It breaks my heart to think that I actually have to get on the disgusting internet at a time when close friends of mine are suffering so. Who would want to post sensationalist reports on a public forum when close friends are grieving? Most unfortunately, I have to post on an internet forum in order to put out the unholy black fire sensationalist false reports have ignited.

"Pfeifferville" has NOT burned down. There are several buildings on this property. The family home, which did burn and is totaled; the chapel, which is untouched by fire; the priest's house, which is untouched by fire; the retreat house, which is untouched by fire; the little schoolhouse, which is untouched by fire; the barns and sheds and garage building, which are all untouched by fire.

The Lord touched only one building with a loving hand that orders all things by number, measure, and weight.

The mailbox is on the road at the bottom of a very long driveway. Of course it is still standing! To report that only the mailbox is still standing, in order to create the illusion that the whole farm burned down, is not from God. May God forgive the one who has done this thing.

Mr. and Mrs. Pfeiffer have a very comfortable roof over their heads, and a large family and circle of friends to support them. Their conduct yesterday, as well as the conduct of the entire congregation, was very edifying. They have not asked for any material assistance, though we are all trigger happy to start purchasing things. They need some time to process what has happened, to grieve, and to think about what they will do next. We will know more about what they need in the days to come.  

We were about 15 minutes before Holy Mass, praying the Rosary in chapel. Someone came in and alerted the congregation that the house was on fire. Everyone ran out. For the next two hours we all stood outside and watched the house burn while the firemen worked tirelessly to put the thing out. It would not go out. This is God's holy will.

Jesus Christ, in His Most Majestic and Real Presence, was only yards away while this event took place. He was in perfect control of the situation. He did not will to stop it. He willed what transpired, and His will is perfect wisdom.

In fact, many people, including Mrs. Pfeiffer, sat just outside the chapel to watch. Jesus watched with us and kept His hand on us while we stood watching in disbelief and shock. He arranged things so that everything would take place on a Sunday while His little sheep were gathered around Him for worship. The event was given to each of us. It belongs to all of us who were called there by God to witness. The entire circuмstance was nothing more or less than an extension of our worship of the Creator of Heaven and Earth.

Mr. and Mrs. Pfeiffer, their family members, and their friends all displayed perfect virtue throughout the ordeal. It was, on the whole, a very uplifting, though very sorrowful, experience - one I shall never forget. Indeed, I cannot get the images out of my mind.    

After a couple of hours, Fr. Voigt called us to Mass. We worshipped God with perfect resignation and tremendous confidence in His Providence. An excellent sermon was preached. Everyone understands that God is moving over the family and the property. Everyone is waiting with anticipation and confidence for the great good that will most certainly come out of this event.

God has obviously asked the Pfeiffer's for a sacrifice. Thus we must conclude that He has something in store, something to give that is much better than what He took away.

Let us take heart and rejoice with those who faithfully serve God in good and evil alike, even while sorrowing with those who sorrow. And, as Fr. Voigt said, let us have perfect confidence in God who is clearly rearranging things in order to bring forth His next great work. God will take care of the Pfeiffer's. There is no doubt.

It's all good.

To report that only the mailbox is still standing, in order to create the illusion that the whole farm burned down, is not from God. May God forgive the one who has done this thing.

Definitely. Thank you Cantate for keeping us informed. You are reliable.

Pablo is a Latino, they tend to exaggerate news. Normal operating procedure.

Does this mean Pablo is not the bulldog as he is made out to be?

Because our good Incredulous suspected exactly this for a long long time...

Pablo...

Back on topic: We too are including in our prayers the Pfeiffers, of course.

Quote

Father also tells me today is the feast day of the ordination of  Father Francis Hannifin, who was the first priest the family welcomed, when he refused to compromise with Vat II and the novus ordo.  The Angelus has the story quite beautifully.      
 
http://www.angelusonline.org/index.php?section=articles&subsection=print_article&article_id=2062

by Fr. John Timothy Pfeiffer
 
It wasn't long that my family had been going to the Traditional Mass, nor was I very old, but I had reached those discriminatory years permitting me to receive my first Holy Communion. It was a country parish out in the Kentucky sticks named St. Michael's and the pastor was a tall white-haired old man who at the moment was preparing for a funeral. He looked over and saw me standing around peering into the sacristy, and he told Jim the head altar boy: "Put that lad in a cassock, he'll carry the incense boat." I got into the cassock and followed them around for the ceremonies. We ended up going out onto the altar for Mass and my mother nearly fell over when she saw me processing out proudly with the rest of them without an idea in the world of how to serve Mass. When the boys knelt down, I knelt down and when they bent over I did, and when they started speaking Latin, I mumbled aloud in the best imitation I could muster. After everything was over, Fr. Hannifin looked at me and said: "You did well son, you're our new altar boy."
 
