Coleridge Christians Caring group honors Fr. Dave Liewer

COLERIDGE — Father David Liewer is this year’s recipient of the Coleridge Christians Caring award for his unselfish and faithful service to the community of Coleridge.

Fr. Dave served as pastor of St. Michael’s Catholic Church and has recently retired.

He was born in Osmond in 1948, into a family of seven children. His dad was a rural mail carrier and his mother was pretty much a busy stay-at-home mom, although she had many interests that took her out of the home.

“We lived across the street from the Catholic church and the one-eighth grade school, so we were all students at St. Mary’s,” said Father. “Dad was very involved in both civic and church programs and was a great volunteer of his time, often times involving us kids in the same. Our mother was a convert to the faith when she married Dad, and both were very involved in everything happening at school and church. The local newspaper was owned by our uncle, Gene Liewer, and many of us kids started helping out there, learning the trade at a middle school age.”

Fr. Dave was a young printer’s aid and learned much from that experience. Following eighth grade graduation, he was invited to visit Mount Michael High School in Elk Horn, along with some of his classmates from St. Mary’s. At that time, whoever went to Mount Michael was most likely considering a vocation. As a large Catholic family, it was certainly a subject we all considered. We had the Franciscan nuns teaching all of the classes at that time. By eighth grade, many of the girls had considered joining a convent and many boys were asked to consider the priesthood.

Father Dave graduated from Mount Michael and went on to study at St. John Vianney Seminary, St. Paul, Minn., from 1962-1968. He received his BA from St. Thomas College and was ordained in the Dioceses of Omaha in 1974. His first assignment was to Lindsay Holy Family, as an assistant to Father Nelson Newman.

Throughout the years, Fr. Dave has found himself in numerous parishes throughout Northeast Nebraska, most of which were in rural small towns. He has enjoyed all of these years and has garnered many friendships. It is hard to go anywhere without a former parishioner coming up to greet him and renewing their acquaintance, recalling the great times they shared.

Fr. Dave has also enjoyed all of the outdoor sports of fishing and hunting abundant in this area and more recently in gardening and reading. Then, of course, there is the Daily “Tri-fecta” as he calls it … The Jumble, crossword and sudoku. He is a master of all three.

Fr. Dave seems to be as busy now as he was before retirement, with filling in for several priests in the area and participating in all of the social events with is priestly friends. He is also a faithful friend to nieces, nephews and brothers, along with his one sister, who don’t live too far away. He is always looking forward to the next fishing trip in the summer and loves to spend a week in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, with family in the winter.