Brother Eugene L. Behenna, C.F.X.

For almost a hundred consecutive years, men of the Behenna family of Somerville were faithful members of the Xaverian Brothers. Herbert, later our Brother Guy, became an aspirant in our high school program at the Juniorate in Peabody in the mid 1920s, and we have been honored to have Eugene, later Brother Edgar, in our midst a century later. There were thirteen children in the Behenna family, eleven boys and two girls. Although Herbert was the godfather to Gene, they only got to know one another when the Juniorate boys were home with their families in the summer. Among the Behennas, there was, of course, an assortment of similarities in looks, voice, favorite expressions and interests, but there were graced differences among them, and only rarely did anyone mistakenly call Gene “Brother Guy”. The Xaverian Brothers and the Church were graced and strengthened by the variety of gifts with which God blessed each of them, and us.