Creighton Program Brings Seminarians To On With Life

Every summer, Creighton University gathers more than 100 seminarians as part of its Institute of Priestly Formation program.

Over nine weeks, the students, all seeking their Masters in Divinity degree on the way to becoming ordained Roman Catholic priests, take part in a hands-on spiritual learning seminar. Some of the young soon-to-be priests have the opportunity to learn a foreign language, take part in a silent retreat, spend time at a new parish and some, like the handful spending their summer in Glenwood, volunteer at On With Life Skilled Care for Youth and Younger Adults.

On With Life is a 32-bed non-profit facility located on the Glenwood Resource Center campus dedicated to caring for individuals with brain injuries. Volunteering at On With Life offers the seminarians a unique experience as they learn how to minister to and engage with people of different intellectual abilities, specifically patients that are non-verbal, while working on reading  facial expressions and body language.
Jenifer Durfey, the recreation therapy coordinator at On With Life, helps coordinate the seminarians that have been volunteering at On With Life since June. The students spent about six hours per week at the facility working directly with individuals with brain injuries. For over a decade On With Life has been bringing in seminarian volunteers.

“The hope of the program is that they (the students) can learn how to minister to people with different kinds of (intellectual) abilities,” she said. “For us, it’s a really nice opportunity for the people we serve to interact with someone who is not their caregiver. To make another social connection.”
Activities include working in the facility’s garden, playing video and card games, baking and helping paint a mural that will eventually hang in the courtyard.

“I’m a recreational therapist so the things that we have them do is things we like to have them (the patients) do that is recreational. If they want to spend individual time in prayer with the person served, they certainly can do that.  They can do a worship service. There’s a lot of fun stuff they do.”

On With Life is among the Midwest leaders in brain injury rehabilitation. Every day, they deal with the challenge of rebuilding lives shattered by stroke, tumor, aneurysm or other traumatic brain injuries. Since opening in 1991, the facility has served more than 2,500 Iowans and their families.

Many of those clients are non-verbal, meaning it might be hard for the students to see just how much of an impact the students might be having. But, Durfey said, she can see it on the patients’ faces.

“You can watch their facial expressions,” she said. “Some are verbal and can tell you whether they enjoy doing something or not. But a part of ministering to people with different kinds of abilities, and some of the students have said this to me already, they didn’t know if they were going to be able to get to know they patients because they are non-verbal.”

Durfey said the students have been pleasantly surprised by the experience and their patients.

“They’ve found themselves getting to know them,” Durfey said of the student’s relationship with patients.

“I think that’s sort of the point of why they’re here. It’s really nice because they aren’t here very long and to be able to say that after just a few weeks in I think is pretty amazing. If you can attend to a person and engage with them and read their non-verbals, that can really speak to you as well.”

That’s perhaps been the biggest surprise for seminarian Christopher Ford, who came to the Creighton program from Naugatuck, Conn. Ford, 25, volunteered for the On With Program with little knowledge of the facility nor any experience working with special needs patients. What might have been a solemn experience has been pleasantly the opposite, he said.

Ford arrived at the facility prepared to be depressed and is leaving with what he called one of his most “uplifting experiences.”

“Getting to know the people served here, which I didn’t think I was going to be able to do, you can see their personalities,” Ford said. “They’re still people and want to share with you even if they can’t say it. The staff is wonderful. We come here tired sometimes and leave uplifted. You can’t not have a good time here.”

The six weeks at On With Life serves as a crash course in “on-the-job” training for the students who will soon join their own parishes. Many of the students, like Ford, had little or no experience working with non-verbal or special-needs clients.

David Harris, a seminarian student from Rye, N.H, feels the experience at On With Life is its own reward. For Harris, 31, working with the residents here is his way of sharing faith in ways other than traditional methods.

“It’s very humbling,” he said. “It’s not direct ministry. We’re not necessarily talking about the faith or praying. We’re trying to bring love and peace to these individuals by being with them and enjoying laughter and conversation and just fun. In some ways, we receive much more than they receive in a sense, because at the end of the day we leave here feeling great with what the patients and the staff bring us.”

That’s a common response, Durfey has seen in her experience working with the seminarian students through the years. Most leave with more than just an education in working with special needs patients.

“These are relatively young guys, still going through their schooling, they’re not priests yet but they speak from the heart,” she said. “They say what a blessing this is and that everyone is created in the image of God and they sound like priests. They speak so well and so truthfully that they are honest and blunt with what they say and some tell you ‘I didn’t think I’d be able to do this,’ and they do so wonderfully.”

Christopher Rubie, a seminarian student from St. Louis, has spent a lot of his time working on a mural that will hang in the facility’s garden area when completed. The mural will depict a colorful owl in a field of flowers and trees. Rubie likes the idea of helping to leave the same lasting impression at On With the Life that the facility, staff and residents have left on him.

“I think this is helping us grow in our prayer life and spiritual formation,” he said. “We’ve been here a few weeks and it’s been a tremendous experience to see the joy that the residents here have, as well as the staff. It makes it such a very welcoming environment for us to come here. It’s been beyond any of my expectations.”