In a world starving for love and affirmation, countless men and women seek and search for meaning, ultimately for God. The Catholic priest is a divine response to this yearning that exists in every human heart. Each priest mirrors God the Father in a unique way, as a spiritual father. Father Tom Aschenbrenner, an associate pastor at Holy Name Cathedral, first discovered this role of priest as spiritual father as a college student volunteering with delinquent teenage boys. “As priests we don’t give birth biologically but spiritually. God the Father worked through me as I was present to these troubled teenagers and their families,” Aschenbrenner said. “God was preparing me for priestly life, which is all about fathering his children — to bring them to a deeper relationship with God and to receive the grace he gives through the sacraments.” In his work with engaged couples Aschenbrenner often explains the parallel between biological and spiritual fatherhood. “You don’t take off your wedding ring when you go out. Fathers and husbands who do that have lost their identity and purpose. It would be like me taking off my collar and going out and saying, ‘This is my time.’ Your identity is not fully realized,” he said, adding that the priesthood is not a “nine-to-five job, it is a vocation, a way of life.” Saving souls Franciscan Friar of the Renewal Father Bob Lombardo agreed. “As a father of a natural family has to take care of his children, in the same way, a priest must care for those entrusted to him. As a priest, we have to make sure everyone is taken care of, placing their spiritual life first — ultimately the salvation of souls,” said the priest who serves at Our Lady of the Angel’s Mission in Chicago’s West Humboldt Park neighborhood. Lombardo, who as a Franciscan has served in poor communities around the world, explained “When you are talking about a father, you are talking about a relationship, a close relationship that should be founded on love. So, it should start with the priest loving the people and the people loving the priest.” Sometimes that means tough love. “I’ve worked with mentally ill substance abusers. Sometimes you have to give people what they need, not what they want. It has helped me mature as a priest, to have the courage to say what they need to hear,” he said. “It is the same as a father, in the same way we have to say things that are difficult to help form God’s children. And that is not an easy thing to do.” ‘A wisdom figure’ Vincentian Father Chris Robinson, who serves both at DePaul University and as pastor of St. Vincent DePaul Parish, also sees spiritual fatherhood as life giving. “I think for myself how God has called me to be generative, how he’s called me to serve, to be a wisdom figure, to support unconditionally. I need to be consistently, lovingly present — the same way a parent should be present,” Robinson said. “Serving college women and men, I am particularly present to their questions of faith, and the transition they go through from the faith of their childhood to the faith of their young adulthood. “One of the reasons I became a Vincentian was to help teach the faith to God’s people,” he said. Ultimately, as Aschenbrenner said, priests help to unite the mystical Body of Christ. “When people see happy, joyful priests, they are attracted and drawn closer to Christ. When we mirror Christ, people are attracted to that,” he said. “If priests as spiritual fathers are able to foster holy vocations to marriage, we’ll have holy vocations to priesthood, religious life and marriage.” That is why priests and laypeople must support each other. “Our vocations work together, to build up the kingdom of God,” he said.