Feast of St. Andrew, brother of Peter

Today, November 30, is the feast of St. Andrew the Apostle. There is a Catholic Church in Westbury, Nassau County, under his patronage.  Please see the updated website HERE.

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Below dates from 2011.

Clicking on any photo will enlarge it.

St. Andrew the Apostle Byzantine Catholic church is located at 275 Ellison Avenue, Westbury, NY 11590, on the northwest corner with Whitney Street. Its website is linked here.

This is an Eastern Rite Catholic parish, not under the jurisdiction of the Latin Rite bishop of Rockville Centre, but rather under the Eparchy of Passaic, New Jersey. It is Ruthenian in heritage. The Divine Liturgy is celebrated in English.

St. William the Abbot, Seaford

The parish of St. William the Abbot is located at 2000 Jackson Avenue, Seaford, NY 11783, one block south of Sunrise Highway (NY 27) and the Seaford railroad station. The parish telephone number is 516-785-1266, and its website is linked here.  The parish was established in 1928. Twice, the church has been enlarged.

Above, the church interior early Pentecost morning, 2012, before Mass.

In the former baptistry on the north side of the foyer, there are shrines of three saints, St. Joseph in the center, St. William the Abbot to the left, and St. Elizabeth Ann Seton to the right. St. William wears the wrong habit, however, for a Benedictine of the 11th century.  The habit on the statue is Franciscan.  
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On Monday, May 20, 2024, Bishop Andrezj Zglejszewski confirmed 143 youths. 

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On Monday, May 22 2023, Bishop Luis M. Romero Fernandez, M. Id., confirmed 145 youths.

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On Monday, May 23, 2022, Bishop John Oliver Barres confirmed about 134 youths in three ceremonies. The two photos below are from the late afternoon confirmation.

On November 21, 2019, Bishop Andrzej  Zglejszewski confirmed 201 youths, mostly eighth graders.  The cathedral website gives the pronunciation of his name On-jay Sklay-shef-ski.   He pronounces his name at the beginning of this interview.

Most photos may be enlarged by clicking on them.

In December 2013, the parish purchased a new outdoor manger scene and placed a memorial list in the church lobby.  Any photo may be enlarged by clicking on it.

Across Jackson Avenue is the parish elementary school at 2001 Jackson Avenue.  The school telephone number is 516-785-6784, and its website is linked here.  At first, Dominican Sisters from Amityville provided religious education.  Later, when the school was opened Ursuline Sisters from Blue Point staffed the school for several decades.  Of the parish elementary schools on Long Island, St. William's is the third or fourth highest in enrollment. In June, 2016, fifty-eight students graduated from eighth grade. In this era, that is a healthy number.

In the autumn of 2017 Barbara and Anthony Fuima created this outdoor prayer space with a statue of Saint Padre Pio.

Deacon John Lynch asks the help of children in blessing the water for baptisms one Sunday afternoon in 2018.
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Edit of September 24, 2021: I realize that this post omits names of importance, such as Catherine and William Morgan, the couple who got Father Theodore J. King from Bellmore to offer Mass in a store on the south side of Merrick Road in 1913. William Garnett Payne lived in the house on Washington Avenue adjacent to and south of the school playground. In the late 1920's the church owned only west of Jackson Avenue, and Mr. Payne at some point transferred the property east of Jackson Avenue to the parish. It may have been a gift or close to a gift. For more about this extraordinary man, please see this link to Find A Grave.

St. Agnes Cathedral, Rockville Centre

This view of St. Agnes Cathedral greets a person who arrives in Rockville Centre, Long Island, by train. To the left of the church is the rectory and the bishop's residence.

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The parish address is 29 Quealy Place, Rockville Centre, NY 11570, telephone 516-766-0205. The parish website is here.  Please check the parish website for photos of the renovation of the interior of the church.  

Any photo may be enlarged by clicking on it.

Would anyone comment on the saints depicted here on the new baldachin?  On the left, I can identify Thomas More and John Vianney.  On the right, the pope seems to be Pope Pius X. Sister Faustina Kowalska appears low on the right rear column.

At the left is St. Frances Xavier Cabrini, in the center Mother Seton.  Who's on the right? In dim light I could not read the pedestal.

The above photo was taken in 2012 or earlier.  

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The A.I.A. Architectural Guide to Nassau and Suffolk Counties (Dover Publ., Mineola, 1992) describes the cathedral as of Norman-Gothic style, of limestone-trimmed buff brick with a single cross-crowned tower.  In 1887, the first Mass was offered in Rockville Centre in a blacksmith's shop on Centre Avenue.  An anvil from that shop is said to be in the cathedral, but I have not found it.

Above is the bishop's residence. 

