We will not be sending out "bills", but Meredith will send out individual pledge updates quarterly. You can make installments towards your pledge at any time during the 5-year pledge period. These quarterly account reports will show the total amount pledged along with the installments we have received that have been applied towards the total amount of your pledge. This is not a bill. It is intended to help households keep track of where they are on their pledge fulfillment.
There are several ways!
Use the Witness to Hope Capital Campaign envelopes that will be included in the offertory envelope packet later this summer. Make checks payable to: St. John Paul II and place in the envelope. Drop the envelope in the offertory basket at Mass or drop off/mail it to the parish office. Always note "Witness to Hope - Capital Campaign" in the memo section.
Mail a check to the parish office, or place in the offertory basket at Mass. Please write "Witness to Hope - Capital Campaign" in the memo section.
Make payments online Click the button below. You can make a 1-time gift or set up a recurring gift through our secure website. Be sure to select "Capital Campaign - Witness to Hope" as the fund from the drop-down menu. Gifts made towards that fund will automatically be applied to your pledge.
Set up a Parish Initiated ACH. The parish can automatically withdraw a payment from your checking or savings account on the 15th and/or last day of each month. Contact Meredith at [email protected] to get that set up.
Stock gift - Many of our parishioners' gift stock or mutual funds towards their Witness to Hope campaign pledge. Contact Meredith for more information.
Qualified Charitable Distributions (QRDs) and Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs) are tax savings vehicles that allow gifts to the campaign at a tax savings to the donor. Contact your financial advisor for more information.
There will be soon! Witness to Hope Capital Campaign envelopes should be included with your other offertory envelopes beginning in August.
The Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas requires parish projects to have 100% of the funds pledged and 50% of the funds in the bank to break ground and start building. Having your pledge is so helpful in reaching that goal! Pledges are not legally binding but rather a way to make your intended gift over the 5-year campaign period known. Yes, you can give to the campaign without making a pledge, but having your pledge will help us reach our goal faster!
We have pledge cards on the table in the vestibule. You are welcome to pick one up or contact Meredith and she will send you one!
Contact Meredith at [email protected].
ACADEMY PLANS
Purchase & Renovate Hilltop School
Located at 175th & S. Mur-Len
CHURCH PLANS
Proceed with Phase 1 of Church Construction
Fr. Andrew Strobl asked us to help lead the initial fundraising for our parish campus and were honored again when Fr. Brandon Farrar asked us to continue to serve. Together let us honor all the past efforts of the many volunteers who helped start the process and boldly look forward to the future of our JPII Catholic community.
We are excited to get to know more of you better as we work toward our common goal of making our new permanent spiritual home in southern Olathe a reality!
Hello! We are Curtis and Amy Keddy, and we are so blessed to be a part of the St. John Paul II parish community! Eight years ago we were living in Amy’s native California, working at a parish, finishing up a master’s degree, and getting ready for baby number three. We had no idea God would soon call us to an exciting new mission in Olathe, Kansas!
In 2017 Curtis connected with Fr. Andrew Strobl through an online forum dedicated to fostering missionary discipleship and was presented with a unique opportunity – come join him in helping to build a brand-new parish. Fr. Andrew invited Curtis to come out for a visit, and he soon found himself in an elementary school gymnasium attending his first Mass at JPII. Afterwards, he called Amy and said, “I can’t put my finger on it, but there is something happening here.” One word kept coming into his head as he prayed during Mass: family. Within a few weeks, we’d moved to Kansas to join the JPII community. Though we didn’t know anyone, we were confident this was where God was calling us to be.
We thought we knew what we had come here to do, but as the prophet Isaiah wrote, “My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, says the Lord” (Isaiah 55:8). It took us some time to realize that, while we thought we were moving to Kansas to help launch a family-centered faith formation program and build some parish buildings, God had a much greater work in mind.
Our journey at JPII has been one of learning to listen and respond to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, stepping out in faith even when the path wasn’t clear, and trusting that God would provide. Along the way, we’ve been blessed to witness the growth of a vibrant parish community, the building of beautiful parish facilities, and the development of dynamic ministries that are bearing fruit in people’s lives.
