Marylake

The year 2005 began with the profession of Joseph Marie Neely on Sunday morning January 2nd at 10:00am. Our superior, Fr. Bonaventure presided, with Frs. Joseph Neilson, Novice Master Raphael Kitz, and Fr. John Michael concelebrating. Br. Juan Cabrera, our student from New Orleans, served. Former student Peter Rivera, now principal of St Joseph school in Pine Bluff where Brother Joseph Marie did ministry with the middle schoolers, attended the ceremony and furnished food for the reception afterwards.

The following evening, Marylake hosted a Christmas party for the priests of the diocese. We were happy to have Bishop Sartain with us for this celebration which began with Vespers and a prayer for vocations which the bishop had composed. Fr. Bonaventure left to give a retreat to the seminarians of Notre Dame at a retreat house in Mississippi. We also began our process of choosing a new Provincial in January with a poll of the solemnly professed members of our province for who they would like to have as their next provincial superior. Fr. Bonaventure went to Holy Hill Wisconsin on the last week of January for the solemn profession of our former student, Emmanuel Betasso. Fr. John Michael gave a retreat in Miami in February, a Lenten mission in Mountain Home Arkansas, and an OCDS visitation in Birmingham in March. On April 2, Fr. John Michael was attending a retreat by Dr. Susan Muto in Belton Texas, when word arrived of the death of Pope John Paul II. Father set up his laptop in our meeting room, so retreatants could view the pope laid out in state in the Vatican.

During the sede vacante the solemnly professed of our province gathered in San Antonio and in Dallas to elect our representatives to our provincial chapter in May. The chapter began on May 16. Fr. Gregory Ross, Student Master in New Orleans, was installed as our new Father Provincial by the outgoing Provincial, Fr. Ralph Reyes. One of the new Provincial’s first requests was for Fr. Raphael Kitz of our house at Marylake, to serve on his provincial council. [Photo of Raphael with his dog Sally] This chapter was historic as the first at which we ever invited our cloistered Nuns and also our OCDS Provincial Council to attend a session devoted to their respective needs.

On the first full week of June, we gathered in San Antonio for our annual assembly. The new Provincial Council, after receiving reports from all of our houses, appointed local superiors: Fr. John Magdalene, who had also been elected our vicar Provincial at the chapter, for San Antonio, Fr. Ralph for Marylake, and Fr. Sam Anthony Morello as student master in New Orleans. Fr. Gregory decided to remain in New Orleans as his provincial residence. Stephen Sanchez was reappointed superior in Dallas, and Jenaro de la Cruz as superior in Oklahoma City. Fr. Jesús Sancho remains pastor of Santa Maria in Dallas. Fr. Bonaventure was assigned to San Antonio, and newly elected Councilor Luis Joakim to Oklahoma City. Br. Charles was assigned to San Antonio to teach for the scholastic year 2005-06 in our parochial school.

Our old superior, Father Bonaventure, left for his new assignment in San Antonio on July 27, and our new superior, Father Ralph officially arrived on August 12, but because of Fr. Jesús Sanchos vacation and Fr. Augustine Healy’s death, Ralph didn’t really arrive until mid September. The following Thursday he went to the Missionaries of Charity where we give a conference and Exposition every other week, alternating between the Missionaries and our own Nuns for confessions. Anyway, Ralph goes to the Missionaries’ house in Little Rock, and gave his conference. After the conference he asked if they had any questions. I praised him for having a question and answer session with his conference. I never dared do such a thing myself, but this is a wonderful learning technique to have a dialogue with the Sisters instead of a simple monologue conference. One Sister held up her hand. “You have a question, Sister?” Ralph asked. “Yes Father. I have a question. What is your name?”

Fr. Augustine Healy, our elder member of the province, died on September 2. We buried him at Marylake on September 8th. His obituary can be found below. The week before Father died, Hurricane Katrina slammed into New Orleans. See the New Orleans report below.

