Not long ago, he said, one of the young men in his parish died in a car accident. Two of the man's brothers, who until then rarely went to church, were at the funeral and were obviously very moved by it. They were grateful that I was there, and I have a feeling it meant something to them. The next Sunday they were all in church. It makes you wonder.
Tragedies are awful.
But so many times something good can come out of it. Tonight, at the Easter Vigil Mass at Assumption, six teens who missed their First Communion will be receiving the Eucharist. One young adult is being baptized and confirmed. At St. Teresa in Pawtucket, where one woman is being baptized and eight other adults are being confirmed, Father Paquette says he's begun to see a resurgence this year in the numbers of people availing themselves of the Sacrament of Reconciliation, which over the last several decades had been in decline.