Meet Our Grand Marshal

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Mid-Hudson St. Patrick Parade Committee

Meet Our Grand Marshal

Grand Marshal
Mid-Hudson St. Patrick's Parade for 2013
Reverend John Logan, O.Carm

Born - May 15, 1936 - Died - January 2, 2013

Father John (Jack) Logan was born in Brooklyn, New York on May 15, 1936 to Michael and Mary (Fahy) Logan. Both of my parents immigrated to the USA from County Galway. My siblings are Margaret Franklin, Anne Corcoran, Bridget Wilson and Ronald Logan. In later years, my family moved to the Bronx where I attended school and graduated from St. Philip Neri's parish school and Cardinal Hayes High School.

I received my habit in the Order of Carmelites, North American Province of Saint Elias in September 1956, when I entered the Carmelite Novitiate in Williamstown, Massachusetts. At the conclusion of my Novitiate year I professed Simple Vows of Obedience, Poverty and Chastity on September 15, 1957. I professed my Solemn Vows on September 15, 1960 and was ordained to the priesthood on May 27, 1964 in Middletown, New York. The Carmelite Friars here in Middletown, New York were founded by the Irish Carmelites from Dublin, Eire.

I graduated from St. Bonaventure, Olean, New York with a B.A. and Masters Degree in Philosophy and English and in 1964 earned my degree in theology from White Friars Hall in Washington, DC. I taught English and Theology in Pottsville, PA (1964-1965), Mount Carmel High School in Auburn, NY (1965- 1970), McQuaid High School, Rochester, NY (1970-1976), and St. Albert's Seminary, Middletown, NY (1977-1978), where I was also the Principal. I was a Chaplain at Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan from 1978-2007. I have been known to say to someone I met for the first time when questioned about my status, I would respond that "I spent some 29 years in Bellevue." Upon getting quizzical looks from them, I would then reply "as the Chaplain."
My love of humor stems from the Irish wit of my parents and the other gift they gave me was my love of Irish music, which as many know I love an Irish "sing along."

After my retirement in 2007, I moved to Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Priory in Middletown, NY. On September1, 2011, I moved to St. Albert's priory in Middletown, New York. I have served as
the Chaplain for the AOH Father Emanuel Hourihan Division 4 since 2008.

St. Patrick's Day has a very special meaning to me as well as all in the Archdiocese of New York. He is our Patron Saint. The Faith of the Irish in our country is beholden to those, like my parents, and thousands and thousands of Immigrants who brought that love of God to our great land. It is a day to highlight and celebrate all Irish culture and the joy being Irish.

The Mid-Hudson St. Patrick's Day Parade is very important to me because it continues the celebration in upstate New York. Joining the AOH has put me in touch with so many fine men and women. God bless them all for their friendship and prayers in my illness.

Fr. John Logan's Funeral

Homily

January 7, 2013

by Fr. Bob Greco, O.Carm

Our spiritual life is richly filled with symbols and substances. Some of them actually essential to our sacraments as the bread and wine in the Eucharist, water in baptism. Others deepen our knowledge and understanding of the teachings of our faith or enrich our prayers and meditations. Two were given to us at our baptism, salt and light.

Over the years since then I have meditated about and used in homilies and retreats the many possible meanings each of these symbols can give to us. In the pre-Vatican II ritual, salt is exorcized to drive out the spirit of the devil and blessed as a medicine for our healing.

Lot's wife was made a pillar of salt as punishment for disobeying God's directive to not look back. Salt can render soil sterile and infertile. It can destroy and corrode. It can enhance flavor and preserve. Salt and light can be both a positive and negative influence in our lives and actions. Maybe you can add more to these thoughts but I will leave it at that.

I would rather go to the great chapter five of St. Matthew's Gospel. After gathering his disciples and also attracting great crowds, Jesus taught them his great truths and lessons for life. It begins with the well-known and often quoted Beatitudes, known for all ages as the Sermon on the Mount. But that is by no means the whole, there is a lot more.

Right after Matthew records the Beatitudes, he tells us Jesus said to His disciples: "You are the salt of the earth; you are the light of the world". The disciples and all followers of Christ down through the centuries, all of us, were given our mission and our commission, our purpose and place in the world's life of faith, salt of the earth, light of the world.

This is a complicated and delicate mission and way of life, Jesus touched on some of the possible pitfalls. What if the salt loses its strength, what if the light is hidden and smothered? And there is a fine line between self-righteousness and holier than thou and humble holiness as we bring light and salt into our daily life with each other.

Fr. Jack embraced the mission he was given as a follower of Jesus Christ and to a greater degree than most of us was the salt of the earth and the light of the world. 'We have known people like this from afar like Mother Teresa or Pope John Paul II -but what a privilege to share everyday life with such a person -that was my life with Fr. Jack.

When I retired from the Navy in 1988, I returned for a community assignment and was assigned to Bellevue Hospital. Fr. Jack was head chaplain there. I didn't know Fr. Jack very well, he was seven years behind me in the seminary and we had never been stationed together. I knew him as a member of our province from meeting him at various provincial gatherings and meetings. How we would work together, live together and become very good friends. We shared our work and community life but also our time off, we were all over Manhattan and favorite outer trips to Brighton Beach, Sag Harbor and many others.

