This Sunday/Today we celebrate Good Shepherd Sunday, and it’s also World Day of Prayer for Vocations. It also so happens that the Gospel is just a slightly
longer version of the one I chose for my Ordination Mass to the priesthood.
The reason I chose it was, when I was being interviewed to train for the
priesthood, Bishop Philip Pargeter asked me to sum up in one word how I
understood being a priest, and I said “shepherd”, with the idea of looking for
the lost sheep, binding up the stray and so on. For the first reading I chose the
option from the prophet Jeremiah, but a bit more about that later. Perhaps I
should just say something now about how I came to train for the priesthood.
This is the edited-down version.
Just shortly before I was seven, I received my First Holy Communion, and
some time later I became an altar server. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and I liked it
when I got to carry one of the acolyte candles. Altar serving got me interested
in the Mass and the priesthood, and so that was what I wanted to do. But things
were to change.
After going to secondary school, I never stopped going to Mass, but through
peer-pressure and wanting to get married, the idea of the priesthood faded
away. When I was in the sixth form, what they now call Years 12 and 13, some
of the people in my parish, and my parish priest as well, suggested the idea of
the priesthood to me. I even went along to an open day at Oscott College,
which is one of the places where priests for this diocese train. I didn’t
particularly like the place or the idea of being a priest, and wanted to forget
about it all.
So I went up to York to study chemistry, a bit like Jonah trying to run away
from God. But, of course, you can’t run away from God, and whilst I was there
I had other people suggest the idea of the priesthood to me as well.
When I came back home for my Easter holiday, by this point we had a new
priest looking after the parish. One of the parish sisters spoke to me after Mass
and said that Father was running a retreat for good Catholic boys in the summer
in Portugal, and you didn’t need to be thinking about the priesthood. I went
and saw him and agreed to go. The thought was that I could go along, say that
I’ve investigated the idea, it’s not for me, and that’s the end of it. But it didn’t
work out that way.
We spent around three weeks in Portugal, with daily Mass, Holy Hour, Rosary,
spiritual reading and various talks and videos on the priesthood, and the
vocations director came to speak to us all whilst we were there as well. We
also did fun things like going motor-boating and went to a smaller version of
Alton Towers. The last few days we spent in Fatima, where Our Lady appeared
in 1917, and the last full day we were there I spent an hour before the Blessed
Sacrament exposed in one of the chapels there. I said to the Lord: I’ve been on
this retreat, so what do you want me to do? The response from God wasn’t a
voice, but more an inner conviction that He was calling me to be a priest.
Then, when I returned home, I went to Mass on a Tuesday evening, and
unusually, I was asked to read the first reading, which was about the calling of
the prophet Jeremiah, where he was called out to preach God’s word. As I read
that reading, I had a sense of God saying to me: this is about your life as well,
although I thought to myself at the time: don’t be so arrogant. I spoke to a few
of the clergy about this and they advised me to complete my chemistry degree
first, so that if it wasn’t my calling I could fall back on my degree. As it
happened, after graduation I went all the way through seminary and was
ordained in July 2010, with a few other twists and turns. But like I said, this is
the short story.
Just a few more points, though. We’re talking about vocations, and whatever
your vocation actually is, whether it’s the single life, married life, priesthood,
diaconate or religious life, the main thing is following the Lord, which includes
being faithful to prayer and open to whatever God wants us to do.
So I’ll wrap up there, but if you want to ask me any questions afterwards,
please feel free to do so.
Curious about exploring things further? If you would like to ask further questions about the topics raised in these homilies (or maybe think it wasn’t explained too well!), please feel free to e-mail Fr Michael at stjoseph.thame@rcaob.org.uk