Father Bergbower to begin assignment as full-time Air National Guard chaplain

Father Dan Bergbower (far right), who will spend the next three years serving full time as a chaplain in the Air National Guard, and Father Bob Marciano, chief of chaplains in the Air National Guard (far left) are shown with National Guard members.

Imagine being 18 to 22 years old, serving in the military, and being stationed nearly half-way around the world in harm's way. Now, imagine being in this situation (or having a child or a grandchild in this situation) without the support of a priest.

It is this reality - an extreme need of Catholic priests to minister to military personnel - that has inspired Father Daniel J. Bergbower to volunteer to spend the next three years as a full-time chaplain in the Air National Guard.

Father Bergbower, who holds the rank of lieutenant colonel, will leave the Church of St. Peter, Quincy, where he has served as pastor for the past four years, to begin his new assignment on July 1. He says that currently there are only about 30 deployable priests to serve well over 100,000 members of the Air National Guard.

Father Bergbower's interest in serving as a chaplain in the military dates to nearly the beginning of his priesthood.

"Shortly after ordination as I considered my priesthood, I looked at unique things that had happened in my life that I could use to serve," he recalls. One of those unique things was growing up as one of five children in a military family. This experience gave Father Bergbower a special understanding of challenges that families and individuals in the military face - challenges he says he has done his best to address during his 18 years of service in the Air National Guard.

Among his duties in the Air National Guard, Father Bergbower will deploy for up to six months each year, serving wherever he is needed.

During June 20-23, Chief of Chaplains for the Air National Guard Lt. Col. Bob Marciano paid a visit to Quincy and the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois to thank the parishioners of the Church of St. Peter and Bishop George J. Lucas for making Father Dan available for the military ministry.

In homilies at Sunday Masses at St. Peter's, Father Marciano described his heart-rending encounter with a 20-year-old soldier after a Mass in the field: "With tears in his eyes, he thanked me for letting him come home for 20 minutes. That is what the Eucharist is - a chance to come home."

As part of its "Farewell to Father Dan," the Church of St. Peter is collecting phone cards to be distributed to U.S. troops. Any person wishing to contribute may send a domestic phone card, preferably for 30 or 60 minutes, to the Church of St. Peter, 2600 Maine, Quincy, IL 62301.