a little tougher, but they were able to find an interpreter who helped.
The conference has made picture ‘flashcard’ sets for different languages, to help determine the needs of their neighbors.
St. Christopher hopes to have another meeting with the Wayne Township Trustee for clarification on how the trustee can help and what restrictions are on that help.
St. Gabriel:
No report received.
St. Joseph:
St. Joseph went through a successful Christmas giveaway with generous support from the parishioners.
The number of calls being assigned to the conference by the SVdP Indy Help Line are about average.
St. Joseph Conference is still looking for new members.
St. Malachy:
In October, November and December, 2023, the St. Malachy Conference handled 9 need calls and helped 23 people. This included help with rent, electric and Kroger cards. $2.523.43 was expended on client help. The conference received donations of $700.00.
Recently, Family Promise of Hendricks County has cut back on the help they provide to those in need. There was a meeting between the St. Malachy and St. Susanna conferences along with other groups to discuss how best to work with Family Promise.
St. Malachy conference is waiting for the pastor to return from his sabbatical to discuss increasing our membership. We expect he will return in April. The investigation of combining with the St. Susanna conference has been put on hold while St. Malachy wants to again explore bolstering their own membership.
St. Michael:
The 4th quarter of St. Michael Church SVdP Conference has been very rewarding. St. Michael Parishioners met with Vincentians with a display of SVdP Indy Council Volunteer opportunities as well as Conference activities after the Masses October 28th & 29th.
November 11th & 12th, the Conference teamed up with the St. Gabriel-St. Michael School and parishioners for a food drive to benefit the SVdP Pantry. Nate Persons arrived with the SVdP truck and we loaded 1,800 lbs of non-perishables into the truck.
Vincentians qualified 30 families for the Catholic Charities Christmas store and have a “Giving Tree” loaded with “ornaments of gift suggestions” to be collected and donated to Catholic Charities Christmas program.
We also attended a seminar sponsored by St. Luke Methodist Church to learn about renter’s rights and eviction basics. St. Michael Church is hoping to sponsor a similar program for interested West District SVdP conferences in early 2024. So, stay tuned for more information on this topic.
All of the members at a recent conference meeting expressed concern about giving their social security numbers for the safeguarding background check. Our treasurer has refused to give it due to privacy concerns.
The conference is also sad to report that the changes related to safeguarding – background checks, training, requiring 2 people on a home visit – has been too much for one of their Vincentians of over 30 years. This individual was a true Vincentian in every way: often transporting goods & furniture from parishioners to a neighbor in need, attending all the meetings and participating in home visits. But after over 1 year of trying to comply, he called and resigned last week. The conference is investigating how to honor him.
St. Monica:
St. Monica Conference provided 48 families in need with Christmas cheer. Due to feedback from past Christmas projects, this year the conference gave out gift cards instead of presents. This way, the family’s adults could purchase their own gifts for the children – thus making sure the child got the correct size or style of clothes or the `right` toy the child was actually wanting. Due to St. Monica parishioners’ generosity, the conference was able to give each family a gift card worth $25/child + $50.
Each Lent, the conference distributes cardboard mite boxes to the parish to collect sacrificed treasure during this season of preparation for Easter.
St. Monica has volunteered to host a Ozanam training on Saturday, April 13th.
St. Paul The Apostle:
No report received.
St. Susanna:
No report received.
St. Thomas More:
Interim President Dana Noel is discerning whether she will run for conference president. There is a concern that the demands of her career – especially the amount of business travel – would prevent her from adequately serving as the conference president. She is seeking a fellow conference member who would be a responsible vice president if she was to run.
