Two Columbus St. Charles Preparatory School graduates were among eight men ordained as priests of the Congregation of the Holy Cross on Saturday, April 6 at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart on the University of Notre Dame campus in South Bend, Indiana.

Fathers Michael Ryan and Brian Vetter, C.S.C. (Congregatio a Sancta Cruce in Latin) graduated from St. Charles in 2008 and 2013, respectively. Both alumni went on to earn degrees from Notre Dame and discerned a calling to the priesthood during their undergraduate years.

The Congregation of Holy Cross, United States Province of Priests and Brothers is based in Notre Dame, Indiana. The University of Notre Dame is one of four colleges in the United States administered by the province.

Blessed Father Basil Moreau founded the Congregation of Holy Cross in 1837 in France. Priests and brothers of Holy Cross strive to be teachers in the faith, educating both mind and heart, in the field of education, parish life and mission.

Father Ryan, who attended Columbus St. Catharine School and was a member of the parish with his family, said his Catholic upbringing and education laid the foundation for his vocation.

Father Ryan, the ninth of 11 children, grew up on the east side of Columbus and said the Catholic faith was integral to the way his family operated.

Regular Mass attendance and praying the rosary during Lent was nonnegotiable, he said, but rather, simply what his family did.

“The fabric of my life has been in the faith, so, tilling that soil and nurturing the ground from which a vocation could sprout,” he said.

Father Ryan had a great network of educators at St. Catharine and St. Charles, he said, who were faithful teachers, mentors and great examples to him. 

In high school and college, Father Ryan said he experienced serious health issues that he described as “brutal.” However, he said, God’s hand was not causing the illness but rather leading him to new life through it.

The health challenges allowed him “to find Christ and come to the Resurrection.

“The new opportunities that arose, the different paths I went down because of those illnesses that ultimately led me to where I am, it’s hard not see as providential,” Father Ryan said.

He said it was not until he arrived at college, however, that he began to think God might be calling him to the priesthood. 

He said all of the priests he knew lived lives of joy. Seeing the fruits of their vocation to the priesthood created some excitement about it.

Father Ryan graduated from Notre Dame with a degree in civil engineering. He worked as an engineer and field superintendent for five years at a construction company in Chicago.

He put the “discernment question” to the side and dived into his work. He worked on great teams and reached management goals he set for himself, he said, but after some time he began to question whether there was “more to the day than just the business that I was doing.”

After more than three years on the job, Father Ryan said he picked up the discernment question again.

Between graduating from Notre Dame and entering seminary, he met with three vocation directors and a spiritual director and talked with family, friends and co-workers. Father Ryan said it was a long process, but speaking with vocation directors was helpful.

After several conversations and time spent in prayer, he continued to discern a call to the priesthood.

“I grew more and more comfortable with the decision to the point that I made it,” he said.

In 2017, Father Ryan returned to Notre Dame and entered Moreau Seminary, the major seminary for the Congregation of Holy Cross in the United States, located less than a mile from the university’s campus. He discerned with the congregation and learned more about religious life and the priesthood.

Father Ryan said he was drawn to the order’s sense of family and community in common mission as well as their spirituality of the Cross as the only hope.

During his second year with the order, he spent a year of “intense prayer and discernment” in Colorado Springs, Colorado. After his second year, he professed his first vows.

“I became more certain every year that this was the life I was being called to live,” he said.

Father Ryan said the vows allowed him to live more freely and joy he experienced were both indicators that he was heading in the right direction. Praying an examination of conscience at the end of the day also illumined that life in Holy Cross was helping him become more Christlike.

He described his discernment as “a curve that never reaches 100 percent. It always gets closer, but there’s still faith that you have to have to trust that you’re following God’s will. It’s very rarely going to come on a certificate that, ‘Yes,’ this is what you are being called to do.”

At certain points during his undergraduate years and in the professional field, he said, he wanted to be 100 percent certain of what God was calling him to. Instead, Father Ryan said his vocation was based on trust in God.

“It comes down to you have to trust, take that leap of faith because not taking it is a bigger risk: What if I was a living a life that God wasn’t calling me to?” he said. “There’s a risk of losing something there, losing that joyful life that I’ve ultimately found.”

As a priest, Father Ryan will continue serving as rector of O’Neill Family Hall at Notre Dame. Being rector of the dorm is similar to a pastor, he said, as he will shepherd approximately 300 men who live in the dorm.

