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Immaculate Conception School 409 Palmer Rd.

Columbia, Illinois 62236 Michael L. Kish, Principal

(618) 281-5353 mkish@icsmail.org Tammy Hoeflinger, School Board President

Celebrating 165 years of Mission, Community, Service.

The mission of Immaculate Conception School is to provide experiences to inspire, challenge, and nurture the mind, body, and spirit of our students within the framework of the Gospel of Jesus Christ

and the tradition of the Catholic Church.

“God is good!” January 10,2020 Bienvenido el parochia! V. 45 #27 Dear Parent,

Christmas 2019 A sincere thank you for all your gifts and kindness over the Holiday Season. This is a very humbling job. I have a hard time accepting gratitude since I do what I do because I love who I work for(God and You). I am not sure what my psychoanalyst calls my embarrassment but please know I am grateful! Now if I only knew who gave me the inspiration magnet, fudge, box of home made cookies, addresses of 7 returned Christmas cards and any other gift I owe a thank you for, my holidays would be complete. God bless all for their kindness to me and Jeanne! PARISH WORKDAY THAT WAS SCHEDULED FOR THIS SATURDAY 1-11-2020, has been canceled due to a funeral. Please come on Sunday January 12, after the 11a.m. Mass to help take down the Christmas decorations! The Baptism of the Lord is the end of the Christmas Season. And it ain’t over till the decorations are put away!

Joyce Rose’s 90th birthday party is January 12. She is grandmother to Kyle, Emily,Taylor and Sarah Rose and was our School Secretary for 17 years. She was all heart to our students and connected much like Mrs. Epplin. She mothered everyone and had a real artistic and literary gift. She is a parish and community treasure who served in many leadership capacities. (She sang my Mom and Dad’s wedding too.) And she produced

amazing grandchildren! We rejoice in Joyce! Happy nine decades! $123,000! That’s how much we earned for College Tuition rewards last year through our Magazine Renewal program! MAGAZINE RENEWAL DRIVE Since 1981, the Eugene J. Schorb Immaculate Conception Fund for Catholic Education

(Endowment Fund) has received $482,518.34, and is generating over $20,000 a year in interest! For the next 4 years, our School Board has committed profits from our drive to the new Catholic Education and Activity Center. So far we’ve donated over $20,000! This year’s drive will have 2 major changes: 1) We are dropping the “Bill-Me-Later” and now take upfront

payments to cut our losses on collection/turnaround/postage. 2) We are rolling out an additional program called “Ready-Set-fund” which looks pretty cool. Last year our sellers attained tuition credit towards over 900 colleges and universities worth $123,000 through the SAGE Scholars Tuition Rewards. 34 earned $2500 and 38 $1000 tuition credit to schools like McKendree, Milliken, Quincy, DePaul, Lindenwood, Fontbonne, Dayton and Creighton. Students can earn up to $20,000 over their Magazine Renewal and Sales life and it is transferable within the family. More info. on kick-off day Tuesday, January 14! Thanks to Kim Siegel for chairing this year! STEWARDSHIP COMMITMENT A letter is being sent out to the 30 who have not completed their forms. “Buy in” please to who we are and what we are trying to do! BILLIKEN TICKETS: We have 25 free tickets to SLU Women vs VCU at 3:00 on Sunday, January 12. Also Shootaround Sunday *kids can go on court after the game to shoot around and get autographs. I went last Sunday. Chaiffetz is a great venue! Even the baby crawling contest at half-time was a winner! mkish@icsmail.org DINNER AUCTION TICKETS Ticket prices go up at mid-night! Go on-line and order today. There's No Place Like Home is the theme this year. For the first time ever it will be held in our new CEAC Center on Feb. 22, 2020. Tickets are $60($75 after today) per person and may be purchased by sending in a check to school made payable to ICS Parents and Friends or online at https://icshome.givesmart.com. Buy them before they go up! Bring your friends! PLEASE DO NOT ORDER ANY SCHOLASTIC BOOKS NOW VIA THE FLYERS. We have our Book Fair coming up and if we hit $2000 in sales, we will receive 50% off on other book purchases which is huge. This is Teresa Dorshorst’s last year as chairperson. Please help us recruit a new chair. THANKS to YourCause Corporate Giving Program for a $100 match! THANKS to the HAROLD LINDBERGH ZARING FOUNDATION AND BOARD for a grant to purchase 41 chromebooks and 7 laptops(nearly $10,000!). This is another Christmas gift for our school! For many years, they have helped us move forward together! BUILDERS CLUB NEWS Open House is January 26 to kick-off Catholic Schools Week. 12:15-2:00. We need Builders Club for Student Ambassadors.

