By OSWALD T. BROWN
WASHINGTON, D.C., February 25, 2024. —I absolutely had to share two keepsake photos posted on Facebook today by my cousin Verona Elliott Missick with readers of my Washington, D.C. – based online publication, BAHAMAS CHRONICLE, which has a huge following among Bahamians in the diaspora across the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom as well as in The Bahamas and the wider Caribbean.
Verona, who lives in Freeport, Grand Bahama, attended Mass at Mary Star of the Sea Roman Catholic Church Sunday morning and later posted two photos with the following narrative:
“On the 13th June, 2023 along with his mother, Leonardette, aunts, Norma, Patricia, Mabel, and Cousin Kenris Carey, I was at the ordination of my cousin Devereaux King to the priesthood. This morning, I attended the 10:00 a.m. service at Mary Star of the Sea where he celebrated mass for the first time in Grand Bahama. In fact, this was his first visit to Grand Bahama. This was followed by lunch at Bell Channel Inn. It was good to be able to spend time with him.”
Father King is also my cousin and his ordination at St. Francis Xavier Cathedral in Nassau, Bahamas, on January 13, 2023 was an extremely proud occasion for me as a grandson of Benjamin and Mabel Elliott of Stanyard Creek, Andros. Because of a serious mobility problem, I could not go to Nassau for the ordination, but I watched the service, conducted by the Most Reverend Patrick Pinder, Archbishop of Nassau, on my laptop and actually lost my battle to fight back tears several times.
Father King’s mother is Leonardette Ross King, daughter of the late Sylvia Elliott Ross, who was the eldest of seven grandchildren who grew up at Andros with Papa and Mama. In addition to myself, the others were my late sister, Elthreada Brown McPhee; cousins Agnes, Beryl and John, children of Uncle Israel “Lee” Elliott; and my late cousin Alphonso “Boogaloo” Elliott, a son of my Uncle Audley Elliott.
However, although Sylvia Elliott Ross was my first cousin, I grew up calling her Aunt Sylvia because she and Papa and Mama’s youngest daughter, Maria Elliott Forbes, were around the same age and they grew up like sisters. Both were very instrumental in steering my life in the right direction during those formative years when young minds are so impressionable and vulnerable to inculcating life-long bad habits.
I am indeed extremely proud of my cousin Father King, whom I have always called Peetie, a nickname given to him from he was a baby, probably before he could walk and talk. Peetie grew up demonstrating a deep commitment to the Church from his childhood years, religiously attending Mass at our family’s parish church, Our Lady of the Holy Souls Catholic Church, through Deveaux Street in the Over-the-Hill area of Nassau.
It was therefore not surprising to me when Peetie decided to pursue studies to become a priest. He initially wanted to be a chef and after high school he subsequently graduated from the culinary school of the College of The Bahamas, which is now the University of The Bahamas, before entering Saint John Vianney College Seminary in Miami.
Having been an altar boy at St. Rita’s in Stanyard Creek and at Our Lady’s after my family relocated to Nassau in 1952, my spiritual foundation in the Roman Catholic Church remains concrete, although my fidelity to the religious principles instilled in me by my grandparents waned in my late teens and twenties. Currently, however, my Lord and Savior is in the driver’s seat of my life and I am really looking forward to being blessed by Father King on my next visit to Nassau.
