By Jim Davis - Florida Catholic

MIAMI | Archbishop Thomas Wenski will ordain five men to the archdiocesan priesthood this Saturday, May 13, 2023, beginning at 10 a.m. at St. Mary Cathedral. The ceremony will be livestreamed on the archdiocesan website and YouTube channel.

Following are brief profiles and video interviews with the soon-to-be new priests. 

DEACON SAUL ARAUJO: NOW IT’S HIS TURN

Some seminarians see the vocation as a choice. Deacon Araujo, 29, talked more in terms of destiny.

His grandfather often asked him and his eight brothers what they wanted to be when they grew up. Even as young as 3, Saul always gave the same answer: “I want to be a priest!” – although he doesn’t remember it. His mother told him a few weeks ago.

He had many models of the priesthood while growing up in Brasilia. “There were always priests and seminarians coming for dinner at our house,” he explained. “So it was not something foreign to me.”

His interest finally jelled during his teen years, he recalled. When he was about 16, and examining his life choices, he thought of his pastor, and of a missionary family from the Neocatechumenal Way that he knew.

“They did it out of gratitude to God,” Deacon Araujo said. “Living their best lives in God’s will.”

He credits the Neocatechumenal Way not only for his spiritual growth but for his very existence. His parents were considering divorce when they joined the Neocats. Instead, they learned Pope Paul VI’s teachings on the sanctity of the family – and remained together.

“Thank God for The Way,” Deacon Araujo said, using a common nickname for the movement. “If my parents hadn't gotten into that, I wouldn’t have been born. But being in a Christian community, living out their faith, allowed them to have their kids – including me.”

Because of his background, he has developed a love for catechesis. “That’s how I got involved in the church: learning about the faith and scriptures. I don’t like to talk about theories. I’d like that Christianity not remain abstract, but (to focus on) how it affects people.”

After all, teaching and examples not only affected his formation, but made his very existence possible. Now he says he wants to do the same as a priest.

Asked what he would like to leave behind when he dies, Deacon Araujo didn’t hesitate: “That I made a difference in lives. That people got to know Christ. That’s what other people have meant to me.” 

FAST FACTS ABOUT DEACON ARAUJO

• Date/place of birth: Dec. 9, 1993, in Brasilia, Brazil; the third of nine brothers.
• Schools attended: CEM #3 (in Brasilia); joined the Redemptoris Mater Seminary of Miami a year after graduation; studied at St. John Vianney College Seminary in Miami and St. Vincent de Paul Regional Seminary in Boynton Beach.
• Ordained a deacon: April 2, 2022
• Served diaconate year: Good Shepherd, Miami
• Interesting fact: Loves all types of music, taking morning walks, and playing soccer; he is also multilingual, speaking his native Portuguese along with English, Spanish and Italian.

DEACON RIKINSON BANTOU: NOW HE’LL BE A BIG PRIEST

“Little Priest.” Deacon Bantou, 37, remembers the nickname with a smile. That’s what people called boys like himself back in Haiti, when they were assisting clergy.

His pastor in his hometown of Jean-Rabel asked his parents, Saint Ange Bantou and Ivania Louidor, if he and his brother could be altar servers. The two brothers then trekked with their pastor to serve at the Eucharist in far-flung churches that lacked a priest.

The experience sparked a desire in his heart “to be with God and help people,” Deacon Bantou said. “Many people don’t have any priest to go to for help.”

As a young man, he joined the Montfort religious community in Haiti in 2006. Thirteen years later, though, he left, finding religious life too constraining.

“I have to be with my family,” Deacon Bantou explained. “When they ask me to do something, I have to do it.”

In 2017, he came to the U.S., hoping for direction for his future – and he got it. Asking what God wanted him to do, he felt a one-word answer in his heart: “Continue.”

He talked to Father Robes Charles, then pastor at St. Clement Parish in Wilton Manors, who explained that diocesan life was different than religious life. “And every time I went there, I felt, ‘This is my life.’”

But he had one more challenge to pass: the death of his father after surgery in 2019. Deacon Bantou was assigned to St. John Bosco Church in Miami at the time, but his father was still in Haiti.

“I couldn't sleep that night,” Deacon Bantou said. “I asked God, ‘Why did that happen?’”