KIDS AGAINST HUNGER The ICS Builders Club is seeking funding

to make over 15,000 meals as part of the Kids Against Hunger project. Olivia Blaskiewicz is Director of the activity scheduled for February 8 in the ICS Cafeteria. This is the 11

th year for the program which makes meals for

children we will never meet in a land we may never visit. The food is often transported by the United States Army. The product in the bags tastes like chicken and rice without the chicken, has a three year shelf life, and will feed six people at a cost of about $1.50 a bag. It is amazing how the good we do accumulates over a period of time! Since the program began in 2010, 136,728 meals have been sent to 6 different countries. This year’s goal is $3,500 to make 15,000 meals. Donations can be mailed to The

ICS Builders Club, Immaculate Conception School, 409 Palmer Rd., Columbia, IL or placed in an envelope and dropped in the Church Sunday envelope collection. Thank you for your generosity. May the New Year bring you great joy in serving God’s people as we work to fulfill our brand of Mission, Community, Service…service 1853! Gratefully, Olivia Blaskiewicz, Director of Kids Against Hunger for the ICS Builders Club

THE DANCE On Friday, January 3rd, the Builder’s Club hosted a New Year’s Dance. A great time was had by all. A special thank you to Molly Hake, Donna Videmschek, Teresa Dorshorst, Carrie Stark, and Shari Murphy for helping chaperone the dance! Thanks to Chairperson Allison Stark and BC Advisor Ms. Kailey Walker!

SCHOOL BLOCK CHALLENGE We submitted 29 ICS blocks and 3 graduates blocks. For the first time, we did not win so Mrs. Fetcho and Mrs. Weiler are headed to Paducah to see who was good enough to beat us. But we did have graduates Maria Biske “Redwood Sanctuary” take second in the high school competition and Emma Melliere Frido Kahlo “A Woman to Remember” taking third! We’ve been on pins and needles this week waiting for this info and now we need to stitch ourselves together and celebrate the fun and joy of creating art! Thanks Mrs. Fetcho, Mrs. Weiler, Mrs. Melliere and Mrs. Holdener! YOUNG AUTHORS TURN-IN...AND LOOKING FOR NEXT CHAIR Turn in date for the spring Young Authors contest will be Tuesday, January 21st. This will also be the jeans day for students turning in a story. The K-4 assembly will be Feb. 19th. We will again need parent volunteers for judging. Please contact Carrie Stark: cbraun79@aol.com if you’d like to be a judge this year. We will also need a new chair for the Young Authors program next year. Interested? Contact Carrie for more information. You might consider shadowing the spring turn-in and judging process to learn the ropes for next year. Guidelines: Please do not write your name on your story, instead use a post-it note or attach your name on a separate piece of paper with a paperclip. The emphasis of the Young Authors program is on creativity! A parent volunteer will judge your work based on its originality, its organization (does your story have a beginning, middle, and ending?), and on its use of clear, descriptive words. Stories are evaluated based 75% on creativity and 25% on grammar and punctuation. You may also enter a poem. Students in grades 5 through 8 may also enter non-fiction essays including classroom assignments. Judges will be looking for clear, descriptive sentences and well-organized paragraphs. Any submission may be written at home or as part of a classroom assignment. Please do not submit work that has been entered in Young Authors competition in a previous year. Young Authors is designed to encourage the student to write, however a parent can help with proofreading grammar, punctuation, and spelling. Very young authors may tell their story to a parent while the parent writes/types the story. It is important that the story be “in the child’s own words,” which is the state rule for the Young Authors program. Parents should encourage their children to work on their submissions as independently as possible. Students in grade K-4 receive their Young Authors awards at presentations following each judging. Older students receive theirs at the Awards Night in May. All winners from fall and spring are entered into a drawing, and one randomly selected student from each grade will be invited to attend the regional Young Authors’ Conference.

Young Authors is one of the best programs we have. Writing uses the most parts of

your brain so it is a real mental work-out and “grows” the brain power.

