I cannot tell you how glad I am that Father Bob is being transferred. He may be special to you, but last summer my daughter had a low blood sugar incident as we were entering church at 5:00 sunday evening. We had to treat it and with 7 of us we were focused on getting in and getting seated once she was ok since there was no later mass to go to and we had assured an arriving guest who had a flight coming in that afternoon that we would take them to mass because MASS IS IMPORTANT TO US!! I guess he thought we made too much noise coming in (and frankly he had started mass early and I thought we came and sat as quickly as we could have...but my first concern was catching my breath from the scare with my diabetic daughter). He chose to make his homily about PEOPLE WHO COME IN LATE AND INTERRUPT MASS and he specifically said that he wanted to thank everyone in the church who DID NOT come in late and interrupt him. We were sitting up front, mortified as everyone looked at us (even though another couple of people entered when we did, they were sitting in the far back and not up front where our group was...we had to sit up front because they were the only available seats and our daughter had to sit quickly. Then he went to everyone nearby BUT US for the sign of peace. A guest who was with us (who we had told previously that Mass at St. Maarten was one of our favorite masses anywhere) almost went up to him after mass because she was so upset with him. He also spent the rest of the homily saying he would not go to the homes of people who did not come to "his" church. He kept repeating throughout the homily how if there were questions it is "his" church, "he" makes the rules, "he: knows the answers, "he: decides who he should visit. We had waited for a late plane (to make sure our guest got to church) treated a low blood sugar, struggled to find parking, and were IN CHURCH on VACATION, and he made us feel unwelcomed and judged. My family had already made the decision to go to church in Grand Case instead of St. Martin of Tours as long as he was the priest. So I hope he was just having a bad day, but it is not 'his' church, it is GOD'S CHURCH....and it was for GOD to judge our arrival, not him to mortify us without knowing our situation. My daughter felt terrible as she felt it was her fault we walked in late....as if having Type 1 diabetes at age 14 and trying to control blood sugars on vacation is her fault. I guarantee it would have been a LOT MORE disruptive to church if she had passed out or had a hypoglycemic seizure.

If he would have said something to us privately after mass we could have explained the situation AND he could have made his point. We had previously enjoyed some of his theatrical ways, but we no longer felt welcome at what he called "his" church...when it is HIS (God's) church