CHARLOTTE — Deacon Crescenzo “Chris” Thomas Vigliotta has been assigned as a permanent deacon to St. Gabriel Parish in Charlotte, effective April 22.
Deacon Vigliotta and his wife Elizabeth relocated to Charlotte from Enfield, Conn., to be closer to family.
He was born March 4, 1943, in Bethpage, N.Y. He grew up in New York and attended Catholic schools in Long Island. Upon graduation he went to work in the family duck farm business and after a year he enlisted in the U.S. Marines, where he served as a Catholic lay leader. In 1966, just before his discharge, he and his wife Elizabeth were married. In February they celebrated their 53rd wedding anniversary.
After his military service, he returned to the family business in Long Island, where he and his wife became active in his hometown parish of St. John the Evangelist. From those formative years of parish life, he was ordained a permanent deacon Feb. 19, 1983, and assigned to his home parish, where he served for 25 years.
In the Diocese of Rockville Centre, N.Y., Deacon Chris was employed as a Catholic chaplain at the Suffolk County correctional facility. His ministry as a chaplain entailed one-on-one counseling, cell visits, group workshops and sacramental preparation. His work in prison ministry became so involved that the bishop assigned him full-time to it. His wife Elizabeth also served as moderator for the Jail Parenting Program.
During his assignment to prison ministry, Deacon Chris established “Beginning a New Life,” a program to help inmates return to mainstream life upon their release.
After 32 years of diaconal service in the Rockville Centre diocese, he served for three years in the Archdiocese of Hartford at St. Bernard Parish in Enfield prior to moving to the Charlotte diocese.
— Deacon John Martino
MAGGIE VALLEY — An inaugural Lent Spiritual Exercises for Men was held at Living Waters Catholic Reflection Center in Maggie Valley, led by Father Richard Sutter, parochial administrator of St. John the Evangelist Church in Waynesville.
The retreat included silent prayer, catechetical talks, meditations on Scripture, daily Mass, Eucharistic Adoration and Stations of Cross.
One retreat participant said, “I was meant to be here this weekend. I found many reasons and obstacles getting in my way trying to convince me to keep me away. Yet something or someone kept me coming! Today is Sunday is my 60th birthday.
This is the best gift I will ever receive – I will be back again so long as there are retreats like this here. Oh by the way, this was my first silent retreat, I don’t know why I waited so long.”
Another noted, “I tend to want to run away from the cross and this weekend, although the cross is an uncomfortable experience, I came to embrace and love the Cross of Christ that Jesus invites each of us to be a part of.”