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St. Conrad's Capuchin-Franciscan Province of Mid-America |
Meet Some Friars
From time to time we will spotlight various Capuchins of Mid-America in articles by or about them. The earlier ones will generally remain archived in reverse chronological order.
Bro. Augustine Rohde, O.F.M.Cap.
Fr. Thomas More Janeck, O.F.M.Cap.
Bro. Benignus Scarry, O.F.M.Cap.
If variety is the spice of life, then my fifty-five years as a Capuchin
priest have been well-seasoned.
They began with studies at Catholic University in Washington. D.C., which led to twenty-some years in seminary ministry at two different locations (in Herman, Pennsylvania, and Victoria, Kansas) as teacher, librarian, spiritual director, seminary director and fund-raiser.
During these years there were many opportunities to conduct high school and college retreats, do a national TV program on CBS and I was able to have two books published: "Master and Model" and "Brothers of the Sun."
A move into communications ministry came next at provincial headquarters in Pittsburgh and then on to Franciscan Communications in Los Angeles with its multi-media apostolate. At that time I also served as associate editor of "Good News," a monthly homily service for the clergy.
In the early 1980's I was asked to assume a sacramental ministry in St. Louis at the Alverne Chapel downtown. In 1991 this same ministry continued at St. John's church nearby.
This spiritual outreach has been a source of much consolation in helping people in their relationship with God. It is an exceptional privilege to be a channel of God's mercy in the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Besides sharing the Word of Life and the Bread of Life at the altar, the priest in the confessional can see close-up the grace of God working in people's lives. St. Paul has described this so well: "God has entrusted the message of reconciliation to us" (2 Cor. 6:19) This means being plunged into the mystery of God's incomparable love, a messenger of his mercy,
So many of our Capuchin saints and blesseds, notable St. Leopold and St. Padre Pio, spent countless hours in the confessional. It has been part of the Order's sacred tradition to be sought out as confessors and spiritual guides. It is always a challenge and opportunity to help another find the way home in God's merciful embrace and unquestionably a humbling experience as well to walk with another in this quest.
I can't thank God enough for this privilege through the years. I am reminded of a quotation I saw years ago: "Enlightened by the past. Embraced by the present. Empowered by the future." So be it Lord. Amen.
Amen.(Reprinted from January 2002 issue of "The Call: a newsletter for people interested in the Capuchin Franciscans")
Every individual chooses his vocation in life over and over again. It is
not a decision made only once for all time when one is young. As one
grows in experience and understanding of the commitment, one has to say
"yes" again and again to a way of life that was not exactly expected at
the beginning.
After many years of teaching in a high school, serving in a parish, and working with Spanish-speaking people, I find myself in a ministry unlike any previous one, the Catholic Center at the Citadel, a storefront ministry in a mall. A ministry that both our provincial and the local bishop have called innovative and creative -- a bringing of the church to the marketplace.
Many people are excited by this adventure, and many are extremely supportive; sixty are volunteers who help in the Center. It certainly is a different ministry. We have been called "mall monks" and "Jedi." We have been told our costume (our brown habits) need brighter colors. Others have looked away to the billboard across the hall from us because we are Catholics. One teenage woman, after hearing what we do, might have summed up the whole feeling when she said, "Cool."
It is an enlivening ministry. At mass, in confession or private talks, answering people's inquiries, helping people find parishes and other resources, I am able to call on all the past ministerial experiences I have had. It is as if nothing has been wasted or lost. More important, for me it recalls the traditional ministries of the Capuchin Order and of our province.
The work of reconciliation, especially through the sacraments, the broadening of the concept of fraternity to be brothers to whomsoever may drop in, Catholics or non-Catholics, all are part of that tradition. The association with Alverne downtown ministry we offered in St. Louis, in a way, makes the Center a spiritual child of the Alverne.
