Wednesday, December 23 will be our last show of 2009 as Jennifer and I will be taking off work to spend time with our family while the boys are out of school for Christmas.

And though we’re taking vacation, we’ll also still be doing quite a bit of work as we wrap up our first fund drive in two years for our non-profit apostolate, Rosary Army.

Regular listeners to our program hear us talk about Rosary Army quite often simply because it’s been a major part of our lives for seven years. Rosary Army has been in our lives longer than some of our children!

The growth of Rosary Army in that time is nothing less than staggering. Yesterday on Lino Rulli’s program on The Catholic Channel, someone called in to suggest Lino make a donation to Rosary Army. Although he already knew the answer, Lino asked the called to describe what Rosary Army does. The caller, rightfully so, talked about the thousands of Rosaries Rosary Army gives away each year, and our mission of encouraging more people to make, pray, and give them away.

But what that caller was not so clear about is that in the past seven years, Rosary Army has also produced hundreds of hours of free audio and video programming that have been downloaded nearly 2.5 million times from people around the world. Our multimedia outreach has strengthened marriages and families, and enriched people’s faith lives, and brought thousands of people closer to God through our initiatives such as TotalConsecration.com, ThatCatholicShow.com, and our other projects.

Because God has taken Rosary Army into so many new and unexpected directions, it is not always clear to people exactly what it is that Rosary Army does.

So one of our goals for 2010 is to more clearly unify all of Rosary Army’s various ministries to make it easier than ever for more people to benefit from our free services. We’ll never stop making, praying, and giving away all-twine knotted Rosaries and encouraging others to do the same, but soon, when people visit RosaryArmy.com, they will also see all of the other wonderful resources available to them at the press of the button.

Though we are far from reaching our Giving Campaign goal for 2010, we decided this website endeavor is important enough to go ahead and hire a web development company to create a brand new Rosary Army website that will more clearly unify Rosary Army, TotalConsecration.com, ThatCatholicShow.com, and The Catholics Next Door radio program all into a single web portal.

Additionally, we are working on two brand-new online media projects for 2010. One is a video mini-series aimed at families with young children, and another is an audio mini-series addressing important aspects of our faith. Plus, we have a tremendous idea for Lent that we hope to unveil in January that will give you opportunities to be a blessing to other people in a very personal and amazing way.

Okay, now you knew the pitch was coming, so here it is.

The truth of the matter is that we have never before been so far behind in raising funds for Rosary Army. Last year we entirely skipped any fund raising activity. That means we went TWO YEARS without asking for a single dime. Nevertheless, in that time Rosary Army kept growing to the point that it was necessary for us to hire a new full-time employee to keep the organization going.

But at this point, with barely a week left in the year, we are $59,350 short of our budget for the next year. I won’t reiterate all the details here, but if you’re interested in reading more about how Rosary Army has spent its money over the past two years as well as the budget plans for 2010, you can check it out here.

But we need help. Now.

On our radio program, we rarely ask for help for Rosary Army. We talk about it, but we don’t flat out ask for help. We just don’t. That’s not the outlet, and we don’t want to betray the trust of our audience for that program by turning it into a public broadcasting giving campaign.

But today we’re most likely going to ask for help because we simply don’t know what else to do.

Now here’s more truth: God has never let us down.

In the seven years of Rosary Army, this is only the 5th time we had a fund drive. Only once before did we not make our goal, and that was only by a couple thousand dollars.

We’ve seen some miraculous things happen at the last minute, and that’s what we’re counting on this year.

After December 31, we’re not going to send out any more pleas for help via newsletters until our next giving campaign. We have too much work to do than to spend all of our time raising money. That’s why we’ve always reserved our fund drives for the periods between All Saints Day and New Year’s Eve. After that, we get back to focusing on other things.

But if you’re reading this, can you help? Will you help? Go check out Rosary Army’s website and see for yourself the good we’re trying to do for God and why we believe God has kept this apostolate going for so many years, because of the way it brings people closer to Him.

Thanks for your consideration, your prayers, and your financial support of Rosary Army.

I was at the Rosary Army office doing some work this afternoon and thought since we talk about Rosary Army so often on our radio show that perhaps you might enjoy a brief tour of the Rosary Army Headquarters.

And of course, if you would like a free all-twine knotted Rosary, be sure to stop over at Rosary Army’s website, print off a form, and send it off to us and we’ll be happy to help you out!