From that day forward I was an altar boy, and somewhere along the line I learned how to serve, as well as the other hidden traditions altar boys must pick up, such as how to "purify" the wine cruet after Mass: you did this when the priest wasn't looking and right down the old gullet. Good, merciful, kind and lenient priests taught you a lot in those days, and to my knowledge not one of his altar boys ever grew up to be a drunkard though none of us ever took the pledge. Fr. Hannifin used to explain to us in the sacristy how he had to take the pledge as a lad and how he had been a tee-totaller till the age of twenty-one. Looking back, I think that was his way of telling us he knew what we were doing and that we should keep it within just limits or he would administer the pledge to us as well. Fortunately for us, Fr. Hannifin wasn't like the priest who reputedly ran off Karl Marx after giving him a yelling in the sacristy over a similar altar boy incident.
 
 
Father's long walk up to the chapel
 
Father's parents were "greenhorns" straight over from the old sod. His father, James Hannifin, Sr. was a tall man from County Kerry and lived by the laws of the old school—he laid down the law. But at the same time he had the love of his family, which made his great affection for his children all the easier to express. His mother, Catherine Gallagher, was from County Clare. True to her Catholic culture she was deeply religious and full of life. A mother to the very core she was the true center of the home and was the ever-ready hostess always having company over. Together they had three sons and one daughter: James Jr., John, Ann and on April 28, 1912, Francis.
 






 
Highschool graduation photo
 


This completely Irish family lived the old Irish life and was always ready to lend a hand to fellow countrymen here or abroad. Often James Hannifin, Sr. would send over "passage" money for families that needed the backing to get over to America. Naturally, the tight bonds between the Irish were maintained and made the old country live in the ample Hannifin residence. It was located on Sigourney Street and the noise and laughter coming from the well-lit abode gave out that the Hannifins were home.
 
Like all good Catholic families from the old world, they knew how to have a good time. In that home one found music, conversation and visitors, so many visitors. Every weekend the latest arrivals from Ireland or perhaps only the regular neighborhood cronies would pop in and the house would rock with music, dancing and merriment. These weekly family gatherings consisted in plenty of songs and, of course, dancing. Since so many families in New England in those days were "greenhorns," fresh from the old country, dancing and singing were strong in their blood. In the old country Irish dancing was something a child learned with walking and speech, and so in the Hannifin home dancing and singing were something in which everyone participated.
 
Francis picked up quickly. It wasn't long before he could dance with the best of them, and by the teen years he was playing the fiddle. He loved an audience and folk tell of how he would throw back his head and laugh as he danced to the music. True to his Irish blood, he was no mean story-teller and where there was a crowd, you would find Frank in the midst of them.
 
When Francis's Aunt Lena fell ill with consumption, his two young cousins Ann and Helen, the one aged only two and the other a mere baby, were brought into the Hannifin household for Ma Hannifin to look after. The two forlorn little girls came into the warm Hannifin household, which very soon made their young lives happy again. Francis loved the little girls and never so much as lost his temper with them (he did have an Irish temper as many will testify). Like most boys in those days he had a paper route he religiously fulfilled, snow or sleet, rain or shine. He fashioned a chair onto the back of his sled into which he would put little Helen and pull her along Farmington Avenue as he delivered his papers. In the summer, the little lass would be seen trotting along his side peppering him with questions as he affably answered with a tall tale or two.
 
The time eventually came when Nancy and Helen grew older and more independent, enabling their father to take them back home to live with him, not too many miles away from the Hannifin homestead. But one thing the little girls noticed about Francis was that he was always with a book. To them it seemed he was always studying and they perceived how he was deeply set on the priesthood. It is true they would note, that he had a hard time in high school and especially had a very hard time passing Latin. But Irish never give up easily.
 
