Brother Knights,

Our next community work day will be Saturday, Oct 18.   As usual, we'll meet for coffee and donuts at 7:30 a.m. in the social hall and then begin work about 8:00.    We schedule ourselves until 12 Noon but we often finish by 11:00.     Please join us for coffee and donuts and some 'fun' work helping out around the parish and in the community.  

We are still finalizing our tasks for that morning but I'm sure we'll have enough work to keep several of us busy.    We'll advise you in advance if we need any tools or equipment.    

Please email me if you can participate.    Thanks in advance and God bless. 

SK Mark Peterson
Grand Knight

Brother Knights,

1) A quick recap from our pancake breakfast last Sunday:

    Gross receipts.........................$1,476 (a record)

    Expenses.......................................205.76

    Net.............................................1,270.24

    10% tithe to our parish................127.02

Net to Council (Scholarships)....$1,143.22

Brothers -- be sure to thank Brian McDermott from The Original Pancake House, and Nicole Wright from the Fishers store for their support and donations of batter and syrup.   Better yet, stop in and patronize their two restaurants!   And, lest I forget, thanks to all the good Knights who helped on Sunday.   You're the best!!!

2) Our next Blood Drive is this coming Sunday, October 5th from 8:30 - 1:30 in the Social Hall.   Two ways you can support this event:

        -- be a blood donor

        -- help out as a volunteer in the Social Hall, or the table in the Commons.   This will be the easiest duty you'll ever have, all for a very good cause.  

3) We welcome seven new Knights to our Council, via our First Degree ceremony Monday night. 

            Peter Nalin

            Joe Heinzmann

            Don Sinclair

            Bob Peters

            Steve Delaney

            Walt Justus

            Michael Gabrick

Welcome to our Council - we're thrilled you became Knights!

SK Mark Peterson
Grand Knight

Brother Knights,

This month -- September 2008 -- has become one of the best months ever for our Council.    Let me briefly recap the highlights:

1) Our annual Charity Golf Outing reached record highs this year:

        Gross revenues        $26,800   (last year about $16K)

        Paid players                    100    (last year about 60)

        Actual players                   91

Net income $17,918.45    (last year $8,900)

2) One of our brother Knights, Bill Reid, was ordained as a Deacon last Saturday at the Cathedral in Lafayette.   Many of us were there, some of us in the Fourth Degree Color Guard.    Congratulations Bill!   We are very proud of you and you have been a spiritual inspiration to all of us.  

3) We had a successful Fall Membership Open House last Wednesday, 9/17 and we look forward to having several new Knights join our ranks.  

4) Our first, live First Degree ceremony will be next Monday, Sept 29th at 7:30 p.m. in the Day Chapel.   This will be the crowning moment for many of us who have worked for over a year putting this together.    We hope you'll be able to join us next Monday evening.  

5) Our first ever Soccer Challenge was held last Saturday on the Seton ball fields.   This is a nationwide K of C activity but the first time we have conducted it in our Council.    Thank you, Tom Beck, for a great job and a lot of work.    While participation was slight, we now have the infrastructure in place to build on this for the future.  

6) Our next Pancake Breakfast will be next Sunday, 9/28.     Thank you to those who will be working in the kitchen next Sunday -- and the rest of you can bring your families and come eat!  

7) We also kicked off our "Baby Bank" campaign to generate funds for K of C pro-life activities.    Keep dropping those coins in those banks and we'll collect them in a few weeks.   

What an awesome group of Knights you are!    Thank you all for making September such a great month.  

SK Mark Peterson
Grand Knight

Brother Knights,

We still need sponsors and players for our Thursday, Sept 11 golf outing at Bear Slide.    We also need more donors -- there are plenty of envelopes left on our Priest Golf Board.    For those of you who cannot play or cannot support a sponsorship, consider taking an envelope off the board and helping us out.    Thank you in advance!

Tuesday, Sept 2nd -- last day for sponsors to sign up and still be recognized with a sign.   (We will accept sponsorships after that but signage would not be available.    With the long weekend starting tomorrow, its time to finalize those commitments you're working on.  

Players -- we will need to finalize pairings early in the week of Sept 8th.    You still have time but we need more players.  

