Social Concerns

St. Teresa of Avila tells us, “Christ has no body now but yours. No hands, no feet on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes through which he looks compassion on this world. Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good. Yours are the hands through which he blesses all the world. Yours are the hands, yours are the feet, yours are the eyes, you are his body. Christ has no body now on earth but yours.”
The following is a list of projects from 2019-2020. Please consider contributing your time, talent, and treasure. If you have any questions, suggestions, or wish to sign up to assist with any project please contact Tina Lindberg at [email protected] or 202-362-3323 x15.

Social Justice and outreach

Social Concerns Committee—Join our Social Concerns Committee and help plan and coordinate our projects. Watch your inbox for email about meetings and opportunities.

The following is a sample of projects we were working on pre-COVID. Most are being done in a modified manner with few volunteers.

Project Backpack—Annunciation helps children in need by providing brand new backpacks filled with school supplies. Cash donations allow us to purchase backpack kits for elementary and middle/high school students. $20.00 will buy one of these kits.
St. Paul Honduras Clinic Supply Drive—Donations of gloves, neosporin, ibuprofen, toothpaste and toothbrushes, bandaids, ect. will be collected. Volunteers from St. Paul Damascus will deliver the donations to the clinic on their mission trip.
Dinner for the Dorothy Day Transitional Shelter—Volunteers are needed to plan a menu and prepare, deliver, and serve.
Summer in the City Food Drive—Canned food will be collected to fill the food pantries at 5 area churches through the John S. Mulholland Family Foundation.
SOME Casseroles—Parishioners provide meals for So Others Might Eat. The recipe and casserole pans can be found on the table in the Parish Center hallway. If you can’t make the recipe, you may purchase or make whatever you would like (meatloaf, chicken, and ham dishes are especially popular); please label and bring it to the Parish Center freezer.
Seniors in Service—Luncheon with service project such as sandwich or snack-bag making for our seniors. Volunteers are always needed to help with planning, set-up, and clean-up.
Winter Warmth—Donations will be collected to purchase hats, gloves, and warm socks to help our homeless neighbors through Friendship Place. You may also donate new or gently used coats, scarves, hats, gloves, boots, long-underwear and warm socks. Volunteers are needed to help with distribution.
Annual Christmas Bazaar—Many hands are needed to sort and price donations, set-up and decorate the parish center, work the various areas, as well as clean-up afterward. Volunteer support makes this annual event a success!
Christmas Project—The Annunciation Christmas Project will benefit our sister parish Holy Redeemer, in DC, and Friendship Place. Parishioners are invited to participate by donating gift cards from: CVS, GIANT, SAFEWAY, TARGET or WALMART.
Cup of Joe—They benefit the homeless and the Cup of Joe breakfast program sponsored by Catholic Charities.
Share the Love Valentine’s Day Service Project--Help support Catholic kids away from their home parish by planning, transporting, and serving a meal to the American University Catholic Club. Volunteers are needed to help with the planning, preparation, set-up, delivery, and clean-up.
Lenten Food Drive—During the season of Lent, Annunciation has the opportunity to provide much needed food for the shelters and food pantries in our Archdiocese. Catholic Charities will once again provide labeled food bags for our use. All donations are welcome and needed.
40 Days - 40 Items Challenge—Lenten clothing drive.

Spiritual formation

Contemplative Prayer—Please join us Thursday evenings from 6:25pm-7:15pm in the Parish Parlor. We begin with Lectio Divina (listening to the word of God in Scripture) followed by Contemplative Prayer (a silent wordless prayer). Contemplative prayer fosters the opening of our mind and heart to God, beyond thoughts, words, and emotions.
Homebound Ministry—Ministers are needed to take Communion to our sick, infirm, or elderly parishioners unable to attend Mass. Please consider volunteering for this rewarding ministry.
Holy Rosary Group—Please join us Wednesdays after the 11am Mass in the church. We also pray the Angelus and Divine Mercy Chaplet
Eucharistic Adoration—Wednesdays from 11:30 through 7pm
Prayer for Vocations
Prayer Partners—Email prayer ministry. Members will receive a weekly email with a list of prayer requests. Simply pray for those who have asked for special prayers - on your own time and in your own way.

young Adult Activities

Newly Married/Young Adult Dinners
Movie Nights
Small Prayer Groups
Service Opportunities
Social Media