Fr. Augustine Kizhakkedam, former Provincial of Malabar, India, came to our province in August. After an earthquake off the Indian ocean caused tidal waves to flood India, Father probably thought coming to the United States would be a safer place to be for the next two or three years. So where did we first send him? --to New Orleans. Father’s introduction to life in our province was evacuating our house there and fleeing across Lake Pontchartrain to Covington where they weathered the storm. Our six Katrina refugees arrived here from Covington at 2:00 am Thursday Sept. 1. Our refugees, [pictured in our kitchen] are: Sam, Vicente, Augustine, Fr. Provincial, Juan & Joseph Marie. Gregory’s family (his parents Mr & Mrs Gilbert Ross, two brothers Gil & Michael, Gil’s wife Lisa and 2 sons) arrived the next day. Bonaventure & Joseph Le came Wednesday the 7th for Augustine Healy’s burial on Thursday morning.

Saturday, September 17th Fr. Provincial’s brother Gilbert, sister-in-law Lisa, two sons Jeremy and Cory, their parrot, blind dog, and three-legged cat left this morning at 7:00am to return home to Harahan, a higher lying suburb of New Orleans. Gregory’s other brother Michael stayed with their mother Helen to care for their father Gilbert Sr, who was still in the hospital with pneumonia and a blood clot in his heart. The hospital finally released him Tuesday morning and they left on the 20th to return to their home. Although still in need of hospitalization, Mr. Ross reported later on Tuesday evening, that he was content just to be back sitting in his easy chair in his home. Much damage had been done to their yards with fallen trees, but the Ross homes sustained no major damage worse than a horrible stench from the refrigerator food that had remained behind for three weeks. Electricity had been restored week earlier and they have drinkable water in their neighborhood.

On Sept 17th, Mayor Nagin of New Orleans allowed residents in the neighborhood of our House of Studies to come home, not to move back in, but to at least survey the damage done to our property. A member of the seminary staff checked our house from the outside and reported no windows broken and the flood line just inches from our front door. We are hopeful at this point the water did not penetrate our first floor. A warning was issued not to open the refrigerators or freezers; simply secure the doors shut and haul them out to have the “toxic waste” that was our food supply, hauled away by the military. On Tuesday, Mayor Nagin suspended his previously announced reentry plan for the city of New Orleans due to the expected arrival of new Hurricane Rita on Friday. Even without a direct hit, New Orleans could be re-flooded by a mere 3 foot surge from the new storm due to the damaged condition of the main 17th Street levee which was breached by the backlash winds of Katrina.

On Wednesday the 21st, our four refugees piled into the Provincial’s car to get their immunization shots in preparation for their return to New Orleans. As they were about to drive into town, Fr. Raphael passed them on his way for his morning hike, and yelled out to them, “Don’t cry when you’re shot!”

Marylake hosted our annual provincial retreat the third week of October. The theme was the Eucharist in keeping with the Eucharistic year being celebrated. Our bishop consecrated a host at the beginning of the year which then made a pilgrimage of the churches in the diocese, ending up at Marylake for the beginning of our retreat. Fr. Raphael gave a talk at the closing of the year held at the state Fairgrounds.

Father Joseph Neilson [photo] usually spends his vacation with his brother near New Orleans. This year he flew to Georgia where his brother and sister-in-law had relocated after the hurricane. Father continues to give conferences on John of the Cross each month despite his age and infirmities, and continues his apostolate of the confessional and counseling in our parlor. Father finds it more difficult to walk, but manages to get around by holding onto walls and railings. Brother Bernard installed an iron railing along the sidewalk that leads from our driveway back to the kitchen. Mr. Al Wrape Jr, who works as treasurer in our office, finds this helpful too as he struggles with infirmities associated with Parkinson’s.

Fr. John Michael gave a retreat to our Nuns in Savannah in November, and used the occasion to revive our Secular Order there. Br. Bernard went to San Antonio to represent our community at the solemn profession of Br. Joseph Le on December 30. He stayed busy in December wiring our monastery for a new satellite internet hookup. Due to our location out here in the country, we have received television from satellite since the days of Fr. Stephen. After hours lost on slow dial-up connections and multiple computer use among the brothers, we decided the time had finally come to set up a better connection for our computers. Getting wireless access from one end of the monastery to the other involved running a cable from the professed section all the way over to the novitiate. Father removed the ceiling to do this, and then had the Geek Squad from Best Buy out three times before the system became fully operative. Half of us were able to connect before Christmas, but Fr. Raphael and Br. Bernard had to wait until February to finally get on line.

--Fr. John Michael