St. Michael Knights of Columbus
Knights of Columbus
St Michael Knights are currently doing a membership drive. If you are interested in becoming a Knight please click the link below.
Happening Now During Lent
Let us make your Friday night meals during Lent!
The Knights of Columbus will be selling fried fish plates each Friday during Lent. Donations will be $10 a plate and will include fish, hushpuppies, coleslaw and meatless baked beans. Take out only beginning at 5:30 pm at the St. Michael Family Life Center and serve until they run out. Proceeds are to benefit Priest Education and Pro Life funds.
Who is Father Michael McGivney?
Michael Joseph McGivney (August 12, 1852 – August 14, 1890) was an American Catholic priest based in New Haven, Connecticut. He founded the Knights of Columbus at a local parish to serve as a mutual aid and fraternal insurance organization, particularly for immigrants and their families. It developed through the 20th century as the world's largest Catholic fraternal organization.
From his own experience, McGivney recognized the devastating effect on immigrant families of the untimely death of the father and wage earner. Many Catholics were still struggling to assimilate into the American economy. On March 29, 1882, while an assistant pastor at Saint Mary's Church in New Haven, Connecticut, McGivney founded the Knights of Columbus, with a small group of parishioners, as a mutual aid society, to provide financial assistance, in the event of the men's deaths, to their widows and orphans. The organization developed as a fraternal society. McGivney was also known for his tireless work among his parishioners.
McGivney spent seven years at St. Mary's, then became pastor of St. Thomas Church in Thomaston in 1884. He died from pneumonia at the age of 38 in Thomaston on the eve of the Assumption in 1890.