She was inspired to offer her life as a lay missioner with Glenmary. Now at retirement pace she asks, “How does a missionary retire?”
Kathy O’Brien spots a cardinal on the window of her cabin. The little creature pecks at the glass and stares at her. The bird’s intense red and its friendliness remind her of the beauty of God. Kathy is on a 30-day silent retreat at a Catholic center in the middle of the woods, in Kentucky. During this period, she is discerning what her life will look like now that she left her last full-time job. She dedicated almost 50 years to serving in the Glenmary missions in several states. She is the last member of a little-known institute: the Glenmary Lay Missioners.
More than half a century ago, she had her first contact with the institute through a vocational brochure standing at a lounge table in her college in Wisconsin. “I contacted them to ask if they would take a volunteer for some of the summer,” she recalls. They replied affirmatively. “I got on a Greyhound bus and rode all the way to West Point, Mississippi.”
That summer, she helped run Bible schools with the Glenmary Lay Missioners. She liked the experience so much that she stayed one more week than expected. Kathy felt that she probably wanted to join the women’s institute. Its leaders recommended that she finish college and then come back, if she was still interested. And that’s what she did. In September 1974, after completing her religious formation, she joined the group.
Religious education and more
“From then, I’ve always worked in teaching and parish work,” Kathy says. Her most recent and final assignment was as a pastoral associate at the St. Michael the Archangel mission in Erwin, Tennessee.
“She developed our youth ministry here,” says Glenmary Father Tom Charters, who served as pastor of St. Michael from its foundation in 2011 until June this year. “She developed our religious education program here. She was also very instrumental in working with the Hispanic community.”
In earlier times, Kathy learned Spanish in Mexico before taking an assignment in Waldron, Arkansas, where Glenmary served a large Hispanic population. “I was 50-some years old by then,” she says. “It was not easy.”
Kathy is now 71 and has diabetes. Five years ago she had a heart attack. She knew that this year was right to leave her full-time job. “I need to slow down, to have a more contemplative mission,” she says. “In other words, more time for prayer and leading others to prayer.”
And even when these days she is discerning what to do in the future, one thing is clear: she will remain active in her ministry. “One day, we were taking the college kids out to Johnson City for a meal, and one of them told me: ‘Miss Kathy, you can’t retire; Mother Teresa never retired,’” Kathy says. “And she’s right, how does a missionary retire?”
A lifetime of service
She will remain active with community organizations like Keeping the Valley Beautiful, which seeks to improve and inspire environmental awareness. Earlier this year, for example, the group cleaned up a river stretch, collecting 16 bags of trash and large items. Kathy helped out, handing trash pickers, bags, and drinks to the volunteers.
The organization has adopted two miles of a highway that they clean four times a year. They also participate with a booth during community fairs to raise awareness on keeping natural resources.
Kathy has served as president of Keeping the Valley Beautiful, but stepped back from that position. However, she plans to remain volunteering. She will also keep serving as a volunteer for the Kiwanis Club of Unicoi County, which runs charity programs for kids, such as sponsoring baseball teams and buying Christmas gifts.
Even though there are plenty of volunteers and lay coworkers active in the Glenmary family, the institute called the Glenmary Lay Missioners will now end. After its founding in 1957, this small group of female members served along with Glenmary priests and brothers in different capacities. But it never grew beyond a handful of passionate members.
It was a colorful career: Kathy served in Glenmary missions in Texas, Mississippi, Arkansas, Ohio, Oklahoma, and Tennessee. She is happy to see that the mission where she worked for the last decade is growing. She’ll live in the area and will still collaborate, but now, at a more relaxed pace. “I feel rewarded,” Kathy says. “I have close relationships still, thanks to the Internet, with people that I had in youth groups that are now grandparents.”
–Omar Cabrera
This story first appeared in the Autumn 2023 publication of the Glenmary Challenge.