Our Ministries
17 Nov

To Celebrate a Life of Love: Joseph “Joe” Schilling

March 9, 1939-November 9, 2020

Joseph L Schilling, “Joe” (Papa Joe), born and raised in San Antonio, Texas, departed us on 09 November 2020 to be with the Lord.

Joe served in the United States Air Force as a Flight Engineer where he traveled all over the world. When he left the military, he worked as a small engine mechanic and eventually worked as the custodian for St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church. He retired to spend a few years RV’ing across the United States with his wife, Margie. They had many adventures and met a lot of people along the way and of course Joe never met anyone that he did not call a friend. Joe was one of the most social people you’d ever meet and enjoyed life to the fullest every day. Returning to San Antonio, Joe came out of retirement and drove a school bus for close to seven years; he loved the kids, and they respected him.

Joe loved the simple things in life. Whether it be watching a western on tv or gathering for a BBQ, a birthday, a Cowboys game, or a full moon, as long as he was surrounded by family and friends he was a happy man. He loved his country music, and if a song came on that he liked, no matter where he was, he would get up and dance, and man could he dance!

Joe had a true love for fishing, hunting, a little golf, and a passion for telling stories about all three. It may have been the camaraderie or it may have been the brag factor. If you’ve ever fished, hunted, or played golf with him, you know it’s a little of both.

Joe is survived by his wife, Margie, of 31 years; sister, Vicky Farnsworth; brother, Kenneth Schilling; daughter, Gigi; son, Michael; stepdaughter, Tena, and her husband, James; 8 grandchildren; and 6 great-grandchildren.

Joe will be missed by all that knew him.

Joe loved a good story, please if you have one, share it.
Rest in peace.

In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be sent to the Disabled American Veterans, https://www.dav.org/.

The funeral Mass is scheduled for 1 pm on Friday, November 20 at St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church. Thank you for following COVID-19 protocols and staying safe.

13 Nov

Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time

Unhidden Talents

What are five things you do very well? And how do you use these things you do well, your talents, in service to God and for the common good? The parable of the talents suggests that we are to make more of a good thing for the sake of others.

Are we willing to take risks to grow our talents? What kind of risks are we willing to take to ensure our growth and the thriving of our community, our church, our country, our world, and our earth? How are we “children of the light” in the midst of darkness?

Perhaps the “burying of talents” or our hiding of talents today comes from a kind of false humility or lack of belief that we have talents to offer. Often those talents are coaxed out of us by others who name them for us. An example of this is the naming of the characteristics of the Proverbs woman. “She reaches out her hands to the poor and extends her arms to the needy.”

Some of the talents needed today are talents for healing, for bringing about unity, for creativity and adaptability in dire circumstances, for accompanying the grieving or those filled with fear, for working to become anti-racist, for leading in climate change, for naming injustice and having the courage to lead for change. Who among us has those talents? Do we seek to learn from them? How do we grow our capacity to grow our talents?

Pope Francis urges us to reflect on our talents:

Have you thought about the talents that God has given you?  Have you thought of how you can put them at the service of others? Do not bury your talents! Set your stakes on great ideals, the ideals that enlarge the heart, the ideals of service that make your talents fruitful. Life is not given to us to be jealously guarded for ourselves, but is given to us so that we may give it in turn….Do not be afraid to dream great things!

    -Pope Francis, General Audience, St. Peter’s Square, April 24, 2013

We pray that each and every one of us does our part to bring healing, to recognize the beauty of all of God’s creation, and to share in God’s great joy!

6 Nov

Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time

Seeking Wisdom

“Resplendent and unfading is wisdom, found by those who seek her.” I love that wisdom in scripture is a “she.”  Alice Camille says, “Women bring light in morally instructive mothering, by mentoring those who seek them in spiritual direction or for professional guidance.”

Our scripture readings ask us to seek wisdom, to stay awake, and to be prepared. Most of us keep our lamps lit, seek wisdom, and make wiser choices in the company of others—in a community of love and care! For many months now, we have experienced fear, divisiveness, and a lack of peace. One of my daily emails comes from Concord Pastor. He helps me to pray daily about the real things that occupy me. This one on Wednesday was right on target!

 

NIGHT PRAYER: Wednesday 11/4

Posted: 04 Nov 2020 04:28 PM PST

We all need a break, Lord!

But when the news is so compelling,

it’s not easy to turn away

from the numbers and the pundits…

 

One question haunts me, Lord: What is truth?