Like most young boys, too, he had a hard time resisting water. Venturing down to the Connecticut river one day, unapproved and unnoticed by elders, he and some buddies went skinny dipping in the river. An undertow took hold and Francis nearly drowned. "It put the fear of God in me." His miraculous survival inculcated obedience and left a strong impression that must have been seminal to his vocation. This "why me?" is often something that makes a young man consider again the destiny of his life. Why am I alive? Why did God give me this Providential gift? A possible reason comes up before the eyes of the soul and the quest for the vocation has begun.
 
"Let's go to the Hannifins'" must have been on the lips of many of the youngsters in those days. With his buddies in the neighborhood, Francis formed an impromptu band that played regularly each weekend in the Hannifin home. Francis played the fiddle, his sister Ann played the piano, and the other parts were played by the fellas. Irish dancing with story-telling and music was sure to fill the air in that happy place. But amid those healthy joys of healthy youth, deep down in his own soul, a little detail let it be known that he was destined for the priesthood. For though he was popular with the girls and many wanted to go out with him, he never did
 
He made his first essay at his vocation by trying a Franciscan community. Unfortunately, the Depression was at hand and because of it the family needed his help at home. Frank had to abandon plans to enter the Franciscan Novitiate in order to stay home to help out during those hard times. He went to work at the Underwood Typewriter Company in Hartford and ended up working there throughout the Depression. The Depression was something he often talked about. For instance, he often used to tell how one tea bag could make as many as ten cups of tea, and he even had me practice it several times. He could also deliver excellent impromptu sermons during dinner on the sin of wasting food and would conjure up the specter of starving children who would appreciate the smallest scrap of what some delinquent was prepared to cast away in his sumptuous pride.



Fr. Hannifin's First Mass (1945). His father, James, Sr., is in the center.
 
When the Depression was over, his father reminded him of the wishes of his mother who prayed God would make him a priest. So Frank Hannifin, nearing 30 years of age, re-applied for the seminary because the older age precluded his original religious aspirations. The Hartford diocese didn't need him, but there was desperate need in the diocese of Louisville, Kentucky, and so he was received into St. Mary's Seminary in Louisville and then sent for further training to St. Meinrad's, a Benedictine Monastery and Seminary on the other side of the Ohio River in Indiana. Frank wasn't the genius of the class, but the notes in the Bible he used then show his love for Scripture and his desire to serve God and save souls. He also contributed considerably to the entertainment, relying on his Irish up-bringing of the fiddle and the art of conversation. Naturally, his family and relatives were delighted when he came home for vacations and the old happy days could come back to life again. In those days, when seminarians went on their summer vacations, they often had to work to help pay their seminary tuition. So during his summer vacations Frank would work sometimes as an insurance agent and at other times at the Post Office.
 


Home for his first Mass in Hartford, CT, 1945.


Francis Michael Hannifin was ordained by Bishop Cotton on February 24, 1945, in Owensboro, KY, and put into action in the Louisville diocese. The life of the parish priest in those days prior to the Council was full of visits to the sick, chaplaincy of hospitals, confessions for the Sisters, catechism for the children, midnight runs for the last rites and the long grind of long, long hours in the confessional. Father often had to sit long hours in St. Augustine's, which was Louisville's black parish in those days, and he would often get upset when the white folk were always over taking up the confessional lines.
 
On the clergy side of things, Father always tended to associate with priests who were more inclined to seek after perfection. Fellow priests labeled Fr. Brown and Fr. Hannifin "the twins" because together they made a pair who were aspiring to fulfill the apostolic lessons of the great Canadian apostle of the clergy, Fr. LaCouture.
 
