Knights of Columbus – Council 3205

By Grand Knight – Ron Gay

Brothers,

We had a great meeting last Wednesday, November 2, 2011. If you missed it, you missed a great time with 35 of your Brother Knights.

Deacon Dave Mayes showed a video and answered questions about the upcoming changes to the mass. Fr. Edwin was also there to help answer questions. I’d like to thank Fr. Edwin for his time with us last Wednesday. Fr. Edwin broke bread with the Council, and stayed for the whole meeting. Thank you Fr. Edwin!

We have a lot of events coming up in the next few months.

Church Activities – We need everyone to save the date, December 15, 2011. That is our Clergy Appreciation Dinner in the PAC at St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church from 6 to 9 pm. Bishop Joe Vasquez will be here, and we want to have a great turn out for his visit to our area.

Important – Brother Don Parsons also asked all of us Catholic Gentlemen to prayerfully consider participating in Eucharistic adoration, particularly during the hours from midnight to 6 am. We need real Catholic men, Chivalrous Knights, to step forward and take on this duty of staying with the Eucharist during the early morning hours, midnight to 6 am. I’ve already called and added my name to the list for the 3 to 4 am shift on Saturday mornings. I know many of you are already committed to a time slot during the early morning hours, and your to be commended. If you already have a time slot adoring the Eucharist, and it’s possible for you to change to an early morning shift, then I want to encourage you to do so. If you do not have an adoration time as of yet please call Don Parsons and arrange to serve.

Membership – Please welcome our newest member Whitley Cave. Our next first degree will be after the New Year in the middle of January.

Council – Our gun raffle is in full swing. We have a net gain from the sale of raffle tickets of $2,300 so far. Please call C. J. Romero if you need additional tickets. We have another sales opportunity on Saturday, November 5 @ Academy from 9 am to 5 pm.

The Council’s Christmas Party will be Friday, December 9, at the home of Russ Kellen.

Community – Larry Hubbell says we collected 21 pints of blood at our blood drive in October.

Thanks also to everyone who showed up and worked with the Special Olympics.

Church – The Council voted to spend up to $200 to provide food for the Deacon Formation Class for the Diocese of Austin when they meet @ St. Thomas Aquinas on December 10.

Pro-life – The Council will sponsor a table at the Good Samaritan Pregnancy Services Dinner on November 10 at St. Anthony’s Catholic Church in Bryan.

Our 2nd Annual Wine & Cheese fundraiser will be Thursday, December 8, from 7:30 to 10 pm in the PAC @ St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church. December 8 is a Holy Day of Obligation, so the Wine & Cheese event will take place after mass.

Youth – We have had four new young men join our Squires Circle.

The Council also voted to send $100 to Council 10624 at Texas A&M University. They are collecting religious supplies to send to the Catholic Chaplains in Afghanistan.

Ron Gay, FSD
Grand Knight

Brothers,

The Knights of Columbus and Special Olympics have had a close association for more than 40 years. We have several members of our parish who are Special Olympians, and there will be an opportunity for our Council(s) to help with a state tournament right here in B/CS. Please review the e-mail below and go to the Special Olympics web page and view all of the volunteer opportunities available to us. If you have time and can lend a hand, I know our Special Olympians would appreciate it. It will require very little of you except time. I’ve given out medals on several occasions and I can’t tell you how rewarding it has been We will talk more about this at our meeting tonight, but I wanted to give everyone an advanced look at what was available to us.

Furthermore if we can get 15 to 20 people to sign up, not only will that help the Special Olympics in a big way, but it will help our Council satisfy all of the “Community” requirements for our Star Council Award.

Ron Gay, FSD
Grand Knight

EMAIL:
Ron,
Thank you so much for your email. I have spoken to our awards directors for Games about your participation and they said they would love to have some Knights help cover awards positions. We will be having awards at Aquatics, Flag Football, Veterans Park, and Golf. Our volunteer sign ups are now live on our website, so please take a look and see if any of those shifts fit into your schedules. Of course, if you would prefer another type of shift, that is also an option.

Here is the registration link: http://sotx.org/news-events/news/2011/volunteer-at-fall-classic.html

Please let me know if I can help you with any other questions.

Judy Yoshimaru
Director of Volunteer Services
Special Olympics Texas
512.491.2947
www.sotx.org

Dear Brother Knights,

St. Thomas’ very own Peter Ramirez will be on the Labor Day Telethon on KBTX.  His parents are Marla and Trey Ramirez.  Peter has spinal muscular atrophy and his goal is to raise $800 for MDA.  You can visit his secure website at https://www.joinmda.org/MyEvent/MyHomepage/tabid/221807/Participant/ramirezmarla/Default.aspx   to donate.  Please pass to other parishioners and friends.  You will start to see promotional clips on KBTX with Peter and his family and the family will be interviewed live on Sunday night.  He has $600.00!  Let’s far exceed the $800.00.

