continue at Milwaukee Catholic HeraldYou grand folks of the Archdiocese of Milwaukee have known and loved him a lot longer than I have, so please pardon my presumption in claiming some special affection here.
My provenance goes back only to Sept. 1, 1972, when I arrived as a new man at the North American College in Rome, there to be warmly welcomed by the friendly class ahead of me, among whom was one Jim Harvey, a second-year seminarian from the Archdiocese of Milwaukee.
While not what you’d call an effusive, backslapping guy, Jim was unfailingly friendly and helpful, and we hit it off from the start. Seems like we had a lot in common: both our dads were named Bob, and had served in the Pacific during the war; both of us were the oldest of five kids, with two brothers and two sisters; both Jim and I had been attracted to the priesthood from an early age; both of us were lifers, entering the seminary right after eighth grade; and the two of us had warm attachments to home, me to St. Louis, him to Milwaukee, to our two dioceses which had fostered our faith in a sustaining Catholic culture of vibrant parishes, great priests, wonderful sisters, excellent parochial schools, and happy homes and neighborhoods.
Oh, we had our differences: he was rather trim, while I was . . . never mind; he was good at golf, thanks to his dad, who ran a driving range, while I wasn’t bad at softball.
photo
No comments:
Post a Comment