Bro. Ricky Medere, OFM, knows what it’s like to get his hands dirty. Before entering the Franciscan community in 2023, he worked as a mechanic, tending to heating and air conditioning systems around Lake Charles, Louisiana, a region where stifling heat and humidity makes cooling systems a necessity.
He’s well-prepared for Franciscan formation. He studies at the Mexican American Catholic College in San Antonio, Texas, learning theology and other subjects which will prove helpful as a Franciscan friar.
Yet perhaps his most vital training is getting his hands dirty, working among the poor all over North America.
Along with his fellow friars in formation, Bro. Ricky can be found performing pastoral tasks, such as bringing Eucharist to shut-ins in San Antonio, as well as work in soup kitchens and food pantries in Greenwood, Mississippi, and the island nation of Jamaica.
“We are following the example St. Francis left us, to be among the poor, not just spiritually, but being with them in person,” he said, talking while during a break in-between helping to renovate a new formation house with his fellow friars in the OFM community in San Antonio.
At St. Francis of Assisi Parish in Greenwood last summer, Bro. Ricky assisted with church upkeep, where his mechanical skills proved helpful. Direct ministry included service at a food pantry as well as tutoring children.
“I learned a lot about the kids. They have the capacity to do the schoolwork, but they needed an authority figure,” he said.
The food pantry attracts those of all religious denominations, and Bro. Ricky found himself discussing the Scriptures in a friendly way with the largely Baptist patrons. Greenwood is in the Delta, one of the poorest regions of the country. St. Francis served as a center of civil rights activism during the 1960s, and Bro. Ricky spend time talking with the older parishioners about the personalities of that era, including famous visitors to Greenwood such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. He also participated in the local ecumenical leadership meetings, in which Catholics and Protestants, both Black and white, joined in addressing community issues. It was learning by doing in a multicultural religious community.
In Jamaica, where he served for nine months, Bro. Ricky assisted at a soup kitchen and tutored students. Beyond the tourist areas and the enclaves for the rich, the island is known for its grinding poverty. Much of the ministry involved talking with the people who live in the mountains, who came down to the Franciscan parish area to collect their rainwater. Bro. Ricky found an opportunity to witness. He told them about his vocation as a friar. Some told him about their deeply-rooted Rastafarian beliefs.
An experienced friar reminded Bro. Ricky about the importance of learning names while doing ministry, whether tutoring children or helping to feed families at the soup kitchen.
“It’s a way to make people feel special, feel loved,” said Bro. Ricky.
Bro. Ricky’s Franciscan vocation has its roots in his interest in diocesan priesthood. Now 32, as a young man working as a mechanic he felt a calling to the diocesan priesthood. He contacted the Diocese of Lake Charles just as Covid began and programs were curtailed. The diocesan vocation director suggested he continue to accumulate life experience, and Ricky began service at a local parish, helping out with maintenance and other duties. Then he saw Fr. Casey Cole, OFM, on a popular YouTube video describing Franciscan life. Bro. Ricky felt another opportunity was opened to him through ministry steeped in fraternal community and service to the poor.
What he saw on the video inspired him, as it told him that the Franciscans offered a way of life where he could get involved in people’s lives, particularly those who are struggling.
“It piqued my interest because what he described was doing hands-on work, being in the trenches with people, bringing Christ to them. It felt like a glove that fit my hand perfectly,” he said. In many ways, the work provided the kind of satisfaction he found through the technical skills he exercised in fixing heating and air conditioning systems, being of assistance to people in need.
“That’s something I could relate to, I could touch and see the results,” he said about what he learned about Franciscan ministry.
That video opened his eyes. “God opened up another dimension for me through religious life,” he said. Bro. Ricky plans to continue his studies next academic year at St. Anthony Shrine in Boston, where he will focus on spiritual development.
He will bring his hands-on experience of social ministry to his studies.
Academic studies are important. But relating to the spiritual and material struggles of people, particularly those who are marginalized, provides a way to put pastoral skills learned in the classroom into action.
“You can do all the studies in a contained environment,” said Bro. Ricky. “But if you want to be effective, you have to get out and reach the people, to see them face-to-face and eye-to-eye and be a presence for them.”