Fr. Cedric Pisegna, CP’s, program, Live with Passion! is on the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN). It airs Sundays at 8 a.m. ET, and 5 a.m. PT. Click to visit Fr. Cedric’s website for more information…
Chaplains and Spiritual Directors
Fr. Simon Herbers, Hospice Chaplain
Being present to a person in the final stages of their life is a sacred trust. As physical life draws to a close, a different kind of life begins. It may be a time of solitude or a period of great intimacy with family, friends, and of course, with God.
Throughout the process of dying, there may be feelings of anger, denial, grief, resignation, or acceptance. Whatever the process, each person approaches death differently.
For Fr. Simon Herbers, CP, it is a privilege to minister to those who have entered into hospice care. “Dying is a part of the normal process of living,” he says, “but it is also the most sacred time of a person’s life.”
When it is determined that medical treatment has been exhausted and a patient’s life expectancy is diminished, the focus shifts from curing disease to maintaining the quality of remaining life. A team of professionals—doctors, nurses, social workers, dieticians, and chaplains—all work together to provide the hospice patient with care that supports their physical, psychological, emotional and spiritual needs. Fr. Simon has worked as a volunteer with the Houston Hospice and Palliative Care System since 1991. Now in his 80’s, he says that sometimes he gets up and he doesn’t feel great. But then he gets the call to come and minister to someone in need, and he feels energized.
“You know, Our Lord talks about the poor, the broken-hearted. You can have the richest man in the world, but at that point, he may be rich in suffering only.” Fr. Simon feels he is treading on holy ground in being present to those who are dying. When you get advanced in years,” he reflects, “it’s all spiritual.”
Think Life
Fr. Simon entered his ministry to hospice patients after his own recovery from colon cancer. He went through a year of chemotherapy after surgery and attended cancer support groups, an experience that helped him to empathize even more with the sick and dying. He recalls that some years later, a fellow group member confessed to him, “When you walked into the group for the first time, I thought ‘he won’t make it.’” “I guess I proved her wrong,” he says with a chuckle.
In addition to ministering to hospice patients, Fr. Simon works in elder care and publishes a newsletter for seniors called “Think Life.” The title says a lot about who Fr. Simon is. To talk with him is to hear a priest of vibrant spirit who embraces life and hope, even in the face of death, and who is very grateful for the opportunity to serve in a ministry that is very much about the Passionist way of reaching out to all with compassion.
Passionist Partners Blog
A meeting place for Passionist Partners…
CPP Member Handbook
Purpose of Members’ Manual
Community of Passionist Partner members have been identified as one of the stewards of the Charism of St. Paul of the Cross and as such must continue to develop as Christians and as members of a community. CPP is an integral part of Holy Cross Province.
Community of Passionist Partners
We Partners formally commit, for a specific period to time, to share in the charism of Saint Paul of the Cross through a contemplative prayer life, ongoing spiritual formation, and profession of the message of Christ Crucified.
We feel that we have a unique organization which is affiliated with the Passionist community on many levels, not the least of which is sharing our covenant with professed religious as well as laity. We gather, professed and laity, in our common vocation of baptism, and in our common goal, to understand and profess the profound good news of Jesus’ Gospel.
We are a community of believers, of seekers and of people who care about a suffering world. We find meaning in the Passion of Jesus and we explore new ways of following in the footsteps of St. Paul of the Cross.
For more information contact:
Fr. Arthur Carrillo, CP
[email protected]
People Profiles
Hear from CPPs about their relationship to Jesus’ Passion…
Ken Schmitt
Ken Schmitt
Head of Nashville’s Community of Passionist Partners
Ken Schmitt moves people.
In the corporate world, he oversees relocation projects for United Van Lines, so getting people and companies from point A to point B is his specialty. He’d never say it himself, but it’s clear that he is extremely good at his job…
This isn’t the only way he moves people, however. Ken Schmitt is a person of incredible dynamism who cares deeply about the Passionists and their ministries, and each day he translates that energy into service towards others. His level of enthusiasm and commitment can’t help but invigorate others.
