So it has come to this: my last article for the bulletin. I am writing this on Sunday evening, almost a week before you will be reading it, and already I feel sad about my departure. It’s sure feeling real to me now: all the pictures are off my walls, the books are off my bookshelves, and the dining room is stacked with boxes. I had to do all of that very early, because I am going to be with a group of priests until Friday. I know that if I hadn’t been going somewhere, I would likely have just postponed the packing anyway.

My new parish does not have a permanent place for me to live yet, so I will be moving to temporary quarters for a while at the faculty residence of St. Thomas Academy in Mendota Heights. Many other priests have lived there through the years, so I know I will do just fine. Learning a new way of ordering my life and learning a whole lot of new people is what lies ahead for me. It’s not what I look forward to doing, but it must be done; it’s part of the life to which I have been called.

How can it be part of God’s plan to move priests here and there, just when we were getting used to each other? It may be hard to see it, but it is part of his plan. This move, and the arrival of a new priest who will serve you as your shepherd, will give us all a chance to see things from a fresh perspective. And what a wonderful thing it is that St. Boniface and St. Mary of Czestochowa are parishes that teach priests how to be pastors! That is what you have done for me.

When I arrived here in 2003, I had no idea what I was doing. Oh, I had been a priest for some time already, but I had never been the pastor of a parish – let alone two parishes at the same time! I had seen how priests led parishes, but I had never done it for myself. I had to figure it out as I went along, with the assistance and encouragement of priest friends. It certainly wasn’t always easy. It’s a real challenge for the people of any parish to be asked to move in a certain direction, and I learned that what I thought was hardly any movement at all represented a great movement for some people. I did not fail to learn that lesson – but that doesn’t mean that the decisions I made were wrong. As I go to a different parish, I will take along with me the things that I have learned. The challenges will be different there, but I’m sure that the way I approach them – whatever they are – will be colored by what I have experienced here.

So thank you, thank you for your many kindnesses over these five years. I will miss it here, and I will miss you! How content I would be to remain among you, to see for myself how your lives unfold. But I have to go on. It’s my hope that you will keep me up to date. My address at my new church will also be a post office box (which is so that the parish can keep the historic name of Mendota, population 197, in its address instead of Mendota Heights). It is:
Fr. Joseph Gallatin
Church of St. Peter
P.O. Box 50679
Mendota, Minnesota 55150-0679
The phone number is 651-452-4550.

I hope you will keep me in your prayers, and I will keep you in mine. May God bless you!

The last time I wrote anything except that continuing summary of Pope Benedict’s encyclical was on June 1. I actually wrote it a couple of days before that, before I ever received that phone call that began the chain of events leading to my departure from the parishes. I had intended to summarize the Pope’s letter sometime anyway, and once I knew I was going to leave, I began the project so that I could finish before I would have to leave, and so that I wouldn’t write anything that might give away what I would announce to the parish on June 14 and 15.

So now I have this column and one more next week, and that will be all. I must admit that this experience has been surreal! I sure didn’t think that my time here would end so suddenly, and with the honor of being asked to go somewhere else where it was determined I was needed more. Saying goodbye is not going to be easy. But every pastor is well liked by a small group of people, is strongly disliked by a small group of others, and has a big group of people who do not much care one way or the other. That was hard for me to believe when I was an associate pastor, but in time I found out it was true. It’s quite freeing to come to terms with those facts, because I believe one of the worst traps into which a priest can fall is to think he can make everyone like him. I have been assured that I would not be doing my job if I were to try to make sure everyone liked me. It would be a foolish endeavor. I have my file folder labeled “unpleasant letters” that I will take along to aid me in my humility, and it will also remind me that in my first pastorate I tried to do what I believed to be best for the parishes. And three or four residents of St. Bonifacius will have the opportunity to start fresh with a priest who does not know them. But perhaps will he discover who they are soon enough. It’s really up to them.

Independence Day was the First Friday of the month of July, and that means this was the week for me to visit those who can’t get to Mass. Now I’m going to be away this week at a meeting of a group of priests to which I belong, and will return on Friday in time for a wedding rehearsal at St. Mary of Czestochowa. So this was a week I needed to take care of a lot of things in the office. But I am very glad I made the visits to people’s homes and to nursing homes. It gave me a chance to say goodbye. I was pleased that a few parishioners who had seemed to be in bad shape for the last few months were better, and were in good spirits. A few shed some tears as I said goodbye, and that means a whole lot to me, even though I know Fr. Balluff will give them good care.

The truth is that I usually pause even when checking out of a room at a retreat center after a few days. It will not be easy to pack up and leave my home, which will soon be home to somebody else. I lived at St. Boniface Rectory two years and three months before the renovation, at St. Mary’s Rectory for six-and-a-half months, and at St. Boniface for two years and two-and-a-half months after the renovation. I will miss these places, especially now that St. Boniface Rectory is so attractive and comfortable. (By the way, the natural gas bill for the rectory went down from $3300 in 2005 to $1600 in 2008!) I am very glad the parishes will have such a great place for the priest to live far into the future. The rectory will be 100 years old next year, and it is in excellent condition. The rectory at St. Mary of Czestochowa is 61 years old, and it has always remained in great shape. The rectory where I’m going was torn down four years ago, and tomorrow I am going out with a real estate agent for the second time so that St. Peter in Mendota will again own a place for the pastor to live. Is that at all ironic?