A Beautiful Priest

This weekend we say good-bye at our parish, to our pastor, Father Tom Brown, who has served our parish for seven years, 2001-2003 and 2007-2012. The bishop of Grand Rapids has transferred him to a differernt parish within the diocese. This priest is the holiest priest I have ever known. Most of the parishioners love him very much and are very sad that he has been transferred. But, they realize that all priests must go where the bishop says. Father Brown is obedient to the bishop, which is one of his fine qualities. He is obedient to Rome and to his local bishop, and obeys without complaining, even though it is sometimes difficult for him to move when he loves his parishioners as his family.

The good things Father Tom has done for our parish are way too numerous to mention, but, I want to say a few. He allowed me to begin a youth group in our parish in 2001. We never had a youth group before, and now it flourishes under its second leader. He allowed a rosary and holy hour with adoration and benedication to happen every Wednesday night. While the rosary was prayed, he would go into the confessional and hear confessions. This developed into a Wednesday evening Mass with confessions. As the years went on, the line for confessions grew and grew. During lent the lines would sometimes be well past the length of the church. He added many additional evenings of confessions during lent and advent. Many returned to confession because Father Tom encouraged people to return to the sacrament and preached on the awesome mercy of God in this sacrament.

He almost never took a day off from work because he didn't consider his vocation "work." He was often heard saying, "I don't work. I love what I do. Does a mother take a day off from her vocation? Neither do I. I don't consider it work." Almost always if asked to celebrate a special Mass for a family event, or to add a holy event of some type for one group or another, he would say "yes." Several years in a row, he traveled an hour an a half to say a Mass in the woods for the youth group while they were on a camping trip, and to hear their confessions in the woods.

I myself was in a prayer group called God's Embrace. We met for three years of training in holiness and discipleship. Each of those three years we had four weekend retreats. Father Tom would come for each of those retreats on a Saturday night after his three parish Masses, and sometimes after a fourth wedding or funeral Mass, without taking time to eat, hear confessions for more than an hour and then say Mass for our group. We would end at 10 at night and he would then say he was ready to say another Mass if we wanted. This is how much he loved saying Mass.

Oftentimes if someone couldn't find a substitute to take their place during the middle of the night in the perpetual adoration chapel, Father Tom would gladly take the place of that person. He loved the Eucharist and didn't mind giving up his sleep to adore Jesus in the Eucharist.

When there was a boating accident and one of the Catholic high school students was missing, many students and parents from the school were waiting by the water's edge while the coast guard searched for her body after midnight one night. The atmosphere was sad and disturbed. I called Fr. Tom at the rectory and asked if he could come and be there to help the people spiritually. He came immediately. He spent part of the night talking with the people on the shore and the rest of the night comforting the rest of the teens who had been on the boats involved in the accident. My son was one of those teens. A few days later, after Mass, my son went up to him and thanked him for staying the night with them that night. It had been a great comfort to them all. He replied that he knew how it felt because when he was a kid, his brother was drowned in Lake Michigan, and he knew how horrible the feeling of waiting was. To me this was an incredible amount of personal pastoral care.

I can only hope and pray that God will continue to use this priest, Father Tom, to minister to his new and future parishioners as humbly and selflessly as he has to our parish. He is a true gift from God.