So, Jim Callan has passed away and Rochester should by all rights have its first saint. Forget the miracles. The wonders of everyday life are enough.
That’s Jim, above on the right, dispensing Communion. The faces across the top are from the local Crimestoppers page. I got interested in them while working as an graphic artist for the Rochester Police Department for a year. Jim welcomed all and set up special ministries to assist the needy. Mark, the sketch in the middle, was the only homeless guy I knew at the time. He was dj on WRUR and would fill in for others. Rumor had it he fell asleep on air one night. As the note in the bottom says, I was baptized in this church but before Jim took over. This image is my first draft for the seventh station of the cross. All fourteen were shown in the 1999 Finger Lakes Show.
The Spiritus Christi community rose from temporal Corpus Christi (body of Christ) . My parents had a second floor apartment around the corner on Alexander Street, a place so small, I have heard, that my crib was out in the hall. Jim Callan and my parents were part of an early group of breakaway Catholics that eventually became the Servant of God Community. In Jim Callan’s 2001 book, “Studentbakker Corporation” Jim tells the now familiar story of his early priesthood.
He was assigned to Saint Ambrose’ parish. They had just spent a fortune on new facilities and Jim had taken a vow of poverty. He refused the opulence and for his obstinance he was reassigned to Corpus Christi, a parish long past its glory days with a dwindling congregation. With ideals borrowed from Jesus he turned the place around with little regard to church orthodoxy. He shared communion with non Catholics, he welcomed gays and he allowed women to take their rightful place at the alter. A 1998 a New York Times article stated the Mass attendance went from 200 to 3,000 under Callan. He filled the pews and after twenty two years the church hierarchy, god’s Rottweiler himself, Cardinal Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict XVI gave him the boot. They renamed their community, Spiritus Christi, and under the direction of Mary Braverman made it the largest breakaway Catholic group in the country.
Sonja Livingston, in her fabulous memoir, “Ghostbread,” writes lovingly about the role Father Jim played in her life. Other than taking his vow of poverty seriously, all Father Jim Callan had to do to get excommunicated was let women say mass, bless same sex marriages and welcome anyone to break bread (receive communion) in church. That’s like crossing the street.
Leave a comment