Bishop Nienstedt named Fourth Degree Knight at exemplification ceremony

Courtesy of St. Cloud Visitor

Bishop John C. Nienstedt has accomplished much during his 57 years on earth. Now, he has added another feather in his cap - literally.

Bishop Nienstedt has received the Knights of Columbus Fourth Degree during exemplification ceremonies Oct. 30 at the Holiday Inn Conference Center in Willmar, MN.

The Fourth Degree, which promotes patriotism, is the highest degree that a Knight can attain.

Fourth-degree Knights wear regalia including variously hued ostrich-feather-plumed chapeaus (hats) and capes while serving in color guards at Masses, wakes, dedications and other ceremonial events.

“I’ve been telling people that I was hoping to get an ostrich feather to put in my miter,” Bishop Nienstedt joked during an Oct. 28 telephone interview with The Visitor.

Fourth Degree Knights who are bishops normally don’t wear regalia, but often do wear Fourth Degree lapel pins or baldrics (ornamental belts worn diagonally from shoulder to hip) “as a sign of solidarity” with fellow Knights, said Tim Hickey, editor of Columbia Magazine, the national monthly periodical published by the Knights of Columbus.

Bishop Nienstedt has been a Knight since 1974, the year he was ordained a priest.

“I was serving my first assignment as associate pastor at Guardian Angels Church in Clawson, MI,” he said. “The pastor there, (the late) Father Robert Bretz, who was chaplain of the parish’s Daughters of Isabella, said to me, We need a chaplain for the Knights.’ So that’s how I became a Knight.”

Bishop Nienstedt decided to receive the Fourth Degree, he said, after celebrating Mass earlier this year at Marshall, MN, with Knights and their wives.

“One of the men came up to me afterwards and asked, ‘Have you ever thought about becoming Fourth Degree?’ so I began thinking about it,” Bishop Nienstedt said.

“I am honored to be a Knight and to receive the Fourth Degree,” he said. “The KCs provide such wonderful service to the church in so many areas. For example, they are on the front lines in the defense of life, they promote vocations awareness and provide life insurance to many.”

Another bishop with the Fourth Degree is Benedictine Archbishop Jerome Hanus of the Archdiocese of Dubuque.

Archbishop Hanus, who served as bishop of the St. Cloud Diocese from 1987 to 1994, received the degree in 1990. Hickey estimated that about 80 percent of U.S. bishops are Knights, and “the majority of those have the Fourth Degree.”

The first three Knights of Columbus degrees, respectively, promote charity, unity and fraternity, which are usually conferred relatively early on in Knighthood.

Men apply for each successive degree, agreeing to devote themselves to the principles each degree embodies. Knights who have not received the Fourth Degree do not wear regalia.

This is the 70th exemplification ceremony of Fourth Degree Knights in the District of Minnesota, which is part of the Marquette Knights of Columbus Province along with districts in Wisconsin and Illinois.

Exemplifications are usually held twice yearly at various locations across Minnesota, said Greg van der Hagen, Master of the Fourth Degree for the District of Minnesota. There are about 45,000 Knights in Minnesota, van der Hagen said, about 3,500 of them Fourth Degree.

Nationally, according to Hickey, there are about 1.25 million Knights, about 200,000 with the Fourth Degree.