Fr. LaCouture was a French-Canadian priest who had done some studies in the US and so was familiar with a broad spectrum of the clergy. He was a man who had learned what the priesthood meant while on a lonely assignment in Alaska. He also preached the Ignatian Retreats with great zeal almost uniquely to clergy and religious during the late '40's and '50's. His fiery preaching to a clergy somewhat annoyed at the practical effects of the evangelical counsels got him sent away to serve the Indians in Northeastern Canada where he died sometime before the Council. Before his exile he had prophesied to the worldly clergy of his day that they would abandon their cassocks and find their churches empty in less than 20 years. His retreats in Pittsburgh drew Fr. Hannifin and Fr. Brown, and together they made a sort of society of friendship in which they tried to put into practice the teachings of Fr. LaCouture. No doubt that Father's endless generosity and freedom with his material goods was a direct result of his effort to practice the evangelical counsels in parish life. Fr. Hannifin most certainly fulfilled the prophesy of Fr. LaCouture, who always promised the clergy that they would never lack for anything if they were faithful and generous with regard to Lady Poverty.
 

 
Fr. Hannifin performed the marriage of his younger cousin, Helen, about one year after his ordination, February 16, 1946, in Hartford, CT.
 

Father drew his first pastorship at St. Michael's in Fairfield, Kentucky, starting there in 1961. When the Council opened in 1962 and closed in 1965, the Archdiocese organized deanery meetings in order to bring everyone up to speed. His first deanery meeting left Father disgusted and he never went back. While he didn't spend much time belaboring a theological argument, his instinct of faith enabled him to diagnose the problem and avoid the changes. Father remained firm in his attachment to the Traditional Mass and with the support of some faithful Catholics, St. Michael's became a center of attraction for those who wanted to stay faithful to the old Mass.
 
Shortly after Father's 25th anniversary, which took place in 1970 as the post-Conciliar revolution was gaining steam, Father sensed danger in the air and with his practical sagacity bought a mobile home. He understood that he was not going to follow the new direction the Churchmen were taking and he wanted to be ready to move out when the time came. That time wasn't long in coming. Shortly thereafter the bishop hinted at and prepared his transfer. Father knew that this was a move to dislodge the geographical monument to the old Mass that St. Michael's was becoming, and he could see that his fidelity to the Mass would only mean more and more transfers. Accordingly, being over 60, he opted to retire and did so retaining all his privileges.
 
The inevitable was to be expected; a priest, public man that he is, does not do things for himself alone and whither he goes, be it for good or for ill, he leads people along after him. And so Fr. Hannifin saw Providence guide him to a private farm upon which he parked his trailer and built a chapel on a little hill in Boston, KY. He named the chapel and the hill Our Lady of Mount Carmel, and the first Mass was said in the unfinished structure on bare floors on July 16, 1972.
 


Father knew how to handle sisters, and as he used to say: "Once a sister, twice a woman:"
Here Father offers Mount Carmel for some physical and spiritual R&R
for these Oblate Sisters of the Society of Saint Pius X.
 
There, the faithful remnant of his old flock was nourished and sustained Sunday after Sunday by the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and was healed in the confessional from their daily wounds. How well do I remember the old altar boy count-down as we would begin eyeing our watches at 9:00am—when Mass was supposed to begin—and waiting for the tell-tale sound of the old rusty fan to go off signaling Father's exit from the confessional. 9:05, :07, :10, still the fan didn't switch off. Finally the door creaked, the plug was pulled and the fan sputtered to its crooked, squawking stop. Father would enter the sacristy complaining how it was always the same people who showed up late, and then half-contritely recovering from his aggravation he would say while throwing on the amice and shaking his head: "People gotta get to the sacraments."
 

Mother Marie Christiane (center—Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre's sister) and her assistant visit Father in view of a possible Carmel in 1986.
 
Father would also make up for the crisis in the Church by giving several sermons each Sunday. The first was an extemporaneous commentary on the announcements including current events such as God's judgment on Carter or Brezhnev. The second came after the reading of the Epistle and the Gospel and the third was a florilege of thoughts and dicta suggested by the contents of the second sermon. Throughout his sermons Father definitely mastered a type of style seen somewhat in the Fathers of the Church, which was use of a type of paradox wherein they would expose two opposite poles of a problem. For Father it would come out like this: "I know we can't judge anyone, but if he (e.g., Kruschev) isn't in hell nobody is!" or "Comparisons are odious, but it's like this" There were entertaining interruptions such as when he would cry out loud: "Joe Bell Jr.! Wake up!" Or "You two boys in the front row! Knock it off right now!" We all learned how the fear of the Lord was the beginning of wisdom.
 


