LAKE WORTH BEACH | Bishop Gerald M. Barbarito marked the third installation of a pastor in the Diocese of Palm Beach for 2024 on July 28, handing the reins to Father Leonard Dim at St. Matthew Parish in Lake Worth Beach, following the November 2023 death of the founding pastor, Father Clem Hammerschmitt, who served there since 1992.
Father Dim’s family members, including his mother, brother and sister-in-law, along with many friends and parishioners, gathered at the noon Mass to witness the installation ceremony and celebrate the parish milestone with Bishop Barbarito.
The bishop spoke of “what a wonderful, loving, spiritual priest you have in Father Dim. He is a man of God, and he is a man of his family, which is this parish. Father Leonard is a kind man. He’s a kind man because he knows the love of God and he wants to share that love as best he can with each and every one of you and with all of us, as he does so well.”
Referring to the day’s Gospel reading about Jesus feeding the 5,000 with a few fish and loaves of bread (the beginning of John, Chapter 6), Bishop Barbarito pointed to the gift of the Eucharist.
“Just as we gather at home around the table to be with our families, to share with each other, to strengthen each other, not only through the food that we receive and eat but also through our accompaniment with them, so together on Sunday we gather around the table of the Lord to be fed with the very body and blood of Jesus Christ as our food for life,” he said.
“Through the Eucharist, we are in communion with the Lord God. Through the Eucharist, we come into the very presence of Jesus Christ, body, blood, soul and divinity. And as we are in communion with him, we are in communion with each other,” the bishop added.
After the parish/finance council chairman read Bishop Barbarito’s May letter appointing Father Dim as St. Matthew’s pastor, the bishop acknowledged members of the parish staff and advised Father Dim to be attentive to their expressed needs. After leading the congregation in the profession of faith, the new pastor agreed to submit himself to God’s word and the bishop’s authority, follow the church’s teaching on faith and morals, and adhere to the wisdom of the pope and the church’s magisterium.
At the liturgy’s conclusion, Father Dim, who is from Nigeria, talked about how the weather and palm trees in South Florida remind him of Africa. His biographical material on the parish website mentions his aversion to cold weather. Speaking at the installation Mass, Father Dim said when he asked Bishop Barbarito to accept him for the diocesan priestly formation program, he told the bishop, “There would be no hurricanes for seven years.”
Father Dim was incardinated into the diocese in 2007 and was ordained a priest in May 2012. He served his diaconate year under Father Hammerschmitt’s supervision at St. Matthew, then celebrated his first Mass as a priest at the parish.
He thanked several priest friends for attending the Mass and others for serving with him after Father Hammerschmitt’s death. Father Dim also expressed gratitude to the deacons, parish staff members, council members, musicians and singers, ushers, altar servers, Knights of Columbus and those preparing food for a parish celebration afterward.
“So, I thank the bishop for accepting me here and sending me to the seminary and ordaining me a deacon and a priest, and today, being the pastor of St. Matthew,” Father Dim said.
To end the liturgy, Bishop Barbarito gave a special blessing to grandparents as part of World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly, which was called for by Pope Francis.
For information about St. Matthew Parish, visit https://st-matthew-church.com/, call 561-966-8878 or connect on Facebook.