Many Blessings to you and your family!

Roger R. Martinez ’85

Brothers,

We held our initial First Degree for this fraternal year last Wednesday, August 17. Please join me in welcoming two new Brother Knights to our Council, Allen Goffinet and Nnaemeka Mozie. I would like to thank our degree team for their commitment to our new member recruitment program. Thanks to Gary Richards, Michael Hlavinka, Adrian Martinez, C. J. Romero, and Jody Supak for your excellent work in exemplifying our new members. Jody is our Knights of Columbus Field Agent and filled in for the missing Warden. Richard Darnell is doing an excellent job as our Council’s Membership Director. We still need fifteen new members this year to reach our Star Council goal.

We have a 2nd and 3rd Degree exemplification scheduled for September 18 in Bryan. We have 80 members of Council 3205 who live in the Bryan/College Station area who are still First Degree members. We need for all of our members to advance to full Knighthood. Please put September 18 on your calendar and plan to be at the 2nd and 3rd Degree in Bryan.

I also want to lift up Brother Kevin Biasiolli for his work on this Summer’s pool party. Kevin did an outstanding job in organizing this year’s event. Kevin’s still getting acclimated to a new job that takes him out of town a couple of days each week but he still made sure we had pizza and drinks for the families attending this year’s party. Thanks Kevin, job well done!

Don’t forget we have AquinasFest on September 24 and 25. Our next pancake breakfast is Sunday, September 4.

Save the date, our next Council meeting will be Wednesday, September 7.

Ron Gay, FSD
Grand Knight

By Grand Knight Ron Gay

Brothers,

Our August 3 meeting was very well attended considering it was still 106 degrees outside. We had 39 members in attendance which is better than expected when you consider the number of members out on vacation. If you were not able to join us we discussed the following information.

Fr. Uche was our program, and he gave a wonderful talk on his journey to the Priesthood and subsequently to the United States. Fr. Uche can converse in four different languages; his native tongue in Nigeria, English, Spanish and Flemish, which he picked up while he was studying in Belgium.

The Council has a busy fall planned with plenty of activity for everyone to join in on. The Treasurer reported that we have $10,294.55 in our operating account, and $759.57 in our charity account. The July 10 pancake Breakfast netted $262.26. The Financial Secretary reported that we have 277 members in the council. We still have 55 members who have not paid their 2011 dues. Their names were turned over to the retention committee.

The Grand Knight reported on the diocesan conference in Rockdale attended by the Grand Knight, Deputy Grand Knight, Chancellor and Financial Secretary. We learned that we have to put on or participate in four first degrees this year if we want to be a Star Council. This is a new requirement. We need 16 new members and 6 new insurance members to reach our Star Council goals.

Membership – Richard Darnell reported that there will be a First Degree for new members on August 17 in Zurek Hall @ St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church. There will be a 2nd and 3rd Degree in Bryan on September 18.

Church – Michael Vidrine reported that the August pancake breakfast will be Sunday, August 7 in the PAC. Michael Hlavinka’s pancake team is cooking. This month’s proceeds will benefit our seminarians. The 2011 Clergy Appreciation dinner will be December 15 in the PAC @ St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church.

Gary Richardson gave a report on Aquinasfest. Jesse Alvarez, chair of the Raffle reported that all tickets have been distributed. The Bar-b-que dinner is being chaired by Leonard Muesse, facilities is being chaired by Al Mazoch, parking is being chaired by David Gerling, Jeff Blaszek is the chair of hamburgers and hotdogs. I think you can see a pattern here, the KofC are leading this parish event.

Community – Larry Hubbell asks that you save the date, October 16 for our community blood drive.

Council – Council raffle tickets will be ready for distribution at our September meeting.

Family – Kevin Biasiolli reported that the Family Swim Party is August 12 at the home of Ron & Terri Gay, 1106 Deacon Dr. in College Station from 6 to 9 pm. The Council will provide pizza and drinks,members can bring a dessert.

Fourth Degree – C. J. Romero is the new Faithful Navigator. The assembly meets Tuesday, August 9 @ St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Hearne. The social begins at 6 pm.

The Council has already made its state charity goal of $2,450.00. The Council audit and the council budget are attached to this report.

Ron Gay, FSD
Grand Knight