My vocation to religious life began when I was born and raised in Rochester, NY. My father was a Catholic, and although my mother was a Methodist, she was very supportive of Catholicism: she had been attending Mass since her college days and agreed to have me baptized and raised within the Church. My birth proved significant for her own spiritual development: told she was barren, she prayed to Our Lady for the grace of motherhood and, lo and behold, I was born. She and I made our first communions together when she completed RCIA.

I enjoyed my catechism classes and leapt at the chance to become an altar boy as soon as possible. I continued serving at the altar through high school and college and loved it: I quickly became so used to the sanctuary that I was more comfortable there than in the pews. My father read Catholic publications avidly and, as I grew older, shared many of his insights with me. I enjoyed attending a Jesuit high school and appreciated its integrative approach to the faith—we studied religion in the classroom, prayed together at various liturgies, and served the poor and disadvantaged together over school breaks. I also encountered religious life for the first time, learning that not every priest lived alone as a parish pastor. Although both the Jesuits at my school and the priests at my parish (especially our newly ordained assistant pastor) discussed the priesthood, my heart was set on having a family and pursuing a career.

I found the transition to life in college disorienting—thrust into an unfamiliar setting, presented with unprecedented opportunities, living with strangers, and given a chance to define myself. Providentially, my orientation leaders were the president and vice-president of Williams Catholic, who quickly involved me in the organization. Amidst the novelty of freshman year, my Catholic faith remained a comforting constant. However, the blatant secularism of Williams forced me to consider my beliefs. Although individually everyone I met was very respectful of religious belief, I found that, institutionally, the school occasionally embraced policies contrary to my religious beliefs—often without realizing that such policies might even give some students pause.

Confronted with atheism in the classroom, condoms in the common room, and gay pornography on the walls of school-sanctioned events, I was challenged to explore the Church’s teachings—not just what was taught, but why. By the grace of God, I questioned in faith rather than doubting, availing myself of the Newman library and pestering Fr. Caster with questions. I found that the Church’s teachings possess a great richness, integrity, and beauty. More attractively, amidst my increasingly specialized (and subjective) studies, I found Truth: a way to unite and integrate the various facets of my life.

However, the Truth of the Catholic religion is not merely intellectual doctrine: it is a personal God, encountered especially in the Sacraments and communicated in the lived experience of the Church. Thus, liturgical and personal prayer and the fellowship I found in Williams Catholic also fostered my vocation. Having grown up fifteen or twenty minutes away from my parish, I had been accustomed only to attending Mass on Sundays. At Williams, I was able to participate in many of the Church’s common devotional practices: weekday Masses, the communal praying of the rosary, the Stations of the Cross during Lent, Eucharistic Adoration, etc. I also recall spending Holy Week on campus one year and being able to attend all of the special liturgies at St. Patrick’s—some, like the Veneration of the Cross on Good Friday, for the first time. The close proximity of so many worship opportunities allowed me to enter into the liturgical rhythm of the season and to appreciate the richness of its unique liturgies. I also benefitted immensely from the accessibility of the chapel: never before had the Blessed Sacrament been available 24/7 just a short walk away, and I often would visit briefly as I made my way across campus.

I was also influenced greatly by the people I met in Williams Catholic. I could not have found a better chaplain than Fr. Caster, with his impassioned and intelligent preaching, reverent liturgies, and congeniality. He was also very present to the students, which made it easier to consider myself as a priest one day—prior to my time at Williams, priests had always been distant figures, not friends. I also enjoyed the great camaraderie of the students of Williams Catholic, some of whom remain my dearest friends. I especially appreciated that the community was open both to Catholic activities and more everyday pleasures (movie nights, broomball, pizza parties—all a college student’s favorite things): I witnessed first-hand how religion perfects rather than replaces the mundane.

Although the idea of a religious vocation had been in the back of my mind for as long as I can remember, I did not begin to consider it seriously until my junior year. After exploring several possible careers, I found myself hungering for something more than an ordinary job. I also realized that, as much as I enjoyed my studies and hobbies, I enjoyed God and his Church more. Looking at my classmates, so many of whom were deeply unhappy despite being talented, hard-working, and fortunate—possessing everything the world considers good—I realized both the fleetingness of earthly goods and the importance of friendship with God as a source of happiness in my own life. And, I wanted to share God, the source of my joy. Intellectually, I recognized the goodness of religious life, of going, selling all that I had, and following Christ. However, I was still afraid to commit until I, while serving Mass, I began to feel an overpowering desire one day to celebrate the Mass myself.

After discussing the matter with Fr. Caster and my friends, it seemed like the priesthood would be a good fit for me. I spent many hours praying in the chapel discerning my vocation. Although I was (and still am) unworthy of the priesthood, I realized that no one is: it is a gift freely given by God to sinful men, whose deficiencies he corrects by his grace.

I discerned very quickly that I would prefer religious life to the diocesan priesthood both because of my desire to follow the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience, and also because I preferred the prospect of community life to living alone in a rectory. I like the idea of the contemplative life, a life spent in prayer and friendship with God: the Jesuits who had educated me seemed a bit too active for me, the monastic life too withdrawn. Although I had never met any Dominican friars, I kept encountering them as the authors of books and pamphlets in the Newman room and as subjects in my history class. After doing a little research, their mixed life of contemplation and preaching seemed like a perfect fit.

The summer between my junior and senior years, I had the opportunity to participate in the Omrit archaeological excavations in Israel with Prof. Rubin of the Classics Department. The Holy Land has occasionally been described as a “fifth gospel,” and my travel there deeply increased my appreciation for the Scriptures. It was also a great blessing to visit and pray at many of the sites associated with Christ’s earthly life: I was able to follow his footsteps literally at the same time as I was discerning following him in religious life.

I returned ready to explore a Dominican vocation and was put in contact with the order by a high school classmate who is now with me at our house of studies in Washington. When I first visited a Dominican priory—at Providence College in Rhode Island—I immediately felt a sense of peace and joy: I was at home. I enjoyed conversing with the friars and was deeply struck by their intellectual character. The Dominican life is an intellectual one. Unlike monks, who are often engaged in manual labor, every friar—from the young novice to the busy pastor to the foreign missionary—is committed to regular study, which is the foundation of our contemplative prayer. The Dominican Order is particularly devoted to the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas, one of the great thinkers whose name decorates Stetson Hall. The clarity and systematic nature of his thought appealed to me greatly (especially as an antidote to contemporary skepticism and moral relativism) as did the friars’ practice of chanting the psalms throughout the day. Moreover, the eastern province of Dominicans has been blessed with a great number of vocations in recent years, yielding robust formation communities. Thus, as I entered my senior year and assumed the mantle of the co-presidency of Williams Catholic (along with Emily Ciavarella), I continued to discern a Dominican vocation and then applied.

I entered the novitiate—a year-long trial period for religious life—a few months after graduation. I enjoyed having a break from my studies to adjust to life within the order and to focus on prayer and personal development. Since then, I have been studying at our seminary in Washington, DC, where my liberal arts education has provided an excellent foundation for philosophical and theological studies. I love the way of life God has called me to and, more importantly, through it I have come to love God more.

Br. Albert