Two Alumni to be Ordained Priests for LA!

On Sunday, the Most Rev. José H. Gomez will ordain eight men to the sacred priesthood for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, including two Thomas Aquinas College alumni: Rev. Mr. Paul Collins (’14) and Rev. Mr. Jorge Moncada Hernandez (’18).

As a child, Deacon Moncada often pretended to be a priest, using his father’s dress shirts as chasubles and blessing people with his grandmother’s flowers. In 2008, he moved to California from Mexico City with his mother — leaving most of their family behind — and became an altar server, which strengthened his faith significantly in high school. Though he was set on attending seminary, he decided first to go to Thomas Aquinas College, so as to obtain a solid intellectual foundation and life experience. In his junior year, while at a friend’s wedding, he committed himself to his priestly vocation.

“The priest started speaking, and something in my head was like, ‘Put yourself in his shoes. How happy would you be?’” he says. “And when that happened, I remember I had a big smile and had this burning thing in my heart. I opened my eyes, and I said, ‘That’s it. That’s what you want, Lord.’”

Deacon Collins, son of TAC tutor Dr. Sean Collins, attended the College for two years before heading to Peru to discern the priesthood and follow his childhood dream of becoming a missionary. On his return to the U.S., he felt restless and unfulfilled until he entered St. John’s Seminary, where he discovered his desire to serve as a military chaplain.

“People everywhere have a lot of hardship on their hearts that they want to talk to a priest or talk to God about,” he says. “But I think there’s a higher concentration in a population like the military, where there’s a lot of stress, a lot of hardship, even in peacetime, let alone if we go to war and there’s death and destruction. There’s a lot of need for God in those kinds of environments.”

Following their ordinations, both men will take up parish assignments in the L.A. Archdiocese. Deacon Moncada will serve at Resurrection Church in Boyle Heights, and Deacon Collins at St. Mary of the Assumption Church in Whittier, where he will spend a few years before being reassigned as a chaplain for the United States Navy.

The ordination will take place at 9:00 a.m. on May 31 at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles. Tickets are required to attend in person, but the Mass will be livestreamed via the LA Catholics website.

Please pray for Deacons Moncada and Collins as they say “yes” to God’s call and take up the mantle of the priesthood!