Six young men entered the Holy Cross seminary this year, double the number of first year seminarians in the past few years.
Newly- appointed rector Fr David Dowling expressed hope that these young men will approach their formation with humility.
“My hope is that these young men will open themselves to be conformed to Jesus, who ‘did not come to be served, but to serve.’,” Fr Dowling said.
“I hope that they will humbly approach their formation, like clay to be moulded, so that the Holy Spirit, with the collaboration of seminary formators can shape them to be good pastors in the image of Jesus, the Good Shepherd.”
Auckland
Zecharia Mathew, 24, said he considers his vocation story as a “conversion” and a “love story between myself and God”.
He said he fell in love with the Lord when he was eight years old when he received his first Holy Communion.
“When I received Jesus for the first time, I was like, ‘oh, snap!’ I want to do that. I want to be able to give Jesus to others,” he said.
As he grew up, he had thought of becoming a doctor as well as a professional football player but the call to priesthood got stronger during his student years at Liston Catholic College.
“I had a massive conversion experience there,” he said.
Straight out of high school, Mr Mathew joined the religious order of the Capuchin Franciscans. He went to the Philippines and stayed there for three years for his initial formation. Then, he went back to New Zealand, took his first vows and a little bit of ministry here.
“I get assigned to India and then, in my prayer and my discernment in India, I realised… that I didn’t want to serve anywhere else in the world, except here in New Zealand,” he said.
Mr Mathew said a religious priest would not have any say in where he will be assigned.
“New Zealand is my home. New Zealand is the country that I love, and this is the people that I want to serve. So, after much prayer and discernment, I discerned to come back home and join the diocese of Auckland,” he said.
Although he had years of training already, he came in as a first-year seminarian because of the differences between the formation of a religious and diocesan seminarian.
As for going straight from high school to the seminary, he said he does not feel that he has missed out on anything.
“It only fulfilled me all the more. My vocation has enabled me to live life to the fullest and to give myself completely to the Lord and to his Church,” he said.
Mr Mathew said he hopes to be a priest to the youth, one who is joyful, orthodox and holy.
Joshua Brodie, 24, was born and raised in West Auckland in a loving and practicing Catholic family.
“My childhood and teenage years were filled with really good, positive memories all around with friends and family and Church. I also had positive experiences just filled with love with school, college, university and work,” he said.
He said his vocation journey started four years ago on Divine Mercy Sunday after Confession and receiving the Holy Eucharist.
“I went and prayed really deeply in adoration,” he said. “It was this one time. I really felt called to the priesthood. [Priesthood] was not something I’ve seriously taken before that even though I did have inclinations or feeling wanting to join.”
“He said it suddenly made sense to him that “everything the Catholic Church teaches in its deposit [of faith] is fully true and I received enormous grace that day.”
Mr Brodie finished his university degree in Commerce at the University of Auckland and did some research work there as well. He also worked in the corporate world before going to the seminary.
Mr Brodie who was also consecrated to the Blessed Virgin Mary according to St Louis de Monfort said he had “a lot of miracles of Jesus and Mary making it obvious that I should consider priesthood”.
Mr Brodie said a year after his Divine Mercy experience, he deep and meaningful conversations with priests, especially those in Auckland. After tests, evaluations and discussions, they told him he would be a good fit for the seminary.
He said everyone should do God’s will because it is what is best for them. He added that he will “leave it to God” as to what kind of priest he may become.
“I also want to mention that we also really need prayers. Because without Jesus and Mary, we won’t get there. We won’t be holy men and holy priests,” he said.
Christchurch
Matthew Clark, 27, said teen angst had him confused and frustrated about life.
“I really didn’t understand what was going on. I was searching but I never really came to an answer definitively,” he said.
He went to Catholic schools in Wellington. When he was in college, he said a good friend persuaded him to attend a camp called “Jesus for Real”.
“I went because I didn’t really have any expectations. I just thought that going to a camp would be cool. I walked in and everyone was happy. That didn’t make sense to me,” he said.
Mr Clark said he met “a really amazing priest, Fr Kevin Connors, the chaplain of the group, who made a profound impact on him (Mr Clark).
“He (Fr Connors) was always happy. And that really struck me because, for me, a priest is someone who sacrificed a lot and didn’t have a lot. But he was still happy,” Mr Clark said.
He said near the end of the camp, he had a personal encounter with God during the adoration of the Blessed Sacrament.
“I felt so overwhelmed with love in my heart for the first time that I reasoned that that was God. And that was really Jesus for me, an interaction with me and just for me, to know the love of God for me,” he said.
He did some youth work in Wellington and later moved to the Christchurch diocese to join the Mission Team. “That really set my heart of fire for the mission in Christchurch,” he said. He, then, was invited to do youth ministry in America.
When he went back to New Zealand, he fulfilled his grandfather’s dying wish for him (Mr Clark) to become a teacher. He taught at a primary school.
