Before moving on to my first parish, I had to say goodbye to SK Wiley and friends at the Miamisburg Police Department. I rode road patrol with them a minimum of once per week my last year of seminary, usually the evening or late night shifts. I was privileged to get to know the officers well, learn their back stories, and of their present day joys and challenges. Saying goodbye was the least I could do; saying thank you for their gift to me and my professional development was even more important.

They pulled pranks on each other, shared tragedies, locked up the same career criminals, week in, week out, over and over again. Shared experience made them tight as a family, dysfunctions, and all. One moment I’d hear whining, “Yeah, that fat fornicator served in Viet Nam, but he spent his whole tour sitting on his ass changing airplane tires.” Or “hope his wife never hears from his mistress.” Or “Too bad he can’t hold his liquor. I found him last week sleeping in his car, passed out behind the wheel, stuck in a ditch, drunk as a cooter.”

It was a different time and a different era.

Yet, when the chips were down, everyone came out of the woodwork to protect one another. Be it “shots fired” or “personal injury accident” all stops were swept away, off duty cops responded, everyone, from the chief to the new hire, jumped into harm’s way. It was tight as blood, and I had been made an honorary member of the family. How cool was that?

There were too many experiences to write about, but here is a sampling: Doing donuts in the high school parking lot after a heavy snow, giggling like high school kids. There was the guy who hung himself in the basement, having his wife discover the grizzly scene. Then, the lady and her infant who’s pickup stalled on the railroad tracks, only to be demolished by a freight train. “You smashed up my brand new $50 truck?” her husband shouted at her over the phone.

I’ll never forget the kid arrested by an Indiana cop on a warrant in a city park, ready to be beaten to a pulp, until the young, inexperienced, poorly trained home-town-hero looked up and saw me standing there in my clerical collar with arms folded across my chest. Not on my dime, Jerk.

Playing the intruder in a darkened bar with an open door, crouching on a toilet in the women’s room, dressed in oversized protective padding, having the police dog sicked on me. Jake was good, even with one incisor missing. Everyone got a laugh of the terrified Padre.

Skyline Chili is a thing. I love it, a five-way topped with melted cheese and tabasco sauce. The local franchise charged us half price if the cop was in uniform and parked the cruiser out front. Problem was, after a five-way and four or more skyline slider hot dogs, the GI system responded with a plumb. “Damn, Padre!” Steve would yell at me. “Roll down your window cause I can’t breath!”

Steve’s radio crackled, “See the domestic, at such-and-such address.” “That’d be Jokie Horn and his girlfriend,” Steve told me. “Let’s go.”

Lights and siren. I love me some lights and sirens, revolving red and blue, both the wail and the European high-low. Traffic parts for you, especially for cops. For fire trucks and ambulances, not so much. I guess a badge, gun, and handcuffs make all the difference. Power. Authority. Command. It matters.

We pull up to find Jokie and his girlfriend duking it out on their front porch. Jokie has a handful of hair and she had cut Jokie face real good. Blood was everywhere. Both hillbillies were blind drunk. Snow was lightly falling and I can still remember seeing my breath. Must have been Christmas time.

Bam! Steve hit them both like a hurricane, while I stood back on the freshly shoveled front sidewalk, unknowingly stepping in something soft. They both collapsed like a house of cards. With Jokie and girlfriend cuffed and locked behind the cage in the back seat, we started the drive back to the station.

The smell of dog shit filled the cruiser. Jokie and his girlfriend began to complain and their eyes watered. The heater was on full blast, which made the situation all the worse. Tear gas would have been an improvement. Steve looked over at me, slammed on the brakes, and said, “Padre, if you go stepping in dog shit, be sure to wipe it off before getting in the car.”

“Yes sir,” I said giving him my best Gomer Pyle salute. I got out, cleaned off my shoe, wiped the floor mat in a snow bank, all the while, Steve, Jokie, and his gal were laughing themselves silly. “Jokie was beating on my face,” she later wrote out her complaint when she sobered up, “That’s why I called the P-O-L-L-I-C-E.”

