Diocese offers prayers, support during first-ever Mass for Childhood Cancer Awareness Month

Before Christmas 2021, Dominic Cappello, 6, seemed like a typical healthy boy. Then, he began suffering random vomiting.

After about a month of being misdiagnosed, Dominic and his family received devastating news that changed their lives. He had a malignant brain tumor. After emergency surgery, he endured radiation and chemotherapy. He suffered pain, hair loss, vomiting, and an inability to walk, during his grueling treatment.

“It was very difficult because I was not with my siblings. I would cry that they weren’t with me. Getting injections and medical stuff was really hard and hurt me,” Dominic told The Beacon.

Today, Dominic, now 9, has returned to playing ice hockey. MRI scans show no evidence of cancer. Lynn Cappello, his mother, spoke on Sept. 7 at the first-ever Mass for Childhood Cancer Awareness Month in the Pater-son Diocese at the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Paterson. They prayed for children battling cancer and for their families.

“Those were dark and demanding times for our family. Our faith was tested. We questioned God. We were angry. We were sad. And we were desperate,” Lynn, wife to Al and mother to three other children, A.J., 10; Joey, 6; and Francesca, 4. “But it was during these darkest moments that somehow our faith grew. We relied on hope and prayer, especially the ones offered up by so many of us here tonight.”

Yet, “There is always the fear of Dominic’s cancer returning,” said Lynn, a St. John’s parishioner and Verona resident.

Msgr. Geno Sylva, St. John’s rector, was the main celebrant and homilist of the Sept. 7 Mass. It took place as part of the cathedral’s 5 p.m. liturgy for children with physical and developmental disabilities on the first Saturday of the month.

Dominic’s fight against cancer inspired Lynn to become an advocate for greater attention or funding. Childhood cancer, she said, receives only 4 percent of federal funding, even though about 1 in 285 children in the United States will be diagnosed with cancer before they turn 20.

“This is unacceptable. Our children deserve better. I dream of the day when our world is cancer-free and when no more children will have to suffer. I know that dream can become a reality,” Lynn said.

Lynn asked to pray for the children and their families, the doctors and nurses, the researchers working on better treatments, and increase in funding, and an end to childhood cancer.

“Prayer helped me because almost everyone was praying for me and that made me believe in myself,” Dominic said after the Mass. “When I was in the hospital, I would FaceTime my family, and we would pray together at night like we do at home.”

The Sept. 7 Mass debuted two petitions the diocesan Worship Office recently developed and distributed to parishes to include in their Prayer of the Faithful at Mass. One is for Childhood Cancer Aware-ness Month. The other is for National Recovery Month to remind people that recovery from substance abuse is possible. The petitions are:

• For all women, men, and children who are battling cancer, may they and their families be strengthened physically, emotionally, and spiritually and be granted the peace and hope of Christ, the Divine Physician. We pray to the Lord.

• For all women and men in recovery, may they be granted the serenity, courage, and wisdom of the Lord as they journey on the road to triumph. We pray to the Lord.

Lynn planned the Sept. 7 Mass with Msgr. Sylva, who is also diocesan vicar of special projects. Prior to that, she contacted the five bishops of New Jersey, and Bishop Kevin J. Sweeney of Paterson expressed interest in a special Mass.

In his homily, Msgr. Sylva imagined the struggles parents of children with cancer endure — “the dark nights, the emotional highs and lows, and the gripping fear…of losing him or her.”

“Victor Frankl wrote, after his years in the horrors of a concentration camp, ‘Those who have a why to live can bear with almost any how. Your why is your child and because of him or her you have borne courageously and faithfully more than you could have ever thought you could, even the how of every parent’s worst nightmare,’ ” Msgr. Sylva said.

Msgr. Sylva also assured Cappello and other families with children battling cancer “the cathedral will be here for you in any way you need, especially with prayers.”