VERONA — The University of Notre Dame Liturgical Choir will be presenting a concert of sacred music at St. Andrew Church on Monday, May 10, to benefit St. Hermine’s Home for the Destitute in Tamilnadu, India.
The concert is free and open to the public and will begin at 7:30 p.m.
St. Hermine’s Home is a shelter for orphan school-age girls and elderly survivors of the 2004 tsunami in India.
Notre Dame Choir
The University of Notre Dame Liturgical Choir, founded in 1973 as the Chapel Choir, is composed of approximately 70 singers drawn from all areas of the undergraduate and graduate student body.
The choir’s main purpose is to provide musical leadership at the 10 a.m. Solemn Mass at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart, a French Gothic structure built in 1871 by university founder Fr. Edward Sorin.
Membership in the Liturgical Choir is open to all undergraduate and graduate students of the University of Notre Dame.
Led by director Dr. Andrew McShane, the choir performs a repertoire drawn from the diverse traditions of a cappella and accompanied sacred music from the Renaissance through the 20th century.
St. Hermine’s Home
St. Hermine’s Home for the Destitute is located in Tamilnadu, India.
Fr. Norbert Thomas is the director, and Fr. Joseph Isidore, who just recently visited St. Andrew Parish, Verona, and St. William Parish, Paoli, is the co-director of the home.
The home takes care of 60 people: 30 orphaned school-age girls (nine to 14 years old) and 30 elderly people with disabilities (some of the orphaned girls are also disabled and need extra care and consideration).
In the devastating tsunami of 2004, these girls and seniors were washed away in the flood waters and later rescued on the shores of the Indian Ocean. Each member of St. Hermine’s Home lost their entire families in the tsunami. They have no one except for the priests and the workers at the home to take care of them.
Parishes adopt Home
St. Andrew and St. William Parishes adopted St. Hermine’s Home as their “sister parish.”
Father Joseph first met Fr. William Vernon, pastor of the parishes, during a visit two years ago to St. Pius X Parish, Cambridge, and St. Joseph Parish, Edgerton, where Father Vernon was pastor. Those parishes were instrumental in providing a bus for the school girls and a gas-powered generator for the home as well as financial assistance.
Father Joseph then returned to Wisconsin and served at St. Andrew and St. William Parishes for a few weeks in the summer of 2009. The parishes have been helping to complete construction of the home for the girls, sending donations on a regular basis.
Due to increased building costs, however, there is a need to raise nearly $10,000 beyond the original budget to complete the home.
Donations welcome
Donations will go directly to the home and its residents in India, where the contributions will go much further.
St. Andrew Parish has set up a direct-wire account to ensure the safe delivery of all donations.
Please make checks payable to St. Andrew Church or St. Hermine’s Home and send to: St. Andrew Parish, 301 N. Main St., Verona, WI 53593