St. Rita Basketball Families,
CYO sent a communication to all CYO Members with an update on the status of our basketball season. Given the recent increase in COVID-19 infections, CYO is postponing the Winter Basketball Season until January, 2021. This postponement impacts games only, and does not prevent us from holding practices. Pending a discussion with St. Rita's pastor, Father Behrend, I will send out additional information as soon as possible regarding the plan to move forward with practices.
I'm including the email below from Dobie Moser, Director of CYO and Mary Ann King, Athletic Administrator of CYO for you to read.
Thank you for your patience and understanding as we continue to navigate through this pandemic.
Patrick McNamara - St. Rita Parish Athletic Director
From CYO:
Dear Members of the CYO Community:
CYO leadership has long held essential commitments to the over 20,000 young people and families entrusted to our care who participate in CYO athletics every year. These commitments include:
- viewing all that we do through the lens of our Catholic Charities mission and Gospel values;
- having a clear and consistent focus on what is best for child development and families in CYO;
- and pursuing excellence in how we operate all CYO programs. This pandemic required CYO to add a new commitment: CYO must be actively aware of current medical developments regarding Covid-19 and make program decisions based on that knowledge.
These commitments informed our decision in March to shut down all CYO programs when the pandemic exploded on to the scene. These commitments drove our efforts to learn all that we could about the virus to prepare for a fall CYO season that placed safety as our top priority. These commitments directed our efforts to build on what we learned from a safe fall season to prepare for the winter CYO season.
The explosive rise in Covid-19 infections over the last ten days sent us back to medical experts to review safety plans for operating CYO in the winter season. The consensus input from medical experts was for CYO to postpone the start of games until early January, 2021. The environment of record Covid-19 infection rates throughout Ohio has made the safety risk too great to have December CYO games.
There will be no CYO games or scrimmages until January, 2021. CYO teams may practice while following the safety protocols and best practices of your own setting and that CYO has provided.
We will continue to monitor the situation and will consult with medical experts throughout December. We will keep our commitment to you to be actively aware of current medical developments regarding Covid-19 and make program decisions based on that knowledge.
As we head into this most dangerous time thus far with the Covid-19 pandemic, we offer two recommendations for your further consideration.
Firstly, we strongly caution against parents having their children play in any travel leagues or programs in lieu of their participation in CYO. With the rapid increase of infections occurring daily, young people who play in travel leagues and other programs are placing themselves and others at greater risk. It is unethical to do so when such actions bring real and significant threats back to their local parish and school communities. Parents – please be thoughtful and kind by looking out for your children and older family members and by looking out for others in your local setting.
Secondly, while the changing information and developments related to Covid-19 can be exhausting and difficult to keep up with, well-established practices of wearing a mask at all times, physical distancing, avoiding large gatherings, and frequent hand washing are known to be effective and beneficial to everyone. Please make the needs and safety of others and of yourself your top priority in your thoughts and actions. By doing so over the upcoming holidays you will contribute in meaningful ways to what we hope will be a safe return to CYO in January.
Thank you for your understanding and support to make CYO a safer environment for all children and families. Thanks too for all that you have done and for all that you continue to do in support of the children and families in CYO. We are grateful for the privilege of serving you.
We invite you to take a moment and reflect on the excerpt below from the book, The Good Society.
At a time when it is easy to feel alone and disconnected, it reminds us that our lives are in God’s hands, and in the hands of our brothers and sisters in Christ, bound together in our common humanity.
Peace be with you.
Dr. Dobie Moser, Director
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Mary Ann King, M.A., Athletic Administrator
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“It is not at first with our own hands that we pick the acorns and apples from the commonwealth of nature to nourish our own bodies. It is the hands of other people that supply the needs of our bodies, both in our infancy and beyond. For each of us lives in and through an immense movement of the hands of other people. The hands of other people lift us from the womb. The hands of other people grow the food we eat, weave the clothes we wear, and build the shelters we inhabit. The hands of other people give pleasure to our bodies in moments of passion, and aid and comfort in time of affliction and distress. It is in and through the hands of other people that the commonwealth of nature is appropriated and accommodated to the needs and pleasures of our separate, individual lives. At the end, it is the hands of other people that lower us into the earth.”
The Good Society, Robert Bellah et all