I have been exceptionally busy all day and was looking for a particular picture when I found this.  It is a Saturday food drive we held in Greenfield, Indiana as a way for us to introduce ourselves to the community.  It is not a new picture as we were just forming what became St. Paul’s in Greenfield, plus Father Chuck (second from the left) is now working from the “home office” (heaven) and Father Templeton (far right) is now working in what I think may be “purgatory” or as we say in the theological world “Ohio.” (The two extremely good looking ones are me on the far left and Fr. PT in between Chuck and Sean)

But the picture really made me laugh and miss some pretty fun times.  We got permission from the Greenfield Wal-Mart to advertise and hold a small donation site and we just sat out there meeting and talking to people while drinking coffee.  AND, the best part was that the Hancock County Food Pantry was able to receive a nice donation for work in the community.

In time, Father Chuck became the permanent priest for St. Paul’s and they went on their own with him (that is not a bad thing but what you want a Church plant to do)  It was his final assignment here on this earth.  When Chuck became terminal, he still worked, but it became harder and harder.  Father Tony, then Deacon Tony, asked to go out to help him and we sent him there.  Tony helped Chuck through those final days and after became a priest and took that parish for a time.  It still exists, but Father Tony is now the Vicar of one of our first Churches, St. Patrick’s in Noblesville.

I spent a couple of hours with Father PT today, as I am now an assistant on HIS staff and he is my assistant in the Order.  Father Sean serves as an assistant in a large parish in Ohio, and writes and does a variety of things that young smart priest do.  I still see him and talk t
o him on occasion too and he is doing well.  But I think we all miss those times.

It surprises me, as I was talking about this today on a couple of occasions, how much fun being a priest is when you just are being a priest.  Sure there is a lot of institutional stuff and details that need to be done, but that is not the core of that call.  And PT is the famous one to us in all this as when we get too overwhelmed with the stuff he will say, “This isn’t fun anymore, we need to plant another church.”

He’s right, and that’s just what I intend to do.

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+