Father Joseph Hennen, 69, hails from Ghent, Minn., where he and his four brothers and one sister grew up. He attended the Crosier House of Studies and St. Francis University in Fort Wayne, Ind., and was ordained a Crosier priest in 1967. He later worked for 22 years in an adolescent drug treatment program in Daytop, N.J. In 2003, Father Joe began assisting regularly during Christmas, Easter, and summer at St. Theresa in Kihei. He moved to Hawaii in 2008 and is the resident priest at Malia Puka O Kalani Parish in Keaukaha, Hawaii.
1. Can you name a challenge as a priest and how you dealt with it?
I had a tremendous crisis of faith in 1982. I was pastor of a huge parish in St. Paul, Minn. I was the finance person, the director, the CEO. I lost all sense of being a pastor and priest. I had nothing to give and wanted to give nothing. I took a leave of absence from the priesthood and started working with drug-abusing adolescents. I discovered these kids were asking profound questions about life, which I never asked myself. While their answers led to addictive behavior, their questions were still very personal and valid. Their questions became mine. Searching for answers led me to Christ in a refreshing way and back to priesthood.
2. Who is your role model?
When on leave, I needed to pay my bills. I saw an ad seeking a psychologist for a residential drug treatment program. I had a psychology master’s so I applied and got the job. Little did I know the program was started by Msgr. William O’Brien. I later discovered when he was a curate at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York, Msgr. O’Brien looked out the doors of the cathedral at the heroin addicts lying in the streets and said, “We have a mission beyond the pews of St. Patrick.” Though he didn’t know it, this visionary man was my mentor. More than anyone, I owe him the restoration of my priestly life.
3. Do you have any hobbies?
After nine years of priesthood, I developed a bleeding ulcer that hemorrhaged, nearly died and was in the hospital for three weeks. Before being discharged, the doctor told me I could never eat spicy food. When he left, my Indian nurse, said, “Father, it’s not what you eat; it’s what’s eating you. Get a hobby.” I took up antiquing and gardening. These remain my hobbies to this day, in addition to walking. I eat everything in sight, the spicier the better, and I have had no ulcer problems since that day.
4. Have a favorite Bible passage?
When I was ordained, the quote on my ordination card was “I came not to be served but to serve and to give my life for the ransom of many.” It is a paraphrase of Mathew 20:28. My entire priesthood is motivated by this phrase. Frankly, this motivates me to look beyond so much of the institutionalism with which I often struggle and gives me the greatest identification with Jesus. It helps me focus on my reason for being a priest.
5. Who is your favorite saint?
She’s not a saint yet, but Mother Marianne Cope is my favorite holy person. I have chronic lymphocytic leukemia. When I spoke with Bishop Larry four years ago about joining the diocese and told of my disease, he said, “You need a cure and Blessed Marianne needs another miracle for her canonization. Let’s get the two of you together!” That’s the first I’d heard of her. Since that day, she’s become my best friend. She’s one fantastic woman, who lived the words on my ordination card. I wish I could be half the person she was. I made a retreat to her Syracuse motherhouse and will go again soon.
6. What is your favorite book?
Besides the Bible, the book with the greatest influence on my life is Viktor Fankl’s “Man’s Search for Meaning.” I first read it as a seminarian. Frankl was an Austrian Jewish psychologist sent to Auschwitz. He was ready to give up until he came to the insight that “unless I have the why to live, I will never learn how to live” even in the hell of Auschwitz. By discovering his “why,” Frankl learned “how” to survive. The book has the same message for us, living in a camp of narcissism and selfishness that becomes a death camp. We need to discover the “why” to live, something or someone greater than what we see and hear. Only then will we learn to live serenely in the self-serving world. For me this “why” is Jesus, and I keep learning how to live in it and the church!
7. Have a favorite sports team?
The Minnesota Twins are a low-paid team but always struggling to be the best and always giving great players to the high-paid teams. One of these years they will take the World Series again. And the Minnesota Vikings! I am still crying! We should have been in the Super Bowl and won it.
8. What’s God’s best gift to you?
God has gifted me in so many ways but I will say my mother. I am about to turn 70 years old and I can still telephone my mother and be “her little boy.” At 96, her mind is very sharp and she still is able to live on her own. When things are going wonderfully for me she will rejoice with me. When I get down and struggle with life, she is still the mom that encourages and lifts me up. She is God’s greatest daily gift.