CHESS TEAM FOR THE NEW YEAR! We now have 98 Grade 2 through 8th graders playing chess! Thanks to Coach Cyra Herrmann! Get these dates on your calendar: Chess Schedule: Practices: In the Garden Level Tuesdays from 3:00-4:30 Grades 2 & 3 - 1/21, 2/4, 2/18, 3/3, 3/17, 3/31 Grades 4 through 8 - 1/14, 1/28, 2/11, 2/25, 3/10, 3/24 Chess Meets: St. Teresa - January 25, Blessed Sacrament - February 22, ICS - March 7, St. Clare - March 14, Queen of Peace - April 4 (Diocesan)

Spittin’ rocks We ain’t finished here yet! Playground development. The best offense is a good D-Fence. You should have seen the surprised faces of our Pre-S and Pre-K’s coming back on Monday! Good fences make good neighbors? Or “this will keep the 8th grade off our trikes”!

INTERMEDIATE SPEECH Our intermediate meet will be February 22nd at St. Joe's in Freeburg. Practices each Wednesday and Friday from 3-4 beginning next Wednesday, January 15th. Practices are not mandatory but the more you attend, the better you will do. I will have more information available about the meet as we get it. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank You, Ms. Catie Taylor HISTORY BEE TRYOUTS FOR THE 2020 SEASON will be held in Ms. Catie Taylor’s room on Monday, January 13th at 3:15. The tryouts will be in the form of a written test with the top ten moving on to the online exam later in January. Anyone in grades 6-8 can sign up. Sign up sheet on the board in Room 226. Contact Ms. Taylor if questions.

MATH PRACTICE (Gr. 6-8) In preparation for MathCounts and high school contest team building. 6-8 are invited to come. Practice schedule-3:00-4:00 Mrs. Weiler’s room: Thurs. Jan. 16, 23, 30 MathCounts Competition Feb. 1 SIU-E REPORT CARDS will be sent home January 17th. The quarter ended the 9th. Scholastic Bowl 2020 Match Schedule Monday, January 13th Bl. Sacrament Tuesday, January 14th Columbia Middle School Tuesday, January 21st St. James Wednesday, January 22 nd @ Queen of Peace Wednesday, January 29 th Queen of Peace Thursday, January 30 th @ Bl. Sacrament Saturday, February 1 st Mater Dei Tournament @ Mater Dei High Tuesday, February 4 th @ All Saints Tuesday, February 11 th @ Carriel Jr High – O’Fallon Wednesday, February 19th @ St. James Thursday, February 27 th @ Triad Tuesday, March 10th Fulton Jr. High – O’Fallon Wednesday, March 11th @ Aviston Wednesday, March 18th Lincoln Middle School – Edwardsville Monday, March 23rd All Saints Tuesday, March 31st Liberty Middle School – Edwardsville Thursday, April 2nd @ Fulton Jr. High – O’Fallon Monday, April 6th Aviston Tuesday, April 14th Carriel Jr. High – O’Fallon Wednesday, April 15th @ Lincoln Middle School – Edwardsville Tuesday, April 21st @ Liberty Middle School – Edwardsville Wednesday, April 29th Regional Monday, May 4 th Sectional Friday, May 8th State @ Peoria Civic Center CALENDAR January 2020 14 Magazine Drive Kick-Off 1:45 gym. Faculty meeting after school with Rick. We need to get our lower grade parents into this fundraiser. Teachers are the key! Turn-in Days are the 17th, 21st, 24th, 28th. 17 Child Protection Children’s Component-8:30 start PreS and PreK, K-2, 3-4, 5-6, 7-8

TEC Retreat HERE-CAMPUS CLOSED thru Jan. 20 20 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, no school 21 Young Authors Turn-in, dress down day, School Board 26 Catholic Schools Week 27 Anniversary of our Church Dedication---All School Mass---all welcome! Fr. Carl leaves on vacation 30-Feb. 2 Scholastic Book Fair 31 Team Quest with Sr. Thea Bowman School Sunday March 8 12:15 Knights of Columbus February 13 Child Protection Training 6:00 Garden Level

January 27 is the anniversary of the dedication of our Church. We will move the All-School Mass to that Monday to celebrate it and Catholic Schools Week. Fr. Gary will have the Mass as Fr. Carl will be off to Florida in search of palms. Join us and give thanks! From time immemorial, humans have constructed beautiful houses for God! THE SPORTING NEWS…DIOCESAN TOURNEY: Our Parochial and Junior Girls strek to Mt. Carmel this weekend for the finals. Parochials open against Blessed Sacrament at 8:30 tonight and Juniors vs. St. Theresa at 7:30. Thanks to players, coaches, and parents for representing us! Leave it all on the floor! SOCCER UNIFORM UPDATE: 194 students played soccer from grades 1-8. 106 boys and 88 girls. There have been 192 jerseys returned and 189 shorts. (2 jerseys and 3 shorts) If you still have a uniform, please return asap to the office. These are new uniforms and we need 100% returned. Look under the bed and behind the washer.