I can’t make this stuff up.

—

Laps this morning were matter-of-fact, no nonsense, fifteen laps of up and back hard charging freestyle. My wife was late to breakfast, so she kindly sent me ahead with her promise to follow.

Our normal routine is for her to meet me when I emerge from the locker room. She’s able to use the machines in the Jewish Community Center that work her arms, legs, abs, and everything else in-between. She knows when I’m coming out because she hears the squeak of my wet Crocks, pink beauties that resemble oversized clown shoes. They protect my feet from the dangers of a dirty, viral infested locker room floors and pool deck. 

Laps today were meditative, restorative, quick to pass by. With each lap I thought of each year I served the churches in Dresden and Milo Center (1986-1989), Canandaigua (1989-1991), and Palmyra (1991-1999). The final two years (to make 15 laps) were painful but necessary years for a mid-career adjustment. 

Reflecting with each stroke I saw beautiful Finger Lakes and autumn leaves, back country roads and Mennonite buggies, and villages nestled in valleys, hidden by wood smoke from fireplaces and stoves. Snow days brought time to a standstill. Fresh plowed and tilled fields graced dairy farms, red barns, and blue silos. Vineyards laden with grapes and orchards of apples and peaches. Tall church spires pointed to heaven and graveyards marked the final repose of both sinner and saints. Trains moved commerce and fire sirens signaled  the ending of the day. 

Life in the Finger Lakes has been good.

—

One of my last opportunities to go on patrol with SK was hard. Emotionally, I knew I had to say good-bye. At the same time, I was having more fun in my clerical collar than should have been allowed. These cops were my cops, and I loved them all.

Steve loved to regale me with his stories of working at his previous department. He was the only white guy to successfully work undercover drugs in black neighborhoods, or so he said. Steve told me of responding to a call on Thanksgiving to find the whole family chowing down on turkey and gravy, even as dad laid with his face in his plate, a bullet hole in his forehead. “I told him to pass the meat,” momma said, and went right on eating. Yikes!

The cops provided perimeter security for a local factory, all very hush-hush, highly classified government stuff. The campus was ringed with military wire, elevated machine gun towers and missiles that pointed towards the sky. I kid you not. A middle of the night call went out, an alarm for a possible security breach. Blue and red lights are beautiful at night. No siren was needed, for the streets were empty during these early morning hours.

SK parked his cruiser diagonally across the intersection, he pointed toward a tree and said, “Padre, park your ass behind that tree and pray nobody starts shooting.” He didn’t have to ask me twice. I peeked out to see SK pop the trunk, put on tactical body armor, strap on a  helmet, and pulled out the coolest looking H&K submachine gun I’ve ever seen.

Now there’s something you don’t see every day.

I salute brother and sister law enforcement officers. They’re often down in the dirt, wrestling with the devil, day in day out, trying to hold their family and personal life together, and remain sane at the same time. It’s a tough job.

Bad cops? Yep. Thankfully, in my experience, they’re rare. Good cops? Lots more good cops than bad. Way more. Exceptional cops? There are a lot of them who live a disciplined life, who embody service and love of neighbor, give extra effort, and strive to be better every day. I hold all in my prayers and highest esteem.

It was really hard saying goodbye.

Those lights and sirens.

—

Writing about my experiences in the parish is complicated. “Do no harm,” my conscience tells me. I couldn’t bear to hurt anyone. Some have died in the Lord, yet, their legacy needs to be respected, defended even. Others live. Their confidences are not mine to share. Even the use of pseudonyms isn’t sufficient, for events may unintentionally identify individuals. 

Parishioners confide in their pastor. That information is theirs, not mine. They own it like a car and title, like a house and deed. I’m not free to share without express permission. Throughout my forty plus years in the parish, I’ve carefully created compartments in my mind to hold memories of confidences. Even a judge’s court order would not compel me to talk without explicit permission from the owner. My wife is not privy to these, nor anyone else on the planet, except for one: my psychiatrist. 