He finally fell back on faith. “I just said, ‘God, everything that happens, you know why. I trust you. Give me the strength to continue to do your will.’”

And he stayed on the path. Because of his religious formation in Haiti, he only had to take a few courses – mainly English and humanities – at St. John Vianney Seminary before being ordained a transitional deacon.

By now, he has firmed up his image of what a priest has: “a heart to follow Jesus Christ, (to emulate) the way he does things.” 

FAST FACTS ABOUT DEACON BANTOU

• Date/place of birth: Sept. 15, 1985, in Jean-Rabel, Haiti; the third of two sisters and one brother
• School attended: Entered Montfort religious community in Haiti from 2006 to 2017
• Arrived in U.S.: October 2017
• Home parish: St. Clement, Wilton Manors
• Entered Miami seminary: August 2018
• Ordained a deacon: Dec. 3, 2022
• Diaconate year: St. Brendan High School, Miami.
• Interesting fact: Favorite saint is Maria Goretti.

DEACON SEBASTIAN GRISALES: IT’S ALL ABOUT THE EUCHARIST

For Deacon Grisales, 32, it comes down to one word: Eucharist.

“We are called to be a eucharistic people,” he said. “We are taken and chosen in our baptism, blessed with the gift of faith; and, although broken by our human frailty, God calls us to give ourselves to others in service.

“Eucharist is: Take, bless, break and give,” he summed up.

Born in Medellin, Colombia, Deacon Grisales moved to Aruba then Miami in 1999 due to social conflicts in his home country. He always enjoyed church. “It felt like home, a safe place,” he said. He also felt he could provide that safe place for others.

“I felt that I should be up there, doing what the priest was doing,” he said. “I felt called to bring the sacraments to people. Especially the Eucharist.”

That love stayed with Deacon Grisales when he took part in youth ministries at his home parish, St. John Neumann. He attended a weekly youth group, ran retreats and led praise and worship services.

While serving at St. John Neumann, he worked for five years as a logistics coordinator, distributing cellphones and tablets to South America for a telecommunications company.

Then he decided to go deeper, entering St. John Vianney Seminary in 2013, and finally St. Vincent De Paul Seminary.

Deacon Grisales then took a year-long break from his studies. “I took some time to get closer to God, to prepare for this moment; and I think God’s time is perfect, and perhaps he chose me for this moment.”

He believes his years in business will be an asset in running a church, especially in budgeting, event planning, and staff management. “I'm very good at thinking how to do an event, what I need, how to get it.”

Still, church life has always been his first love, and it now has his full attention. Asked what he would want to leave behind when he dies, he replied immediately: “Love for the Eucharist, and trying my best to be kind to others. “I feel my vocation was molded to what it is in the Eucharist.”

FAST FACTS ABOUT DEACON GRISALES

• Date/place of birth: Aug. 21, 1990, in Medellín, Colombia, youngest of two brothers
• Arrived in U.S.: 1999
• Home parish: St. John Neumann, Miami
• School attended: Félix Varela Senior High School
• Career before priesthood: Logistics coordinator for a small telecommunications distributor
• Ordained a deacon: April 11, 2021
• Diaconate year: St. Coleman, Pompano Beach, and St. Thomas the Apostle, Miami
• Interesting fact: Loves to cook “anything and everything.”

DEACON GUSTAVO SANTOS: FROM TRAGEDY TO JOY

Most paths to priesthood don’t include a bullet. The path for Deacon Santos, 29, did.

His grandfather owned a trucking company in their native Venezuela. In 2011, kidnappers fired on the grandfather’s SUV, with one bullet striking a leg. He died from loss of blood.

The tragedy taught Deacon Santos a stark lesson: “It doesn't matter how much money you have, if you don’t have life.”

Looking back, he can see other influences steering him toward the priesthood.

When he was 14, his parents were going through marital problems and his father even left the house. His mother “found refuge” at healing Masses, he said. She also had Deacon Santos pray the rosary with her, asking God to bring his father back. One day, he did. The three of them then began to pray together.

Their pastor then invited Gustavo to help in his ministry, and the boy saw how he served at hospitals, orphanages and nursing homes.

“I wanted to be like him,” he recalled. “But I was happy with high school, dating and going to parties like everyone else.”

