In my own experience, there has been priests like this is the seminary I am currently studying in. I actually thought that the men who "form," or, in the case of seminaries like mine, "deform" men who believe they have a calling to the priesthood would be Christ-like. Christ was first and foremost a compassionate man. Some of the men who call themselves "priests of Jesus Christ," that I have to live with, fit the characteristics of some of the men that Carl White had to deal with in his seminary formation, even though he is a non-Catholic Christian. Take the president of Mr. White's seminary, he sounds like the character we have to deal with, we call this character, "Fr. Edward," although in this case the prefix "father" is used lightly. The man puts on a mask and hides his true self. I can truly repeat with Mr. White: " If I have ever seen a man put on a façade and pretend to be what he is not, it’s him." Formation is intended to be hard, you are being formed into a Man of God, which is not an easy task to undertake, but sometimes the people who are in charge of formation can really make you question your faith in the priesthood. I have witnessed other seminaries in action, and I can truly say that the environment in which I am being formed is not healthy or how the Church would like its future priests to be treated. I am tired of fake men telling people that they are not worthy to serve the Church or God. Such men should really look into themselves and start forming and criticizing themselves, before they do the same to others.
Now, that being said, I do appreciate those men who have the heart of Christ and who have to deal with men like Fr. Edward or people like him. I have met the worst priests of my life in seminary, but I have also met the best shepherds and Christ-like men in the same place. I ask the readers to please pray for all priests, especially those who fall from time to time in their priesthood. I ask you to pray for seminarians everywhere, especially those who have difficulties in formation.
Justin, Sounds like your seminary is the pits! I will be praying for you. I too met some of the worst and some of the best priests during my seminary years. It is sad that some bishops don't take the Church's counsel seriously and are, therefore, not willing to sacrifice the best priests they have for the ministry of Seminary Formation. What we need when we are seminarians are men who inspire us to great heights and who really radiate the love, wisdom, holiness and friendship of Christ. Men we can look at and think - 'now if I am half the priest he is then I'll be doing really well'. Such priests do exist, but, unfortunately, in my experience those kinds of priests were virtually non-existent in the seminary.
ReplyDeleteI have met Priests like the ones you mention and they truly give themselves to their priesthood. These are the priests we need in the seminaries forming the future shepherds of Christ's Church. As always, I will keep praying for you, Father, and for priests like you, who remember their days in seminary and can tell the truth about them.
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