If I had to find a verse from the Bible describing my vocation journey so far, it would definitely be 1 John 8:4 – “God is love”. It was God’s love that moulded me and ignited the fire in my heart to follow Him, God’s love that consecrates me to Him in the present moment and God’s love that carries me forward into my future. The whole journey began since I was young, where my Catholic faith was always the biggest part of my life, nurtured by the exemplary model of faith shown by my Mum and Dad. They always taught me the importance of my faith and fostering a profound love in my relationship with Christ. However, growing up I never thought I would ever take the pathway of priesthood, but my own faith matured over the years and I was inspired by the witness of the Somascan Fathers in Australia. There was something that attracted me to this way of life, mission and most importantly – the charism. I discerned and prayed very much and felt that I couldn’t wait any longer to discover this deep and profound feeling that I felt in my heart towards the Somascan Fathers.
I began my journey with the Somascan Fathers in 2014 and I carried out my first period of formation called ‘postulancy’ in St. Jerome’s Parish and Our Lady of Lourdes, our two Somascan parishes in Perth. It was a time where I was called away from the world as I knew it, to discern and pray to discover exactly what Our Lord called me to. I realised that the Lord combined my great desire to share His great love and my desire to become a Father, and manifested that through my vocation with the Somascan Fathers whose very charism is the Paternal Love of God the Father.
Going forward with the decision also meant making some tough decisions. I battled through the thoughts of everything that I would miss out on becoming a religious when I would profess the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience. The greatest difficulty was the thought of leaving behind my family and friends. But it was only when I trusted Our Lord and let go of my own hopes, plans and desires for my life that I gained so much more than I could have ever imagined. I began living the life that the Lord had planned for me. I began living out the very purpose of my existence and my unique path to Holiness. I began my journey to become a Somascan.
Not long after, in August 2015 – I left for my noviciate, a year of intense formation in preparation for religious life and the Somascan spirituality. I left my family and friends, the beautiful beaches, weather and relaxed lifestyle of Western Australia for the picturesque village of Somasca, a town located in the mountainous regions of northern Italy on the south-east part of Lake Como, the spiritual heart of the Order of Clerics Regular of Somasca (the Somascan Fathers) and resting place of their founder, St Jerome Emiliani.
I still remember my arrival there. I remember thinking that this was so different to everything I had ever been used to. A new language, a new culture, a new way of life. But I knew that before I left Australia that I would not leave without being accompanied by God’s grace. For it was because of His grace and love and the intercession of Our Blessed Mother, the best example of the consecrated life for us in her absolute docility to the Holy Spirit that accompanied me this far.
The year was composed of formation in the Somascan spirituality led by my novice master, including our history, our charism and our works. The more I learnt, the more I fell in love and felt the purpose of my life being manifested in this beautiful gift of my vocation our Lord had given me. We were also immersed into the various apostolates of the Somascan Fathers, with the children in our family houses and also in our community situated in Como where we care for sufferers of HIV/AIDS.
It was there that I was really able to begin expressing the charism of God’s paternal love in a more concrete way and began my work in Our Lord’s vineyard. Each encounter with the ill and the children was an opportunity to use my own life to extend the Paternal Love of God, with the same intent of St. Jerome Emiliani which was the reformation of the Church back to state of sanctity of the apostles. It was truly a life-changing year, where I learnt more about myself in relation to others but most importantly, I was able to grow in my relationship with Our Lord in trust and faith. I can easily say it was the most beautiful year of my life to date, and whilst being tested along the way, I always remembered the motto for the Somascan Fathers, “Onus Meum Leve” from Matthew 11:30, ‘My burden light’ because I knew that the Lord was there with me the whole way to help me carry my cross.
After the year of noviciate, with all the formation in our spirituality and preparation to follow Christ more closely in the consecrated life through professing the evangelical counsels, on the 3rd September 2016, along with my other 2 novice brothers, I publicly witnessed to God’s Love by making my first simple profession in poverty, chastity and obedience with the Somascan Fathers at St Jerome Emiliani’s Sanctuary Basilica in Somasca. The joy that I experienced that night is unexplainable, in which I could not stop outwardly manifesting the joy that came from within my heart. It was only in my surrender to our Lord that I was able to experience the fullness of the joy of consecrating my life entirely to God. I truly felt at the moment of my consecration, the word of God in Galatians 2:20 was alive, where it was no longer I who lived, but Christ who lived in me.
Although there is a long way to go in my journey, my vocation doesn’t begin once I’m done with my formation period. Instead, God calls me to start living out my consecrated life now and carry out the mission of St. Jerome Emiliani and his charism of the paternal love of God to all those that are in most need. I go forward now not by my own accord, but with the intercession of Our Blessed Mother and St. Jerome Emiliani and God’s infinite love that sees me through each day. Each day I must renew my commitment to Our Lord and follow Him in my vocation, so that despite my limitations, I will be everything that Our Lord wants me to be. A channel of God’s Paternal Love. A worker for the reformation of the Church to the state of sanctity to the times of the Apostles. A Father to the abandoned and poor. A Somascan.