Because of what had happened to his grandfather, and fearing for their oldest son, his parents, Robert Santos and Evelyn Higuera, sent him to South Florida in 2012. While studying English at Miami-Dade College, he drove a black Camaro, went to the beach and attended parties. But it all left him lonely.

After he received a phone call from his mother in Venezuela telling him that a beloved priest they knew had died, he looked for the closest church. He began attending Mass at Little Flower Parish in Coral Gables, first weekly, then daily. Then he got involved in visitation ministries and Emmaus retreats. And church life clicked for him.

“It’s like I came alive,” he said. “I decided to give myself to something everlasting. That was God. That was Jesus Christ.”

The final piece fell into place one Saturday, he said. Sitting before Mass at St. Martha Church in Miami Shores, trying to decide whether to apply to the seminary, he heard an inner voice: “Yes, you're ready.”

He called the vocations director.

Looking back, “I can see God’s hand even in those troubling times,” he said. “I love my life, with its ups and downs. And beyond sadness and trouble, I know God loves me and is bringing me to a better future.”

FAST FACTS ABOUT DEACON SANTOS

• Date/place of birth: May 20, 1993, in Valencia, Venezuela; oldest of four, two boys and two girls
• Came to the U.S.: 2012
• Schools attended: I.E. Juan XXIII and one semester of college in Venezuela; Miami Dade College for four semesters
• Entered St. John Vianney Seminary: August 2015
• Ordained a deacon: April 2, 2022
• Deaconate year: Our Lady of Guadalupe, Doral
• Interesting fact: Likes playing sports – soccer, basketball, volleyball – and watching classic movies.

DEACON ANDREW VITRANO-FARINATO: HE RECEIVED, NOW HE WANTS TO GIVE

The way Deacon Vitrano-Farinato, 27, tells it, his journey toward the priesthood was both a push and a pull.

The pull was seeing a priest ministering at his home parish, St. Mark in Southwest Ranches. The example he saw during Mass set his own path.

“I was always involved in church,” he said. “I saw the priest and said ‘Wow, I could do that!’”

The push was his parents’ divorce. Such personal tragedies often drive people away from God, yet it did the opposite for Deacon Vitrano-Farinato.

“I was angry and needed some purpose and meaning in my life,” he recalled. “I decided to be more intentional about my faith.

“The monsignor at the time (the late Msgr. Edmond Whyte) helped my mom through the divorce, and my grandfather was a deacon,” Deacon Vitrano-Farinato added. “So I was receiving help in the midst of the difficulties.”

Teachers at St. Mark School, where he attended through eighth grade, were likewise understanding, such as when he couldn't turn in a homework assignment, he said.

He even made peace with his father, who is agnostic. When the father learned of his son’s vocational choice, he was “contentious” at first, Deacon Vitrano-Farinato said.

Ironically, it was during one of his frequent debates with his father that he first openly admitted wanting to pursue the priesthood.

“I was thinking about it, but I had not verbally said it to anyone, and at this point he’s just calling me out saying, ‘Are you going to be a priest or what?’”

Later his father, a nurse by profession, acknowledged: “I work for people for a better future. And you're doing the same thing.”

Interestingly, his father cited clergy as an influence as well. “He said he learned from priests that you need to question your faith,” Deacon Vitrano-Farinato said. “But reality is always greater than theory. Doubt actually strengthens faith. That’s how I get to know God even more.”

The push/pull clearly affected what kind of priest Deacon Vitrano-Farinato said he wants to be: a priest “who attracts people not to myself but to Jesus. I was loved by him, with all my faults. Now I want to be merciful like that to everybody. I’d like people to say, ‘He had a relationship with Jesus.’ I just want to be the guy who facilitates that relationship.” 

FAST FACTS ABOUT DEACON VITRANO-FARINATO

• Date/place of birth: Nov. 2, 1995, Cooper City, only child
• Home parish: St. Mark, Southwest Ranches
• Schools attended: St. Mark School and Archbishop Edward McCarthy High, Southwest Ranches (class of 2014)
• Ordained a deacon: April 2, 2022
• Diaconate year: St. Andrew, Coral Springs
• Interesting fact: Loves watching “scary movies,” reading non-fiction books, and baking “anything that’s sweet.”

Rocío Granados of La Voz Católica and freelancer Cristina Cabrera also contributed to this report.