Dear Parishioners, It’s been a month since the tornado. One of the questions that I am frequently asked is “How much longer before you can move back to the rectory?” The other question is: “Can they rebuild the rectory?” The plan is to rebuild the rectory. The way that building insurance works for Catholic Churches in the State of Michigan is that we all belong to a self-insured loss fund. All the parishes in the state pay into this fund and then we are covered when there is a loss like we have had. Our insurance recommended that we hire the disaster recovery company that has been onsite just days after the tornado. It is a full-service company that not only has emptied out the rectory and threw out things that were damaged by the tornado, but they are also contractors that have all the trades in-house. They are currently working on our buildings to restore them (and build new garages) and are working closely with our insurance company. Right now, it’s still early in the reconstruction process, but my hope is to return to the rectory sooner rather than later. Let’s all pray that it’s sooner rather than later. It will be good to be living on the church campus again! I will certainly do my best to keep everyone informed on the progress and, as things move forward, we are getting a pretty good idea of how much insurance is going to cover and how much the parish will need to cover. Thanks for reading! Fr. Mark