Interfaith Projects

Unity Walk—People of all faiths and cultures from around the DC region will walk down "Embassy Row" and visit houses of worship and other religious centers in a public celebration of unity and support for our diverse community on Sunday, September 8, 2019. The Unity Walk is open and free to everyone. Help is needed from 1:30pm until 5:00pm to welcome walkers to Annunciation, help bag apples, and serve refreshments.
Kristallnacht Remembrance—Kristallnacht, or the Night of Broken Glass, was a series of coordinated attacks against Jews throughout Nazi Germany and Austria that took place on November 9-10, 1938. The attacks left the streets covered with broken glass from the windows of Jewish-owned stores, buildings, and synagogues. We come together with members of St. Alban’s and the Washington Hebrew Congregation once a year to remember this event with an evening of readings, prayers, and song. The program will take place at Annunciation. Date and time TBD.
Thanksgiving Dinner—Every year the Interreligious Council provides a Thanksgiving Dinner for those who find themselves alone and would like to share the friendship of others on this holiday. This year's dinner will take place at St. Alban's Episcopal Church. Annunciation Catholic Church and the Washington Hebrew Congregation will help provide and serve dinner. Members of our three congregations join together to offer this wonderful event. Volunteer assistance for the dinner includes: Food Donation, Set-up, Kitchen help, Servers, Greeters, and Clean-up.
Washington Hebrew host the following events. Dates TBD.
MLK Shabbat Service and MLK Day of Service—Celebrate the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. with their partner churches (Annunciation is one) and mosques for dinner at 5:30 pm followed by a special 7:00 pm Shabbat service. A day of service offers many different ways to help our neighbors in need.
Passover Freedom Seder—Celebrate Passover.
Interfaith Concert—Choirs musicians, and dancers from the area share their diverse expressions of faith.

Poor Box Donations

Each month of the year donations to the Poor Box are dedicated to a project, or an agency needing financial support on a regular and on going basis.
January – The Northwest Center
The Northwest Center seeks to promote the dignity of women and a respect for all human life. We seek to accomplish this goal by offering the loving support and comprehensive aid necessary to enable all women to continue their pregnancies, deliver healthy babies, and adequately care for themselves and their children.
February – FAIR Girls
The FAIR Girls home office in Washington, D.C. offers compassionate care to prevent the exploitation of all girls, with a special emphasis on girls who have experienced homelessness, life inside the foster care system, sexual abuse, and trafficking.
March – Martha's Table
Catholic Relief Services is a humanitarian aid organization which helps the poor and vulnerable overseas by responding to major emergencies, fighting disease, and poverty, and nurturing peaceful and just societies.
April – Christ House
Christ House provides comprehensive and compassionate health care to sick, homeless men and women in the District of Columbia.
May – S.O.M.E.
SOME (So Others Might Eat) is an interfaith, community-based organization that exists to help the poor and homeless of our nation’s capital. We meet the immediate daily needs of the people we serve with food, clothing, and health care. We help break the cycle of homelessness by offering services, such as affordable housing, job training, addiction treatment, and counseling, to the poor, the elderly and individuals with mental illness.
June – St. Paul Honduras Clinic
The St. Paul Honduras Clinic serves hundreds of families from eight communities near the capital city of Tegucigalpa. The Clinic provides medical and dental care and is one of the only clinics in Honduras to provide medical care to AIDs patients. It also regularly reaches out to remote areas of the country to provide medical care to those who are unable to get to the clinic.
July/August – St. Vincent de Paul
The Society of St. Vincent de Paul attends to the spiritual and material needs of the poor. These funds are kept for Annunciation’s St. Vincent de Paul Society.
September – DC Food Project
DC Food Project Weekend Bag Program provides participating DC students access to healthy non-perishable food items over the weekend. These bags contain nutritious meals for two breakfasts, two lunches, two dinners, and two snacks, discreetly packed in the students’ backpacks each Friday afternoon or before a long school break.
October – The Gabriel Project
Gabriel Network is a Christian ministry of loving service to women and families challenged with a crisis pregnancy. We have been helping women and children in Maryland and Washington, D.C. for more than twenty years.
November – The Father McKenna Center
Provides care for families struggling with poverty and men facing homelessness by providing food, shelter, clothing and services to support their journey toward stability, productivity, meaning and hope, building upon the good works, ideals and values of Father Horace McKenna, S.J.
December – Holy Family of Bethlehem Foundation
Holy Family Hospital is the premier maternity hospital and neonatal critical care center in Bethlehem region of the West Bank. Its Neonatal Intensive Care Unit cares for the most critically-ill newborns, some weighing just over one pound. The Hospital and its Outreach Clinics provide the highest quality care to all regardless of religion, ethnicity, or ability to pay. No one is ever turned away.