News Post

Utilizing two gymnasiums to ensure social distancing, St. Joseph’s Academy hosted two masses on August 19 to celebrate this year’s charism theme, Relationships: Sacred Threads that Connect. Father Michael Alello and Father Matthew Dunn were the presiders, enabling SJA to gather half the student body in each building and to celebrate mass for the first time in more than a year.

This year’s charism theme calls us to be bridge builders in this time of tension and division. It calls us to unify through collaboration, enthusiastic participation, inclusivity and hospitality; to reconcile by being flexible, respecting differences, restoring to friendship through forgiveness, problem solving, extending and receiving mercy; and to mediate conflict with patience. This theme is uniquely suited to the challenges of this year as we continue to persevere in the face of the pandemic. Through our relationships with each other and our good and gracious God, we will endure.

Following mass, the students heard from SJA graduates Emily May Kline ’99 and Fallon Gerald ’16 about what the charism means to them, how it has impacted their lives and how it led them to become lay associates of the Congregation of St. Joseph. 

Readers for the two masses were Avery Bruce, Maddie Kate Gardiner, Shobe Manuel, Ava Kathryn Nesbit, Kamryn Reed, Caroline Ruth, Claire Waggenspack and Anna Webre. 

Lending their musical talents to the service were cantors Cate Arms, Alana Buckley, Ella Kate Aucoin and Chloé Khuri. Keyboardists were Aimee Urdiales and Izzy Gruner. The liturgy choirs were under the direction of Danielle Laird and Aimee Cronan. 

The mass in the Academy Student Center was livestreamed on SJA’s Facebook page. It was produced by Media Coordinator Matt Smith and faculty members Sara Rounds and Meghan McGinty. Production assistants were members of the SJABR TV student organization: Abigail Martin, Carly McConnell and Megan Otterstetter.

Mindy Brodhead Averitt
Communications Director

Photos by Jennifer M. Fontaine