Fred's ordination

A few weeks ago I mentioned getting an invitation to Fred Hickey's ordination, and today I went back to Holy Hill to attend it. This time I saw a bunch of friars who were not there last weekend, including Daniel Chowning and Michael Berry. It was a beautiful day -- mid-July can be hot and sticky even here -- and there was a good crowd, including thirty or forty people from Fred's home parish in Michigan who made the trip

Fred is the last of the guys I worked with to finish his training, and at the moment there are no students in formation at all in the province for the first time in it's hundred-year history. Because it takes so long for a guy to go through all his training, even if someone were to enter next year -- no one is entering this fall -- it would probably be 2016 or 2017 before they would be ordained. Not good! Where there have been new members joining in the last few years, they are men who transferred from other provinces, meaning there was no real increase in Carmelites, just a redistribution of those who were already in the Order.

In Africa, on the other hand, the Carmelite community is growing. The Kenyan part of the province, where Steve Payne is stationed, has four young priests, four young solemnly professed brothers and fifteen seminarians. And that has all happened in the last twelve years.

On the critter front, Cassidy seems to be doing better but Sundance started hacking. So Tom called the vet and now both cats are getting medicated.