The Working Week. A Call to Priesthood

The Working Week

 

My experience of the call to the Sacred Priesthood.  Ordained 5^th July 1992

 

I had this ache to leave school early!

 

To branch out on my own, a desire to discover,

to really find out why it was that

I stood upon this solid ground

fascinated by peering into the heavens,

 I just wanted to stand on my own two feet

without someone telling me to do so,

these nagging thoughts overwhelmed the teenage me.

 

I suppose I wanted to experience the working week.

A kind of fledgling independence I had vowed to seek.

 

I longed to sing with joyful abandon Morrisey’s lament.

Every note sung so thoroughly meant!

 

Why? Because I had looked for a job,

I had found a job

after enduring an interview too,

but heaven knew

I was miserable then!

 

I sang along with the others

my sisters and working brothers

sitting together on our work fitting

after walking to the sorting office

at 5 am in the morning,

leaving behind any lingering  

nostalgia for teenage schooling,

engaging with the cynical working world of men!

 

It was the shock of the reality or drudgery of work.

 

A realisation that this occupation

was but a mere means to an end,

that gave my waking thoughts a jolt

a realistic movement, an involuntary jerk.

 

And O Boy George was I grateful for its end’s truth!

 

This revealed for me in visiting record shops

flicking through the vinyl and gasping at the artwork,

if this was all there was, I was ok with it,

looking through a Mirror in the Bathroom

observing my roots, my Musical Youth.

 

Dreaming of a Night Boat to Cairo

or imagining being on Swansway’s Soul Train,

happy to be lost in A Forest, with electric friends,

Ozzy enticing, wailing, come on board with the crazy!

 

It got into your head,

the tunes, the lyrics, the artwork

made you think of Ghost Towns

of stints on Maggie’s unfair farms,

of UB40’s soulful melodies,

Birmingham’s finest musical legacies,

a rush of energy,

a happiness uncomplicated, eternity gazing,

all this beauty and creativity,

this daftness and this refreshing anarchy!

 

All this sang to my heart,

rested upon my soul, steered my life’s direction.

 

Led me to seeking a purpose for it,

a meaning to be proud of, even a possible vocation.

 

I suppose the silence too

pierced the outer shell of the man seeking his way .

I was attracted by such words of unimaginable grace

spoken from a cross by a man overflowing with love

after all, as the Barlow says, “all you are to do each night is Pray.”

 

My searching heard his song,

of faithfulness,

of forgiveness

of contrition.

 

A word unheard within me til

that moment,

a melody of true sincerity,

this found its voice for me,

as from the cross Jesus said loudly, boldly

passionately, with utter conviction:

 

“Hey you Patrick, why not, come, follow me!”

 

Who me?

 

I said time and again, a protest of vanity

and I have never really stopped with the same question

floating around my now rapidly aging head…Who Me?

 

Surely, I am not worthy, not extraordinary,

cowering behind a hollow humility,

until finally finding the courage to let go of useless anxiety.

 

Overcoming my faltering reservation.

 

And feeling at long last,

sure, of the authenticity of my own Priestly Vocation.

 

Fr Patrick Brennan © June 26^th 2026

 

A look back at my leaving school at 16, in 1983, starting a job in the Post Office. I was a postman for three years before entering the seminary in 1986 and enjoying the music of the time! I still enjoy the music of the 80’s and feel affirmed in my call to the priesthood. 

Source: https://humblepiety.blogspot.com/2026/06/the-working-week-call-to-priesthood.html