But what strikes me most about all this is the response of those who come to the Center. No matter what has happened in their lives or how dark life seems, God's care and love can be seen in the pattern of their experiences.
So far, there has been a contemplative dimension to the ministry. There are times when nothing seems to be happening. But waiting in patience and doing whatever is at hand often readies us for the times when the Lord comes with the surprise of his presence and healing.
The ministry at the Center is not three months old; but it is exciting, enlivening, and fulfilling.
(Reprinted from the March 2002 issue of "The Call: a newsletter for people interested in the Capuchin Franciscans")
Bro. Augustine Rohde, O.F.M.Cap.
"Why in the world would want to be a nurse!?" I hear this all the time
when I mention what I do for ministry in the province. Why indeed!
It did not come to me overnight or in a vision as some may think. Nor did it come from a whim or passing fancy that grabs one today but is gone tomorrow. No, it comes from who I am as a person and how the gifts God has endowed me with can be used for the greater glory of His name.
I have an abundance of gifts with which God saw fit to bless me. Any one of them I could have focused on to use in ministry, yet through much prayer and reflection I was shown that I was meant to be a nurse in and for the Province of Mid-America and beyond.
Health care runs in my family, as I like to say. From my maternal grandfather, a country doctor for 50 odd years, to my mom, who was a medical records librarian, to her sisters, one of whom is a nurse and another a medical laboratory inspector. I always told my sisters that one of them should carry on the tradition. Never would I have thought I would be the one to do it.
During my second year of post-novitiate when ministry formation was to begin, several occupational tests were administered to me since I was unsure of what I was called to do as Capuchin friar. The results showed strong leanings toward chemistry, math, art .... and nursing! This was a shock to me, yet I did not know how nursing could be formed into a particularly Capuchin ministry.
Spending a lot of time reflecting on the beginning of the Capuchin Reform in the 1500's, I began to think a little differently. The first friars of the Capuchin Reform became well known in Italy, especially in the area around Camerino for their unselfish care of those dying during the Black Plague which was sweeping across Europe at the time.
When Bro. Blaine Burkey heard I felt called to study nursing, he gave me a copy of the story of our Capuchin brother, Blessed Jeremiah of Wallachia. Jeremiah was a simple man who spent most of his life caring for the sick and afflicted friars in Naples and Pozzuoli. What a great model to have for one who cares for others! Jeremiah was always cheerful in his dealing with the ill and others.
As I studied for a nursing degree, I was reminded that the spiritual side of a person is so important in their overall well being. Jeremiah surely helped those whom he cared for by steering them to greater spiritual health through his own deep relationship with God and the Blessed Mother. I prayed I could be half the man Jeremiah was.
Taking the health of the friars to heart means that I feel called to care for all of them in some way. I hope to carry this help to them where they are, not just to have them come to the infirmary when they are ding. This help means meeting with the friars and discussing their health care needs, medications, treatments and also finding the help they need in their own areas. But this is to be done with joy of heart, so that helping others, the poor and the sick, I am helping Jesus, and/or being Jesus to them.
Prior to formal nursing studies, my main focus of Capuchin formation had been toward those who were dying and had no one to care for them. Those with AIDS and other terminal illnesses draw me toward them, since they are the poorest of the poor and those in most need of being shown God's tenderness and love. I hope to work with Hospice someday since I feel this is the greatest way of caring. It will hopefully reveal to me a greater way of dying to myself so as to gain greater closeness to God.
(Reprinted from the September 2002 issue of "the Call: a newsletter for people interested in the Capuchin Franciscans.")
Fr. Thomas More Janeck, O.F.M.Cap.
(by Blane Burkey, O.F.M.Cap.)
Early retirement is
how many men and women deal with their 62nd birthday, and many more begin looking forward
to retirement at 65.
For Thomas More Janeck, however, 62 was not the end of his career, but the beginning of a new era. He returned that year (1982) from a sabbatical at the Franciscan Theological Institute at Santa Barbara CA and began a new ministry to migrant workers in northeastern Colorado.
