Dear Friends of SJV!
December has arrived, signaling the end of our first academic semester. Before our seminarians leave for their break to observe the end of the Advent season in their parishes, we will celebrate the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception on December 8th and the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe on December 12th.
This month, our focus in human formation is on the virtue of “Studiousness and the Intelligence of Heart.” The term studiousness, derived from the Latin verb meaning “to study,” emphasizes not merely the acquisition of knowledge but the virtuous moral order of our intrinsic desire to know.
Our intellectual formation is all about putting on the mind of Christ out of love for Him. Other than charity, intellectual priestly formation also emphasizes the virtues of faith and piety. The latter allows us to respect tradition, avoiding the extremes of traditionalism and the protestant and modernistic disregard for it. Our intellectual formation wants to form spiritual fathers who serve and govern in the Church by teaching, with the power of truth, following Christ’s and God’s example.
This month’s newsletter will highlight Father John Ezratty and the apostolates of our seminarians, along with our seminarian Rendon Chambers from the Archdiocese of Oklahoma, who will share insights from his apostolate experience at SJV.
May the Lord bless you in this Christmas Season to come,
In Christ,
Fr. Angel Perez-Lopez
Sharing the Heart of Christ
This year, I began a new apostolate, the parishes of St. Bernadette and St. Mary Magdalene, after serving my last assignment for the past three years. During the first couple of weeks, it felt strange coming to a parish I had never been to, so I could serve a community I had never met before. I would show up trying to appear like I was prepared for anything, while inside, I had no idea how to help. But perhaps this was the greatest gift I could receive from my apostolate this year, because in these times where I would have no idea how to help, it was so much easier to turn to the one thing left I could offer to the community: the heart of Christ. When sending us out to our assignments at the beginning of this year, our director of apostolates, Fr. John Ignatius Ezratty, told us not to worry about developing a skill or just having a new experience. Instead, he challenged us to focus above all on sharing the heart of Christ. That is what matters most in our apostolates, not that we bring ourselves with our skills, but that we bring Christ with His Sacred Heart. And it is this Sacred Heart of Christ that has accompanied me through the many parish activities that I have immersed myself into, such as giving a presentation on Dei Verbum, teaching sacramental prep classes, and helping with OCIA in Spanish. That is why I thank the Lord for sending me to this apostolate this year; for every week, I come truly dependent on His Sacred Heart, which He desires to share with the world through my apostolate and the apostolates of the rest of my brother seminarians.
Rendon Chambers
Theology III Seminarian from the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City
The Program of Priestly Formation
The Program of Priestly Formation recognizes four dimensions in which the Church’s future priests are to be formed: the human, the spiritual, the intellectual, and the pastoral dimensions.
At St. John Vianney Seminary, we see the apostolic formation as much more than a training in pastoral skills. Rather, we see it as a way for our men to configure their hearts to the heart of Jesus, the Good Shepherd, who “when He saw the crowds, was moved to compassion for them, because they were troubled and abandoned, like sheep without a shepherd” (Mt 9:36).
Throughout their formation, the seminarians receive various apostolic assignments that will help this transformation of the heart to take place.
During the Propaedeutic and Discipleship Stages, they focus on the Corporal Works of Mercy, such as visiting the sick and the elderly, and ministering to the homeless on the streets and in shelters. These ministries give them the opportunity to experience Christ’s compassion for those who suffer, and to bring them our Savior’s hope and love.
The seminarians in the Configuration Stage are assigned to parishes, where they are specifically tasked with teaching the catechism to both children and adults and leading formation groups. This is their opportunity to imitate Jesus, who “went around all of Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom” (Mt 4:23).
Finally, there is a group of seminarians who lead “Vocational Discernment Groups” in high schools and colleges. Facing the shortage of priestly vocations in our times, we believe that Christ never stops calling men to the priesthood, but rather, many times, men just do not pay attention. These groups, led by seminarians who have said “yes” to Christ’s invitation, are meant to provide the environment for young men to open their hearts to the possible call to the priesthood.
With this approach to the pastoral dimension of priestly formation, it is our hope that by the end of their time in seminary, our future priests will not only have a strong human formation, a profound relationship with Christ, and a solid knowledge of Theology, but also a compassionate and fatherly heart modeled after the Heart of Jesus.
Father John Ezratty
Coordinator of Pastoral Formation and Formator
St. John Vianney Theological Seminary
