By DEB PIROCH
With all our talk of pandemics, masks, shut-downs, and vaccinations, and with Ash Wednesday not being celebrated as we are accustomed with ashes on our forehead, we would do well to recall that our souls are fashioned for the next world.
Moreover, we should concentrate on the next 40 days, indeed for a lifetime, on improving within our state in life during this Year of St. Joseph. We should also ask Blessed Solanus Casey to intercede for us to prepare us for a holy and blessed death when our time comes.
Fr. Solanus Casey was the religious name given to Bernard Francis Casey, a priest of the Capuchin order, born in 1870 as the sixth of 16 children to devout Irish parents. The Caseys had moved to America to escape the Irish famine.
I first heard his name from Fr. Benedict Groeschel. This priest and psychologist, who founded the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal to work with the poor, wrote many books and was on EWTN for many years, and there I produced his prime-time show. Fr. Groeschel spoke of Casey’s holiness. Apparently, he had seen Fr. Solanus in ecstasy, praying late one night. This was the only time he witnessed someone praying in ecstasy and he said Blessed Solanus was the holiest man he ever knew.
As a child, Bernard Casey and at least two of his siblings became ill with diphtheria. Before there was a vaccine, it was known as the “strangling angel of children” and was characterized by a bacterial infection causing a sore throat, a croup-like cough, swollen glands, and difficulty breathing. Though it was children who chiefly died from it, adults did as well. Thousands were killed from it, even into the early part of the twentieth century. Two of the future Fr. Casey’s siblings died.
Let us ask him to intercede for all those suffering and dealing with COVID and other illnesses today.
Because he had trouble with his studies at St. Francis de Sales Seminary in Milwaukee, Bernard Casey was ordained in 1907 but under the condition he not hear Confession nor give homilies, which is called “sacerdos simplex,” otherwise known as a simplex priest. Today, simplex priests no longer exist! So we are truly blessed that Fr. Casey was able to become a priest . . . along with two of his brothers.
He took his name from a sixteenth-century Spanish friar, a Franciscan named St. Francis Solanus. Both men liked to play the violin. Blessed Solanus may not have played well, but he loved to play alone before the tabernacle for God. Besides residing at the monastery in Detroit, he also lived in New York City, Huntington, Ind., Yonkers, N.Y., and again Detroit.
For over two decades Fr. Solanus happily worked as a porter, seen by some as a lowly job, answering the door at the monastery. He was found most of his life at St. Bonaventure’s in Detroit. Detroit is also where the Solanus Casey Center is located today.
Ordained Fr. Solanus at St. Francis of Assisi Parish on July 24, 1904, with his family in attendance, when he took the brown habit he was at perfect peace, with no doubts whatsoever about his vocation. Just as he was well liked in the seminary, his likability would carry over to his position as porter. When he greeted those who came, he was able to show God’s love in welcoming them and they felt it. They began coming to him in greater numbers, asking for prayer, counsel, and help.
In 1923 his superiors told him to begin keeping a record of the prayers that God answered. He was first sent to New York, then later called back to Detroit. Lines of people blocks long would assemble to speak with him. When he would eventually retire at age 76 in Indiana, despite his not being a porter anymore, people still found ways to communicate with him. He was always gracious, humble, and gentle.
He had suffered many years from a painful skin condition. He would eventually die of erysipelas, a bacterial skin condition not unlike cellulitis. On the 53rd anniversary of his first Mass of Thanksgiving following Ordination, he said his last words: “I give my soul to Jesus Christ.”
Pope St. John Paul II declared him venerable in 1995, and he was beatified in 2017 in Detroit. The miracle that qualified for his beatification involved the healing of another skin disorder known as ichthyosis, a genetic condition for which there is no cure. The healing occurred at his former monastery, St. Bonaventure, in 2012.
In researching reports of miracles associated with Fr. Solanus, one that occurred shortly before his death and was reported online via Catholic Exchange resonated particularly with me. A Mrs. Feighan had traveled to Huntington, Ind., all the way from Utica, N.Y., hoping to see him. You see, she had Rh-negative blood. Today this is not such an issue as it was when I was born in 1967. But this was 1957. Mrs. Feighan had one healthy baby, followed by a miscarriage and two stillborn babies. In women with RH negative blood, if the mother’s blood mixes with that of the baby — often Rh-positive blood — the mother’s body thinks there is a foreign “invader” and her system attacks the baby’s system. This ends the pregnancy. My mother’s first child was a miscarriage and there were some distress signals with me, but fortunately I was born, and my two brothers as well.
When Mrs. Feighan cornered a religious brother, he tried to put her off. After all, Fr. Solanus had been very ill. She begged, he tried again to say no. She looked terribly devastated. In the end he said he would ask…but he well knew Fr. Solanus never turned anyone away. She was brought to him and he welcomed her, asking her given name.
“Gladys.”
“Gladys, what do you want from God?”
“I want a baby. Another baby.”
“A baby! For a woman to want a baby — how blessed. To hold God’s own creation in your own hands.”
She mentioned to him about her RH factor and her worries that her deceased children were not baptized. He said:
“That’s not for you to concern yourself about. Just have confidence in our Lord’s infinite love.”
“Maybe I am selfish.”
“No, you are not selfish. For a woman to want children is normal and blessed. Motherhood entails so many responsibilities — bringing up a child as it should be brought up is doing God’s work. One doesn’t always meet women who want children.”
He was so ecstatic and spoke much of God’s love, finally asking Gladys to kneel so he could bless her and her family. He spoke: “You will have another child, Gladys. The Blessed Mother will give you another child. You must believe this with all your heart and soul. You must believe this so strongly that before your baby is born you will get down on your knees and thank the Blessed Mother [for her intercession]. Because once you ask her, and thank her, there’s nothing she can do but go to her own Son and ask Him to grant your prayer that you have a baby.”
Not long after, Fr. Solanus passed away. And in 1962, another miracle should have been added to his book, for Blessed Solanus Casey had won another miracle from God. Gladys Feighan and her husband had been given a precious gift — twins.
Fr. Solanus died in 1957. His feast day is November 3.
“Do not pray for easy lives; pray to be stronger people. Do not pray for tasks equal to your prayers; pray for powers equal to your tasks” — Blessed Solanus Casey.
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