His resume was already remarkable enough for anyone's laurels. After earning a Master's degree in physics, he taught physics and served as a disciplinarian for 11 years at St. Joseph's Military Academy in Hays KS. Then he served another two years as president of St. Fidelis College in Herman PA.
Meanwhile he served for five years as a councilor of the Capuchin Province of St. Augustine and seven more as its provincial minister -- this during the hectic days following Vatican Council II.
He was one of the founders and the first president of the North American Capuchin Conference, an office he held from 1964 till 1971. He attended historic general chapters of the Order in Rome in 1969 and 1970, and the First Plenary Council of the Order at Quito, Ecuador, in 1971.
After that he was assistant novice master for a year, and then, at 52, he entered into a completely new culture and apostolate. He studied Spanish and did parish ministry for nine years in Hispanic churches in Ponce PR and Denver.
During this time, T More -- as we friars call him -- was very much involved in the establishment of the Capuchin Province of Mid-America. From 1975 till 1980, both before and after the 1977 establishment of the Province, he served as a councilor to Fr. Vincent Rohr, who was first director of the western planning office and then provincial minister of the new jurisdiction.
Fr. T More's Hispanic parish work led to his beginning a new ministry for the Archdiocese of Denver among the thousands of migrant workers, mostly Catholic, who come each year to harvest the crops. And service of these transient field-working families has consumed his attention now for 18 years.
This has involved constant traveling to the many migrant camps throughout northeast Colorado. There, when the workers were not in the fields, he has provided Mass and the sacraments and counseling. He also collected and distributed food, clothing, and even mattresses to the families, found treats for the many children, and attended countless meetings aimed at providing better living conditions for his people. He has also traveled to their winter homes in Texas and Mexico to maintain continuity with them. He also organized groups of lay volunteers who perform similar ministry throughout the area.
Boards T More has served on include the Colorado Migrant and Rural Coalition, the Governor's Advisory Group on Implementation of the 1987 Amnesty Laws, the Colorado Rural Housing Development Corporation, Service, Empowerment & Transformation of Colorado, Inc., and the Colorado Immigration and Refugee Services. He served as president of the Coalition, an umbrella group of 40 public and private agencies dealing with migrant issues, from 1986 till 1993.
From 1985 till 1990, Father directed the migrant apostolate as a member of the archdiocese staff, for awhile even carrying the title of Episcopal Vicar for Hispanics; but as the apostolate became more complex, others took over the direction of the diocesan office, and Fr. Tom spent more of his time in the fields with his people.
Since the 1988 arrival in Denver of the Mexican Capuchin Poor Clares, T More has also served as their chaplain. Besides liturgical leadership and spiritual direction, this has included providing much culturalization advice and regular English lessons.
Father's service of the migrant workers earned him the Capuchin Province of Mid-America's 1994 Conrad Key of Recognition. More recently, in September of 2000, Pope John Paul II honored him with the Cross Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice. It was announced that Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput would present the scroll and medal to Fr. Tom at the cathedral on Oct. 15, 2000.
The first Capuchin Constitutions in 1536 gave very clear
and concrete direction to the friars concerning the establishment of their houses.
The friaries were to be simple and austere, and they were to be built on the edges of towns and villages. This location put the friars close enough to minister to the people in the city and parish, but distant enough to have the necessary space and quiet for fraternal life and contemplative prayer. Thus, the Capuchins could enter fully into the service of God's people, yet guard and nurture their own particular gift of religious life in the church.
The location of the friars on the edge of civil and parochial life provides a good metaphor for reflecting on the place and perspective of my Capuchin priesthood in the church. ....
