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Dear NCR Readers, with your generous support we’ve surpassed the $40,000 mark. We’ve surpassed the $45,000 mark. We’re a chip shot from the $50,000 green.
Today is the last week day – the last high traffic day – of our Webathon week. It’s the last day we can pull together to reach - and potentially exceed - our $50,000 goal.
Please, give now if you haven’t already given.
You simply cannot know how satisfying it is for all of us here at NCR, in our Kansas City, Missouri offices, to feel your support.
To those who have already given, know how grateful we are.
To those who cannot give, know we appreciate your morale support and prayers.
To those who have waited to give, do not wait any longer.
Giving to NCR will make you feel good. Will make us feel good. Doing so, you will become a visible and active participant in the growth of this Web site.
Here's some good news: After this week we will not ask you again to donate for one more year. That’s a promise. Keep in mind, however, that all the services of this Web site, day after day, come to you without charge. This is your day to come forward and show you will help us carry the load.
NCR's goal is simple: to provide you, the reader, with the highest quality, independent Catholic journalism we can provide.
Do you believe in providence?
I am wondering out loud how it came to be that on the first weekday morning of this Webathon week we learned that Pope Benedict had sacked an Australian bishop following a pastoral letter he wrote in which he dared to suggest that his growing priest shortage could be alleviated with married or women priests.
That apparently was a shock of shocks to folks in Rome. That story only grew through the week as Australian clergy and others came to Bishop William Morris’ defense.
In the process of this developing news story, we witnessed record numbers of visitors to our Web site. We’ve seen 25,000 visitors or more daily. These numbers, then, translated into donations as readers heard our appeals and took notice, once again, of the unique role we play in our church as watchdogs for those facing adversity.
Where else can you find a story like the Benedict/Morris story? Where else can you watch journalists pursuing the story and sorting out the facts, giving them context, as best one can, as the story develops? Those who come to this site for information know well the Morris sacking as implications for the wider church.
Yet the full ramifications of this story are yet to be seen. Stay tuned.
Meanwhile, thank you so much, Pope Benedict, for your generous contribution and for helping to bring this Webathon to the edge (and beyond?) of significant, collective, Catholic community achievement.
Donate here.
Tom Fox
NCR Editor
PS From "WORD FOR THE DAY" at Gratefulness.org: "Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace, and gratitude." -- Dennis Waitley
