Priest who fought drug lords celebrates 50th anniversary
By J. Michael Parker
For Today’s Catholic
When 14-year-old Francis Theodore “Ted” Pfeifer first arrived in San Antonio in 1946 to follow his vocation with the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, he couldn’t have known what awaited him in the mountains of Oaxaca, Mexico more than 30 years later.
But his years of preparation at St. Anthony’s Apostolic School (now St. Anthony’s High School) and the De Mazenod Scholasticate (now Oblate School of Theology) told him that the Oblates were “Specialists in Difficult Missions” – a title an admiring Pope Pius XI gave to them in 1938.
At his priestly ordination in 1959, the 26-year-old Father Pfeifer took the customary religious vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, adding the Oblates’ fourth vow: perseverance even unto death.
Now 76, Father Pfeifer brought a wealth of personal experiences confirming both the title and the gravity of the fourth vow to his 50th anniversary as an Oblate priest May 30.
Many of those experiences are detailed in a 72-page memoir, When the Wolves Came, privately published by his family just after the anniversary festivities.