Seminarian Alfonso Pizano speaks on his call to the seminary and expected ordination to the priesthood during a vocations talk July 20 at St. Anthony Parish in Davenport.
By Barb Arland-Fye
The Catholic Messenger
DAVENPORT — As a ninth-grader at Sudlow Junior High School, Rudolph Juarez and his classmates were making predictions about each other for the school newsletter. Beneath his name, someone had typed, “Rudy Juarez will be a priest,” Father Juarez, pastor of St. Anthony Parish told a gathering that filled the parish center July 20.
A friend recently sent a clipping of the prediction from the 1969 newsletter. “I guess it’s meant to be,” Father Juarez quipped, as people helped themselves to slices of sheet cake to celebrate his 45th anniversary of ordination to the priesthood. “The call of God is the call of God. You can’t resist it.”
Two other priests, a seminarian, and a nun also shared their vocation stories during the combined celebration of the pastor’s anniversary and an afternoon of reflection and prayer for an increase of vocations.
“We need to have priests to celebrate Mass and we need deacons to help out the priests and religious sisters and brothers to help with education and the youth,” said Hang Dinh. She assisted John Cooper, St. Anthony Parish’s pastoral associate and business manager, who organized the event.
Cooper, who is also a deacon candidate, said it made sense to connect the anniversary celebration with prayer and reflection on vocations. “It makes me realize that vocation is something that we’re all called to respond to.” Praying the petitions for Mass that weekend, he prayed for vocations to the Church in general, Father Juarez specifically, and for each vocation, including marriage and the single life. “All of us should see our lives as a calling to vocation, a calling to serve God,” Cooper said.
Priest heroes
The speakers told their stories as people enjoyed Mexican, Vietnamese and American food. Father Brian Miclot said witnessing many good priests in ministry inspired his vocation to the priesthood, beginning with his childhood at St. Anthony Parish. The retired diocesan priest and philosophy professor celebrated the 50th anniversary of his priesthood last year. “The priesthood,” he said, “should be a delight. God is in our midst to be a delight.”
His heroes were the late Father Richard Welsh, who spoke with insight, Father Kevin Coughlin, who taught that religion should be joyful, and Msgr. Marvin Mottet, whose social justice work resonated with Father Miclot. Msgr. Mottet taught at Assumption High School in Davenport when Father Miclot was a student there.
“He was talking about Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights leaders. The rest of us were still using the N word, officially it was ‘Negro.’ But Father Mottet was saying something different. He was soft-spoken,” Father Miclot recalled. “A vague notion came to me; I don’t want to be a math teacher like my brother, I want to be a priest.”
However, he also wanted to continue dating. Soon enough, he couldn’t resist his calling. “I wanted to do the things a priest did because of the things that Father Mottet did.”
Catholic education
Seminarian Alfonso Pizano Jr., a California native, was an altar server in his youth and saw priests as human beings, which inspired him. So did the witness of women religious who taught him in Catholic schools. He studied at a high school seminary and a college seminary, both of which closed. “After that, I thought, ‘maybe I’ll do something else with my life.’ Finishing college led me down a different road. I still wanted to be of service to the Church — that’s why I chose to teach in Catholic schools, giving back to an education system that really supported my faith and helped me grow into it.”
In contrast to his experience in Catholic schools, his students did not have women religious as teachers. “It awakened my awareness of the need to step up to the call that had happened all those years ago,” Pizano said. He was attending graduate school at the time and developed an appreciation for the Jesuits, well known for teaching and serving as priests. For six years, he discerned a vocation with the Jesuits and later, with the Priests of the Sacred Heart before discerning a call to diocesan priesthood in the Davenport Diocese. “Like Father Rudy, when you get the call, you can’t resist it,” said Pizano, who will be ordained a deacon on Aug. 2.
Father Brian Miclot talks about his call to the priesthood during a vocations talk July 20 at St. Anthony Parish in Davenport.
Say ‘three Hail Marys’
Sister Theresa Pham of the Carmelite Sisters of the Aged and Infirm, who serves in Naperville, Illinois, recalled praying the rosary nightly with her family while growing up in Vietnam. “My sister said to say an extra three Hail Marys (after the rosary),” to seek Mary’s advice, said Sister Pham, a friend of Dinh.
Sister Pham attended public schools but participated in religious education classes as a child. Her love for St. Therese of Lisieux began after reading a book about the saint, which drew her to the Carmelite sisters. She wanted to live in an active community and not a cloistered one, which led her to the Carmelite Sisters of the Aged and Infirm in Germantown, N.Y. She entered the community in 1999 and celebrated her 25th anniversary last year. Sister Pham believes that saying those three extra Hail Marys a day inspired her vocation. “I believe if we pray to Our Mother, three Hail Marys every day, she will open the way.”
Prayer from the heart
Father Bill Kneemiller, a retired diocesan priest, grew up attending Catholic schools where he concentrated on sports. He injured his knee in high school, which led to more time for reading. During college, he found his way to Eastern meditation, which he stressed, “I don’t recommend.” It consumed 20 years of his life, during which he traveled the world learning and teaching about Eastern meditation. He moved to Fairfield, Iowa in 1980 after Maharishi University purchased the former Parsons College to teach Eastern meditation.
Father Kneemiller worked as a painting contractor to pay his bills. His life changed when a family invited him to pray the family rosary with them, he said. That experience led him back to the Catholic Church.
“When they started the family rosary, they asked for the grace to pray from the heart. That first rosary was the first rosary I heard that wasn’t rushed,” he said. “After asking for God’s grace to pray from the heart, I felt a peace I had never experienced before. That’s what I was looking for.” His searching led to discernment of his calling to the priesthood. Ordained in 1999, he celebrated his 25th anniversary last year.
