Back to School

Even though the semester ended last week, this has been a busy week for the seminary community. On Monday and Tuesday, we visited Elementary and High Schools and on Wednesday and Thursday we participated in a Priests Symposium as part of the Church’s Year for Priests. While each event this past week provided positive experiences, Tuesday topped them all.

On Tuesday, I “officially” returned to St. John the Baptist Diocesan High School for one of the Vocation presentations. Words cannot express what a great day it was for me to return to a community that has done so much for me. The day was a great one for a lot of reasons:

First, I was uncertain what it would feel like to go back to SJB, especially in this new role. The second I walked in the door I felt like I had never left. The warm welcome, excited response and great words of support reminded me of how fortunate I am to be a part of this great community.

Second, I asked John Kwon, a fellow seminarian, to share the presentation with me. I think he was a little reluctant to speak before hundreds of kids in a Catholic high school (not to mention giving up valuable time off in the midst of a busy week). John is from the Diocese of Daejeon, South Korea and it is only his second year speaking English and living on the mainland of America. Whatever his reluctance may have been, he worked right through it as he gave the students at St. John’s a great personal reflection about making the sacrifice to enter the seminary and his hopes and dreams for priesthood.

Two things that stand out from John’s talk were summed up by one of the Religious Studies teachers who e-mailed yesterday. First, he spoke about the influence of a parish priest in South Korea who helped his family through a difficult time. His presence inspired John to want to make the same difference in the lives of others. Second, John talked about the absence that can be felt in relationships. He had a powerful statement, “I thirst to be loved” and said he has only had that thirst satisfied in his relationship with God. What a powerful witness he offered (and offers) on Tuesday.

I have written before about the benefit of working together with other seminarians, particularly through the parish visits and other projects we’ve been involved in. Spending the day working with John was a good thing for me and for the students we spoke to on Tuesday. First, it was great to show him an American high school and a little bit about my "former" life. Second, John is a great person to share life with here at the Seminary. He’s a good witness to me about keeping focused on what is important both inside and outside of the seminary. I realized that more as I listened and worked with him throughout the day. I suspect he impacted the community at St. John the Baptist in the same way he has done for me.

Well tonight is my last night at the Seminary for this year. On Sunday, I leave for a three week Spanish institute. More to come soon!

Have a great week!

Soon to be Father John Ryan - A Character and a Man of Character

It’s hard to believe the first “year” of seminary life is drawing to a close! Life at the end of the year here has prevented me from posting these last few weeks. But, now, classes are finished and we have about a week left of seminary and outside activities. I’ll write about those next week.

Today as part of the closing ritual for the school year, the seminarians in third year offer testament to the seminarians preparing to be ordained this June. I was asked to offer a reflection about Deacon John Ryan. John is from Our Lady of Lourdes, has become a great friend and a true guide through this first year of seminary life. Here’s the text of my talk:

Many gathered here can tell colorful and lively stories of priestly “characters”. Our churches and parishes are filled with them. The stories we sometimes are even embarrassed to tell or can’t get through without laughing about men called to serve God as priests. I think many today would agree that John Ryan is well on the path to becoming one of the “characters”.

It is not since I started living here this past year that I realized what a true character he is. There have been times when he has said something and I said to myself, “Did he really just say that?” …the various imitations and comedy bits and testimonials he’s been part of (and I’ve only been here a year!)…knowing exactly what button to push (in a good way)…being able to reach out to many segments of our seminary community. Yet he offers me and, I think, all of us here a challenge – that we, too, might be characters.

You see, people who are characters are often some of the most authentic people we will ever meet. It is not that they don’t care what other people think. It is that they have come to know themselves so well they are not easily swayed or influenced by the words or ideas of another. For they have done the difficult work of self-reflection and discernment. Yes, John Ryan is surely a character, but I propose and I think you’d agree, he is a man of character. He is a man who knows who he is and who he is not.

I hope this is not a formation issue, but truth be told, John Ryan is part of the reason I finally came to the Seminary. I'll probably have to talk to Msgr. Swiader about this later. More than once, we would talk during one of his visits to Our Lady of Lourdes or even over this past summer about seminary life and priesthood. In my own anxiety and doubt, he would encourage often with a line like, “Hey, I’m making it there. If I can do it, trust me, you’re going to be fine” or in the midst of the first weeks here at the Seminary, the quick check ins to make sure I was OK or the invitations to go for a walk and sort through a new and life changing experience. I don’t think I would have been and know I cannot be that open and vulnerable with just anyone but I can with a person of authenticity- a character and a person of character like John Ryan.

