A History of the Northwest Region of the Catholic Medical Association
THE NORTHWEST
In 1957 there were four Constituent Guilds of the national federation in the Northwest: Great Falls, Montana, Vancouver, British Columbia, Eugene, Oregon and Portland, Oregon. By 1961, the Guild of Tacoma, Washington was added to the list.
The Northwest Region (Region VIII) of the CMA covered the huge landmass of Washington, Wyoming, Oregon, Idaho, Montana and Hawaii and British Columbia until 2002 when the CMA Board unanimously agreed to form a new Region that would include all of Canada. British Columbia formerly part of Region VIII shifted into the new Region XI, the Region of Canada. This was done to facilitate communication among Catholic physicians in Canada and to invigorate the formation of Canadian CMA guilds.
OREGON
The Guild of Oregon was formed in 1950 as a Constituent Guild of the national federation by four Catholic Physicians: Leo Meienberg, M.D., Ernie Albers, M.D., John Murphy, M.D., and Paul Zuelke, M.D. Anxious to receive moral guidance on medical/ ethical issues, the administrators of the two Catholic Hospitals in Portland proposed that their chaplain serve as the first chaplain of the Guild. The four founding physicians served consecutively as President. The original mailing list was obtained by canvassing the pastors of all local parishes for the names of physicians in their parishes, who were then invited to join the Guild. The Guild boasted 40 physician members for most of the next five decades, a small number compared with the five hundred members of the Boston Guild but a big number for Oregon, the least Catholic-populated state in the U.S.
The guild meetings held quarterly were educational sessions with a presentation on a subject of medical ethics given either by a member of the guild or by an invited expert. Annual events included a White Mass and a brunch on St Luke’s Day and a banquet with guest speakers in the fall and in the spring.
Contraception was the intense moral debate of the 1960s but with the help of Chaplain, Fr. Alfred Williams, the Oregon Guild marched in step to Magisterial teaching. Fr. Williams attributed his capacity to responsibly and effectively lead the Guild through the difficult decade to his attendance at the annual national federation meetings. Fr. Williams also served as chaplain for the University of Oregon Medical School and Hospital. Recognizing the need for a parish church for the University medical community, Fr. Williams and the guild raised funds, purchased land adjacent to the University Hospital and Medical School and built St. Elizabeth of Hungary rectory and church. The church was dedicated in November 1958 and continues to be the parish for Catholic medical students, interns, residents and medical staff.
In 1977, after twenty-five years of service to the medical community, Fr. Williams retired. The Guild continued under the spiritual leadership of diocesan priests until the mid-1980s when a Benedictine priest and monk from Mt. Angel Abbey became the Guild Chaplain. The Benedictine spirituality left its particular imprint on the formation of Catholic physicians for the ensuing decade. A weekend Lenten retreat at the Benedictine monastery became an annual event for physicians and spouses at which the physicians learned to regard their medical work as Opus Dei, the work of God.
As with so many of the other Member Guilds of the CMA no one recalls exactly why the Guild ceased to send its Chaplain to the annual CMA meeting or when the Guild dropped out of the CMA or how all Guild functions ceased in the early 1990s. The Guild was all but inactive when His Emminence Francis Eugene George, then the Archbishop of Portland, working with dedicated Catholic physicians revitalized it as an Independent Guild in 1996. These physicians became active members of the CMA and brought the North West into the sphere of influence of the national organization. On March 6, 2004 the Portland Guild Board of Directors ratified the Charter of the CMA and again became a Member Guild of the CMA.
WASHINGTON
In the early spring of 2000 A.D. the Northwest Regional Directors: Drs. Thomas M. Pitre, Lynne Bissonnette-Pitre and Howie L. Bright, began the work of starting a Catholic Physicians Guild in Seattle, Washington and hosting a Northwest Regional Conference. Seattle, a large metropolitan area with many Catholic physicians had never had a Catholic Physicians Guild and could serve as a hub for many future Northwest Regional conferences.
To accomplish the goal, the first objective was to engage a local physician to serve as the nidus for the formation of a Catholic Physicians Guild and to help in the organization of the Regional Conference. The Regional Directors found a pro-life physician, Jan R. Hemstad, M.D., who was interested and willing to be involved in the formation of a Catholic Physicians Guild and in organizing a Regional Conference.
In 2001 the Northwest Regional Directors Thomas M. Pitre, M.D., Lynne Bissonnette-Pitre, M.D., Ph.D. of Oregon, and Howie L. Bright, M.D., of British Columbia joined with Jan R. Hemstad, M.D., of Seattle to form a Guild in the State of Washington. Instrumental to the formation of the Guild was Fr. Joseph Hattie, O.M.I. who had been the Chaplain of the Vancouver, British Columbia Guild in the 1990s. Fr. Hattie, with foresight and spiritual direction, encouraged the Northwest physicians to form the new Guild. Most Reverend Alexander J. Brunett, Archbishop of Seattle, formally inaugurated the Catholic Physicians Guild of Washington State on May 19, 2001. The blueprint for a biannual regional meeting was created with the first meeting in Seattle in 2001; the second regional meeting was held in Vancouver, British Columbia in 2003.
The theme of the conference was selected--The Catholic Physician: A Vocation as Icon of Christ the Divine Physician-- and the keynote speaker was engaged, Robert Spitzer, S.J., the President of Gonzaga University. A date was set for the following May 2001, based upon the availability of the main speaker.
A letter was then sent by the Regional Directors to Most Reverend Alex J. Brunett, Archbishop of Seattle to introduce the concept of forming a Guild and to gain his approval and support for the Regional Conference. A meeting to discuss this with the Archbishop was requested. Two additional speakers were engaged for the conference and a tentative program outline was drawn up and presented to the Archbishop at a meeting of the Regional Directors, the Seattle physician and Archbishop Brunett. The Archbishop enthusiastically approved the program with speakers and offered to host the Friday night reception at the opening of the Conference. He also offered to celebrate Mass on Saturday morning for the conference attendees.
Other physicians were contacted in the Seattle and Tacoma area that would support the new Guild. The Regional Directors called a meeting with the local physicians to present the purpose of a Catholic Physicians Guild and to inform them of the Regional Conference to be held in Seattle in the spring. Assignments of duties and a timetable were laid out. Subsequent to this meeting, the Seattle Physicians formed a Board of Directors for their new Guild.
The President of the CMA was informed of the conference and was invited to host the 2001 Spring Board meeting of the CMA as part of the Seattle Conference and in support of the formation of the Washington Guild. The CMA President, Charles P. Prezzia, M.D., accepted the invitation. The schedule of events then included the CMA Board of Directors meeting on Friday; Archbishop Brunett’s Reception Friday evening; Opening Mass on Saturday morning celebrated by Archbishop Brunett; an all day conference on Saturday; a Banquet and keynote speaker on Saturday night; a Mass celebrated on Sunday morning by the Episcopal Advisor of the CMA, Bishop Robert Vasa followed by summary remarks by the three conference speakers. There were over 175 attendees at the conference and the Washington Guild was formed with 60 new members.
