I was born and raised in Gainesville, Georgia, but moved to Clermont, Georgia, in 2023. Both of my parents were born in Mexico. My Dad being born in Michoacan and my Mom in Jalisco. They immigrated here to the United States as teenagers for a better life.

I have many hobbies, some of them being playing the accordion, working out, studying church history and being with my brother seminarians. I am very interested in music as well as all church studies, especially history. Smaller hobbies or interests I have would be tailoring as well as working on my truck.

One of my favorite scriptures is Matthew 5:39 as it teaches to not seek revenge, but approach situations with love and humility. The reason for this being my favorite is it is something I struggled with as a young teenager. Like most young kids in school, I was immature and held on to grudges a lot, which turn made me want to get revenge for everything. Whenever I came across this verse, my eyes were opened to the truth, which is to approach all situations with may be offensive with love and empathy.

My favorite saint is Saint Augustine of Hippo. The reason he is my favorite is because of his honest way of prayer; he hid nothing from the Lord and prayed with full honesty, which is something that immensely helped me with my spiritual life.

I was born and raised Catholic and was always close to the church. I began to altar serve when I was seven years old, and it is where my desire to serve the church first started. The more I served, the more I would find myself wanting to learn everything about the Mass along with its history. During the pandemic is when my passion for learning about the church really started to flourish. I found myself in a deep sadness that was due to being at home along with some family issues. I found true happiness and comfort learning about Christ and his church which eventually led me to start discerning priesthood in high school. During my senior year of high school, after much discernment and prayer along with talks with different priests, I decided to apply to seminary in order to further discern Gods calling.

So far with the start of my propaedeutic year, I have found seminary life amazing. I have made many friends and have already begun to grow much more in my spiritual life. I pray that throughout the years that I am in seminary I can learn to be the best shepherd for the Church and for the people that I can be.

I look forward to sharing my experiences as a man with other young men that may be going through similar struggles I went through so that I can help guide them to the path of Christ.

Be open to whatever God’s will may be. Whether it be having a family or priesthood. Pray and really discern what you feel is right. Do not let the priesthood be a last resort or escape plan from the world, but let it be something that you truly feel called to. Do not rush the process, God has a plan for all of us so we must be patient and trust in him. Make sure to also talk to a priest you know so that you can talk with someone who took those very same steps you are wanting to take in order to have a better understanding of what comes with priesthood.