Alumni Reunion 2008

The annual alumni reunion for Conception Seminary College was held last Friday and Saturday, September 26-27. I'm not sure of the number attending but I think there were about 65-70 alumni here for some part of the of the two days. There was a lecture on Friday afternoon at 3:00 P.M. and then Mass was celebrated at 4:30 PM. At the conclusion of the Mass the "Distinguised Alumni Award" was given for this year. This year it was given to Sam Cline who attended school here 1974-78. He and his wife, Carol, were here to accept the award. The Mass was celebrated by Father Daniel Petsche, O.S.B., Prior of Conception Abbey.

After the Mass there was reception held in the lower plaza area outside of St. Raphael Welcome Center and then a banquet was held in the guest dining room in St. Joseph Hall. Later in the evening refreshments were available in St. Michael Hall.

Abbot Gregory arrived home from Rome and the meeting of Abbots on Friday evening.

Pictures posted up above: All three photos were taken at the reception following the Mass. Two are general pictures and the third is of Sam Cline and his wife Carol, along with Fr. Kenneth.

To enlarge any of the pictures, click on it.

To see a few more photos of the alumni reunion go to

http://kennethosb.smugmug.com/gallery/231360_txGmj/7/382234307_DxotD/Medium

Busy Fall Season

Accord-

ing to infor-

mati0n that I have from the internet the fall or autumn season officially begins today, September 22, at 10:48 AM Central Daylight Time. So that's about the time I am writing this.

As usual for us the fall season turns out to be a rather busy time. We had three or four groups of retreatants here this past weekend. This evening we have about 75-80 priests coming from the Archdiocese of Kansas City, Kansas for their annual continuing education workshop. They leave on Thrusday and then Friday and Saturday we have our annual alumni reunion. So you can see the guest house keeps rather busy this time of year, especially making beds, cleaning rooms, bathrooms etc. Soon after that we will be having Family Weekend for the students and then after that the Kansas City-St. Joseph priests come for a continuing education workshop.

I am again including a couple more older pictures in this blog. Sitting at his desk in his room is Father Patrick Cummins, O.S.B., a famous scholar in our community for many years. He died in 1968 but taught many of the "old timers" who went to school at Conception. The other picture is a young picture of then Frater Jerome Hanus, O.S.B. Later on in 1977, as Father Jerome, he was elected abbot of our community and in 1987 was appointed bishop. He is presently the Archbishop of Dubuque, Iowa.

This past weekend was an off campus weekend for the students. They were all due to be back last night.

That's it for this time. Let us keep each other in prayer.

Fr. Kenneth

Lots of rain again

This time on the blog I decided to use a couple of older pictures that I had available. On the left is a picture of Brother Godfrey and Brother Thaddeus. Both are now deceased but they were great friends and for many years provided flowers for the church on feast days. We had a green house at the time and they always had poinsettas ready for Christmas and lilies ready for Easter. The other picture is of Abbot Stephen and myself when I was serving as Abbot Stephen's secretary. Yes, that's me at the typewriter. The picture was taken about 1960 or 1961. Abbot Stephen died of cancer in November, 1961. I continued to serve as secretary for Abbot Anselm for about a year before being sent over to the seminary to work as a prefect.

We had lots of rain again last Friday -- about three inches. Not far from here in other parts of the state they had as much as five, six or eight inches. So many rivers and streams are out and there is much flooding and many road closings. Just this morning I looked at the map of Missouri roads that are closed and through central and eastern Missouri there are many.

Fortunately, despite the heavy rain on Friday they were able to have the seminary and soccer tournaments on Saturday and Sunday. I believe about six seminaries participated in the tournaments. I understand Conception Seminary College won the championship in the soccer tournament and Mundelein Seminary in the Chicago Archdiocese won the championship in the volleyball tournament.

Yesterday the annual golf classic was held in Kansas City. It was a beautiful day for that and I'm sure it was well attended. It is a day when the Serra Clubs in the Kansas City area honor priests and seminarians and make money for the seminary. It is sponsored by the Serra Clubs on the Missouri side (Kansas City-St. Joseph diocese) and the Kansas City, Kansas side (Kansas City, KS Archdiocese).

Let us continue to pray for vocations to the priesthood and religious life.

Fall is just around the corner

Yesterday evening we had a beautiful sunset so I took a couple pictures. In case you live someplace where you never see the sunset you can look at these to cheer you up. In the meantime it feels like fall is coming. We have had some cool days and cool nights. Last night I think it got down in the 40's so it was a little cool this morning. It is only in the 60's this afternoon but at least the sun is shining so it feels good. I just came back from a nice walk. Walking outdoors is so much more interesting than walking on the treadmill.

Monday morning Abbot Gregory left for Rome. Every four years all the Benedictine abbots of the world have a meeting in Rome. This is the year for such a meeting. They usually meet for about ten days or two weeks. The meetings are held at Sant' Anselmo in Rome, the International Benedictine College.

This week we have the Episcopalian priests from the diocese of West Missouri meeting here at Conception. They come every fall for such a meeting. I believe they are here until Thursday. This coming weekend we have a number of seminarians from other seminaries coming here for a soccer and volleyball tournament. I believe there will be over a hundred here for that.

Otherwise there is not much new to report on.

Let us pray for one another.

Labor Day Weekend

On Monday afternoon, Labor Day, I went for a good walk. I was out in the area of the orchard and took a picture of a couple of pear trees we have there. You can see there are a good number of pears on the trees this year. Then also, the apple trees seem to have a pretty good crop this year. Last year we had no fruit at all on any of our trees as we had such cold weather in the latter part of the spring and everything got frozen.

Also, on Labor Day the students had a Day of Recollection. It began Sunday evening with a Holy Hour and concluded with vespers yesterday evening. The day was conducted by Bishop Robert Finn, our own bishop of the diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph. After the day of recollection the students and monks had a picnic together on the plaza area between St. Joseph and St. Michael Hall. I did not get any pictures of the picnic.

This past weekend we had very few guests here and no retreats. From now on every weekend is pretty well filled with retreatants and even during the week we have some groups coming to use our facilities. Both the priests of the Kansas City-St. Joseph diocese and the priests of the Archdiocese of Kansas City, Kansas will each be here for three or four days for continuing education.

The weather has continued to be very comfortable and we have had a couple of small rains so the grass is staying green.

Wednesday of this week, September 3, is Abbot Gregory's nameday. So keep him in prayer, especially that day.

Let us all keep one another in prayer.