By Robert R. Schwarz
From several parishes they had come this night to be healed of afflictions of body, mind, and spirit. Some were there to pray for a deathly ill friend or loved one. It began with a trio of two ladies and a man filling the sanctuary with pulsating music of a tambourine, drums, and a guitar. Arms went up, and palms faced outward as if to brace a strong wind. Voices of more than 125 people kept repeating the refrain, " Yes, yes, yes, Lord! " The music subsided and Kathy began praying, so softly that only her friends on her right and left could hear her. Fr. Michael Sparough, S.J., now rose from his altar chair to begin his homily in this St. Theresa Catholic church in Palatine, Illinois. " Let's open our hearts to God's healing power," he said. " Believe that God's grace is sufficient for us to carry the cross we are carrying." Afterwards, on her way to the altar to "drink the blood and eat the body of Christ,” Kathy reverently touched a glass case. Inside was the skullcap worn by Blessed John Paul II when he was shot by an assassin outside the Vatican. She momentarily thought of how her former pope had been healed of that near-mortal wound. Twenty minutes later, she was first in line with dozens of men and women waiting to be anointed with holy oil by the priest. With his finger moistened by the oil, the priest made the blessing sign of the cross on Kathy's forehead, then on her palm. Two men stood behind Kathy to catch her as she now fell backwards. The men gently laid her on the floor, where others would soon be lying for several minutes— "resting in the spirit."
" Let's pray together, " the surgeon told Mrs. Kathy Muhr, a Eucharistic minister at St. James Catholic church in Arlington Heights. The surgeon, a Baptist, had just told Kathy she had stage four cancer in her lungs, lymph nodes, and spine and that she had six months to a year to live. That was in May, 2012.
But this grim scene never appears to play out on Kathy's face as she carries out her ministry today and most days of the week . As worshippers grasp the chalice or host from her hand, they see the same welcoming, good-to-be-alive smile on her face that they have since 1990. " I know what God wants me to do and that makes me happy, " she said when interviewed in her home.
She is 76, an active woman with salt-pepper hair, and she was wearing a white tee-shirt with white pants and white earrings; around her neck was a bronze crucifix and a Marian medallion, a gift from her late husband. " This crucifix," she said, " has done more evangelizing than any other thing I've worn."
In the other room watching a ballgame sat two of her three sons: Kevin, 54, an employee of the Chicago Executive Airport, and Mike, 53, who produces a resale shop directory.
I asked if she felt frightened by her physician's prognosis: "I used to be. That was before I knew you could go directly to God. You see, we were brought up to believe that we have to earn our way to heaven." This she loves to tell to "old school " Catholics who are hospitalized.
She also loves to relate events in her life which she believes were directed by God. One event was her joining the Charismatic Renewal of Chicago, whose prayer group meetings she attends on Wednesdays at St. Theresa's . "It changed my life forever, " she said. " I learned we can have a close relationship with the Lord, that he wasn't up in the sky but right here with me. I found out how real God was. When I now pray, I know that He sometimes answers our prayers faster that we could ever imagine. "
Worshippers at Kathy's prayer group meetings speak in tongues, and Kathy was quick to point out that this is the "least important" gift of the Holy Spirit. " We got these gifts from the Holy Spirit at baptism, but they're sitting in the closet not being used. "
In 1990, Kathy said she had a "personal encounter with the Holy Spirit. " I felt this love of God absolutely drenching me. I had never experienced this before, and as I went up to the altar to receive communion, I was weeping and I realized God was saying ' You do what I ask of you and you will be rewarded.' " Immediately after communion, Kathy had a great desire to go to mass every day—and has ever since. That reward, she said, was eventually being given the "joy that only God could have given me. "
Since then, Kathy says God has also given her a desire to "welcome" people, especially to St. James. " I try to go to people I never met. It means so much to people if we just take the time to say 'Hi' , welcome! ' " She doesn't worry about anyone rejecting her or her words.
