It would be difficult to come up with a better description of Br. Raymond Papenfuss than missionary. Since 1959 his life has been devoted to the Midwest Province’s apostolates in West Africa. It was in that year that Br. Raymond was assigned to St. John’s Secondary School in Ghana, one of the first brothers to staff that mission.
Born in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, Br. Raymond distinguished himself at the University of Notre Dame academically and then taught for three years at Holy Trinity High School on the near northwest side of Chicago before being asked to go to Africa. In September of 1959 he arrived at St. John’s School, the base of his activities for the 28 years he spent in Ghana. Illness forced his return to the U.S. in 1987. Saddened by this necessity, he immediately sought to continue his contribution to the province’s missions in Africa by becoming its Mission Promoter, a job that requires experiential knowledge of West Africa, the willingness to travel and speak, skill at facilitating the multiple tasks connected with arranging travel and appointments for missionaries, and, far from least, the patient determination and ability to do significant fund raising and other development work.
It was his 28 years in Africa that have made him the religious he is. His roles there ranged over the years from being highly adept and effective at teaching English language, composition and literature at St. John’s to being assistant headmaster of the school; serving as infirmarian for the students; organizing and sponsoring a student rock band; directing the candidate program for young Ghanaians interested in joining Holy Cross at St. Joseph’s Hall; serving terms as local superior of the brothers’ community; becoming the first district superior in West Africa in 1967; directing the novitiate program; doing pastoral ministry for St. Paul’s parish in Sekondi and Star of the Sea parish in Takoradi, the school’s neighboring twin cities; and starting and seeing to the financing of an exceptionally effective ministry called the Holy Cross Skills Project, which serves the poorest among the youth and trains them in basic maintenance and building skills to enable their employment and stability. In all these activities, Br. Raymond’s energy and enthusiasm for the work of Holy Cross in Ghana was more than evident to all, but was perhaps most concretely typified by his fiery enthusiasm for a challenging game of tennis.
Br. Raymond took time out in 1984 to experience a beneficial spiritual renewal program in Nemi, Italy, in the Alban Hills outside Rome. Returning to Ghana, Br. Raymond began to experience unusual and complex problems with malaria, and early in 1987 was diagnosed with cerebral malaria, the virulent form of that endemic disease that threatened his life and forced his leaving the country and the people to whom he had devoted himself in Holy Cross.
Planting his feet once more on U.S. soil, he taught Third World Literature at both Holy Cross College and Saint Mary’s College at Notre Dame before taking up the challenge of the Mission Promoter’s role, a job at which he has labored ever since. As if that were not enough, he assisted the province Vocation Promoter for a year, then took on the role entirely from 1989 until 1996, when he handed it over to spend full time working on the development of the African missions.
Br. Raymond remains involved in many related activities in the province, including provincial chapter meetings and other gatherings of province members. He also enjoys cultural events, especially musical and dramatic productions that have a significant message to offer.
But perhaps his primary interest since his return to the U.S. has focused on the personal responsibility he has taken for the welfare of a seriously handicapped youth named Matthew, whose reliance on others has been from birth one hundred percent. Br. Raymond has been not only a direct care giver almost daily for Matthew from the ages of 6 to 21, but a forceful and astute medical and legal advocate as well, assuring Matthew and Matthew’s family in another city that whatever care is available, and only the best of it, will be given Matthew.
In his childhood years, Matthew’s prognosis for both development and life itself was guarded and not overly optimistic. Through Br. Raymond’s devoted attention, Matthew has survived many medical crises as well as the threat of being transferred to an undesirable housing situation when a large facility closed. Even more, Matthew has shown a learning potential and achievement that, while remaining extremely limited as measured against expectations of non-challenged youth, has already gone far beyond any predictions the medical or social personnel set for him in those years.
Br. Raymond acknowledges that Matthew has been a great source of spiritual growth for him and has in fact done more for Br. Raymond that Br. Raymond feels he has done for Matthew. One needs only to talk to other care givers to know that both Matthew and Br. Raymond have contributed immensely to one another’s development, although in far different ways.
If being a brother to others is at least part of the definition of the vocation to the brotherhood, Br. Raymond exemplifies it to the highest degree.
