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Rev. Leo John Trese (1902-)
MAY 6 IS THE FEAST OF ST. JOHN AT THE LATERAN Gate. On May 6,
1902, Pope Leo XIII was in the twentyfifth year of his illustrious
reign. It is not surprising then, that when their fifth and last
child was born to Joseph and Alice (Byrth) Trese in Port Huron,
Michigan, on May 6, 1902, he should be named Leo John.
Joseph Trese operated a grocery
store and butcher shop (the term "meat market" came
later) and managed to show enough profit to send all his children
through high school and the two youngest, including myself, through
college. This was in the pre-supermarket era when a clerk from
the store (usually one of my older brothers) called at the customers'
homes in the morning to write down their orders, and returned
in the afternoon with horse and wagon to deliver the orders.
Practically all sales, in and out of the store, were on credit.
On pay day, when the families came in to settle their bill, there
always was a free bag of candy for the children. When a householder
was sick or out of work, his bill would mount indefinitely until
he went back to work. The friendliness of the local grocer was
the only social security of that day. I would not, however, call
them "the good old days." Standard wages for a laborer
was $1.00 a day. I still remember my shock, when having supper
with a chum, to learn that there was no milk for the tea because
the family could not afford milk on the father's pay. I worked
in my father's store, after school and during vacations, from
the time I was old enough to sack a peck of potatoes or draw
a gallon of kerosene.
My mother was a former school
teacher; one who, fortunately for me, loved books and included
several shelves of good books among her home's furnishings. I
cut my reading teeth not only on such juveniles as Robin son
Crusoe, Black Beauty, Gulliver's Travels, and Swiss Family Robinson,
but also on such classics as Dante's Inferno (spine-chilling
pictures") and Lamb's Tales From Shakespeare.
More than any other single
influence it was, I am sure, the presence of books in our home
and the encouragement to read them, that laid the foundations
for my avocation of writing. There is nothing that will better
develop a "sense for words"--for their right use and
for the many nuances of their meaning-than early and extensive
reading. This is not something that can be taught; it can only
be absorbed. When I was old enough to hold a card of membership
in the local Carnegie Library (and may God rest Andrew Carnegie!)
I was frequent visitor, usually leaving with the two books allowed
by my card, plus two or three more hidden under my jacket.
The grade and high school of
St. Stephen's parish provided my basic education and Assumption
College (now University) at Windsor, Ontario, provided me with
Bachelor of Arts degree, philosophy as my major. Four years of
theology at Mount St. Mary Seminary, Cincinnati, led to my ordination
to the priesthood as a Detroit diocesan priest on February 13,
1927, at the hands of Bishop Joseph Plagens, then auxiliary bishop
of Detroit.
After a five-year stint as
assistant pastor at Blessed Sacrament Cathedral (then Blessed
Sacrament Church) in Detroit, I was bitten by the foreign mission
bug and joined the Benedictine Order to teach at the University
of Peking. Before I could reach China, however, the Benedictine
Fathers were forced by financial straits to relinquish the university
to the Divine Word Fathers. At the expiration of my first vows
(taken for three years), after a year of college teaching at
St. Vincent's, Latrobe, Pennsylvania, and two years of work with
homeless boys in Norfolk, Virginia, I returned to my diocese;
a better priest, I am sure, for my four years of monastic life.
In 1936, the year of my return,
I was assigned to establish a new parish, St. Christopher's,
at Marysville, Michigan. There followed pastorates (1941) in
Melvindale, and (1945) in Carleton, Michigan. The appearance
of heart damage, stemming apparently from rheumatic fever in
my youth, indicated the advisability of work less taxing than
parochial administration In June of 1950, His Eminence Cardinal
Mooney considerately assigned me as chaplain of Vista Maria school
(a residential high school for girls) in Detroit. As I write
this (1960), my present post is about to terminate in a leave
of absence graciously granted by His Excellency, Archbishop John
Dearden, to allow me to devote myself to an uninterrupted year
of research and writing. It is my hope that the year will result
in (among other things) a book on parent-child relationships
which has been requested by one of my publishers. Perhaps I should
mention that for the past ten years my principal work has been
that of providing guidance for emotionally handicapped adolescent
girls. To better equip myself for this work, I undertook studies
in the field of guidance and counseling at Wayne State University,
Detroit, and was granted a degree of Doctor of Education by that
university in 1957. This is the background for the writing task
which I am assuming.
When I was eleven years old
I wrote a prize-winning story which was published on the children's
page of the Sunday Detroit Free Press. After that I did no writing
for the professional press until I was forty-two years old. In
January of 1944, I decided to visit a priestclassmate of mine
who was stationed in Puerto Rico. World War II was on, and to
get transportation to Puerto Rico it was necessary to have business
there. I told the airlines clerk that I was going to Puerto Rico
to write an article about the island for a magazine. My reason
was accepted. Not wishing to be a liar, I did write such an article
and sent it in to the Commonweal. The editor liked it, in fact
paid me $25.00 for it, and what was still more exciting, he published
it in March of 1944. My career as a writer was launched.
Until the Commonweal article
I never had realized that I could write or that I would enjoy
writing. The dyke was broken, and I have been spilling words
ever since. In addition to many articles for magazines (mostly
Catholic), there have been seven books: three for priests, Vessel
of Clay (1950), A Man Approved (1953), and Tenders of the Flock
(1955); and four books for general consumption, Many Are One
(1952); Wisdom Shall Enter (1954), More Than Many Sparrows (195
), and The Faith Explained (1959). The first three were published
by Sheed & Ward, the latter four by Fides Publishers. The
manuscript for Many Are One, incidentally, was rejected by Sheed
& Ward, yet Fides scored with it one of their greatest successes,
having sold to date more than 100,000 copies of the paperback
edition. Embryo authors may find encouragement in the fact that
a publisher's judgment is not always infallible.
At present my regular writing
commitments are the weekly "Father Jim Says" column
for The Young Catholic Messenger, a monthly article for The Catholic
Boy magazine, and a monthly article for the priests' magazine,
Emmanuel, whose masthead lists me as a Contributing Editor. I
do occasional articles, when requested and when time allows,
for other Catholic magazines. For seven and a half years I did
a weekly column for The Michigan Catholic and eleven other Catholic
papers, until the pressure of deadlines became too great for
me. I write best at night, when the world has quieted down and
interruptions are rare. I do all my writing with two fingers
on my typewriter, usually with one revision of the original draft.
For recreation I do a little
bowling, a little golfing, and swimming in season, a little card-playing
with my priest friends, a little visiting with my ten nieces
and nephews and their thirty-five children. But mostly in my
spare time I like to write. Putting words together to give clear
expression to my thoughts, watching sentences form and ideas
develop (sometimes, it seems, out of nowhere) is a fascinating
pastime. It is hard work, and oftentimes I have to drive myself
to sit down at the typewriter; but then time stops.
Writing, of course, carries
with it a serious responsibility. That is why one of my permanent
intentions in my daily Mass is "for all those who read what
I write." Now that you have read this, you are included
in that intention.
Originally
published in The Book of Catholic Authors, Walter Romig,
Sixth Series, 1960.
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