Over the weekend I had a story about the rapid enrollment increase at St. John’s Seminary in Brighton. As part of the reporting for that story, I interviewed Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Boston, about the state of the seminary. Here’s a transcript of our conversation:
Q: Tell me a little about what the state of the (St. John’s) seminary was when you arrived here.
A: When I arrived, the enrollment was way down, and there was a lot of pressure on me from some of the pastors to close the seminary, to amalgamate it with Pope John (Blessed John XXIII Seminary in Weston). Pope John really is a specialized seminary that serves the entire country, and even though it is a seminary of the archdiocese that we run and we’re responsible for, I thought that was an important service that I didn’t want to jeopardize. And the numbers there have remained sort of a constant -- about 65, more or less, over the years. And, as I told the priests, I said, ‘We have to give it one good try, to see whether we can save the seminary, because once we close it, we’ll never get it back.’ And for New England, with the large Catholic population that we have here, the presence of our own seminary is very important. And so I reached out to the other bishops in the region, and asked them to try and become involved with the seminary, and to send people, and to use it as an instrument of recruiting, inviting them to have retreats and to bring men from their dioceses, so that they could experience a little bit of seminary life. And we have named Dan (Hennessey) to the vocation office, he and Michael (Harrington), and Father (Alonso) Macias, and they've done a great job. So the response has been good, and our numbers are up, which I think is important, because even that helps recruiting, for people to come to the seminary and see that it's a going proposition. There are a lot of people there, and there's some excitement, some energy. And so we feel very good about what's happening in the seminary.
Q: Is this your first diocese with a seminary?
A: No, Palm Beach had a seminary.
Q: And what was your assessment of the quality of what was going on here in terms of instruction?
A: I think the seminary is doing a very good job. We're very grateful for Father Arthur Kennedy (left) for accepting the post. He's a man who has had vast experience in higher education, in starting the Catholic study program at St. Thomas, in Minneapolis/St. Paul. And his ecumenical work is also, I think, something that is very valuable. He has a global view of the church. And so I was very gratified that he was willing to come back. And the fact that he's a diocesan priest from Boston is also important.
And the studies that were done of our seminaries by the Holy See two years ago got very, very positive feedback from the bishops and the teams that visited the seminaries. And one of the recommendations from Rome was that we have too many seminaries in the country, and we need to amalgamate them, and so I was very happy that we have numbers now that justify us maintaining a seminary here, because I think it's important.
It also allows us to have a cadre of experts in different theological areas always on hand that can serve not only the seminary community but the larger church and the church of the region.
Having the priests from the other dioceses come in and study at the seminary is also an important way to allow the priests to have priest friends in the region. As the numbers of priests are smaller, those kinds of friendships put people in good stead. And it's seminary training that is really geared to train people to work in this part of the country, with this culture, with this history, with the challenges that we have.
Q: Did you have a relationship with Father Kennedy before?
A: I had heard so many good things about him, and I knew about the work that he had done at the Catholic studies department, and I was always very impressed with him.
Q: There must have been a lot of people arguing that, simply for financial reasons -- this is the last piece of property that you have in Brighton -- that it would have been easier to just get rid of the whole thing.
A: Yes, but I think that also for historical reasons there are people who see the seminary as an important link with our past.
Q: And that was persuasive to you?
A: Yes.
Q: So what was your strategy once you decided, ‘OK, we're not going to close it, we're going to try and make a go of it.’
A: Well, strengthening our vocations department. I issued a letter on vocations. I've been involved in giving vocation retreats, and these Andrew dinners. And I've tried to strengthen our ministry to young adults, and the campus ministry, and getting them working together with the vocation department.
Q: And you put many of your fellow bishops onto the board of the seminary?
A: Yes, I've invited the bishops from the region to be a part of the board.
Q: Why was that important?
A: So that they could feel as though they had input into the formation of their own seminarians, and also so they would be informed as to what was happening at the seminary. Because there were also rumors, ‘Oh, the seminary is going to close,’ and why would you want to send seminarians there if you don't know if we're going to be open? We need the seminarians and so that has been important for us to have the bishops on board.
Q: And did you personally ask them to send seminarians?
A: Yes. I went around visiting them and asking.
Q: Several of them (the other bishops) mentioned the decision to hire Monsignor (James P.) Moroney (of Worcester) as symbolic of a willingness to have non-Bostonians on the faculty.
A: Yes, and we have one priest from Fall River who is in training right now in Rome to get a doctorate to come and teach on the faculty.
Q: And that's intentional?
A: Yes.
Q: And tell me what that's about?
A: So that the other dioceses have more of a sense of ownership and participation. And that way, in the formation staff that's evaluating their seminarians, they have someone from their own diocese there who is part of it.
Q: There was a period when a number of faculty left, and then a rector whose contract was not renewed. Does that reflect some concern on your part about what was going on there?
A: Well, I'm very confident that the people we have in the seminary are very fine role models for our young priests and our future priests, and they're very well trained, and they have my trust and, I think, the confidence of our clergy and the other bishops.
Q: The seminary is now less exclusively Boston -- there are people from around the region and two dioceses in Vietnam, several religious orders, and an ecclesial movement. What are the pros and cons of that kind of a mix?
A: I think it's good. When I was in the seminary, the Capuchins had a college, and we had a philosophy house where the diocesan priests and the Benedictines came and studied with us. They used to joke, because of course we were very self sufficient, and had a big farm, and they referred to us as the Capuchin agricultural school. But later on our friars were working in the same dioceses with these religious priests and diocesan priests, so it made for the kinds of relationships and friendships that were very valuable in ministry later on. And I believe that here, too. And having a more diverse group prepares our future clergy to work in a church that's going to be much more diverse. It's no longer just the traditional Irish and Italian, Lithuanian and Polish. We have a lot of Asians, we have a lot of Caribbean people, we have a lot of Brazilians and Central Americans, and so the population in the seminary now reflects some of that diversity and it's good for our men to be exposed to that during their time of training.
Q: Is there any intention to have the seminary be more theologically orthodox or traditional? I know there's talk about the presence of the Neocatechumenal Way folks.
A: Well, I'm very pleased with the seminary, and as I say the reports that we received from the visitation teams, that were sent by the Holy See, were very laudatory.
Q: The Neocatechumenal Way folks -- some of them, or all of them, will stay here?
A: They will be ordained in Boston and some may be sent to the missions, but some of them will work here, obviously with the different ethnic groups that we have. The advantage of their community is that they have many Spanish and Portuguese speaking, and in the future we see that that's going to be a big need of the diocese.
Q: And they become ordained priests of the Archdiocese of Boston?
A: They're diocesan priests.
Q: I know in some dioceses there have been concerns about separate worship services for people who worship in the Neocatechumenal Way style and those who don't. Will that go on here?
A: Where they have communities, they have a Mass for their people, but this is not something terribly unusual. We have Latin Masses and Spanish Masses.
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