Now, who said that???  Ah, yes!  A government official:

– Pontius Pilate… John 18:38

 

Help us get to the truth, Lord,

in this season of doubt and rumor and obfuscation,

help us get to the whole truth and nothing but the truth…

 

Help us discern the truth, Lord:

we don’t do very well at finding it on our own:

we need your help,

we need your reassurance,

we need your wisdom and your grace…

 

We need your counsel to help us find and keep

what’s true, what’s real, what heals…

 

We need your grace to give us strength

where we are weak and ineffective…

 

We need your Spirit for a jump-start

when our energy is low…

 

We need a barrel full of hope

to see us through these troubled days…

 

We need to learn to help each other

and to welcome others’ help…

 

We need to trust one another

as once we did before;

we need to trust

those with whom we disagree;

we need to trust one another

for the sake of the common good;

we need to trust in a truth

greater than our self-interest,

greater than our ideologies,

greater than our partisan dogmatism,

greater than the mean, small spirit tempting us

to be less, much less than we can be…

 

We need to trust, Lord,

that all shall be well, that all shall be well,

that all manner of things shall be well…

 

Help us let go and let you, Lord, be

our strength, our hope, our peace…

 

Be with us, Lord, while we’re awake,

be with us as we sleep

that awake we might keep watch with you

and asleep, rest in your peace…

 

Amen.

 


 

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03 Nov

To Celebrate a Life of Love: Timothy O’Connor

Mr. Timothy Patrick “Tim” O’Connor, 62, of Brownstown, IN, passed away Friday, October 23, 2020 at Baptist East Hospital in Louisville, KY. He was born at an Force Base in Arrington, England, into a military family. Timothy was the third child out of seven from the family of Rex and Joan O’Connor. In the mid 1960’s after relocating serveral times, Tim’s family settled in San Antonio, TX, where he called home. In January 23, 1982, he married the love of his life, Gayla Glietz. He was passionate about airplanes from childhood. As a child he built model airplanes and dreamed of becoming a pilot like his father. He realized his dream in 1984 when he earned his private pilot license. He worked in aviation all his life starting at Continental Airlines, FedEx, Boeing, and finished his career at UPS as a Team Fleet Supervisor.

Tim’s passion for airplanes continued with his restoration of a SR-9 Stinson Gullwing. He won many awards including Grand Champion in Denton, TX, and was acknowledged in Georgia’s Who’s Who in Aviation. Tim’s recent projects, a ME-103 and a P-26A had kept him busy. Many articles have been written worldwide about his talent and excellent workmanship.

Tim was a member of the Elk’s Club, Knights of Columbus, and a member of Masonic F & AM Lodge #146 in Seymour, IN, and volunteered for Habitat for Humanity for several years.

Tim is survived by his wife of 38 years, Gayla O’Connor; children, Nicholas Patrick O’Connor, Erin Nicole LeDuc and her husband Kevin; by his parents, Theodore Rexford O’Connor and Joan Kathleen (McNerney) O’Connor; siblings, Bill O’Connor and his wife Gail, Kathy O’Connor, Michael O’Connor and his wife Karla, Mary Rice and her husband Gary as well as several nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by his brother, Tom O’Connor.

The funeral Mass of the Resurrection will be celebrated at 12 pm on November 5 at St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church in San Antonio.

30 Oct

Solemnity of All Saints

The Way of Happiness

Pope Francis says, “The saints are not perfect models, but people through whom God has passed.” When the first of my Benedictine aunts, the youngest of the five died, all of us in the room experienced a light passing through her body. When her eyes popped open—the eyes that had been so cloudy in her last days of life—they were so clear, so transparent. God had passed through her body. I always knew that my aunt was a saint!

Pope Francis continues, “This is how the saints are: like everyone, they breathe air polluted by the evil there is in the world, but on the journey they never lose sight of Jesus’ roadmap.” Jesus did give us the recipe for blessedness, for happiness. We know them as the beatitudes. Pope Francis describes them this way, “Blessed are the simple, the humble who make room for God, who are able to weep for others and for their own mistakes, who remain meek, fight for justice, are merciful to all, safeguard purity of heart, always work for peace and abide in joy, do not hate and, even when suffering, respond to evil with good.”

At another time, Pope Francis preached the Beatitudes in this way. Blessed are those who remain faithful while enduring evils inflicted on them by others and forgive them from their heart. Blessed are those who look into the eyes of the abandoned and marginalized and show them their closeness. Blessed are those who see God in every person and strive to make others also discover him. Blessed are those who protect and care for our common home. Blessed are those who renounce their own comfort in order to help others. Blessed are those who pray and work for full communion between Christians.

May we all embrace our identity as “saints in the making.”  May we accept the challenges of following the path to blessedness, to happiness.  And may we celebrate the communion of saints who have gone before us, as well as those we encounter every day—the everyday saints among us!

