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Bishop George Leo Thomas celebrated
his 35th anniversary of priestly ordination
on May 22, and his seventh anniversary as
10th Bishop of Helena on June 4. In light
of these milestones, editor Renée St. Martin
Wizeman interviewed Bishop Thomas
about his years of faithful service. In part
one of the series, Bishop Thomas reflects
on the nurturing of his priestly vocation, as
well as on his early years of priestly ministry.
Part two will be published in the July
17 edition of The Montana Catholic.
Q: What influence did your childhood,
high school and college friends
have upon your vocation?
I grew up in a very Catholic environment.
I was educated by the Sisters of
Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the
Christian Brothers of Ireland, and then
went to the diocesan college, followed by
four more years of seminary. So from stem
to stern, with the exception of just one year,
I was in Catholic education for the entire
time, until I entered graduate school at the
University of Washington. I had Catholic
friends through and through. All of us
deeply revered the priests and religious in
our lives. There were many priests we admired
greatly, and the priests were held in
very high esteem. Those who felt a calling
to vocation to priesthood were really supported
and really encouraged by our peers.
There were a handful of us – one Christian
brother and some diocesan priests – in my
high school class. But it was a very easy
transition because the Catholic environment
was so supportive and caring.
Q: When did you know that you
would pursue a vocation to the priesthood?
This answer may surprise you, but I
knew pretty clearly by
age 5 that this was
what I wanted. For one
year, my first grade, we
lived on the Hi-Line, in
Harlem. We had a Jesuit
parish priest, Father
Borbeck, who was
very close to my family.
And my first-grade
teacher there, Miss
McDermott, said she
recognized the priestly
vocation God gave me
that early in my life. Mom and Dad, on the
other hand, while they loved the priests
very deeply, always said to me, “If God’s
calling you to the priesthood, we’ll support
you and care for you, and if you’re called
to married life, we’ll support you and care
for you. So bottom line is whatever makes
you happy and is God’s will.” So I never
had family pressure to move into priestly
life, but a great deal of support. And the
seeds of that where planted in my very earliest
days, then cultivated by caring teachers
and a very large extended Catholic
family.
Q: How did your family influence
your vocation? How do they support it
today?
In my childhood, my mom and dad
were very wonderful about sending us to
Catholic schools, when we were growing
up in Butte. It was at considerable sacrifice,
but Catholic education was so important to
them, they made sure that it happened. In
Butte, at St. Ann
Parish, the parish was
really our second family
in many ways, including
the parish
schools. In our family,
Sunday celebration of
Mass was non-negotiable.
We’d plan our
vacations around attendance
at Sunday
liturgies. I was an altar
boy, from the earliest
days, when the Mass
was in Latin. We belonged to various
Catholic clubs and service organizations.
The rosary was very important to our family,
and we prayed it together. I came from
a very culturally Catholic family and we
practiced Catholicism as the warp and
woof of the family fabric.
Today, my three sisters, my brother and
my 15 nieces and nephews are all very
close to the heart of the Church. And my
siblings have also created Catholic households.
I’ve had the opportunity with all
these kids to celebrate their baptisms, I
have confirmed them, I’ve done their weddings,
and it’s very touching to me that
they continue to love the Church very
deeply. It’s not perfect by any means. We’ll
occasionally have lapses, but the kids challenge
each other, and they push each other
very directly to stay close to the heart of the
Church. When we gather for holidays, I always
celebrate Eucharist with the family,
and the first, second and third generations
are all there. The Eucharist remains at the
heart of the family.
Q: You have described yourself as a
parish priest at your core. What does
this mean for your ministry as bishop?
They are very interrelated. I was a
parish priest in five different venues in the
Archdiocese of Seattle, prior to my transfer
here. I loved parish life and when I was a
young man that’s really all I ever thought
of: being a parish priest. The reasons were
uncomplicated. I love celebrating the Eucharist
in the parish; I love preaching; I
love preparing homilies and making application
of the Word to people’s daily lives;
I love teaching and evangelization, so I
would teach adult education and in the
parish schools. And I loved the outreach to
the poor and the needy. Every parish has
the hidden poor. One of the questions that
a parish priest has to ask if he’s true to the
Gospel is “Who is not at the table?” and
then go out and find those people who are
lost or have strayed from the Church.
