The second oldest diocesan priest marked his 65th anniversary as a priest May 26 and celebrated his 90th birthday Dec. 31, 2024. He remains retired in Albuquerque, N.M. He offered this reflection on his life and priesthood.
“From this day all generations will call me blessed: The Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name.”
These words, originally spoken by our Blessed Mother, seem strangely to also apply to me.
All my life, I have been “blessed” by God. More than 90 years ago, I was born in a Catholic hospital, received emergency baptism by the hospital chaplain, a retired bishop, with my pastor, Msgr. Carroll, serving as my sponsor.
My parents were both devout Catholics. My dad was a picture of stability and dependability. He was a doctor and had all the nuns and priests in Hot Springs as his patients. My mother was the most loving person I’ve ever known and became my best friend as I grew older. I had one sister, Connie Newman, who, upon her death, left me with a loving niece and two wonderful nephews, all of whom have generously shared their families with me. Another blessing.
The Sisters of Mercy have always been a big part of my life. I was born in their hospital, went to their grade school and celebrated with them immediately following my first Mass. I remember as a little boy walking through the halls of their hospital with my dad as he made his calls. One of those days, a nun inquired as to whether I wanted to be a priest. I responded negatively and told her I wanted to be a doctor like my father. She replied that it would be good also, as one took care of the soul and the other of the body. Perhaps that planted a seed. Another blessing.
The seed was assuredly not nourished during my high school years, when the priesthood was certainly not on my mind and other things less salvific took its place. When I graduated from high school, my father said he would send me to any university I wanted as long as it was Catholic. I chose St. Louis University in St. Louis, Mo., as it was the closest to Hot Springs. Another blessing.
God saw that I needed more guidance and gave me the best roommate I could have wanted and certainly the one I needed. Jim was a strong Catholic from a middle-class family in Colorado. He got up every morning at 5:30 to go to Mass and receive the Eucharist. What else was I to do at that time of day? — certainly not study — and so I tagged along. It was there at Mass, before the Eucharist, that I began to feel a pull toward the priesthood.
Each day, I would stop before a life-sized crucifix in the vestibule and ask Jesus to let me know what he wanted me to do with my life. I had come to realize that being a doctor was not my calling, and thought perhaps the priesthood was. I wrote to my dad, telling him of my decision. He then contacted the pastor, my godfather, and told him. Msgr. Carroll, from Ireland originally, commented, “Well, why wouldn’t he be; he had me for an example!” I have never been able to tell when the Irish are joking.
I also wrote to my girlfriend at the time telling her of my change in direction. I don’t remember her reply, but it was amiable. Blessing.
I can’t say I enjoyed those seven and 1/2 years in the seminary. They were instructive and formative. There were only a few priests who were gifted as teachers. The rest were mediocre or less. But those long years did give God a chance to work on me, to form the lump of clay. The times before the Eucharist in the chapel were the best. Again, there was that life-sized crucifix; again, there was the Eucharist.
The years of formation passed, and I found myself lying on the sanctuary floor of St. Andrew’s Cathedral with my head resting on the cold tile (long replaced now with carpeting), waiting to be ordained a priest of God. Unworthy, surely. Blessed, absolutely!
My first assignment was to live at the Cathedral and teach at Catholic High School. I loved teaching. I loved being with boys, sponges ready to absorb some truths, starting out promising lives, so filled with life and fun and dreams. If I had been able to see into the future, I would have seen that some would become my parishioners, that I would see their children and grandchildren come into the Church and that some would become my friends in their maturity. I would officiate at some of their marriages, would lay my hands on their heads as some became priests, would work with some on the diocesan level and would bury some. Another blessing.
After teaching at Catholic High School for 15 years, I was assigned as pastor of St. Paul the Apostle Church in Pocahontas. As this was my first parish, I had a lot to learn. The great people in Pocahontas were generous and affirming in teaching me to be a good pastor. No priest could ask for a better parish or a more welcoming community. The six years that I served there were both formative and again a great blessing.
In 2001, Bishop McDonald asked me to become the pastor of Christ the King Church in Little Rock. It was a challenging assignment to come from an agrarian parish to one in the state’s capital. The first year at CTK was difficult as there was conflict within the parish as to whether they should build a school, and the style and quality of the liturgical music. The Eucharist again provided the answer and brought peace to the community. Through the generosity of the parishioners, we built a beautiful Eucharistic chapel, and miraculously, Jesus solved the problems of the parish.
In the 20 years I served at Christ the King Church, my love for the people who made up the body of Christ there grew steadily. My love for them was so strong that it was difficult for me to feed them the Eucharist without tearing up as I saw their goodness. The school became a reality, opening its doors with 200 students and growing to 700 as those years rolled by. Amazingly, there were those “boys” I had taught at Catholic High School, now strangely having grown older, serving as lectors, extraordinary ministers, parish council members, working with me to build the body of Christ within the parish.
That gave me a great sense of fulfillment as I realized I had helped plant the seed of faith in their lives and was now blessed to witness its growth. What a great blessing!
In 2001, my close friend, the legend of Catholic High, Msgr. George Tribou, died at UAMS hospital as Archbishop Sartain stood on one side of his bed and I on the other. He had done so much for so many. As I left that hospital, I had the feeling that my life had changed. I had lost all my immediate family five years before, and I was exhausted. I felt empty with nothing left to give. Within a few weeks, I wrote a letter to then-Bishop Sartain, asking to retire as pastor from the parish that I had grown to love so deeply.
To this day, some 24 years later, I do not know if it was the right decision on my part, but it was made in prayer before the Eucharist.
The exercise of my priesthood changed dramatically upon retirement as pastor of Christ the King Church. I had not stopped being a priest, simply being a pastor. Archbishop Sartain continued to call upon me when there was a need for a priest throughout the diocese. I shared a chaplaincy with Father Rossi for the nuns at Good Shepherd in Hot Springs, did some temporary fill-in work and became the administrator for the parish I grew up in, Our Lady of the Springs in Hot Springs. When Bishop Sartain was named the ordinary of Joliet, Ill., in 2006, the consultors for the Diocese of Little Rock elected me to serve as administrator for the diocese.
Working at the diocese was a great blessing to me due to the quality of the staff. Three of the men I worked with there were some of the “boys” I taught at Catholic High School. They were fine kids when I taught them, but they were outstanding Catholic men when I worked with them. Blessing following upon blessing.
When Bishop Anthony B. Taylor was ordained as bishop of Little Rock in June 2008, my duties at the diocesan office came to an end. I had served as a priest under four bishops: Fletcher, McDonald, Sartain and Taylor. They were all kind and supportive. Both Bishop McDonald and Bishop Sartain gave the honor of working for them as their vicar general.
Three years later, at the age of 77 and with a few health problems, I moved to Albuquerque, N.M., and helped at a local parish with a fantastic pastor intermittently for the next seven years until my lack of mobility made that impractical.
I am blessed to have a nice home at the foot of the Sandia Mountains, made possible by the inheritance my mother left me. I live alone, but I have the additional blessing of a very loving niece who lives within a half mile. I am blessed to have a chapel. In that chapel, there is a beautiful antique French crucifix, and there is a tabernacle that Bishop McDonald gave me, and in that tabernacle is the Eucharist. Yes, I am blessed and always have been.