God bless the very fine seminarian James Gebhart, the 26-year-old Delaware native who will be ordained to the priesthood May 18 in the Diocese of Wilmington.
It’s difficult to know what it’s like to dedicate your life to vocations unless you’ve done it, which most of us have not.
You can come close. Maybe you are good friends with your parish priest, or you considered a life dedicated to God in your formative years or maybe you simply knew men or women who committed their lives to vocations.
As we’re raised in life as Catholics, most of us have had some exposure or another to life in the church.
We don’t really know it the way priests and religious do. We haven’t answered a calling that commits us to life in the church, but we are vital in supporting those who do.
I spent my youth growing up about five city blocks from a very large seminary in Philadelphia. It’s a place where our local Catholic elementary school took advantage of the vast fields for baseball and football practice. Acres upon acres of open space made it an oasis in an otherwise urban setting. Those were the days when hundreds of men studied for the priesthood there. As a sign of the times, the seminary is picking up stakes and moving this month to a less expansive campus elsewhere in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.
Shortly after my seventh birthday, my brother — 14 years my senior — entered his first year at the neighborhood seminary, St. Charles Borromeo. I spent most of the years in my memory as the brother of a seminarian and then ultimately a priest. He spent nearly 47 years as a priest — an administrator, teacher, associate pastor, pastor — especially pastor — and friend.
But to me and our three sisters, his parents, 11 nieces and nephews and at least as many of the next generation, he was something much more.
You see, when you have a priest in the family, you have a lifelong treasure. Not just because he marries those who would like him to do so, or because he buried your parents, an unimaginable job that comes with the territory. Not the dozens of christenings, first communions, Baccalaureate Masses, confirmations and other milestones.
Instead, it’s the shining light of his grace and understanding. I would say I don’t know a person who knew my brother that didn’t benefit from the experience, but he would rebuff such platitudes, rejecting the suggestion. As a sinner who loved and believed in his faith, he would want to be recalled as someone who tried to be there for people when they needed him and helped lead them to God. He can rest assured that his large, extended family knew him as the unshakeable one we could trust. Always there for us. Always.
May 18, 2024, is the date of James Gebhart’s ordination. I won’t be there to share in the celebration. May 18, 1974, was the date of my brother’s ordination. On that date this year I will be at Our Lady of Lourdes Church in the Overbook section of West Philadelphia for a Mass scheduled to be celebrated in my brother’s memory.
Msgr. Thomas J. Owens is not here for the 50th anniversary of his ordination and his first Mass the next day (where at age 11, I participated as an altar server) at the same hometown church where generations of our family grew up.
He died unexpectedly in November 2020.
He was 71 and had been forced to retire for health reasons when he was 66. He had every plan to work in his beloved pastorate until he was 75. He scoffed at his baby brother who tried to soften the blow of unwanted retirement by reminding him that most people retire in their mid-60s. He had certainly given everything he had to the priesthood, living and working at a parish as a senior priest up until the time that he left us too soon.
This weekend would have been special for him. Still, we celebrate his life and rely on his faith.
We celebrate James Gebhart, too. We’re eager for a new, shining light of our faith, fresh and ready for a life of service to God and his people. And we’re happy for his parents and brother and extended family who will share in his joy and know what it is to have the treasure of a priest in the family.
“The glory of God is man fully alive” are words attributed to the first-century bishop St. Irenaeus, words my brother encountered as he was discerning his vocation.
It is a quote his family inscribed on monsignor’s headstone.
Msgr. Owens would be happy that his brother begins and finishes this about James Gebhart, less enamored of the mentions of him.
He’d be happy for the blessings Father Gebhart brings to the church. And he would appreciate sharing in the joy of May 18 — 50 years later.
Me?
I’m grateful for them both and all of our priests who help lead us to the glory of God.
And there is nothing like having a priest in the family.
Joseph P. Owens is editor and general manager of The Dialog. Email him at jowens@thedialog.org.
