Tribunal staff member Jimmy Olson talks faith, family, military service
By Gabrielle Nolan
Sgt. James “Jimmy” Olson is currently on his first overseas deployment with the Tennessee Army National Guard.
The husband and father of four is on leave from his position as moderator of the Tribunal and ecclesiastical notary for the Diocese of Knoxville.
After leaving at the end of September, Sgt. Olson is expected to be overseas in the Middle East for about nine months, with time before and after in Texas for additional training and administrative duties. He is expected to return home in July.
Prior to his deployment, Sgt. Olson spoke with The East Tennessee Catholic about faith, family, and service to the military.
Faith and sacrifice
Sgt. Olson shared that he grew up in the military, noting that when he was 13 years old his father joined the Army. Still active duty, his father is currently stationed in Japan as a chaplain.
Sgt. Olson joined the Army while in college in November 2013.
“Initially, I thought to go active duty once I graduated, but I ended up getting married and started to have kids, and one thing that I wanted to make sure I did was be able to give my kids a home,” he said. “My dad joined the military kind of late, and so I had a home. I grew up until I was 13 here in East Tennessee, and I wanted to be able to give my kids that same kind of groundedness I guess that comes from having a place where you’re from. That’s just not something that happens if you grow up in the military; you’re kind of from everywhere. You don’t really have a place you call home, and I wanted that home for my kids. So, I ended up staying in the National Guard, not going active.”
Jimmy Olson takes part in training exercises in Texas in July 2020. (Photo courtesy of Jimmy Olson)
Every year, Sgt. Olson has training requirements he has to meet with the Army National Guard. In addition, he attends monthly drills that normally last three to four days. During their monthly drills, the soldiers qualify on the vehicles they operate and the individual weapons that they use.
For Sgt. Olson, what he enjoys most about the military is the camaraderie among the soldiers.
“There’s kind of an underlying bond that’s forged with other men when you go through adversity together that’s not really able to be replicated anywhere else. That’s probably my favorite thing about it,” he said.
On the other end of the spectrum, the most challenging part about being in the military is time away from family, Sgt. Olson shared.
“It does take me away from my family quite a bit. I have four kids; we just recently had our fourth about three months ago, and actually I was on a training assignment in Texas the day he was born. I did not get to see him until he was almost a month old. So, it’s that kind of stuff that I think is the most challenging,” he said. “This upcoming deployment, I’m going to leave him, and he’ll be about 4 months old, and by the time I get back he’ll be a year. And all those milestones I’m going to miss, the birthdays I’m going to miss, the mornings where they run into my room and jump in bed with me, that kind of stuff. I think that’s the hardest part about it, is the time away from family.”
A convert to Catholicism, Sgt. Olson came into the Church in 2018 alongside his wife, Naomi. He was Southern Baptist, and she was non-denominational.
Sgt. Olson said the biggest thing that drew him to the Catholic Church was the Eucharist.
“I kind of fell away from my faith for a while, and I started searching to get back into it,” he explained. “I started reading the Bible again, and it was shortly after reading through the Bread of Life discourse in John 6 and seeing the kind of nonchalant way that churches I grew up in and churches I was in then treated Communion, kind of made me sit there and wonder: it seems like it’s supposed to be a bigger deal, who seems to make a big deal out of Communion?”
Sgt. Olson shared he had a “Holy Spirit frying pan moment” then.
“I was like, oh Catholics seem to make a big deal about this, I’ll go check them out. So, I dropped that bombshell on my wife that evening and told her I was going to check out a Catholic church, and the rest is history I guess,” he recalled.
Since becoming Catholic, some of Sgt. Olson’s favorite devotions include wearing the brown scapular, praying the rosary, and praying the Liturgy of the Hours.
“When I first converted, I had a priest that confirmed me into the Church; he gave me some very good advice. He said there’s a million and one different devotions in the Church; find two or three that you like. So, those are the two or three I’ve grown accustomed to and grown a devotion to,” he said.
Additionally, he has a handful of patron saints to rely on.
“St. Joseph was my confirmation saint,” Sgt. Olson said. “My job in the military is I’m a cavalryman, and so the patron saint of cavalrymen is St. George; and of course, St. Michael. All saints that I regularly ask the intercession of, along with St. Benedict, would probably be the biggest ones.”
His faith inspires him to fulfill the duties of his military obligations.
“The Catholic faith has always encouraged service and patriotism,” Sgt. Olson said. “I remember reading, specifically, Pope Pius XII exhorting particularly the Americans to patriotism and love of country. While I wasn’t Catholic when I initially joined the military, I found confirmation in the service I can give to my country through various Catholic teachings and social teachings, particularly. As I’ve grown in my Catholic faith, I have been confirmed in my desire to serve and protect the nation that I call home.”
The ‘front lines’ of the Church
While deployed, Sgt. Olson’s position with the Tribunal will be held. His work duties will be distributed among other members of the staff.
He has served the Tribunal for three years.
“Specifically, my duties are to make sure that all the documents are drawn up correctly, all the procedures are followed, and coordinate with our administrative assistant to make sure that communications to and from the Tribunal from the faithful are handled in a timely and efficient manner,” Sgt. Olson said.
In addition to his bachelor’s degree in business administration, Sgt. Olson also received a certificate from the Tribunal Institute from The Catholic University of America.
“Life is messy, inside and outside the Church, but particularly for those outside the Church,” he said. “People come from a variety of backgrounds, and a large majority of the cases that we process here are for people who are coming into the Church and people who may not have known that marriage is a lifelong commitment, and that you can’t get remarried after being married once.”
“People come from a variety of different backgrounds, secular to pagan to evangelical Protestant, high-church Protestant, and they come with a variety of different beliefs; and oftentimes there’s messy situations that have occurred in their lives,” Sgt. Olson continued. “And the Church in her wisdom and mercy has devised this pastoral ministry that we can look at these messy circumstances and see if there’s some sort of defect or problem with the marriages that they had prior to coming to the Church that would have compromised the ability of them to actually contract a marriage. And so in doing that, enabling these people who are coming in from messy situations to live a full life in the Church rather than having to live with something they had done in the past and that bound them.”
He recognizes the importance of serving the Church via the Tribunal.
“Any job working for the Church is a ministry, but particularly I feel that where I’m at here in the Tribunal is kind of on the front lines of ministering to the people here in East Tennessee. I love working here, and I love being able to help people to live the fullest sacramental life that they can within the Catholic Church,” he said.
