Twenty-five years of service in the priesthood! It’s a significant number of years in ministry. How fast the years went by! It seemed like yesterday when I was just a young seminarian at St. Martha’s Church directing a summer camp.
They were not only 25 years of service to God and his people in the priesthood, but also tremendous experiences of love, faith, prayers, and growth!
They were also 25 years of not merely about me, but about how God has been with me in my journey to priesthood. How he has shown his love and mercy to me despite my human imperfections, and how he has used me in many ways to bring love, joy and hope to people.
They were 25 years of Jesus’ actions in my life and in the life of my family and those I served. After all, he was the one who called me to this joyful, fulfilling and, yes, at times, challenging and painful ministry.
I often wonder how I survived in the ministry, knowing my personal weaknesses. The answer is in today’s Scripture Reading this Sunday.
“For this command that I enjoin on you today is not too mysterious and remote for you. It is not up in the sky that you should say, “Who will go up in the sky and get it for us and tell us of it, that we may carry it out? No, it is something very near you, already in your mouths and your hearts; you have only to carry it out.” (Deuteronomy 30: 11-14)
Yes, the driving force for my perseverance in the priesthood is the law of love written in my heart and in the hearts of the people of God. It’s what makes me passionate and do wild and crazy things for the love of God and his people. It’s what makes me spend sleepless nights and enormous energies, thinking of what I could do to serve my parishioners or my students better. It’s the outpouring of the Holy Spirit written in my heart, my mind, my mouth and my soul.
I feel this even stronger now that I am working in the seminary. I feel this law of love written in my heart when I meaningfully and joyfully prepare seminarians for future ministry.
For example, I had this beautiful experience this past week when I directed debriefing sessions with seminarians who just came from a year-long parish internship. As I was present to them and listened to their experiences and insights, I could feel in my heart this tender and genuine concern for their well-being. I realized that this pure affection that I felt for them must have come from God. It’s the law of love that the Scriptures tell us—a love that is not remote or mysterious, but is in in our hearts and our mouth. It is love that comes from the Holy Spirit.
Parents can identify with my feeling — when they wake up every morning thinking about the welfare of their children, when they would do and sacrifice everything to make them happy. It’s that law of love written in their hearts that causes them to love heroically! Again, this law of love is not something mysterious and remote you. It is near us; we only have to carry it out!
This law of love cannot be vague. Rather, it should be concrete, as concrete as what the Good Samaritan did for the poor man in the Gospel this Sunday. How he lifted him up from his injury, poured oil and wine over his wounds and bandaged him, took him to an inn and cared for him while others ignored him and made excuses for not helping him.
Indeed, we find the nearness and the concreteness of the Kingdom of God when we visit someone who is sick, when we hand a few dollars to a homeless person, when we help someone find an apartment or when we give our full attention to a person who expresses his heartaches.
We should never ignore this law of love written in our hearts. All genuine feelings of compassion, mercy and love that flow from it should manifest themselves in concrete actions. It’s the right thing to do!
I did it in last 25 years of my ministry as a priest, and I’ll continually to do it for the rest of my life.
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From a Filipino immigrant family, Reverend Rodel G. Balagtas was ordained to the priesthood from St. John’s Seminary in 1991. He served as Associate Pastor at St. Augustine, Culver City (1991-1993); St. Martha, Valinda (1993-1999); and St. Joseph the Worker, Canoga Park (1999-2001). In 2001, he served as Administrator Pro Tem of St. John Neumann in Santa Maria, CA, until his appointment as pastor of ImmAaculate Heart of Mary, Los Angeles, in 2002, which lasted 12 years. His term as Associate Director of Pastoral Field Education at St. John’s Seminary began in July 2014.
