GREETINGS FROM DEACON ANTHONY

I am so happy to be able to join in ministry at St. Margaret’s. Thank you for the warm welcome you have given me.

To share with you a little about me, I have lived in New York for 14 years. I grew up in Texas and graduated from Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas and South Texas College of Law in Houston, Texas. I am often asked what brought me to New York and I usually say, “I thought it would be a fun place to live!”

This actually is my honest answer. I had always loved New York. After practicing law for a number of years in Houston, I decided I wanted to live in New York. So, I found a job and moved to Bellerose. I did not know anyone here at the time.

I located an apartment in Bellerose, which is a village that straddles the Queens/Nassau border and I immediately found St. Thomas’ Church. St. Thomas’ became my home parish, which presented me for ordination to the Sacred Order of Deacons. I still live in Bellerose with my cat, Chloe.

I was ordained a deacon on Oct. 5, 2013, and continue to work as an attorney at the Department of Veteran’s Affairs Regional Office in Manhattan. Most deacons continue to work a full time job because it is part of their ministry. Deacons take the Church into the world and bring the needs of the world to the Church. Where a priest’s perspective is more about shepherding us through life and equipping us, the deacon is about sending us out into the world to be Christ’s hands and feet in ministry.

It is my prayer that, together, we will go forth to be Christ’s hands and feet in this place – that we may be so clothed in the Spirit that, reaching forth our hands in love, we may bring those who do not know Christ to the saving knowledge and love of Him.