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3/29/13

It's All about Family for Our Deacon , a Stay-at-Home , Bike-Pedaling Dad



By Robert R. Schwarz

The sacrament of Holy Orders marks them
[ deacons ] with an imprint …which configures
them to Christ, who made Himself the 'deacon"
or servant of all. ( Catholic Catechism 1570 )

            On a nippy February afternoon ,  Matthew M. Hahn , 48,   could be seen fast pedaling his bicycle  down Harvard Avenue . Several yards behind him, also on bikes, were his son and two daughters who,  a mile ago, Dad  had met as they left grammar  school.
Matt, a slim, six-foot-one-inch former U.S. Marine Corps sergeant, wheeled his bike into the home garage, soon followed by the kids , who, unlike their father, were breathing a bit hard.  This caravan-on-wheels  has  been  a  family practice for almost nine  years, ever since Matt, one of five deacons at St. James Catholic  church in Arlington Heights, Illinois,  chose to become a stay-at-home dad. His employed  wife gladly  went along with the decision.  
            I followed them into the kitchen, where the Hahn's oldest son, Stephen, 12,  had arrived earlier and was now seated doing homework.  When Stephen's  three siblings—Isabel, 11, and nine-year-old twins Andrew and Lucille—came in, they too geared up for homework.
With a  haircut he called "high and tight "  and  straightforward speaking with few adverbs or adjectives, it was easy to envision Matt as the Marine sergeant he once was.   He was in blue jeans and wore a tucked out,  unbuttoned blue shirt ( "my  housecoat  ") over a sweat shirt stenciled with  " Abbott Labs " , a former employer.  " My wife would be embarrassed if  saw me being interviewed in this," Matt confesses.
            While we waited for Matt's wife, Zuleida ( " Zuly ")  to arrive, we talked about his decision to be a stay-at-home-dad.   It was all about prudent economics, he says. Though he had been earning a $70,000 salary at nearby  Abbott Laboratories  and Zuly was working as a part-time  pharmacist at Target, " it wasn't easy to make ends meet, " he explains. There also was a badly needed home addition. The problem seemed solved when  Target offered Zuly  full-time work with a $3,000 raise . But  that meant there'd be no one home to care for four  children.   " At the dinner table one night,  I said ' I'll  stay home and you go to work . ' "  Matt snaps his fingers  to indicate how fast this mutual  decision was made. 
            Zuly arrives  wearing a glad-to-be-home smile.  We recognize each other from Sunday mass. In 1982 she immigrated here  from Cuba with her father and mother. Zuly  is 49 and works nowadays in Mt. Prospect as an  "infusion pharmacist,  " someone who compounds  medicines for  home delivery. Matt met her when a woman in his religious education class handed him Zuly's phone number, telling him, " I think this woman and you would make a good pair. Why don't you give her call ? "  Matt did , and a week later the  two dated , then married exactly a year later and honeymooned on the South Pacific island of Bora Bora , the island which  inspired the "South Pacific"  show song  " Bali Hai."
            It was dinner time, and if Matt got his way, he'd be cooking  jambalaya. But this evening the kids got their favorite: macaroni and cheese.  " I learned to cook by baptism by fire, " Matt says.  Dinner, of course, is preceded by family prayer. 
            A good part of the evening in the Hahn home is spent in family conversation, with Matt listening carefully to the conversation of his children and what they have experienced during the  day. This,  along with his reading of world affairs ,  is  part of the research he does for any upcoming homily.
          
