maly, too: Pastor Roland Pillack IsTurning 85

Saturday, January 28, 2017

Pastor Roland Pillack IsTurning 85

By RON MALY

There are several things a person can count on when he or she is greeted by Rev. Roland Pillack at Mount Olive Lutheran Church in Des Moines:

1. Pastor Pillack will always be smiling.

2. Pastor Pillack will give you a firm handshake.

3. Pastor Pillack will be wearing his pastoral church attire or he'll be in a suit or sportcoat, dress pants and a necktie. Nice shirt and shoes, too, of course, on this very dapper man.

It's been that way for years--I mean, a lot of years-- certainly at Mount Olive and likely at every other church he's served.

Speaking of years, they'll be honoring Pastor Pillack next week, I'm assuming with birthday cake and the fixin's, when he turns 85 years of age.

"Join us as we celebrate and thank God for Pastor Roland Pillack's 85th birthday," daughter Becky put on the card that arrived in my mail the other day.

Becky will be hosting an open house next Saturday, Feb. 4, at 4048 42nd Street in Des Moines from 1 to 4 p.m.

Obviously, Norma Pillack, the pastor's wonderful wife, will also be present for the festivities.

I've provided a photo of Pastor Pillack and Norma [courtesy of Lois Jean Schumann at Mount Olive] so you can see what a nice-looking couple they are.

Pastor Pillack, who has been at Mount Olive for more than 20 years, will also be available to greet people between church services Feb. 5.

Take it to the bank that there will be lots of people present at both get-togethers to wish happy birthday to a man who has had a lot of 'em.

And he certainly deserves the celebrations.

Senior pastors have come and gone at Mount Olive, but Pastor Pillack stayed as an assistant pastor, visitation pastor, vacancy pastor, whatever you want to call it.

He's been Mr. Dependable.

He's been the Do-What's-Necessary man of the cloth.

Pastor Pillack was stationed at other Missouri Synod Lutheran churches around the nation, but he was a perfect fit at Mount Olive, and he stayed.

Pastor Pillack conducted the ceremony in wonderful, very spiritual, first class fashion in 2006 when my mother, Alice Margaret Maly, died at 94 years of age.

That's why I have a special reason to greatly respect this marvelous man.

Kendall Meyer was one of the senior pastors with whom Pastor Pillack worked at Mount Olive.

I asked Kendall to give me some thoughts about Pastor Pillack, and it comes as no surprise that he high praise for him.

"I first got to know Pastor Pillack when I began my ministry at Mount Olive in 2009," Kendall said. "His deep love for the people of Mount Olive was evident to me from the very beginning.

"He loves visiting with people in their homes, providing a spiritual word of encouragement and giving the Lord's Supper.

"He loves sharing his life and stories with anyone who is willing to hear them, and has become an integral part of the social fabric at Mount Olive.

"I had the benefit of having Pastor Pillack take me under his wing to help me get to know the people and needs of the congregation.

I also asked Rev. David Mumm, another former senior pastor at Mount Olive, to give me his thoughts on Pastor Pillack.

He said: "The thing I remember most about Pastor Pillack is his gentle and always kind nature. He was always willing to help when he preached. It was always a message filled with Good News of our Savior's love for us sinners."

Pastor Pillack is pretty much retired these days, but I'll bet he could handle any church-related job if needed.

I mentioned earlier that you won't see Pastor Pillack in church without a necktie or without a suit or a sportcoat and dress pants.

That's the way it is with this man.

You know and I know that the clothing people wear to church has gotten a lot more informal at virtually every church in America in recent years.

Blue jeans are in [what the heck, I often wear 'em, too], dresses for women and suits and ties for men have gone the way of Fifties music and Studebaker automobiles.

You won't see Pastor Pillack dressed in blue jeans at church.

I don't know if he'll be wearing a tie and dress clothes at his birthday bash.

That's up to him.

Hey, he has the right to decide.

The way I look at it, when a man is celebrating his 85th birthday, he can wear anything he wants to wear.

Finally, here are more thoughts from Kendall Meyer on Pastor Pillack:

"His patient listening and way that he handles himself with the shut-ins and those in the hospital have guided the way that I do those visits today in my ministry [at the Lutheran Church of St. John in Quincy, Ill.] While I am thankful for those examples he provided me, since I was in the ministry for only a short time when I came to Mount Olive, I am most grateful for the private counsel he gave me as I sought to learn how to be a pastor and a dad at the same time. Pastor Pillack will be the first to acknowledge he didn't always make the best decisions during his ministry when it comes to the time he spent with his family. With this in mind, he wanted to pass on his experience to me to keep me from making some of the same mistakes. He told me, 'Pastor, don't ever forget your wife and your kids. You have a responsibility to them. You have those kids for a short time and your wife needs your help just like Norma needed my help.' I am thankful to him for his words of wisdom.

"When I accepted the call to the Lutheran Church of St. John, Pastor Pillack came up to me after my announcement and told me words that I will always carry in my ministry, 'Kendall, you will always have the Lord with you in your ministry. Be certain of that, be faithful and trust in Him. You will be missed. Thank you Pastor Pillack to the one who is a pastor's pastor. A wonderful and blessed happy 85th birthday to you, my friend.'"

