Building DEVELOPMENT

We feel so strongly about our home and our family of believers at St. Mark’s that we have chosen “Building Our Future Home ~ Together”, as our campaign name, and trust God that because of generosity and sacrifice, our home will be well prepared to be a spiritual shelter for generations to come.
 
“We stand at the threshold of a new era in our short history as the Catholic Family that is St. Mark Catholic Church. Dedication and sacrifices of many have brought us to where we are today.

Our great parish is so much more than just a place for weekend worship.

The construction of our new worship center will allow us to better serve the expanding Parish Family and continue to offer the strong and growing ministries with which we are blessed plus offer so much more.

Arizona is now the fastest growing state. The only thing that will happen to us, it seems, is our need to expand will be greater and growth will become more costly. Population growth in the area is beyond imagination. We have to be ready to meet what is coming so we can better control what we will look like and what we will be as we grow.
May God bless you and everyone you hold dear. Working together we will grow in faith.”
- Fr. Liam

We look toward the future with hope, confident that our parish community will continue to serve the Lord and His Holy Church for many years to come.

CAMPAIGN PRAYER
Loving Father, we are all members of Your Family, the Church here on Earth.
Everything we have comes from You, Father, through Jesus, Your Son.

Give each one of us the true spirit of generosity in returning to You
The first fruits of our time, gifts and finances. Amen.

MEDITATION
Almighty, loving God, You have blessed us with many wonderful gifts –
. . . a deep faith through which we come to know You
. . . a parish Family that works to be united with You
. . . our namesake, St. Mark the Evangelist, who recorded the deeds of Jesus
so we might better see how to live the Christ-life
. . . and the gift of our salvation through Christ’s life, death and Resurrection

Help us give ourselves to Your service and lead us to evangelize in the spirit of our patron, St. Mark.
We gather now to build a worship center to better reflect the beauty and wonders of Your Being, to help us be truly contrite for our sins and celebrate Your generous blessings.

We pray that our children and our spiritual Family grow in Your love and knowledge to
spread the Holy Gospel and carry the work we begin here closer to Your Perfection.

We pray to You, Father, to praise and give thanks, and we do it in the Name of our Most Holy Redeemer, Your Son, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Generate LEADERSHIP
A proposal of the plan for growth was presented for Diocesan review in 2007, and was affirmed with approval. Although very supportive of all our plans, the Diocese was not in a position to help with funding. As per their directives, we must have 50% of the cost in cash in order to begin building.
          An initial limited campaign for Leadership Gifts was completed by volunteers to take advantage of an extraordinary timing opportunity within the diocese that aligned with the presence of our winter residents. We were blessed with remarkable results, and attracted pledge amounts of over $1.4 million toward Phase 1 construction.

IDENTIFY Prerequisites
Encouraged by the commitment and participation of a very few families, the Development Committee contracted for the professional fund raising counsel of the Cosgriff Company to conduct an in-depth campaign planning study, the first and most important component of an organization’s capital development effort.
The goal of the study was to determine prospective leadership, the existing and potential depth of emotional and financial support within the parish for a major fundraising campaign, identify problems early and establish expectations regarding the building of a new church and extended space for ministries.

QUALIFY Potential
Information was gathered and attitudes tested through private personal interviews conducted formally with members of St. Mark’s and a direct mail survey in the form of a modified version of the questionaire used during personal interviews was sent to all registered households. The exercise signaled an effort to raise funds with a renewed priority and that members’ input was necessary to form a workable plan.
The Cosgriff Company presented a plan based upon proven campaign procedures used in successful direction of capital campaigns by the fundraising industry over the past 75 years and it was accepted for adoption by the Core Committee for the Master Plan.

PLAN the Plan & EXECUTE
The plan would be intensive, short term and a wholly unified effort to raise a large sum of money for a specific purpose. It required a more carefully developed organization and many more volunteers than almost any other philanthropic effort. In short, it was one of the most arduous and demanding tasks St. Mark’s has ever attempted. To succeed, it required that supporters give a vast energy and commitment of time as well as committing to the full time professional counsel provided by the Cosgriff Company remaining on site through the campaign.

Elevate AWARENESS

Several activities, presentations, stewardship material, campaign materials, pulpit announcements, display of simplified renderings, an informational DVD, a scale model, and open house activities all served up the message that, ”There is a need and a plan to meet that need” and “It is really going to happen”.

