Swapping sport for the spiritual on a Friday night in Adelaide
Local
About 40 people curious to find out more about the life of the Catholic clergy came along to an inaugural vocations evening in the Adelaide CBD in early August.
The ‘Beyond the collar and veil’ evening at the Wakefield hotel was part of the annual, national vocations awareness week and attracted two very special speakers.
Adelaide’s Fr Anthony Beltrame, parish priest at Hectorville, and Sr M. Olivia Lukaszewich, originally from Adelaide and a former professional tennis player, but now an integral member of the Secular Institute of the Schoenstatt Sisters of Mary, a community of consecrated women in Mulgoa, NSW.
Emceed by Maddy Udawatta from the Archdiocese of Adelaide, both speakers talked for almost two hours across many different topics but with a primary focus on what drew them into the clergy.
Fr Beltrame was, he said, heading for a career in his family’s construction business when a sports injury sidelined him for some time and he used the opportunity to pray heavily and finding his way to the Church in the process. Once he had made the decision, things happened quickly he said with his decision made in August and starting life in the seminary the following February.
He had aways gone to Mass he said but got to pray for the first time when injured and at something of a loss. Silence can help hugely he said and remember, “If it doesn’t feel right, it probably isn’t”.
The Archdiocese’s Tracey Tessitore has a question for the panellists.
Sr Olivia, understandably, took a different tack and talked about how always wanting to be a wife and mother and had ceded to a relationship with God and being a spiritual mother to many people.
“We are very much encouraged to be the people we are,” she said of the Schoenstatt Sisters.
MC Maddy, perched on a (particularly small looking) stool with his guests throughout the night, felt the evening had been a “truly electric experience”.
“The diverse crowd leaned in as Sr Olivia compared her vocation to a marriage and Fr Anthony spoke of God’s constant presence,” he said.
“Seeing the audience react with such genuine emotion was a personal highlight. The high-energy rapid-fire round had everyone laughing, reminding us that priests and sisters are human just like us.
“Social media feedback has been incredibly positive, and even a stranger at a coffee shop complimented the night. I left convinced that building a relationship with the Lord is our first priority.”