Having the support of a psychiatrist is an essential key to my success in the parish. I’ve been blessed with the same professional for over twenty-five years. He is the one source of objective feedback regarding my mental, emotional, and spiritual health. Our relationship is locked tight confidential. 

During periods of anxiety or stress, my psychiatrist has carefully monitored me and provided effective treatment. Symptoms of depression have been held in check. He’s taught me effective management techniques to remain healthy and productive. He has put more tools in my toolbox than all the workshops or continuing education experiences I’ve attended combined. He is a cheerleader, guide, counselor, and accountability check. I don’t get a free pass when I’ve screwed up. Rather, options are played out for redemption and healing. It also helps that he is a faithful layperson in a similar protestant denomination. He knows how the sausage is made.

Over the years, I’ve counseled new or less experienced pastors to get themselves a good psychiatrist. Not because I think they are crazy. No. We all need that someone we can go to when the going gets rough. And, yes, it can get rough in the parish. 

Okay. So I can’t betray confidences, but …

… there are stories of triumph to share, heartwarming experiences to tell about. There are moments of faith to witness. There are accounts of the movement of the Holy Spirit – the God of my experience – to testify. I’ve even been witness to miracles. My life lived in the Spirit gives me goosebumps when I fathom the blessings and grace I’ve received. 

This, I will attempt, with pastoral love and affection, with the sole purpose of giving glory to God. 

—

George and Laura were our neighbors. I came to love them both.

Each in their eighties (I would guess), George was retired from the local power plant; a boiler operator who spent his life watching and adjusting the ratio of coal, sulfur content, and oxygen being atomized and shot into a firebox. Industrial scale electricity generation, courtesy of New York State Electric and Gas. George spent a lifetime at top level engineering, critical thinking, and decision making. It was soot covering, sweat stained, muscle straining, salt of the earth hard, honest work. It fascinated me.

George smoked a pipe, so I did, too. He had a Sears lawn tractor; the church provided me with an identical grey Sears steed, so when he mowed, I mowed, too. George had a split rail fence between our houses that we’d lean against and talk about everything except getting down to doing something productive.

One hot, summer afternoon we took a break from mowing. We chatted small talk over the fence when a flatbed truck pulled into my back yard. The driver, a farmer from my parish, didn’t say a word. He just backed up to my door, left arm farmer tanned flopped out the window, navigating in reverse using his side mirrors. He squealed the brakes to a stop and tilted the bed. Off slid a wood crate full of freshly harvested cabbages. “This is for you and the misses,” he said, giving me the thumbs up.

“Good for the colon!” he grinned, and drove off.

“Now, what am I going to do with a crate of cabbages?” I wondered aloud. “If you don’t want them, I’ll take ‘em,” replied George. Visions of sauerkraut ferries danced in his head. George had a lifetime of being well prepared for such an occurrence.

Over the next couple of weeks, the neighborhood became saturated  in the smell of sauerkraut fermenting from his garage. Cut up in a 55 gallon barrel, simmering over a slow burning propane flame, George cooked down some mighty fine tasting, old fashioned kraut that he shared with the neighborhood. Um, good!

“Can you drive a fire truck,” George asked me as he pulled on his pipe. Cyntha and I had only moved in a week, or so, before. The parsonage had been left a wreck, so we stayed at a parishioner’s lake house for three weeks while work parties (and Cynthia) stripped wall paper, patched walls, repaired cabinets, replaced appliances, and painted. The parsonage was like new when we moved in. The generosity of parish volunteers still takes my breath away.

“I suppose I can drive anything, if you teach me,” I replied. “Good,” George replied. “Here is an application for the volunteer fire company,” he pulled the form from his pocket. That afternoon, George gave me my first orientation, most certainly before I was elected and approved.

