WEST CLARKSVILLE, N.Y. — When John and Anita Dutcher, OFS, learned of the shooting at Connecticut’s Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012, they were making gingerbread cookies. Both members of the St. Irenaeus Secular Franciscan Fraternity were deeply affected — they had lost a close relative to a gun-related incident. As former representative Gabrielle Giffords called on the nation to “do …
Gene Pistacchio Leads Secular Franciscan Retreats
This past spring and fall, I was privileged to offer two weekend retreats for the Secular Franciscan Order. The first, held at Mt. Alvernia Retreat Center in Wappingers Falls, N.Y., for the Our Lady of the Angels Region, included OFS communities in Manhattan, Staten Island, Yonkers, and Mt. Vernon, N.Y., and in North Jersey. The second retreat, held at the …