Pastoring isn't always easy but Fr. Hannifin with over 40 years of experience doesn't break a sweat.
Father drew faithful Catholics from all around. Here the Ulmers from Oregon visit on May 13, 1984,
to investigate moving closer to Father and the Mass.

In those '70's and '80's it was common for old diocesan buddies to come through and sit in discussion with Father. As the on-hand altar boy I would serve as a sort of butler to these little meetings and often it was said to him: "Frank, I haven't got the courage to do what you are doing." This meant that the fear of losing pensions, the uncertainty of where to live and the lack of conviction all combined to keep them away from such decisions as the great defenders of Tradition made. I can never forget the day in 1978 when Father was in conference with three of his priest friends in his trailer. I had just left to get some tea prepared and at that very moment the death of Pope Paul VI was announced over the radio. Dropping everything I made a dash for the trailer, burst into the living room without knocking and blurted out: "Father, Pope Paul VI is dead!" No sooner were the words out of my mouth than Father clapped both hands down hard on the arms of the chair, nearly bolted up out of his seat and cried out to the astonishment of his confreres: "Thank God!" He immediately gained possession of himself and offered up prayers for his soul: "He's got an awful lot to answer for." We all prayed with him.
 


Fr. Hannifin, the Pfeiffer family, and Raymond and Helen Graft,
the Old Guard choir finishing the usual long donut period after Sunday Mass.
Choir duty necessitates long refreshment periods after Mass.
Photo from the 1970's with the old chapel in the background.

A question we always ask the old-timers who have held the Faith is: "How did you do it?" And then we wait expectantly with notebook in hand for the answer that, like a magic potion, will keep us like them immune from falling away from the Faith and becoming ourselves cooperators in the universal evil. Some of the old-timers I've known have said: "I asked myself that too, and I chalk it up strictly to the grace of God. So many men I've seen better than me in the seminary and yet here I am and there they are." For his part Fr. Hannifin said: "I don't know." But then he would also say: "I don't know why they can't see it!"
 


During the priestly ordinations at Winona, MN, on June 25, 1994,
Father lays hands on another of his spiritual sons, Fr. Joseph Pfeiffer.

But I think we know. Father had a genuine love for souls and he would do anything for them. Throughout the younger years of his priesthood he was always seeking for ways to help them in whatever circuмstances they found themselves and in his latter years he was always available for everyone at anytime. How many times would a young man go to him for confession and he would grope for his stole, not find it and say: "The stole doesn't hear your confession, kneel down." It was something he had learned from his old pastors as he would often relate. A sick call at any hour was standard practice and in those sick calls he combined two virtues that sometimes can seem to oppose one another: an ease, openness, and kindliness towards the sick person from the moment of his entering their abode and a great reverence for the Blessed Sacrament he carried on his person. Father's genuine love for souls was certainly at the source of his fidelity to the sacraments of their salvation.
 




Preaching, preaching, and more preaching. Anyone trained by listening to Father's sermons considered a 45 minute sermon a short homily. Here he is in perfect form at his 50th.
 

A priest can never really function without a theological frame of mind and Father's centered around two great principles that he seized particularly well in his seminary days and which served him well throughout his priestly life: "Sacraments are for men" and "Epikeia." The first means that men have the right to the sacraments and that the priest is a man for the salvation of souls, therefore he must use the sacraments for their salvation, at least that's the seminary version. To be more precise, Father's oft-repeated version was "Sacraments are for the living" and it was interpreted more along the lines of "You can't give the sacraments to dead people! We have to get to them while they're still alive!" Very often this took the form of giving people "the benefit of doubt." Fr. Hannifin would always say: "If you're going to err, err on the side of mercy." He would always mention how the five years he spent under Fr. Gettlefinger, one of the most fervent and revered priests of the Louisville diocese, taught him more about the priesthood than he learned anywhere else.
 
Epikeia is a Greek word we learn in the seminary. Father would have it on his lips anytime he had to justify his so-called "disobedience" to the Bishop or he had to discuss ecclesiastical matters like jurisdiction with his fellow priests or inquisitive lay-folk. Epikeia means departing from the letter of the law when the letter of the law involves injury to the common utility or something against justice. This kind of thing happens because the letter of the law can't foresee every case, especially in difficult circuмstances such as the crisis of the Church presents. In such cases, the letter of the law is defective and one must act according to the virtue of Epikeia that guides a man according to the necessity of the common good. One can easily appreciate the extent of the God-given wisdom Father had by considering how he was able to apply this virtue though all his best friends and diocesan experts were following the so-called path of obedience to the detriment of the Church and countless souls.
 