There were three institutions in town, the church, fire company, and the Masonic Lodge. My church trustees were the fire chiefs and officers. They also served as the grand poo-baas in the lodge. I figured I could do two of the three. Being the pastor of the church, I was happy to be a worker bee in the fire company.

“Here’s the starter,” George patiently told me. “And over here is the radio, the lights, and siren.” Red and blue lights. And a siren. It was if my heart skipped a beat. Memories of Miamisburg flooded back to me. It didn’t come with a gun, badge, and a pair of handcuffs. But, it would do.

George and I would go on to putting out a lot of fires over the next three years. It was often just him and me in town during working hours. He was a county deputy fire commissioner, which entitled him to add a radio, emergency lights, and a siren to his F-100 brown pickup. Well into retirement, George would pull up behind my pumper at a scene, drag off a hose line, stretch it to where it needed to go. I charge it with water from the tank, and boom. George put the fire out.

Time to take the truck back to the barn, clean up, put everything back in order, and have a cup of coffee. Becoming a volunteer firefighter in Smalltown, USA was about as close to heaven as this country boy could get. And it came with lights and siren. Be still my soul.

One day, over the side yard fence, George had a pained look in his face. “What’s up,” I cheerfully asked. “My daughter has brain cancer.” Silence followed. What is there to say. My empathy and love for George and Laura were unbounded. “Would you take part in her funeral Mass?” he asked. “Yes, of course. It would be my privilege.

The Roman Catholic priest uptown was a good friend and trusted colleague. He was the fire chaplain for his department and a medic on the volunteer ambulance. We ran in the same circles. Our paths often crossed. Father M readily agreed to grant me access to all his bells and whistles.

The processional halted midway down the aisle and Father M began to use a mace to splash holy water around the casket. “In baptism, she was born to Christ. In baptism, she has died in Christ. In baptism, she has been welcomed home by Christ.” Or something like that. Father M stopped, pivoted in my direction and handed me the mace, smiling. When in Rome, I guess. I too, splashed the holy water. George and Laura took notice.

Not long thereafter, Laura became sick and was dying. Hospice arranged for a hospital bed to be place in the living room. My heart was breaking for George. With a stiff constitution, his faith saw him through. “Would you celebrate Laura’s funeral Mass with Father M?” “Yes, of course. It would be my privilege,” I repeated my promise. And I did.

George died a few years thereafter, perhaps of a broken heart. I cried deeply at the loss of my friend and neighbor. As a lifelong volunteer firefighter, his casket was carried on the hose bed of Dresden’s polished pumper from the funeral home to the Roman Catholic Church. Father M and I rode in the undertaker’s car at the front of the processional. The sky was turning black as we pulled up to the church and George’s casket was solemnly brought by the pallbearers into the sanctuary.

Midway through the funeral Mass the sound of rain on the roof and windows began to rise. Flashes of lightening increased in frequency. The roar of thunder growled over the church, village, and Finger Lakes region. Burial in a thunderstorm wasn’t going to be pretty. The church was full, mostly with volunteer firefighters in formal uniform dress. Midway through the funeral, pagers simultaneously went off, and a dozen or so local firefighters filed out before the Mass was done.

During the recessional, the rains came to an end and sunlight began to filter through the stained glass windows. We exited the church to witness a rainbow, beautiful and full of assurance, that hung above town. I said to Father M on the ride to the cemetery, “Wasn’t that just a beautiful sign from God?”

We pulled into the village cemetery and made our way to the open grave. There were three firetrucks parked off to the side, hoses lying on the ground, and the burnt trunk of a tree next to the grave. Yes. A bolt of lightening struck a tree beside George and Laura’s grave, just as we were prepared to say our final prayers. It was one of those God moments. A divine intervention for all of us to witness.

I’m still moved with emotion forty years later. Bearing witness to God’s grace, power, majesty, intervention is truly miraculous. Thank you, God, for extending to me your unmerited privilege.