Minnesota priest to serve as chaplain with Army combat team

Published: 2005-09-29

ST. PAUL, Minn. (CNS) -- Father Jerome Fehn was blessed with prayers at an Edina Catholic church before he left to serve as chaplain for the U.S. Army's 1st Brigade Combat Team, which will be going to Iraq after completing training in Mississippi. Father Fehn, who had been serving as chaplain at Methodist Hospital in St. Louis Park and Fairview-Southdale Hospital in Edina, was to leave Minnesota at the end of September. The blessing was Sept. 18 at Our Lady of Grace in Edina, where he resided. Overseas military service is not new to the priest, who joined the Minnesota National Guard as a chaplain in 1998. He served in Bosnia from September 2003 to March 2004, when he was asked to extend his service an additional 20 days in Kosovo to cover Holy Week and Easter services, he said. He returned to the United States in April 2004. About 2,700 troops will go to Camp Shelby in Mississippi for several months of training.

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