In his younger days, Michael Keating was a little closer to being a vampire than a priest.
Before becoming a “man of the cloth,” the Cascade, Iowa native was working as a phlebotomist, spinning the plasma out of customers’ blood and then reinjecting back into their veins.
It was in that line of work where he discovered his true calling — helping others experience the Word of God in the Catholic church.
“I became a priest because they wouldn’t let me be a nun,” he joked after his retirement party Sunday afternoon at St. Michael’s Catholic Church in South Sioux City.
Keating, 66, had plenty of inspiration when he decided on his career change more than 30 years ago. An uncle and his godfather were both Catholic priests who, unfortunately, died at a young age.
As he withdrew and replaced the blood of customers, he would strike up a conversation with them.
“I was kind of like a vampire bartender, serving blood to people,” Keating said, laughing. “And people would tell me their problems and a lot of them were alone in their lives and providing plasma out of the kindness of their heart.”
After eight years of work, he decided that people needed something more than just advice.
“They needed more than a medical person telling them something. What they really needed was something spiritual. They were like a sheep without a shepherd, as Jesus says in the gospel,” he said.
By 1997, the decision to enter the priesthood came to him, and he attended a seminary college in a Benedictine monastery in Missouri. He studied there and in Chicago, where he received has Master of Divinity degree as part of the Archdiocese of Chicago.
“I was 10 years older than the average seminarian, so I really had to crack the books and I didn’t have much of a social life and just a few friends,” he said.
He was eventually ordained and was first stationed as a contracted chaplain at Offut Air Force Base in Bellevue. He was also a chaplain for the Sarpy County Sheriff’s Department in Papillion and worked at parashes in Omaha before moving to Cedar County.
From Hartington, he moved on to Columbus and did hospital ministry for six area parishes, and also served as chaplain for the Columbus Police Department when the opportunity to come to Dakota County came up.
“I had a good friend, Father Paul Lemonucius, who was an active pastor in Jackson at the time, and I wanted to come up here and work with him,” he said.
That led to his arrival here in South Sioux City, where he has come to love the parish of more than 3,000 residents, more than half of whom speak Spanish or are bilingual. He has been involved in Spanish-language masses at churches in South Sioux City and Emerson.
It hasn’t always been easy for Father Mike, though.
“I have learned Spanish and can give my homily and celebrate Mass and give them homily in Spanish, and I hear confessions, but my conversational Spanish was rough because sometimes it takes me a while to think of what I’m going to say,” he said.
On April 9, Father Mike suffered a heart attack, which led to his decision to retire effective at the end of June.
“I died for 10 seconds,” he joked again. “I didn’t see Jesus, but luckily I was already on the table and the cardiologist was right there with the paddles and brought me back. At first, I wondered if I was in heaven because the first voice I heard was a nurse, who I thought might be an angel, and she said I was going to be OK.”
Keating has been active in physical therapy and has been working hard to get back to 100 percent, but he’s noticed that the experience has sapped some of his high-spirited energy.
“I never realized until recently how much energy flows out of you when you’re in front of an audience of 200-300 people celebrating Mass,” he said. “This is such a wonderful congregation, but doing it is exhausting. I have to sit on a chair when I preach and have people give out communion for me, and after about 10-15 minutes I’m just exhausted.”
That was the signal for him that it was time to step aside, but that doesn’t mean he’s not going to stay busy.
“I was encouraged to apply to be on the Citizens Advisory Board for the City Council here,” he said. “I decided that I was going to stay here when I retired, because I love the community. It has excellent government and law enforcement and is just a great community to be in and is growing.
“I have a brother in Texas who keeps trying to talk me into moving down there, but why would I want to broil in Texas when I can sizzle in South Sioux City?”
