USCCB to give more than $7.8M in grants to strengthen US mission dioceses

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Subcommittee on Catholic Home Missions this year is awarding more than $7.8 million in grants to 69 dioceses and eparchies.

The funding for these grants comes from donations to the Catholic Home Missions Appeal, an annual collection taken in dioceses across the nation.

“When parishioners contribute to the Catholic Home Missions Appeal, they bring faith, hope and love where it is most needed, regardless the amount of their gift,” Bishop Chad Zielinski of New Ulm, Minnesota, chairman of the subcommittee, said, according to a Dec. 1 USCCB press release. “Their gifts have a profound, positive impact on Catholics who face poverty or the isolation of being a small, minority faith.”

Home mission territories are dioceses and eparchies — the Eastern Catholic equivalent of dioceses — identified by the USCCB as sparsely populated and impacted by economic challenges. USCCB grants to mission dioceses help defray the costs of everything from standard operational costs to ministries working on evangelization and catechesis.

One such diocese is Rapid City, South Dakota, which oversees the Standing Rock Reservation Ministry. This ministry serves the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. According to the USCCB, the ministry consists of three Franciscan sisters and a priest who administer four parishes, tending to the spiritual needs of around 500 Catholics. Additionally, the ministry provides services to 8,000 non-Catholic members of the tribe living on the more than 2.3-million-acre reservation.

The Office of Deliverance Ministry in the Diocese of Brownsville, Texas, has also received a grant. This ministry provides both spiritual and emotional care to those wounded and oppressed by sin. According to the USCCB, the ministry helps more than 100 people each month, providing prayers of deliverance, Confession, and Anointing of the Sick.

The USCCB has also approved a grant for the Syro-Malankara Eparchy of St. Mary Queen of Peace. The eparchy’s 24 priests serve around 11,000 Eastern Catholics around the country. The eparchy has no lay staff, but according to the USCCB, the grant will help cover the costs of a youth summer camp, retreats, family conventions, and vocational discernment.

Bishop Zielinski said that Catholics in mission dioceses have a range of financial and spiritual needs.

“Parishioners in mission dioceses already give sacrificially from their limited means,” he said, according to the USCCB. “My prayer is that their example of faith will inspire the rest of us dig deeper to help our neighbors carry out the mission that Jesus has entrusted to us.”

Those who wish to donate to the Catholic Home Missions Appeal may do so here.