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May 21, 2024
Dear Sisters and Brothers,
Welcome back to the Baltimore Beacon after a brief
and unexpected two-month hiatus, due to some changes in the Communications Office. I hope and pray that you have enjoyed an Eastertide of peace and joy and that this season of spring finds you delighting in the trees greening, the flowers blooming, the seeds budding, the birds singing, and people -young and old- once again enjoying the great outdoors! Easter and Spring have burst forth with their power to awaken us anew to the promise of life and the gift of love. May these be the blessings you have given and received over these past weeks.
As I put pen to paper for this May pondering, I find myself deeply aware of the grace and gift of friendship in life. It might sound a tad strange to tell you that this musing on the blessings of friendship in life flows primarily out of my recent experience of death. The recent death of my Redemptorist confrere, Father Donald Miniscalco, is the reason and inspiration for this reflection. Hopefully, a few details will help demonstrate why such is the case.
A few hours before Father Don went home to God, I joined my confrere, Father Ken Gaddy, and Father Don’s friend of over twenty-five years, Phillip, at Father Don’s bedside as he lay dying. I had not met Phillip before that first moment in the ICU. In between praying, singing, and periods of gentle quiet, I learned in conversation that Phillip had flown from Miami that same morning when he heard that his friend, Father Don was critically ill and slipping away. From that early morning call to Father Gaddy when Phillip heard that Father Don was critically ill, it took him only six hours to get from Miami, Florida, to Towson, Maryland and into Father Don’s hospital room, all by noontime. There Phillip would remain with his friend until died just before 6:00 PM.
During those hours of keeping vigil with Father Don, Phillip shared a good bit of the story of his friendship with Father Don and tenderly spoke of the many blessings he experienced through their relationship. Of course, it all began with God. Phillip heard Father Don preaching in a church in Chicago and was deeply touched by his powerful proclamation of God’s love and mercy. So moved and touched, Phillip went to meet and talk with him. Sharing the stuff of his story -his struggles, his hurts, his sorrows, along with his hopes and his dreams, Phillip encountered a man of faith and a friend of God in Father Don. He went on to share how Father Don was there for him in both the good and the challenging times of his life. Phillip recalled with particular joy that his friend was the priest who witnessed his marriage and baptized his two children. He could barely imagine celebrating these sacred experiences of his life without Father Don’s pastoral presence and care in the midst of it.
It was truly clear to me that the friendship that they shared was grounded in Phillip’s experience of Father Don’s faith and his ministry of care for God’s people. Father Don was clearly Phillip’s priest-friend and theirs was a gospel friendship. What was also clear to me from the time of storytelling and remembering that we shared during Father Don’s last hours on earth, is that their friendship was mutually life-giving, wonderfully real, deeply human, and a blessing of God to each of them. Hearing about the many and myriad stories of the times they shared enjoying their love of good food, classical music, art museums, South Philly cheese steaks and cannoli, sports, along with deep spiritual conversations about God, faith, and life, spoke eloquently to me and to Father Kenny of the blessing they were to each other in the friendship they shared for so many years. As I listened to Phillip speak of how he could ‘tease’ Father Don out of his doldrums into his light, out of his seriousness into some playfulness, out of his fears and into his hopes -and how Father Don could and would do the same for him - I gave thanks to God for their friendship and for all the good it brought to each of them. In befriending one another they clearly helped each other become more real and loving as human beings, more alive as men of faith, and more aware of their call to follow Christ in their lives.
Friendship is a gift of God that makes us all more human and helps us to experience God as friend, companion, and source of blessing. I hope and pray that you might take some time to reflect on the grace and blessing of friendship in your own life story. I will always be grateful to Phillip and Father Don, whose story inspired me to do so, and in doing so, has blessed me greatly. I wish and hope the same for you!
Gratefully,
Fr. John Collins, C.Ss.R.
Provincial