Fr John Prochaska will be our speaker at our July meeting.  He is a local boy who earned a degree in chemical engineering and was working for a local packaging company when he felt called to the priesthood.  He was and still is a keen backpacker. He was ordained May 29, 1993, and served at St. Joseph Parish in Pinole and St. Leander Parish in San Leandro before coming to Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish about 17 years ago as pastor.  In his priesthood, travels and mission, he felt called to something more.  Five years ago, he received a leave of absence from Bishop Barber to join the Missionary Society of St James, which takes diocesan priests and places them for five years in mission territory in Peru before returning them to their home diocese.  Since he had backpacking experience at high altitudes (he had scaled Mt Whitney above 14,000 ft) he was assigned to an alpine parish at 13,000 feet, from where he visited his parishioners as high as 17,000 ft.  Fr John is back now and will be assigned to St Joseph the Worker parish in Berkeley on July 1.  He will address us at our July meeting and share some of his experiences and perspective. Attend the meeting and hear from a true missionary!