I don’t recall ever giving much thought to the existence of Holy Men. At age sixty five, this world, which can be so very beautiful in so many ways, can wear on you, turning you cynical. Perhaps living that life in Chicago, where wise guys abound and where the greatest crime is being a chump, has made me more so. I did know a lot about the big hitters in the Holy Man game: Jesus, John the Baptist, Gandhi, et al. Twelve years of Catholic schooling, four of those in a minor seminary, will give you almost lethal exposure to the lives of the saints, the sacraments of the church, and the rules of the road as set forth in the Baltimore Catechism.  But Holy Men? Didn’t think much about them.

The Minor seminaries in 1960’s Chicago, high schools really, were two schools, both gone now. Quigley North was the overcrowded original, back in the days when every mother prayed for at least one of her sons to take up the cloth. In my case, my grandmother was putting money away for my chalice when I was fourteen. The money later served as a down payment for a 1965 Plymouth, my first car, but that’s another story.

The Diocese, happily seeing no end of future priests, and not foreseeing the seismic changes to religious life which would be brought on by Vatican II, decided to build a second, larger seminary/high school on the South side. That was, aptly, Quigley South, and that was my school, even though I lived on the west side. Both schools were designed to capture religious vocations early, and the attrition rates were high, as each class was evaluated yearly by the faculty for priestly worthiness. I never got caught, somehow.

Over time, as the alumni aged into old men, the Quigley you attended and exactly when you attended seemed to matter less and less to those who carried the torch of reunions for all of us. There was something about having gone to Quigley, to have once aspired to the priesthood, which drew you into a common bond with your fellow once-seminarians, and you were invited.

And so it was that on a December night in 2014, I accepted the invitation from this loose confederation of alumni, whose criteria were that you once attended one of the Quigleys and that you were still alive. I met the group in the bar of The Greek Islands on south Halsted. It was warm, welcoming, with men who might have been strangers a moment before shaking your hand and asking which school, what year, did you know this person or that, whatever became of so-and-so. After cocktails, it was family style dinner, and seating was random.

There was a big man on my right, friendly face, but a little reserved. He was dressed in jeans, work shirt, and a sort of hunter’s vest. He had a bushy head of brownish grey hair and bushier moustache. While the others and I talked about our careers, retirements, grandchildren and told stories we had told a dozen times to a group that still wanted to hear them again, this fellow smiled, asked questions, asked others to expand on their stories.

Later, he spoke briefly of a few places he had been in his travels, and they weren’t places I had been. Cuba, Guatemala, North Africa. I wondered what business he had been in, to take him to such exotic locations. He mentioned that he now lived in Cicero, a suburb once known as the center of mob rule in Chicago, but these days just a down on its luck blue collar suburb. Curious, considering the Quigley crowd tended to be pretty affluent and lived at much tonier addresses. When he got up to use the facilities, my friend John across the table mentioned that the big fellow, also named John, had always been admired by his classmates. Several readily agreed. One pointed out that he had been the president of his class.

After he took his seat again, it seemed to me that, in a quiet way, he seemed to be almost presiding over the get together. Not in any overt way, but by his manner, which was sort of “favorite uncle by way of the favorite teacher you remembered”. He exuded a sort of care for all of us and in no way did he try to dominate the talk. His did not talk with his hands, nor use any body language that said “OK, now it’s my turn.” I noticed that others at the table would occasionally look his way and give a sort of unofficial salute, a nod of approval, a small sign of being glad to be in his company. They were proud of him, somehow.

It became nine o’clock and old men don’t party till dawn. As we began to break up, I said to my friend John, “Funny, you don’t see lot of ordained priests at these things, just lay people like us.”

“Just two tonight.” The guy down on the end, who I don’t really know, and of course, the bishop, sitting next to you.”

I was speechless for a moment. “That guy was a bishop?” Suddenly it all made sense. The travels to different mission lands, the Cicero rectory, the pastoral manner, the esteem in which the group seemed to hold him.

I caught up with the Bishop outside as we awaited our cars from the valet. “Nice party”, he said. “And it was nice to meet you, also.”

I replied in similar fashion and we made small talk about the weather, Greek Town in the old days, the White Sox. His car arrived first and he shook my hand and wished me a Merry Christmas.

“And you too, Eminence,” I said.

He turned as he got in his car, a small smile. Was he pleased I had recognized his Office, or irritated that I wouldn’t let him take the night off from his job? Did I even get the title right for a bishop with “Eminence”? (I got it wrong, it was Excellency, but I wouldn’t have gotten that out with a straight face.)

Driving home, it occurred to me that you simply don’t meet all that many people in life who seem to project that kind of pastoral good will, that priestly concern, and that warmth without a hint of judgment. Was I in the presence of a Holy Man? I think maybe I was. Maybe that’s why they made him a bishop….even the Catholic Church gets it right, now and again.