Father Vince
My vocation was born on a college campus where I changed radically. For the first time I was totally free from my parents and faced the great questions of life. Why do I exist? What is the meaning of life? Where do I come from? What awaits me after death?
Up until this point, I had taken in the prepackaged answers from the formation I'd received in catholic schools, but now that I was totally free, I wanted to know if these answers were really true.
During a Sunday Mass at the St. Lawrence Center, a catechist challenged the students to get more involved at the center, especially in theology classes, to go deeper in our knowledge of the Catholic faith. I was really interested and decided to give it a shot. After all the empty solutions college life gave me, I knew that only God could answer my questions.
The more I learned the Catholic faith, the more I loved it and understood that it is true. The theology class became the best part of my week and in the enthusiasm that carried me along, I began to put into practice the things I was learning. At the beginning of my sophomore year, I started going to daily Mass, pray the Rosary, and spend thirty minutes in meditation every day!
I kept on growing, learning, reading, praying, and in my junior year I knew I wanted to consecrate my life to God. My old plan of becoming an engineer wasn't enough any more. The only question I had was: where?
The summer before my senior year I visited several religious communities but I never found the right environment and so I decided to begin the process of enrollment for the diocesan seminary: I knew many good priests in my diocese so it was an attractive option.
During my senior year, three sisters of the Apostles of the Interior Life opened a house at the St. Lawrence Center (2003). Through my contact with them and the experience of their charism, I saw the beauty of spiritual apostolate, which is what most attracted me to the priesthood!
I went on a parish mission with them during Christmas break that year and it was this experience of being an Apostle that made me seriously think about joining the community. Not only did I like the charism, but above all else, for the first time I experienced a profound interior peace towards this choice, despite all the difficulties that I saw before me, like moving thousands of miles from home to Italy and learning a new language.
In June of 2004, I left Kansas to come to Rome and after just two weeks I was certain that God was calling me to become an Apostle of the Interior Life.
Up until this point, I had taken in the prepackaged answers from the formation I'd received in catholic schools, but now that I was totally free, I wanted to know if these answers were really true.
During a Sunday Mass at the St. Lawrence Center, a catechist challenged the students to get more involved at the center, especially in theology classes, to go deeper in our knowledge of the Catholic faith. I was really interested and decided to give it a shot. After all the empty solutions college life gave me, I knew that only God could answer my questions.
The more I learned the Catholic faith, the more I loved it and understood that it is true. The theology class became the best part of my week and in the enthusiasm that carried me along, I began to put into practice the things I was learning. At the beginning of my sophomore year, I started going to daily Mass, pray the Rosary, and spend thirty minutes in meditation every day!
I kept on growing, learning, reading, praying, and in my junior year I knew I wanted to consecrate my life to God. My old plan of becoming an engineer wasn't enough any more. The only question I had was: where?
The summer before my senior year I visited several religious communities but I never found the right environment and so I decided to begin the process of enrollment for the diocesan seminary: I knew many good priests in my diocese so it was an attractive option.
During my senior year, three sisters of the Apostles of the Interior Life opened a house at the St. Lawrence Center (2003). Through my contact with them and the experience of their charism, I saw the beauty of spiritual apostolate, which is what most attracted me to the priesthood!
I went on a parish mission with them during Christmas break that year and it was this experience of being an Apostle that made me seriously think about joining the community. Not only did I like the charism, but above all else, for the first time I experienced a profound interior peace towards this choice, despite all the difficulties that I saw before me, like moving thousands of miles from home to Italy and learning a new language.
In June of 2004, I left Kansas to come to Rome and after just two weeks I was certain that God was calling me to become an Apostle of the Interior Life.
Father Edward
I grew up in a strong Catholic family, but I was a "Sunday Catholic." I went to Mass on Sunday, but the rest of the week I did what I wanted. I loved God and I wanted to be a good person, but I was more interested in having fun than in living what I thought was a boring faith.
During high school, I had high hopes and had my whole life mapped out: I wanted to go to a prestigious college where I would have met the girl of my dreams and afterwards, have gotten a great job. I would live in a beautiful house in the Chicago suburbs with a nice car and enough money to live comfortably.
My priorities were having fun, finding new pleasures, keeping myself in shape and having a solid reputation: but I was unhappy. I realized I had this infinite desire for love, for true fulfillment, for something real. I was becoming increasingly disillusioned with the false promises of the world.
Slowly all my plans for the future crumbled: instead of winning a running scholarship, I had several injuries; I didn't have the grades I wanted, and worse I was unable to get into my top university. I felt like all I had ever wanted until then had left me frustrated and disappointed.
I had lots of questions, but one in particular kept torturing me: What is the meaning of my life?
In the fall of my freshman year at the University of Illinois (my fallback school), I met one of the female Apostles, Sr. Raffaella at the Catholic Center. She suggested a way to get an answer to my question: daily meditative prayer. It was the first time I had heard that it was actually possible to talk with God!
Slowly I began to pray and through meditation I learned how awesome it is to personally meet Jesus. Through prayer I experienced a profound peace and an inexpressible joy that I could have never imagined before. After an experience with the male community of the Apostles of the Interior Life, I felt that becoming "an Apostle" was God's will.
Since I entered I have been confirmed that this road is God's plan for me. As an Apostle of the Interior Life, I desire nothing other than the sanctification and salvation of souls by helping others discover God's plan of holiness and happiness for their life!