JACKSONVILLE — Nine-year-old Hannah Kittler hasn’t been focusing too much lately about her Easter dress, dyed eggs and candy. Her goal of becoming Catholic is of the utmost importance to her.
At the Easter Vigil April 11, Hannah will be baptized, confirmed and receive the Eucharist at St. Jude Church in Jacksonville. She has selected a white first Communion dress to wear for the occasion.
“Our priest is really cool,” she said of pastor Father Les Farley. “He’s great with kids.”
It doesn’t hurt that he has dogs too.
But Hannah won’t be alone for her big day. Converting to Catholicism is a family affair. About half of St. Jude’s Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults program is related. In addition to Hannah, her parents, Jamie and Ben Kittler, and her grandparents, Kathy and Randy Campbell, all of Lonoke, are joining.
Kathy’s brother, Phillip Hunthrop, is also becoming Catholic. Hunthrop is the main connection that is bringing Hannah, her parents and grandparents to the faith.
“Every year for the past four or five years, he says he is going to convert. ’Will you convert with me?’” Kathy Campbell said.
Hunthrop is married to Sharon, who was born and raised in the Catholic faith and faithfully attends Mass at St. Jude. Her quiet influence over the past 15 years convinced her husband to start the conversion process last spring. Phillip Hunthrop’s sister, Kathy Campbell, was also watching Sharon’s action and her devout faith.
“There is this peace about her, this calmness,” Kathy said. “You see this faith in her. Her whole family is like that. I just love her mother and her sisters.”
Kathy was particularly moved by Sharon’s faith in 1996 when Kathy’s father died. Shortly before his death Sharon visited him in the hospital and read to him from the Bible.
“It was the calmness she created over him. You had to see it,” Kathy said. “She is just an inspiration.”
Sharon Hunthrop, who will serve as the sponsor for the Campbells and Kittlers, said, “I give all the credit to my parents and the good foundation they provided me and my brothers and sisters. Mass is very important to me. My mother has always said it is the ultimate prayer you can do for someone.”
Ann Gallegos, co-director of the RCIA program at St. Jude, said Sharon Hunthrop and her sister Miriam Moix are models of the faith.
“It’s their actions. It’s the way they live their lives,” Gallegos said. “It’s rare to see that in this world. It’s a genuine faith.”
Attending Sharon’s father’s funeral at Immaculate Heart of Mary Church in North Little Rock (Marche) in April 2008 finally pushed Kathy to start seriously consider becoming Catholic. She was impressed by the “ceremonial” natural of the Mass “from the beginning to the end.”
“How can you not be drawn to something like that?” Kathy asked.
Kathy was able to convince her daughter, Jamie, and granddaughter, Hannah, to start attending Mass with her. They were eager to find a Christian church to call home.
“We have visited a lot of churches until the point we started here,” Kathy said.
When Kathy walked into St. Jude, she knew she was home.
“I felt this sense of peace and belonging that I have never felt anywhere else in all my life. I have always been looking for something else.”
Even though she was raised in the Assembly of God church and took her daughter, Jamie, there, Kathy said she was always in awe of the Catholic Church. She recalls a day when she was 6 or 7 years old and she saw a nun. She asked her mother, “Why can’t I be a nun?”
“She told me no because I wasn’t Catholic. I asked, ’Why can’t I be Catholic?’ All of my life I always thought Catholics were this special group of people that nobody could join. It was like this club that nobody could get in to.”
The family conversion really took off when Kathy Campbell asked her husband, Randy, and Jamie Kittler asked her husband, Ben, to go to church with them on Mother’s Day in 2008.
To Kathy’s surprise, Randy attended Mass at St. Jude that Sunday in May.
“When I started here I had been married 34 years. Other than funerals and weddings, (Randy) hadn’t been to church with me,” Kathy said. “Since (Mother’s Day) he has only missed a few days when he was sick.”
Randy was baptized in the Baptist church but stopped attending decades ago.
“The first time I stepped into this church, there was this calmness,” he said. “No screaming the Bible at you. I told her, ’I came in this world a Baptist, but I am going out as a Catholic.’”
Kathy added, “It’s the best move I ever made. It got all my family together in one place.”
Jamie admitted it took her until July 2008 before she knew that being Catholic was the right decision.
“It just hit me. ’Wow. This is the right place,’” she said.
Ben Kittler also attended that Mother’s Day Mass with his family and in-laws. He was baptized in the Assembly of God church.
“I started because of her,” he said of his wife. “I liked it. I told her I am coming next Sunday.”
Jamie Kittler said her family was immediately drawn to the sincerity of the St. Jude parishioners.
“Everyone is so genuine,” Jamie said. “Everyone is so friendly. They are excited for us.”
After Sunday Mass, parishioners are invited to the parish hall for breakfast. “Big Ben” Kittler immediately noticed that everyone was interested in talking to him and didn’t seem to judge him.
“It’s a variety of people,” he said. “You’ve got all ethnic groups.”
Gallegos said she is most impressed with the conversions of Randy Campbell and his son-in-law, Ben Kittler. Both men had not attended church for many years before Mother’s Day 2008.
“The Catholic faith is what has brought them to Christ and salvation,” she said.
The admiration of Sharon Hunthrop might have gotten the family to the church, but there were many factors that kept them coming back each Sunday.
Jamie Kittler appreciates being able to follow the Mass in the missalette.
“I know exactly what they are talking about,” she said.
Kathy said, “There is a sense of community. It really is a community.
“I love being Catholic,” she added. “I know how old our Church is. I know who founded it. I read it in the Bible.”
Because Hannah, who attends a public school in Lonoke, must attend parish religious education classes and the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults program for children, the family is regularly at the church. After each Mass or class, they are energized to learn more.
“We are constantly talking about it, what we learned,” Jamie said.
While it helps to have a support network of six family members, Kathy Campbell said she finally made the decision to convert on her own.
“For me it didn’t matter. Even if Phillip backed out again, I knew where I belonged,” she said.
The Campbell and Kittler families have been so focused on receiving the Eucharist for the first time on the Easter Vigil that, until recently, they had forgotten the significance of Holy Week and Easter. At first the family said they were not interested in attending the Triduum services.
“We were reading about it,” Kathy said. “I was not going to miss it. I don’t want to miss any of it.”
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