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vocations spring from faith nurtured in families

Story and photos by LIZ QUIRIN
Messenger editor

Two mothers, whose children grew up in different parts of the diocese, saw their offspring decide at roughly the same time, to make a decision to pursue vocations in the church for their life’s work.

Mrs. Pauline McGuire, 97, of Ridgway and Mrs. Mary Hitpas, 95, of Carlyle talked about their respective children and their decisions to pursue their dreams through a commitment to the church.

For 40 years, the McGuires belonged to St. Patrick Church in Pond Settlement, known as Ponds in Gallatin County in southeastern Illinois.

Other McGuire children include Bob, Carol, Chuck and Fred.
“Out of that little parish, three priests and 11 sisters came from there,” Mrs. McGuire said.
Mrs. McGuire’s daughter, Kathleen, became an Adorer of the Blood of Christ, and in 1992, she was one of five Adorers killed in Liberia during that country’s bloody civil war.

When she was a little girl, Kathleen — folks called her Kay — she went to the country school, and during the summers the “Precious Blood sisters” taught a two-week summer school at the parish.
“She fell in love with them,” her mother said.

At about the age of 10, Kathleen told her mother she wanted to go to the convent and become a sister.
“I didn’t believe her,” Mrs. McGuire said. “Kids change their minds all the time,” so she assumed Kathleen would too.
When she left at 13 to go to Ruma, Mrs. McGuire thought she might change her mind. “I thought she’d be home in two weeks, and she never came back.”

Later, she wanted to make sure Kathleen knew she would be welcomed home if she changed her mind about a vocation to religious life.

“If there’s ever a time you want to come out, you don’t have to worry about disappointing me,” she told her daughter. “You won’t.”

Mrs. McGuire said one trait Kathleen exhibited throughout her life was a determination to finish what she started. And, she seemed happy in the convent.

When Kathleen told her mother she would go to Liberia in Africa to work, her mother was concerned.
“When she told me about going to Liberia, I asked her if there wasn’t enough work on this side of the ocean” for her to do. “She said they needed her,” Mrs. McGuire said. “I was behind her about her going,” but “she knew I wasn’t crazy about it.”

How was this vocation fostered? Mrs. McGuire said she never encouraged or discouraged her daughter in her vocation.

However, she also said her husband, John “felt like when the church doors opened, he ought to be there.”
The family said the rosary every night even though they had a television “when they started making them.”
Ever a creative spirit, she said Kathleen decided one hot summer day, it would be cooler if the family could watch TV from outside. They turned the set around to face the windows and tried it.

Her father decided turning on a fan and watching from inside the house would be just as good, so the experiment didn’t last long.

It has been 16 years since Mrs. McGuire received news that her daughter had been killed in Liberia, but “it seems like I hurt as much today as I did when they told me,” she said. “It’s hard to give up a child.”
Mrs. McGuire continues to practice her faith, now belonging to St. Joseph Parish in Ridgway where she frequently goes to Mass.

She had to give up her drivers license at 95, and “that was hard,” she said. She continues to keep in contact with the Ruma Adorers and other friends Kathleen made along the way. Proud to be the mother of a sister, Mrs. McGuire would have been content to keep her “at home. I hated to give her up but I was happy she was doing what she wanted.” Even today, she misses her. “I wish we could visit,” she said.

In Carlyle, Bill Hitpas was growing up in town, a few blocks from St. Mary’s Church with his family. The second child, Bill and his older brother Bob, played together.

As many Catholic youngsters do, they played Mass, with Bob always playing the part of the priest and Bill the altar boy. The story goes that Bill said he would “show them,” he would become a priest.
Whether this is myth or reality, it is the turn his life took.

“He never said anything (about the priesthood) until after he made a visit to then St. Henry’s Seminary in Belleville during Vocation’s Week at St. Mary School.

The week was held for those going into the eighth grade. “He said he liked it,” Mrs. Hitpas said.
He began talking about going to the seminary in eighth grade. “We never encouraged nor discouraged him,” she said.
“He left when he was 13,” she said. “I’d never do that again; he was a little skinny kid and weighed 75 lbs. I couldn’t see him for a month.”

Mrs. Hitpas said she and her husband, Ed, cried all the way home from the train station, but they didn’t cry when they dropped him off. They thought he would be homesick and return shortly. He didn’t.

When they were permitted to visit, Mrs. Hitpas said she baked all day the Saturday before their trip to Belleville. “I took cookies,” she said. “He waited at the gate when we came.”

Her son told her there were times during high school when he felt like quitting. “He came home and said ‘I quit’ one time,” Mrs. Hitpas said. “He and dad sat and talked until one o’clock in the morning.”
He went back the next day.

What did his father, Ed, say to the young man? Mrs. Hitpas said her husband “told him when he gets into a parish, that would be his family.”

Now, Msgr. Bill Hitpas, pastor of St. Nicholas Parish in O’Fallon, “has come home every two weeks” to see her, she said, and probably sometimes more often than that.

Bill was especially helpful when his father and Mary’s husband, Ed Hitpas died. “We’d sit here on Sunday night until 12 o’clock, and we’d talk,” she said.

Describing her son, Bill, as “a very caring person and helpful,” she also said he has a sense of humor.
“He told me a joke when he walked out the door one night, and I was still laughing when I went to bed.”
(Sorry folks, she didn’t share the joke.)

She is proud of her other children as well — Bob, Pat, Marie and Jerry — because they all made their own way in college.

At the Hitpas home, the rosary was recited each evening after supper, and Ed Hitpas sang in the choir, with beautiful voice, Mary Hitpas said.

“He sang the “Ave Maria” as a solo at Mass one time, but I didn’t get to hear it. I was home with the kids,” she said.
She still wishes she could have heard him sing that solo. “He said he had to put his hands in his pockets to keep them from shaking.”

Bill also had an older cousin, diocesan Father Ed Hustedde, now deceased, that may have had an impact on his vocation. Another cousin, Joe Hitpas is an Oblate priest.

Visits to the Hitpas home from then Father Stan Schlarman, who was at St. Mary’s while Bill was growing up may also have had an impact on his vocation.

Or, it could have been a combination of all of those people and events.
These days, Mrs. Hitpas is concentrating on recovering her health; she said having a priest for a son “seems like a special blessing.”

And, looking at it today, she said: “It all turned out well.”