Mr Clark said teaching gave him a foresight of how life would be as a priest.
“I still struggled with the idea of sacrificing a lot to enter the priesthood and being a gift of ourselves as well,” he said. “But working with some really incredible mothers, I saw the sacrifice and the gift of their life that they had for their kids and that really inspired me to say yes to the Lord.”
He said, like St Therese of Liseux, he will be faithful to what kind of priest God calls him to be.
Tuong Duong, 27, was born to and raised in a devout Catholic family in Vietnam, however, he did not really consider the priesthood until he was in high school.
“My parents introduced me to a priest. They wanted me to stay in the presbytery with the priest. At that time, I didn’t think about becoming a priest, but I obeyed them,” he said.
He helped the priest with whatever work was needed in the parish. During this time, he grew to love the work he was doing for the people in the parish.
“I think that is when I fell in love with priesthood,” he said. “I prayed and discerned, and I was advised by a priest so that I decided to follow the vocation in Vietnam.”
While he was helping out at the parish, Mr Duong was studying IT at a university. He also joined a group of people discerning their call.
After graduating from university in 2021, he took the entrance exam to the seminary of the Vinh diocese but failed the examination.
This didn’t discourage him, however. “I think I still had a chance to become a priest, that’s why I kept waiting for the next exam. I still studied more and more to get more knowledge [so I can] be confident in the next exam. But suddenly, I received a call from New Zealand,” he said.
It was Christchurch vocations director Fr Tien Cao, also the nephew of Vinh Auxiliary Bishop Pierre Nguyên Văn Viên. It was Bishop Viên who recommended Mr Duong to Fr Cao.
“It took me half a year thinking about this call. And by Christmas 2021, I said yes. I came here in October 2022,” he said.
Mr Duong said his parents were not exactly happy that he was leaving Vietnam but he was able to convince that that this was what he was called to do.
He said is open to be moulded to the kind of priest God wants him to be.
Hamilton
Nhat Cao, 23, was born and raised in Vietnam. He said he did not really want to become a priest when he was in high school.
“I wanted to be a famous person,” he said. “I wanted to be a manager of famous singers. This is a way to become famous [in Vietnam].”
He said because a number of talent managers went to the same university he got into, he was able to talk to these managers to find out how he can get into show business.
“I feel that my life is not going to be peaceful if I step into showbiz,” he said. “That environment is not good for me to be a good person. Because my personality would be changed. Because I have to adapt to that toxic environment. When I heard that, I changed my mind.”
His path to the priesthood became clearer when his godfather asked him to come to his (godfather’s) parish to teach people to play the piano so that these people can serve in the church.
“I felt that it was very peaceful, and my life is better than [if I were to] spend all of the time doing toxic things in a bad environment. And after that, I always prayed constantly to realise my vocation,” he said.
In his second year in university, he received a call from Bishop Viên. Mr Cao said he did give his answer right away.
“It took me one week to think about that, to reflect about that. After nearly one week, I decided to go to New Zealand,” he said.
Mr Cao said when he started his university studies, he decided to take up English. He said this was unusual because he found studying the English grammar “boring”.
However, after Bishop Viên’s call, he linked the two together and thought that he must have been directed by God towards studying English so that he can be prepared for priesthood in New Zealand.
He said he would simply like to be a priest who can bring people to the Church.
Wellington
Max Copley, 34, said for him, the call to priesthood “wasn’t a one moment flash of light”.
“I just know that, at a certain point, after ignoring the call to priesthood for many years…I became convinced that Christ was actually saying to me, ‘Come follow me!’,” he said.
“There was a clear sense that what I heard in my heart was no human voice, nor was it just an idea of my own. Christ was calling me to serve him as priest. It was a desire in my heart that I couldn’t keep a secret anymore so I decided to take action and apply for seminary,” he said.
Mr Copley graduated in 2017 from the Victoria University with a Bachelor of Software Engineering decree. He, then, worked in the areas of Information Technology, Transportation as well as for the New Zealand Defence Force.
“As a young child, I do remember having a particular devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus because of a family painting we used to hang over the kitchen table,” he said.
Mr Copley said his vocational discernment lasted many years during which he developed his prayer life with the following devotions: The Flame of Love Rosary by Elizabeth Kindelmann and the Divine Mercy Devotion by Sr Faustine. He said praying and being a part of Opus Dei New Zealand helped his discern his path.
Mr Copley said former Apostolic Nuncio to New Zealand Archbishop Patrick Coveney inspired him to become a priest. He remembered attending the Mass at the Apostolic Nunciature in Wellington at a young age.
He said he used to ask, “Lord, why me?”
He attended many vocations meetings hosted by the Wellington Archdiocese since 2022 and finally made the decision to follow Christ.
Mr Copley said he wants to be a priest “that shares the mercy and love of Jesus Christ”.
Reader Interactions