My dear beautiful people of God, 

“I am going to prepare a place for you…I will come back again and take you to myself, so that where I am you also may be.” 
I remember just about four weeks before my mother's death, she called me to her house and told me; “it’s time honey, it’s time to take me to Sycamore.” (Sycamore Manor was a nursing and rehab facility which also provided hospice care. Marie was there once before for rehab after a fall) Honoring her wish, I reluctantly made arrangements knowing that this was not a visit which would result in her coming home…or was it? 

In the next few weeks, she had many, many visitors and while conscious was able to express her feelings and share her final wishes. In some ways those final weeks were a reflection of her entire life. This extremely outgoing “people person” was also a woman of deep faith who quietly knew that her Lord had a place for her, and it was only a matter of time until she would occupy it; her new home, an eternal one. This woman who became an outstanding mommy to the two children whom she and her husband adopted, shared her faith and taught her children not by lectures or lessons, but by the way she lived her life. 

Having a full-time career outside of the home, something frowned upon by many at that time, was never her top priority. Her love of God and her love of her family came before everything. As the first woman to become an Extraordinary Minister of the Eucharist in her parish, she shared Christ in the breaking of the bread as well as through her entire being. She not only proclaimed the word of God as a Lector but lived the word with her life. She taught children about Jesus in the parish religious education program, but she also walked with him on a day-to-day basis. And then at the very end of her life she took a final journey believing that her Lord came to earth to give us all, the unequivocal assurance of everlasting life. On February 13, 2008 she quietly closed her eyes to the things of this world only to open them again and occupy the place which the Lord had prepared for her. 

“I am going to prepare a place for you…I will come back again and take you to myself, so that where I am you also may be.” 
REST IN PEACE MOM--HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY! 

Love, 
Fr. Andrew