Witnessing - When Priests Wear Their Clericals

A photo of my friend Lois and Fr. Grace upon arrival at our home.

Father Grace almost always wears his clericals in public. The only exceptions are when playing tennis or surfing. At these recreation times he wears a T-shirt with our Lady of Guadalupe boldly printed on the front. When he goes surfing, he continues to wear his Brown Scapular (tucked of course beneath his swim shirt). He says he can evangelize that way. More on that later.

Father told us two stories that I would like to share with you. I believe I told him I would be sharing these on my blog.

One was when was going to or from the World Youth Day in Toronto. A man dressed in casual wear approached and greeted him. "G'day Father, I'm Archbishop ________". Father responded, "Oh, Your Lord, I didn't recognize you". A little while later, an airport security personnel approached Father Grace and said "Father, you don't have to wait on line, just follow me". The archbishop got the message.

Second incident was when two young surfer dudes approached Father and asked him where they could get vested up. Father retorted "You're priests?" "How did you know I was a priest"? Again, they got the message.

Interestingly, my friend in the photo is on a one woman campaign to tell our priests just how important it is for children to see our priests dressed as priests. What she is doing is talking to them privately and what we should do everyday, , is to pray for our priests.

I remember when my sister was a sister. She belonged to a conservative order of sisters who dressed in full habit. People everywhere would treat her with such respect! They would greet her with such joy. They wouldn't let her pay for anything in stores. They would ask her to pray for them.

It seems an easy way for our religious to evangelize, yet so important! So, how can we help? Again, pray for our priests and religious, and don't criticize.