For a native who claims to “get a complete blood transfusion every time I go home so I’m a Southerner again,” Brother Sam has connected with many different kinds of communities easily and joyfully. Each group of Brothers he has lived with was instrumental in making him feel at home.

“Every time I’d go where I thought I should go,” he reflects, “I’ve been blessed with Brothers who opened me to new ways and supported me in challenging areas. They cleared a path for me as a fairly young person in the community, and I’ve been surrounded by great men.”

Community life was easy for someone who grew up with five brothers and sisters, but his first taste of it was especially exhilarating.

“There were about 100 men in Austin,” he said, remembering his first days in the Congregation. “It was really exciting to have so many energetic men with the same focus from all over the U.S. I thought I had died and gone to heaven!”

Brother Sam went on to complete his novitiate training in New York and earn his B.A. at St. Edward’s University in sociology and social studies. In San Antonio he taught high school for five years, which he terms “fantastic.”

“This was the low-income part of San Antonio, so I identified with struggling people in a school where every penny counted,” he recalls. “In the sacrifices we made, the experience met all the expectations I had of being a religious.”

In 1977 he transferred to Moreau Catholic High School in Hayward, California, where he also began working toward his master’s degree in counseling. During the summers he worked with street kids and wards of the court at Rancho San Antonio in Chatsworth, California.

“Those are the most disadvantaged kids,” he observes. “As I look back, I’m glad to see that I mirrored Jesus’ love and understanding, and showed them that people can care for them without any strings attached.”

That ministry sparked his interest in drug and alcohol counseling, but first another ministry called him to Casper, Wyoming. There, at the invitation of the Bishop, he and four Holy Cross Brothers started a program to help the poor and needy. The South-West Province was looking for ways to address the needs of the poor in areas where no one else was helping them. Brother Sam helped set up a food and clothing bank that continues to thrive today under Brother Francis Kjeldgaard, and with plenty of talent on hand, he returned to Rancho San Antonio for a year.

After finished his counseling degree, he taught at Notre Dame High School in Sherman Oaks, California for five years, then in Melbourne, Florida for one. The Cardinal of Western Samoa then asked the Province to send a Brother to look at the possibility of working with alcoholics on that Pacific island. His month-long stay confirmed his interest in alcohol and drug counseling, and he went on to post-graduate work in that specialization at University of California, Long Beach.

“During that time I was trying to discern whether I should go that route,” he says. Yet as a Brother might tell you, we don’t always know what is best for us. “The Lord intervened again, and our Provincial said, ‘We need you at St. Francis.’ Through the wisdom and guidance of our superiors, we Brothers set the needs of community before our personal needs.”

As a guidance counselor at the Mountain View, California high school, Brother Sam sees five to ten students on a daily basis. He also meets with a group regularly for academic counseling. Spiritually, he is a great believer in praying for guidance, especially if you are trying to discern if religious life is for you.

“Seek the Lord’s guidance through the Holy Spirit, but also through other people in religious life,” he advises. “Search out the information, then act on it.”

And what would he tell people he has discovered as a “man with hope to bring?”

“The life I live is not connected to worldly things,” Brother Sam says gently. “My love for God is strong enough to be beyond the here and now, and the way I demonstrate that is how I interact with people.”