January 18, 2026

January 13, 2026

Dear Friends,

 

On the actual Feast of the Epiphany, January 6th, I had arrived around 5:45 AM to celebrate the 6:45 AM Mass at Transfiguration. While I was preparing for Mass I received a text from a dear friend who shared we have a new Bishop. I thought, is she serious? I knew she was awake, so I called her.

 

Yes, she was right! We have a new Bishop as everyone knows at this time. The Most Reverend John S. Bonnici is our bishop-designate.

 

For so long folks have been asking me when will we have a new bishop. Well, I can say our new bishop will be installed as the tenth Bishop of the Diocese of Rochester on March 19th, the Feast of Saint Joseph. 

 

Our new Bishop is succeeding Bishop Matano.  Bishop Matano came to Rochester in November 2013 after Bishop Matthew H. Clark retired. We certainly thank Bishop Matano for his presence these 16 years for dedicated service to our diocese. Our prayers will continue to support him. Bishop Matano has shared he will continue to live in our beloved diocese.

 

Our new Bishop is a native of New York City. His parents, were immigrants to the United States. His father, John, was from Malta. His mother, Gertrude, was from Romania. After World War II , his parents left and came to this part of the world. They met, got married, settling in Toronto, then they and his sister moved to New York City, where he was born.

 

It is an exciting time and we can only imagine what is going through the mind, heart, soul, and prayer of our new Bishop.

 

May we keep Bishop Bonnici in our prayer as we prepare to welcome him to our diocese and also keep in our prayer Bishop Matano, for his years of dedicated and prayerful leadership.

 

I have known five Bishops in my lifetime. They are Bishop Kearney (who confirmed me), Bishop Sheen (who I was an altar boy with), Bishop Hogan, Bishop Clark ( who ordained me), and Bishop Matano. I look forward to the days ahead of getting to know Bishop Bonnici!

 

Blessings to all,

Father Rob

 

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Father Rob's Weekly Message

June 14, 2026

June 9, 2026
Dear Friends, June is a month that has many of us involved in several types of celebrations. I shared that last weekend I was blessed to be with my friend, Father Clarence Rumble, to join in mass and celebration of his 40th anniversary to the Ordination of the Priesthood. We have been blessed friends for 49 years and I am so grateful! This past week, on Wednesday, we welcomed our new members to join our Parish Pastoral Council and bid with deep gratitude to those whose term has ended. Joining us in the coming three years are Keith Bock, Christine Spring, Tom Kilian, and Kevin Marren. Their alternates are Bill Hulbert and Dade Kelly. We will be excited to welcome Matteo Smith as our Youth Representative. How blessed we are by all these six individuals willing to be servants for our Parish Pastoral Council. I am also grateful to all those who were willing to be candidates for our council and were not selected this time. I pray they will continue to be present to our parishes serving with their compassion and love. I am also very grateful for the council members completing their terms: Tom Cincebox, Charlene Weeks, Bob Ciccone, Rebecca Hartman, and Michael Musa. Each of these individuals have brought blessings to us in their years of service. God be with them now and forever. The days are blessed with many graduations. I’ve had a preschooler at morning Mass share with me his excitement about graduation! For him, our kindergarteners, grammar school and middle school graduates, our high school graduates, our college and university graduates, and those preparing to take exams for their doctoral dreams, God Bless each and every one of you! I am grateful to know the blessings, from our precious preschoolers, to those who are preparing to make our society and world better with their visions and gifts! God is so good and how fortunate I am to see this goodness in our young people! June is here and gifting us with so much to celebrate and appreciate from our Lord! You are in my joy and celebration of faith! Thank you for being present to me and our sisters and brothers! Blessings to all, Rob

June 7, 2026

June 2, 2026
Dear Friends, This weekend our church celebrates the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ. Many of us will recall this day was often referred to as Corpus Christi Sunday for years. We are so fortunate to have the joy of our faith, and celebrating the sacred liturgy of the Mass, to receive in the Eucharist the Body and Blood of our Lord! My very dear friend, Father Clarence Rumble, will be celebrating on Sunday his fortieth anniversary of Ordination. Clarence and I met in 1977 while at the Becket Hall Seminary. We quickly became friends and so did our parents, Kate, Clarence, Betsy and Paul. They had a great bond and the four of them had a great sense of humor, joy, faith in the church, and of course in their sons. Our parents celebrated with one another many joys, some heavy heartaches, and as the years moved ahead, the funerals of one another. Clarence and I were blessed with so many years our parents had time with one another and us. I’ll be forever grateful. Clarence is a priest in the Diocese of Syracuse and is Pastor of Holy Family Church in Endwell and Maine (not the state, but Maine, New York). He is a fabulous man of faith and has led his parishes with great his faith, love, devotion and living the Gospel as a priest. This is a perfect weekend to celebrate Clarence’s priesthood because he faithfully brings the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus to so many people. I am blessed to call him my friend for almost 50 years. He is my brother. I will be with Clarence for this weekend. Please say a prayer for him, for our church, for the future of vocations, and that we might all realize what a gift we have in the Body and Blood of Jesus! Blessings to all, Father Rob

May 31, 2026

May 26, 2026
Dear Friends, I hope you were able to enjoy last weekend and remember all the gifts of life; given for democracy for our nation, and nations throughout the world. God bless all the veterans who sacrificed their lives so you and I might live freely this very day. It seems many believe the season of summer begins with the arrival of Memorial Day. Officially, I know the season begins in June. Nonetheless, we look forward to days of warmth, and planning for graduations, end of school years, being able to take time away from work, perhaps a wedding or two, new life being born into our world, and joyful surprises we are not even aware of at this moment. Your Parish Staff is not only looking to summer ( “I have a lot of PTO coming”, who might they be?), but we are planning the parish calendar for the remainder of this year and the coming year. It is such a reminder of how fast time passes. For several years now many of our Parish Staff have been coming together to keep our two parishes, Saint Catherine of Siena and the Church of the Transfiguration, vibrant and vital for the future. That is our vision and mission. My goal is to support the mission of our parishes, and the Parish Staff, to be prayerful in becoming what the Lord is calling us to be, “ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC, APOSTOLIC”. Our Parish Council is addressing this vision and mission. The Parish Staff, is committed to serve as the Gospel of Jesus calls us to serve in following Him. You will see things unfolding in our Parish Staff and visions of your Parish Pastoral Council. Our future looks and will be bright! I am so happy for the response of individuals willing to serve on Parish Pastoral Council these coming years. I want to thank Bob Ciccone, Tom Cincebox, Rebecca Hartman, Michael Musa, and Charlene Weeks for serving the council these past years. You have been a gift as we bring our two councils and parishes together! You are a remarkable piece of history! I also want to welcome our newly chosen members, Keith Bock and Christine Spring from St. Catherine, and Tom Kilian and Kevin Marren from Transfiguration. Your presence will be a breath of fresh life and blessing as we grow together as “ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC, APOSTOLIC” faith community! Thank you also to our alternates, Bill Hulbert from St. Catherine, and Dade Kelly from Transfiguration. So, I am blessed by many around me who love the church, and are visionary, and are seeing where the road ahead of us is leading. Please continue to keep all of us in prayer, as we do all of you. Blessings, Father Rob