  Recreation doesn't  take a high priority in the Hahn family, at least for Mom and Dad. " Zuly and I don't  really have a chance to go out that much , Matt says. "If we do have a free night and we don't have an activity with the kids, then I'll book something for the church . "  He is also Cub master  to 62 scouts at the  Patton grade school .  Now and then the  family  might  watch the History or  Discovery television channels or some of the TV  oldies- but -goodies like the " Mary Tyler Moore " show. The Hahns have summer fun , however,   when they go  camping or biking in a forest preserve or at Kettle Moraine Park in Wisconsin.  And there's target shooting  at a conservation club in Kenosha, Wisconsin ( Matt has a .22 caliber rifle and a 9 mm  pistol ) .
            When morning breaks, Matt wakes up  Stephen at 6  up and then makes breakfast for him and the three other children, whom  he will call an hour later. Zuly sits down to her husband-made  breakfast at 7:30. The three kids then mount their bikes and head for school , with Dad again  leading the pack.
            Later that morning, after Zuly has left for work,  Matt tackles his stay-at-home chores: cleaning,  laundry, and bill paying. He also attends to a small home-based business of "hot stamping"  inscriptions  on items such as napkins and peoples'  personal  Bibles .  If he is "deacon of the week, " then there might be a  baptism, funeral , paper work for a marriage or communion to give at the Manor Care nursing home .  "Going to Manor Care," he says, "gives me the most satisfaction.  Just to be with those people , even though some  are asleep in wheelchairs, is most rewarding. "
            When asked if this family arrangement is  working, Matt replies, " I think so. My degree is in education .  ( He got a B S. degree in Occupational and Practical Arts from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champagne. ) , and this helps me with the kids' homework.  I think I have a little more patience with the kids than  Zuly,  and this helps me to be around them a lot. "
His Decision to Become a Deacon
The catalyst for Matt's decision to become a deacon came from two former Baptists who had converted to the Catholic faith and who led the RCIA class  Matt attended at St. Mary's church in Buffalo Grove.  "They were spiritual and compassionate  people and they had a good impact on me, " Matt says. " They were deacons and very good examples of 'servants'. And I said jeepers, this is what we're suppose to do—serve people. ' All this made a big change in my attitude and the way I looked at people.  Up to that point, maybe I was pretty selfish and self-centered, but going through RCIA was very awakening. "  Matt had already  graduated from college and  served seven years in the Marine Corps  as a radio repairman stationed at nearby Glenview Naval Air Station where, he says, he learned leadership and how to "follow" .  
One of those RCIA deacons suggested that Matt  consider becoming a deacon  because he had that " service mentality. "  Matt today gives most of the credit for  learning discipline, not to the  Corps, but to his parents. "They gave me respect for other people. If someone in authority asked me to do something, I would do it. "
Matt then plunged into three years of  studying for the deaconate, much of it at St. Mary of the Lake Seminary in Mundelein .  In May of 2004, he was ordained by Cardinal George.  Explaining what challenged him the most during his deacon training, Matt says,   " I was somewhat intimidated by the educational level of some of my classmates, some of whom were lawyers and doctors. And  I didn't think I was worthy of the position of deacon, and I still don't think I am.  "
He sums up his faith with: "I believe in God's compassion and mercy, and so I'm hoping that the things   I do will get me and my family into heaven. I struggle with the question  whether I'm not spending enough time with my family or my church.   "  He then pauses and adds, " That's not a bad conflict to have. "  He goes to confession in his parish three or four times a year.
Matt will soon begin  taking his children to the monthly  Holy Hour at 4 p.m. at St. James. He says he and  Zuly and the kids are   "constantly talking about religion because it's such a big part of our lives. "  He tells me that even when he and his children are pedaling their bikes to school,  they ask each other questions like " why does God do certain things or how should we react to this or how we should apply our faith. "
He and 9 Siblings Raised by  Conservative Catholic Parents
Matt's mother , who died in 2009, was a Catholic convert from her Methodist faith and bore ten children ( one died in childbirth ). Matt's father, Jim Hahn,  88 , lives six blocks from his son in the home Matt was raised.  During many of his 63 married years, the senior Hahn made scientific  instruments . " My parents were [ religiously ] conservative ," says Matt, "and the changes made by Vatican II were pretty unsettling to them, so they catechized me at home until my first communion.  After that, they encouraged me to go to church but they didn't require me to. I really didn't go to church a lot until  I was in the RCIA program." 
     When I ask Matt what has molded him most in life, he first studies the question. Then comes: " Watching my mother and father being so faithful to God and the church."  He quickly adds, " My wife and kids are very good influences on me. How can you have kids and not be a good person, because if you're not, then they're  not. "  He admits , though, that in college he was "kind of a wild kid and got into some shenanigans. " At that, he suddenly  rises from his chair,  puts on his jacket, and heads for the door.
Excuse, me…I got to go get my kids. You can follow me if you want. " I did—with my car."
             Matt will tell you that three things make him sad:  if he doesn't do his best;  the secularization of American society;  and people who oppose Catholic church teachings.  As for what makes him happy other  than Zuly and the kids, he points to his dad. "He is a good example for me and the kids .  He comes over now and then and we just might exchange some advice for one other." 
                As expected, this deacon would like to see this on  his  tombstone:  He was a good servant to God, a good husband, a good father, a good son , and a good brother.
***
I talked with Matt's father early   one  morning  during a weekday  mass at St. James. He was sitting in the last pew,  where he always sits at every weekday mass. Several of the weekday "regulars", including Jim,  were reciting the Rosary before mass began . It was Jim's turn now to voice the beginning words of  ten "Hail Mary's.  When he did , you heard a familiar voice,  that of a tall, slim  deacon giving a homily  , a voice loudly confident and compassionately  commanding.
Jim mentioned  a book about Vatican II , which his son gave him and which, he  is reading nowadays with a positive attitude about that council .  He also mentioned  two traits are as active today in his son as in childhood:  "one hundred per cent   honesty and straightforwardness.  "  Putting down his  "Magnificat " missal on our pew bench,  Jim says ,  "Our family was well knit ."  After mass,  I watch him drive away in a car with the license plate number   Mom to 10.   It's a tribute, of course, to his wife, whose car he donated  to his son's seminary after her death.
***
     It is Saturday night, THE family night in the Hahn home… On the family room floor , wrapped in blankets stitched by  Zuly, lies Mom and Dad and the four children.  There is popcorn and potatoes chips
and laughter . On television is the Mary Tyler Moore show.
The End



comments welcome 
 rrschwarz7@wowway.com                                                                                                          ©  2013  Robert R. Schwarz