Mass of Christian Burial: Homily

Rev. Albert J. Smith, Jr., OSFS
December 31, 2018

Faithful Cross!
Above all other,
One and only noble tree,
None in foliage, none in blossom,
None in fruit thy peer may be.
These lyrics begin the 8th stanza of “Pange Lingua” by St. Fulgentius.

Dear Father Provincial, beloved brothers, cherished family and friends,

There is no better way for me to express my perception of Fr. Albert Smith than to say that the silver profession cross, laid over his shoulders at his first taking of vows, bloomed joyfully, prodigiously, and vibrantly his entire life.

Al was a cherished only son. I met him in junior year at North Catholic. I was awed when told me that he did 50 pushups every night! What’s more, that he got tea and a snack before 9:00 o’clock bedtime. Al threw the javelin for North Catholic’s track team. Once, a football player thought he would have some fun at Al’s expense. He grabbed the long, pointed pole and hurled it. It tanked. The javelin event took skill, not just strength. Al played baseball, too. He was given an athletic scholarship for it to Villanova. Al was an eagle scout, a lifeguard, and played guitar. He was also a sacristan as was I. Most of us entered the Oblates or went to St. Charles, the diocesan seminary. I could not then find in myself anything comparable to Al Smith’s talents, but he extended to me the gift of a lifetime of friendship. Both he and I had long and successful ministries in secondary school and as campus ministers.

In retirement, I joined Al at Villa de Sales and took stock of the man I had known for 65 years. When I arrived, he had been saying Masses for the Medical Mission Sisters and the Christian Brothers. He toiled sweat-hard on our four acres of land, making war on kudzu, planting new trees and bushes, and buying a birdbath. He got our pizza and cheese steaks faithfully every Friday night. And he was good for stories, long stories. They captivated many.

Al used Asian and native American spiritual traditions in his life of prayer. He liked praying outside on sunny mornings in the four directions. He had a Tibetan singing bowl in the prayer corner of his room. Framed Asian calligraphy silently spoke their wisdom from his walls. And I know that there’s Eagle’s feather tucked in there, somewhere.

On Alaska vacations, Al released the pent-up, caged huskies for the Iditarod and went trekking through Denali Park. He was the only priest on earth to run electric trains through an Alaskan village on a platform in his bedroom.

Al had developed multiple interests. He had gone to clown school. As a certified Tai Chi instructor, he exercised their graceful moves beside our carriage house. He printed two books of his poetry. Al joined a local barber shop group that practiced almost every Sunday in the great room of our house. He sang karaoke on Thursdays at the Whitemarsh Inn. He became a member of the elite Rittenhouse Singers. They with others came to him at the Villa a few weeks ago during our open house and sang exquisitely arranged carols. Though Al had already become weak, they got him to join them. It became a moving farewell.

A closer look at Al’s life reveals unrecognized generosity. As swim team moderator, Al had to rise at 5:00 AM for years while teaching a full load. When involved in athletic department work, he often had to miss the community dinner. At our home, Al had no second thoughts on getting up in the middle of the night to rake leaves from the sole drain that floods our parking lot. He worked as an instructor of Tai Chi for Catholic Social Services of Philadelphia and at Morris Arboretum. His teaching was gentle, compassionate, and flexible. His students, mostly ageing and fragile persons, many of low income, loved him.

Al was devoted to all his friendships, the graying members of the Ireton musicians and swimmers with Harry as their coach. Al has been the most requested Oblate by Ireton graduates attending the school when the Oblates staffed it. His trips to Alaska were made to see Dorothy, a sister of St. Joseph who directed catechesis for a diocese. While there, Al often took priests’ masses to give them needed rest. He recently gave a retreat for kids out on the Aleutians. His trips to Boston over several years were to keep the bonds he made with the brothers of Caroline, a School Sister of Notre Dame who, like him, died suddenly of cancer. Al took his friend Kathleen, a former cardiac surgical nurse, suffering from Alzheimer’s, while using a wheelchair, to comforting places outdoors, and to movies and dinners.

