Asked as he celebrates 50 years of priesthood what drew him to religious life and international retreat work that integrates physical, emotional and spiritual healing, Jesuit Father Matthew Linn didn’t hesitate.
“I just thought the happiest people in the world were people helping others,” he said.
Still, the road to the priesthood from growing up in Minneapolis at Resurrection (now Our Lady of Peace) parish and school, with his parents, the late Leonard and Agnes May Linn, and his siblings, Dennis and Mary Ellen, wasn’t altogether straight. He first wanted to be a doctor.
“But at the time I was pondering this, a cousin who was in residency in an emergency room urged me to consider how I might help keep people out of harm’s way in the first place,” he said. “The majority of his emergency room patients were from abusive or addictive situations and so were constantly cycling in and out of the hospital. My doctor cousin said, ‘We are just patching up knife wounds, but they keep returning until we treat the hole in their soul.’”
Desiring to help others with that kind of healing, and hoping to live in community, the then-18-year-old Linn explored 12 religious orders. He landed on the Jesuits, a global order that encourages its members to be doctors, teachers or other specialists, as a means to helping others. He also was attracted by the Jesuits’ two-year novitiate, which helps those interested in formation look closely at their lives, so they discern how God — as Father Linn says, the Divine Lover — is moving them to share that love.
He entered the Jesuits in 1960 and was ordained a priest in 1973. Since 1970, he has taught courses and given retreats on healing in every state and in more than 60 countries. He has lived in 17 different Jesuit communities throughout his ministry. Now, he lives in the Markoe House Jesuit Community in Minneapolis. He helps train people as spiritual directors through Sacred Ground Center for Spirituality in St. Paul, following the tradition of St. Ignatius of Loyola, who helped found the Jesuits.
His brother, Dennis, entered the Jesuits two years after he did. But his brother was called to marriage. Now, together with Dennis and his wife, Sheila, who live in Colorado, they have formed Linn Ministries, giving talks and retreats on healing. They are co-authors of more than 20 books with titles that include “Healing of Memories,” “Healing the Greatest Hurt” and “Good Goats: Healing Our Image of God.” The books have been translated into about 25 languages.
Their best seller, “Healing Life’s Hurts,” describes five stages of forgiveness based on Kubler-Ross’s five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. The Linns have found that the grieving process heals emotional wounds of even the deepest hurts. They learned this by giving healing retreats in war-torn countries like El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, South Africa and Northern Ireland. They found that only people who healed their grief through forgiveness and gratefully taking in new life recovered from trauma. Those who forgave let go of the pain, anger and grief, and the grateful ones constantly found the Divine Lover giving new life, he said.
The Linns continue to give retreats, and as a priest in the Twin Cities, Father Linn, 80, also celebrates Masses and assists in area hospitals when other priests are not available. While pleased with the books he has helped write, he said he believes more important are the people he has helped and who have helped him by sharing their experiences.
“My legacy is the people,” he said. “Books are fine. But I would hope that people would have found the Divine Lover and can now share that. Like the pebble thrown into the lake, love keeps radiating out in ever-expanding circles.”
