A New Priest For The Church!

Mass today was a little different from normal. The celebrant was someone I knew when I was young and he was even younger! Fr. Matt Kinney came up to Michigan from Texas to say a Mass of Thanksgiving at the parish he grew up in. I have known Father since he was in elementary school! To watch him say Mass today was pretty amazing! It seems like it was just yesterday when he was little and yet there I was, listening to Father Matt give a homily on vocations.

The main point of his homily was that God doesn't always call us with a loud cry and all the bells and whistles. Many times it is a silent, gentle nudge here and there, almost unnoticeable if you aren't paying attention. I believe that this is most often the case. So often we surround ourselves with the noise of the world that we don't spend time in silent prayer. Or we look for big signs from God. But we have to remember that God was not in the wind or fire but in the gentle breeze. We need to spend more time in silent prayer and meditation. To discover our vocations we need to listen to what is being said to us in the silence of our hearts To sit in Adoration and open ourselves up to God's loving and gentle voice, calling us to our vocation.

Just as we won't always be called with signs and verbal words, our vocations are all different. Everyone has a purpose here on earth, hence a vocation. Not everyone is called to do something big and noticeable. Yet we can do great work even with a quiet and seemingly insignificant role. When Father Matt said he felt he was called specifically to be a parish priest, I started to think of the other priestly callings he mentioned; missionary, contemplative, or specific organizations such as working with the homeless, sick and so on. I realized that the parish priests are often the unsung heroes of our faith. Thousands of people come to them for help and advice and everyone starts from infancy and baptism and go through their life always coming back to their parish priest. It is their job to care for the souls of their parish family and that responsibility is great! I am proud and happy to know Father Matt because I know that with his ordination the Catholic Church has gained a priest who will do his best to bring people to God and care for them with great generosity!