The week has been a very eventful one with a mixture of joy and sadness. It began with the joyous celebration of our Feast of Title on Sunday, June 26. In the evening, my family and I went to dinner at the home of some friends and parishioners. It was a great evening in spite of the fact that we were unable to do some of the activities we had planned to do, like play tennis and swim in the pool.  Yes, I am going back to playing tennis. I bought a Babolat tennis racket last week and I like it. Ready to play pro tennis (laugh out loud…I wish). Nevertheless, we had an enjoyable and awesome time, the children had a blast, and we plan to play tennis in the near future.

I had a number of meetings this week, including the usual staff meeting on Monday morning, and another meeting on Tuesday with the members of a Task Force I have commissioned to organize a Leadership Workshop. The workshop is scheduled for Friday, August 19 and Saturday, August 20. The group of seven, under the leadership of Linda Schlepp Gray, are excited about having a successful workshop that will set a direction forward for our church and its ministry and mission to the community and beyond. We will be holding the second meeting next Tuesday.

On Monday, June 27, I learned of the death of the brother-in-law of one of our members who has ailed for 5 years. Claude James was a young man of 47 years, with a beautiful, loving and wonderful family – a wife and three children. I spoke with my parish family member, Robin Turner, extending my condolences to him and his family. We had prayed for Claude for some time. Today, I attended his funeral service, which was held at St. Edward’s Catholic Church, Pembroke Pines, just a mile from my home.

However, if that was not enough for the week, by Wednesday afternoon, I received the news of the sudden death of one of my parishioners, Alma Cunningham. Alma and her husband, Henry, who are both originally from Belize, were at the 10:15 a.m. Eucharist last Sunday. I hurriedly went to their home to administer the rite called, “Ministration at the Time of Death.” I spent some time with the many family and friends who had gathered by the time I arrived. Both she and Henry are two wonderful and loving people and Alma’s death will be a great loss to the parish family. May the souls of Claude and Alma and the souls of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

Another meeting (Wednesday) was with a member who is interested in helping underprivileged children with back packs and supplies to take to school for the beginning of the next semester. Thursday morning meeting was with the Senior and Junior Wardens, the Property Committee Chair and the Sexton outlining the latter’s job description and responsibilities, and our expectations. In the evening, two members of the Stewardship Committee wanted to discuss with me and to receive my blessing on a Rally the Committee is planning to hold between August 1 and November 20 to raise funds for a specific church project. With these meetings, one would think that I have been “meet-ened” out. In addition to all of this I had two sessions with two couples, one of whom are getting married.

Amidst having to do a number of other things this week, I could say “What a week!”

By the way, Happy “Canada Day” (July 1) to our neighbors to the north.