St E CYO Reunion Gazette

Saturday Nov 12, 2011

Hometown Monsignor Edition
Editors Note: Recently we caught up with Monsignor Virgil Mark. Virgil was Asst. Pastor at St. E in 1969 and 1970. Many remember Uncle Virgie (as many CYOers called him in those years) for his dry sense of humor playfully going along on CYO hayrides in the dead of winter, asking wryly as he shivered underneath a blanket, Are we there yet? email website online registration

Q:

Tell us about your parents. How did they make their living?
My father was a railroad man and my mother was a homemaker. Neither of them were college graduates, although my maternal grandfather was a career teacher and a college graduate. Life was pretty simple in those days and we lived, like most other folks, very modestly with hand-me-downs for clothing and home gardens to supplement the family table. My parents were totally dedicated to raising their children, loving them and one another, and making family life a priority. One of my fathers boasts was that he and my mother never went anywhere that they could not take the children. I have no experience of ever having had a babysitter and was the first of that kind when I was old enough to qualify. That was only for short intervals when parents needed to run errands etc. We were fortunate enough to have a family car and one driver. My mother learned to drive only when she was 46 years old.

Q:

Youre a Granite City hometown boy, made good. Tell us about your family.
I am the first- born of seven children (five boys and two girls) born to William and Louise Mank. My father was a switchman on the Gulf Mobile and Ohio Railroad; my mother was a stay-at-home mom. We were a very Catholic family, having attended Catholic Schools and always made Church and religion a priority. All of my siblings married and have children and grandchildren. Presently I have thirteen nephews and nieces and eight grand nieces and nephews. All live in the metro-east region, except my youngest brother and his family (Charlotte, N.C.) Our family lived in so-called West Granite. That meant that we belonged to St. Joseph Parish at th 20 and State Street. At that time, Granite City had a local ordinance that excluded AfricanAmericans from living in the city. I grew up without much experience of racial diversity in my early life. Only after I was ordained a priest did I experience the mores of the black community and that was when I served as Chaplain of the Newman Community at Eastern Illinois University in Charleston. The isolation was not an advantage. I enjoyed living in the shadows of St. Louis and I have continued to benefit from the advantages of that most of the years of my life.

Q:

Siblings . what have they been doing in their lives?

All of my siblings have children and seem to live the middle-class American life fairly modestly. None of them have been inventors or CEOs of major corporations but each one has prospered and all live in relative comfort and contentment.

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Husbands and wives are called to love one another with the same deep and abiding commitment as Christ loves His Spouse, the Church. St. Paul makes this analogy in his Letter to the Ephesians. In this day of secularism, holy marriage is a great challenge to so many. Listening to the call of God is the only way married people can distinguish the garble that confronts them from every side by those who have lost the sense of definition and the divine vocation of marriage.

Q.

Tell us about your postings over the years: parishes served, offices held.
I have had the privilege of serving in nine different parishes in the course of my 44 years in active priestly ministry before my 2009 retirement. Five of those years were spent in Campus Ministry and all the rest in parishes in the Springfield diocese. I was an associate pastor at multiple parishes: St. Agnes (Springfield), St. Elizabeth (Granite City), and SS. Peter & Paul (Collinsville). As Pastor, I served at St. St. Marys (Taylorville), Church of the Assumption (Ste. Marie), St. Cecilia (Glen Carbon), St. Ambrose (Godfrey), and St. Jerome (Troy). For the last 22 years of my priestly ministry I was the dean of the Alton Deanery (including Madison and Bond Counties in Illinois).

Q:

In an upcoming Gazette edition Fr. John Franklin discusses with us the nature of being called. In a time of disappearing attention spans, iTunes, internet, and media onslaught, how does one hear ones calling?
I think one hears ones calling by being attuned to the voice of God, heard in the inner sanctum of ones heart and soul. In order to do this, one must find refuge from the noise of the excessive media constantly demanding our undivided attention. One must foster their spiritual side with solitude, prayer, meditation etc. in order to be able to hear the voice of God. Like every human relationship, that relationship with God requires time, attention and selfless effort for that relationship to mature, prosper and grow.

Omnia vincit amor (Love Conquers All)

Virgil, the Roman poet, has long been considered one of the masters. His Aenid was the central Latin literary text of the Middle Ages and is considered the grand epic of the Latin peoples. It also held religious importance as it describes the founding of the Holy City that would become Rome. In the Middle Ages, Virgil was considered a herald of Christianity for his verses concerning the birth of a boy, which were read as a prophecy of Jesus' nativity. According to family legend, Msgr. Mank was named Virgil at the suggestion of his mothers midwife. He was born on Christmas Day. For three months in 1999, I was elected by the diocesan consultors to serve as the Administrator of the Springfield Diocese during the interim between Bishop Daniel Ryan and Bishop George Lucas. In 2002 I was named Chaplain to His

Q.

