This grand Father is a grand father and a grandfather

Father Tressic, a "second-career priest" ordained in 1996, is a former business owner whose marriage was annulled. He is the father of David Tressic, 33, and Tina Marie Wise, 32, both of Connecticut.

When he made the decision to become a priest, "I was very concerned whether I was abandoning my children," Father Tressic told The Evangelist. Even though David and Tina Marie were adults, "I didn't want them to experience Dad up and leaving. [I worried about] being a parent to them, being there to support them."

Children's reaction

However, the future priest found he had little reason to worry. "I was very supportive, very happy for him," Tina Marie stated. "It was something he was torn with all his life. I thought he would be very good at it. He was popular in the community, well-liked, respected. I just thought he would be a natural at it."

Even with such support, Father Tressic admitted that answering the call to the priesthood wasn't easy. "I had resisted for five or six years to react to this feeling I had within myself. It was constantly there to plague me," he said.

Called by God

"I see it as a call; they think of it as a choice," he explained. "My son said, `Well, if this is what you want to do....'"

Still, David says he "thought it was great." Since his father owned a chain of service stations and convenience stores at the time, his son felt "it was great that he was running a multi-million-dollar business and was willing to give that up."

Father Tressic's children also did not see his vocation as having a major effect on their lives. "I don't look at it as something about me. It's something about him," Tina Marie said. "If he's happy, I'm happy."

David experienced more of a change when his father left for the seminary: While only in his twenties, he took over the family businesses and home.

"It made me grow up," he said. "I gained respect for him -- what he had given up for his calling. It was hard for him to leave myself and my sister."

In touch

"I'm always their dad, and they're my children," he explained. "I've never become `Dad-priest' or `priest-Dad' or something. That persona never comes between us."

Ordination day was emotional for the entire family. "I cried, just out of happiness," David recalled. "I envy what he has done. I'm real proud of him, because it goes to show you never stop growing."

Ironically, it was also the day before Father's Day. "He was very emotional. My father was becoming a Father," Tina Marie said.

Her gift to her father that day was a framed letter in which she expressed her pride in him "for following so successfully your dream...for choosing a life of worship and caring/helping other people and for finding peace within yourself."

While babysitting a friend's child, the letter continued, Tina Marie had been asked about her family's unusual situation. After she explained that her father was a priest, the little girl responded, "Wow, you've got to be the luckiest person in the world."

"I thought about it later and realized how right she was," Tina Marie wrote.

Broad view

"It broadens my view. It gives me a different approach to my ministry: been there, done that," he told The Evangelist. "I'm able to approach a situation from [the perspective of] a person that has had a family, had to make the mortgage and pay the bills, and had the struggles of being a Christian at the same time."

When parishioners come to him with problems in their marriages and families, he added, "I can usually relate. I'm able to empathize with them."

Having struggled through ups and downs with his children as well, the priest often uses family anecdotes in his homilies. "We as parents think we're supposed to be teachers. But sometimes, our children can be the teachers to us," he said. "It wasn't until I understood the relationship between parent and child that I was able to understand God's forgiveness."

'Kind of weird'

While she is now a Lutheran because of disagreements over Church doctrine, she said that her father's becoming a priest "opened my eyes to religion."

Having a priest for a father "is kind of weird," David admitted. "He's been in [the family] business for so long, but now he calls me and asks me for money!"

However, he boasted that his father "is a very open, '90s kind of priest. He's been through everything, experienced everything."

Grand-Father

Being the "token priest" in the family tree has advantages and disadvantages, he said wryly: In his first year after ordination, he nearly went bankrupt flying all over the country to witness marriages and baptize children for relatives. He also joked about the stress of being "on stage" before extended family members who expect him to do a perfect job at their celebrations.

"People say to me, `You're going away on vacation?' I say, `No, I'm there to work!'" he said.

More welcome

"I wish more people who have been married and now have the choice to do something else with their life would consider" religious life, Father Tressic stated. "The Church desperately needs people who have had that type of life experience. It brings a sense of reality into the person and into the ministry."

For those who do see a vocation in a family member, the priest's children advise only support. "At first, there will be a sense of abandonment, but then the feeling subsides," David said. "Be happy with your father's decision and [have] respect for what they want to do."

"Don't judge," Tina Marie added. "There are very few people who can do this."

As for her own father, she said, "Not only is he a good father to his children; he's a very devoted man."

(07-23-98) [[In-content Ad]]