JOLTIN' JOE GOT IT STARTED

When Ron Maly was a kid in Cedar Rapids, he wanted to enter an essay contest, and he did. He wrote about Joe DiMaggio of the New York Yankees being his favorite baseball player. For finishing second in the contest, Ron won a Louisville Slugger baseball bat autographed by DiMaggio. Ron later wanted to be the first person in his family to attend college, and he was. He earned a degree in political science from the University of Iowa, and did what all political science majors do. He became a sportswriter. He had, after all, covered high school football, basketball and baseball games for the Cedar Rapids Gazette while he worked parttime during his university days. Ron wanted to sit in the press box and write about an Iowa-Minnesota football game, and he did. It happened while he was the sports editor at the Albert Lea [Minn.] Tribune, and the game was at Memorial Stadium in Minneapolis. Ron wanted to cover a World Series, and he did. Also when he was working for the Albert Lea newspaper. Ron wanted to cover Rose Bowls, Sugar Bowls, Orange Bowls, Cotton Bowls, Holiday Bowls, a Freedom Bowl, a Sun Bowl, a Super Bowl and NCAA basketball tournaments, and he did those things after he moved to Des Moines. Ron was a four-time sportswriter of the Year in the state of Iowa [the years were 1977, 1978, 1994 and 1996]. In 2006, he was named a charter member of the University of Iowa's media Wall of Fame in the Kinnick Stadium press box. A photo of the plaque that's displayed in the press box is displayed above this story. Following Ron's retirement from the newspaper business, a publisher asked him if he wanted to write a book about the rich football tradition at the University of Iowa, and he did. The hardback version of "Tales from the Iowa Sidelines" was a best-seller, and so was the revised, softback version. Now he's been asked by his publisher to update the book for a second time. He's in the process of doing that at the present time. Ron considers being asked to update a best-selling book for the second time to be the supreme compliment, considering the Hawkeyes won just four games in the 2012 season. When Ron isn't working on books, he's busy traveling and spending time with his family. Indeed, he attends the athletic, theatrical and musical [both vocal and instrumental] events in which his six grandchildren participate. He also writes about anything that interests him for his many websites. Every chance he gets, Ron proudly wears his America Needs Farmers T-shirt.

The Hawkeyes' Rich Football Tradition, Revisited

I mentioned a while back that I was in the process of updating my Tales from the Iowa Sidelines book. Updating it for the second time. The original hardback edition of Tales from the Iowa Sidelines [pictured at the right] was published in 2003, during the 10-3 season, when coach Kirk Ferentz and his Iowa football team had a 10-3 record that included a 37-17 victory over 15th-ranked Florida in the Outback Bowl and after the Hawkeyes went 11-2 in 2002. That book was a best-seller, so the publishers came to me again in 2005, a season that finished with a breathtaking 30-25 victory over No. 11 Louisiana State in the Capital One Bowl on New Year's Day, 2005. Because buyers had cleaned out the the shelves in the bookstores, the publishers wanted to know if I'd do an updated version of the book. I agreed, The revised, soft-cover edition [pictured at the left] was published in 2005. Warren Holloway, who teamed with quarterback Drew Tate on a miraculous 56-yard touchdown pass to win the Capital One Bowl, was featured on the cover. That book, too, turned into a best-seller, So I had reason to feel very good about my years as a published author. It's not every day that a the original version is a best-seller, and so is the updated version. Then, imagine my surprise when I received an e-mail from a senior editor at the publishing company last fall, wanting wanted to know if I was interested in doing a second updated version of the book. It came at a time when things weren't going well for the Hawkeyes in the 2012 season. They lost their last six games and finished with a 4-8 record. Frankly, the thought of doing a revised edition of the book during a 4-8 season seemed to be a stretch. "Maybe producing a revised edition in a year or two would be a better idea," I told the publishers. "We'd like to do it now," I was told. "Let me think about it," I said. After a few days of thought, I accepted the idea. I talked myself into the idea that this was the supreme compliment--being asked to do a second book update during a 4-8 season showed strong confidence by the publishers in me and in the Hawkeyes' football program. So I got back into the business of interviewing players and coaches again, going to postgame press conferences, weekly press conferences and a scrimmage in West Des Moines. After a press conference in Iowa City, I did a one-on-one interview with coach Kirk Ferentz, and mentioned to him that I was in the process of doing a revised edition of my two best-selling books. I congratulated him on the excellent things he had done for Iowa's football program--all of which contributed to the success of my books. "I think Coach Fry had more to do with it," he told me, bringing up the name of Hayden Fry, his one-time boss at Iowa and a man who brought Iowa's football program back from the dead in the 20th century. That's modest Kirk Ferentz for you. Even though the 2012 season wasn't something Hawkeye coaches, players and fans will recall with any special feeling, Ferentz has a 14-year record of 100-74 at Iowa that includes two 11-victory seasons [2002 smd 2009], two 10-victory seasons [2003 and 2004], plus he's been the Big Ten coach of year in 2002, 2004 and 2009, and national coach of the year in 2002. Indeed, Ferentz has done some wonderful things at Iowa City, and I fully expect his success to continue. I've concluded my writing for the second update of Tales from the Iowa Sidelines, and the senior editor has furnished me with an early look at the book. Not only are the Kirk Ferentz years included in the updated version, but so is the stuff I previously wrote about Howard Jones, Dr. Eddie Anderson, Heisman Trophy winner Nile Kinnick and the 1939 Hawkeye Ironmen, Ronald Reagan, Ozzie Simmons, Ossie Solem, Randy Duncan, Alex Karras and lots of other legends from Iowa's rich football history. I expect the book to be in stores soon. I hope you like it.