Rosemary Schumacher, who has worked alongside Kathy during mass for more than ten years, described her as a " caring, thoughtful person who's done a lot for the church." And St. James pastor Fr. Bill Zavaski called Kathy "a deeply dedicated, devoted member of our parish community . " He added that "she is grounded in faith and lives out her life in a beautiful way, especially as a minister of care and bereavement minister. "
Small Town Beginnings
The youngest of ten children, Kathy's childhood was spent in Varina, Iowa (population 150 ) with her "very Catholic family"—two sisters today are Franciscan nuns, two cousins are priests, and a deceased aunt was a mother general of a Franciscan order. A few years later , the family moved to Pocahontas, Iowa (population 3,000). "We had a larger house so I thought we were rich," she said. " But we were poor, very poor, but didn't know it because all our neighbors were in the same boat. We had no TV to show us how well some others were living. " The family had lost everything during the Great Depression.
In 1941, the family moved to Chicago. There , Kathy saw streetcars for the first time and experienced the comforts of indoor plumbing. " I thought I had died and gone to heaven, " she said. ( Her 94-year-old brother and his wife still reside in the same house. ) She graduated in 1954 from Alvernia Catholic girls school. She met her husband Bill at a St. Viator dance when she was a member of the St. Viator's young people's club and he a member of the St. John Bosco youth club. " Bill and I started these clubs because at that time it was difficult to meet other Catholics to date," Kathy said. They married in 1957 and moved into their current home on North Kennecott Avenue in 1964, the same year she became a St. James member. After Bill had retired from Motorola , he and Kathy owned and operated an antique business , but, as Kathy said, " It got too cut-throat for us, and I decided I really wanted to get involved in church work. "
Besides sons Kevin and Mike there is Bill, 44, a Christian counselor in Palatine; and daughters JoAnne, 50, a youth ministry volunteer; and Mary, 51, a junior high teacher at Holy Family school in Inverness and the Carl Sandburg school in Palatine. There are 12 grandchildren and one great-grandchild.
Any special talents? Kathy mused a moment. "No, I feel being a mother and a wife were my special talents. " The she added whimsically, " God knows that I'm worn out from kids and baby-sitting. I never got away from my kids in 20 years. Today they all live in Arlington Heights, and we get together all the time….Raising my children gave me an opportunity to understand God's love and mercy. I learned that when things were happening that I couldn't control , I said to God, 'You love them more that even I do, so I am giving them over to you.' The weight of the world was lifted and I was free to let God do the work."
She loves to play bridge and "silly" card games with her family. The only thing that makes her sad, she said, is the unwillingness of people to forgive a hurt. Remaining angry at someone, she believes, unknowingly binds one.
Earlier this year doctors found swollen lymph nodes on her lungs . When told of the diagnosis by her son-in-law, a pulmonologist , Kathy replied that it was okay with her. They was no need to discuss Kathy's five-year-old inoperable brain aneurism , which this woman today dismisses with, "It's just there. I've lived a long life. God has blessed me in so many ways. "
Enthusiastically she related the event when her surgeon Dr . Pae was praying for her just before the lymph node surgery. His prayer sounded familiar to Kathy , though she could not place it. At the next charismatic prayer meeting—Kathy was not there—a man , according to Kathy, felt that the Lord wanted him to read verses from Sirach 38. He did, and later related this occurrence to Kathy. Curious, Kathy read Sirach and found that the first eight verses tell how God's grace shines on the physician.
Hold the physician in honor, for he is essential
to you, and God it was who established his
profession… ( Sirach 38: 1 )
The next day Kathy had Dr. Pae paged and read the eight verses to him. "There isn't any Sirach book in the Bible, " Dr. Pae asserted.
"He's a Baptist, " Kathy told this reporter at the end of our interview. "Sirach is not in the Protestant Bible, you know. "
Kathy has no wish-list of things to do in her remaining time. " My kids all know what I have and they all know I am good with it. They also know I am not afraid , because He has promised me a place with Him. "
And, of course everyone knows that the best of doctors can be wrong.
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