St. Anastasia Roman Catholic Church
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“Parting Is Such Sweet Sorrow”

I cannot believe that my time at St. Anastasia has come to an end.  Actually, my assignment to St. Anastasia officially ended on the day of my ordination to the priesthood, May 22, 2010.  St. Anastasia has become a kind of home away from home and as with all homes they are but temporary dwellings for us pilgrims on our journey to eternal life.  We are all on this earth for only a short period of time and during my period of time here God has chosen to bless me with the hospitality, generosity, and love of the St. Anastasia family. 

We just received our quarterly award from the Kroger Community Rewards Program and we’ll be receiving a check in the amount of $798.00 by May 31^st.  That gives St. Anastasia $1,797.78 for you  parishioners just shopping at Kroger. If anyone is interested in signing up, the information is on our website or you can write me and I’ll get it to you.  Remember, if you were signed up before, you have to “re-register” as of April 30^th of this year to keep the rewards coming.

As the school year is drawing to a close and planning for next year is ramping up, I have three things to share with you regarding various kinds of missions.

The mission statement of your revised and revitalized St. Anastasia education staff is as follows: With the help of the Holy Spirit, under the leadership of our current pastor, and alongside the education commission, we will work together as a team for the glory of God and His kingdom, to the benefit of the people of the Roman Catholic parish of St. Anastasia and the community at large. Please continue to pray for us as we strive to serve you well. Our education commission is in need of a few more members; please contact me if you are interested in working with us.

I’m looking forward to next week, my son Eric and our wives (Arlene and Jackie) are heading out on Thursday evening on our motorcycles to participate in “Rolling Thunder” on Sunday the 30^th.  It’s a massive motorcycle (most bikes will be Harley-Davidson) rally in Washington DC (we’ll be riding about 1,300 miles round trip) to show support for those who served in Vietnam and to push congress to more aggressively pursue assistance and closure from the SE Asian countries regarding those Servicemen still listed as MIA.  Reports continue to come in claiming that there are still US POW’s in those countries being held against their will…while our country officially goes down the path of political and economic relations with those countries, the POW/MIA situation is swept into the background as too volatile to discuss.  The rally will consist of a drive-by of Government Buildings including the Capitol and White House, a ride through Arlington eventually ending up at the Vietnam Memorial, “The Wall”.  I ask your prayers for the rally but in the bigger picture, ask your prayers that anyone still held in SE Asia is released and MIA’s are once and for all accounted for…if you feel moved, write your congressman/woman and ask them to support economic and political sanctions against countries that refuse to assist the United States in bringing resolution.  

CONGRATULATIONS FATHER JOHN: Yesterday, Archbishop Vigneron called down the Holy Spirit on this Pentecost weekend and ordained seven men to the Catholic priesthood, six of them for the Archdiocese of Detroit, and one for the Archdiocese of Douala in Cameroon.

A former co-worker once commented to me: “It’s almost impossible to maintain friendships these days.  People are continually coming and going often moving to other states.” I think this is one of the sad consequences of our modern mobile society. In fact this came to mind back when I was visiting the Holy Land in May of 2007. Jesus spent his entire life within the confines of very small community, relatively speaking. Aside from his childhood years in Egypt, he never left the general area of Jerusalem. In all likelihood, Jesus spent the majority of his life within about a 100 mile radius of Jerusalem, and to top it off, he walked nearly everywhere he went! (He must have been in pretty good physical shape with all that walking.) But this notion even applies to us here in metro Detroit. Over the years I’ve heard countless stories of people having grown up in close, tight-knit ethnic communities all within the confines of the city of Detroit. The automobile made traveling long distances possible over a very short period of time. Add to that the invention of the airplane, and world wide travel becomes the common place event that it is today.  And this kind of long distance travel does make friendships harder to maintain. The statement that Hilary Clinton made famous, “it takes a village to raise a child” is also true, to some degree. Neighbors cannot take the place of one’s own family, but a close knit community certainly helps us to grow and mature and to learn to properly interact with others and develop long lasting friendships. It is also worth   remembering that these small, close knit ethnic communities were almost always built around the Church. This is very evident in older communities where the Church would be the central, focal point of the village. This is, I think, the ideal.  God should be the center of everything including our everyday lives.

SOON TO BE “FATHER” JOHN: This is the Year of Priests. Pope Benedict XVI has declared a “Year for Priests” which began with the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus on June 19, 2009.The year will conclude in Rome with an international gathering of priests with the Holy Father from June 9-11 of this year. With the announcement of this year for priests, the Pope has    declared St. John Vianney the Universal Patron of Priests on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of his death. Our own Dcn. John Dumas and seven others will be ordained to the priesthood on May 22 (next Saturday) at the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament at 10 a.m. He wrote me a note that said, “Please let the entire St. Anastasia parish family know that they are all invited to my ordination – I can’t send invitations to everyone, unfortunately.” If you have never been to an ordination, (my favorite   liturgy, but I am biased) this is your chance to attend. In the mean time, please pray for him (and all priests). The U.S. Bishops suggests the following prayer:

You can listen to our parish mission and/or Steve Ray’s talk about the Gift of the Eucharist right at your computer. Simply visit the Audio Download page of our Adult Education section on the website.

Like many of you, I grew up listening to Ernie Harwell broadcast the Tiger Baseball games. What a class act this man was not only in the way he did the Tiger games but in the way he lived his life and in the way his earthly life ended. I was watching the Red Wings game on Tuesday night when the news came across the TV of Ernie’s passing and suddenly the hockey game didn’t seem so important. God bless Ernie and his family and us, as we come to the realization that we’ve been in the shadow of greatness.

MOTHER’S DAY:  A little trivia:  The celebration of Mother’s Day dates back all the way to ancient times,  although the idea of the celebration was first kicked around in 1872. Julia Ward Howe, author of the words to the “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” proposed Mother’s Day as a day dedicated to peace.