Hello to all of our past and present participants in the HOPE journey and to all of our friends.

At this time of year, as we prepare for the coming of Our Lord, it is useful to reflect on the accomplishments of the year and to look forward to the challenges of the future.

HOPE and its community have experienced a memorable 2014.

We celebrated the pilgrimage of another group of teachers and administrators from our Archdiocese as they seized the opportunity to visit, teach and learn from their colleagues in the Latin Patriarchate Schools by exchanging lesson plans and teaching techniques.  And our HOPE participants also enriched their spiritual lives by exploring some of the Holy Land’s sacred sites.

We have just recently welcomed Father Sleman Hassan of Amman, Jordan (who many of our members remember as Deacon Sleman in Beit Jala) as he visited Cincinnati to celebrate the wedding of his cousin.  Father Sleman graciously met with us after concelebrating Mass with Father Waller at St. Andrew and also had a very interactive meeting with students of St. Andrew – St. Elizabeth Ann Seton School.

On a more practical level, 2014 saw our HOPE organization take several giant steps forward.  Thanks to the  efforts of our volunteer legal advisor,  HOPE has incorporated in Ohio as a Non-Profit organization, and has applied for and received tax exempt status under Internal Revenue section 501(c)(3).  This means that interested donors may now make tax deductible contributions directly to HOPE!

Our blog, HOPE Voices (https://hopevoices.wordpress.com/) continues to inform and educate ourselves and our friends about the activities of HOPE.  Also, we now have a presence on Facebook, in order to introduce ourselves to a wider audience.  Visit us at https://www.facebook.com/HolyLandOutreach .  And, in anticipation of building an internet site in the near future, we have secured a domain name, hopevoices.org.

Also, thanks to the expertise and generosity of a friend, we now have a new full color tri-fold brochure that highlights HOPE.  Please see the attachment and feel free to print it off and share with your friends.

But with all of the extraordinary accomplishments of 2014 come the ordinary challenges of an ongoing program.  Our HOPE Community is blessed in having members who are most generous in their gifts of time, talent and hospitality.  But in the everyday world, cash is still king and the flow of it determines what we can and cannot accomplish.

For example, we plan to bring two talented LPS teachers to the U.S. next year to embark on advanced Talents Unlimited training, so that they may return to the Holy Land and further train their colleagues in this proven program.  However to date, we have on hand only about half of the roughly $16,000 that will be required to accomplish this.  In addition, we are hoping to bring another group of LPS teachers to Cincinnati in October of 2015 in order to continue the annual cycle of establishing and strengthening twinning relationships. This is also dependent upon the success of our fund raising efforts.

As we approach the end of 2014 and the opportunity to make charitable contributions for this year, we ask that each of you consider what HOPE means to you and what you may be able to do to assist all of us in our mission, both now and in the future.

And, if you have friends, businesses, organizations that are seeking to make end of year charitable contributions, we urge you to contact them and tell them about HOPE.  Feel free to print and pass on a copy of our brochure.

We are acutely aware that our request comes at a time of the year that has many other challenges and obligations for each of us to face.  We also believe that, while cash donations enable us to do much, your support in many other ways, including your prayers, are critical to our survival and growth.

Any donation that you may care to consider may be made payable to HOPE and sent to:

HOPE

c/o Fifth Third Bank

5540 Cheviot Road

Cincinnati, Ohio 45247

HOPE is a non-profit organization as recognized under §501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue code and donations are tax deductible. No donation is too small.  Every donation will be gratefully received and acknowledged in writing.

Thank you for your continued support of HOPE.  We wish you the Joy and Peace of a Blessed Christmas.

Sincerely,

The Board of Directors of HOPE