Within the same block, the elementary school is at 70 Clinton Avenue, Rockville Centre NY 11570, telephone 516-678-5550. Its website is linked here.  With about 845 students, it is the largest elementary school in the diocese.

This large hall between the church and school has similar porticoes, east and west. The cornerstone reads 2004.  One of its purposes is to provide space for catered events, for example, a reception after a Mass celebrating the jubilees of religious, which we attended here in 2012.

The diocesan office building is a few blocks away, at 50 North Park Avenue, between Sunrise Highway (NY 27) and the railroad station.  The above view of  its west side shows how it began with an older building (maybe a former bank), where the flag is, at the corner of Sunrise Highway and North Park Avenue.  The addition, with a tall cross facing the railroad, is sheathed in a green similar to that of The Long Island Catholic website.  This page might explain some of the diocesan offices.  I was about to use the word Chancery to describe the above building, but it appears that the Chancery is only part of the organizational structure.

Appointments, effective June 24, 2015

The diocesan website has published a four-page list of the appointment of new pastors, administrators, and associate pastors, effective June 24, 2015.  The link is HERE.
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In Nassau County, I note new pastors for St. Boniface (Sea Cliff), St. Barnabas (Bellmore), Our Lady of Mercy (Hicksville), St. Mary (Manhasset), and St. Aloysius (Great Neck). About eighteen associate pastors moved to a different parish.
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On a separate page is a list of fourteen associate pastors that have been reappointed.

Nassau Catholic HS Grads 2015

Newsday.com posted the names of high school graduates in Nassau and Suffolk Counties in June, 2015.  The numbers that follow represent my count of the names. I have interspersed some public high schools for the sake of comparison. There are seven Catholic high schools in Nassau county.
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St. Dominic HS, Oyster Bay -- 96 graduates.
Our Lady of Mercy Academy, Syosset -- 116 graduates.
St. Mary HS, Manhasset -- 128 graduates.
Oyster Bay HS -- 133 graduates.
Sacred Heart Academy, Hempstead -- 212 graduates.
Manhasset HS -- 242 graduates
Holy Trinity Diocesan HS, Hicksville -- 320 graduates
Chaminade HS, Mineola -- 420 graduates
Hicksville HS -- 452 graduates.
Kellenberg Memorial Academy, Uniondale -- 456 graduates.
Massapequa HS -- 635 graduates.

Sacred Heart, Island Park

There are two parishes in Nassau County named Sacred Heart.  This one, in Island Park, is the older one, being established in 1938.  Its address is 282 Long Beach Road, Island Park NY 11558, telephone 516-432-0655.  Its website is linked here.
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Regarding the Mass schedule: The same schedule was seen here in May, 2015.

The tent may signal preparation for the annual feast of San Gennaro.

Across Long Beach Road is the parish center.

The N15 bus provides frequent service on this street, connecting Roosevelt Field, Mineola, and Hempstead with Long Beach.  The above three photos were taken in 2011.
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In May, 2015, I visited the church after the Tuesday morning Mass. This was still the Easter season.  I wonder whether the celebration of the Resurrection is there all year long, as its reality endures.

St. Ladislaus, Hempstead

The mailing address of the parish of St. Ladislaus is 18 Richardson Place, Hempstead NY 11550, telephone 516-489-0368.  The church faces the busy intersection of Front Street, Peninsula Boulevard, and Richardson Place, about a quarter-mile east of Main Street.  The parish website is linked here.
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About forty years after the establishment of the parish of Our Lady of Loretto in Hempstead, a mission to Polish Catholics was begun, first in Uniondale (where St. Martha's now is) and later in Hempstead.  This led to the formation of the parish of St. Ladislaus, which welcomes Catholics of all backgrounds.

The above photo was taken on 1.16.2015.  Any photo may be enlarged by clicking on it.  The parish website and other sources show also a Mass in Latin at 9 a.m. on Sundays.

Looking west along Front Street on a Sunday morning, one sees the white steeple of the United Methodist Church (1822), and beyond it the cupola of St. George's Episcopal Church (chartered by George II in 1735).  The Presbyterian congregation a few blocks north dates from the 1720's. Previously, the church organization was apparently Congregational.  Robert Fordham, one of the 1643 founders of Hempstead, seems to have been a Quaker minister.  Although these older churches are "downtown," the Catholic churches are in easy walking distance: Our Lady of Loretto to the south (with a wise purchase of larger grounds), and the St. Ladislaus and St. Vladimir to the east, maybe in the direction of the parishioners' farms.  Any photo may be enlarged by clicking on it.

The Internet Polish Genealogical Source includes a lengthy history of the parish.  The architect of this 1926 church was Gustave Steinback.