NORRISTOWN - Friend. Confidante. Counselor. Comedian.

The late Rev. Kevin C. Trautner was so many things to Times Herald city desk editor Cheryl Rodgers that she might have felt she had lost 10 men in her life at one time when she heard of Trautner's sudden passing on Tuesday.  "I first met Father Trautner when I joined St. Francis in 1988," Rodgers remembered. "I served on the CYO board under him, when he was the moderator. He was, without a doubt, the most generous, thoughtful person. We had a lot of fun at those meetings. There was always a lot of laughter."  Years later, Trautner never failed to compare the radiant hair color of Rodger's daughter Kaitlyn to that of his own mother.  "So many little things like that come to mind when I think of him," Rodgers said.  During the traumatic time when her newborn son, Matthew, was being diagnosed with Down syndrome, Rodgers turned to Trautner, who by then had been named pastor of St. Francis of Assisi Church, following the death of the Rev. George P. Ettore.  "I was getting some pretty devastating news, and Father Trautner was the first person I thought of calling. He was so comforting," Rodgers recalled.  "I remember going up to the rectory and sitting in his office with one of his cats on my lap. He just said some really wonderful things to me that made me feel a lot better and made me want to embrace (the future). One of the things he said was, 'This baby is not a curse. This baby is a blessing. This is God's gift to you.' And he was right."  As Matthew grew older and healthier, Trautner always referred to him as "my little Matthew."  The telephone news of Trautner's untimely death at age 57 so stunned Rev. Christopher Redcay, president of Kennedy-Kenrick Catholic High School, that he thought the caller may have had the wrong information.  "I received the phone call Tuesday evening and I kept asking, 'Are you sure it's Father Trautner of St. Francis?' I had to ask a second and third time, to make sure we were talking about the same person," he said. "He just seemed like someone who was in good health, so I was just stunned by it."  Redcay knew Trautner in an official capacity, as both men served on the board at Kennedy-Kenrick.  But it was perhaps Trautner's role as a comforter that Redcay will remember best.  "When my father passed away, it was during Hurricane Floyd and my mother was home by herself," Redcay recalled. "I was coming from Radnor and couldn't get across the river, so I called him and he was just so gracious.  "My mom lives two blocks from St. Francis, and he was the first one to reach her. I've always been indebted to him for that, because I couldn't be there with her. It was a very confusing day all around, and he made it a point to drop what he was doing to be with her."  In July, 2002, Trautner took time to discuss with this reporter his having reached the milestone of pastorship.  "When you get to this point in your career, after 25 years, you look forward to becoming a pastor," said Trautner, who had celebrated his silver jubilee in the priesthood in 1999.  As the recognized head of St. Francis since the winter of 2000, when the ailing Ettore stepped down, Trautner was looking forward to bearing the official title of pastor, in lieu of "parish administrator."  Acutely aware of the ever-growing turmoil and criticism facing the Catholic church in the last decade, Trautner felt there was no better morale booster than for St. Francis parishioners to revel in the joy of welcoming their new pastor.  Recalling an exhortation received many years before, the Northeast Philadelphia native invoked the memory of a particularly persuasive priest who spoke to him about the priesthood when he was in the seventh grade.  "I was really impressed with what he told the class and really began to seriously think about it," Trautner said.  By the time he was ready to graduate Cardinal Dougherty High School in 1965, he had made a decision to enter St. Charles Borromeo Seminary.  "My dad was a funeral director and I could easily have walked into an established business," he confessed.  Perhaps a lingering taste for those good-life perks was what led him to the affluent shore point of Avalon, N.J., summer after summer, where he loved to hear the live sounds of the Fabulous Grease Band, according to Rodgers.  Before fully arriving at St. Francis in 1993, Trautner had served at St. Louis in Yeadon, St. Joseph in Collingdale, and Holy Trinity in Bucks County.  He admitted to possibly finding St. Francis folks the warmest and friendliest of all.  "I have had some happy years here, and I've enjoyed being with these people on all of their spiritual journeys - as far as their weddings, baptisms, the whole gamut of parish life," he said. "I've found them very appreciative toward their priests. I couldn't say enough about how I feel about them."