Join in Celebrating ‘World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly’

Story by Shelley Wolf

When Father Diego Jimenez was a boy, his grandmother, Ana Atehortua de Jimenez, took her 11-year-old grandson to a daily Mass. “My grandmother brought me to Mass and the priest said, ‘Why isn’t he an altar server?’ So my grandmother promised to bring me every day.

“In the morning we went together to the 7 o’clock Mass,” Father Jimenez says, and that’s how he developed his love for the liturgy. Today he is the pastor of All Saints/Todos los Santos Parish in Waterbury.

Last year, Father Jimenez took time out of his busy schedule to travel home to Colombia. There he joined his extended family in celebrating his grandmother’s 100th birthday and thanked her for the gift of his Catholic faith.

The priest’s story of his debt of gratitude to a grandparent is a common one, yet not everyone thinks to honor their grandparents.

This July will mark the fourth year of “World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly,” a budding annual Church-wide celebration that falls this year on Sun., July 28.

Recognizing the importance of grandparents, Pope Francis in January 2021 established World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly to be celebrated on the fourth Sunday in July, near the liturgical feast day (July 26) for Sts. Joachim and Anne, the grandparents of Jesus.

Pope Francis is hoping to spark Church-wide recognition each year of the vital role that grandparents and the elderly play in the lives of young people.

“The voice of the elderly is precious because it sings the praises of God and preserves the roots of the peoples,” Pope Francis said. They “remind us that old age is a gift and that grandparents are the link between different generations to pass on to the young the experience of life.”

Deacon James McCormack, archdiocesan director of the Permanent Diaconate and deacon at the Cathedral of St. Joseph in Hartford, recalls both his maternal and paternal grandparents playing a large role in his upbringing and faith.

“Particularly on the maternal side, both grandparents were very devout,” Deacon McCormack says. “Grandpa often spoke about the importance of prayer, and family lore contained a personal Marian apparition he had as a young man.

“Faith was important to the family and the tone was set by the grandparents,” he adds, who were regular churchgoers. They also attended all of his sacraments of initiation.

The inspiration of his maternal grandfather ultimately resulted in two priests in the family as well as a deacon. Today, Deacon McCormack is a grandfather himself, with four grandchildren.

Father Joseph Cronin, pastor of St. Luke Parish in Southington, also has many grandparents to thank. Yet it was one who encouraged him to follow God’s call.

“From Grandma Robinson, I learned the most,” he says. “She had actually studied to be a nun with the School Sisters of Notre Dame. It was not her true calling, but she let me know to be open to the call of God, and follow the path, even if it seems like it leads nowhere. There is value to the journey, and you may find you are actually called to something you never expected.”

He recalls his Grandma Robinson taking care of her ailing mother-in-law and taking others into her home. She always shared her faith in a merciful God, who loves all people.

Father Cronin, who studied to be an architect, later discerned a vocation to the priesthood. 

“When I sit in a confession to this day,” Father Cronin says, “I often think of how she would answer this person seeking the healing grace of Christ.”