Had the call to priesthood not risen, Fr. Arturo Ysmael, SDS, appeared destined to become a physician. However, when the call to priesthood became more persistent, he answered. Interestingly, he remains pulled to work in a hospital as a priest and chaplain.
As a Chaplain at Froedert Hospital in Milwaukee, WI, since May of 2023, Fr. Arturo is available to everyone in need of spiritual and emotional support regardless of gender, culture, age, or religious or political affiliation. “I believe in the all-inclusive, universal, truly Catholic character of chaplaincy,” he said. “Between the medical staff and the religious needs of our patients, as a priest chaplain, I fill this gap. I minister to patients, their families, the hospital staff, and personnel.”
Out of the ten full-time chaplains at the hospital, Fr. Arturo is the sole Catholic priest on duty. He specifically addresses the spiritual needs of Catholic patients, mainly within four medical units of the hospital. “I bring patients communion, hear confessions, administer the Anointing of the Sick, last rites and commendation of the dying, and celebrate Mass each week,” he shared.
Having also worked in a long-term care nursing home facility, Fr. Art notes the difference for him is the shorter, urgent, or limited contact with patients in a hospital versus the deeper connections formed in a nursing home where more extended stays occur.
Fr. Arturo shares that some of the most rewarding days are when a frustrated patient gains calm and smiles, when a baby is delivered successfully against all odds, or when he can hold a patient’s hand after a final blessing and before a final peaceful breath.
“I am constantly confronted by the reality of death, but more so by the quiet nobility of the human spirit,” he said. “Blessed Francis Jordan’s mission for us as Salvatorians, to serve ‘by all ways and means’, certainly plays its role here in this ministry.”