As many of you may know, John and I have a lot in common - the beautiful red hair, the common hometown of West Islip, strong connections to the same parish. We also both have backgrounds in catering and restaurant work. John and I have often talked that some our best formational experiences, in addition to the seminary, have been our experiences in deli and restaurant work and catering. As you know, John, like most of us, left a lot to come here. He could be running a business or working in restaurant management. I’d even suggest he could be on the concert circuit singing “Bridge Over Troubled Water” with Paul Simon. But that’s another talk. The idea of serving or waiting on others involves emptying, humility, discouragement, joy and frustration. It builds character and comes from people of character. It helps one to realize it is not all about them – but rather bringing something great to others. Good servants, good waiters get out of the way so people can get to the meal, so they can come to the table. Priests of good character do the same with the Meal and the Table.

John Ryan is going to be a great priest because he is man of great character. His humility, gentleness and good humor – all qualities of a good waiter – will call those he serves not to focus on him or themselves. Rather, he will get out of the way and lead them to the Table – to discover the presence of God in their own lives. That’s the kind of priestly character I think we will be talking about for years and years to come when we talk about Father John Ryan.

A Regular Sunday

This weekend is our first “regular” Sunday since the beginning of the semester. As I recognized this for myself, I realized I haven’t written about a typical Sunday is about for the community here.

Sunday in the life of the Christian should be a day set apart. We celebrate the Lord’s Day on Sunday. Catholic attend Mass and should set aside the whole day for Sabbath – for rest, family, prayer and fellowship. The reality of our lives of late is that this is harder and harder for many of us to do. That’s a topic for another post.

The Seminary community sets Sunday aside too. It has a different rhythm so that this day may be different than the others; that this day may be a time to pray, reflect, renew and grow away from the weekly schedule of classes, meetings, etc.

Here’s an overview of our Sundays….
9:00 A.M. – Morning Prayer. We pray Morning Prayer every morning we are here. On
Sundays, we start a little later.
10/10:30 A.M. – Conference. Each Sunday, the Rector, Vice Rector or Spiritual Director hold a conference. Today, for example, Fr. Peter led the final Rector’s Conference for the Spring Semester. One of the ideas, I think, is to listen to that and with the time built into the day reflect on the main ideas of the conference. Fr. Peter spoke about charity and love today and gave us much to think about.
11:30 A.M. – Mass. This community Mass is different from our regular daily liturgy. First, only seminarians attend the Sunday liturgy. There is more singing, the homily is directed primarily to the seminarians and we work to plan and minister throughout the Liturgy. We also dress in cassock and surplice for Sunday liturgy.
12:30 P.M. – Lunch – enough said!
1:00 – 5:00 P.M. – Free time. This is a time to catch up on school work, enjoy the outdoors, catch up with some friends, or take a break for a few hours. Today, for example, I did some school work outside as the weather was wonderful. The picture above shows my outdoor view today.
5:00 P.M. – Evening Prayer. Evening Prayer on Sundays is more formal. We process in with the Paschal Candle and sing all of the psalms and canticles. A seminarian preaches at Sunday Evening Prayer which is also a great opportunity for both the seminarian and the community. Tonight, Dwayne Davis preached about the promise of hope and how we must seek that out in our lives.
5:30 P.M. – Social. After Evening Prayer, we gather in the Faculty Lounge for a Sunday Social. This is a chance to catch up with one another, talk about our weekends and even look forward to the week ahead.
6:00 P.M. – Dinner. We gather for a formal dinner on Sunday nights. An “alley” sets up and serves the meal. Tonight, my alley, 3-B, set up and serve. The dinner is a little fancier, tablecloths, etc. but the community is still the same. These last two events can seem out of place at times, I admit that. Yet, it helps to highlight the significance of Sunday dinner and also is probably good preparation for many a parish social and/or dinner in the future.
7:00 P.M - ???. Free Time. Here again is some time to catch up, finish up some class work, take a walk, or even updates one’s blog (:)) as I’m doing right now.

So the Sunday pace is different and I realized missed a bit. Between speaking in parishes, guests here for Palm Sunday and our breaks, this is our first “regular” Sunday since early February. It is good to have some of that rhythm back.

Have a great week!

