The Archbishop and the House of Cards

This week Fr. Jon Seda from St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Center on the campus of Iowa State in Ames, Iowa, brought four college students with him to stay at the Abbey for the week.  They are on their Spring Break and are experiencing monastic life.  On Monday, they prayed with the monks, met to discuss a book they are reading, and gathered together to hear the vocation stories of a couple of the monks and ask questions.  They also helped out yesterday afternoon working in the apple orchard, picking up sticks and the like.  Fr. Jon is a priest of the Archdiocese of Dubuque, which means that our Archbishop Jerome was his former boss!

No visit to the monastery would be complete with an evening of card playing with Archbishop Jerome.  The group played Euchre.  Fr. Jon brought a deck of cards that read:  “You can’t be a Dubuquer if you don’t play Euchre.”

And, of course, Archbishop Jerome and his partners won the game.  I think that they just thought it was unkind to beat an Archbishop in cards.  The Iowa State group stays until Friday, and we will play more cards and games this evening.

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