December 9, 2009

Ordination of Bishop Paul Etienne

Update from Cheyenne #1

By Sean Gallagher

Well, the 67 people taking the Republic Airlines flight chartered by the archdiocese arrived at the international arrivals and chartered flight building at the Indianapolis International Airport before dawn on Dec. 9.  The weather was cold and rainy.  Not an auspicious start for what we hope to be a joy-filled day.

By its end, we will have witnessed the ordination of Bishop-designate Paul D. Etienne to the episcopate as he begins his ministry shepherding the Church in Wyoming.

It’s a historic day, also, because it will be the first time in 20 years that a priest of the archdiocese has been ordained a bishop.  Bishop Gerald Gettelfinger of Evansville was the last archdiocesan priest to be so ordained.

Despite the gloomy weather, spirits were high in the terminal as the group awaited to board the airliner.  Part of that may have been due to the simplified security for chartered flights.  No walking through metal detectors and the necessity to take off shows as often happens on ordinary flights.

Security officials simply looked through our carry-on bags and waved metal detecting wands over us.

Our pilot is Anthony Campo, a young adult Catholic from the archdiocese. His wife, Stephanie, is one of our flight attendants.  We learned before the flight started that they were married last summer and took their honeymoon in Rome where they were able to meet Pope Benedict XVI.

They had hoped to attend the ordination with us, but the winter storm that is expected to blow through the Rocky Mountain area to which we’re flying is forcing them to take the airliner to Denver’s airport shortly after we arrive in Cheyenne.

In all, there are 43 priests are our flight.  Most of them are from the archdiocese.  The reason we’re only leaving on the actual day of the ordination is that the priests had to be in their parishes yesterday for the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, a holy day of obligation.

There are also 13 seminarians (most from the archdiocese) on the flight and 11 lay people, most of them ministering in the archdiocese in one capacity or another.

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