23 Oct

To Celebrate a Life of Love: Garrett Richard Joiner

September 1, 2000-October 20, 2020

Garrett Richard Joiner, gone much too soon, but will never be forgotten. Garrett passed away on October 20th, 2020 in San Antonio, TX. He was born in Irving, TX on September 1st, 2000. Garrett was beloved by so many friends and family members. Garrett was intellectual beyond his years. His genius-level intelligence and exuberant work ethic made him one of the most successful young architectural designers of his time, although his immense humility would never let you know how truly smart he was. Garrett was always the one to lend a helping hand wherever, whenever and to whomever. Yet, he never asked for a single thing. He was the most kind-hearted person; he didn’t have a mean bone in his body. He was gentle and loving to all.

His funny and sweet personality will forever live on through his beloved mother Cedar Joiner, father Donald Joiner, his sisters Alex and Ashley Holifield, Christopher Greer, his cousins Grant, Kirsten, Griffin, Luke, Eric, Paul and Aaron, his aunts and uncles, his multitude of friends, as well as, all of those whose lives he deeply touched though his years of selfless service.

Life will never be the same without you. We will love you forever!

23 Oct

Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

The Law of Love

Love is a core theme in our readings for this weekend—love of God, love of neighbor, love of self. For me, these readings offer a saving grace in the face of all the noise, rancor, and fear-mongering of these elections. This year I find myself increasingly agitated at what I experience as deliberate divisiveness. I want so much for us to be one, to be united, to work for the common good, to understand each other, and to reconcile and heal. The readings teach me that love is stronger than fear and hope is stronger than despair. The risk of loving is always worth taking—even in an election year. It is a huge risk to love the unlovable, someone “different” from myself and my beliefs and values. Jesus tells us about the law of love, the greatest commandment.

In the midst of all the election distress, this prayer has helped me tremendously. I pray that it helps you too!

From the Facebook of Fr. James Martin, SJ. 

An Election Season Prayer

God, I know that I don’t have to get angry.
I don’t have to get worked up.
I don’t have to get depressed.
And I don’t have to throw anything at the TV.

I just have to use my conscience and vote.

So help me remember what Jesus taught in the Gospels,
and what our Church teaches,
especially about the poor, the refugee, the migrant,
the sick, the homeless, the unborn, the disabled,
the hungry, the elderly and the lonely.

Help me remember the “least” among us,
and help me ponder in my heart
how to cast my vote for the good of all.

God, I know that no candidate is perfect,
because I’m not perfect either,
the last time I checked.
So free me of the burden of having to
vote for someone who satisfies
all my desires for a candidate.
My candidate will be imperfect, like me.

Help me to be grateful for the ability to vote,
because not everyone has that privilege.

And when I meet people voting for someone else,
Help me to take a deep breath and
give them the benefit of the doubt,
because they are following their consciences, too.

Help me remember
that even though they sometimes drive me nuts,
I don’t have to argue with them,
I don’t have to convince them,
I don’t have to hate them,
And I don’t have to demonize them.

Then, after the election, help me work for unity.
Because I know that’s what you want.

Amen.

16 Oct

Twenty-ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time

What is God’s?

“Our gospel did not come to you in word alone, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with much conviction.” For me, these words of St. Paul to the Thessalonians offer such great wisdom for living through the current election process in our country. What words of the gospels inform our hearts, minds, and actions? What power—what anointing’s, what gifts of the Holy Spirit are we experiencing? And where does our passion, our conviction come from? How do we use our power—our voices, our actions, our voting?

Over the past few months, many of us have been intentionally hosting listening conversations. We have encouraged open, respectful dialogue among persons we love, and sometimes among persons who think very differently. Our respect for each other comes from our firm belief that we are all made in the image and likeness of God. We are acknowledging the pressures, the grief, and the stressors of life in pandemic times. Some of these are exacerbated by partisan politics. Others are discovering

The Pharisees tried to entrap Jesus. What is “Ceasar’s”? What is God’s? What is the challenge of sorting out this reality? How do we do it? For me, this Gospel is very real in the midst of our elections.

Pope Francis, The USCCB (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops), Archbishop Gustavo, and our pastors offer us guidance in applying the gospels, listening to the Holy Spirit, and exercising our civic responsibility in voting. They instruct us on how to form our conscience—our own conscience. No one can tell us who to vote for. No one can tell us that it is a sin to vote for a particular person because of their religion, or because of our own religious beliefs. (God used Cyrus, a pagan king, even anointed him, even though he didn’t know God, to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem.)

Ultimately, it is up to each one of us to vote with an informed conscience. Decisions about who to vote for are difficult given the complexity of all the issues. To help you with informing yourselves, you will find excellent, reliable, multi-issue oriented resources here: http://sfasat.org/resources-2/faithful-citizenship/.

Share these resources with others.

The reality is that there are many voices, authors, websites, groups that are trying to influence us to vote for certain candidates. Many of them use the adjective Catholic. Some of them are even priests and bishops. In most cases, they do not represent the totality of Catholic social teaching when they present a single issue, one that they claim is the most important one. The Catholic perspective and influence include many issues. I dare to say that Jesus was about healing divisions, naming injustices, making people think before they act (casting stones?). As followers of Jesus, we have much to think about! For wisdom, guidance, and courage, we pray!

