Concordia University Mequon president Rev. Patrick Ferry recently completed his book, Faith in the Freshman: A Story of Hopes and Hoops. Ferry will officially launch the release of his book tonight at a book signing and reading in the Concordia University Todd Wehr auditorium at 7 p.m.
“It’s really an interweaving story that has been tied together across generations,” Ferry said. “While basketball is an important theme, I hope that anyone who reads it will realize that it’s about so much more. It’s about pursuing dreams and knowing that refining dreams along the way is OK and that it’s more about the journey.”
The memoir is based on Ferry’s own life, and follows his college basketball career along with his son Andrew’s.
It contains some of life’s most powerful lessons on family, faith, academic and transformation, Ferry said.
“I was actually writing Andrew’s part of the story as it was in progress,” Ferry said. “His story was made more interesting by the fact that he was diagnosed with type one diabetes in high school. His dream is still to play college basketball, and the book demonstrates the challenges that he faces with being undersized and the other complications and so on.”
Ferry hopes that his book can serve as a way for others who face similar obstacles and challenges to be encouraged. The book portrays his son’s struggles as a college freshman basketball player with home sickness and chronicles Ferry’s own hopes, fears and dreams for his son.
“I think the book will be useful and helpful for people who are like me, parents of children in college, parents of children with diabetes, who ask ourselves questions about how we help our children chase their dreams without pushing too far or trying to re-live our own experiences through them,” Ferry said. “In my honest assessment that has been something I haven’t been very successful at doing.”
Ferry wrote the first draft of his book in about four months.
“I turned 50 this year, and as part of my new year’s resolution I decided I needed to do it now,” Ferry said. “I’ve been journaling for quite some time, and thinking about this for a while so it came together pretty quickly.”
The book offers an overview of Ferry’s college experience in what he calls one of the ‘worst basketball programs in the country.’ It flashes back and forth to his son Andrew’s basketball career which begins at Valparaiso University.
The book is available at Concordia University’s book store, as well as local book stores in the Milwaukee area. It can also be purchased online at www.faithinthefreshman.com or on Amazon.com. All proceeds from the book will go towards Concordia University and the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
“We really wanted to support the causes that are important to us,” Ferry said.