The place from which I go about my mission in the church is the Capuchin brotherhood, the community I call my "fraternity." We friars live, pray, eat and play together; we minister "two by two" where possible; we share sorrows and joys as companions on the journey of life. In the midst of cultural individualism, fraternity gives witness to cooperation over competition, to the common good over the private. When it works well, our brotherhood of young and old, healthy and sick, conservative and liberal _ imperfect brothers all striving to build unity _ demonstrates that reconciliation and peace are possible in the church and world.
In the practical exercise of my ministry, there are conflicts between ministry and fraternity: between a parish meeting and a simultaneous Capuchin gathering, between my presiding role at parish liturgy and my prayer leadership in the fraternity, between being the spiritual head of the local church and making the Capuchin community my primary family. But consecrated life is my "first mission" in the church (Vita Consecrata, #72) and our brotherhood is the "primary apostolate" for Capuchins (Capuchin Constitutions, #145), and so I choose the fraternal edge of the conflict.
Giving priority to brotherhood not only safeguards my life of fraternity, but also strengthens my ability to "brother" those I serve in ministry. Schooled in mutuality, I can resist superiority and privilege, and choose to lead and teach and heal with equality, humility and simplicity. Nourished by fraternal communion, I can better brother those who are difficult to love and give witness and power to my ultimate gifts: love, unity and peace.
Legend has it that St. Bonaventure, the great church theologian and Franciscan general minister of the Order, was washing dishes in the friary when he got the news of his receiving the cardinal's hat. Capuchins — and other religious priests or bishops — who wash dishes with their brothers at home and then sweep the floor with their fellow parishioners after a parish carnival preach more than a thousand words about the holiness of the margins of the church.
In my Capuchin life, then, I am a brother and a priest. I became a Capuchin brother through profession of vows in 1968, and didn't cease being a brother when I was ordained to the priesthood in 1973. Rather, I brought to the ministerial priesthood the charism of my Capuchin brotherhood, especially my minority and fraternity, to "father" as a "brother." When you address me, I'll answer to both "Father Bill" and "Brother Bill." But in truth, I think "brother" keeps me closer to the edge of the church where I live.
(Excerpted from a longer article entitled "Capuchin Priesthood: a view from the Edge," which appears in the December 1997 issue of THE SERRAN.
(In his first 25 years as a priest, Bro. Bill served the Order and the Church as a seminary teacher, novice master, provincial councilor, local superior, homeless shelter director, inner-city pastor, and vocation director. Then in September of 1998, he became a foreign missionary at Yecora in a remote mountainous region of northern Mexico, where he is assisting friars from the Capuchins Province of Western America both in evengelizing the local people and in helping form some as new Capuchin brothers.)
Bro.
Benignus Scarry, O.F.M.Cap.
(by Tim Carpenter)
Gerald and Mary Richter found ownership to be a
life-changing event.
Janene Reese and her three children experienced the same transformation.
Likewise, the sense of pride welled up in Gloria and Craig Jacob.
They are among the 22 families in Lawrence [Kansas] that have sweated their way to homeownership under the guidance of Habitat for Humanity's local chapter.
And for the past eight years, Brother Benignus Scarry -- Brother B to all who know him -- has helped families accomplish what they probably wouldn't have been able to do alone.
"I've seen how it changes people's lives, from living in an apartment to having your own home," he said. "Now they can tell the kids, 'We won't move again in a year or two from apartment to apartment.' Kids have a place to call home.
"They get a sense of pride. Everybody needs pride."
Habitat for Humanity is a Christian organization that welcomes people of all faiths committed to the goal of expanding decent, affordable housing. The blueprint calls for families and communities to come together with volunteers to build new or rehabilitate old housing.
Owners contribute at least 375 hours of "sweat equity" to Habitat projects. The city of Lawrence has supported Habitat by assisting with acquisition of construction sites.
The 21 Habitat homes in Lawrence -- one is occupied by a second generation family -- have sold at no profit. So far, homeowners have paid $30,000 to $38,000 for the properties.
