Father Robert Braun, O.M.I. - Julie Bostick

Hello my name is Julie Bostick and I met Father Braun through Cursillo, and I wanted to share with you how Father Braun touched the hearts and lives of so many Cursillistas.

In Cursillo, our ideal is make a friend, be a friend and bring your friend to Christ, and Father Braun lived that each and every day.

Father Braun made friends easily, because he didn’t look at people he had never met as strangers. He looked at them as Future Friends. In fact, if you ever went anywhere with Father you know that he never missed an opportunity to work a room. People were attracted to his openness, his kindness, his soft and loving voice, his warm hugs, his sense of humor and most of all to his contagious love of God and the Blessed Mother. He was never afraid to walk up to anyone in any setting.

For example, a few years ago, I asked Father to pray for a lady that was in my ministry formation class, because I knew that Father prayed in front of the Blessed Sacrament three hours each day. This lady had serious cancer and she was going to have a very invasive surgery. He promised he would pray. A week or so later he called me to tell me that he had gone by the Shrine on a Friday evening and one of his friends there had asked him if she could introduce him to someone in the restaurant. Father’s friend introduced him to the lady I had asked him to pray for, her mom and her husband. They were eating at the Shrine restaurant the night before her surgery. He didn’t seem at all surprised by meeting her. He just smiled and said, “You’re the one I have been praying for.” After spending about 30 minutes with her and her family and giving her a special blessing he left, but he traveled several times over to a St. Louis hospital to visit her despite the fact that he had only met her once.

He visited her several more times at home, and then during her time with hospice he went to her home each week to say mass for her family.
Father Braun was a great friend, because he knew what it meant to “BE” a friend. For instance, I helped him type up his rolodex and he had hundreds of friends and next to each of their names he had their anniversaries, birthdays, children’s birthdays and so on. If he knew his friends birthdays he would send them a card and in the corner he would write, “From the Birthday Place in heaven.” He also never forgot to send a special thank you note for any kindness his friends showed to him.
When one of our Cursillistas called to say that one of their children was in a serious car accident he traveled to a St. Louis hospital, so he could be with them during their pain. He attended all the important events in our lives and he was there to laugh with us and cry with us. One time he drove all the way to St. Luke’s in Chesterfield to bless my Dad before he went into surgery. He traveled all over to be there for funerals, baptisms, weddings, and all kinds of celebrations. He gave 100% of himself to everyone he met, and he had special pet names for his friends and his favorites were, “Dear ones, Little Rascal, and Hon.”

Even though he always knew when to be serious, we were never afraid to tease and laugh with Father Braun, because he loved to tease and laugh back. During one of the women’s Cursillo weekends as soon as he stood up to give his talk the women all stood up picked up their chairs and turned them to face the opposite direction. He loved to tell that story. On one of the men’s weekends, when the men wrote his name on the dry erase board they put One Mean Individual next to the initials O.M.I. When he finally noticed it he laughed and couldn’t wait to share the story later.
Most importantly, Father Braun had a very special talent for bringing his friends and their families to Christ. When friends told them of their children or family members who were not practicing their faith he added them to his very long prayer list and he faithfully prayed for them everyday. Whenever he met a woman expecting a baby he would ask her if he could give her baby a special blessing. Then he would offer her a beautiful blessing and give her a typed copy he always kept in his breast pocket so she would have a copy for her baby book.

Besides sharing his deep appreciation of the color blue, Father Braun also shared his love for the Blessed Mother, St. Terese of Lisieux, the trinity and especially for our God of Love. He gave beautiful blessings and his unconditional love made it easy to go to reconciliation. He shared inspiring books, novenas, prayers, poems, and words of wisdom.

Just a few days after Father passed away, I went to St. Clare’s in O’Fallon to hear Matthew Kelly, who is a great Catholic motivational speaker that Father introduced us to and Matthew told us that some people come into our lives and they are living examples of Christ’s love for us. When Matthew said that, I realized that Fr. Braun was a living example of Christ’s love for me and so many others. Even though I had prayed for God’s will for Father and that he would find peace and not have to suffer anymore, I felt an emptiness inside because Fr. Braun’s example was not visible or tangible anymore. I was still having a very difficult time with my grief. Then this week while my husband and I were driving to work and saying our morning prayers together, I looked down and noticed Father’s handwriting on a card in the pocket in the door of the car. I took it out and I read out loud to my husband to remind us of why Father had sent it to us. We had a personal setback in August and Father Braun had sent us the card to help us accept God’s will in our lives despite our disappointment.

In the corner of the envelope it said, “From the Consoling place in heaven.” Inside the card he had stuffed a typewritten sheet labeled, “some thoughts on the will of God and his love.” He had typed beautiful words that he had shared many times with many of us and we could almost hear his voice as I read. He had written a special blessing on the card that said, “With my blessing, my love, and my prayers in Jesus and Mary Immaculate, Father Robert Braun, O.M.I.

With the help of the Holy Spirit, Father Braun reminded me that he is still here with us in our hearts and he will continue to be an example of Christ’s love in our lives. He left us his legacy and through it he will continue to bring his friends to Christ.