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Mission Statement

The Diocesan Office of Stewardship and Development is responsible for the overall stewardship education and fund development for the Diocese of Houma-Thibodaux. The office looks to promote total stewardship as a way of life by educating the parishioners and donors on the present and future needs of the diocese, its parishes, and its schools and institutions.

Stewardship and Education: The Renewal of Our Minds

The Sunday newspapers are filled with back-to-school sales ads. School principals and teachers are preparing their schedules, curricula and classrooms. Practice for fall sports has already begun and new students are going through requisite orientations. As the anticipation for the new school year begins, it seems fitting to reflect on the discipline of Christian stewardship as it relates to education.

Education is a life long activity, which begins at birth and continues until a person passes on to the Lord. It is so important to the development of an individual and society that it is cherished and fostered in every age and culture. Education can be formal or informal; for the very young and for society’s matriarchs and patriarchs; and for all whose minds continuously react to personal needs, societal expectations, material circumstances, and ever changing political and economic realities.

For the Christian steward, the acquisition of knowledge and problem-solving skills, however, is not an end in itself. The good steward recognizes that we have been given stewardship of the earth and have a responsibility to make the world a better place. Knowledge and skills must be put to work to create practical solutions for human challenges.

Stewardship Saint for August

A saint who exercised extraordinary stewardship of the faith was Saint
Dominic (1170 – 1221 c.e.), founder of the Order of Preachers, commonly known as the Dominican Order.

St. Dominic was born to a wealthy family of Spanish nobility in northern Spain. As a young man, he was devoted to his intellectual pursuits, but had a reputation for being deeply compassionate as well. While at school during a famine, he sold his books and furniture to raise money for the poor.

As a priest he adopted an austere lifestyle and traveled barefoot as he preached from place to place. He declined appointments to the church hierarchy because he believed he was called to live modestly and embrace the life of an itinerant preacher.

St. Dominic was known as a man of remarkable vision. He saw the need to use all the resources of human learning in the service of Jesus Christ. It was from this vision that St. Dominic conceived of founding an order that would spread the Gospel by preaching to the ends of the then known world; a religious community whose members would be highly trained, bound by vows with an emphasis on poverty, and devoted to the ministry of preaching and teaching.

The new order was phenomenally successful in converting people to the faith by applying St. Dominic’s concept of harmonizing the intellectual life with addressing people’s spiritual and physical needs.

The feast of St. Dominic is August 8. He is the patron saint of the Dominican Republic and astronomers.