SAN DIEGO — Local Catholics are invited to play their part in “Advancing Our Mission.”
That’s the theme of the 2025 Annual Catholic Appeal, the diocesan collection that provides essential funding for Catholic education, faith formation, clergy formation and support, and Catholic Charities.
Through the appeal, which will have its kick-off during the weekend of Feb. 15 and 16, the Diocese of San Diego seeks to raise $3.5 million by the end of the year.
“The Annual Catholic Appeal … allows our parishes, schools and ministries to have a shared approach, with everyone working together in co-responsibility for our parishes, schools and ministries,” said Manny Aguilar, director of the diocesan Office for Stewardship.
“We’re very grateful to all the parishioners and donors who (have given) to the Annual Catholic Appeal,” he said, “because we couldn’t do it without their support.”
Beneficiaries of the appeal include:
— The diocesan Office for Schools and some of its programs;
— Faith formation programs, including those that helped to bring 1,284 catechumens and candidates into full communion with the Catholic Church in 2024 alone;
— The diocese’s 12 seminarians, including three men –– transitional deacons Brian Frulla, Anthony Jimenez and Jesse Lopez –– who will be ordained to the priesthood this summer, as well as the 52 retired diocesan priests who receive assistance and support through the appeal; and
— Catholic Charities, which operates homeless shelters, food distributions to the hungry, and assistance to immigrants, refugees, asylum-seekers and others. In 2023, the agency helped more than 10,500 members of the local homeless population and, last year, partnered with Cathedral Catholic High School to open a pantry to serve food-insecure individuals and families in the Carmel Valley area.
Each parish in the diocese has been assessed a certain amount that it must contribute to the appeal. Whatever it raises in excess of that will be returned to the parish to support its own projects.
“Primary in the life of the Church that all of us belong to is the life of the parish,” Cardinal Robert W. McElroy said in a recorded message, inviting San Diego Catholics to participate in this year’s appeal.
“Part of the work of the parish requires the wider work of the diocese to supplement what can’t be done at the parish level and to coordinate the work of all of our parishes, and schools, and institutions to make them more effective,” he added.
“The Annual Diocesan Appeal each year helps us in the San Diego Diocese to live out this advancing the mission of Christ,” he said. “I hope that you will be generous in doing so, because, when you do so, you are fulfilling the most basic, fundamental call of the Gospel, to radiate Christ in your hearts, in the hearts of our parishes, and the hearts of the whole diocese.”
