From June 2012 PORT ISABEL — Our Lady Star of the Sea Catholic Church has a new pastor in Father James Erving, 40, from the order of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate. He fills the vacancy created with the retirement of Oblate Father Gerry Barrett, who is now living at the Oblate Madonna Residence Retirement Community at 57722 Blanco Rd., San Antonio, TX 78216. An imposing burly figure with his full beard, shaved head and full length black robe with a large silver crucifix, with a representation of Jesus’ body, tucked into his waistband, Father Erving said he can usually be found in blue jeans and cowboy boots around the church offices when not performing official functions, his Oblate attire when he is, or in traditional robes while leading Masses. The Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate are an international order of Roman Catholic Priests and Brothers founded in France by St. Eugene De Mazenod. The Oblates are dedicated to bringing the Good News to the poor in nearly 70 countries worldwide. Ordained at the age of 29, Father Erving is a native of New York, where he attended mostly East-coast Catholic elementary and secondary schools, including Calvert Hall College High School for men and Saint Anselm College in New Hampshire. He continued his education in Wisconsin and Texas, has studied in Rome, and has traveled to several continents. He most recently served as a priest in El Paso and participated in World Youth Day in Spain prior to this arrival in Port Isabel. Father Erving’s interests include a wide variety of sports, and he acknowledges he is a Green Bay Packer fan. He works to maintain his colder climate roots with weekly ice hockey exercise in McAllen. Among the greater challenges faced in today’s society and the church, Father Erving said, is the need to reach youth, many of whom struggle with human formation and the dignity of becoming honorable men and women. “Saint Eugene said that we first have to be humans, then Christians and then Saints,” he said of his belief in the progression involved in Catholic development. However, he noted, many of today’s youth throughout the country do not have the basic elements needed to steer them through that development. Fortunate to have been raised by two committed Catholic parents, Father Erving recalls that his father set standards that shaped his later development. “He wouldn’t permit me to join sports that overlapped”… because practice or contests would likely result in an incomplete commitment to one or the other. On one occasion, he said, he broke a finger that caused him to cut short a game. However, since the game was on a Sunday, and after the break had been tended to by a physician, time did allow them to attend Mass, another obligation that was taken seriously. Those basic elements are among what Father Erving hopes to help further instill in families in the Laguna Madre area. Forthright and direct, Father Erving said his younger days were not always the most honorable. “I was bad,” he said of many of his high school and college years. It was during his teens and early 20s that he thought he might become a priest, but instead continued behaving as a “goofball” and then decided instead on the traditional path of having a wife and a lot of kids. But that neither materialized. He was not compelled to join the priesthood until he was 25, at which time his life changed and he made the initial commitment that led to receiving the Sacrament of Holy Orders and his ministry. Largely influencing his life although he did not realize it at the time, he said, was study during his high school days at Saint Anselm’s. At the institution, students participate in the humanities Program, Portraits of Human Greatness, during their freshman and sophomore years and may elect further Humanities courses in their junior and senior years, according to the school’s website. Through readings, lectures, seminars, and a varied program of films, concerts, exhibitions and stage presentations, the Humanities Program seeks to confront the student with questions of value, moral choice, and the real significance of human life. For Father Erving, human greatness for most people can be found in service. He describes himself as a ditch-digger doing God’s will. And so he began his priestly career, working on his quest for human greatness through service to our Heavenly Father. Not anticipating an assignment to this region of the state, Father Erving said he is nonetheless comfortable with the blue collar, hard-working, good people of the Laguna Madre area. His goals here are for parishioners to come to know the dignity of who they are in Our Father’s eyes. An articulate public speaker who is adept at self-effacing humor, Father Erving has also engaged middle school youth in Wednesday’s Continuing Christian Education classes, creating a strong, new approach to imparting religion and morals for youth in the Port Isabel, Laguna Heights, Laguna Vista and South Padre Island area. Those basics are also included in a new addition to Our Lady Star of the Sea’s educational programs in a twice-monthly catechism course that imparts the basic teachings of the Catholic Church.
Posted on: Wed, 19 Mar 2014 22:13:48 +0000
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