FROM THE PRIEST’S CORNER: FR. JUSTUS ALAETO

Thank you!

May I first thank you all for making the Installation ceremony successful. In a special way, I want to thank all those who coordinated volunteers who helped with the Liturgical activities, those who coordinated the hall, meals, the Knights, Pastoral council Chair, Finance Council, Sacristans, staff, Deacons, flower arrangers, Choir, Altar Servers, Lectors, Ushers, and other ministers and volunteers. Please, know that I am very grateful to all of you!

The Archbishop has officially appointed me to serve as your official pastor in accordance with the norm and custom of the Catholic Church. I feel pleased to let you know that it is a privilege and humbling to serve your spiritual needs as your pastor. With the Lord’s daily help and through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, I will do my best to serve your spiritual needs well. I will also need your help to serve you well. The center of our spiritual focus is Jesus Christ and our own salvation. I am not here to be served; rather, I am here to serve as Jesus Christ, according to the mind of the Church that delegated me through the Archbishop. Jesus came to love. He came to heal and came to serve. The Pastor “leads the parish as an extension of the ministry of the archbishop. Pastors are to teach, sanctify and govern for the good of souls in a certain geographical area.”  I have been here with you almost a year now, and you have already made it home for me… I love you all so much! My focus and goal is for us to build stronger faith and trust in Jesus the Savior through daily transformation in our lives to become like Christ our Lord and Savior.  Mass as the highest of all prayers transforms us. Love, understanding, encouragement, forgiveness towards one another, as Christ Himself Commanded us, need to be our daily hunger for coming to Mass. Making our Parish “A Eucharistic Parish” will be our priority and goal. Please keep me in your daily prayers as I work with Jesus the Savior and Our Blessed Mother, the Virgin Mary, to serve you.

Soon enough, close to the beginning of next month (August), I shall update you about our pastoral goal for the year, discussed in our last pastoral council. I shall also update us about some improvement and changes in our parish administration, communication, and ministry.  We shall keep doing better and keep improving. Finally, a new pastor needs to select new council members and commission them. He might choose to work with the same group or choose new council members with duration of terms. As it is now official that I will serve as your official pastor and the Installation of pastor is done, I would need to commission all the ministries with Mass and officially install them for the duration of their office term. That will include: the pastoral council, the finance council, and the heads of commissions, and other ministries in the parish (Star of the Sea and St. Charles Mission Gold Beach). I will also commission all the parish staff, volunteers, and teachers of our parish. The Altar Society has already been installed. We shall conveniently set dates for those commissioning/installations/Blessings. Please, we need more teachers for “faith formation.” Please let me know if you would like to help. I would need to interview and commission you before classes start in September. We want to work hard to improve our faith formation this year for the good of our faith and the faith of our children.

Finally, I have invited a priest to conduct an annual retreat close to the end of August and beginning of September. There will be two different retreats. The first part will be for all those involved in any ministry in the parish and the other part will be dedicated only to the members of the Knights of Columbus in our parish. The priest will be coming from Rome. I will update you more about the dates according to what will be convenient for you. May God bless you and joyfully guide all we shall do with faith and love in Him!

Fr. Justus Alaeto, Pastor