Deacon Jacob Chavez: Seed planted leads to faith in motion
Deacon Jacob Chavez was 20 years old when his parents, Brian and Luzinda, drove him up to St. John Vianney Theological Seminary in Denver.
“We could barely stop the car before he jumped out,” recalled Brian.
“Growing up, he was always moving,” Luzinda said. “He was a good kid, a good student, a great athlete and violinist. A really good brother and very good son.”
The third of seven children, Deacon Jacob grew up in Gilbert and attended public schools. When it came to learning the faith however, it was his father who stepped up.
Brian and Luzinda were reverts to Catholicism, having returned to the Church when they were expecting their first child. Brian later became an Order of Christian Initiation instructor and decided he wanted to teach his children the faith.
“I really think the seed of faith was planted in me thanks to my father,” Deacon Jacob said. “If my father is taking the time to teach us all this, then there has to be something to it,” he recalled thinking.
“I was very fortunate to have my dad actually show, teach and give an example of a good Catholic Christian. I love my parents. They’ve been good to me my whole life.”
When he was around 12 years old, he met Father Will Schmid who later served at Deacon Jacob’s parish, St. Mary Magdalene in Gilbert, Ariz.
“He had a genuine joy,” Deacon Jacob said. “He was a good confessor, too, and someone who I thought represented Christ so well in a tangible way. And I thought, ‘maybe I can do something like that.’”
Deacon Jacob attended community college after high school and dreamed of various vocations. “I was going to try to be an orchestra teacher, and then I was going to be a youth minister. None of these things were really satisfying,” Deacon Jacob said. He ended up getting an associate’s degree in liberal arts.
A retreat that he went on as a young man proved pivotal. During Benediction following eucharistic adoration, Deacon Jacob said he felt a call toward priesthood, sensing the Lord telling him, “I want you to be My priest.”
At first he said no, but then he began going to adoration weekly with a friend.
“I think it was during those hours of adoration that the Lord really chipped away at my heart. Little by little, He just opened up my heart from a heart of stone — a fearful, reluctant heart — to a real heart of ‘I want to be completely conformed to Christ.’”
One of Deacon Jacob’s favorite memories of seminary formation is the 30-day silent retreat his class made after its first year.
On the retreat, he learned about the difference between treating God like a vending machine or genie in a bottle and seeing Him as a loving Father. Especially when his prayer time during those the first few days of the retreat was a bit dry.
Again, he felt that interior voice of the Lord: “I am not your God to be used, but I am your God to be loved.” He broke down in tears before the Blessed Sacrament.
“And from that moment on, it was like, ‘OK, God, I’m willing now to be purified. I realize now that I know a lot less than I thought.’”
The chalice he will receive at ordination is engraved with the Scripture verse he’s been mediating on for the last few years: “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”
“Those who have pure hearts, hearts made of flesh, hearts that are living, hearts that are willing to be moved and converted — those are the ones that are going to be able to see God.”
Deacon Jacob is looking forward to being able to celebrate Mass and hear confessions.
“I’ve received so much mercy at confession that I desire to give that back to people as well, letting Christ use me as an instrument of mercy.”
Deacon Connor Companik: From science and mixed martial arts to seminary
Somewhere between the tender age of 5 or 6, an intriguing thought cropped up in Deacon Connor Companik’s mind: “I made the connection — I could be a priest someday.”
That was during grade school at St. John Bosco Catholic School in Ahwatukee. The notion went dormant for some years only to bubble up later. Growing up in the East Valley, the oldest of three children, he and his family were active members of St. Benedict Parish in Phoenix.
Deacon Connor’s parents said they began to see signs of a budding vocation to the priesthood in their son when he was in his last couple of years of high school. He didn’t really meet many seminarians until his years at Seton College Preparatory.
“When I first started seriously considering the call was on a Kairos retreat my junior year,” Deacon Connor said. One of his good friends, who is now Father Ian Wintering, announced that he was entering seminary.
“Someone from my peer group, someone like me, was making the move to enter seminary and that was when it became a real possibility for me.”
Academics were important to Deacon Connor but he was also involved with long distance running and Kajukenbo, a form a mixed martial arts.
Although Deacon Connor credits his family for their strong support and inspiration, he said the example of his Kajukenbo instructor made quite an impression on him.
“I remember just being really inspired by how good of a teacher he was, how fatherly he was, how good he was at leading,” Deacon Connor said. “I think I learned a lot from him. He was a great role model at a really formative time in my life.”
“Connor has always been a very good student,” said Amy Companik, Deacon Connor’s mother. “In his later years of college, he started getting the occasional B. And we were like, ‘What’s going on?’”
Deacon Connor would then explain that he had commitments at church and didn’t have time to complete a project. “How do I argue with that?” Amy laughed. “It was funny because we did have to have a conversation about maybe doing less stuff at the Newman Center and focusing on school.”
Deacon Connor was majoring in astrophysics, not exactly an easy course of study. He lived in the dorms on campus at Arizona State University at first and then his senior year resided in a St. Paul’s Outreach (SPO) household in Tempe with nine other college men. SPO is a Catholic movement focused on college campuses that builds strong Catholics and community.
A men’s Bible study was where he learned more about discovering his vocation.
“In contrast to just waiting for signs or waiting for something to work out, the idea of actually taking concrete steps was something I learned from this group,” Deacon Connor said.
Over spring break, he visited St. John Vianney Theological Seminary in Denver. The experience wasn’t what he was expecting and some months went by. Then he attended a diaconate ordination. “Something in that liturgy really spoke to me,” Deacon Connor said.
Not long afterward, his friend Ian, by that time a seminarian, asked him point blank if he was going to apply to seminary.
“I basically told him yes. It came out of my mouth before I even realized what I was saying.” That was the day he started his application.
Now, as he looks toward ordination to the priesthood, Deacon Connor is filled with anticipation. He longs to offer Mass and looks forward to being able to preach more consistently than he has had the opportunity to as a deacon.
His favorite memory of his seminary years is a 30-day poverty immersion experience. Seminarians are sent out in pairs to different areas of the country to work in homeless shelters, hospitals, alongside the Missionaries of Charity and in other areas of service.
“We don’t really know where we’re going until a few days beforehand. And there’s kind of an unspoken rule that you keep the location quiet. So, I won’t share where I went, but I had a really great experience there.
“There’s just something about the freedom of having to rely on God’s Providence in a new way.”
