Hispanic Heritage Month is celebrated from Sept. 15-Oct. 15. As an archdiocese, we are blessed by the multicultural heritages represented in our parishes and parish missions. In particular, the Church recognizes our Hispanic Catholic brothers and sisters who, by their heritage of faith, witness and loving service, enrich the Archdiocese of Mobile.

On a warm Sunday afternoon, I boarded the MV OMIROS with Deacon John Archer, maritime deacon of Stella Maris Mobile, to meet 19 seafarers experiencing a difficult and uncertain time far from home. Their ship arrived at Mobile Anchorage on July 10, expecting to load coal at the McDuffie Terminal before continuing to Mexico. After several delays, the vessel was scheduled to berth Aug. 1. However, on July 30, the U.S. Coast Guard boarded the ship and served a warrant of arrest connected to a legal dispute between the Greek shipowner and a creditor bank in Greece.

Earlier this year, I was invited at Little Flower Catholic School to participate in preparing Easter baskets for the elderly residents at the Little Sisters of the Poor Residence. I thought to myself, would the lower grades understand the word "elderly"? The teachers were using the phrase "old people."

When Mildred Blount became interested in the Catholic faith, there was no priest serving Tallassee and no Catholic church in the community. So she wrote to a priest whose voice she had heard on the radio: Fulton J. Sheen. Sheen, then a professor at The Catholic University of America in Washington, invited Blount to visit him. She traveled to Washington, received an intensive course of instruction from him and returned to Alabama, where she was baptized at St. Peter Catholic Church in Montgomery.