The Leadership Conference of Women Religious has prepared reflections for each week from now until Election Day. They are very helpful to me, and I hope you will be encouraged and inspired.

14 Oct

To Celebrate a Life of Love: James Foster Rapier

August 25, 1931-October 10, 2020

James Foster Rapier, age 89, of Shavano Park, Texas, passed away
peacefully on Saturday, October 10, 2020 with his family at his side.

Foster, as he was known to all, was born in Alton, Illinois on August 25, 1931 to Leland and Catherine Rapier. Foster attended Roman Catholic parochial schools in Bloomington, Illinois. He graduated from Trinity High School in 1950 and was inducted into the Bloomington Central Catholic Hall of Fame in 2006 recognizing his outstanding athletic achievements. Foster met the love of his life, Frances Daleiden, Class of 1949 at Trinity. They were married in 1953 while Foster attended John Carroll University in Cleveland, Ohio. Foster was a standout football player for the Blue Streaks from 1950-54. He attracted the attention of the Cleveland Browns, but was called to duty in the U.S. Army in 1954 upon graduation from John Carroll. He served our country for two years at Fort Eustis, VA while playing Army football.

While in the Army, Foster and Frances welcomed their first child, Carole Rapier Clark (Michael) of Shavano Park, TX in 1955. Following his honorable discharge, Foster began his professional career with the Equitable Life Insurance Company in Bloomington, Illinois, a tremendous career that lasted for the next 32 years.

Theresa Rapier Swift (Terry) of Georgetown, IN was born in 1957, followed by Mary Rapier Millage (Tim) of Boerne, TX in 1961. Christopher James Rapier (Jill) of Champaign, IL was born in 1966. Frances and the children survive. The Rapier family was a part of the founding of St. Matthew Roman Catholic Church in Champaign, IL in 1968.

Foster was a storyteller. His life included many adventures as an active father, coach, craftsman, hunter, fisherman, and golfer. His exploits are well documented in family history. He never knew a stranger and his personable style related so well to people from all walks of life, but he enjoyed his family the most. His pride and joy was being a grandfather  and great-grandfather and it put a bounce in his step. His 11 grandchildren and 10 great grandchildren loved his devotion to their games and various important life events. Foster and Frances were always there, without fail.

He fought the good fight and will be missed dearly by his loving family. His marriage to Frances was a model of devotion to the very end. Her constant care and vigilance for him was a wonderful example of unconditional love. His, “I sure do love you, Mom,” will echo in our hearts for years to come.

The Rapier Family would like to thank the staff of The Etta Senior Living at Shavano Park for their heartfelt care throughout Foster’s final 5 years.

Following a funeral Mass, October 21st at 12 pm at St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church, Foster will be buried in a private family ceremony with military honors at the Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery in San Antonio, Texas.

In lieu of flowers, memorials may be sent to Geneva School of Boerne for tuition support where Foster’s granddaughter and son-in-law are part of the faculty (113 Cascade Caverns Road, Boerne, TX 78015).

Graveside service live stream: https://admin.mediafusionapp.com/_live/eventPlayer.php?eventId=2097_9879

9 Oct

Twenty-eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Abundance and Need

“I have learned the secret of being well fed and of going hungry, of living in abundance and of being in need. I can do all things in him who strengthens me. Still, it was kind of you to share in my distress.”

I feel like St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians was directed to me. I needed this reminder during these COVID-19 times. And I should probably just end this reflection right here.

Let me be clear—I do not lack for food. But I have missed the riches of long, drawn-out meals with provocative, exciting conversations. I have missed seeing people that I love and visiting in person. Nothing can replace the St. Francis community gathered in person. In essence, I missed the Parish Festival so much! The drive-by blessing of the animals was just a taste of what we missed. Feast or famine has become real to us in many ways. With these experiences, what we miss teaches us about what abundance means. And we are reminded about sharing with those in need.

The readings for this weekend include imagery of wedding feasts, banquets, and special meals. Such occasions often require special attire, as well as a special demeanor or disposition. Such celebrations are filled with love, filled with gratitude for the relationships we share. Can you imagine that you would ever say NO to an invitation? What would it mean to show up without a “wedding garment”?

If persons are called in to the banquet out of the streets, they certainly do not have the right clothes. This is when the words from our baptismal ritual become real. “You have become a new creation and have clothed yourself in Christ. See in this white garment the outward sign of your Christian dignity. With your family and friends to help you by word and example, bring that dignity unstained into the everlasting life of heaven.”

May we all be clothed in Christ, providing and protecting, grace-filled and grateful or all that we are becoming in preparation for the greatest banquet of all!