In the Jubilee Year of 2000, John Paul II made a very insightful statement.  He said: “Our Christian witness would be hopelessly inadequate if we ourselves had not first contemplated the face of the Lord.”  The same might be said of our fully entering into the Christmas season. Christmas is a time in which we ...read more

I could not speak about the Ordained life without speaking about the two questions that most people have about the priesthood: The ordination of women and celibacy. Some people will ask why women are not qualified to be priests. The reality is that it’s not about qualifications. No one is really qualified to be a ...read more

The seasons of Advent and Christmas seem to come so quickly and to be filled with many activities to say the least. In the everyday planning and preparations for family and community celebrations there are inevitably certain individuals who for whatever reason go unnoticed or unrecognized. They make important contributions. They are invaluable in their ...read more

Last week we looked at the Vocation to the Ordained Life and the Sacrament of Holy Orders. The tradition of the priesthood is not specific to Christianity and our tradition dates back to the early days of Judaism. God’s chosen people, the people of Israel, was considered a “kingdom of priests and a holy nation”, but ...read more

One main difference between the Vocations to the Single and Religious life and the Vocations to the Ordained and the Married Lives is that Ordination and Marriage, in the Catholic Church, are Sacraments. Let’s look at the Vocation to the Ordained Life and the Sacrament of Ordination. It is very common to hear about the ...read more

Deacon-structing Vocations: The Religious Life. ...read more

If there is anything that we learn from reading Scripture is that God calls people. Consistently, every story in the bible, involves a call: Abraham, Moses, Noah, Gideon, Jonah, Samuel, Ruth, Esther, Mary, Paul. Everyone gets called. God may not ‘call’ us the way He called Moses or St. Paul, or the specific way that ...read more

Last week we looked at what Vocation is and what it means to “be called.” Everyone is called to one of four vocations and so at some point in our life, if we want to respond to God’s call, we have to think about where God wants to take us. Figuring this out may not ...read more

I am in Chicago for the 2014 National Religious Vocation Conference. The NRVC is the association of all religious vocation ministers in the United States. The Conference promotes vocation awareness, invitation and discernment to life as a religious sister, brother or priest. This year is the 25th anniversary of the Conference and the theme of ...read more

Yesterday we looked at the Book of Revelation and how it is a powerful reminder to those who too easily compromise their beliefs. This message is clear right from the beginning of the book with the letters to the seven churches. After the letters to the seven churches, and after the first vision of the ...read more