A Contemplative Prophet

Today’s inspirational piece is about a man I have never heard of before reading an intriguing obituary.  He was called by Betty Campbell, a nun who worked alongside of him for decades, “a contemplative prophet.”  I am sorry I have only met him in death.  His story is compelling and I wanted to share some of it with you.  His name was Peter Hinde.  He was a fighter pilot in World War II and then became a Carmelite monk and priest.  The Carmelites are a Roman Catholic order, founded in the medieval time and focus on community, prayer, and service.

Interestingly, he was born in Elyria, Ohio in 1923.  He studied engineering for a couple years and then volunteered for the Army in 1942.  Eventually, he became a fighter pilot headquartered in Okinawa.  As Mark Day, author of the article I read, said, “On Aug. 12, 1945, three days after an atomic bomb destroyed Nagasaki, Hinde's squadron flew over the devastated city en route to a mission in South Korea.  ‘For a brain-washed pilot at 15,000 feet, it was simply a casualty of war,’ he wrote in his private autobiography.”  I have been to Hiroshima and visited the museum there, so I can imagine the devastation he saw from his plane.  

Soon the war was over, and Peter joined the Carmelites in 1946.  Here is the first major gap in Mark Day’s story.  What happened in that year between the end of the war to his joining a meditative Catholic religious order?  I suspect he already was a Catholic, but that seems like a radical step---from fighter pilot to monk!  By 1952 he had become a priest.  The author tells an interesting story when he recounts that “Three years later he traveled to Rome to study theology. While on a stopover in Paris he met a Japanese Catholic priest, ironically a former fighter pilot cadet from Hiroshima.”  

The plot thickens when we learn, “The two decided to make a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Therese of Lisieux.  Hinde was stunned when the cleric told him he lost his family to the Hiroshima atomic bomb that exploded on Aug. 6, 1945, killing an estimated 140,000 people.”  This I cannot imagine.  I liked the words from Peter Hinde himself, when he acknowledges, “a process in my, you might say, 'demilitarization,' to some extent.”  This is a fascinating confession that his mindset had been transformed---or converted if you prefer that language.

In Mark Day’s article we next meet Peter in Washington, DC in the 1960s where he is teaching some Carmelites.  He was also involved in civil right.  By the end of that decade, he was sent to Latin America to work among the poor.  True to who he had become, he was again involved in working for the rights of the poor and disenfranchised of various countries.  There he teamed up with a Mercy Sister, Betty Campbell.  Together they have been involved in this important, challenging ministry since then.  

He became involved with Gustavo Gutierrez, one of the founding figures of Liberation Theology.  These theologians and leaders of the church worked on behalf of the poor and uneducated---most of whom would have been Catholic.  Often the Catholic hierarchy, which too frequently was in cahoots with the US government, was part of the problem.  Even at that time in his life and career, I can see how folks saw Peter Hinde as a prophet.  But he was first and foremost a priest.  I liked the advice Gutierrez offered those involved in the Liberation Theology movement.  He said, “You are not here to raise hell, but to do pastoral work.”

Hinde was good friends with many of the martyrs of that time.  For example, he and Betty Campbell were close to the four women killed in El Salvador---three Ursuline nuns and a lay woman.  He was also close to the five Jesuit priests killed in the 1980s.  He was a supporter of Oscar Romero, archbishop of San Salvador, who recently was canonized by the Pope.  We know that “In 1985, Hinde co-founded Christians for Peace in El Salvador (CRISPAZ).”  This became a form of “reverse mission” work to sensitize North Americans to the plight of the church in the South.  

In Mark Day’s article a number of people are quoted as they talked about Peter Hinde’s life.  But I want to end with Betty Campbell’s words about her friend and fellow minister.  “Peter was a prophet, sharp, intelligent, always searching for the truth, speaking the truth to the best of his ability.  He was a very humble person.  He lived poorly.  Just before passing he called Elijah to come with his chariot of fire and take him to God.”

I didn’t know about Peter Hinde, but I feel like I have come to know about him.  He sounds a lot like Jesus, except maybe the early part about being a fighter pilot!  His life offers hope for all of us yet with some of our journeys to go.  Let’s search for truth.  Let’s become humble.  Living poorly seems like an appropriate thing to level the field with all the poor around the world.  I want to get to the place when on my death bed, I am ready for Elijah, too.  I want to jump in the chariot.  I’m not so sure about the fire part!

Thanks be to Peter Hinde---a contemplative prophet.