Fifth grade boys ended the season last night taking 5th place at St. Theresa’s Tourney and closing out at 11-1 for a stellar year!

GIBAULT CATHOLIC HIGH SCHOOL Attention 6-8 grade students! Join the Gibault Ambassadors Club for a mini lock-in on Saturday, January 11 from 4-10PM. Movies, flash-light scavenger hunt, kickball tournaments, and more! RSVP by Tuesday, January 7 to Kara Hoke (khoke@gibaulthawks.com) Be a Hawk for a Day Gibault Catholic welcomes 6-8 grade students to visit the campus and shadow one of the many GCHS students that make our school what it is! Contact Kara Hoke, Director of Enrollment (khoke@gibaulthawks.com) for more information and to arrange your student’s shadow visit. Coach Rueter Court Dedication Join the Hawks between the JV and Varsity games-7:30PM on January 17, as we dedicate our new gym floor to Coach Dennis Rueter. THE COLUMBIA VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPT will be hosting a Benefit Mouse Races and Silent and Live Auction on Saturday, January 11, 2020 at Turner Hall in Columbia. This year’s profit will be donated to the Reddick family. Tickets are $25(free soda-draft beer). Doors open at 6:00---first race at 7:00. Connie Huebner has tickets to sell. Thanks for supporting the CVFD! ATTENTION 4TH THROUGH 8TH GRADERS! You and five or six friends have the opportunity to earn prizes, cash, and goodies through a competition of co-ed winter dodgeball between schools. Make sure to tell your parents they have the opportunity to earn guest prizes and

giveaways, all in the same place! Grab your coat and your snow boots and sled on down to Columbia High School on January 18th for a friendly snowball fight. 4th and 5th grade, your bracket starts at 11:00 AM. 6th through 8th grade, your bracket starts at 2:00 PM! Remember, you and your team are guaranteed 2 games and will be competing for a cash prize and a sleigh load of bragging rights, SO DON’T MISS IT! Let’s see ICS in the winners circle and beat SPPS!" Sponsord by the Mo County Entrepreneurs.

Free 50th Anniversary Celebration Concert, Saturday, January 11 at 3:00pm Musicians of the St. Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra have been dazzling audiences for five decades! Join us as an audience member to celebrate this milestone 50th anniversary as YO alumni from the last 50 years join current YO musicians and members of the SLSO in a casual, fun and free celebration concert. SLSO Conductor Kevin McBeth will lead a lineup of favorites including: Shostakovich Festive Overture Sibelius Finlandia Brahms Academic Festival Overture John Williams Main Title from Star Wars Free concert but let them know: http://email.wordfly.com/view/?sid=MTExXzE2MTg2XzE1NDY1NV82NzY3&l=63f957ff-aa2d-ea11-8991-e41f1345a486&utm_source=wordfly&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20-yo_na-1111&utm_term=rt_nodisc_local_parentsof&utm_content=version_A&uid=496947&sourceNumber=47906

Sisters of Charity---St. Theresa’s order our projectors at the Catholic U. in Haiti and uniforms in Ghana MISSIONS INTERNATIONAL, Inc., sponsor of the sister parish program, also does charitable work on its own with our help. The first picture is of medical aid to the Sisters of Charity, St. Theresa of Kolkutta’s order. Notice the joy in their faces as they help the poorest of the poor in Venezuela. The second picture from President Shelly Sands shows our soccer uniforms and digital projectors. Read her letter to the class please. Chicken comments included. Shelly lives in Highland and keeps her Dad Len Daiber’s dream alive. I traveled with him to Guatemala in 1998. Once again, the power of one! A good idea from the martyred ASC Sister Kathleen McGuire, working with Fr. Vince Haselhorst and Len in the 1980’s brought all this about. We were the first parish to have a sister parish in Guatemala! Host Family needed Kelly from Vietnam is coming to Gibault Catholic HS for the Spring semester, arriving in early January. We have had some people interested in hosting her but have needed to change their plans. We are looking for one final family take on this young lady as she begins her American journey. You can receive $100 for referring a family to host. Host families come in all shapes and sizes, some are empty-nesters, couples with no children, homes with teenagers or young children. The possibilities are endless. A host family provides a bed, meals, and transportation to and from school and will receive a monthly stipend. This is a great way to share with a student your beliefs, culture, and community. Andrea Bodinet, Regional Manager, Central Region, Educatius Group Cell Number: 618-250-2569

From Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM As one author I read years ago said, silence is the net below the tightrope walker. We are walking, trying to find the right words to explain our experience and the right actions to match our values. Silence is that safety net that allows us to fall; it admits, as poets often do, that no words or deeds will ever be perfectly right or sufficient. So the poet keeps trying, for which we are grateful! The great spaciousness and safety net beneath a tightrope walker is silence; it offers freedom from self-preoccupation and the fear of making a mistake. A regular practice of contemplation helps us trust that silence will uphold us, receive our mistakes, and give us the courage to learn and grow. Please keep Maren Donjon’s mom, Marian Wickersham, in your prayers as she recovers form a fall. Lindsay White, Mason’s Mom, battled infection over the holidays. She’s home but needs our prayers. She has had some good news on her cancer but then something else pops up. Ashley Burris, Lily’s Mom, is on bed rest for her pregnancy. Please pray for her. Lauren Darr, (Eric and Everett) delivered Vance Gabriel Monday night at 6 pounds 1 ounce but Lauren is battling a severe virus and needs our prayers. Our condolences to Tammy Prater May (Cheyenne and Kegan) on the loss of her father Richard Prater on Christmas Day. He was from Steeleville, Illinois. Prayers please during this time of grief! HOPE CAMPOS Once again tagedy has struck our Columbia Community with the loss of CHS Freshman, Hope Campos who took her life. It is so hard to sort this out. And we ask ourseves where is our God with this. But God put natural law in effect and it runs the world. Prayers for Hope’s Family, friends, and the CHS community. Prayers for action in our community to be more vigilant to needs, more counseling, better responses to life’s disappointments, and knowing how loved we are by so many. Rest in peace Hope. PRAYERS: Special Intention Logan Eichenseer, Marian Wickersham, Ashley Burris, Lindsay White, Danielle Dorlac, Patrick Kish, Tom Keeven Sr., Ed Schaefer, Dan Hoeflinger, Libby LoPorto, Tom Giovanni, Dion Scherr Miller, Donna Kania, Dorothy Buechler, Owen Jordan, Anthony Hendricks, Mark Fiore, Shawn Eichoff, Charlie Stockes, George Perry, Angela Roepke, Jan Hoffmann, Bill West, Jennifer Nesser, Tom Kish, Patti Rottler, Mike Taylor, Lindsey Herbeck Well worth your time---We are all to be ‘mothers of God” by bringing Jesus Christ to birth in the world.

Incarnation---“Mothering” God Christmas, Feast of the Incarnation Here, in time, we are celebrating the eternal birth which God the Father bore and bears unceasingly in eternity, because this same birth is now born in time, in human nature. St. Augustine says, “What does it avail me that this birth is always happening, if it does not happen in me? That it should happen in me is what matters.” We shall therefore speak of this birth, of how it may take place in us. —Meister Eckhart (1260–1327) You might be a little surprised to hear a celibate medieval friar make such a shocking statement about God giving birth, but his question is a good one for Christians to grapple with. Matthew Fox, a theologian and a personal friend, gives us a more contemporary version of Eckhart’s words and offers this commentary:

What good is it to me if Mary gave birth to the Son of God 1400 years ago and I do not give birth to the Son of God in my own person and time and culture? . . . We are all meant to be mothers of God.

O’er the River Jordan, God parted Heaven. This Sunday we recall the Baptism of our God who did not need it, but who went through the ritual to bond with us in our humanity. We are a ritual people. Jesus shows us we need to be so too. Church, like so many things in life, may not be the place we want to be at the moment we are there, but we seldom regret going once we get there. And maybe the onlookers, like those who witnessed Jesus Baptism, were moved just like the community members around us when we attend. My birth is celebrated on April 15 but April 24, my date of Baptism, was the most important day of my life! Come to the Water of life this weeked!

Mike Kish Principal PS HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Angie Pace on January 2 and Donna Carrico on January 3. Birthdays are good. The more you’ve had the longer you’ve lived. PS AND NOAH SAID---“I TOLD YOU SO!” PS Do you know where the AED’s are in the new school???? One is by the office in the hallway and one is right outside the bathrooms in the cafeteria, between the gym and café. PS Parish New Year’s Resolution---a full Church. Come be community! Come build memories and traditions that will add depth to your life and a place to go to in the ups and downs of life. We have no right to go to God in bad times and say “why me” if we don’t go to Him in the good times and say “why me?”. Take a chance. I dare you! Happy New Year!

Why following Jesus is so hard…