Last Stop: St. Mary's Manhasset

This past Sunday, the World Day of Prayer for Vocations, found Daniel Opoku-Mensah and myself speaking at St. Mary’s in Manhasset. This is the last weekend in this Spring semester that seminarians visited parishes.
St. Mary’s is an incredible place. First, it’s in Nassau which is a distant land for someone from the South Shore of Suffolk. Second, there are so many things happening in this parish. There is a high school, elementary school, incredible youth ministry program, faith formation, outreach and so much more – they have their own Gift Shop! Third, the priests and people here helped to make it a great weekend as well. They supported, affirmed, and encouraged both Daniel and myself in work and life at the Seminary.

There is a sadness and that our parish visitations are complete. Sadness because this has been a tremendous opportunity for me personally and I think the seminarians in general. I don’t often speak about my own vocation story so it has been a good “push” for me. Second, it has been wonderful to be present in parishes throughout the Diocese and to learn about the diversity and excitement present in so many of our parishes. It also has been a good opportunity to work on a project with a fellow seminarian in a way that we would not normally work. While we were not at the seminary, a sense of community continues to form. For example, this weekend it was great to spend time getting to know more about Daniel's journey to the Seminary from the Diocese of Konongo-Mampong in Ghana and to share a weekend of experiences together. Finally, and perhaps most important, we learned a tremendous amount about priestly ministry over these past weeks.

As we return to the Seminary and gain back some of the “rhythm” of seminary life again, the Spring semester is coming to an end. Bring on the papers and finals!

Have a great week.

St. Patrick’s, Bay Shore – “FORTUNATE US”

This past weekend, Fortunatus Mugisha and I visited and spoke at St. Patrick’s R.C. Church in Bay Shore. For me, it was a homecoming of sorts. I lived and worked in West Islip my entire life. Spending the weekend at St. Patrick’s allowed me to return to an area I am very familiar and comfortable with and to meet many wonderful individuals and families – some familiar and some brand new.

It was great travel to St. Patrick’s with Fortunatus (photo, right). He is actually a local celebrity at St. Patrick’s. Last Christmas break, Fortunatus lived in the parish during his Christmas break. The day before we arrived in St. Patrick’s, Fortunatus and the parish learned that he would be spending his pastoral year (Fall 2010 and Spring 2011) in the parish. As St. Patrick’s pastor, Fr. Thomas Coogan (photo, below left) said, it is “fortunate us” for having Fortunatus in the parish. If you met Fortunatus, who comes from the Diocese of Kabel in Uganda, you’d quickly agree.

Each parish I have visited offers so much to the people they are called to serve. Of course, they have many things in common. In addition, each parish has opened my mind and heart to new possibilities for ministry and service. In addition to Fortunatus’ celebrity status :), St. Patrick’s holds a monthly Mass for Children with Special Needs on the third Saturday evening of every month. I had the chance to meet some of the children and families who attended that Mass as the liturgy ended on Saturday evening.

What a tremendous outreach St. Patrick’s offers to these families! Once a month a special liturgy is help in the Coffey Center. It is a smaller space and allows families to come together to hear God’s Word and pray together. For some, the formal experience of Church can be tough and sometimes too structured. For others there may be fear of embarrassment or of being distraction. For sure – all are welcome at God’s table! This is just another way that St. Patrick’s puts that into action. Celebrated traditionally by Msgr. Emmett Fagan (who lives here at the Seminary), the Mass is a tremendous service to God’s people at St. Patrick’s!

The parish also provides respite for parents. Children can stay with trained volunteers on Saturday nights. This gives the kids time to play with one another and give their parents some time together too!

So the speaking tour continues…next week, St. Mary’s in Manhasset. In some small way I hope we are able to invite others to think about priesthood and religious life. In some large ways, we are gaining much more than we can ever hope to offer. Indeed, “FORTUNATE-US!”

Rector's Conferences

“The rector’s conferences are especially helpful in aiding students to interpret rightly their life in common, their discernment of vocation to the priesthood, and the human and spiritual virtues they strive to appropriate.”
-Program for Priestly Formation, 267

I’ve written before about the role of the Rector, in general, and the Rector here, Fr. Peter Vaccari. The Rector carries out numerous tasks and responsibilities. One of these is a monthly Rector’s Conference. This takes place in every seminary. (Archbishop Dolan has put together a book of his Rector’s Conferences from the time he was a Seminary Rector. It’s a great book!) Each month, the seminarians meet with Fr. Peter, usually in the Main Chapel, for a time of information and formation.

Tonight, on the first day back from the Easter break, we gathered in the Chapel for the April Rector’s Conference. In this semester, Fr. Peter has examined each of the theological virtues (faith, hope and love) and how they need to be cultivated and realized in the life of each seminarian and priest.

