My mom dragged me into Church and I ended up a priest
I am always impressed at the many and varied ways that God leads people into the Catholic Church. Dominican Father Raphael Mary Salzillo was just ordained a Dominican priest last month, years after his mother led him into the Catholic Church at the age of 15:
He grew up an evangelical Protestant here, suspicious of Marian theology. Now he’s a Catholic priest and a physicist. He’s even taken the name of the Mother of God…
Born Wesley Salzillo in 1976, [Dominican Father Raphael Mary Salzillo] grew up in this small coastal town. He’d been raised with a strong Christian faith by an evangelical mother. The father, a chemical engineer raised Catholic, would sometimes attend church with the family, but tended not to participate.
The mother yearned to have the family worship together, and despite what she had been taught about Catholicism as a girl by her minister relatives, she shyly rang the bell at Our Lady of the Dunes Church one day. She wanted to learn about Catholicism, thinking perhaps that would help her husband join the family worship…
Wesley was 15 at the time and had siblings of 12 and 9. The children were to prepare to join the church, too, and were at first “stiff and reserved,” Father Cunniff says. But after some gentle care, they seemed to embrace Catholicism. It was 1991.
Some would question the conversion of a teenager who became Catholic under the influence of a parent. Yet God worked with the future Father Salzillo and led him to embrace the Faith unreservedly. Along with Mary, I’m sure St. Monica also had a role in praying for the children of such a wonderful mother.
Mary, Mother of God, pray for priests!
Update: Father Raphael’s father clarifies some of the details of this story in the comments below.
I loved the blog about my son. But we were all a little disappointed that our 88 year old retired priest got things a little mixed up in the telling. It seems that there were two families that approached Father Cuniff’s door that year. In our case both my wife and I rang the door bell at St. Marys – Our lady of the Dunes in Florence, Oregon. Father Rafael was 14 at the time, his sister Deborah was 12 (she died in a car accident in 1998 at 19), and his little brother Mike was 6 years old. I attended Church and then Mass as much as anyone in my family. Father Rafael did say at the time “Why are you doing this to me?” He also made it clear that he would not pray to Mary nor participate in reconciliation. Later on he caved because of the Holy Spirit. I laughed when I read the blog as well as the article in the Catholic Sentinel. However Father Rafael did not laugh. He asked the Sentinel to remove their article from their web site. In my mind its mostly accurate but he did not like it that I was characterized as sort of a reluctant bystander. He knows different and because he’s loyal to his Dad he spoke up. In reality it was surely easier for me to return to the Catholic church then it was for anyone else in my family to join for the first time. I truly admire my wife Renita who went against family and friends and in many ways initiated the transformation. I totally agree with the sentiments expressed at the end of this particular blog. Thanks for reading this and writing about us. Please keep up the good work and we shall remember to say a heartfelt prayer for you.
-TS
Thank you Mr. Salzillo for your clarifying remarks. Your family’s story is still beautiful!
I will tell you why. I have found that people ignore warning signs.
Like when someone stands before a priest and tells him that he is the Prince of the Church and he does nothing. And then he tells another priest and he does nothing but goes back to drinking Pepsi and eating.
And he tells a Bishop and he does nothing but goes back to drinking Orange Juice and eating. And he tells his friends and they do nothing but go back to writing their songs in the key of “G” while their best friend is being destroyed by the people and the government.
Radical Islam is ruining the Roman Church and I don’t want to even tell you what is happening in some peoples homes.
It would be good to meet a brother. A True one.