Catholic Men's Quarterly

Home

THE FINAL BLESSING

Fathers, Sons, and Hunting
by Father J. Patrick Serna

“The metal cup was soon filled with water and simmering over the coals to make tea, while an antelope steak was roasting on a forked stick. It is wonderful how cozy a camp, in clear weather, becomes if there is a good fire and enough to eat, and how sound the sleep is afterwards in the cool air, with the brilliant stars glimmering through the branches overhead.”

--Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President and Founder of the Boone & Crockett Club

Dad asked Mom to double check his duffle bag. He always forgot something if Mom didn’t double check. I knew Dad was going deer hunting, and I knew he would be gone for a few days, because he was wearing that same red flannel shirt, permanently stained blue jeans, and the .270 bolt action was right next to the bag. Dad’s best friend George would be by any minute to pick him up. As usual, I begged and begged to go, but Dad kept saying I wasn’t old enough yet. “But Dad! You said I would be old enough when I showed you I could be safe with the BB gun, and when I could hit the bull’s-eye almost every time! You told me that I’m the safest kid you know, and you told me I’m the most accurate kid you know! So I’m ready!” Dad’s face gave in a bit and it looked like he was about to make my greatest dream come true. He brought me one step higher on the ladder rung of becoming a man, but not in the way I expected. Dad presented me with my first great moral dilemma, and he guided me out of it. He knew this would form me into a better man if my choice was the honorable one.
     “Son, you are right. I’d be lying if I said you weren’t old enough or good enough. But I need you to do something more important now. Last year, you were only four years old and too young, so Co-Co did the protecting all by himself. That’s too much work for just one dog. Now you are five, and I need you to help Co-Co take care of Mom and your little brother. If I knew that you and Co-Co were both taking care of the house, I sure would be able to relax and enjoy myself even more while hunting those deer. You can go hunting with me and George, or you can stay here and take care of Mom and your little brother David. So which is it?”
     This wasn’t the first moral dilemma of my life, but this was the first time a moral dilemma required me to sacrifice something this precious, priceless, and valuable...not just my FIRST hunting trip, but to go hunting with my Dad and his best friend. I waited my whole life for this moment! I could seize the hunting opportunity...or sacrifice it. Selfishness and Greed or Duty and Honor? Dad was big on teaching us the manly virtues at an early age. “Dad, I’ll take care of Mom and David. Don’t worry. Shoot a big one!”
With proud and loving eyes which instantly took my sense of loss away, Dad then said,
     “I knew that’s what you were going to say son. You know you are the oldest, and you know it is always your job to protect your Mom and little brother. Next hunting season David will be five, and he can take care of Mom by that time. You’ll be six next deer season, and you’ll be even more ready! On top of that, God will bless you later for making this tough decision right now.” This was the first of many times that God would use my Dad to form and mold me, against the backdrop of the outdoors and hunting.

“In our present condition, the created universe itself is a ladder leading us toward God.”

--Saint Bonaventure, Itinerarium Mentis in Deum

(The Journey of the Mind to God) Ch.1

Sure enough, Dad took me hunting the following deer season. That was twenty eight years ago. At the end of deer season, I was confused as to why Dad only saw or harvested bucks when I accidentally slept in, yet when we hunted together, the most we would see were rabbits, birds, and does. He never told me, but now I know. It was those crackly plastic bags of Dorito chips I insisted on taking into the deer blinds! I was a bag crackler and chair squeaker! The worst kind of greenhorn! How could he have been so patient without ever saying a word of frustration or disappointment to me? How could he have sacrificed those many hours of “no luck” just so that I could sit with him over the hunting spot, him knowing ahead of time that my presence would guarantee a zero in the way of buck activity?
If hunting were simply about killing animals, then yes, they would have been pure wastes of time. Harvesting the animal is only part of hunting though. When thinking of the many deer hunts Dad and I shared, I think on God the Father’s Providence in each of our lives. Sitting next to Dad last deer season, I was first in spotting all the animals. I pondered how my five senses used for hunting were worthless twenty eight years ago, and how my Dad’s were superhuman. Now, time has changed things for both of us.
In this cycle of change in both of our lives, only God’s nature has remained constant. Nature’s principles, reflections of the Supernatural Creator, did not and will not deteriorate or change. The foregoing aspect of this hunting experience reminds me of excerpts from Joseph Plunkett’s poem, St. Augustine: “Question the beauty of the wide air around you, the beauty of the sky.... question the living creatures that move in the waters, that roam upon the earth, that fly through the air.... Who made these beautiful changing things, if not One who is beautiful and changeth not?” Such are the perceptions and reflections which are common and typical for the hunter.

