The Reverend John C. Zingaro, 62, of Ellwood City, passed away

on Thursday, July 14, 2016, at the Family Hospice and Palliative Care facility in Mt. Lebanon.

Rev. Zingaro was born on April 4, 1954, in Ellwood City to Norma L. Rossi Zingaro and the late Patsy C. Zingaro. He was a member of Lincoln High School class of 1972 and was a mem-ber of the high school's varsity football and baseball teams. John also graduated from Point Park University in 1976 with a BA degree in Journalism and Communications, and the Pitts-burgh Theological Seminary, Masters Division in 1993. He also attended the Kingsmead Col-lege, and the Selly Oak Colleges in Birmingham, England, in 1987. From 1994 to 1998, John studied Psychology and History of Religion at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, WI. In 2014 he completed training to become certified as an interim pastor at the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. On January 30, 1994, John was ordained in the Pittsburgh Presbytery as a minister of the Presbyterian Church (USA). He had lived on three continents (North America, Europe and Africa) visiting 13 countries. He spoke Swahili, German, French, and could read Greek, Hebrew, Latin and Russian. He worked as a freelance writer throughout the 1980's. From 1987 until 1989, he was a missionary for the Presbyterian Church (USA) in Tanzania and East Africa where he served three congregations. He served as Pastor at the Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church in Cottage Grove, WI, from 1994-2007, the First Presbyteri-an Church in Newton, NJ, from 2007 to 2009, the Westminster Presbyterian Church in Peoria, IL, from 2009 to 2012, and Supply Preaching in the Pittsburgh Presbytery and Kiskiminetas Presbytery from 2014 to present.

John had also written six books: Thielemann, The Preacher's Preacher, Harry Potter Ser-mons, Spellman: One Man's Influence, Who are the Faithful?, The Struggle for Truth against Fundamentalism, Susan Nelson: The Life and Influence of a Feminist Theologian and the Progressive Pulpit. From 1969-1975, John was a sports writer, photographer, and staff writer for the Ellwood City Ledger, 1974 to 1976 he was the Sports Information Director at Point Park College, 1976-1978 he served as a Vista Volunteer in Pittsburgh, and from 1978 to 1979 he was the Executive Director of the Pittsburgh Neighborhood Alliance. John served on the Presbyterian Board, United Ministries in Higher Education from 1995 to 1998. He was elected by John Knox Presbytery as the Minister Commissioner to the 210th General Assem-bly in Charlotte, NC in 1998. In 2004 he was a member of the Investigating Committee of the

First Person / No longer dead: They told me I was dying; then I met Dr. Bartlett

Only once in my life have I had the experi-ence of being told that I was near to dying. That was nine months ago.

I was 58. I had been getting chemotherapy for nearly a year at a cancer clinic in the Midwest. The cancer was a recurrence of a colon tumor that was operated on six years ago. This time, however, the cancer sur-faced in the layer of fat between the skin and the stomach called the omentum. The cancer was stage 4 -- the worst.

After 12 chemo treatments, the oncologist gave me the hard news: It wasn't working. The cancer was still "only" in the abdomen. But growing. If nothing changed, the oncol-ogist told me, I would become deathly ill; death itself would follow, perhaps in a year. He recommended I return to my home area of Pittsburgh. "Go back to the people who will love you and support you and who will take care of you," he advised. "You are go-ing to become very ill. You won't be able to take care of yourself." While in Pittsburgh, he added, go to the Hillman Cancer Center. See if anything can be done.

As a minister, I had to go on disability. No church would hire me in my condition.

I packed everything and moved to Pitts-burgh, arriving a few days before Christ-mas. Getting in to see a specialist at the Hillman Cancer Center was surprisingly easy. I called "cold" -- with no referral from a doctor. Just phoned one day and asked to see a specialist.

John Knox Presbytery, and in 2005 he was elected to the Presbytery Council of the John Knox Presbytery.