In Al’s day, the Oblates promised him “A Happy Way of Life.” He got it and shared it with so many. He lived in the shadows of God’s wings. Shouting for joy, his soul clung fast to God whose right hand upheld him. I heard, by phone, that he was the kindest man a person ever met; by email, that he always smiled; in person, that there wasn’t a mean bone in his body. In my entire life, I never heard him say a hateful thing. Never so much as a “damn,” his speech was always G-rated. He was a superb priest who smelled of his sheep.

When Al found out that his cancer was terminal, he entered the kitchen, opened wide his arms and silently said through wide eyes, goodbye. No hugger, he hugged me for the first time. Though stunned, Al accepted his swift death with abandonment. St. Francis de Sales speaks of Calvary as the Academy of Love. In his dying, Albert Joseph Smith completed what he began the day he received his cross. He shall now see God with his own eyes, and not another’s. In dying to self, he produced much fruit. He rests from his labors, and his works accompany him.

May God Be Blessed.

Mass of Christian Burial: Homily

Bro. Thomas P. Brophy, OSFS
December 22, 2018

“None of us lives as his own master, and none of us dies as his own master. While we live we are responsible to the Lord; when we die we die as his servants. So then, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s.”

This the essence of obedience. And just to be clear, obedience is not simply doing what you’re told to do. In the Salesian tradition, obedience is the art and science of listening. Specifically, listening for the voice of the Lord in the simple, ordinary events of everyday life, and having the courage to say “yes” to that voice.

Bro. Tom’s personnel file is a testimony to a life dedicated to the practice obedience. It is filled with letter after letter in which this provincial or that provincial assigned him to this community or to that apostolate. Throughout his life as an Oblate, Bro. Tom never questioned his latest transfer. Tom went wherever he was asked to go – he said “yes” to the voice of the Lord wherever it sent him. And time after time after time, the voice of the Lord was asking Tom to serve the needs of others in simple, ordinary and everyday ways.

Bro. Tom knew his way around a kitchen. He knew his way around a supermarket. He knew his way around a balance sheet and a check book. He knew his way around a print shop. He knew his way around a library. He knew his way around a retreat center. Primarily, Bro. Tom served the needs of others through manual labor, a ministry highly praised by our founder, Blessed Louis Brisson.

Father Brisson observed:

“We reprint the Gospel by means of work. We must reprint the Gospel and reprint it page by page without omitting anything. Our Lord came upon earth and spent thirty years engaged in manual labor. His labor was not intellectual, even though he was the Light which enlivens every person coming into the world. It is precisely because he was a working man – because he worked with his hands – that he knew the language of divine science so much elevated above human thought, the language of union with the will of God. He dignified manual labor.”

Fr. Brisson continued:

“Without a doubt some people are better equipped at working with their hands than others, but there is a place for manual labor in all our lives. There is a library to be kept in order, a helping hand to be given, some shopping to be done, a little tiding up or organizing to be accomplished…I very strongly recommend devotion to manual labor. God has attached great graces to it. All religious communities that have held manual labor in high esteem have produced great saints. Therefore, be great lovers of manual labor.”

As devoted as Bro. Tom was to meeting the needs of others throughout his life, he struggled in retirement to allow others to meet his needs. As he aged and became more dependent on the manual labor of others, the voice of the Lord urged him to allow others to serve him. Frequently, he would ask, “Why won’t God just take me?” When asked the next day if he still wanted God to take him, Tom would reply: “That was yesterday.”

The power of the present moment.

Allowing others to do for him was perhaps the greatest challenge of all. But now, I pray that Tom is in a place where God himself will meet Bro. Toms needs – and allow Tom to rest from his labors – for all eternity.

We honor Bro. Tom’s life by following his example – by rolling up our sleeves and doing what we can in ordinary, everyday ways to continue Jesus’ saving work in our little corners of the world. As St. Francis de Sales challenges us, let us dedicate our hands to the service of others. Let us listen for the voice of the Lord who invites us each and every day to do perform simple, good works with great love. Likewise, let us also listen to the voice of the same Lord who invites us to allow others to perform good works with great love for us.

