91849

Living His Faith

Jeffrey Mladenik leaves a wife, Suzanne, two daughters, Kelly, 21, and Grace, 4, two sons, Joshua, 18, and Daniel, 17, and a baby in China named Hannah, whose exact age is unknown. Her adoption was under way on Sept. 11, when Mr. Mladenik, 43, was a passenger on Flight 11. Mrs. Mladenik plans to take her home in the summer.

Mr. Mladenik was the interim chief executive officer of eLogic, an internet publishing company in Los Angeles. At home in Hinsdale, Ill., he worked with Christ Church of Oak Brook, leading discussions about faith in the workplace.

"You couldn't be around him without being affected by his enthusiasm for God," said Bill Cirignani, a friend from church. "I had been a Christian for six years, and had gotten stale, a little bit awry," but Mr. Mladenik, an ordained minister, reignited him, he said.

"He was actually seeking to live this radical vision of Jesus Christ, set out for us as human beings," Mr. Cirignani said. "I hope we can help Hannah learn about her dad."

Profile published in THE NEW YORK TIMES on January 20, 2002.


A hurried businessman and Christian pastor, Jeffrey Mladenik had to carve time out of his busy daily schedules to read his Bible. The times he most frequently chose, friends said Wednesday, were on the long flights he commonly took from Boston to Los Angeles.

An associate pastor at Christ Church in Oak Brook, Mladenik, a father of four, was killed when American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center.

"He used his airplane time as his Bible time," said Bill Cirignani, a Chicago attorney who knew Mladenik from a class Mladenik taught at the church. "And I'm sure Jeff would have had that Bible open when the plane was being hijacked and he would have been talking to those other passengers and praying with them."

Mladenik, 43, of Hinsdale worked at Cahners Publishing in Des Plaines for four years. In the past month, he became an interim president of a new Cahners subsidiary, eLogic. Cahners has an office in Boston, and eLogic was based out of Los Angeles, said Jeff Greisch, president of manufacturing and electronics for the Des Plaines office.

Profile courtesy of THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE.