HOMEPAGE for this issue: December 22, 2010
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To honor the feasts of St. Juan Diego (Dec. 9) and of Our Lady of Guadalupe (Dec. 12), students in Blessed Sacrament School's Spanish classes held a bilingual prayer service Dec. 10 that included a dramatization of Mary's appearances to St. Juan Diego on a Mexican hillside in 1531. 

Students from many grades processed to the altar with a statue of Our Lady of Guadalupe, roses and candles, singing in Spanish and inviting the Blessed Mother to walk with them.

Then third-graders dressed as St. Juan Diego, Our Lady of Guadalupe, the unbelieving bishop and St. Juan Diego's ill uncle reenacted the story of the appearance of the miraculous image on St. Juan Diego's tilma.

Fourth-grade students at Notre Dame School in Denver organized a toy drive for needy children in October to provide Christmas gifts. The class led the effort which the entire student body participated in.

"Notre Dame students pride themselves on being servant leaders," said principal Charlene Molis. "Each grade in the school organizes at least one service project during the year.

For many years, the fourth-grade students have collected toys for children who (otherwise)would not receive presents for Christmas.The toys collected this year were sent to the children at a parish in Hatch, New Mexico."

For the second year in a row kindergarten through eighth-grade students of Our Lady of Lourdes School in Denver, led by the Little Flowers girls club, participated in Fast for a Feast Dec. 2 in which the children fasted for lunch and donated the proceeds to provide lunches to the homeless for the sandwich line at St. Elizabeth of Hungary Church on the Auraria campus in downtown Denver.

“As Catholics, we believe sacrifice is essential to our spirituality,” said parent organizer Nancy Sayers.

“But it is not enough to ask young children to fast; they must see the fruits of their work and how God blesses their generosity with his. Students assembled Child of God Chow bags and loaded them (Dec. 3). With prayer, song, and a devotion to giving what we have for those who have not, the meals were sent to St. Elizabeth’s. The fast had indeed become a feast.”