Extra For Lent

To my son Tommy,

I wonder if the person who counts the collections at church is picking through the coins and asking "Wonder who is the cheapskate that put all these pennies and nickels and various coins in here?". For the past two Sundays (and hopefully the next four) we have taken some coins from your piggy bank and put them in for the collections.   Not much, but perhaps two or three dollars worth of coins.  Last week we used a couple extra envelopes from the end of the pew and wrote in your name.  This week, no pencil in the pew and when you went to do the drop it in the first collection you opened the envelope and poured in the coin and dropped in the empty envelope.  All I could do was chuckle and smile and shake my head.  On the second collection for vocations we didn't even bother with the envelope.

I always enjoyed putting the envelopes in the basket when I was young.  Offertory and the sign of peace were the highlights to a young version of your dad.  I think you will develop a joy for this process too.  Of course we have to give you extra to put in because mommy and I signed up for the automatic electronic giving which means no envelopes for us.  We missed the first six months or so, after trying to sign up twice for the fledgling system.  We just realized it wasn't coming out again, so we re-did the account yet  again and they finally started taking it out this week.  So if we give a little extra in envelope form so you can have the fun of giving, well we are just making up for what we missed.  We just might have to find the collection plate counter person and offer our apologies for the extra work.

Sincerely with love from your dad,
Leo