St. Mary of Mount Carmel

VNA Hospice and Home Health sponsored a “Sock in the Box” Campaign recently to collect socks which were then donated to different shelters, Veterans groups, Meals On Wheels, and Skilled Nursing facilities to name just a few. Over 4,000 pairs of socks were collected.

Students from St. Mary of Mount Carmel School, Dunmore, also joined in and did a great job in collecting over 2,000 pairs.

VNA extends a big thank you to all of the students, faculty, staff, Administration and family members for the generous sock donations The students had a competition to see which class would donate the most socks and congratulations go out to the 7th grade class for achieving the largest donation. VNA treated the winning class to a pizza party.

Father John A. Doris retiring from St. Mary of Mount Carmel

By Steve Svetovich

The beloved Reverend John A. Doris is retiring as pastor of St. Mary of Mount Carmel Parish, 322 Chestnut St., Dunmore, on Sunday, July 16.

Son of John and Theresa Doris, Father Doris was born in Wilkes-Barre and where he attended St. Aloysius Elementary School and graduated from St. Mary’s High School. He attended St. Charles College, Catonsville, MD, and graduated from the University of Scranton.

Father Doris pursued his theological studies for the priesthood at Mary Immaculate Seminary, Northampton, PA, where he attained both his Masters of Divinity and Masters of Theology.

“Dunmore has truly become my home for the past 28 years,” Father Doris said as his retirement approaches. “Retiring now leaves me so thankful to the people of my parish and in general to my Dunmore family.

“I have truly experienced love, joy and Jesus here. I truly feel honored knowing and loving the people of this community. I do hope to stay close to my friends and real family here.

“And in the words of poet e.e. cummings, “‘I carry your heart in my heart.'”

Father Doris served three years as assistant pastor at St. Rose of Lima Church, Carbondale, worked one year with the Vincentian Fathers in experimental ministries in Alabama and Philadelphia, and served as assistant pastor at St. John the Evangelist, Pittston, while teaching at Seton Catholic High School.

Father Doris was later transferred to Hazleton where he served as catechist and later as director of Religious Formation at Bishop Hafey High School until 1989.

In 1989, Father Doris was named Pastor at St. Anthony’s Parish, Freeland, and continued teaching for the Religious Education Institute for the Diocese of Scranton. In 1991, Father Doris became pastor both for St. Anthony’s and St. Ann’s in Freeland, and in 1993 was named pastor of St. Casimir’s and St. John’s, thus becoming pastor of a four-parish restructuring in Freeland.

In 1995, Father Doris was named pastor of St. Mary’s of Mount Carnel, Dunmore, as well as St. Casimir’s, Dunmore. He also served as president of the Board of Pastors at Bishop O’Hara High School, Dunmore. In 1998, the Dunmore Parish restructuring would assume a new sister parish, All Saints Parish, and in 1998 Father Doris would serve as Dean of the Dunmore Deanery.

In his retirement letter to Bishop Joseph C. Bambera, Father Doris wrote: “I asked our Lord where to begin. I thought of the words gratitude, love and thanksgiving for a call so precious that such a call would entail my whole life and the lives of so many precious people.

“I remember my parents, brother, grandparents, aunts and uncles holding me and revealing Jesus to me in rather beautiful ways. I remember the Religious Sisters often telling stories of Jesus, His Mother, Saints and Apostles.

“I remember the joy, the reverence, and care of our parish priests whom I served as altar server. These memories, especially serving at the altar and knowing the love of Jesus in such profound and private ways, led me to ask to enter the Seminary.

“The Seminary, a place to learn more and more of Jesus, His Church, the Revelation of God in His history revealing His love to us. It is a magnificent love. The Seminary, what a place of good times and bad, sickness and health.

“The journey to know, love and manifest this divine love as His priest would become revealed over the next 40 some years. The call to know, love and serve Him as an assistant pastor, as a teacher of youth, as a teacher of adults, and as a pastor.

“What a gift it is to see Jesus in the lives of our youth, their parents and grandparents and to experience Jesus in the very lives of all His people and then to share the gift of Christ with so many. I have found, after being a pastor for so many years, that I have not only shared Christ as a member of their families, but been given the privilege of seeing the very presence of God within and among those families.

“To this day I can still look for Jesus and perhaps understand His process of revelation continuing in our lives. The people I have worked with have shown me Jesus in their sacrifice, joy, and true care. My brother priests continue to manifest Christ to me in rather unique and humorous revelations. I know to look to Jesus, as I am about to retire, in the lives of my brother, my niece and her husband, and Serena, a 16-month old who constantly shows me Christ.”