Jesuit Journeys
Spring/Summer 2005
Ignatian Spirituality:
Listening to the saints: Joe Sheehan, SJ
Saint and model for
the Wisconsin Province
BY FR. Tom Sweetser, SJ
 Fr. Joseph D. Sheehan, SJ – a model and inspiration
to so many. In talking with him, you felt not just his
support and understanding, but his honesty and
sincerity as well. He was a “truth-sayer” with a simple and
clear awareness of God’s action in and around him.
Whenever I would share a personal issue or concern with
him, he would respond with a simple “Oh, Thomas,” and then
give out with that hearty laugh that was his hallmark. Many
times that was all that was needed. I knew he understood
and accepted me, and that was enough.
Those who knew him have many stories to tell. My
memories begin when I entered the Jesuit Novitiate at
Oshkosh in 1957 and continued to the day before his death
at the Milwaukee Hospice in 1997.
I arrived at Oshkosh on a bright, sunny August day
accompanied by my parents who, not knowing when they
would see their youngest again, were not entirely happy to
be leaving me off. When Joe Sheehan came up to introduce
himself, my mother asked to meet the novice master.
“I’m the novice master,” Joe replied with a youthful grin.
“Oh no, that can’t be,” my mother retorted. “I know just
what he looks like. He’s in his mid-60s, has white hair, and is
very ascetical looking. I’m sorry, but you are none of these.”
Joe responded with uproarious laughter, and they became
fast friends on the spot. Many years later, when Joe was
provincial, I went home for a visit only to discover that he,
having escaped for a few days from the pressures of his job,
had arrived ahead of me and was taking a nap upstairs – in
my room. Years after that, while Joe was pastor at St. Agnes
on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in Manderson, South
Dakota, my mother sent him a small donation each month
“just to keep him in cigar money during his card games.” Joe
loved a good game of Sheepshead.
Profile
 Fr. Joseph D. Sheehan, SJ (1918-97) is remembered by many as a
compassionate adviser and loving leader with a gift for bringing
people together in difficult situations. He profoundly affected
many, many lives over his 62 years in the Society of Jesus.
Innately joyful and often inspired, he
possessed a paternal nature that prompted
many young Jesuits during the 14 years
he served in the Wisconsin Province novitiate, along with many
parishioners, to view him as a father figure. These same qualities
served the province exceedingly well during the 6 turbulent years
(1966-72) he was provincial.
Whatever he did, wherever he went, people came to know
Fr. Sheehan on many levels in many ways. Sometimes as mentor
or counselor, other times as retreat
director or pastor – but always as
a wonderful human being.
 Born March 29, 1918 in Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, he attended Marquette
University High School and entered
the Society of Jesus after graduation
in 1936. Ordained in 1949, he spent a
year as an administrator at Creighton
Prep in Omaha, Nebraska before being
sent to the novitiate as assistant novice
master and then as novice master. During
those days the novitiate was a huge
operation, serving as many as 40 new young men annually
who were beginning their formation as Jesuits.
His 11-year tenure as novice master ended when he
was asked to be provincial of the Wisconsin Province
in 1966. From fallout over Vatican II to the national rift
created by Vietnam and the Civil Rights Movement, it
was a difficult time of change for the country, Church,
and the province. Fr. Sheehan’s hearty laugh and
openness to people in emotional pain were great gifts
that helped him be a conduit for God’s grace.
After completing his term as provincial in 1972, Fr. Sheehan
asked to go to work among the Lakota people of South Dakota.
Shortly after arriving on the Pine Ridge Reservation, he was
appointed superior of Holy Rosary Mission. When his term as
superior ended in 1979, he asked to stay on the reservation as pastor of St. Agnes Church in Manderson.
The parish came to hold a special place in
his heart. “It was there that I learned to be a
Christian,” he said.
Heart problems forced Joe into semiretirement
in 1993. He became a volunteer
at a diocesan drop-in center serving Native
Americans in Sioux Falls, SD; but a 1996
diagnosis of cancer forced him to fully retire. He
died in Milwaukee on Nov. 4, 1997. The Church
of the Gesu was filled to overflowing for his funeral Mass. At his
request, he was buried in St. Agnes Cemetery in Manderson, a place
close to his heart and to the Lakota people whom he loved and who
considered him part of their tribal community. |
As I continued in my Jesuit formation, I spent a few
summers of my regency attending the University of Notre
Dame. This was in the mid-1960s when new life and ways of
operating were flooding into the Church. Notre Dame was
alive with happenings of all kinds, exciting courses on new
theology and avid discussions about changes introduced by
Vatican II. A whole new world was opening up for which I
felt ill-prepared.
I phoned Joe when he was still the novice master, but now
at our new facility in St. Bonifacius, Minnesota. “Joe, I have
to talk to you.” Generous man that he was, he invited me up
for a conversation. I took the night train to Minneapolis and
spent an hour with him, unloading my concerns about not
getting help in the novitiate about how to relate to women in
this new and freer environment. His response was a concern
for me and my own vocation.
“No, Joe,” I responded, “it’s not about me, it’s about what’s
happening out there. It’s a whole new world.” He shook his
head as we parted, promising to pray for me. I was frustrated,
but I knew he would take it to heart.
Several months later, when I was correcting papers in
my room at Marquette University High School, there was a
knock at my door. In walked Joe. “No one knows I’m here,” he
said, closing the door quietly. “I’ve been thinking about what
you told me. There are some changes in the works and I want
to hear more about your experience.”
We talked for a while and he left. Shortly thereafter he
was named as our new provincial, a
completely unexpected occurrence.
Young Jesuits all around the
province cheered at hearing the
news. Here was someone who knew
us and would listen to us, someone
we could trust and admire. When
word reached me I could only smile
and say to myself, “Joe, you are going
to be a great blessing for us all.”
His years as provincial in the late
’60s and early ’70s were difficult times in which to keep the
province united and on an even keel. Joe Sheehan was the
right person for the task, but it took a toll on him. What
carried him through was his personal relationship with the
Lord. Even now, when I pray the Our Father, I remember
how deliberate he was in leading us in this prayer during
those early morning novitiate Masses. Each word was
important to him – not so much a prayer as a personal
plea – “Your will be done ... forgive us this day … forgives
us… deliver us…Amen.”
Fr. Bob Dundon, SJ shared a story with a group of us
about a time when Joe was struggling with his assignment
as assistant to a rather severe novice master. As Bob tells
the tale, Joe said to him, “One night I came to my room and
God was in the room. I don’t remember the words, but one
thing stood out. He said, ‘You’ll never be happy unless you
give yourself to the novices.’ I knelt down and prayed, I don’t
know how long … maybe a couple of hours. From that time
forward, I began to give myself to the novices and I found
peace. It certainly stayed with me all my life. Every time I’d
go to work, I’d find that I’d give myself to certain people,
whether it was the Indians or whomever. I’d give myself to them. This has been a great blessing.”
To me, this is an essential to living a saintly life – finding
peace with who you are and what you are asked to do. Joe
Sheehan was the embodiment of this acceptance. At the end
of his life, I had a brief moment with him as he lay dying. We
held hands and I talked about my mother who loved him so
and who had gone before him.
“Thank you, Thomas, thank you.”
And that’s what I say right back. “Thank you, Joe.
Thank you from the bottom of our collective heart.”
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