While speaking to others about living at the Cathedral, one of the first things I comment on is the blessing of living in a full house. For just over a month, we have had one bishop, four priests, and two seminarians living at the Cathedral Rectory. It has been a source of great joy to have so many of us around, sharing in various ways in the ministry of the parish and enjoying some great fraternity with one another.
As they say, though, all good things come to an end. This weekend will be the last one for one of our seminarians, Ryan Kehoe, who has been with us here since the pandemic caused all of our seminaries to send their men home early. Wanting to make their abrupt transition away from the seminary more manageable, we attempted to put pairs of seminarians together at various parishes. With the room available, it made good sense to send one of our seminarians here, and Ryan was the lucky one to come to join Grant Wilson who has been with us the entire year.
The new priests in the house affectionately refer to our seminarians as “the kids” and we joke about sending them back to school at the end of the summer. But we all will miss them very much as they have been an absolute delight to have around the rectory and the parish. I hope that many of you have had the opportunity to meet and interact with these two fine men.
Since Grant will be with us a little longer, we can save our farewell for another time and I can write a few things about Ryan. He recently graduated from Bishop Simon Bruté College Seminary in Indianapolis. He is now moving on to theology at Kenrick-Glennon Seminary in St. Louis. For the next four years, Ryan will dedicate himself to being formed in four dimensions: intellectual, spiritual, pastoral, and human. This formation will lead, God-willing, to a man who is more closely configured to Christ, the Good Shepherd, whom He will seek to imitate in ministry to the people of God in our diocese.
Now that he has become a part of our Cathedral Parish family, I invite you to add Ryan to the list of your daily prayers, asking the Lord to give Ryan the graces to be totally open to the work He wants to do in his heart as he prepares for the priesthood. And please pray for all of our seminarians, for the chances are very good (almost guaranteed) that some of these men will serve here at the Cathedral as priests one day. Our prayers for them now will be for their benefit and ours.
Father Alford is the Rector of the Cathedral and serves in the diocesan curia as the Vicar for Clergy, Consecrated Life, and Vocations.