We are so grateful for the way the Lord has led us and for the community He has given us in St. John Paul II parish. We can’t wait to see what He has in store for us next!
Blessings and salutations from Harrison Design Architects. At the invitation of Fr. Farrar, we are happy to prepare a short weekly piece on Catholic Sacred Architecture, its origins, principles, great works, history, and importance for the liturgy. This week, we would like to introduce our team, which has been working diligently on the future campus for St. John Paull II Parish. As you may note, most of our team graduated from the University of Notre Dame’s traditional architecture program. This education forms the basis for our understanding of the grand history of western architecture, and we hope that this series of brief lessons will in turn impart the wonder and joy that traditional architecture gives us.
Principal, Studio Director
Nic received his calling to Architecture during a study abroad trip to Italy. A visit to the 16th-century San Giorgio Maggiore basilica sparked an interest in the work of Andrea Palladio, and the Classical tradition of which he was exemplary. In the exquisitely refined palaces and churches of the Renaissance, Nic saw that classical architecture was deeply beautiful, in its forms and proportions as well as the nobility of its principles, and he resolved to pursue design and the building arts. After an internship with an architecture firm, Nic attended the University of Notre Dame School of Architecture, and attained his Master of Architecture in 2009. Nic joined Harrison Design in 2015 as Director of the Sacred Architecture Studio in the firm’s Washington, D.C. office. He has overseen all phases of design for a diverse group of projects, ranging from intricately detailed interior renovation projects to large-scale ecclesiastical and institutional projects. Nic is married and the father of six children.
John Parker first dreamed of building churches while sitting in the gardens of Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity Chapel at Thomas Aquinas College, his Alma Mater. While earning his Master of Architecture from the University of Notre Dame, he enjoyed designing churches in a variety of styles as a means to more fully understanding the deep symbolic meaning and rich history of sacred spaces of the Church. An additional year, earning him a Master of Urban Design, led to a richer understanding of the entirety of the human environemnt and its interaction with creation as a whole. At Harrison Design, he has assisted with several renovation projects, including the design of wood and marble liturgical furnishings, as well as schematic design and construction administration of several new builds.
While studying in Rome and Florence, Joshua first encountered the most exemplary sacred architecture of the Catholic Church, which instilled in him a desire to serve the Church directly through architecture. For his Master’s thesis at California Baptist University, Joshua choose a Catholic parish design project. After intensive study of Catholic architectural tradition and theology, he defended his thesis and won the ICAA Julia Morgan Award for Excellence in Classical Design. Following graduation Joshua spent half a year on a missionary pilgrimage with the Catholic Community of the Beatitudes, living at monasteries and traveling across Israel to walk in the footsteps of Jesus. He has architectural experience in California and Washington D.C. across a wide variety of building types from commercial and educational to higher-ed and sacred.
Michael fell in love with church architecture while visiting churches both home and abroad during his high school years. His degrees of architecture and theology from the University of Notre Dame gave him both the tools of architectural design and understanding the profound sacramentality of the built environment. His student design work and renderings have garnered him an Acanthus Award and a John Russell Pope Award from the Institute of Classical Art and Architecture. Michael has enjoyed working on all types of religious projects, seeking to create transcendent spaces that use the material world to point to the immaterial. At Harrison Design, he has assisted with schematic design for both renovations and new construction, as well as the design of liturgical furnishings.
Natalie’s interest in architecture began at the University of Notre Dame, where her eyes were opened to the power of architecture to affect and uplift people. She graduated from Notre Dame with a Bachelor of Architecture with a concentration in furniture design, which allowed her to develop her design skills at the urban and architectural scale alongside the detail scale with her design and construction of wood furniture. Her education culminated in her thesis design of a pilgrimage church, which was awarded an ICAA Acanthus Award. After graduation, she came to Harrison Design, where she has assisted with a variety of church projects in different phases, which has allowed her to continue to follow her passion for sacred architecture.
