Davidson looks back on decades at Holy Family

Players who can field multiple positions on the baseball or softball diamond are said to fulfill a “utility” role. A utility player may chase outfield flies in one game, dive for sharp grounders at third base in another game, and stretch to snag infielders’ throws to first base in the next.

The Parish Life Administrator for Holy Family Parish in Marion County also must be versatile.
Event Planning? Check. Creating the bulletin? Check. Bookkeeping? Check. Scheduling? Ordering supplies? Tax reporting? Answering phones? Check, check, check, and check.

That list is hardly exhaustive, says HFP Parish Life Administrator Rose Davidson, though she acknowledges there are some tasks on which she always passes. “I don’t do what the priest does,” she said. “I don’t handle sacraments.”

As Davidson approaches retirement after more than two decades in the position – which came on the heels of an earlier stint in a different HFP staff position – she reflects that her time as parish life coordinator has immersed her in the parish.

“We are different – with four churches spread out in four towns – but I can see somebody in Mass or hear a name and I immediately know if they’re a parishioner or visitor. By now, I know where most parishioners live,” Davidson said. “It’s a very close-knit, intimate connection and those relationships are what makes us Christian.”

She indicates the view from inside the parish office also has deepened her appreciation for the men wearing Roman collars. “I came to understand how hard it is to be a priest and all the things priests give up,” she said. “Some people think priests sit around all day after Mass, but that’s so not true.”

But even when a priest and the parish staff are occupied with weighty matters, the care of souls takes precedence, she adds. Davidson was initiated into this reality early during her stint when she fielded a call from a parishioner in tears amid her husband’s final moments.

“Father rushed off to grab his stole, I backed my car into his garage, he jumped in, and we sped over so he could anoint the man,” she said. “Sometimes you just have to drop everything.”

Davidson has served under five pastors, she says, all of them unique. Fr. Steve Gronert was her first boss, and she distinctly recalls the day he walked into her office to introduce her to the subsequent boss, Fr. Hien Nguyen, who on that day had accompanied his predecessor on a tour of the parish’s four churches.

“Fr. Steve walked in first, obviously exhausted, and plopped into my guest chair, worn out,” she recounted.

Davidson presumed the middle-aged Vietnamese gentleman that entered the room next was her soon-to-be pastor, though it threw her for a loop when he crossed the room and took his place next to the copy machine. She was still puzzling over that when someone else entered.

“He didn’t walk, he bounced,” Davidson said. “This young Vietnamese boy was grinning from ear to ear, he was so excited. Yep, this young man was going to be our pastor. He looked years younger than he was. More than once, people in town mistook him for our exchange student.”

Over the years, she also would work for Fr. Darrin May, Fr. Brian Bebak, and HFP’s current pastor, Fr. Isaac Coulter. “They are all fine servants of God and I appreciate working with them,” Davidson said.

Many Memories
Davidson grew up in Hays and she and her husband, Greg, settled in Wichita early in their marriage. He taught at Bishop Carroll Catholic High School; she worked as an accountant for Koch Industries.
By 1995, she says, her hours at Koch seemed excessive, especially in light of their two young daughters, Sarah and Rachel. As the family examined its options, a house in the country, six miles outside Marion beckoned. “We wanted to raise our kids in a small town,” Davidson said.

For a time, Greg worked in a nearby public school, though he would later go back to Bishop Carroll, despite a daily commute of 140 round-trip miles. She worked as HFP’s director of religious education until the previous parish life administrator decided to retire.

“I had been in and out of the office, helping with things such as editing the bulletin before publication,” Davidson said. “Since I have an accounting degree, she also had me help with the books. When she retired, it was an easy transition.”

In the years since, she has witnessed some major milestones, she says, such as the renovation of St. Mark Church in Marion and the return of Fr. Emil Kapaun’s remains to the Diocese of Wichita.

Even so, more routine events also stand out. Davidson cites examples of helping organize and put on HFP bible studies and small groups, but also the parish’s Mardi Gras and Halloween parties, as well as its New Year’s Eve Dance. “There have been a lot of fun times, like the skit performances, white elephant bingo, or the ‘Minute to Win It’ nights with a potluck supper,” she said. “I love organizing events that bring people together.”

She says Fr. Coulter has helped her better appreciate the deeper reality about forming and strengthening such interpersonal bonds.

“The relationships we build with others – and how we should look for the face of Jesus in those we interact with – is what spread the Catholic faith so rapidly in the early years of the Church,” Davidson said. “That is more important than any program or book, and is what people are so hungry for today. I didn’t know how to say it until I hung around Fr. Isaac, but I felt it in my heart.”

Whether she is recalling the parish’s beautiful Easter and Christmas Masses or its gatherings, Davidson says the commonality is the ties they establish and nourish. “It all comes down to the relationships we develop with those around us,” she said. “It’s not all fun and games. There are the countless times parishioners walked into the church office crying because they had come to plan the funeral Mass for their loved one. I could be there to give them a comforting hug and offer my condolences.”

Enduring Relationships
Davidson announced her impending retirement in a note she wrote for a late spring edition of the HFP bulletin, in which she cited what a former HFP pastor had impressed on her: The position is not a job, but a ministry to serve God’s people.

“Working for God through the Catholic Church by serving Holy Family Parish has been a soul-fulfilling experience,” she wrote. “It has helped me live my faith in a close-up, magnified kind of way, since everything in my work day is tied back to him. Sure, you’re supposed to bring Jesus with you throughout your day no matter where you are or what you’re doing, but it’s different when you’re being paid to focus on him, his teachings, his bible. I learned a lot about our parish, our diocese, and the global Catholic Church by working in a church office.”

Once her successor is hired and trained, Davidson says she is looking forward to more exercise, travel, and home projects such as decluttering her attic, but moving on from a job that is more than a job will be difficult. Nevertheless, she adds, the relationships will endure, especially with the Lord.

“I have so many good memories, but the best part is seeing where God’s hand guided me, which I couldn’t tell at the time,” she wrote in the HFP bulletin. “He’s always been there for me and I know he always will be.”