Fr. Peter spoke about hope tonight and there were three main points for the seminarians – and perhaps for each person who reads this. (These are not Fr. Peter’s exact words just the ideas I left the Chapel with tonight.)

1. A priest must be a person who emanates hope. As seminarians and priests, our presence must demonstrate that we are people of hope. In welcoming, reaching out and even challenging, our faces should reveal what is in our heart. Our speech - in every work we speak - should be spirit and hope-filled. This leads to the second point.
2. You cannot give what you do not have. We cannot preach, live, speak about or emanate hope if we do not believe it ourselves. We are called to pray, reflect and talk about our feelings of hopefulness and perhaps even more importantly, in times of hopelessness. We can never be authentic disciples if we are not honestly engaged in consistent self-examination and reflection, particularly when it comes to hope.
3. Be aware of false hope. Fr. Peter’s last point, at first, may appear relevant for seminarians and priests but I think has a message for each of us. It is easy to imagine ourselves in a certain role or career, i.e. I hope to be assigned to a certain parish, or be the “Director” of this, or have this particular job or something like that. It’s unrealistic. It is not who we are called to be as priests (or as people). It’s a false hope, one bound to leave us disappointed and discouraged.

Now this is only one Rector’s Conference so you can imagine what a year’s worth of them offers. It is another part of the formational process and one that has been a huge source of inspiration and support.

This particular conference, offered in the Easter season and on the first day of a new semester, gives much for me (and hopefully all of us) to think, pray and reflect upon!

Vulnerability

Part of the formational process at the Seminary involves Liturgical Formation, including preaching. Today, Good Friday, I preached at the Morning Prayer service. Below is a basic text of my first seminary preaching text, based on the text of Isaiah 52:13-15 and the spirit of the day...

In so many ways we seek to tie these three days together. What can be a thread for us as come to prayer this morning from last night’s liturgy and prepare for the Easter Vigil. I would like to propose that the “VULNERABILITY” might be a thread for each one of us here today to consider. The vulnerability evidenced in last night’s Liturgy – the one who washes feet as well as the vulnerability it takes to have one’s feet washed – to serve and be served. The vulnerability and emptiness required to accept and embrace God’s saving love for us throughout history and in Jesus we will celebrate tomorrow. And today, the vulnerability required to accept the cross, the model the suffering servant offers – that we might accept and even embrace our vulnerabilities and emptiness.

In my previous ministry as a high school campus minister and social worker, one of my responsibilities involved helping to coordinate a comprehensive support group program to address student needs and concerns. So groups were offered in everything from Eating Disorders to Divorce/Separation, Bereavement and many more. To “advertise” or inform the student body about it we’d visit every class in the building, explain each group, and invite kids to sign up. Hundreds did. Were some of the antics those of high school teenagers? Surely. Yet a tremendous majority were the writings of young people looking for help and unsure where to turn. Aware of their vulnerability, uncertain they could fully enter into them.

Our work after the sign up involved interviewing each student to determine their interest nad issue and then provide them a pass for the first meeting. The numbers surely dropped from sign up to the time of the first meeting. See, even at that age many could sign up but few could show up. Many could check off a box, but few could fully embrace their vulnerabilities in the hope that something greater might come about. Those who showed up, whether they realized it or not, entered into the cross. We, too, must do the same.

The challenge of these three days for all Christians, and perhaps in particular way for we who live in this house is to go beyond the signing up and in the deepest way possible, to show up.

It’s easy to say we signed up and each one of us here has. We have the uniform, the status, the place to live, the vocation, the community, the prayer, the process. All good things that, hopefully, in some way speak to a deeper reality.

We need to ask ourselves though – and I start with myself – have we worked to show up? Have we fully or are we willing to bring our real selves to the cross? Our pains and struggles? Our doubts and fears? Our history and past? Our fears and anxieties? Our insecurities and frailities? Or have we only made the simple gesture of signing up and remain hidden by the sign up form. Will we hide in the statuses? The externals? It’s easier there. Then, have we truly embraced the cross, have we truly embraced the Lord? For if we are unwilling to do the soul work required to show up, perhaps we need to ask ourselves what have we signed up for in the first place?

As our celebration of the Triduum continues, let us pray for and with one another that we might truly embrace our vulnerabilities this day and always, that we might show up at the Cross today. Like the suffering servant, may we startle and amaze those whom we serve both here and in the future. For if we do, the vulnerabilities, that emptiness, the pain in our lives will not only be healed but transformed in the new life that Christ brings. Our God will show up. Let’s pray that we can do the same.