Priests are People too….

In the Summer 2020 Issue of CANFP NEWS, in articles posted HERE and HERE and HERE and HERE we read compelling reasons to form future priests in the principles of NFP. Providing programs for seminarians and clergy has been the highlight of my work with CANFP. We offered our first clergy convocation nearly twenty years ago, and our first program for seminarians in 2012 for the Diocese of Oakland (Executive Board Member, Fr. Mario Rizzo, attended that program!). Over 500 clergy and seminarians have completed God’s Design for Married Love. We recently completed our first virtual clergy day, for 37 recently ordained Deacons (and wives) of the Diocese of Sacramento. Every opportunity to be with clergy and seminarians has been rewarding, inspiring, and memorable, programs of several days duration yield the most amazing stories of conversion on these teachings.

We talk about providing formation on this topic, but we are kidding ourselves if we think formation has not already happened—and here I am not talking about formal education, but life experiences which can profoundly influence our views, even if not consciously. Priests grew up in families who have formed many of their ideas about marriage and family, for “better or worse”. They are products of a culture, that most certainly did not reflect the values articulated in church teaching. They may have attended high schools and universities hostile to these teachings, even if Catholic.

They have been influenced by the opinions and experiences, again, for better or worse, of the women in their lives—mothers, sisters, friends, even parish secretaries. Physicians in their parishes may not be practicing medicine in accord with their faith, and a source of misinformation on modern NFP, due to their own poor formation on the topic.

In my experience offering clergy programs (the first one I offered was in 1989, in my own Diocese of Monterey), there is much information to be absorbed, but the process can also include a personal journey for some priests, as they reconcile these teachings with life experiences. We can certainly impart a significant amount of information in a one day program, but I have found that several days not only provides the opportunity to explore the topic in depth, it is also crucial in allowing the seminarian, deacon, or priest, time to process the information, in light of experiences he may have brought to the topic. Sometimes it is a beloved niece who was conceived through IVF, or a brother who had a vasectomy, or a cousin bitter over a surprise pregnancy using NFP.

I have never forgotten one priest, who spoke to me during dinners and breaks, every day throughout a five day program. Initially, he shared that while he found what we presented compelling, he was struggling to reconcile it with the memory of his own saintly mother going away for a few days when he was a child, to have her tubes tied—though it was never spoken of openly in the family. Over the course of the program, we spoke often, as he grappled with that, and other barriers to fully embracing what he was learning. He was moved greatly by the testimony of couples who shared how contraception had harmed their marriage. By the end, he came to understand his mother may not have had a priest in her life that was informed enough to provide her good guidance, and he vowed to be that priest for those he served. It is amazing to witness such transformations. But don’t take my word for it, hear it in their own words:

The convocation has changed my understanding and thinking on contraception” “I will never be lukewarm about this subject again!” “It opened me to another horizon on the Gospel. The term “Gospel of Life” has new meaning to me. Personally this could be the beginning of a new growth spiritually.” “I have been coming to these convocations for 16 or 17 years. I have never enjoyed one more than I have this one. I go back to the vineyard renewed and refreshed, with a lot more ammunition for the battle. I would recommend this to anyone! Great job—God Bless You!”