Vincent Agostini

In the best of times, it’s never easy to summarize who a person is in one or two paragraphs. In a time of grief, it becomes fairly impossible. How do you share a person’s life in just a few moments? Yet, that is what we attempt to do. And if anything would be the summation of who Vincent Agostini was when he left us, I believe it would be the words of Paul:

I do not consider, brethren, that I have captured and made it my own [yet]; but one thing I do [it is my one aspiration]: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the [supreme and heavenly] prize to which God in Christ Jesus is calling us upward.

- Philippians 3:13-14

Vincent was always pressing forward, pressing upward. His press led from his native Trinidad to the United States where there was still opportunity for those who would work for it. He pressed in his work and his desire for his family to be established. He pressed ahead in love and partnership with his wife Betty. Vincent became part of a community, one who could be called and depended on.

Vincent moved through the God-given seasons of his life, pressing to do better, become better, and live better. Though he will be mourned and missed, he leaves behind the legacy of a life well-lived. Especially in his latter days, Vincent sought to live a life more abundantly, not in service to himself, but in service to God and those around him. He brought light to others, and his memory will not dim.

The poet Robert Frost said, “In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: it goes on”. And so it does. Life goes on for those who mourn his loss: his 3 children, 7 grandchildren, 19 great-grandchildren, and 1 great-great-grandchild. The mantle to live fully, to love fully, to forgive quickly, and serve God completely now falls to us.

Rest well, Vincent. And may those who know you and love you seek to live each day we are given as God intends, with the hope of seeing you again.