NORMAL - Bishop Daniel Jenky, head of the Catholic Diocese of Peoria, has not spent much time on a tractor, even when he spent a year on a Vermont farm while training to be a priest.

"The head father would say, 'Jenky, get off that tractor,'" Jenky said. "I never was very mechanical."

Despite that, Jenky, dressed in his full vestments, including his miter, walked around a tractor Friday under a tent, blessing the site with holy water and incense.

He then climbed aboard and pulled a lever, dumping a load of dirt.

Ground was ceremonially broken for a $3 million project to expand and transform St. Robert Bellarmine Catholic Newman Center, the college home for Catholic students at Illinois State and Illinois Wesleyan universities.

Jenky has experience with groundbreaking and dedication ceremonies - he's attended 57 events connected with the diocese's current capital campaign. Despite that, he said Friday's event was special.

"This one had the most enthusiasm," he said. It's also generated the most questions from people wanting to know when it will be done, he added.

The block-like, one-story Newman Center at 501 S. Main St., Normal, will be rebuilt with a 400-seat chapel and added recreation, library, classroom and office space. A more traditional church facade will be added in front of the existing building, which dates to the late 1960s.

Hundreds of people gathered for the ceremony, which was followed by Mass and a reception.

Eligio Marcheschi, a 1965 ISU alumnus who was Newman Club president in 1963-64, reminisced about the previous facilities. The students met in an old house, and the chapel and library were roughly the size of a three-car garage.

His daughter, ISU senior Keri Marcheschi of Crystal Lake, said the current building is described as "that warehouse next to Avanti's."

The current building's shortcomings aside, having the people of the Newman Center in her life during her college years was crucial to growth in her faith, she said. Being away from home, "we needed someone to care for us and to have a shoulder to cry on," she said.

"I'm really excited - even though I have only 21 days left (as a student)," she said.

Tom and Doretta Herr of Bloomington have five children. Two sons, Ryan and Michael, graduated from ISU in 2005 and 2006, respectively, and the Newman Center was part of their experience.

"Whenever they came home, it was always Newman Center this and Newman Center that," Tom Herr said. ISU already is an excellent school, he said, and having a new center will make it even more desirable for Catholic families.

"This is a really happening place," Tom Herr said. "There is a particular magic going with this particular priest (the center's chaplain, the Rev. Antonio Dittmer) and this particular staff."