By Mary Stadnyk | Associate Editor
The newly installed pastor of Resurrection Parish is happy to have accomplished one top priority since he arrived to the Delran parish one year ago.
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Father John C. Garrett said he wanted to take time to get to know the parishioners and “for them to get to know me,” adding that he’s been telling his parishioners, “I need to become your priest – and not just the new priest.”
And in looking back over the past year, “I know that many of them have mentioned that they appreciated that approach,” he said.
Father Garrett served as administrator of Resurrection from July 1, 2015, to Dec. 8, 2015, when he was appointed pastor by Bishop David M. O’Connell, C.M. His installation as pastor took place June 18 during the 5 p.m. Vigil Mass in Holy Name Church, one of the parish’s two worship sites. Msgr. Thomas N. Gervasio, diocesan vicar general and moderator of the curia, presided over the installation.
A native of Hamilton, Father Garrett’s home parish is St. Raphael-Holy Angels, Hamilton. He attended the parish grammar school and is a graduate of McCorristin Catholic High School (now Trenton Catholic Academy). After receiving an undergraduate degree in government and politics and psychology from King’s College, Wilkes-Barre, Pa. (1986), he went on to pursue graduate and doctoral degrees in counseling psychology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, which he was awarded in 1989 and 1992, respectively. For about six years, Father Garrett worked in the psychology field in a number of capacities, including as a staff psychologist, an adjunct professor and as a consultant. His work experience within the Diocese included St. Lawrence Rehabilitation Center, Lawrenceville; his alma mater, McCorristin Catholic; and Catholic Charities.
In 1998, he began studies for the priesthood in St. Charles Borromeo Seminary, Wynnewood, Pa., where he was awarded master of divinity and bachelor of sacred theology degrees, which he received in 2002 and 2003. Following his transitional diaconate ordination, he was assigned to Corpus Christi Parish, Willingboro, then to full-time ministry in Sacred Heart Parish, Trenton. For several months, he also worked as interim coordinator of Consolation Ministries in the diocesan Office of Family Life/Respect Life.
Following his May 15, 2004, priestly ordination by Bishop John M. Smith in St. Mary of the Assumption Cathedral, Trenton, Father Garrett served several assignments as parochial vicar including St. James Parish, Red Bank, June, 2004-December, 2005; Our Lady of Sorrows-St. Anthony, December, 2005-August, 2008; St. Theresa, Little Egg Harbor, August, 2008 – December, 2009, and St. Mary, Barnegat, December, 2009 – June, 2013. From June, 2013 to June, 2014, he was chaplain and director of Catholic Campus Ministry at Rider University, Lawrenceville, and chaplain in Notre Dame High School, Lawrenceville. In July, 2014, his duties at Rider ended, but he continued on as chaplain of Notre Dame High School in addition to his being named chaplain of Trenton Catholic Academy, where he remained until last June when he became administrator of Resurrection Parish. On a diocesan level, he has served as director of the Catholic Campaign for Human Development since the fall of 2014.
Sharing more about his positive first-year experience in Resurrection Parish, which was created in 2008 from the merger of Holy Name, Delran, and St. Casimir, Riverside, Father Garrett said he has found the people to be welcoming and is “impressed with how unified the parish is.”
He noted how he recognizes the challenges that come with ministering in a merged community. Two of his previous assignments included Our Lady of Sorrows-St. Anthony Parish, which is also a merged community, and St. Mary Parish, Barnegat, which is not a merged community, but one with two worship sites – St. Mary Church, Barnegat, and St. Mary of the Pines, Manahawkin. The latter was built in order to pastorally accommodate the ever-increasing membership.
Of Resurrection Parish, Father Garrett said the parish is currently composed of around 1,800 families with 290 students in the religious education program. Its various ministries include a round-the-clock Perpetual Adoration Chapel located in the Holy Name worship site and a “very active ministry to the sick and homebound.”
Looking to the future, Father Garrett sees two areas that he hopes to address in Resurrection – developing a youth ministry program and fostering evangelization efforts to “people who are already active in the parish and in reaching out to Catholics who are inactive.”
Noting that he is familiar with evangelical Catholics and the training programs that they offer, Father Garrett said, “I would like to identify and form an evangelization team to get the training and start some faith-sharing groups in the parish.”
“Once we (establish) those groups, we will form teams who will make door-to-door visits and invite some of those inactive Catholics back to the parish,” he said.
Regarding youth ministry efforts, Father Garrett said that this summer, Resurrection is going to look to beginning an American Heritage Girls troop for young female parishioners. An information night on the American Heritage Girls is scheduled to be held this summer.
“My sister started the first Catholic AHG troop in New Jersey, and I know that their program is very conducive to teaching the faith while also doing leadership and character development and just having a good time,” he said, adding that while there is a Boy Scout troop available for the young males of the parish, he hopes to work with the Scouts in “strengthening their Catholic identity and for them to see that they are an integral part of youth ministry.”
Of his Mass of Installation, Father Garrett said he was “very happy” that his family was present and to have Msgr. Gervasio preside.
“I’ve learned a great deal from Msgr. Gervasio,” said Father Garrett, who served in Our Lady of Sorrows-St. Anthony Parish, where Msgr. Gervasio is pastor.
Other priest concelebrants at the installation Mass included Father Marcin Kania, parochial vicar in St. Mary Parish, Barnegat; Father James O’Neill, parochial vicar of Visitation Parish, Brick; and Father Joel Wilson, who currently lives in residence in Resurrection Parish rectory.