We vacationed together with memorable trips through the Smoky Mountains and through the by roads of Vermont. Jack wanted to visit the museum neighborhoods of Norman Rockwell his paintings and magazine covers of simple everyday life fit perfectly with Fr. Jack's way of life.

My 11 years at Bellevue with Fr. Jack, sharing work, walks, conversations and just everyday life together were a blessing, joy and fun. Fr. Jack was so easy to be with, always a smile, always positive, always caring, and always available. Always sharing salt and light to season and brighten my day or the day of any patient or person he met.

Funerals naturally turn our thoughts to life after death but I think today it would be far better for us to think of our way of life here day by day. Take our memories of Fr. Jack's way of life as our homily to take with us today. We believe in our immortal life after death and we hope for our place in the presence of God. It will happen if we try, with the help of God's grace to be salt and light. 'We have been shown how to do it"

Fr. Jack's last days were not easy. He could not swallow solid food but always came to share meal time with the community. It was uncomfortable for me to have our meal while Jack could not. But typical Jack wiped out our discomfort by making us think he had the better deal with a bowl of delicious soup and a chocolate milk shake. And always the smile and to the very end always the salt of the earth and the light of our world.

Eulogy for Father John Logan

by John Cummins

Pope Benedict XVI has declared this year to be one of Faith and Evangelization, convinced that God's presence and His love should be obvious all around us. It should be especially obvious, here and now, in this chapel because Father Jack Logan, Order of Carmelites, evangelized us all his life. I know he evangelized me. And now I will tell you how Jack the Evangelizer, whom I loved, did it.

Fr. Jack taught us that our God is the source of all joy. When Fr. Gus called me on Wednesday evening to tell me of Jack's death, he summed up our mutual feelings in five words. "What great times we had." Reminiscing about those times is best done over a pint, at another time. But, can we seek the source of the joy that Jack consistently brought to his family, to his Carmelite brothers, and to his friends? I think the answer is simple. Because of his faith Jack was comfortable with everybody- he was comfortable with men, he was comfortable with women and he was comfortable with the stranger. He liked us all because, well, he really liked us all- and it was easy to like him back. And this quietly morphed into us "loving him back" with the quality of affection shared by his brother and sisters. For Jack, friendship was never an investment, made with the hope of some handsome return in the future. It was consistently the real deal. We knew it and it was the source of all the "great times we had."

Fr. Jack taught us that the path to God is straightforward if approached with simplicity. Jack's family (and mine) grew up in the post-World War II Bronx, a simple world where a boy's treasure consisted of one pink Spaulding in the junk drawer, one stick ball bat, a pair of Keds with cardboard masking the holes in the bottom and, if you were flush, a basketball (which, by the way, both Jack and Ron bounced with impressive dexterity). The immigrant parents who loved us did such a good job that we fancied ourselves wealthy. It turns out that Jack never left that Bronx. All his life he carried with him a fierce loyalty and a dramatic
Simplicity of life. He made promises of simplicity to the Order and to the Church and he kept them. He had absolutely no desire to collect stuff or to assemble a posse, no desire to live other than Bronx-like, no desire to appear important and absolutely no inclination to pretend to be other than he was. A good friend, a

Good book, a beautifully composed and witty letter to a buddy- this was his wealth. Jack even made dying appear simple, although the care givers here at St. Albert's and, for sure, Jack's beautiful and devoted Bridgett can tell you how un simple it actually was. But during the past few years we watched Jack migrate from carefully shuffling across the sanctuary to the altar so as not to stumble, to leaning on a cane, to following a walker, to sitting in a wheel chair, and finally to reclining in a bed. During that time, not once did I hear Jack complain. Not once! The simplicity of Jack's faith, his decision to forgo treatment and take this final journey in peace and dignity is pure Bronx and it will walk with me for the rest of my life. God's simplicity revealed.

Finally, Fr. Jack Logan taught us of God's faithfulness. Jack was faithful to his family (including the 'football team plus three referees' of nieces and nephews whom he loved ferociously). He was faithful to his Carmelite brothers. He was faithful to his friends. And he was faithful to whatever mission the Carmelite Order sent him. Imagine twenty-nine years of walking the halls of Bellevue Hospital day and night with Fr. Frank Marani and Fr. (& Captain!) Bob Greco, bringing healing and comfort to the poor and afflicted of New York City. Their very presence at Bellevue was an evangelization effort of service and a faith commitment which few of us could have accomplished so generously.

There you have it. Our joyful, simple, faithful Jack- now safely in the arms of the Lord and secure in the embrace of Mary of Carmel. Peggy, Ronnie, Anne and Bridgett- you must know how much the Order thanks you and how much we all thank you for sharing your brother with us for almost sixty years. As for the hole in your hearts and the salt in your tears- pay no mind. They're simply the heat and smoke from the fire of the love you have always shared and will continue to share with your brother. We hope that it is some consolation that all here sits around that fire with you.

And why not take consolation from another five words. They're clearly non- biblical but they are pure Logan, and they do contain a profound meaning. "Jack. We'll catch you later."

Photos of 2013 Grand Marshal