Still leading the team
HIGH POINT — On the Feast Day of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Bishop Michael Martin traveled to Pennybyrn Aug. 22 to celebrate Mass with retired priests Father Edward Sheridan, Father Lawrence Heiney and Monsignor John McSweeney, alongside the community's residents.
With a combined priestly service of more than 165 years, the three priests still happily live out their faith through daily Mass and offering the sacraments.
While the Church nationwide is celebrating a resurgence among youth, the bishop thanked the elders who helped pave the way.
Bishop Martin said, “Truly I am honored by these men and by the gift of their lives, and I want them to know how much I appreciate them.”
Father Patrick Hoare, chaplain of Pennybyrn, and Father Miguel Sanchez, priest-secretary to Bishop Martin, concelebrated the Mass while the retired priests listened to the bishop’s message encouraging discipleship.
His homily noted the tactics of preseason football – how players want to win, but not enough to get injured.
“There are spaces in our lives where we realize that we are maybe not in it to the full,” Bishop Martin said. “Sadly that reality takes place often in our following of Jesus Christ in the Church, where we find ourselves just doing enough. Playing the game, but not getting injured.”
“All of us in today’s Gospel are called onto the carpet. We can no longer sit in the stands, up in the cheap seats, and simply be a fan of Jesus,” he said. “Jesus calls us down onto the field, to play the game.”
As Catholics at any age and level of physical ability we need to “get in the game” and play hard in Christ’s league, he said, joking that his homily was not recycled from a visit to Charlotte Catholic High School.
“I am not messed up in my paperwork. Father Pat told me that this community is vibrant,” Bishop Martin said. “No matter what our age, we are always being invited more deeply into relationship with Jesus Christ and in the Church.”
The path of discipleship is still theirs to take, he said.
“Are you ready for that?” Bishop Martin asked.
And, with the energy of teenage cheerleaders and an entire football team, the residents shouted, “Yes.”
The bishop smiled at their reaction.
“I knew I wasn’t coming to any sleepy retirement community with bad hearing aids,” Bishop Martin said. “There is no fourth quarter when it comes to discipleship; it is always gametime. Christ wants you on His team, proclaiming every day that He is the Christ.”
Their leadership days are not over, the bishop reminded them.
“Even to my brother priests in their older years, they are still leading. They’re still holy priests. Not just leading you, but leading by example,” Bishop Martin said.
The bishop emphasized that there is still fuel in the tank, still a message to preach, and still life to give.
“Never, ever think that one day of your life is not worthy for the call of God to be a disciple,” he said.
During the Eucharistic prayer, the retired priests were the loudest on the team, reciting every word with the same passion as when they were newly ordained.
“When I am up there serving, I can hear them all the way on the other side of the altar,” Deacon Francis Skinner said.
With Mass offered daily, a 24-hour perpetual adoration chapel, and the retired priests hearing confessions, the community proves to be a faith-filled home for its senior parishioners.
At the end of Mass, Bishop Martin spent some time with the residents and clergy.
“I am delighted the bishop came,” Monsignor McSweeney said.
Sacristy volunteer and resident Judith Griffin feels closer to God than ever in retirement.
“I started volunteering only after my husband passed away,” Griffin said. “I have more time for God now, and I feel so blessed. Every morning I wake up and say to the Holy Spirit, ‘We have to do this, this, this and this.’ I tell Him, ‘Here, you take care of it,’ and He does. It’s amazing.”
A volunteer since 1995, Alice Gottschalk was delighted by the bishop’s visit.
“He is a Franciscan and I’m a secular Frasiciscan. I was the one that started clapping at the end,” she said, noting “there is a spitirual growth happening in this community that is palpable.”
While the retired clergy and religious continue to make her smile, Gottschalk believes parishioners can keep them smiling as well.
“They could have been a husband, a grandfather, a father…but instead they chose to follow Christ with all they had. It can be a lonely life,” Gottschalk said, noting that Catholics have a responsibility to “recognize them for the gifts they gave to us.”
“If you had a direct connection with these priests remember them, remember where they are,” she encouraged. “Invite them for dinner, send letters.”
— Lisa Geraci
