News On Houston Seminarians

The Anglicanorum Coetibus Society has posted brave words about wanting to be a source on ordinariate news, but frankly, Mrs Gyapong and Mr Jesserer Smith have always struck me as complacent and self-congratulatory people whose actual interest in researching news is at best tepid. Hey, if they change one day, I could give up this gig! My regular correspondent asked a perfectly reasonable question, who's still in the seminary pipeline with the summer round of new ordinations?

The report:

The picture above was used as part of the publicity for the ordinariate Seminarian Formation Fund second collection in June 2020. However, as we see here, most of the men in the publicity picture are not seminarians: the two men on the right were ordained to the priesthood in June and have taken up ministry positions; the three men in the centre are of course Bp Lopes, J Henry, and Fr Perkins, the V-G; and second from the left is Fr Kramer, the Vocations Director.

The Canadian seminarian is not in attendance. Of the four seminarians on the current “Our Seminarians” page, three are studying at the Pontifical North American College in Rome, which is up and running according to its Facebook page, and one is, or was, at St Philip’s Seminary in Toronto, although I see he is identified as being at the Pope Benedict XVI House of Formation, which is the residence owned by the ordinariate, not an educational institution. He apparently wasn’t in the neighbourhood when the publicity shot was taken, and indeed why would he come to Houston at the moment?

The bulletin of Our Lady of Walsingham, Houston is looking for volunteers to deliver Sunday dinner to the Benedict XVI House of Formation beginning this month, however, so someone must be in residence. I notice that Bp Lopes refers to eight seminarians in this article from 2018.

According to his mother’s blog (fourth happy face down) Luke McDonald will be living at the B16HF -- “right next door almost to Bp Lopes“ -- while studying at St Mary’s Seminary in Houston this academic year. He is not shown on the “Our Seminarians” page of the seminary website, but it does not appear to have been updated to the 20-21 school year as Frs Alejandro and Davis are still shown as 4th year Theology students. Seminarians arrived at St Mary’s a week ago and are in two week quarantine.

I'm still not clear on how many seminarians there are. If eight minus the two ordained this summer leaves six, and Mr McDonald adds one, that's seven. But of the nine men in the photo above from 2019, six are not seminarians as of summer 2020. So apparently three in the 2019 photo are in the program as of 2020, plus Mr McDonald, plus the Canadian seminarian, which leaves five. And that still leaves the question of how many are living in the House of Formation. Four?

UPDATE: My regular correspondent clarifies, "Luke McDonald IS the Canadian seminarian, so there are now four in total."

This could be a start for a thorough and informative followup by the professional journalists at the Ordinariate News. They could make my regular correspondent and me look like the rank amateurs we actually are. I don't have many hopes, though. But hey, if they take over the job, I could give up this gig!