“I see his blood upon the rose, and in the stars the glory of His eyes, His body gleams amid eternal snows, His tears fall from the skies. I see his face in every flower; The thunder and the singing of the birds Are but His voice -- and carven by His power Rocks are His written words. All pathways by His feet are worn, His strong heart stirs the ever-beating sea, His crown of thorns is twined with every thorn, His cross is every tree.”

--Joseph Plunkett, “I See His Blood Upon the Rose”

     Hunting with a father figure, friend, or alone, can be a very spiritual experience, an intimate encounter with God, if the hunter is careful to make the most of what nature and the hunt have to offer. Part of hunting is the experience of getting a glimpse of God in the sunrise, hearing an echo of heavenly music through the birds, admiring God’s infinite Wisdom when pondering the order as found in the trees, valleys, hills, clouds, water on leaves, dew on grass, or the intricate exactness of spider webs. The critic who would accuse a hunter of being “spiritually excessive” or overly optimistic in his quest for God in the hunting experience, an experience which invariably and always transpires in and through nature from beginning to end, should heed Saint Bonaventure’s theologically sound observation: “Nature and all material things are made to serve man, and to enkindle in him the fire of love and praise for the Maker of the universe.” --Breviloquium, II ch.4

“I reckon the Old Man was about as strange as they come, a stickler for a whole lot of things that mightn’t make much sense to other people.” ‘I’m too old and sot in my ways to learn a mess of new teachin’. I have seen the elephant and heard the owl. I don’t do nothin’ I do except for a reason. The reason may not suit other people, but it suits me, because I have tried it all and made two mistakes for every mistake I didn’t make. I am what you might call a monument to trial and error.’ “I missed a lot of birds....but the important thing was that we had plenty of lovely time in between the actual shooting. So suppose it took us all afternoon to get a limit or a near limit? We had just that much more time in the woods, to see all the things a man can see in the woods if he’s traipsing along slow and easy and taking his time.” The Old Man and the Boy, “September Song II” Robert Ruarke

     For a son, there is no greater reward after the hunt than the lifelong memories of sitting next to the Dad, or the Father figure, who was and is such an important part of his life. For a Dad, there is the great satisfaction of knowing that he is leaving a part of himself with the young man who loves and admires him so much.
     Every person is given the chance at life everlasting in Paradise. The hunter, however, is also able to live on for generations to come in the sagacious advice he gave to the youngster who incessantly asked all the important, along with unimportant, questions. In a world of mass information, data, and technological communication overload, it is the modern-day hunter who preserves the oral tradition of times past, represented by Homer, or the early Church Fathers who had limited access to the written Word.
     Those hours of silence while sitting or stalking together, those long hours of driving to and from the hunting grounds when the greatest and most memorable conversations in the lives of boys and men take place... this is at the heart of what hunting is all about. Sure, bagging the bird or walloping the big game animal is part and parcel of the hunt. This is one of themanyelements of what hunters mean by the phrase “Gone Hunting.”
     Hunting is not about mass carnage “done legally” or outlaw poaching done illegally. A frequent query by non-hunters to hunters, one we are asked time and again, goes like this: “Well, do you just leave the animal there or do you at least save the meat?” Sadly, this question betrays the mass ignorance which still runs rampant. These ignorant types should simply ask: “Are you an ethical hunter or an immoral poacher?” Theodore Roosevelt, an accomplished hunter of dangerous African game and the like, said what is at the heart of every true hunter: “I have never sought to make large bags, for a hunter should not be a game butcher.” (The Wilderness Hunter “Hunting Lore”)

“You really like to do this, what you do now, this silliness of hunting kudu?” “Just as much as I like to be in the Prado.” “One is not better than the other?”“One is as necessary as the other. There are other things too.” “And you know what you want?” “Absolutely, and I get it all the time.”

