Relationships among people are very interesting. When I look back on the friends I've had, I see that some of those friendships were temporary or very short lived while others last a lifetime. My friendship with Fr. Marian Zalecki, a Pauline Father from the Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa in Doylestown PA, was one of those everlasting friendships. Fr. Marian passed away in 2006 from colon cancer, but I am almost certain he is enjoying the Beatific Vision of Heaven now with Our Lord and Our Lady. I do not ordinarily say people go straight to Heaven when they die but Fr. Marian was an extraordinarily holy man and had a great love for Our Blessed Mother. Anyone with his love for Mary cannot miss out on going to Heaven. We had the privilege of living near the shrine for a while and so we got to hear Fr. Marian speak with sincerest fond devotion for Our Blessed Mother and the importance of praying the rosary. In his heavy Polish accent he used to say, “Pray the rosary, my dearest people… and bring all your deepest dreams, concerns and desires to Our Blessed Lady. We are her little children…. The rosary is a way to talk with our mother and we go to her as children go to their mothers with their needs when we pray the rosary. Praying the holy rosary is very powerful and if you pray the rosary often, Our Blessed Lady will not refuse you.”
Fr. Marian was one of those people you meet once in a lifetime. He had a lot of charisma whereby he was filled with the joy of the Holy Spirit. I mean, he was always happy, always joyful. He was always on the move – constantly on the go – and he never got down or tired of serving people. Oftentimes, I’d be at the shrine for Mass and when I’d see him I would think “Geez, doesn’t he ever get tired and just want to take a vacation to get a rest? Because he would give his heart and soul to the pilgrims who came to the shrine and never bat an eye about it. He was a priest of the Lord and he truly loved his vocation. This joy he had appealed to me very much so that every time I saw he was going to celebrate Mass, his presence excited something inside of me and lifted my spirits. It was never about him; rather it was all about others and bringing others to Our Lady.
Some might say we met by chance but I say it was by the grace of God that we met. Fr. Marian sought me out – I didn’t seek him out. I am the quiet type….the type that sits back and waits for people to notice them. Well… we were at the shrine praying after Mass and Fr. Marian just came up and asked me my name. We had a spiritual connection and became fast friends. I would describe Fr. Marian as having one foot in Heaven and one foot on earth. He was so focused on Heaven that oftentimes I had the sense he didn’t really relate to others on a tangible level. He sort of overlooked people’s physical handicaps so sometimes he would ask me to do things that were beyond my capabilities. And, I just would laugh because while he was annoying, he had so much love that you just had to forgive him for his lack of common sense. A Great man, Fr. Marian!
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