The Guide

Missionary Among Indians His Urge to Help Goes West

By RAYMOND LANG Times Reporter Father Harold Liebler, tall, lean, 72, with long grey hair touching his shoulders - what makes him? When he was 54, an age when many men make retirement plans, Father Liebler became a missionary to the Navajo Indians in southern Utah. He gave up a church in Old Greenwich, Conn. that he had founded and headed since 1918. In 1942 he went West, bo[?]t a couple of ponies and scoured deserts for an Indian tribe that had never been missionized. Why? His answer is simple. "I had wanted to get into Indian work before I was too old . . . And I never lost the boyhood interest in Indians." Father Liebler is now vacationing at 4521 SW 62nd Ct., where his wife, Francis, lives. As the grandfather of seven children told you of the life he leads, you realized he had discovered a beauty among the Indian peoples of the desert. Father Liebler found an unmissionized Indian tribe in 1942 and set up a mission with several lay ministers and a nurse. Hard work lay ahead. "We had taken tents with us and we lived in those tents," Father Liebler said. "And the Navajos came around right away. "They're very inquisitive. "We had a trained nurse and the Indians asked for medication. Very soon they asked for a school." While Father Liebler spoke, you noticed his 10-gallon hat on the table, the sandals on his feet. "As soon as we decided on a site, we built an altar of stone," Father Liebler went on, moving a weathered hand across his heavily-lined brow. That's where the heart and soul of our work was going to be. The fact that we did not make it of plank was a sign of permanence. "Then they began to believe we were going to stay. Well, little by little, we began to build houses for the ministry, for the sick, a place for their school." "Then we built a church around the altar. "The thing they couldn't accept was our statement that we had come to help them," Father Liebler said. "They wanted to know our motives." Father Liebler had but one motive. That was, he said, to share with the Indians his belief in the goodness of God. So to live with the Indians, to instill in them a love of God and His ways, Father Liebler must live their way. It's primitive. Father Liebler wears second hand clothing. He gets no salary. Much of his food comes from two gardens he works. Dust storms sweep in at any time. The sun bleaches the air at 120 degrees and then dips at night to six below. To attend to the religious needs of the Navajos, Father Liebler bumps across 3,000 square miles of desert to reach the Indian families. In the past 18 years, he learned that the Navajos are forgiving, they don't hold grudges, they're adaptable and resourceful. And they fear death, these same hardy people who have eked an existence from the dusty desert sands. One final question. What effect have the last 18 years had on you? "If you're thinking of religious belief, that is stronger than ever," Father Liebler said. "I think I'm more tolerant. "As for convictions, they're stronger than ever before." FATHER LIEBLER

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