A young priest in his first assignment as a pastor has much to celebrate and look forward to. He also faces a number of challenges for which his previous years as a parish associate cannot fully prepare him. Father John Fraser describes the experience as “an overwhelming sense of joy, mixed with anxious hope.”

Last July Father Fraser, who was ordained in 1996, was named pastor of Holy Rosary Parish in Hawthorne, N.Y. His first six months, by his own estimation, have been spent getting to know the people of the 2,000-family parish, learning from the parish staffers who have been there longer than he, and mastering the budget. Any ideas he may have for changes he is putting off for now.

“Coming in as a pastor, you feel you want to do something big that will put your mark on the parish or make a statement,” he admits. “But I see the great wisdom of letting the people of the parish speak for themselves, and for me to be patient and learn first. The biggest mark I can make right now is to listen, and to let Christ speak to me through the experiences of the people.”

He has inherited a sensitive situation that not every priest would welcome, especially in his first pastor’s assignment. The parish grade school suffers from an exceedingly low enrollment, and there has been talk over the years of closure or merger. Parishioners have been divided over the purpose and the mission of the school and its building within the parish, with emotions running high at times.

“Father has been a calming presence,” says David Dziena, 34, a parish trustee for the past three years. “He has given a sense of stability and purpose, and people of the parish are embracing that. I think he will do what is best for everyone by bridging the gap between the school and the parish.”

Dziena said that Father Fraser’s patience and good heart are winning people from all sides of the controversy. “He loves his priesthood; that is very evident,” he says. “This has an effect on everyone who meets him.”

George Hosey, a member of the Westchester parish for the past 36 years, sums up his thoughts on Father Fraser this way: “If there is any one person who can find a solution to the school situation and bring this parish together, it is Father Fraser. I see it happening already. The fact is there’s nothing wrong with the school, and I don’t think anyone is hoping that it closes. But we are in a section of Westchester that has a very good public school system that gives parents a lot of what they want for their children. It’s tough to ask them to pay the very high school taxes and then dig deeper and pay for a Catholic education.”

Father Fraser has had a wide variety of personal and pastoral experiences, both before and after ordination. Prior to entering the seminary, he worked in a funeral home, where, he says, he “met people at times of great grief and transition in their lives.” After hearing a call to the priesthood, he studied for a while with the Vincentian order before transferring to St. Joseph’s Seminary in Yonkers to study for the New York Archdiocese.

After ordination, he served for three years in a Yonkers parish, while also teaching high school seminarians and preparing men for the permanent diaconate at the seminary.

In 1999 he was assigned to St. Patrick’s Cathedral in midtown Manhattan. His six years there, serving first under Cardinal John O’Connor, who died in May 2000, and then under Cardinal Edward Egan, were “filled with an immensely diverse and satisfying range of pastoral and sacramental duties,” he says. “You met people of all walks of life, as you can imagine in a cathedral that has 10,000 visitors a day. The challenge was to approach and deal with everyone as an individual, as Christ himself, whatever that particular person’s need or question was.”

“After that I was very well prepared,” he adds, “for any pastoral situation.”

Strength in Celibacy

“I think that coming as a pastor to a new parish must be something like a father seeing his newborn child for the first time,” remarks Father Fraser. “As a pastor, I am called to be a father to the people, to see Christ always reborn and renewed within them. I have responsibility for their spiritual welfare.”

Celibacy allows a deeper level of spiritual fatherhood, he explains. “You are available and present to all the people. You are giving your life to Christ and to his people in a sacrifice that is really meant to affect at a deep level how you spend your time and relate to people. If you spend your time properly, in prayer, in contemplation, in selfless service, you see immediately the great graces God bestows. You are understanding and gentle beyond your own human capacity.”

As pastor, Father Fraser also has oversight and responsibility for the temporal welfare of the parish, from the budget, to the physical plant, to dealing fairly with employees and teachers. The school situation, he said, will take time and discernment, with the weighing of competing goods involving the finances of the parish and the positive effect of a Catholic education on the students who attend. His role for now, he said, is to try to bring both sides into a dialogue in which all parties seek to see the good points and intentions of the others.

Hosey says of his pastor: “He is bright, he is sensitive, he is willing to listen, and he doesn’t have an agenda. I have seen a lot of pastors over the years, and I know that he is God’s gift to this parish at this time, under these circumstances.”

Stephen Vincent writes from

Wallingford, Connecticut.