It is hard to believe that we are already at the Ascension of our Lord and we are hearing Christ’s final commandment to His disciples, “Thus it is written that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in His name to all the nations,
beginning in Jerusalem.” May this mission echo within our hearts. This is our Baptismal call—to announce that Christ died for the forgiveness of sins to those who do not know His mercy! I periodically honestly evaluate how I spend my time, especially considering my narcolepsy, to this great mission of our Lord. I always see opportunities for growth.  

It has been over 3 months since I introduced no longer having a forward-facing email. This has helped immensely, thank you all for adapting quite well to this—especially our great staff! However, despite this shift, narcolepsy’s impact on my day kept me slipping back into 10–13-hour workdays. This created a burnout cycle. How long could I push myself until I had to take a week to recover? It wasn’t good. So, I continued to discern and tweak how to be more ordered in my life to be a fully present priest for all of you.  

This prayerful consideration has led to the decision that I needed more help. For this reason, we discerned to hire Jessica Sartoris to work  directly with me part time as administrative support. Her first official day was Tuesday, May 24. She is already a familiar face around the parishes because of her excellent work with Coram. The plan is that she will develop processes and procedures that will help streamline my time in the office, so that I have more time to be present to all of you. While I will still direct and give guidelines for projects, I will be able to delegate more. Most importantly, she is helping to design this position so that I can carry the job description with me to future assignments.  
 
All of this is to create more opportunities for me to be a fully present (and as rested as possible) priest for all of you. For example, thanks to her work already, the priests of the region have 5 Sunday evenings scheduled to simply chat, pray, and make s’mores with any parishioners that want to hang with us.
More information to come!  
 
I am already seeing the fruits of her help in creating more opportunities for me to be with and pray with all you. It could be a one-on-one or a scheduled event. Please kindly welcome her to the parish staff and keep her in prayer. She will need the prayers—she has to work with me! All for the salvation of souls. Thank you all for your patience as I am frequently making shifts, but it always for the salvation
of souls, always for all of you.