"I shall be
very happy to make my weaknesses my special boast so that the power of Christ
may stay over me, and that is why I am quite content with my weaknesses, and
with insults, hardships, persecutions, and the agonies I go through for
Christ's sake. For it is when I am weak that I am strong." (II Corinthians
12: 9-10)
Contemplative
Intercessor
"Brother
Tony"
Formerly known as
Brother John OHC in the monastic Anglican Order of the Holy Cross in West Park,
New York, Tony converted to the Roman Catholic Church in 1961. He then became a
Catholic lay person. Subsequently, he took again the monastic habit as Brother
Tony on his fiftieth birthday, December 27, 1984, in St. Mary's Catholic
Cathedral, Austin, Texas. The Rev. Joseph H. Frazer, Jr., Ph.D., pastor of
Saint Margaret of Scotland Roman Catholic Church (Anglican Use) in Austin and
Tony's spiritual director, invested Tony in the monastic habit and received his
simple vows to a rule of life as a lay brother, with the permission of the Most Rev. Vincent M.
Harris, D.D., bishop of the Diocese of Austin. At the time, Brother Tony was
operating the Angels House soup kitchen and street ministry. Over the years, he
has struggled to live a consecrated life despite difficulties with the world's
system and temptations of the flesh. Throughout, he believes he is called to
live as a solitary contemplative intercessor. His monastic habit consists of a
bluish grey tunic, a navy blue scapular, a bluish grey capuche, and a bare pectoral cross of Brazilian hardwood. "In the final
analysis," Brother Tony says, "What truly matters is not what a
person wears around his or her body. What is of importance is whether a person
puts on the Lord Jesus Christ! Wrap yourself in Jesus! It's the habit that
wears well!"
"It is by
grace you have been saved, through faith; not by anything of your own, but by a
gift from God; not by anything you have done, so nobody can claim any
credit." (Ephesians 2: 8-9)
Tony wore a white monastic
habit as a choir brother of the Anglican Order of the Holy Cross, West Park, New York. He is pictured when he was twenty five years of age.
New Email to Brother Tony Hearn