News from Episcopal Diocese of NW Texas

GARNER ROBERTS Special to the Abilene Reporter-News

The domestic terrorist attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City, April 19, 1995, did more than kill 168 people, injure more than 800 others, destroy the federal building and damage hundreds of nearby buildings.

It started a seemingly unlikely chain of events that would result 15 years later in the arrival of Rev. Luke Back as the new rector for Abilene's Episcopal Church of the Heavenly Rest.

Back was a 22-year-old graduate student at the University of Oklahoma, and his father, George, a longtime Episcopal clergyman, was dean of St. Paul's Cathedral. George Back was on his way to the historic cathedral, built in 1903, that morning when federal authorities said someone had detonated a powerful bomb adjacent to the nine-story Murrah building.

Despite its extensive damage, St. Paul's became a triage area - a place where the terrorists' destruction and the community's compassion came together in the ensuing burdensome days. Rescue workers were fed there, and it became a spiritual sanctuary for people seeking comfort and peace after what at the time was the deadliest act of terrorism on U.S. soil.

"The cathedral was only a block and a half away," Luke Back said. "It was heavily damaged. It took three years and a $7.5 million restoration project to repair the building and the campus. "But I learned about a healthy church community and the spirit at work in a church community," he added. "It was an amazing thing to watch."

Back had earned a bachelor's degree in European studies and was planning a career of foreign service in the diplomatic corps. He worked at the university's Office of International Relations, studied abroad in Germany, China, and Mexico, and enrolled in graduate school for a master's degree.

From his office at St. Paul's, ... he recalled the days after April 19, 1995. "During that time I began to change my focus from international work to becoming an ambassador for Christ," he explained in an interview this week. "I saw how a community held onto faith and trust in God."

After receiving his master's degree, Back moved to Alexandria, Va., to become an ordained minister. He earned a master of divinity degree from Virginia Theological Seminary in 2002, spent that summer in Wilmington, N.C., as chaplain at New Hanover Regional Medical Center, and then returned to Oklahoma City to serve with his father at St. Paul's.

"I got to work with him eight years at St. Paul's," Back said of his father, who recently retired after 28 years as senior clergyman at St. Paul's. "That's a rare thing."

Luke was born July 7, 1972, in North Brookfield, Mass., where his father was rector for a small country parish. The family moved to Orlando, Fla., in 1979, and then in 1982 George and his wife, Margaret, moved Luke and his brother and sister to Oklahoma City.

After his time as curate, Luke Back served as associate, then canon and then priest-in-charge at St. Paul's.

He admits that "it hurts" to leave the "many ties of love and care and fellowship" that he, his wife Meredith, a former Abilenian, and their three young children have at St. Paul's.

In his letter of resignation to the congregation, he wrote, "There is no other place on earth quite like St. Paul's, and I consider it the greatest of graces to have served here with the clergy, staff and people whom I love so much. Taking my wife and children away from the only home our family has known challenges all that my mind, heart and soul can bear."

This week in an interview he called it "a paradoxical time - a time of real pain and real loss, but also such joy. There's a sense of a time to grow and change. The people in Oklahoma City are so excited for us and thrilled for us even though they are very sad."

He said Abilene and the people of the Church of Heavenly Rest have been welcoming and caring. "They have been very gracious and warm and have reached out to us," he said.

At Heavenly Rest, itself a historic church that traces its beginning back to 1878, Back said, "you know you are in a place of great beauty. There's holiness here - something that speaks to your soul. We are called in life to take all the blessings and all the pieces and all the brokenness and make something beautiful of it."

He said he hopes "to enable worship that reflects the beauty of the space" and maintain what he calls the church's "authentic welcome" and "authentic fellowship." The new rector added, "You have to love your neighbor."

Back said the food pantry that the congregation operates shows that "they are generous in their outreach. They respond to the person who shows up on their doorstep. Ultimately there's a sense that God is beauty. It's a wonderful time to share in that."

Back and Meredith, the daughter of Heavenly Rest members Scott and Jill Bishop, met 10 years ago in June at a wedding in Oklahoma City. When asked about his family, Back said, "This is the best part." Back returned home from North Carolina to attend the wedding, and Meredith, a graduate of Cooper High School and the University of Richmond, came from Austin, where she was in graduate school in architecture at the University of Texas.

"God smiled on my weekend," Back said. "We met at the rehearsal, we were together at the parties and other wedding events that weekend, and I took her to church Sunday." Two months later Back made his first trip to Abilene, and the couple married in 2002 at Heavenly Rest. They now have a 5-year-old daughter who will start kindergarten at St. John's Episcopal School this fall, and identical twin 3-year-old boys.

"My family is my greatest gift," Back said. "They are the ones who recognize who I am. I am a priest. I draw a great sense of joy and satisfaction in sharing in the most meaningful times in people's lives."

The 38-year-old Back also enjoys golf, hunting, and fishing. "I plan to take up gardening," he said, "and I'm really excited about the start of dove season with my father-in-law and friends. My children aren't ready to hunt, but they think they are ready to fish."

His final Sunday at St. Paul's will be Aug. 15, he will begin work here Monday, Aug. 23. His first Sunday at Heavenly Rest will be Aug. 29.

Two members of Heavenly Rest's search committee, Annabel House and Blake Fulenwider, said Back and his family will bring youth and enthusiasm to the church and become active in the local community.

"He's young, energetic and enthusiastic," Fulenwider said, "and that will be great for Heavenly Rest. He's a great preacher. I got to hear him in Oklahoma City. He's very spiritual, and I really liked his style of preaching - rooted in Scripture and enthusiastically done. He'll have a lot to offer in helping us grow." House called Back "a really dynamic preacher and an asset to Heavenly Rest and Abilene." She said he has served as chaplain to the Oklahoma State Legislature and is active in the arts in Oklahoma City.

"Rev. Back embodies exactly what we were looking for in a new rector," she said. "He understands and cherishes our liturgical traditions, but he's not afraid to try new things."

Heavenly Rest's new rector added, "We feel like we are finding our place."