Friday when we were not taking classes and during
the evening we had study hall and would work on our assignments.
Learning all the vocabulary and the grammar for our Latin class
was the most difficult task and it really trained our memory.
Father Louis was our first-year Latin teacher and learning grammar
helped us not only with English but with all the liberal arts
of reading, writing, speaking, and listening because we came
to reflect upon all the grammatical ways of our language.
I,1.3 Our alma mater’s Vital Nourishing
“I came to give you life and to give it to you more abundantly.”
Those words of Jesus were the basis of our life at the Angel Mount.
Spiritual love, intellectual light, moral life, and physical logos
all fit together in such a way so as to contribute to each other.
Like tributaries of the same stream that contribute to living waters
theological, intellectual, moral, and physical virtues were forms
of excellence nourishing the fresh seeds in that seminary seedbed.
Those moral virtues of prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance
were very important for future priests for they would have to be
excellent examples of those virtues that their people might imitate them.
The exercise that was most focused on growth in moral virtue
was our practice of weekly confession with our own confessor.
The virtue of temperance or self-control was central to confession.
Week after week I would tend to confess the same vices or sins,
of getting angry, swearing, or indulging in uncharitable thoughts,
words, or deeds and I just did not have consistent self-control .
We learned of a self-realization ethic that we could be happy
if we were virtuous for virtues are means to happiness.
This self-realization ethics for seminarians also aimed at
an other-realization ethics for priests loved as good shepherds
attempting to bring their flock to a healthy, happy, holy life.
We had to grow in vitality that we might help others do the same.
People tend to be so incompatible that they cannot be happy
and be at peace together and living closely with one another brought
many opportunities for disgust at each other’s strange tastes.
We were often told about the battle between the flesh and the spirit
in St. Paul’s letter to the Galatians in which he wrote:
You cannot belong to Christ Jesus
unless you crucify
all self-indulgent passions and desires.
We had to become free from sin to be free for serving others.
I,1.4 Our alma mater’s Physical Nourishing
At Mt. Angel we were nourished in the heart’s love, the mind’s
wisdom, the soul’s moral virtue, and the body’s physical strength.
Building up good habits of physical exercise was part of
our seasonal and daily routine. In the fall we played football,
in the winter basketball and we trained for boxing, and in spring
we had track and field and we were each on a softball team.
We often heard about a strong mind in a healthy body and to that
was added a warm heart and a virtuous self-sacrificing soul.
The monks imitated Jesus in all of that and their very lives
of poverty, chastity, and obedience let each of us know their love.
Even as freshmen we were told about cardiovascular exercise
and at the football field we would run around the track until
we were perspiring profusely and lift weights and stretch.
We would practice passing and catching the football and blocking.
In High school we had about eight football teams with
members from each of the four classes and we would compete
to see who won at the end of the season as we also did in basketball.
For the first three years I did not really understand what was
demanded to be really competitive in track and field even though
I was very interested in running and jumping especially because
I had delighted in my father’s high school annuals, and he
was a star athlete in all sports, but especially in the half mile.
With him when I was six years old I had already started
learning to box when he taught boxing at Carey High School.
So already as a freshman I was eager not only to play
basketball during the winter but also to train for boxing.
Father Louie called it the manly art of self-defense and
we had great fun sparring with each other and learning
how to work the rapidfire punching bag and even skipping rope.
That was the main thing about sports for me—they were lots of fun.
Play is fun and we did play football, basketball, and baseball.
I,1.5 Father Bernard and the Spiritual
Father Bernard Sander was the rector of the minor seminary
and as the person in charge of everything he primarily
concentrated on making sure each of us got deeply involved
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