January 6, 2026 // Diocese

Bishop Luers Students Share Musical Talents

Georgia Lieb

Bishop Luers High School sophomores Alejandro Palma and Ethan Roebel are living witnesses to their school and parish community through their generous service, creativity, and leadership. Both students are active members of the Bishop Luers Knights for Life Club and founding members of the newly established Catholic Relief Services Club. Drawing on their artistic talents, Palma and Roebel recently collaborated to design a holy card for the CRS Club encouraging prayer for the poor and needy around the world. In addition, Palma is a dedicated altar server, faithfully serving at all-school and chapel Masses. Both Palma and Roebel participate in the all-school Mass set-up and tear-down crew each month. 

Along with all these acts of service within their school community, they have found ways to serve their parish community through music ministry.

Palma and Roebel, both parishioners at St. Joseph Catholic Church in Fort Wayne, found their inspiration to create liturgical music when they heard the parish’s music director, Ken Jehle, play at Mass.

Palma approached Jehle when he was in sixth grade at St. Joseph Catholic School and asked him for guitar lessons. “I always thought it was so cool that he played (guitar) at Mass,” Palma said. After taking lessons for a few years from Jehle, Palma began playing at the all-school Mass at St. Joseph each week.

“Alejandro is just a great kid,” Jehle said. “He has a really strong prayer life. He stays really close to the Lord and has a fervor for prayer. I’ve really been impressed by Alejandro’s love of the Lord.”

Ethan Roebel plays the organ at St. Joseph Catholic Church in Fort Wayne. He was partly inspired to play by his grandfather, who played the organ at local parishes.

Around this time, Roebel, who was one of Palma’s eighth grade classmates at St. Joseph School, spoke to Jehle about his interest in learning how to play the pipe organ. “I always liked listening to it at church,” Roebel said. As Roebel had never formally played an organ or piano before, he began by practicing on the piano for a few months. He moved to the pipe organ in February of 2024.

Roebel joined Palma at the all-school Masses. Jehle eventually began to integrate them into the St. Joseph weekend Mass schedule. Now, they are advanced enough to lead the music for an entire Mass without Jehle present. They play at one Mass per month.

Jehle told Today’s Catholic he is impressed by these two young musicians, saying: “It’s not common to see this fervor; they are passionate about church music. That is uncommon in this day and age.”

Jehle spoke about the many Masses he covers each week and how he is grateful that Palma and Roebel have assisted him with their talent.

“They just seem to really love doing it,” Jehl said. “They love the music, they love the Mass, they love the serving. They are not there for the compliments or the show. They have a great heart posture to offer this up in sincere prayer, and that’s beautiful.”

Roebel said, “It’s a way to take a talent that I was gifted and give it back in worship to God.”

While Roebel was inspired by Jehle, he was also inspired by his own grandfather, an organist who has formerly provided sacred music at local parishes including St. Mary Mother of God Catholic Church in Fort Wayne and St. Joseph – Hessen Cassel Catholic Church. His grandfather also used to be the full-time pianist at Von Maur in Fort Wayne.

Now that Roebel has more experience, he gets to choose the songs for Mass. Some of his favorites include “Gather Us In,” “Sing of The Lord’s Goodness,” and the “Mass of Creation” setting. 

Along with teaching himself how to play the pipe-organ, Roebel has begun to compose his own liturgical music. While none of his music is officially published, an “Alleluia” that he wrote was recently played at one of the Masses at St. Joseph.

Jehle said Roebel “could grow up to be an incredible organist someday.”