Friday morning, we went to the Solanus Casey Center in Detroit, the first time since the new vistor’s center had been completed.

I rather liked it – the display did a nice job of explaining his life and work, and had some interesting artifacts on display, including one of the small notebooks he kept, recording the prayer petitions and needs of the thousands who came to see him. I thought there was nice art – interesting tile renditions of the Works of Mercy, large figures of saints etched in glass, although the life-size figures of Dorothy Day, Catherine Doherty, et al, arranged at the door representing the Beatitudes, were kind of freaky and would definitely be so at night.

For those of you not familiar with the story of Solanus Casey – get familiar. He’s a prime example of God working around and through and despite human short sightedness. The short version is: Solanus Casey was a miserable seminary student, not, it seems because he lacked intellectual ability, but rather because he was behind in his formal education and found himself in seminaries where he had to deal all day, not only with Latin, but with German (this was in Wisconsin, and he was of Irish heritage). The Capuchins finally agreed to ordain him, but as a simplex priest – he could not hear confessions nor preach doctrinal sermons.

So, he spent most of his life as a priest serving as a porter in the various friaries to which he was assigned, first in New York, and then in the Midwest, including our own Huntington, Indiana. (That friary was sold by the Capuchins and is now owned by an evangelical denomination….)

And as a porter, his days were devoted to…what? Listening to people. Giving those who came to the doors of the churches and friaries comfort, advice and prayers. Not to speak of healing at times.

Sort of ironic, I’d say.

(By the way, in case you’ve never heard this story, Michael credits Solanus Casey with interceding to save his life one stormy night on a highway outside Louisville. Joseph’s middle name is Bernard – Casey’s baptismal name [as well as the name of one of Michael’s grandfathers’, I believe.]).