Father Dan Callahan is chaplain and spiritual director at St. Josephs Rehabilitation Center.
Posted on 07/31/2008 4:36:07 PM PDT by NYer
RYE, N.Y. (CNS) -- Atonement Father Dan Callahan evangelizes underwater. And on a bike. And while he's running. All on the same day. And he helps recovering alcoholics and substance abusers at the same time.
Father Callahan, 57, is known as the "Iron Friar" for successfully completing 12 daylong triathlons since 1997. Most recently, he finished the Ford Iron Man USA competition July 20 at Lake Placid in 14 hours and 43 minutes. Three inches of rain fell while he swam 2.4 miles in Mirror Lake, biked 112 miles through the Adirondack Mountains and ran a 26.4-mile road marathon.
In a telephone interview from Toronto, where he is associate pastor at St. Joan of Arc Parish, Father Callahan told Catholic News Service that his goal in competing is "always to finish, enjoy the pizza, be healthy and go to work the next day."
Father Callahan uses the annual race at Lake Placid as an opportunity to evangelize and to raise funds for St. Joseph's Rehabilitation Center in Saranac Lake, where he once served as a pastoral counselor and spiritual director.
St. Joseph's is a 58-bed facility run by his order, the Franciscan Friars of the Atonement. It provides inpatient, outpatient and community residential alcoholism and substance abuse services to men and women.
"I talk to the residents two days before the race," said Father Callahan. "I use the race as a foil to talk about recovery. I know what a struggle they have in life, and I know what good people they are.
"I tell them that it's a grueling race for me, but it's nothing compared to the race they're in for their life. I get choked up every year. It's very inspirational," he said.
He also invites his friends and supporters of St. Joseph's to sponsor his race. He said that he has raised more than $100,000 for St. Joseph's through the Iron Man competitions.
Father Callahan said that he is always invited to offer the opening prayer at the "carbo-load dinner" on the Friday night before the Sunday race. At the dinner, where the racers eat a carbohydrate-heavy meal to sustain them for the event, "there are 2,400 racers there and their families and supporters. I always put in a plug for Mass," he said.
He also is the main celebrant and homilist at the evening Mass at St. Agnes Church the Saturday before the race. He said he has been told that it is the most crowded Mass of the year.
"At the end of Mass, the athletes are invited to the sanctuary for a blessing and I take my place with them. The congregation prays over us. Seeing the tears in the eyes of the athletes is a moving experience," he said.
Racers and onlookers invariably approach Father Callahan during the actual competition, he said. "People thank me for the homily. Some say that a point I made helped them through a tough spot on the course.
"It's a real evangelizing opportunity. Some (participants) don't have a spirituality beyond running," he said.
And in case he might get mistaken for one of the other tall, lean triathletes, Father Callahan wears a shirt emblazoned with "Iron Friar."
The moniker was the idea of Atonement Father Art Johnson, former CEO of St. Joseph's, Father Callahan said. "When I approached him about using the Iron Man race to make money for St. Joseph's, he said, 'What'll we do? Call you the Iron Friar?'"
He said that running, biking and swimming offer "a great space for contemplation. The interplay with nature is a place of information. It's a great place to pray and discover the fruits of contemplation."
Father Callahan said, "It's incredibly efficient. You have flashes of insight when you're out there. When the blood is pumping through the body and the brain is working faster, you're open to new things. It has given me so many blessings."
The path to insight for the Iron Friar was not a direct one. Father Callahan grew up in New York, in "Irish Catholic Democratic South Buffalo," as he described it. He was one of eight children. He commuted across town to Bishop Fallon High School on a bus that also carried the late newsman Tim Russert to Canisius High School.
Father Callahan said that by the time he graduated from Boston University, he was "pretty much of an agnostic." He had a conversion experience during one of his daily swims.
As he described it, "I heard a voice that said, 'Dan, do you believe that I am in the Eucharist?' I said that I did and got the reply, 'So why are you swimming so religiously and not going to Eucharist?'"
Father Callahan said that it reminded him of St. Paul's conversion. "It opened my eyes to see."
It also brought him back to Mass and led him to the Franciscan Friars of the Atonement, whose charism appealed to him. He was ordained in 1987.
Father Callahan ran several marathons when he was stationed at St. Odilia's Parish in South Central Los Angeles and joined his sister and her husband in a triathlon there. He entered his first Iron Man competition in Montreal in 1997.
Father Callahan said, "For each person, it's a major accomplishment to become an Iron Man. As each person goes through the finish line, a cheer goes up" from family, friends and other contestants. He said "it's a marvelous analogy for life."
This makes my hip rehabiltation physical therapy and pool therapy seem puny. LOL!
57 years old! What an inspiration (albeit along with a rebuke) to those of us younger.
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