Location of miracle rosary unknown

Dear Editor,

Many thanks from our parish to Donald Serfass for his fine coverage of the rosaries that grew flowers. It is a conversation with many these days: Who remembers the many people coming to see them? How did we discover the story? Most especially, where are they now?

In her interview, Ann Marie Bitsko Williams clarified that the rosary had never left Lansford as early newspapers had reported. By her account, family members had had the rosary in a picture frame for years, then gave it to the church, as she discovered going to confession.

As a youngster, she had first seen them at her Aunt Mamie and Uncle John Bitsko's house. Then after going to confession later when she was "about 10 or 11 years old" she went home and told her mom "Do you know the rosaries with those flowers are in the back of church?" and her mom said, "Yeah, I thought that you knew that."

When she married in 1973, she and husband John circled the altar, as was the tradition. As they walked, she specifically looked for the rosary on the corner wall but it was missing.

As of now, St. John the Baptist Parish does not know the location of the rosary after the 1960s. Did one of the priests give them to a parishioner who has them in storage? I know a woman in the parish who has a holy picture which spent years in a garage until she'd asked her mom for it. Oddly, she was the only person to know it was there.

I ask your readers: "Does anyone in your relation from the area know of this story, no matter your church? Does any friend of the Kuskos who went to Mamie and John Bitsko's home remember seeing it there or who saw it going to confession, cleaning church or serving at Mass?" Please ask your friends and neighbors, especially those who may have had the privilege to see them. Meanwhile, we ask that St. Anthony guide us to find it.

Sincerely yours,

Rev. Vasyl Chepelskyy

St. John the Baptist Byzantine Catholic Church