Volunteers -- we need more volunteers for the day of the event.   Please see the roster attached for areas you can help.   This is a great event for our Council and you needn't be a golfer to enjoy the day with us.   There are lots of ways you can participate and help out.   

Now the good news -- while we still are far short of our goal of 100 golfers and $25,000 in revenue, we are AHEAD of last year in both categories.     Thanks to all of you who have stepped up so far.  

SK Mark Peterson
Grand Knight

I thought posting some news stories about Lucious would be a great way to help preserve his memory and his ministry.

Community center leader teaches lesson in forgiveness

Indianapolis - It will be hard to find someone in central Indiana going without a Thanksgiving meal Thursday. That's because so many volunteers are seeing to those who need them.

Volunteers are busy at the annual Mozel Sanders Thanksgiving Day Food Giveaway, a 35-year tradition. Another man who's spent more than two decades feeding the hungry every day is 92-year-old Lucious Newsome.

Last Thanksgiving someone shot up the community center Newsome had just opened. Since then, Newsome says he's been praying for that person.

When the door to Anna's House swung open last week, the person standing before Lucious Newsome was a complete stranger.

Read the rest of the story here.

Lord’s beggar – 90-yr.-old Catholic will serve poor until ‘God calls me’

By John Shaughnessy
7/14/2006

The Criterion (www.criteriononline.com)

INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. (The Criterion) – At 90, Lucious Newsom hitches up his blue bib overalls and climbs into his white van, preparing to continue his work as “the Lord’s beggar for the poor” – a role he has served for 18 years in Indianapolis.

‘LORD’S BEGGAR’ DISTRIBUTES FOOD – Lucious Newsom, in the blue bib overalls recognizable to those he serves, talks with two women who come to get food that he begged for and collected from an Indianapolis, Ind., company. The 90-year-old “Lord’s beggar for the poor” has been working for 18 years to provide aid to the poor. (The Criterion)

Pulling the van away from the curb, the retired Baptist minister-turned-Catholic waves goodbye to some of the 89 Hispanic families who have just spent the last 30 minutes filling their laundry baskets and milk crates with free tomatoes, onions, peppers and other vegetables – produce that Newsom begged for and collected from an Indianapolis company shortly after he awakened at 4:15 a.m. on this sunny, steamy morning.

Now, as a gold crucifix bounces around his neck – a gift from the families he has just helped – Newsom weaves the van through the city’s near-westside, heading toward a place that he views as a beacon of hope and promise in an area scarred by poverty, crime and drugs.

The place is called “Anna’s House,” a clinic and learning center that will offer food, dental care, medical help and educational services, including tutoring and computer training for children.

Scheduled to open on July 29, Anna’s House is Newsom’s dream to make a lasting difference in the lives of people who struggle against the odds. The house is named in honor of Anna Molloy, a 10-year-old blond-haired, brown-eyed member of St. Jude Parish in Indianapolis, who helps Newsom feed the poor from her wheelchair.

“I named it for her because of her hard work and her love of Jesus,” Newsom says. “She’s on oxygen all the time, and she still keeps coming out to help me.”

Read the rest of the story here.

Lucious Newsom, ‘the Lord’s beggar for the poor,’ dies at 93

By John Shaughnessy

Let’s start with a telling story from the remarkable life of Lucious Newsom, “the Lord’s beggar for the poor” who died on Aug. 18 after 20 years of feeding the needy in Indianapolis and nourishing the souls of the volunteers who helped him.

The story involves one of the thousands of people the retired Baptist-minister-turned Catholic served as he drove through the city in his white van while wearing his trademark blue bib overalls and a gold crucifix that was a gift from the families he helped.

In the story, Newsom befriended a little girl whose heart was broken when her mother walked out the door of their family’s home and never returned, leaving the girl, her sister and their father behind.

“The little girl stopped talking after that, for about three years,” recalls Bill Bahler, one of the countless Catholics who volunteered to help Newsom aid people in areas often scarred by poverty, crime and drugs.

Read the rest of the story.

God bless you Lucious and thank you for the ministry you founded. 

Mike Ryan
Third Degree Knight