Franciscan, almost killed in accident, rejoices in return to ministry

Published: 2004-06-30

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. (CNS) -- "When you see Father Austin, you see the Lord at work," said Eleanor Jackson. "He is totally in tune with his Lord and the Holy Spirit." Jackson is Franciscan Father Austin Budnick's longtime volunteer secretary. Father Budnick, 79, who was nearly killed three years ago in an automobile accident, recently returned to ministry in the Watkins Glen area of the Rochester Diocese. It is a place he has known and loved for more than 50 years. "He just keeps plugging along. If he were a quitter, he would be dead by now," Jackson told the Catholic Courier, Rochester's diocesan newspaper. Father Budnick also has returned to his beloved Padua. It's the site of St. Anthony of Padua Minor Seminary and Prep School, which his order established about 1949 and ran until it was closed in 1970.

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