GREENSBORO — The Family of Monsignor Anthony Marcaccio, pastor of St. Pius X Church, has established an endowment to honor a favorite saint of his family. His late parents, Tony and Rose Marcaccio, worked throughout their lives to practice kindness to their neighbor, so it was a natural choice to endow their devotion to St. Anthony of Padua who is known for his ministry of preaching and charity.
“My parents were part of the Greatest Generation,” Monsignor Marcaccio said. “They were children during the Depression and lived through World War II.”
He believes this contributed to their practice of charity towards others.
“My parents were very generous and welcoming. We always had people to our home. Mom would invite the person who was alone, an elderly person or an exchange student to our home for the holidays. Mom and Dad would help with meals and deliver Thanksgiving and Christmas food baskets, and volunteer throughout the year with senior Meals on Wheels,” he recalled.
In April, the Marcaccio family established the St. Anthony Bread Endowment to benefit the poor in the Greensboro and Asheville vicariates.
“The idea of an endowment goes way back to miracles attributed to St. Anthony. People gave things in charity because they felt the intercession of this great saint in their lives. It was a way of thanking him.”
Monsignor Marcaccio and his family wanted to honor his parents’ memory with something that would speak to the kind of people they were. “When someone passes, you can only have so many flowers, so when my dad died we erected a marble statue of Our Lady on the grounds of Saint Pius in his memory.”
This new endowment carries forward works of charity that both his parents believed in so deeply.
Disbursements from the endowment set up through the Roman Catholic Diocese of Charlotte Foundation will be allocated around the feast of St. Anthony, June 13.
“The endowment which we have funded will hopefully achieve with family bequests my personal goal of a million dollars. The income from the endowment would feed the poor,” Monsignor Marcaccio said, “providing a significant aid in buying groceries for them, especially if we leverage its purchasing power. I would love to see that be the case. This is something for my parents and the poor. My parents always acted in charity, and this endowment continues that legacy.”
He believes it will also continue the legacy of St. Anthony’s intercession in the lives of others and their response in charity.
“Many of us have felt the charity of the intercession of the saints in our lives,” he noted, “and this could be a way to ‘pay it forward.’
“Think of the impact this could have on a person’s life when they are most in need, maybe even despairing, to have the help they need to hope again. I think that would be fantastic. Because of this bequest people my parents never knew, people I will never know…. even generations long after us, will benefit from the kindness we commit to today.”
St. Pius X Church has 12 endowments totaling more than $1.5 million to benefit the people of the Diocese of Charlotte.
“We encourage parishes to set up multiple endowments to benefit their parish, school, ministries or the diocese – similar to what St. Pius X Parish has done – or encourage their parishioners to set up endowments in their estate plans,” said Jim Kelley, diocesan development director.
Kelley also noted, “Eight of the 12 endowments that St. Pius X has are named in honor or memory of individuals, which more and more people are doing to leave a legacy to loved ones.”
Monsignor Marcaccio is adamant that the endowment continues the living tradition of the saints in his life.
“St. Anthony was known for his preaching and for his charity and for living the truth in love. He was known to have said, ‘Let our words teach and our actions preach.’ And that is what the endowment is set up to do.”
— SueAnn Howell, senior reporter
For more information
To learn more about the St. Anthony Bread Endowment at St. Pius X Church, contact the parish at 336-272-4681.
Interested in setting up an endowment? Individuals can establish an endowment in the diocesan foundation by leaving a bequest in their will, a beneficiary designation from a retirement plan, a gift of real estate, a gift of life insurance, cash or securities sufficient to set up an endowment, or a life income arrangement such as a trust or annuity.
For details about setting up an endowment to benefit the Church in western North Carolina, contact Gina Rhodes at 704-370-3364 or email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
Christian joy motivates people to act in faith
GREENSBORO — More than 100 parishioners and dames and knights of the Order of Malta gathered June 13 at St. Pius X Church for Mass, followed by a special Italian dinner and presentation celebrating the feast day of St. Anthony. The Italian feast was prepared by Knight of Malta Sal Giaimo and friends, with proceeds benefiting the St. Anthony Bread Endowment established by the Marcaccio family.
Dr. Alessandro Rovati of Belmont Abbey College, who gave a presentation entitled “Encountering Christ: The Gospels and Christian Morality,” noted, “It was so beautiful to start this evening with Mass, for it put at the center the Lord and His Presence, because the more we are centered in Christ, the more we will be led to go out and announce Him.”
Reflecting on Pope Francis’ encyclical “The Joy of the Gospel,” Rovati focused on a “return to the essentials.” Rather than a legalistic set of rules, we must return to Christ’s love, he said. “We are created for what the Gospel offers us… love for others and friendship with Christ.” It is “from love the commandments are born.”
God always waits for us, he said. “He seeks to get involved with each of us. All we need is a desire to take a step towards God. There are embers of a desire for God in all of us.”
He referred to John 21, explaining that when we take a step towards God, He is there waiting for us, “therefore, Christian morality is a response… It’s in always getting up, thanks to God’s hand.”
If we focus too much on the faith as a list of rules, if we take away the awe, then we end up being Christians without Christ, he said.
Rovati said Pope Francis suggests “at least three things for the way we understand, study and teach Christian morality.
“First, Francis emphasizes that the foundation of Christian morality is the relationship with the Lord and not one’s own capacity for coherence and perfection. Second, Francis shows us that Christian morality is the response to God’s gratuitous initiative and not faithfulness to some abstract principles, for it is the encounter with God’s love that liberates people from narrowness and self-absorption, transfiguring their lives and leading them onto a path that has distinctive moral implications. Third, Pope Francis indicates that Christian morality is not a matter for isolated individuals but rather a response to Christ’s initiative that always implies embarking on a communal journey.”
As a professor at a Catholic college, he believes one of the greatest challenges to the Church today is young people who “suffer a terrible passivity,” not asking questions or even knowing what questions to ask. They lack a burning desire for life, meaning and joy, he said.
“The desire for joy, the desire for happiness is part of the fabric of our very being, which means we cannot take it apart, we cannot take it outside of us,” he said. If this hole is not filled with Christ, the true source of joy, then it will be filled with fleeting things. “And so our hope is that the newness and the surprising life that Christ makes possible will burst through us. Our hope is that the mystery of the Holy Spirit will never abandon us.”
In his concluding remarks, Monsignor Anthony Marcaccio spoke of Christian joy, noting Mother Teresa’s remark that “joy is the net with which we catch souls.” Holiness and joy are alluring, he said, and while some may not know the questions to ask, they will notice when someone has the answer.
— Georgianna Penn, correspondent