Christmas, 2008

Dear Friends and Relatives,

“This very day in David’s town your Savior was born – Christ the Lord.” is the message of the angel to the shepherds. The shepherds went and found Mary, Joseph and the baby. “The shepherds went back, singing praises to God for all they had heard and seen.” This time of the year we are celebrating the fact that Jesus continues to be born in so many ways in our lives that we sing praises to God for all that we hear and see. This special feast brings us together as a big family once again and in this spirit we offer news from our family to you and your family.

In January we were blessed with a very pleasant and joyful four week visit with Elisia’s family in Santarem. It was a pleasure to see Elisia’s mother who now is 97 years old and still very well except for normal limitations that come with that age and random ackes and pains that also appear at times. We spent many joyful moments with Elisia’s brothers and sisters and their families. Only Joel was not able to go with us as this year they did not give the vacation time to the people of the clinic where he works in January.

Elisia and Francis were invited to take part in a Marriage Encounter promoted by the parish the end of May. There were many couples taking part and it was a very wonderful experience. Since then they have participated in several activities and many meetings of the group of married couples of the parish. Once the group made a presentation on abortion and another time a presentation on the life of St. Paul. It has been very gratifying to be able to get together, plan and share with other couples of the parish.

The three boys are doing very well. Eddie (28) and Ronnie (21) continue in the Administration course in college. Eddie should finish his course next year and Ronnie still has some time to go before finishing the course. Both of them are trying to find jobs but that is extremely difficult here in Macae. Next year when they come back from Santarem they plan to start job hunting once again. Joel (25) continues his work as Psycholigist in a clinic here in the city and works two and a half days a week there. Another possibility of a job seem to have appeared but in the end it did not work out for him. He also continues his participation as a counselor for a group that works in the prevention of drugs.

Elisia is still president of one of the groups of the Legion of Mary. She is always kept busy with the meetings, home visits and projects of the group. She has been feeling pain in one of her knees, old age setting in, and has been treating that with physical therapy, heat and cold applications and medicine. According to the doctor if what she is doing now does not take care of the pain she will have to operate the knee, but she is doing everything possible to eliminate the pain without any operation.

Francis got some excelent news in March as we were afraid that he had to work another four or five years to be able complete 35 years of contrubution, and the situation in the company was just getting worse and worse as time went on. Elisia went to the government office that handles retirement to find out how many years he still had to work and discovered that Francis could retire if he wanted to since he had completed 66 years. So he presented all the documentation and paperwork that was required and within three weeks was retired by the government agency. That was the best news for all of us that we had for a long time. Francis then advised the company that he was retired by the government and that he would like to retire from his job as soon as they could find someone to replace him. This person starts to work on Decembe 15^th and with this Francis is hoping that he can finally retire completely on January 31^st. This was excellent news because the work load had become almost impossible due to the high number of vessels in Brazil and many changes that were made in the company which made the work even harder yet. So if everything goes well the end of January Francis will be completely retired and will be able to enjoy life with the family at home.

It always makes us happy when we receive an e-mail, card or letter from any one of you bringing us closer together. We hope that we hear from each one of you in some way. Our e-mail addresses are froetheli@uol.com.br (Francis) and elisia.roetheli@uol.com.br (Elisia), our phone number is 55 22 2772 1408 and our mailing address is: Francis and Elisia Roetheli; Rua Aime Borges Chaloub, 157; Miramar; 27943-540 Macae, RJ, Brasil.

With this we want to wish each and everyone of you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. All will be remembered in a very special way in our prayers and thoughts this Christmas and New Years season.

Francis, Elisia, Eddie, Joel & Ronnie