“In my mind and heart I have always wanted to be involved with the Passionist Community. So many Passionists have influenced my life. I feel as if I have been part of the Passionist Community since the day I was baptized.”
Throughout the years Ken has been a faithful contributor to the Passionists both in time and treasure. He was the force behind the founding of the Community of Passionist Partners in Nashville. Some years ago Ken had a kind of epiphany at a Passionist Mass that was particularly moving. “I realized that I needed to bring the Passionist charism to people in Nashville, and that was the beginning of our chapter of the Community of Passionist Partners.”
The CPPs are a group of vowed religious and lay people who enter into a spiritual covenant to study and promote the charism of Passionist founder, St. Paul of the Cross.
Today, the Nashville CPPs are an especially vibrant and diverse group. In addition to their ongoing spiritual formation, they are actively involved in several outreach efforts. They continue to provide support for troops in the 101st Airborne Division currently serving in Iraq, and they have met with state leaders urging them to advocate for additional monies to improve education, health care, nutrition and agriculture for the very neediest people in developing countries.
Reaching out to those who are suffering is at the core of the Passionist charism. Ken Schmitt has made a personal commitment to share this charism, and would gladly move heaven and earth to do so. Before heading off to his next project, he adds, “We need to spread God’s love wherever we go, to whomever we meet.” And knowing Ken, that’s a promise he’ll keep.
Deacon Manuel Valencia
“My whole spirituality, everything, my studying for the diaconate, everything for me is framed by the Passionist charism. There is no other way for me to see my spiritual growth or my prayer life or even the diaconate other than through this prism of the Passionist charism.”
Sharing Our Stories
So what is it about us that still connects you to us as Passionists?
There was time when I thought that being a Passionist meant having to wear the habit and the sign and follow the rule book —and that unless one did all of these things, one was not truly a Passionist. I thought being a Passionist meant living simply—to get up in the morning after sleeping in a very simple cell, on a wooden bed, on an old army surplus mattress. Over the years I have come to the realization that all of that is not the essence of being a Passionist. I am still understanding as I get older what the essence of being a Passionist is.
For me, certainly, the signature logo of the Passionists is their sign and after that, the gift the Passionists have that continues to attract me is, proclaiming Christ crucified. My attraction to Passionists is still in the whole realm of retreats, of silence, and the contemplative aspect of it. Dying to oneself in that silence and trying to understand who Christ crucified is, brings about the centrality of the cross in my life. Christ crucified is more easily heard here, so that I can go back into a very noisy, busy, buzzing world to proclaim Christ crucified by how I live.
The Passionists have changed along the way, and I think that’s important. It’s certainly the missions and the retreats that keep me connected. There is also embracing the suffering of the world more, embracing the poor, the homeless, which makes the Passion more relevant. Passionists’ understanding of Christ’s suffering in the world today is constantly evolving, moving them to understand more deeply and live the Passionist life in a radical way. I can see this, and I can take part of this understanding with me wherever I go. Others like me, who learn from the Passionists, gain a deeper understanding of the Passion and make it their own. That is what is really important to the Passionists.
How has the Passionist charism affected the way you pray or the development of your prayer?
One of the dimensions that has become more and more meaningful to me has been silence, has been making personal, silent retreats. I have come to the Retreat Center for a week at a time or more, to be alone and be absolutely in silence, to fast and to learn how to pray better. Learning how to pray better for me has meant using fewer words, to the point now that I use no words, simply wordless prayer — simply sitting in centering prayer and being utterly in silence. There are moments when it can be terrifying. Silence can be thunderous.
The words of Paul the Apostle, “I am crucified with Christ, it’s no longer I who lives, but Christ who lives in me” were once lovely, poetic lines. Now when I sit in silent prayer, in contemplative prayer, there is part of me, the ego, that is dying, and I’ve learned what those words mean now. The ego is crucified with Christ, it’s no longer the ego that lives, but it is Christ who lives in me and that has come through just hours and hours of being in silence and learning how to pray in silence, with Paul of the Cross, in contemplative prayer, solitary prayer. From that, I am learning how to live in community with my Passionist partners, to proclaim Christ crucified.