Coach the TALENT
Proper stewardship calls for timely and frequent planning of our services to make sure we are properly equipped to meet future need. It does not take much imagination to see that our current facilities, our church, the social areas and education areas stretched nearly to the limits, with the current rate of growth, will not be at all adequate very soon. If we want our church to be in a position to minister as a vibrant and thriving faith community well into the future, difficult decisions and hard work must be accomplished.

Parish leaders, committees, staff and pastoral leaders have confirmed the inadequacy becomes more apparent every day. Some may question this claim but they need only to show up as classes come together. A quick review of current news articles will show that this area is on the brink of a major expansion and may require the services of our Catholic community. We want to be on the right side of such growth.
We work with vigor and joy because we know the work we do is built on the sacrifice of others and that what we leave will help address the needs of those who follow us.

Share the EXCITEMENT!
As is known, St. Mark Catholic Church has been blessed with growth, an opportunity to serve our parishioners and our children. Our new church facilities, sacred and treasured, will speak boldly about architectural beauty, dignity and the character and commitment of our Catholic Family.
Less obvious to the passerby is the excessive blessings we have in the parish each day with education and RCIA ministries, outreach, home bound, social services, interfaith services, Life Teen, Respect for Life and more.
Through the stewardship of many these works and their benefits will glorify the Lord’s house. Like any home our church has many needs. Our parish family must pool its collective resources to address the challenges that face us today and tomorrow.

EMPOWER the People in FAITH
“The Lord commanded Moses to tell Aaron and his sons to use the following words in blessing the people of Israel:
May the Lord bless you and take care of you;
May the Lord be kind and gracious to you;
May the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace,
And the Lord said, “If they pronounce my name as a blessing upon the people of Israel, I will bless them.” [Num 6:22-27]

Accept EQUAL SACRIFICE
“On the day Moses finished setting up the Tent of the Lord’s presence, he anointed and dedicated the Tent and all its equipment, and the altar and all its equipment. Then the clan chiefs who were leaders in the tribes of Israel, the same men who were in charge of the census, brought their offerings to the Lord: six wagons and twelve oxen, a wagon for every two leaders and an ox for each leader.
After they had presented them, the Lord said to Moses, ‘Accept these gifts for the work to be done for the Tent; give them to the Levites according to the work they have to do.’
So Moses gave the wagons and the oxen to the Levites. He gave two wagons and four oxen to the Gershonites, and four wagons and eight oxen to the Merarites. All their work was to be done under the direction of Ithamar son of Aaron. But Moses gave no wagons or oxen to the Kohathites, because the sacred objects they took care of had to be carried on their shoulders.
The leaders also brought offerings to celebrate the dedication of the altar. When they were ready to present their gifts at the altar, the Lord said to Moses, ‘Tell them that each day for a period of twelve days one of the leaders is to present his gifts for the presentation to the altar’ ” [Num 7:1-11]

“When Moses went into the Tent to talk with the Lord, he heard the Lord speaking to him from above the lid on the Covenant Box, between the two winged creatures.” [Num 7:89]

Continue BUILDING Discipline
“The Lord commanded Moses to say to the Levites: ‘When you receive from the Israelites the tithe that the Lord gives you as your possession, you must present a tenth of it as a special contribution to the Lord. This special contribution will be considered as the equivalent of the offering which the farmer makes of new grain and new wine.
In this way you also will present the special contribution that belongs to the Lord from all the tithes which you receive from the Israelites. You are to give this special contribution for the Lord to Aaron the priest. Give it from the best that you receive. When you have presented the best part, you may keep the rest, just as the farmer keeps what is left after he makes his offering.
You and your families may eat the rest anywhere, because it is your wages for your work in the Tent. You will not become guilty when you eat it, as long as you have presented the best of it to the Lord. Be sure not to profane the sacred gifts of the Israelites by eating any of the gifts before the best part is offered; if you do, you will be put to death.” [Num18:25-32]

“Moses gave the following instructions to the leaders of the tribes of Israel. When a man makes a vow to give something to the Lord or takes an oath to abstain from something, he must not break his promise, but must do everything that he said he would.
When a young woman still living in her father’s house makes a vow to give something to the Lord or promises to abstain from something, she must do everything that she vowed or promised unless her father raises an objection when he hears about it. But if her father forbids her to fulfill the vow when he hears of it, she is not required to keep it. The Lord will forgive her, because her father refused to let her keep it.” [Num 30:1-5]

“The property of every Israelite will remain attached to his tribe. Every woman who inherits property in an Israelite tribe must marry a man belonging to that tribe. In this way each Israelite will inherit the property of his ancestors, and the property will not pass from one tribe to another. Each tribe will continue to posess its own property.“ [Num 36:7-9]