By Stephen Cauchi
9 December 2021
NEW Melbourne priests have been urged to put aside ambition and serve where they are most needed at their November ordination.
St Timothy’s Bulleen and St Mark’s Templestowe senior minister Reverend Canon Ben Wong delivered the sermon on the account of Jesus feeding thousands with five loaves and two fishes.
Mr Wong said that while “ordinary Christians” could choose to serve in their preferred area, clergy should serve where it was most needed. He said Jesus distributed the multiplied fish and loaves where they were needed, not where they were wanted.
“Likewise, you are also distributed and sent to where it is in need because you each have been set apart to fulfil God’s will and plans,” he said.
Mr Wong said if the clergy were miserable, or at a loss in their careers, they should look to where the need was, rather than what they wanted. He said they had been chosen to be God’s vessel, to accomplish his distinctive purpose.
Mr Wong urged the priests to seek God’s will for their career path, saying in Matthew 26 Jesus said, “Yet not what I want but what you want; your will be done”.
He said that in the same way Jesus made a miracle out of ordinary fish and loaves, God could make a miracle out of ordained priests, if they placed themselves in his hands.
“When we are ordained as priests, we are being set apart from other Christians. We have been chosen by God to be a pastor, a teacher, an army chaplain, an age care chaplain, a carer, a Church planter, an evangelist, a peace maker, a spiritual leader,” he said.
The 14 priests ordained by Archbishop Philip Freier at St Paul’s Cathedral on November 27 were:
- Ros Armstrong
- Russell Goulbourne
- Gordon Li
- Debra Saffrey-Collins
- Peter Shih
- Agatha Wakyereza
- Breannon Wilkinson
- Kirsty Brown
- Kathryn Bellhouse
- Patricia Hunt
- Andrew Seedhom
- Mark Tibben
- Luke Whiteside
- James Young