I was a very happy parish priest, and I
think I bring many of those values to the
life of a bishop. I still see the Eucharist as
being the heartbeat of the diocese. I love
the language of the Second Vatican Council
to ensure that our lay people have full, active,
conscious participation in the liturgy,
to make sure our parishes are life-giving,
lively, engaging and dynamic. I really do
see that in so many of the communities in
this diocese, so parish visitations remain a
very important part of my work as a
bishop. When I go out into the parishes, I
try to involve myself with the various leadership
groups in the parish, and whenever
possible go on sick calls with the parish
priest. It’s important
for me
to connect
parishioners
with the wider
Church. It’s
not the same
sustained way
that a parish
has contact
with the ordinary
lives of
people, but it’s
still enough
for me to taste
and see the
goodness of
the Lord
through the
lives of ordinary
parishioners.
Q: What lessons stand out from your
first years of priestly service? How did
those experiences shape your ministry,
both as a priest and bishop?
I had the privilege of serving the first
five years with a tremendous pastor in the
Archdiocese of Seattle, Father William
Gallagher, now in his late 80s. He was a
priest’s priest. What I learned from him
was very uncomplicated. He always ensured
that the Eucharist nourished the daily
lives of our people. He also emphasized
preaching , teaching, and outreach to the
poor. He divided our parish into quadrants,
and each one of we priests was assigned to
take care of the pastoral needs of our people,
especially the homebound. Each of us
was also assigned to an institution. I would
make about 30 calls on first Fridays, and
spent 13 years as the nighttime chaplain for
an enormous city-county jail. I really grew
to love that outreach very deeply. It gave
me a wide exposure to the various and
sundry issues people struggle with day to
day. I am grateful to him (Father Gallager)
right up to the present day for giving us a
marvelous experience of priestly life.
Q: As a young man growing up in
this diocese, you knew and were educated
by many priests and religious.
How did they contribute to your formation
as a Catholic and your openness to
a priestly vocation?
In my growing-up years, our pastor for
all of my time in St. Ann’s was Father J.
Bruce Plummer, a very formidable figure.
As a kid I was scared of him. I used to
serve the morning Mass as a gradeschooler.
In the winter darkness he would
come across the parking lot in his cassock
and black cape, and he looked like Zorro.
My dad used to say that he was a lion in the
pulpit and a lamb in the parlor, and I said,
“But, Dad, we never see the lamb.” It took
me all my childhood years and coming back
as bishop to see all of the beautiful dimensions
of Father Plummer. He received me so tenderly when
I came back as his bishop, saying “I’m so proud to
have one of my former altar
boys as my bishop,” and I thought to myself,
“If I’d only known in fourth grade that
I was going to be his bishop, it would have
been a lot less intimidating and scary!”
And Father Jack Sladich was just a dynamo
of a priest, and I think every kid in
the grade school wanted to be a priest because
he was such an extraordinary one.
Msgr. Don Shea is another huge influence
in my life. Now up in the Bigfork
area, he was a general in the Army. And he
was the parish priest at the Cathedral of St.
Helena, and in my seventh grade, he had a
vocations club, and every boy in that seventh
grade wanted to be a parish priest like
Msgr. Shea. And the list goes on and on.
The same is true with the Christian Brothers
of Ireland, who were very influential in
our lives. I just knew so many happy
priests and dynamic priests. I look back at
my time at Carroll College, at priests like
Father Tom O’Donnell, Father William
Greytak, Msgr. Joseph Harrington, Father
Jim Sullivan, Father Lee Hightower, Father
Tom Flynn, and the late Fathers Bob Mc-
Carthy, Humphrey Courtney and Paul
Kirchen, to name a few.
I just feel so privileged to have had a
prayerful and prized relationship with these
men. They really had an enormous influence
on my life. Only God knew I’d come
back someday as a bishop for these extraordinary
men. Bishop Gilmore said, “My
priests can do anything.” There was always
a sense of pride in his life about the Diocese
of Helena. I have the same sentiments.
This is an extraordinary presbyterate and
they were responsible for my formation.
Published in The Montana Catholic Online, Volume 27, No. 6, June 17, 2011.
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