Pastor's Column for September 20, 2020

Last Tuesday we celebrated the funeral Mass for Agnes Franko. She and her husband Clarence were married for 68 years! They had 5 children and several grandchildren & great-grandchildren. Agnes & Clarence had lived in St. Mark parish where I had grown up. Every week I would see them at the 8am Mass on Sunday, and Agnes had a devotion to Mary and prayed the rosary daily. At her funeral, I mentioned that her name was based on the Latin word “Agnus” which means “Lamb.” To me, she was gentle like a lamb and I will miss seeing her. Let us pray for her husband and children & ask the Lord to receive her soul into the peace of Paradise. 
Congratulations to Amanda Pasela & Anthony Zingale who will be getting married this weekend at St. Leo’s, and to Jim Hogue, a member of the parish who will be getting married at Nativity Parish in Lorain. May God give them many happy and fruitful years together. 
Once again I want to express my thanks to three parishioners who have made generous donations to our landscaping this summer. Thanks to Rose Zarko, Mary Jane Kozlowski & Rose Pelley for helping to make our grounds look so nice. With the money they donated, we were able to purchase the statue of St. Francis of Assisi that is between the front church door & the rectory office, and the fountain and light and additional trees, plants & shrubs by our Marian shrine. Please be sure to take a walk over to the shrine if you haven’t seen it lately & see how much more beautiful it is. What a great place to pray the rosary or just to sit quietly & enjoy the peace. Debbie McKiver is the landscaper who designed & then did all the landscaping work this summer. Most notably, she replaced the cracking stone around the marquee sign facing Broadview Road with new brick and did the same around the sign you see on the right when you drive in, welcoming you to St. Leo’s. She lined the fence (very nicely repaired/replaced by Christopher Ish) with trees & planted many new trees, shrubs & flowers on the property. We are blessed to have such good people care so much for our parish property.
Thanks too to Mary Kubala for her donation which allowed us to get the vents in the church cleaned out, especially as we become more aware of the air we breath during the coronavirus. Ron Kollar also donated to our landscaping efforts and I’m grateful to all who contribute to our capital improvements fund. Hopefully you can see your donations at work.
I appreciated what Eddie Abufarha had to say last weekend about how the people in the Holy Land are really suffering during this pandemic since they do not receive any kind of stimulus checks or assistance from the government as we do at times like this. So thank you if you purchased anything from the sale of the beautiful olive wood carvings after Mass last weekend. If you couldn’t be here due to social distancing at this time, you can view everything they offer on their website, holylandcarvings.com. We have a link to it on our parish website as well. I look forward to the Holy Land pilgrimage organized by Eddie’s travel company that will take place whenever this pandemic is behind us.