Together, we pray through the intercession of Bro. Tom that just today we might reprint the Gospel by working to meet the needs of one another.

Mass of Christian Burial: Homily

Rev. Charles C. Garst, III, OSFS
November 28, 2018

“Do not babble like the pagans, who think that they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them.”

Throughout his priestly ministry, this admonition from Jesus was Charlie Garst’s guiding principle when it came to preaching - Charlie was a man of few words. As the person tasked with preaching tonight, I will endeavor to do right by him by emulating Charlie’s example…more or less.

“Take care not to perform righteous deeds in order that people may see them; when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right is doing, so that your almsgiving may be secret. And your Father who sees in secret will repay you.”

Performing righteous deeds – doing what’s right – without people noticing? How does that work? Jesus’ teaching, preaching and healing were the talk of the town. Jesus’ attempts to stay under the radar were incredibly unsuccessful. Jesus’ suggestion to folks miraculously cured to keep it to themselves was almost universally ignored. Jesus’ life was an open book.

It’s not possible to do good for others without others eventually noticing – the challenge is to do good for others in ways that they take notice not so much of us but rather take notice of the God who is the source of our goodness. After all, how many times does Jesus himself tell his audience that it’s not his will that he’s come to fulfill but rather the will of his Father?

When it comes to performing righteous deeds, Jesus isn’t requiring us to be invisible any more than He was invisible! What Jesus is asking is for us to be transparent. Jesus is challenging us to do what’s right to draw attention to God, rather than to do what’s right to draw attention to ourselves.

St. Francis de Sales viewed John the Baptist as a shining example of the difference between being invisible and being transparent. When John famously said of his relationship with Jesus, “He must increase, and I must decrease,” John wasn’t putting himself down; John wasn’t saying that his life didn’t matter. John was simply naming and claiming his part in God’s plan of salvation. In his ministry along the River Jordan, John’s mission was to draw attention to Jesus without allowing himself to get in the way. John knew his place – and had the courage to take it.

Charlie Garst wasn’t invisible – anything but. Charlie was transparent. His ministry was never about him. Charlie was at home with himself. To the extent that he was comfortable in his own skin, Charlie was able to do lots of good for lots of people throughout his life as an Oblate and as a priest without the need to draw attention to himself. Like John – like Jesus – Charlie was humble and unassuming in accepting his part in God’s plan of salvation in drawing other people’s attention to God.

Be it teaching by word or example, preaching, counseling or presiding, Charlie knew his place – his place was mostly just being with people. Be it in the classroom, standing along a sideline, sitting in a confessional or spending time on a ride-along, Charlie had a knack for helping others to feel at home with themselves – Charlie had a knack for allowing others to be comfortable in their own skin – in ways that were known ultimately to God alone.

“Take care not to perform righteous deeds in order that people may see them…”

Just last week, I learned about some righteous deeds done by this humble, practical and down-to-earth man who dedicated his life to doing good for so many others. How many of us know that on many occasions following 9-1-1, Charlie traveled to New York City to support first responders in their recovery efforts in and around ground zero? How many people know that he received an award recognizing him for his ministry?

How do you keep something like that a secret? I don’t know, but Charlie somehow managed to do just that.

“And your Father who sees in secret will repay you.”

If in fact the Father does reward in a particular way those who do good for others in unassuming, ordinary and everyday ways during this earthly life, I am confident that it will take an eternity for Charlie to enjoy his heavenly reward.

Each of us would do well to imitate Charlie’s example of how to spend one’s life doing good without drawing attention to oneself. Half the battle of following Jesus is just showing up – it’s simply being there for others. However obvious or obscure, we can pay tribute to Charlie’s life and legacy by doing one of the things he did best – simply making others feel at home.

As Charlie Garst – Oblate of St. Francis de Sales - clearly demonstrates, it is possible to accomplish many righteous things in this life without letting your left hand know what your right hand is doing, provided that your mind - and your heart - are in the right place.