Joe and Kathy Ferbrache

Joe and Kathy Ferbrache

In 2015, we attended a seminar about the Idaho Catholic Foundation at St. Mary's. That ignited us to include the Church in our will. We also worked to bring the seminar to our parish, Our Lady of Good Counsel in Mountain Home.

We were encouraged through the years by the pastors of our parish to be involved. We were married at Our Lady of Good Counsel 37 years ago, and we've been active members ever since. Kathy wasn't Catholic when we got married, but she became Catholic after our first child was born.

We schedule things and do things according to what is going on in the church. If there is some special function or seminar or teaching, we schedule other things around that. We've been involved in whatever way we can be, including taking communion to the homebound for the last 20 years.

In 2011, Joe had cancer and we had no insurance. Joe couldn't work for six months. So our church and our community helped us. All kinds of people, churches and businesses just came out of the woodwork to help.

We weren't comfortable receiving because we were used to giving. Our pastor at the time, Father Ben Uhlenkott, told us, though, that it is a God-given grace to receive, and we needed to let people help. It was so humbling. People came to a spaghetti dinner fundraiser, and they kept putting money and checks into a big bowl—just like the last scene in It's A Wonderful Life. We were able to pay all our bills for six months.

We want to be able to contribute to the Church after we're gone. There are so many people who kept the Church going until we got there, and we want to be able to have that same influence on future generations. We want the Church to be there for our kids and for our grandkids. We love the Catholic Church.