--Ernest Hemingway, Green Hills of Africa, “The Need to Hunt”

     My little brother David, healthy, strong, six foot and nineteen years young, died unexpectedly in 1992, two months after I entered the seminary. Thanks to the great sport of hunting, I have many memories of shooting at the range, or hunting rabbits, with my little bro. I have many good memories of my brother and Dad which do not include the outdoors or hunting, but the best memories are the ones of my Dad teaching us gun safety, shooting skills, or stalking and tracking techniques. I remember with great clarity and joy the many times our Dad drove alone inside the pickup cab while David and I stood in the bed of the truck, “sorting out” cottontails with our .22 rifles for the next day’s barbecue.
     The memories of Dad showing us how to clean and cook rabbits, quail, and other game, are as abundant as they are comforting. These were the special experiences which “most of the other boys” didn’t get to appreciate. These memories are all the more special now. Since ordination I have gone on multitudes of hunts with my spiritual father and mentor, Rene H. Gracida, Bishop Emeritus of Corpus Christi. Since 2001, Bishop Gracida and I have hunted and collected numerous pheasants, a pronghorn antelope each, numerous whitetail and axis deer, fallow deer and sika deer. Countless feral hogs, javelina and coyotes have fallen to our well-placed bullets, and we each bagged our first elk last October.
     Just when I thought that academic degrees over the span of ten years in America and Rome would provide me with all I need to know as a priest, our Good God gave me frequent exposure to a spiritual father who has shown me by word, example and experience, the different ways I can become a better Catholic priest and man. Our common appreciation for the outdoors, and hunting, has made these frequent interactions possible.
     The small rural parish to which I am assigned boasts several boys--some young, some old--who have expressed a desire to become priests. Our humble parish can say that since the summer of 2002, every Mass, including the daily 7:00 A.M., has been celebrated with at least one Altar Boy. We do not use an Altar Boy schedule, the boys simply follow the “First come, first serve” principle, and, boy, do they compete over getting to serve! Boys in CCD and the Altar Boy program are fascinated by the reality of having a priest who loves the outdoors and hunting, just as they all have that same appreciation and love. The enthusiasm of these young men is incredible.
     During this time of crisis in Fatherhood and manhood in America, when more children are growing up without father figures than at any other time in American history, could one solution be the rediscovery of the outdoors, hunting, and fishing? Do we not need fathers and father figures willing to spend time with boys, doing the things which men did as a matter of course for centuries before these last fifty or so years?
     I am anxious to see what new lessons God will show me in His outdoors over the course of my remaining years on earth. One day, I hope to see my little brother David again, this time in Heaven. Between now and then though, I’ll primarily be found celebrating the sacraments in Church, or hunting in the outdoors when free time permits. Now and again, I’ll hunt with the .270 Remington I bought for my little bro in 1991, a year before his passing. When using that rifle I gave him, I’ll be reminded again of Heaven, the mysteries, and the meanings of eternity and “always” as I reflect on the words I engraved on the bottom metal of that rifle:To David From Patrick, Brothers Always. I happen to think that there is much more to hunting than killing an animal. Some would beg to differ, and I do feel sorry for them.
     Saint Hubert, patron of hunters, pray for us!

Fr. J. Patrick Serna writes from a small town outside Corpus Christi, Texas. Contact Fr. Serna at krakalese@yahoo.com

Also available...

A classic adventure tale full of excitement and sound morals. Join a young man and his friends on a quest to save their land from the scourge of evil and restore the Faith that sustained generations.

Price: $6 per copy

To order, make checks payable to House on the Moor Books and mail to:

House on the Moor Books
PO Box 156
Bernardston, MA 01337-0156