This past Thursday was the feast of St. John Baptist de la Salle, the founder of the Lasallian Christian Brothers. As we have begun to re-associate with the brothers, we decided to mark the day with Mass. We also elected to use the day as an occasion to honor local men and religious as well as our Grandparent's Day celebration.
We were originally scheduled to honor the local men and religious at our Catholic Schools Week Mass in February but that day got snowed out. Yesterday about 30 sisters and 2 religious men joined us including the original assistant principal of Trinity High School, Sr. Frances Lessard, CSC. Sr. Frances was the inaugural recipient of the Bishop Leo O'Neil Award in 2011 and this year will mark her 70th anniversary of religious profession. We recognized her and our good friend Bro. John McMahon, FSC, who also joined us and proclaimed the first reading, before Mass began.
Our Grandparent's Day is typically celebrated on the Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord but our seniors will be at an event that day this year so we moved the celebration to yesterday. We had many, many, many grandparents and special friends with us, it so much fun.
The Mass was celebrated by our superintendent of schools, Fr. John Fortin, OSB. He generously agreed to celebrate the Mass on Monday as our chaplain, Fr. Richard Dion, had a scheduling conflict come up at the last minute. Fr. John did a masterful job talking about St. John Baptist de la Salle in his homily, quoting a famous line of his that teachers are called to be "ambassadors for Christ."
Following the Mass, the students took their grandparents around the school while we turned the gym over for lunch. Thus, our students had the chance to pray and spend time in fellowship with their grandparents. It was a lovely morning, made extra special by the presence of the religious, our grandparents, and the celebration of the feast of St. John Baptist de la Salle at Trinity for the first time in decades!
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