he picked up Ben and took him to a sporting goods store to buy his first set of clubs.“ We play golf around here,” Fr. Junk told him. That was Ben’ s introduction to what he described as“ the awesome and treacherous game of golf” that hooked him the rest of his life— though for those who had the privilege of playing golf with Ben over the years, you know he rarely hooked his drives. He did not have the distance, but they were straight down the middle.
Like his drives in golf, his life was lived“ down the middle.” Although when he left Hamiliton and moved to Glandorf in December 1952, Ben admitted,“ I did not make a very good impression upon the pastor, Fr. Otto Brackman. I carried my golf clubs in first. He looked at me and said,‘ Where is your chalice?’” Ben also recalled how in those days the assistant was not allowed to own or possess a car.“ So when Fr. Otto allowed me to use his car,” Ben said, he would tell him,“ Be sure to take good care of this car. I can always get another assistant but I’ m not sure I can buy another car.”
In 1963, Ben moved to western Kansas to become pastor in Syracuse. He told me when he arrived, his first thought was:“ Where are the trees and the lush blue grass?” But the wide-open spaces of western Kansas captured the landscape of Ben’ s soul and the open-minded and compassionate priest he was. The only drawback he said of the five years he spent in western Kansas was the local golf course only had sand greens. Fortunately when he moved to Linton, North Dakota in 1968 to begin a decade of service as pastor of St. Anthony’ s Parish, the local nine-hole golf course converted the sand greens to grass greens and Ben said,“ I played some of my best golf.”
His greatest shot, however, occurred on October 9, 1996 when he lived in St. Joseph, Missouri. Ben achieved golf nirvana when he recorded a hole in one.“ There was something very special about that shot, about its accuracy( some say luck) with which it was executed,” Ben recalls.“ Using a seven wood on a par three 135 yard hold I knocked the ball directly into the hole, no bouncing across nor dribbling on the green. The ball just landed in the hole. That took real skill!”
Welcome Home
Ben’ s greatest skill, of course, is not on the links but in the thousands of living rooms where he visited the people he served with gentleness, kindness and care. His reputation for being a good mentor to young priests was well known in the province. During the ten years he was there as pastor, six different associates, some of whom were newly-ordained, benefited from Ben’ s gentle guidance and mentoring skills as a pastor. One of Ben’ s fondest memories of Linton was the large number of parishioners who came to daily Mass. Ben loved to lead them in singing at the Daily Eucharist. Indeed, for many years, Ben helped to lead the singing at our provincial assemblies each year. And for many years, the jubilee banquet that closed out the Assembly would not be complete without Ben singing his beautiful rendition of“ Danny Boy” in honor of the first provincial of the Kansas City Province, Fr. Danny Schaefer.
Ben became chaplain at the Motherhouse of the Adorers of the Blood of Christ in Wichita, Kansas in 1980. During these seven years, Ben said worked with the nuns on peace and justice issues. They also impressed him with their care for one another.“ I was deeply impressed by their health care unit,” Ben said,“ and in their gracious and trusting art of dying in the Lord, the way they supported each other in the dying process, praying and singing their favorite hymns and being with them until their death. They really taught me the blessed way to prepare for God’ s call from his life.” For the past few years, Father Ben has been engaged in this“ art of dying in the Lord,” and we are profoundly grateful for the extraordinary care he received from the nurses and staff here at St. Charles.
Whether around the table in a family’ s dining room or around the altar in the many sanctuaries where he broke open the Word and passed the Cup, we are grateful to God for Gentle Ben and his ministry of compassionate presence that reflected the best of priesthood in the blood of Christ.
May he rest in peace W
February 2017 • The New Wine Press • 15