GREENFIELD — Blessed Trinity Parish’s newest priest is organizing a patriotic walk/run event on Sunday afternoon to celebrate the American military and his fellow veterans.
The Rev. John Williams, who served in the U.S. Marine Corps from 2003 to 2007, has planned the Freedom 5K for 1 p.m. on Nov. 9. The event will begin and end at Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church at 221 Federal St.
“My experience as a veteran has taught me that veterans want to do something on Veterans Day but are uncomfortable, sometimes, with all the attention. And non-veterans want to honor them, but they don’t always know how,” Williams said. “So the Freedom 5K brings these two groups together in faith and fellowship. And we all get to lose a few carbs in the process. So everybody really wins here.”
Anyone interested in participating can register for free at tinyurl.com/GreenfieldFreedom5K until Friday evening. After that, anyone who wishes to attend must register in person. Williams said there were already at least 100 people registered, as of Thursday morning.
“We’re very gratified so far by the response,” he said.
The route can be found at the website, and questions can be emailed to Freedom5kgreenfield@gmail.com.
Williams, an avid runner, said he got the idea after meeting like-minded people in his congregation.
Everyone is welcome to Mass at 11 a.m., before the event. Williams mentioned he will use this opportunity to share his vocation story. He grew up just outside Washington D.C., as the youngest of 15 children. He was educated in Catholic schools and attended the College of William & Mary in Virginia following high school, but dropped out during his junior year in 2002 and enlisted in the Marines, a time that clarified his call to the priesthood.
He was deployed on two combat tours in Fallujah, Iraq, and in his spare time he earned a bachelor’s degree in social sciences from Chapman University in California. He later obtained a master’s degree in philosophical studies from Mount St. Mary’s University in Emmitsburg, Maryland, and taught in Catholic schools in Jesuit high schools in Maryland and Indiana.
He attended Pope St. John XXIII National Seminary, a Roman Catholic professional and graduate theological institution in Weston for men 30 and older. He was ordained by Bishop William Byrne at St. Michael’s Cathedral in Springfield on June 21 and was assigned to Blessed Trinity Parish, where he had previously been a transitional deacon, the step before a seminarian is ordained as a priest.