Letter from the Pastor
Third Sunday of Advent
December 17, 2023

Cooking, Thank You

I understand that Fr. Andrew took my name in vain last weekend in his homily. He told last week’s congregation, “We don’t have a can or two of crushed tomatoes in the house we have cases!” and “While I was cooking, I wondered if we had garlic in the refrigerator, but when I looked I saw we had a jar filled with 5 or 6 garlic bulbs!” Of course, he blamed me and he was correct. When he told me, I looked at him and said, “What’s so strange about that? Doesn’t everyone have cases of canned tomatoes? You know you can never have enough garlic in the house. God forbid!” We both did have a good laugh!

Both Fr. Andrew and I enjoy cooking, and we do like to laugh. There is something very creative about cooking, plus, you get to eat what you like. I do contend that if you know how to read, you can cook. It might not be great the first time you try something new but like everything else that is really worth it, practice is the best teacher, especially when it comes to learning useful techniques in the kitchen. Among the 5 friars, 4 of us usually take at least one night to cook dinner. One friar, who will go nameless…for now… likes to claim he does the dishes. We’ll leave it at that…for now, but we all know the challenge of preparing a meal and getting everything set on a regular basis.

It is one thing to cook for 5 people and it is entirely another to prepare a dinner for 260, but that is exactly what our Beefsteak Dinner Committee did for us on Dec. 1st. It was a great evening with friends we knew and others that we just met. The St. Francis Center gym was transformed into a wonderful 5-star restaurant. It truly was delightful. The all you can eat Filet Mignon was cooked to perfection by Nightingale Catering and this year they included an added treat of a first course pasta dish. [See, everyone has tomatoes and garlic on the ready!]

Thank you, thank you, to Joan Sawicki who leads the charge on this dinner. She has put together a wonderful team to help with all of the planning and implementation of serving the meal, providing the musical entertainment, and running the auctions and raffles. That is a lot to coordinate and it does take a great group of people to pull it all together.

Thank you to this great committee: Kathy Reinbold, Mary Law, Diane DeMeo, Judy O’Connor, Madelyn Pietrucha, Ellen Dombrowski, and Lorri D’Orsi for all of your hard work. This year’s Beefsteak Dinner was the best yet! Thank you David Sondano for his musical charm and wonderful sense of humor. He kept us entertained and his Sintraesque flare was a marvelous addition to the evening. Thank you to all of those who volunteered to serve the dinner, sell the raffle tickets, and make sure we all had enough of everything and thank you to everyone who made those delicious desserts. I confess, although tomatoes and garlic are important, dessert is always my favorite part of the meal. I also want to Amanda DeFusco, Michelle DiBella, and Amy Marks, our wonderful employees who worked hand and hand with the committee. It was a great team effort to make the evening so successful. Thank you to everyone who joined us for the evening. I think we would all agree, it was a great night!

So when you are cooking, make sure you have garlic or ask Joan and the Beefsteak Committee over to your house!!

May this Advent season truly be an adventure that leads us all closer to Christ.