The Jesuit priest and the Lutheran investment counselor make plans to meet before dawn, just as they have hundreds of times in the past 23 years. One man's daily bread depends on prices, profits, and dividends. The other lives vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.
Yet Fr. Ed Sthokal, SJ and Denis Bakke are drawn together as often as twice a week when they saddle up horses at the Demontreville Jesuit Retreat House and ride off into the sunrise, or sometimes the afternoon sun.
"If it weren't for the horses, he wouldn't be here. Do you think I'd associate with a Lutheran from across the lake if it weren't for the horses?" Fr. Sthokal lightheartedly chides his friend and riding companion.
The retreat house sits on the banks of Lake Demontreville, a pastoral setting only a few miles northeast of St. Paul, Minnesota. Fr. Sthokal and Denis met here in 1977, an occurrence not nearly as unlikely as it might appear on the surface. Denis purchased land on the lake in 1956, built a home, and moved to the area with his family in 1960. Fr. Sthokal was assigned to the retreat house in 1959. About 10 percent of the retreatants are non-Catholic (also the case at the Oshkosh Jesuit Retreat House in Wisconsin).
Denise and Sue Bakke, Denis' daughters, had summer and after school jobs at Demontreville. The girls waited tables and worked in the kitchen during retreats. Part of the retreat program includes playing spirituality tapes in the dining room while retreatants maintain silence at meals.
"Denise came home one day and said, 'Dad, the subjects they talk about on those tapes are subjects you're interested in. Maybe you would be interested in a retreat,'" recalls Denis.
"I think what she said was she thought you could use a retreat," Fr. Sthokal chides him once more.
"That's true. She had insight. So when your daughter says you should go on a retreat, this dad goes on a retreat," Denis says. Shortly after the retreat ended, Fr. Sthokal called to invite him to help exercise the horses. Both Bakke girls and their friends had ridden with Fr. Sthokal and spoke of him often. "My first reaction was those are big, dangerous animals. I'd been on a few ponies when I was a youngster, but I wasn't so sure about this. I went ahead, though, because I felt it was an opportunity to get to know Fr. Sthokal." Get to know each other they did - drawn together by the horses week after week, year after year.
It wasn't two partners riding on the trail, jawboning as they moseyed through the countryside. Rather, they were two men drawn by the contemplative elements within the common pursuit.
Their rides sometimes last more than an hour without either man saying a word. Other days there might be a little more conversation - whatever seems right for the day and mood.
"We talk about the weather. We talk about the Vikings. We talk theology, philosophy, psychology, and horticulture," says Fr. Sthokal. "Denis was a horticulturist in his early days.
"I almost got this fellow straightened out after a while. As we rode and talked, I'd tell him, 'you can't say that. Even if you are a Lutheran, you can't misquote St. Paul.'"
"When did I ever misquote St. Paul?" Denis asks, ever the straight man.
"So often that I keep silenct because it's not worth it," quips Fr. Sthokal.
"The horses are the catalyst," Fr. Sthokal says. "The outside of a horse is good for the inside of a man." It is a line he believes and repeats often. "You get your mind off yourself when you're on a horse. You have to keep alert because if you're not, you might not be on the horse very long. Being on that horse you focus on what a marvelous creature you're on. It's a real spiritual experience and can be a good time for prayer. Secondly, you're outside. You're in nature, far from the maddening crowd. You come back feeling like you've taken a nice sabbatical. It's a real break.
"Friendship is just the extension of the joint pursuit. For instance, if Denis didn't appreciate the outdoors, the morning sunlight, nature, the birds flying, the trees, the changing leaves, I would have said goodbye long ago."
"And I would have said goodbye to you," says Denis, breaking from his role as straight man. "My favorite season to ride is the spring," he adds. "Every moment you ride is different. From high on the horse you look down and you see new life coming up each day in new places."
Denis' many horseback rides at De-montreville are punctuated by annual retreats in which he continues to deepen his relationship with Jesus through the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius.
"I have listened to 22 fine men of various ages with different approaches as to how they direct a retreat. I just marvel at what I've heard over the years," he says. His appreciation for the Jesuits and Ignatian spirituality is further enriched by the men he often meets after riding with Fr. Sthokal - Jesuits who are visiting Demontreville or come to direct retreats.
Time also ripened his friendship with Fr. Sthokal. One year Denis and Fr. Sthokal made plans to hook up while Denis was traveling abroad on a business trip with his wife and one-time high school sweetheart Phyllis. Fr. Sthokal accompanied Denise and Sue Bakke to London, where they caught up with their parents. From there everyone traveled together to Oxford to meet with the late Fr. Bernard Basset, SJ, a renowned retreat director who had conducted 34 retreats at Demontreville over 13 years, and many more at Oshkosh as well.
When Frs. Basset and Sthokal concelebrated Mass in the very room in which John Cardinal Newman was received into the Church, the Bakke family comprised the entire congregation.
Another time Fr. Sthokal and and Denis headed out to South Dakota, where they joined up with Fr. Pat McCorkell, SJ at the Sioux Spiritual Center in Howes. The riding took on a real cowboy dimension that trip when they rode with a group of ranchers and spent some time on the range doing the nitty gritty jobs that go with raising cattle.
Over the years Denis has remained comfortable in his Lutheran faith. It is how he was raised. He is also comfortable with his Jesuit ties and grateful for the spiritual enrichment made possible by his ongoing contact with Demontreville and the Jesuits.
A few of his Lutheran friends don't quite grasp his affinity for the silent retreat, a concept foreign to their faith. If things ever get too difficult to explain, however, all he would have to do is borrow a line from his Catholic priest friend. He could say:
"If it weren't for the horses, I wouldn't be there. Do you think I'd associate with a Catholic from across the lake if it weren't for the horses?"
To contact Fr. Sthokal, write him at:
Jesuit Retreat House
8243 Demontreville Trail N, Lake Elmo, MN 55042-9546
Telephone: 651-777-1312
For a listing of Jesuit retreat houses visit
www.jesuit.org
