It only seemed appropriate that Deacon John Feeley would receive the Boy Scout’s highest volunteer award given at the district level at an event in the Northeast Washington neighborhood where he grew up and lives.
On Feb. 13, at Busboys & Poets Restaurant in Brookland, Feeley received the District Award of Merit. It was presented at the Washington, D.C. District of the National Capital Area Council of the Boy Scouts of America awards dinner, in a crowded room with more than 200 Boy Scouts volunteers and staff, family, and friends.
A little more than 40 years ago, in 1983, Feeley became the Cub Scout Pack 98 leader at St. Anthony of Padua Church, in Northeast Washington, and has continued to be involved, through the peaks and valleys of scouting activity, which included his reconstituting the troop in 2013 after several years of dormancy. This year, there are more than 40 young people participating in the three scouting groups at St. Anthony, which includes Girl Scouts.
“There were not enough den leaders,” Feeley told the Catholic Standard, when asked how he got involved. A lot of parents with boys who could participate in the Boy Scouts were single mothers who were stretched for time. “I don’t think anyone was particularly interested in being a Cubmaster.” He recalled that very few of the parents had camping experience.
In his new Cub Scouts gig, Feeley got to work with fellow volunteer Helen Senerchia, whom he later married, after her brother, Richard Senerchia, asked Feeley to volunteer.
A permanent deacon for the Archdiocese of Washington since 2006 and assigned to serve at St. Anthony, Feeley’s nomination was initiated by Bryan Martin Firvada, a Cubmaster emeritus for the St. Anthony Boy Scout troop, and one of his letters of recommendation for the honor was written by D.C. Councilman Kenyon McDuffie, an alumnus of St. Anthony Catholic School who was a Cub Scout with Troop 98 at St. Anthony.
After saying the Pledge of Allegiance and the Scouting Oath with the other standing participants, including some who wore Boy Scout uniforms, Feeley sat down to dinner joined by Herbert and Kathy Wood, longtime St. Anthony parishioners, at a table for four. A longtime science teacher at St. Anselm’s Abbey and father of eight, Dr. Wood spent many years as a Boy Scouts leader, as he and his wife raised their children within a block of St. Anthony. Feeley paid tribute to Wood, a previous winner of the District Award of Merit, in his brief remarks when receiving the award.
Recalling highlights from his time with the Boy Scouts, Feeley said he enjoyed city hikes with the boys and volunteers, as well as sleeping in a hammock at times on scouting trips. In the noisy room of the restaurant, he and Wood joked about the Boy Scouts using World War II-era Army tents and the current scouting use of terms such as “scouters,” to describe participants. He has also enjoyed his many scouting trips to Cunningham Falls State Park in Thurmont, Maryland.
Feeley also let out a chuckle, recalling being awakened at 3 a.m. on one scouting trip, after falling asleep near an extinguished fire pit, after he had given over his tent to newbie “dad campers.” He soon found that what had awakened him were fathers who were venturing out of their tents to their cars in the middle of the night. Clearly in a nostalgic mood, he brought to the dinner a book about hiking on the C&O towpath and photos from his youth as a Boy Scout.
In addition to his work as a deacon and Boy Scout volunteer, Feeley also leads historic tours through Brookland, the neighborhood where Catholic University of America is located, and has co-authored a book on Brookland history.
The U.S. bishops formally partnered with the Boy Scouts of America in 1934, seeking to encourage Catholic boys to learn the leadership skills and participate in the moral formation that scouting offers. There are more than 10,000 parish-based Boy Scout troops in the U.S.