This virtue also enabled him to make a cooperative link with Archbishop Lefebvre and the Society of Saint Pius X. Father was responsible for at least six vocations in the last 17 years as well as steering several priests to the family of Tradition. At the same time Father was benignly tolerated by the Diocese, which even went so far as to meet certain inquiries and criticisms with "We already have a Latin Mass, see Fr. Hannifin." Father was fearless with respect to his Bishop and the local clergy, yet at the same time congenial and respectful. He couldn't stand how they were destroying the Church and there was no way he was going to assist them in the process.
 







Fr. Hannifin ready for action. Here he gets ready to make a trip into town.

Faults he had, but his virtues outweighed them. Father was generous and warm-hearted. He proved in his life the old axiom of many a wise priest echoing St. Paul: give freely and you will receive freely, give and you shall not want. This generosity grew out of an inner love for poverty that he nourished throughout his priesthood and that most manifested itself in his detachment from things and in his confidence in Divine Providence.
 
Much could be written of Father's patience. Here the whole complexity of the admirable mix of patience and the Irish temperament makes one admire the grace of God. His patience transcended but did not destroy an Irish explosiveness that manifested itself at times. Never was Father in finer form of eloquence than when he was thoroughly stirred up and the most memorable sermons he ever delivered were against abuses and, when a little red in the face, the vocabulary was apt to move souls away from evil and towards the fear of the Lord. On the other hand, he could sit and converse with someone for a long time, listen to problems and willingly be held back from dinner to attend to someone's needs. Father would often stop what he was doing to repair a kite, bless a dog, and unknot a rope or a rosary. Little things like that endeared Father to people and made the explosiveness all the more effective.
 
Humility was another of Father's outstanding virtues. He never tried to hide his faults and he never put on airs as if he thought he was the sole defender of Faith in the diocese or anything pretentious. He had a profound spirit of contrition and he was always begging God at the altar to have mercy on him, sometimes in loud accents that passed beyond the circle of priest and altar boy. He never begrudged a criticism (at least most of the time and in most circuмstances), and would very often humbly admit a fault when brought up to him, easily and sincerely apologizing and making amends.




The dynamic duo. So different yet such a great team. Monk and Pastor process in for the Ordinations of June 1989. Fr. Urban Snyder (left) and Fr. Francis Hannifin (right).

Joyfulness and ease of conversation were his hallmarks. Despite this, to go shopping with Fr. Hannifin was an ordeal of patience—for his driver that is. From parking the car to walking to the store front meant meeting people whom Father would know and inevitably enter conversation with. Once within, there would be several more such encounters all the way up to the clerk, who most likely was known to Father either personally or per relatives (rural Kentucky is big on relatives). Upon leaving the store, the return through the parking lot to the car had to be negotiated and more pedestrians cordially greeted and conversed with. One return trip sticks out in my mind. It was just after I had gotten my license and Father had purchased a new car. Father directed me to the local four-laner. We had just gotten on the Bluegrass Parkway when Father turned to me and said: "Go a little faster." So I eased it up to around 65 and more. "Go ahead, go a little faster. Yes, I like the feel of a new car." I upped the speed more. As a new driver I was a little nervous, but as an altar boy I had a moral question: "Father, isn't it a sin to speed?" Father paused a moment, then said: "Nah, every once in a while you've got to clean out the carburetor." Needless to say, I've tried to keep my carburetors clean.
 
But the Pastor—this is what Father was and meant most of all. The man who didn't abandon his sheep. The man who was always there—who even if he didn't say anything gave the gift of his presence and the security of his stability. One need not fear for his soul, the Pastor is there. One need not fear there would be no Mass this Sunday, the Pastor is there. One need not worry about the Sacraments for the old grandfather or grandmother, the Pastor is there. Take away the Pastor and the Mystical Body that is a parish, even if its members are spread over a radius of two hours, that body becomes fearful and scattered. Such a Pastor can be compared to electricity in the modern home. When it is present it is never noticed and is taken for granted. When it is lost, security and safety vanish and the days till its return are nervously counted.
 


