My Brothers in Christ:

Grace and Peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.  We have just experienced the devastating impact of Hurricane Ian, and know our brothers and sisters across local and international borders suffer from catastrophic flooding, wildfires, typhoons, etc.  Even with emergency response to provide rescue and shelter, and restore electricity and water supplies, we realize their impacts will be long-lasting throughout the nation and the world.  We offer our prayers to all the families affected by these disasters and pray for the repose of the souls whose lives were taken.

In St. Luke’s Gospel, we are called to love God with all our heart, with all our being, with all our strength, and with all our mind, and our neighbor as ourselves.  In solidarity with our brothers and sisters, I ask you to participate in Disaster Relief 2022, a voluntary special collection for the humanitarian, long-term recovery, and Church needs arising from these calamities.  We join other dioceses through the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops for this voluntary special collection.  The funds collected in this special appeal will be used to support the efforts of the official relief agencies of the U.S. Catholic Church, Catholic Charities USA and/or Catholic Relief Services, as they and their local agencies respond to immediate emergency needs for such necessities as water, food, shelter, and medical care, and aid in long-term rebuilding and recovery efforts; and the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops for pastoral and reconstruction needs of the Church.

Communicate this opportunity to serve to your parishioners and ask them to notate their donations for Disaster Relief 2022.  Realizing there are other important collections and celebrations during October, please choose October 9 or October 23 for this special collection.

Once this collection has been subject to your parish’s standard offertory count and accounting procedures, please send the entire collection (monetary donations) made payable to the Diocese of Orlando, Disaster Relief 2022, at P.O. Box 1800, Orlando, FL 32802-1800.  Please remind your parish bookkeepers/business managers to record all amounts received in connection with this special diocesan collection on line 405 of your parish financial statements (i.e. Diocesan Collections).  Disbursements of the collected funds should be recorded on line 705 of your parish financial statements (i.e. Diocesan Collections).

We pray our love of God and neighbor are worthy of His mandate.

Sincerely yours in Christ,

Most Reverend John Noonan