Two seminarians from the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis were among 18 seminarians ordained as transitional deacons in Rome Sept. 28.
Deacons Joseph Wappes and Michael Maloney, both of St. Charles Borromeo in St. Anthony, promised during the ordination to live in prayer, celibacy and obedience to their diocesan bishops.
In his homily, Archbishop Paul Coakley of Oklahoma City, the ordaining prelate at the Mass, said the transitional deacons will serve in a Church today that more resembles the early apostolic period of persecution and martyrdom than the Church of Christendom when Church and society were interwoven, the Pontifical North American College said in a news release.
Deacon Wappes told Catholic News Service he had prayed during a spiritual retreat before his ordination in preparation for the “moving” moment of prostration, which he called a “concrete sign of giving back to the Lord everything he’s given to me.”
All the seminarians ordained at the Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican are studying at the college, which serves as the American seminary in Rome. More study will follow as the transitional deacons prepare to be ordained as priests in their respective dioceses.
In his homily, the archbishop said examples of living in difficult times today include Blessed Stanley Rother, a priest of the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City who was martyred in Guatemala in 1981, and Blessed Michael McGivney, a priest of the Diocese of Hartford, Connecticut, who founded the Knights of Columbus. Archbishop Coakley encouraged the men to follow the examples of Blesseds Rother and McGivney of not seeking privilege, but rather being prepared for sacrifice and persecution in serving Christ and his Church.
“Be not afraid, Christ goes before us,” the archbishop said.
