Ahead of their Ordination to the Priesthood on Saturday, June 7 at St. Patrick Cathedral, we sat down with our three transitional deacons for a Q&A about their discernment, their seminary experience and what they’re most looking forward to as ordination approaches.
Read on to learn more about Deacon Andrew St. Denis, and check out the full, in-person interview with Rachel Troche of our Candid Catholic Convos podcast on the Diocese’s YouTube Channel.
Tell us a little bit about yourself.
I was born in Lancaster. I grew up just outside of Mount Joy. My home parish is Mary, Mother of the Church in Mount Joy. I absolutely love sports. From the time I was real little, I was involved with baseball and played that up until high school. I was in baseball, football, bowling, track, cross country – whatever I could do to be active and compete. I even got roped into running cross country for a season in college. That was truly a penance.
I had a great love for wanting to be a physical therapist from a couple injuries I got in high school and going to PT. Looking back on it now, I realize it was the Lord steering me to be a doctor of souls by first kind of opening that door of wanting to be a medical doctor. It’s cool to see how even in all of that, the Lord has been bringing me to this place and this time right now.
I have a younger brother and a younger sister, and we had such a fun time growing up together and still to this day just having each other to talk to and lean on. My sister is currently teaching in Detroit. She was discerning with a religious order, and I made sure she could get back here on a flight for June 7.
Would you say you had a typical childhood?
I think it was kind of that typical American childhood. You grow up, play sports, be involved with Boy Scouts, get involved with the youth group, and come together to be with the whole family. It was such a blessed environment to grow up in and to be nurtured in virtues and nurture this vocation. Looking back, I can say I am so thankful for the many blessings the Lord bestowed upon me and my family. I could never be thankful enough for it.
It’s not only family years of formation to form myself but also to kind of give everyone a better understanding of what it is the Lord is calling me to, and what it is that I was crazy enough to enter into.
What was your formation like? Seminary is different from college.
I did four years of undergrad studies in college before entering, and I’m about to finish my sixth year of seminary. It was very different going from your typical university to seminary. It’s definitely much more intense; not necessarily that classes are harder, but in that our life is so regulated and regimented to help us foster virtue and mature as good Christian men. It helps lay that bed for the seeds of vocation to take root and grow.
But it’s not just regulations and regiments. It’s like living in a huge fraternity with 140 other guys and it’s the holiest group of people. Everyone is trying to help build up virtue, help build up holiness and grow in that relationship with Jesus, and grow as brothers in Christ. It’s intense, but it also has many more moments of relaxed atmosphere and feeling like you’re part of a really big family.
Yes, it is a little different from college, where you think, “I’m going to forge my own way and do my thing,” and now it’s “I’m going to enter into this family and be a part of something bigger than myself.”
You don’t have to be perfect to enter seminary.
One of my biggest things in discernment was, “I can’t do this. I’m not this holy guy who’s praying 15 Rosaries a day.” I have my own shortcomings that by the grace of God I’m continually handing them over to Him and letting Him work on me.
It came to a moment during my junior year of college where this question of the priesthood continually kept coming up in my heart. I said, “Lord, if this is your will, you’re going to have to be the one to open some doors. You’re going to have to be the one to take care of things. I’m not going to worry about those questions of whether I’m smart enough, am I holy enough, am I good enough. God, if you’re calling me to this, then help get me through. If you’re not, close the door and I’ll go.” I thank God that He really helped me continue through to embrace this vocation, embrace this call and embrace the Christian life even more fully to want to grow in holiness myself and from that want to call others into this life of holiness.
When did you first hear the call to priesthood?
I was an altar server at my home parish from second grade on. I was either 11 or 12 and before Mass one day, the parish priest came up to me and said, “Andrew, you’re going to be a priest one day.” I was like, “There’s no way that’s ever going to happen.” I started praying about it and the prayer shifted from the prayer of an immature 11 year old – “God, give me a Play Station” – to “Jesus, what are you calling me to? Show me your love. Show me how you want me to love others.” It was just this constant calling of “Be a priest.” I tried to kind of push it away and hide and run away from it, until I couldn’t anymore. Even discernment alone was years in the making.
What were some of the biggest surprises when you got to seminary?
One of the first nights, we had a house party. It was all the guys hanging out, sitting around a camp fire, sitting around a table. I thought to myself, “This is not at all what I thought seminary was going to be like.” I thought it was going to be this monastic environment, everyone’s going to be in their pew reading their Bible, sitting around and all you do is pray and study and that is it.
