By Lois Rogers | Correspondent

Ministry support, prayer and learning highlighted the annual diocesan Pastoral Care Retreat May 4 as 100 parish visitors to the sick, chaplains, clergy, religious, family caregivers, volunteers and health care professionals gathered in San Alfonso Retreat Center, West End, for a daylong retreat led by Vincentian Father Martin McGeough.

Titled “We’re All Unfree, and on the Road to Freedom, God is the Key,” the retreat called participants to set aside the doubts and concerns of daily life and contemplate a renewed and deeper relationship with God.

Using Scripture as an example, Father McGeough recalled the two disciples on the road to Emmaus who failed to recognize Jesus until he spoke, and Mary and Martha’s disillusionment with the Lord for not reaching their brother Lazarus before he died.

He urged the group to always be open to the Word of God though it may appear in a “veiled and hidden form.”

Hearing Jesus speak brings about a significant change in the disciples, Father McGeough said, explaining that “Jesus speaks to all of us, but we [often] just don’t know how he will speak to us. The Word Jesus speaks not only revives the others in their lives,” but the lives of those with whom the disciples later share the experience.

He also asked the participants to consider instances when Jesus changed the lives of those who recognized Jesus despite their pain and suffering. “This is something we can look at. What’s dead in us? What fears, pains and shadows are part of us?”

“What are the crags in our lives that keep us from people?” he continued. “Consider, when you had demons, who helped you? That is the Jesus that touched your life.”

Working with a booklet prepared by the diocesan Pastoral Care Department, retreatants explored a range of issues reflecting those questions including their disappointments, negativity and loss of faith – and how those issues may have impacted their lives and the lives of others.

Father McGeough encouraged the group to be creative in their approach to ministry and to “create a Plan B in case Plan A goes out the window.” He urged against “creating little reasons to keep from allowing God in our lives.”

“Faith is not just a philosophy … it is about a personal relationship with God,” he said, adding that for pastoral ministry, faith is sharing that relationship with “the stranger, the sick, those in prison, the hungry. We need to share with others; this is the key ingredient. Consider what you heard here. Go back to your parishes and ministries and focus on what the needs are and how to help.”

That suggestion to share insights gained was one Lydia Okunseinde of Asbury Park’s Mother of Mercy Parish planned to take to heart.

“I was quite impressed at how he could relate the Scripture to contemporary issues and walk us through what we have to do to have the light,” she said.

Among the contemporary issues discussed were substance abuse, divorce, prison ministry, technological overload and the fast pace of society.

Participants also shared their insights about pastoral care programs in their parishes, those on a diocesan level and ones they would like to see.

Cathy Chiusano-Green, a volunteer caregiver from St. Dominic Parish, Brick, said she was glad to hear from Deanna Sass, diocesan Pastoral Care director, that many of the programs participants were interested in were already on the Diocese’s schedule or in the planning stages.

She said she also appreciated Father McGeough’s insight on prison ministry, as she is looking to get involved with more pastoral care opportunities. Father McGeough served as the Diocese’s coordinator of Jail and Prison Ministry from 2012 to 2017.

“I felt that God was working in the vineyard for me,” she said. “Here we were able to make contact with people who had prison ministries going and programs on the drug situation. I was able to get their information. It was a great sharing experience.”

Anne Robustelli of the Light House Bereavement Ministry in St. Leo the Great Parish, Lincroft, agreed. Attending the retreat for the first time, she called it an eye-opening event, one that shed light on what the Pastoral Care Department has to offer.

“It made me aware of how many aspects there were to pastoral care,” she said.