My heart was filled with great feelings on the evening of Tuesday, June 20, when so many of you came to the Retirement Party. I thank each one of you for coming that evening; a good time was had by all! The food for the occasion was excellent and so enjoyable. The spirit of the evening: of faith, of friendship, of appreciation, of affection and of community, was delightful. My heart will long remember your kindness, your care and your good wishes. My five years with you’ll here at St. Elizabeth Seton Church Parish will be a source of blessing for me for a long time. A special word of gratitude to all those who helped to plan, to organize and to serve at the Retirement Party. May the Lord fill you with his grace, his peace and his guidance for all your generous efforts.
The few days between the Retirement Party on Tuesday, June 20, and last weekend (June 24-25) were more stressful for me than usual. After much prayer and thought, I knew that it was the better thing and the right decision for me to announce to you the medical challenge that I have been facing since my visit with my medical doctor on May 24. After that visit and several other tests, it was determined that I had a lymphoma in the abdomen. Since then I have had other tests and hopefully by early July, I will meet with an oncologist to decide what course of treatment I will be facing. As I mentioned last weekend at all the Masses, I ask, above all, your prayers, your support, your friendship and your positive feelings. This is the first serious health problem that I face in my almost seventy years of life. How blessed I am! The Lord has been so gracious and so abundantly generous to me over those years. I have not only blessed with great health all my life; I have also been honored by the Lord to be a Priest for 48 years, five wonderful and happy years with you’ll here at St. Elizabeth Seton. With my faith in the Lord, I face what I will need to do to deal with this lymphoma. Many of you have already been so encouraging toward me by sharing some of your own personal struggle with this type of cancer. You are surely a source of hope, of faith and of courage. In the days to come, I will keep you posted on what form of treatment I will be undergoing, probably some form of chemotherapy. In the meantime, let us pray for one another and may each one of us do our best to be faithful to the Lord and live our lives in service, with the strength of the Spirit, as good stewards of all of our godly blessings, health being one of them, and with deep personal gratitude to the living God, the source of all our blessings and the giver of all our good gifts.
This weekend (July 1-2) is my last official weekend with you as your Pastor, I thank you again for all you are, for all you do for the Lord and all you do for the good of St. Elizabeth Seton Church Parish. You have been so kind, accepting, co-operative, faithful, supportive and helpful to me during the time I have shared the awesome priesthood of Jesus Christ, the great, merciful and gentle high Priest. In more ways that you know, you have made my life so blessed, so fulfilling, so busy and so worth living. You, the Parishioners of St. Elizabeth Seton, have nourished my desire to be the best Priest I can be with the gifts and the shortcomings of my personality as a Priest. I have done my best to serve the Lord with you to the best of my ability and to stand before the Lord with you as a believer and as a parishioner. May all of us continue to strive to love the Lord with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind and all our strength; be a person of prayer and a daily reader of the Scripture; live your faith at home and wherever you are; be an active and involved member of St. Elizabeth Seton Parish as you seek to make ‘stewardship a way of life,’ and live your patriotism as a citizen of our great country.
Know that you will be in my prayers. Welcome our new Pastor, Father David Hebert, as he comes to be your Priest, your Pastor and your Shepherd. Help him feel at home here as you have made me, help him make that change from St. Augustine Parish in Basile to St. Elizabeth. Changes take time for both Priest and congregation. Let the Lord guide, bless and help you in the days and weeks ahead. May God be with Father David and all the members of St. Elizabeth Seton Church Parish as this community of faith continues to grow in faith, in service, in worship, in fellowship, in hospitality and in unity.
Happy July 4th to all of you!! Be a proud, patriotic, moral and devoted citizen so God can bless America through you. My prayers, best wishes, love and gratitude to you for who you are, for all you do for the Lord and for the good of St. Elizabeth Seton Church.
SHALOM!
Fr. Gary
Homework for the week of July 2 – July 8