How did you recognize your calling?

In addition to the comments above, I think I recognized my call in the example and encouragement of those around me. My parents were a gentle influence but the various priests of my parish also served as an inspiration to me to emulate them in ministry and the service of others. I am grateful to all of those who lead me to seek Gods Will in pursuing my vocation in life.

Q.

Share your thoughts about the vocation of marriage.

I am equally enamored with the vocation of Holy Matrimony. Certainly I believe that God calls people to follow Him in this sacred way of life.

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Holiness (Monsignor) by Pope John Paul II.

surround myself with persons who would assume those duties for me. I think this freed me up to

Q.

Tell us what youve learned about love from your lifetime of service.
I have learned that love is, by nature, a giving of self for the good of another. The more total the giving, the deeper the love! I have learned that love in marriage is intended to be the total surrender of self of the two spouses to each other; love in the ministry is intended to be the total surrender of the priest of self to his spouse (the Church, the parish, the community of believers, the family of God). My happiest days were those in which I was most deeply in love with my parishioners and when I most deeply experienced their love for me. Fortunately, for me, that was the case during the vast majority of the days of my ministry. I truly loved being a priest and continue to love being a priest in my retirement.

What / Who Is The Church?

Cardinal Avery Dulles, SJ, prominent American Catholic theologian, was the son of John Foster Dulles, Ikes Secretary of State. He spent his career thinking about God and His people. Dulles identified several models illustrating the various aspects of the Church:

Earthly institution: formal hierarchical org specific roles & responsibilities Mystical Communion: fellowship of people with shared beliefs Sacrament: an instrument bridging the earthly and divine Herald: proclaim the Christian message to the world Servant: responsible for encouraging good works and helping those in need

Tell us what youve learned about the nature of man from listening to thousands of confessions.
Since Adam and Eve, unfortunately the human race has found itself surrounded by an environment of sin and selfishness. Unfortunately, each of us loses sight of the call to love and to respond to the human propensity to selfish and sinful pursuits. My best description of sin is our desire to be god, not our desire to be LIKE God. That is the same problem that Adam and Eve had at the beginning (original sin) and that we have maintained ever since. We should not be surprised that we will sin but I am surprised that so many fail to recognize their sin, to repent of their sin and to seek the forgiveness of a loving God. Instead, so many seem to rationalize sinful behavior as permissible and acceptable. That has served to create a culture of evil, violence, corruption, unhappiness and disrespect in every age since the beginning of time. The call to repentance and conversion must be heard and answered in order to reverse the malaise of discontent unhappiness that tends to prevail too often.

serve as Pastor, Shepherd without conflict. I must say, though, that not having to oversee those administrative responsibilities is the real joy of retirement.

Q.

Youve held administrative roles in the diocese. Give us an inside view of how the organization and business of a diocese works?
You must be referring to my duties as Dean for 22 years. A Dean (Vicar Forane) is a priest selected by the Bishop to represent the Bishop in a region (Forane means in the field, the territory). Too often the role of the dean is to be called to resolve tensions and problems that arise in the parishes of his territory. That is not always pleasant but someone had to do it. The Bishop, who is the Chief Shepherd of the diocese, tends to delegate some of that shepherding to the local representative, of which there are seven in the diocese of Springfield.

Q.

Tell us about balancing multiple roles: Pastor as Shepherd and Pastor as Administrator.
I hardly ever experienced the burden of administration because I was always able to

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. Personnel decisions & considerations, parish decisions, personalities

Priest personnel decisions (appointments, changes etc.) ultimately are made by the Bishop. Personnel decisions are made by the Pastor. However, both Bishop and Pastor are urged to consult with their advisors in these matters. The priests have an elected priest personnel board that is consultative to the Bishop and Pastors are urged to consult with their advisory bodies (Parish Finance Council and Parish Pastoral Council) in forming their decisions that affect major personnel, pastoral and administrative matters in their parishes.

Financial stewardship
Financial stewardship is more and more becoming a challenge in parishes. Stewardship is the philosophy that each of us is called to share our gifts and blessings with the community with which we identify. I give of my time and my talent and my material well-being to the extent that I have first been blessed by God. I volunteer to serve my parish according to the availability of time at my disposal and according to the talents that I bring to the needs of the parish. I give of my monetary support proportionately, according to the blessings that I have received. The consensus is that all the needs of a parish would be satisfied if all the constituent members practiced stewardship according to that standard. The key to it all is to educate people in the art of giving and to convince people to practice stewardship with the guarantee that God cannot be outdone in giving and that what we give is given back by God many times over.

25th Ordination Anniversary

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