Why I want to be a priest

A commodity today besides money is time. There never seems to be enough time. In talking with people one of the points I hear over and over again is I don’t have enough time to be…. And the list is long that can come after the “be.” Whether it “be” a better golfer, “be” a better husband, “be” a better child, etc. We seem to realize that we have not made enough time to fulfill a commitment in our lives.

As a priest I hear from people that they don’t pray enough or that they are not the person that they should be. I encourage people to place prayer in their schedules.  Sometimes we taken it as a given that prayer needs to occur, but we never write it into our daily routines, so our daily life slips by and we never accomplish this task that we know as important.

In the Ordination to the Diaconate there is an examination of the candidate in which the man must answer, “I am” to a series of questions. One of the questions is:

Are you resolved to maintain and deepen a spirit of prayer appropriate to your way of life and, in keeping with what is required of you, to celebrate faithfully the liturgy of the hours for the Church and the whole world?

The man then answers, “I am” to the Bishop asked the question. This is another great reason to be a priest. It is our responsibility and job to pray. I encounter many people who state that they do not enough time to pray and devote themselves to God.  And here I have been called to a life where I actually can and I am held accountable to this ideal.

As a priest I have the responsibility to have my own prayer life, but I am also charged with praying for the Church and for the world. People expect a fireman to put out the fire, they expect the police to uphold the law, and they expect a priest to be a man of prayer. I know that I am graced to have as a daily priority what so many people want in their life, but don’t always accomplish.