The inestimable value of the Pastor doesn't stop there but goes further because in this man the faithful find their identification with the past and their promise of the future. The firm anchor in Catholic Tradition that a faithful man of God is provides the greatest strength in the souls of the young and a most powerful argument for their own connection to Christ. The tenacity of the old Pastor becomes mystically their own tenacity to hand down themselves what they have received from the very hands that confessed and blessed them. We Catholics are not people spawned from outside of history, but we receive the promise of Redemption down the ages through the living flesh and blood men who baptize and catechize, inspire and reprove us.
 
Sometimes people live at a distance from the priest and differ in their opinion about him according as their first impression goes. Some think he's a saint and others think he's a sinner. But whether you live closer to the priest or further away, it's wise to remember the Simon-Peter principle. This principle explained by Archbishop Fulton Sheen is that every priest is like his prototype Simon Peter. Sometimes the Simon comes out, and he's ready to cut off somebody's head, utter a bad word or seek after the highest place. Sometimes the Peter comes out, and then the "feed my lambs, feed my sheep" comes through and Jesus Christ working through His minister is recognized. Every priest has in him a good deal of Simon with the divinely infused substrate of Peter.
 


Father's long extended thanksgivings after Mass became a bout with pain.  Foregoing the use of his usual post-Missam booklets, Father would simply pray to God to alleviate his pain.
 
One day not so many years ago at a celebration, a little girl of nine or so was sent on an errand for the old Pastor and so fulfilling this duty of charity she came up to Father to give him a piece of pie. He looked into the girl's eyes and with years of pastoral experience he patted her on the head, blessed her and said: "God bless you my dear child." Coming from the old priest and going straight through the eyes of the young girl into her soul went words and thoughts that made a mark on that girl's soul. A mutual exchange of impressions took place, the girl conveying an inner sadness and the old priest sensing that sadness in her. The old Pastor said to her: "Always remember God loves us and I'll say a Hail Mary for you every day until I die." Those words and that promise resound to this day in that child's now teen-aged soul. The strong pull of grace through the thin cord of human contact made real by the pat on the head by the old Pastor still has a power of convincing her of the all present and merciful God who is ever looking out for us. And that contact of old Pastor to that little girl still leaves its impression. The old Pastor was—and still is— there for her.
 


Praying the Office for the Dead for Fr. Hannifin are (left to right),
Frs. Timothy Pfeiffer, Joseph Pfeiffer, and Steven Soos.
 
Old Pastors are hard to replace and they can easily be forgotten. Father often would say that no one is more forgotten than a deceased priest. Though he passed away on January 15, 2001, let us not forget him. We must be mindful that whatever our old Pastors do, all they give is ultimately the gift of God. To God, therefore, we are grateful. But the glance back over the past must keep us straight for the future. Few as the old faithful Pastors are, their testimony to the Faith is for that all the more powerful, just as a candle in a dark cave shines more brightly than in a well-lit room. For the rest, we will account ourselves blessed if we can follow in their footsteps, handing down to ours what they handed down to us.
 
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Fr. John Timothy Pfeiffer was born in Miami, Florida, in 1965 and raised in Kentucky. When his family began attending Mass at St. Michael's in Fairfield, Kentucky, in 1970, he became one of Fr. Hannifin's altar boys. The Pfeiffer family moved into the country in 1974, and at the same time Fr. Hannifin retired from the Diocese, built the Chapel of Our Lady of Mount Carmel on their property and took up residence there. Fr. Timothy and his brother Fr. Joseph Pfeiffer were both sponsored through the seminary by Fr. Hannifin. He was ordained on June 24th, 1989, and is presently stationed in El Paso, TX, performing there the duties of Novice Master for the Novitiate of the Brothers of the Society.

 

Pablo, pay them no attention.  

It is upsetting to hear of any one's home burning to the ground.

Our thoughts and prayers are with the Pfeiffer family.

I got the impression Pablo only talked about the house, not of the adjourning buildings.

I edited the thread title. After sending an email yesterday to many locals (Fr Tim is a former pastor here), I thought I was about to have to retract it. I understood sufficiently well from the original announcement that it was only the home which had burned.