John was also a baseball and softball um-pire, and a soccer, field hockey and futsal referee for the PIAA. He belonged to the McKeesport Umpires Association, Pitts-burgh Suburban North Umpires Associa-tion, Western Pa. Field Hockey Associa-tion, and the Pittsburgh Suburban North Soccer Officials Association. John is sur-vived by his mother, Norma L. Rossi Zin-garo of Ellwood City; his sisters, Bonnie (Dr. David) Seaburn of Spencerport, NY, and Dr. Marian Zingaro of Davis, CA; his brothers, Dr. Joseph (Judy) Zingaro of Dover, DE, and James (Elaine)Zingaro of Newark, DE; his nieces and nephews, Rachel Pignagrande, Emily Seaburn, Erika Opalecky, Patrick Zingaro, David Zingaro, Maya Zingaro, JakeZingaro, Ben Zingaro, and Sam Zingaro, and his great nieces and nephews, Gianna and Makayla Pignagrande, Ethan, Wyatt Opalecky, and Delia Hall.

Visitation was held on Saturday, July 16, from 2:00 p.m. to 4 p.m. and 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. in the SAMUEL TEOLIS FU-NERAL HOME INC. AND CREMATION SERVICES, 309 Spring Ave., Ellwood City.

A Memorial Service for The Reverend John Zingaro was held on Sunday, July 17, at 2:00 p.m. in the Christ Presbyterian Church with The Rev. David Seaburn, The Rev. Judy Zingaro, and Father Sam Espos-ito officiating. Entombment will be at the Holy Redeemer Cemetery, Resurrection Mausoleum.

Memorial contributions in Rev. John's name may be made to the Ellwood City Area Public Library.

June 8, 2013 By John Zingaro

Dr. Barry Lembersky met with me. Chemo isn't the only treatment, he said. "We have good options for you. We can take good care of you."

One option was surgery, a procedure called "de-bulking." The abdomen is opened. The tumors lie before the na-ked eye. They are literally grappled with and pulled out.

The surgeon, I learned, was a specialist in great demand: Dr. David Bartlett.

His reputation has spread such that pa-tients arrive from all over the country -- all over the world! I learned how busy he was when I met with him in January but couldn't get a date for surgery soon-er than March 1.

The best I dared hope for was ... could he get out all of the cancer?

But that didn't seem realistic. I was told only nine months previously that the situation was so dire, I had to consider the end.

More likely, I was thinking, maybe enough of the tumors would be re-moved that it would be like pushing back the tide. I could get some living in for a few years before the cancer re-turned.

The procedure would take 12 hours and involve an entire team of physicians serving under Dr. Bartlett as well as nurses and technicians. An anesthetic lasting more than 12 hours meant that I would not find out how the operation went until waking up the next after-noon.

•

The long day of the surgery, my mother

drove in from Ellwood City, and my older sister drove down from Rochester, N.Y. They kept vigil in the waiting room at Shadyside hospital. Thus, they were the first to hear the report.

Dr. Bartlett arrived beaming. "We re-set the clock!" he remarked. In other words, the surgical team had given me a new begin-ning. They had gotten out all of the cancer!

Dr. Bartlett found tumors not only in the abdomen but in the intestines. In the abdo-men, the tumors were plentiful, lodged deeply within the layer of fat, the omentum. To remove them, he had to take out the en-tire intra-abdominal wall. In later weeks when I would try on clothes my pants would simply drop to my ankles!

When a person wakens from radical sur-gery, you feel like a turtle on its back. You can barely move. When you do move, the pain is blinding. It was all I could do just to stay awake for any length of time. At one point, my mother and sister came to my room. They shared the happy news.

From then on, any pain, any struggle to get out of bed, any encumbrance (I had eight tubes attached to my nose, arms, neck, stomach to drain the incision, give me oxy-gen, feed me liquids) ... it was all worth it! All of the pain, all of the discomfort -- I supposed that was the price for a new life.

The nurses and nurses' aides escorted me through weeks of recovery. To show how much I admired all they did for me, I got the idea of asking them to autograph a baseball. I'm an umpire for the Pennsylva-nia Interscholastic Athletic Association.

•

I spent nearly the entire month of March in the hospital. There were so many nurses, nurses' aides and doctors attending to me,

one baseball filled up with autographs, then another, then another. "I never autographed any-thing before," one nurse remarked with a smile.

One evening, a visitor entered my room -- Dr. Bartlett! He apologized, said he wished he could have seen me sooner. I said, "That just shows how much in demand you are."

He asked how I was feeling. I said, "I heard what you said to my mother and sister -- but I have an emotional need to hear it directly from you. I'm told you got out all of the cancer."

He nodded. "You're in remission."

I reached out to the bedside table and picked up a baseball.

Westminster Presbyterian Church would like to extend our most sincere condolences and sympathy in this time of great loss of The Reverend John Zingaro.

2009 - 2012