naked in napasan francisco – 6^th entry

This triptych is in the Hess Gallery at the Hess Winery – the first winery we visited. (I guess wine has made millionaires of the Hess family.) And next door was the Christian Brothers Novitiate and Conference Center. I don’t know what I liked more – discovering the Christian Brothers Novitiate in Napa, especially after having written about the contributions of the religious orders to American culture, or that the old and retired Brothers are living next door to a modern art collection.

In the whole United States, there are about 700 Brothers left in the organization I joined back in my youth. (The average age of the group is over 70.) The religious order that took me out of northern Ontario and opened the door to New York City and Pittsburgh is dieing. Within 20 years the Brothers, Sisters and Priests that ran the Catholic Schools in the United States will be no more. Bobby, who is my remaining friend in the Brothers, is in Concord, CA; he is the principal at the Brothers High School there; and Bobby is my age.

Tom and I did go up to the Brothers House asking if Brother Robert was in, but school, in the East-Bay Area is still in session.