No, seminary is something more. Not that prayer and study is less, but I was thinking of seminary as being too small. This was an invitation to bring my whole self into this, to grow in this relationship with my brothers and be able to learn from them, gain wisdom from them.
Just sitting down and getting to know those guys. We have such an awesome tradition at St. Charles Borromeo Seminary, of having small groups that meet together to pray and share what’s going on in our lives. Joining up with one of the small groups and getting to hear the other guys’ stories, you realize you can relate. You recognize, “I’m not the only one who walked in here thinking I’m not good enough, I’m not holy enough, and the guy who I thought had it all together is also struggling with that same thing.”
I was given this great advice one of my first weeks. I went and talked to one of the priests there and he said, “Don’t judge anyone who is here. If you think one guy has it all together, I’ve been a priest for years and I don’t have it all together.” No one does; only our Lord and our Lady. All we can do is continue to show up and pray and live our lives in a holy manner.
How are you different from the person you were when you entered seminary?
Although I knew that I wasn’t perfect, I still came in with my ideas – I’m going to do this, and I can fix this problem or whatever. No, I can’t. The greatest impact I can have is to be a man of prayer and be there for the people that God has entrusted to me, and be faithful to Him. I can’t come in with any of my own ideas and run my own crusades. I just need to be myself and be a true disciple of Jesus. That is probably one of the biggest and hardest lessons I had to learn in seminary. Everyone else isn’t me, and I’m not everyone else. We’re all different, but we’re all disciples.
The me that entered seminary kind of went in a little timid, I would say, of the spiritual life and of what was coming. But now, I think it’s a grace from that discernment of being willing to just open the door and there’s a greater trust that God’s got it. Whatever is going on, I can let go and just let God take care of it.
I think I’ve grown in a greater compassion over the past six years. At St. Charles, we do this awesome program of apostolates. Every Thursday, we don’t have classes. Instead, we get assigned to a parish, school, college, prison – any of those places where if they can see you being a priest there one day, they’re going to put you there for a year. We get to meet so many different people from all different walks of life and see that there is the one universal need that we all need Jesus. It’s a sense of looking at how God is calling me to help them get from where they are to where He is trying to bring them.
Who was influential in your discernment or helping show you the path?
I went to Bloomsburg University. At the beginning of every year, there’s an activities fair. There was a group of people from Catholic Campus Ministry with a stand there, and they asked if I was Catholic. Little did I know, all those people would end up being my friends. They really helped me along the way. The priest who was there at the time helped me, at my own pace, come to see what God is doing in my life and the care that He has for me.
That was one of the hardest hurdles to get over at the beginning. We hear over and over again, “God loves everybody. God loves everybody.” But we exclude ourselves. Having the revelation that God loves me was changing. Going from this guy who tried to push myself away from the faith and from God and from the Church to having this revelation was another one of those turning points in discernment and in my own life as a disciple.
What have you enjoyed most in serving the Church as a deacon?
I was able to baptize one of my cousins’ daughters. One of my aunts sadly passed away four years ago, and my uncle got remarried last summer. He called me up and said, “I hear you can do funerals and baptisms and weddings. I was wondering if you could do my wedding.” It’s this awesome feeling of not only being able to go out but also now my own family is coming to me and asking for the sacraments, which is so awesome.
Every baptism I’ve done was so amazing. This is the moment that this child is now a Son or Daughter of God. Welcome to the family; it’s going to be fun! To be able to share that experience with those families and in some awesome way have this connection to them for eternity is a blessing.
I have absolutely loved being able to preach at Masses and go back and preach at Mass at the seminary. It’s an awesome way of being able to open up the Scriptures even more and share it with others, and do it through my own personal lens to build up that relationship from the pulpit to the pew.
What advice would you have for a man who is considering a vocation and applying for seminary?
If you’re discerning seminary, go to seminary. You can’t discern without actually being there. It’s almost like wanting to date someone but never actually going to talk to them. We kind of do the same thing with vocations to the priesthood and religious life. We’ll kind of sit there and think, “Maybe that will be nice,” but we don’t engage it. When that inkling of an idea comes in, go talk to your priest. He’s been through it and he can help you get the ball rolling. That conversation doesn’t mean you’re 100 percent entering seminary or you’re 100 percent going to be a priest. It means “I’m open to whatever the Lord is doing for me.” No matter what happens, you’re going to be a better person for doing it. We’re always told in seminary that even if a guy leaves, he’s going to be a better husband and a better father for being willing to engage formation, dive deeper into his own spiritual life and grow as a disciple. The question is, “How are you calling me to be that disciple? Give me the grace to accept what it is you’re calling me to.”
