It’s The End

“The end is where we start from.”  ~ T.S. Eliot

I’ve been a pastor at St. Thomas More parish for twenty-three years.  I knew that one day the end of my assignment would come around although, honestly, I thought it would be as a transfer to another parish several years ago.  I was ordained a priest forty-three years ago.  I knew that one day this day would arrive: the end of my officially assigned ministry.

Endings happen.  Endings are natural.  Endings are a part of life.  Endings don’t mean that everything is over or complete.  They merely herald new beginnings.  In the past, the end of an assignment meant a new pastoral assignment somewhere else.  Now that I am retiring, there are still new beginnings.  Priests don’t really retire.  We become “senior priests”.  The only things that changes is that we no longer have a pastoral assignment.  However I, like other senior priests, will be busy helping other pastors when the need calls for help.  That is why we are often referred to as supply priests.

Endings come to all of us and we deal with them differently.  Some deal with them with a certain amount of dread.  Others deal with them with a copious amount of anxiety.  Still others deal with them with a great deal of hope.  I don’t look at my retirement as an end.  Instead, I view it as the beginning of a new adventure.

FAITH ACTION:  Don’t fear endings.  Instead, embrace what may come.