Happy New Year to all new and long-time members of the Catholic Writers Guild!

For the past month, I’ve been busy sending out invoices to members who are not on auto-renew through PayPal. Many of these emails are coming back as undeliverable. To ensure that we have your most up-to-date email address, could you please send it to me: president(at)catholicwritersguild(dot)com.

If you haven’t paid in a while, you should have already received an invoice by now. The dues have increased to $40 a year for those of you who are not paying automatically through PayPal. If you haven’t received an invoice, we may not have your most recent email address.

Are you on Facebook? Please ask to be added to our members-only Facebook group! Lots going on there!

As always, we have a few volunteer positions opening up. The Catholic Arts and Letters Award committee and the Catholic Book News committee are in need of volunteers. We may also have an opening on the Seal of Approval committee within the next month or so. If you are interested in any of these positions, please contact me at the email above.

In personal news, today is my fourth son’s 19th birthday. A child’s birthday is always something to celebrate. When it comes to my two youngest sons’ birthdays, however, I always feel a special joy in my heart because we were told (ordered!) not to get pregnant after I nearly died from complications of an ectopic (tubal) pregnancy when my third son was 10 months old. In fact, one of the doctors strongly urged me to have my remaining tube “tied.” I refused. As faithful Catholics, my husband and I have only ever used natural family planning to avoid pregnancy. The decision to be open to having more children was not one that my husband and I made lightly, but it is a decision that we have never regretted. Read more about it here in a blog post from 2011. (And this post might be especially pertinent given Pope Francis’ recent statements on Responsible Parenthood…)

As always, if you have any concerns, comments or questions, please feel free to email me:
president(at) catholicwritersguild(dot)com

Ad Jesum per Mariam,

Ellen Gable Hrkach
President