{"id":9557,"date":"2023-03-16T00:27:17","date_gmt":"2023-03-16T05:27:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/?p=9557"},"modified":"2023-03-16T00:30:24","modified_gmt":"2023-03-16T05:30:24","slug":"home-for-the-formed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/?p=9557","title":{"rendered":"Seminarians Are Home In L. R."},"content":{"rendered":"

The front of the House of Formation. Photo from the East Harding Construction website.<\/em><\/p>\n

Way down on 12th Street, there\u2019s an inconspicuous-looking building. To the average viewer, it\u2019s nothing more than part of Our Lady Of Good Counsel\u2019s school complex. But it\u2019s nothing ordinary. There, a group of men is training to be extraordinary.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The Dioceas turned the old school into the House of Formation. A webpage explains their mission:\u00a0\u201c<\/span>The House of Formation gives seminarians and discerners a place to live and become acquainted with the four pillars of priestly formation \u2014 human, spiritual, pastoral, and intellectual \u2014 as they seek the will of God for their lives,\u201d said the House\u2019s webpage. \u201c<\/span><\/p>\n

Bishop Anthony Taylor dedicated the $1.6 million <\/span>House of Formation<\/span><\/a> on the grounds of Our Lady of Good Counsel Church in Little Rock on Sept. 20, 2012. The 6,000-square-foot building includes a chapel, kitchen, meeting room\/library, dining room, common area, 10 student rooms, [the bishop\u2019s apartment], and two priest apartments.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

House life isn\u2019t exactly what most people would expect it to be. Current resident seminarian Pedro Alverez\u201919 said, \u201cI would describe it in three words: prayer, study, and fraternity. What I mean is that life here is a unique mixture of the life of a regular college student regarding the study, plus prayer and a simple and joyful fraternity.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSo a typical day in the life of a seminarian at the house looks somewhat like this,\u201d said Alverez. \u201cWe start with Mass and morning prayer in our chapel at 6:45 a.m. Afterward, some of us hang out in the kitchen making ourselves breakfast and getting our daily dose(s) of coffee before classes begin. Depending on what our schedule looks like, our classes are spread throughout the day between the house, UALR, and Newman University in Kansas (online). So between 6:45 a.m. and 5:45 p.m., we are pretty much free to develop our schedule around our classes,\u201d said Alverez.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe individually do our holy hour (time of silent prayer) at our convenience throughout the day. Some of us work out in our state-of-the-art bunkroom\/gym\/storage\/music room at different times, and other guys take walks in the afternoons after they’re through with their classes. At 5:45 p.m. we gather for evening prayer which is followed by dinner as a community.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

While the House is a home for the seminarians, it is also the home of Bishop Taylor as well. \u201cLiving with the bishop is a unique blessing and a fun experience,\u201d said Alverez. \u201cZero if not any seminarians from other dioceses can say that their bishop has dinner with them almost every night and knows their names. Our bishop does. He celebrates Mass for us a few times a week; he’ll sit down and watch a movie or a show with us; he’ll crack a beer and join us in a board game or a bonfire. He’ll even try playing video games with us, if we can convince him.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

While it might seem that it\u2019s all fun and games, there is still work to be done. The seminarians are responsible for keeping the House clean and orderly. Sweeping the patio, cleaning the classroom up, or taking care of the vehicles \u2014 each person is expected to do his part. \u201cI’m currently in charge of updating the bulletin board in our hallway and getting the mail,\u201d said Alverez. \u201cIn addition to these chores, we have chapel duties and these typically change every two weeks. One guy is in charge of setting up for Mass every morning, another is the lector, another will be the server, and still another will set up for our communal holy hour on Thursday and our rosary Saturday mornings.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Life at the House, however, always seems to keep people on their toes. \u201cI have to say, we do have some of the strangest conversations,\u201d Alvarez said. \u201cI think it’s hilarious. At one moment we’ll be arguing about which animal would win in a fight, then we’ll take a steep dive into metaphysics and natural theology, and out of nowhere we’ll start making fun of each other because we’re bad at Smash Bros.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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The front of the House of Formation. Photo from the East Harding Construction website. Way down on 12th Street, there\u2019s an inconspicuous-looking building. To the average viewer, it\u2019s nothing more than part of Our Lady Of Good Counsel\u2019s school complex. But it\u2019s nothing ordinary. There, a group of men is training to be extraordinary.\u00a0 The…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":91,"featured_media":9563,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[215],"tags":[143],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/liftoffnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Diocese-of-LR-House-of-Formation-1.jpg?fit=1400%2C933&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3xfZw-2u9","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9557"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/91"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9557"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9557\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9574,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9557\/revisions\/9574"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9563"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9557"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9557"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/liftoffnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9557"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}