« Latin Grammar | Main | Why Would Someone Die for a Guitar and a Felt Banner? »
Why I Want to Be a Priest
By Fr. Dennis | June 26, 2003
What follows is a short essay I was asked to write as a part of my application to the seminary…
My earliest memory of a priest is that of Father MacRedmond at St. Michael. As a small child, much of the mass seemed strange and unfamiliar to me, with all the strange words. Most of the time, I could see only the backs of people’s heads, and my dad would sometimes hoist me up so I could see what was going on. And even though I didn’t really get what was going on, other than some vague notions of Jesus being the Son of God, who made everything, one thing sticks out. Every week, the man who stood at the front, and who sounded like the voice of God over the public address system, would lean forward into his microphone and say, in a booming voice that commanded attention, “Take this all of you, and eat it!” For the rest of my life, no matter where I go to mass, no matter how many different priests or bishops are reciting the words of institution, I still hear Father MacRedmond’s voice in the back of my head when I go to mass, booming into my mind, “Do this in memory of Me!”
The influence a priest has on the world lives long after him. Father MacRedmond died in 1985, I think, or thereabouts, but even today he colors every mass I attend. When I think of why I might want to be a priest, aside from the specific notion that somehow I think the Holy Spirit is calling it me to it, I can’t help reflecting on the specific influence of priests throughout my life. Something inside me wants to participate in leaving that legacy on to others.
Of course, other vocations leave important legacies too. Specifically, the legacy of most parents is the children they raise up. They have their time on earth as productive members of the community, and they have forever in heaven (hopefully) to praise God with the hosts of saints and angels. I recently read a very well-framed argument warning against the dangers of modern feminism which explained something that I guess I had always known was true, but which I had never thought much about: God’s ultimate purpose in inventing sex is to give us the opportunity to populate heaven with saints. The vocation of marriage and parenthood has great attraction for me. And what legacy could be greater than bringing new people, who had never existed before and who would exist forever, into heaven to be with God forever?
Not to mention the human desire for intimacy with a wife – intimacy in every sense of the word. To have a partner that I would give my life for, who would give her life for me, who would work with me to raise up our children to have good lives and be happy with God forever. These things are attractive to me.
But the attraction to the priesthood has been ever present in my life. In high school I often told friends of mine that I wanted to be a priest. I would imagine myself being a priest, counseling others during times of trouble, delivering the gospel and the homily at mass, organizing retreat workshops, working with the high school youth groups, and all the other things that I saw priests doing.
It was the singing, though, that really hooked me on the idea. As I was beginning to play guitar in the parish music group, and even have a hand in picking out which music we would use, I began to see the beauty of the structure of our liturgy, and to fall in love. Keith Zavelli, a friend of our family, would come back to town from seminary each summer with some new song he had learned or had written, and he invited me to sing with him at mass. He told me, “You don’t sing with your voice. You sing with your heart.” As I learned more about music from him and from other liturgical musicians, I could begin to see the shape of the mass, and the rhythm of the thing, and how each week was part of a great cycle. Every day, every week, every year had a constant rhythm to it. The words come to my mind: “…so that from east to west a perfect offering may be made to the glory of Your name.”
It is the liturgy that has the greatest hold of my imagination when I imagine the priesthood. Once, during the Easter Vigil in 1995, Father Sartain was lighting the new fire, and the desire was almost uncontainable. It was like a thousand voices shouting inside of me that I should be doing what Father Sartain was doing. That I could stand with a parish as its priest, and light the first fire that would be shared throughout the faithful.
But it is not just the liturgy that kindles my interest in becoming a priest. Priests do all kinds of work, from administrative and managerial functions at the parish and diocesan level, to weekly sick calls, to working with the ladies altar sodality, to any list of things you might find in a typical Sunday bulletin. The priest’s duty is as a shepherd, leading the people in verdant pastures and by restful waters. Specifically, it is his sacramental role that is his and his alone.
In his sacramental role, the priest baptizes the infant, being with families at the great moment when a person is first welcomed into the family of Christians. He gives children their first communion, which will become their spiritual nourishment for the rest of their lives. He is there at the moment of great redemption, when a penitent returns to the life of holiness and firmly resolves with the help of God’s grace to make up for his sins and to love as he should. He meets with the young couple beginning their life together, and guides them in their understanding of marriage, and is there that day when God joins them in covenant. And he baptizes their children too. He is there in sickness, bringing comfort and the promise of God’s healing. And finally he is there in death, helping the family to pray for the dead, to grieve their loss, and to carry on the legacy left them by those who came before.
I cannot even begin to understand the depth of the privilege it must be to participate in the most intimate, most important moments in the lives of so many fellow Christians. A priest may have no biological children to whom he leaves behind the legacy of his life. Instead, he has hundreds, or maybe thousands, all children, all of whom call him “father,” to whom he hands on the legacy of our Faith, and the life of Christ, entrusted to him.
Why do I want to be priest? I guess you could say that it is for the same reasons I might want to be a husband and father, only more so.
Topics: Uncategorized |
June 28th, 2003 at 7:15 pm
Why He Wants to Be a Priest
Here is why Dennis says he wants to be a priest.