A 40-year Journey Ends with Baptism

I love listening to the stories of our senior members. Their mission experiences remind me of the experiences our missioners still have today! Recently I had the opportunity to reminisce with Father Richard Kreimer about his last assignment in Jefferson, N.C., a mission that Glenmary returned to the Diocese of Charlotte in 1998.

Father Richard’s mission in Jefferson was home to about 35 Catholic families and he also served the 10 Catholic families in nearby Sparta. One day he received a surprise phone call with an invitation to visit a man living in Independence, Va., just over the state line. “When I got to Sam’s house, he told me he had been waiting 40 years for the Church to come [to his county],” Father Richard remembers. “He said it looked like Sparta was as close as the Church would come to him before he died so he asked me if I would baptize him.”

Father Richard learned that Sam had studied the Catholic faith through a correspondence course sponsored by the Knights of Columbus. “I was privileged to baptize Sam only four months before he died,” Father Richard told me. It was because of the generous support of our donors that a Glenmary missioner was present in this home mission county and was able to respond to Sam’s desire for baptism.

Glenmarians have—and often share—beautiful stories of baptism and the people who come to the Church requesting the grace of that sacrament. Father Tom Charters, for example, baptized an entire family in Logan, W.Va., at the Easter Vigil this past Easter. And the Spring 2008 issue of Glenmary Challenge introduced readers to several women in South Georgia whose spiritual hunger led them to Glenmary mission communities and to the Church through the sacraments of initiation.

The support of our donors makes it possible for missioners to settle in rural communities and bring the Church to people who may have misconceptions about the faith. In low-key, unobtrusive ways, missioners become a part of the community and proclaim the Gospel through their everyday lives. Because of this witness, people connect—or maybe reconnect—with the Catholic faith.

Unlike the family in Logan that joined the Church in a community setting, Sam made his 40-year journey in isolation, without a faith community, as he waited for a Catholic Church and for baptism. I wish he could have known of and thanked people like you, our donors, who make it possible for Father Richard and missioners like him to live in areas of the United States that are in need of a missionary presence—places with a large percentage of people with no faith tradition and few, if any, Catholics.

“There is still no Catholic Church in Independence,” Father Richard says. “Independence is located in one of the over 170 counties in Mission Land, U.S.A., that have no Catholic congregation.” But Glenmary missioners are working everyday to decrease that number, one county at a time!

While Glenmary missioners reach out to feed people spiritually, we never want to lose sight of responding to the material needs of those living in the home missions. The sharp increase in the cost of gasoline and the accompanying increases in the cost of food and utilities are making it even more difficult for people who are already struggling to make ends meet.

Because Glenmary serves areas where the poverty level is twice the national average, the people who live in our communities are especially hard hit during an economic downturn. Many of our missions work with other churches to meet local needs and with rising costs, the requests for assistance are growing every day.

Missioners report many of the food pantries that their missions help support are facing especially difficult times. Keeping the shelves stocked to meet the needs of the people who come to their doors is difficult because families who often found their cupboards bare at the end of the month now have to seek assistance weeks earlier. People simply do not have enough money to feed their families or take care of healthcare expenses like the cost of medication.

When I lived and worked at the Glenmary mission in Hugo, Okla., people of the county continually told me “The Catholic Church is known as the church that helps the poor.” I found it humbling to greet strangers who came to my door seeking assistance because they had no where else to turn. And how grateful I was to you and all our Glenmary supporters for making it possible for me to be there to help!

As times grow increasingly difficult for those in our mission areas and for the missioners who serve them, I hope I can count on you to continue your generous support. I know that working together, we will continue to meet the spiritual and material needs of those living in the home missions.

Please know that your gifts—donations as well as prayers—are deeply appreciated by our missioners, coworkers and most especially by those we serve. There are many like Sam living in mission counties today, waiting for the Church and yearning for the sacraments. With your help and Glenmary’s ministry, they won’t have to wait 40 years.

Your brother in mission,

Father Dominic Duggins
Director of Development