He said some might think his time spent in construction was wasted because he discerned a vocation to the priesthood, but he is grateful for those years.

“I learned a lot about the world and learned a lot about how I operate, how the world operates,” he said. “It really changes my vision on how I see things and how I interact with things, that experience of working with people and learning how to build buildings.”

Father Ryan said he sees the engineer in him come to life in his preaching and conversations with young men in the residence hall where he serves. He said his engineering background also led to unique opportunities.

Now, as a priest, he said, “being an engineer seems atypical and maybe it is atypical, but it allows you to connect with people in a different way than you otherwise might.”

As a newly ordained priest, Father Ryan will regularly celebrate Mass in the dorm’s chapel, St. Joseph the Worker.

“I’ll be able to celebrate Sunday Mass, which will be a great privilege to offer sacrifice on behalf of these young men,” he said.

As rector, he will also assist with campus ministry, discipline and coaching young men in his dorm regarding decision making and listening as they discern God’s movement in their lives.

An older brother, Father Brogan Ryan, C.S.C. is also a priest in the Congregation of Holy Cross. He serves at King’s College in Pennsylvania, which is also administered by the congregation’s United States Province of Priests and Brothers.

“He and his twin, Brendan, have been great examples for me of how to be virtuous young men,” Father Ryan said. “Brogan has been a great mentor of mine throughout formation and throughout my discernment.”

Father Brian Vetter, CSC, approaches the altar during the ordination Mass for the Congregation of the Holy Cross on April 6. Father Vetter is a Columbus St. Charles Preparatory School graduate

Father Vetter, the youngest of three sons, attended Columbus St. Andrew School and belonged to Dublin St. Brigid of Kildare Church. He graduated from Notre Dame with a degree in pre-medicine and theology in 2017 and entered Moreau Seminary that same year.

Father Vetter said he experienced a call to consider a vocation to the priesthood during his undergraduate years. He originally planned to attend medical school after graduating college, marry and have a family.

“I kind of realized that it was a call to love in maybe a different way, and this is where I see it was a call to religious life,” he said. “At the time, I didn’t realize it, but then, as I discerned, it became clear.”

Father Vetter said he also thought somewhat about a religious vocation in high school. Attending St. Andrew and St. Charles, he said a Catholic education allowed him to ask questions about the Catholic faith and make the faith his own.

Father Vetter said he felt called to give himself to the Church’s mission through community life. He said he could best love others and be loved by others by living and serving in community.

The strong sense of community he experienced in the campus dorms at Notre Dame, which, he said, he first experienced as a student at St. Charles, led him to discern a vocation with the Congregation of Holy Cross.

Father Vetter also considered the Society of Jesus, known as the Jesuits, or becoming a diocesan priest, he said. However, he discerned a calling to Holy Cross because of the order’s sense of community.

“Over a few years, I was able to see that, actually, I was most fulfilled and I experienced the most joy when I was in community and when I could give more of my heart to more people in the way that the religious vows of chastity, poverty and obedience allow me to do,” he said.

Father Vetter said he felt the order was the right fit, too, because of its strong sense of family. 

The Congregation of Holy Cross is modeled after the Holy Family, and the congregation is under the patronage of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Our Lady of Sorrows and St. Joseph.

Father Vetter currently teaches sixth through eighth grade science and religion at St. Adalbert School in South Bend. As part of his calling to the priesthood, he said he felt the need to serve young people.

As a Holy Cross priest, he can “give my heart to people like my students” and “be nourished and loved in community life.” As a priest, he said, he will serve as a father to his students and love them as his own.

Teaching children enables him “in a beautiful way, to help show them the love of God and the love of Jesus in their lives in a way that I think I couldn’t in any other role.”

He said this is important “especially for those who might not see that love in their lives and maybe have difficult home lives and might struggle to see that. … The beauty of Catholic education is you can really show them the love of Jesus in a very explicit way in a Catholic school.”

As a priest, Father Vetter will continue teaching at St. Adalbert, which primarily serves a Mexican immigrant community. He will also assist with Masses at St. Adalbert Church, which is connected to the school.

Father Vetter said he will offer the sacrament of reconciliation during the school day and hear students’ confessions during lunch and recess.

On the day after their ordinations, Fathers Ryan and Vetter each celebrated a first Mass on Sunday, April 7, Divine Mercy Sunday. Father Ryan celebrated Mass on campus at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart and Father Vetter’s first Mass took place at St. Adalbert Church, which he celebrated in English and Spanish.