CARIBOU, Maine — Catechumens and candidates participated in the Rite of Election and Call to Continuing Conversion service celebrated by Bishop Robert P. Deeley last month at Holy Rosary Church in Caribou.
The bishop led similar celebrations in Waterville and Portland.
Joe Gonzalez from Houlton is looking forward with anticipation to becoming a full member of the Catholic Church.
“I feel full. I feel like I’m fulfilled,” he said at the Caribou event. “My life has just been so much better since I found God. Everything just sort of came together. I just feel happy.”
Tina Tompkins from Mapleton said she, too, has seen a difference in her life as a result of her journey to the church.
“I just feel differently. I look at things differently. I’m a registered nurse, and I think it’s even helped me in caring for people, for patients, just being overall more patient, more at peace, more at ease,” she said.
Catechumens are those who have never been baptized in any faith, while candidates are those baptized in another Christian tradition. All will be welcomed into the Catholic Church during the Easter Vigil.
During the Rite of Election, celebrated for catechumens, and the Call to Continuing Conversion, celebrated for candidates, parishes present to the bishop and the congregation those who desire to become Catholic. The catechumens and candidates then publicly affirm their desire to enter the Church, and godparents or sponsors confirm their readiness. For those who are catechumens, Bishop Deeley then signs each parish’s Book of the Elect, signifying they have been chosen by God and his Church.
“One of our privileges as Christians is to be open to see the ways in which God works in our world,” said the bishop. “Being with you, hearing your stories, and seeing the community that is formed among you and in your parishes is a gift.”
Each journey is unique. For Joe, a Border Patrol agent, it was a move to rural northern Maine from Washington, D.C., that gave him time to reflect on his life. He said he really felt he could hear God talking to him, as well as a deceased brother and grandfather.
“I felt really connected,” he said. “As an atheist for 11 years, for the better part of my adult years, having a sense of feeling and a sense of bigger purpose was a very scary realization moment for me.”
He went to see Father Kent Ouellette, pastor of St. Mary of the Visitation Parish in Houlton, which led him to the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA), a period of learning, preparation and growth in faith.
“I was just trying to learn, and I wanted to take a very elementary approach to things. Then, I just kept falling in love more and more with the faith,” he said.
Other catechumens and candidates said they were inspired by the witness of Catholics in their lives.
For 10-year-old Austin Saucier of Chapman, it was his grandmother.
“My grammy mostly inspired me, and I just really want to be like her,” he said.
Austin is hoping to become an altar server once he receives the sacraments at Easter.
Meghan Dumont of Fort Kent and Samantha Cummons of Northport said they were both helped in their faith journeys by their husbands.
Dumont had attended both a Catholic and a Baptist church growing up but had never been baptized in either faith. After she got married, she began to feel more connected with Catholicism because her husband and his family are Catholic. Now, she and her daughter are joining the church together.
“I’ve always been fascinated with the Masses, with just the whole process of it,” she said.
Cummons pointed to a homily given by Father Bob Vaillancourt, pastor of St. Brendan the Navigator Church in Camden.
“He spoke about how you didn’t need to know everything right off the bat, as long as you were willing to be a seeker and kind of search for your faith,” she said. “That was what kind of drove me to be a seeker.”
The elect and candidates will now spend the rest of Lent in final preparation for receiving the sacraments and deepening their faith, something, the bishop noted, the season calls all Christians to do.
“The name of God is mercy. As we reflect on our need for change, for conversion, all the more do we become aware of his grace and his compassion for us. It is the fruit of Lent. And, as we become aware that God’s mercy is transforming our hearts, through his faithful love for us even in our weakness, let us not forget that we are called to love and be merciful in return,” the bishop said.
“That is the work of Lent for all of us. We will find ourselves a joyful people at Easter if we can use these days well.”
