1/17/21

Dear St. Joseph Parish Family,

We're now back in Ordinary Time and this Sunday is the 2nd Sunday of Ordinary Time. It's called Ordinary Time because of the numbering: it's 'ordinary' for ordinal numbers, as the Sundays in this time are counted 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc. 

The construction is back in full swing and I want to give everyone an update. The school building repairs are completed – the new roof, repointing the exterior walls, and other work to make the building water-tight. There will be some more exterior wall repointing this Spring, but it will be minor compared to the work done this past Fall. 

I'm currently beginning the fundraising for the perpetual adoration chapel. I'm raising the money outside the parish, and if you know someone who would be interested please mention the project's website: www.perpetualadoration.nyc. 

This weekend we'll finish restoring the original St. Joseph baptismal font and it will be back in use soon. 

We've also been working on the boilers that serve the church building, the rectory, and the school building. They are old and temperamental, but I want to get as much life out of them as possible.

The biggest current project is the new parish hall: McGuire Hall. We've torn the church undercroft (basement) down to the structural frame. I'm glad we did because we found many issues. The steam pipes were a mess – in many places they continually poured out water like a fountain. Also, the pipes' arrangement was incorrect and so there was that loud banging in the church from the pipes. They have now been repaired. There are many pipes in the undercroft and we've had most of them moved so that in the new parish hall there won't be pipes across the ceiling. We're not going to have an 'industrial' look to the space! Also, we've had to replace some of the structural columns to provide better structural support to the building. In other words, the project is moving forward, but there was more work to be done than we expected. I'm hoping that the hall will be ready by June. I can't wait until we unveil the new McGuire Hall and have our first parish dinner there!