Three in first year at Holy Cross Seminary

Three men have started their first year as seminarians at the Holy Cross Seminary in Auckland this year.

Peter Jang, 29, is studying to become a priest for the Auckland diocese. Mr Jang was born in Korea, and came to New Zealand in 2008.

“It’s a funny story. The first ‘job’ that I wanted when I was young was to be a priest. I still remember when I was 7 years old, I said I want to be like him, him being a priest,” he said.

“It’s because he had the biggest smile, and he had open arms welcoming all the little kids into the church.”

Mr Jang said that this happened in Korea. “I don’t even remember his face or his name. I just remember his smile,” he said.

Mr Jang said that he was “side-tracked” along the way.

“I dropped out because I wanted to make money and have fun,” he admitted. “I had a gap of around four years where I stopped going to church altogether. And at the end of that dark age, I was kind of very deep down in the pits, and there seemed to be no way out.”

Through the grace of God, he found his way back.

“He used his loving servants to bring me back out and salvage me. So, I met God, and he enlightened me through Mass and through Jesus. He really wanted me,” he said.

Mr Jang said that, while his Mum is a devout Catholic, other members of his family have stopped going to church. He hopes his eventual ordination will also bring them back.

“I won’t be able to convert them, only Jesus can. But who knows what God has in mind? It’s like the joy of being here, I wanted to be spread out to the ends of the earth [as] the fathers here are teaching us. Through us, let God be preached to the ends of the earth,” he said.

Zung Phan, 27, is Vietnamese, and is discerning to be a priest for the Palmerston North diocese.

Mr Phan came to New Zealand in the middle of 2018 at the invitation of Fr Vui Hoang. He studied English and passed IELTS in 2019, and was looking forward to entering the seminary.

He went back to Vietnam at the end of 2019 to visit his family, intending to pursue his vocation the following year, but Covid struck.

“I was stuck there (Vietnam) for two years and a half. It was really a hard time for me. But through prayers and the support from my parents and people around me, I overcame that difficulty,” he said.

Mr Phan added that it was when he finished his high school studies that he thought about becoming a priest.

“I went to a church, and I saw a priest with the cloth of clergy with [a] white collar and that attracted me. Maybe a few years later, I told my Mum and Dad, I want to be a priest,” he said.

He went to a university in Vietnam to fulfil one of the requirements of priesthood there (Vietnam). It was then that he met Fr Hoang.

“At the time, he was a seminarian. He came back to Vietnam, and we had a little talk,” Mr Phan said.

Fr Hoang asked him to consider being a priest in New Zealand. Mr Phan said he was hesitant because he didn’t speak English, but was assured by Fr Hoang that he (Mr Phan) could study the language while in New Zealand.

Mr Phan said that he wants to be a priest who follows tradition and the bishop. He originally wanted to be a priest in Vietnam.

“I think one of the reasons why I came here was redemption, . . . not only in Vietnam, but also [in] all of the other countries,” he said.

Shane Gallagher is pursuing priesthood for the Dunedin diocese. He said that he received the call while on an overseas adventure in Europe.

“I was hiking in the tallest mountain in Europe, which was called Mt Blanc in France. It was a five-day hike and on the third night . . . God came to me in a dream. Christ came to me in a dream, and he said, ‘do my work. Feed my lambs. Care for those who need . . . care for the sick’,” he said. “It was a very powerful experience.”

He said he was bewildered and surprised to receive the call because, at the time, he was just going to church occasionally.

He spent seven years “looking at every possible option”.

“I’ve looked at Franciscans, Jesuits . . .  In the end, I came back to the calling sense of a diocesan priest, the fullest expression of that original call, that dream. To me, it felt like, as someone once said to me, diocesan priests have the charism of Jesus,” he said.

Mr Gallagher is a potter who still exhibits and makes sculpted works.

“Working with clay is a very prayerful activity. It’s a very centring activity. And so, I really still enjoy it,” he said.

He said that he is involved in Ignatian Spirituality New Zealand, as his Dad was one of the group which set up the organisation in this country.

“My mother and father are deeply contemplative Christians, but they are also really involved in their parish. They’re very happy for me to be here. They always wanted one of us to be a priest. I’m the last one, so I’m their only hope,” he said with a laugh.