Brother Benignus said Habitat's biggest need, aside from volunteers, remains cash donations. The organization could use more money to meet or expand upon the goal of opening five Habitat houses each year.
During an interview on the back porch of Habitat's most recent house at Second and Michigan, Brother B explained how he found his way to Lawrence and Habitat for Humanity.
Brother Benignus, 53, is a member of the Capuchins, a Franciscan religious community based in Denver.
Before making a pilgrimage to Lawrence, the chain-smoker served in more jobs than he has fingers.
"I've done all kinds of things. I was a tailor. I've cooked and I've barbered. I've been a bookkeeper, accountant," he said. "But I'm master of nothing."
Brother Benignus, his gray hair cropped close and dressed casually in blue overalls, said he committed to the Capuchins at 21.
"It was something I'd felt ever since I was a kid," he said. "The things that intrigued me the most were that they had a home for boys and an orphanage and were in foreign countries working with kids."
At a theology school in Washington, D.C., he labored as a tailor, in the laundry and as a carpenter's helper. He stayed at the school nine years, eventually becoming the institution's treasurer.
Brother Benignus came to Kansas in 1977. He liked the pace of life. He also knew Capuchins didn't have an especially strong presence in the Midwest. None of his four sisters or seven brothers had strayed that far from their home state of Pennsylvania.
"My parents thought I had disowned them," Brother Benignus said. "They never really accepted that I came to the West."
His first assignment in Kansas was a Catholic church in Hays. His duties included visiting people in jail. While testifying in court on behalf of a 21-year-old petty criminal, he inadvertently sent the guy to jail.
"I told the judge he (the criminal) needed to get out of town because he had too many connections with the wrong people. The judge sent him to jail for six months," Brother Benignus said.
"I always felt so bad, but the end result turned out good. He came back and it was a whole different ball game. He changed his life."
Brother Benignus then moved one mile west to Thomas More Prep. He stayed nine years at the high school, serving as director of maintenance before heading Thomas More's boarding program.
What did he get from the experience? "A lot of gray hair."
"They lived there 200 days a year. They were like family. You hated to see them go. When they came back, you were upset because they were destroying your peace and quiet.
"Sometimes I'll be at home fixing supper and the phone will ring and it will be one of those kids."
His next stop was St. Louis. It was in that city that he sought to bring his future into focus. "I needed to find out what I was going to do with the rest of my life," he said. "As it turned out, I took some testing. They said, 'You should never have been working with kids. The tests show you appreciate working with your hands.'"
While pondering that analysis, Brother Benignus remodeled a St. Louis friary. He also dabbled in Habitat for Humanity projects.
He was eventually notified by Capuchin leadership that he would go to Colorado for six months to assist Habitat or a similar organization.
"A day before they were going to send me to Denver, they said I would be going to Lawrence," he said.
Starting as a volunteer with the local Habitat chapter, Brother B's role expanded rapidly until he was named construction manager.
"It's really general contractor because you've got to make sure everything gets done," said Brother Benignus, who lives with five other brothers in Old West Lawrence.
Brother Benignus has participated in construction of 24 Habitat houses.
Last year, he went to Hungary to help prepare sites for Habitat construction. Three weeks later, for the 20th anniversary of Habitat, he helped build 20 homes during one week in Georgia, where the organization was founded.
He'll help Jimmy Carter and others next year build 100 homes in one week in Houston. In Lawrence, Brother Benignus is planning to orchestrate construction of a Habitat house in seven days during the spring.
"You've got to be just a little bit crazy, but it's a helluva lot of fun," he said.
Demand in the United States for modestly priced housing may never be satisfied.
"I don't know of any Habitat that's closed its doors," he said.
After eight years building in Kansas, Brother Benignus still likes to get his hands dirty.
"It's so much fun," he said. "The saying is, 'The Excitement is Building.' That's true. You start building a house, there is natural excitement." (Lawrence Journal-World, Lawrence KS, Sept.1, 1997)
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