April 15, 2020

By Darcy Fargo
Editor

PLATTSBURGH – What started with an initial meeting at a popular local eatery turned into a marriage that has spanned 50 years.

Ken and Kathy Racette, who typically attend St. John the Baptist Church in Plattsburgh, were first introduced to one another by Kathy’s sister, who thought the two make a good match.

“The funny thing was that her sister, Barbara, got to know me because her husband was a student at Plattsburgh when I was going to school,” Ken said. “He invited me over to their house for dinner. I didn’t want to go over empty handed, but I also didn’t have any money, so I cut gladiolas from my sister’s garden so I could bring them a bouquet. Barbara was so impressed. My sister was not as impressed.”

Kathy’s sister facilitated an introduction in the parking lot of Gus’ Red Hots.

“My reaction was, ‘wow! He’s cute,’” Kathy said. “We went back to (Kathy’s sister’s) house and had dinner. It was history from there. We dated from a distance. I was living in Albany, and he was here. We’d travel back and forth on the weekends.”

When the couple was married, seven priests concelebrated.

“I worked at my old high school in the Albany Diocese for a year before we married,” Kathy said. “All the priests teaching there were invited and wanted to concelebrate. God has surely blessed us over the years.”

While faith was always part of their lives as a couple, there was a period of time when Ken was in graduate school that they didn’t attend Mass regularly.

“We were slackers,” Ken said. “We would go when we felt like it.”

Then, the Racettes moved to Vermont, where they found a community of faith.

“Our faith really grew in Vermont,” Kathy said. “We raised our children there. We were there for 30 years. Not long after we got there, we met a wonderful young couple, Jim and Grace. They had nine children. He was a deacon. They did a lot for our faith. They introduced us to things like Cursillo, Marriage Encounter, Life in the Spirit, and we tried to form community. We’d get our families together once a week to pray together. God was so good to us. Our faith grew.”

During that time, Kathy said she felt called by God to home school the couple’s children.

“In 1985, I started to homeschool them,” she said. “We were able to teach our children the faith and give them our values. There was no option for a Catholic school where we lived at that point, so we homeschooled five of our six children right through high school. Ken taught math and science, I did English, history and religion.”

“I think that’s the reason none of our kids went into math and science fields,” Ken added, laughing. “But all of our kids are still practicing their faith, as far as we know.”

In fact, Kathy noted that she and her daughters are currently doing a consecration to Mary together.

“It’s a beautiful thing,” Kathy said. “Because we’re doing it from different locations, we’re all sharing our reflections. As I read what my daughters are sharing and see what they’re getting from this consecration, it’s just beautiful. They’re really growing in their faith. We don’t always get to see the fruits of that. It’s really great to see what’s in their hearts.”

The Racettes continue to work together to try to grow in faith and grow their relationships with the Lord.

“We pray the Liturgy of the Hours together almost every morning,” said Ken, who is in formation to become a deacon. “She supports me with the diaconate and comes with me to the meetings at Wadhams. We’re both very involved in the church in different ways. Our faith is the center of our lives together, as well as our own personal lives.”

“If you can pray together, it’s really important,” added Kathy. “It doesn’t matter how you do it. It could be the Rosary, Liturgy of the Hours, going to Mass together. Pray together and pray for each other.”

The pair attributes their success in marriage to their faith.

“If it wasn’t for our faith, we wouldn’t still be married,” Ken said. “We’ve had disagreements and difficult times, but our faith kept us going. It still does.”

The Racettes noted that they hope our world reverses course and returns to seeing marriage as vital.

“I think it’s sad that marriage is being attacked on every front possible,” Ken said. “Divorce is rampant. People don’t see marriage as a lifelong commitment. They see it as a commitment of convenience, if they even see that. There are so many different weird options people are calling marriage. Our culture has moved away from God, and those things are considered mainstream. Our culture has changed so radically. We need to change back to God.”