Msgr. Mulvey prays over Father Will Straten during his ordination in June of 2009. In addition to his parish ministry and diocesan positions, Bishop Mulvey served as Director of Spiritual Formation at St. Mary's Seminary for six years. (Photo by Shelley Metcalf, Catholic Spirit, Diocese of Austin)

The ‘striking moment'

The new shepherd of the Diocese of Corpus Christi, Bishop Wm. Michael Mulvey, said that God's call to lead the life as a celibate priest was probably with him "all along, but there was a certain point in college" when it became much clearer. He was attending St. Edward's University in Austin at the time.

"I was there with some friends and a girl friend at a dance and it seems funny to think that this would be the striking moment—and we were all having fun—but I looked around and I felt this was not for me, there was something inside that said this was not my way," remembered Bishop Mulvey.

"At that point is when I really began to feel I wanted to talk to a priest at a parish and begin looking at the possibility. The more I looked at it, thought about it and eventually went to the seminary, it just became more firm as time went along."

Seminary years were a continuation of the Catholic education that began earlier in his life including attending St. Theresa and St. Cecilia in Houston and then going on to St. Thomas High School in Houston from 1963 to 1966. He was confirmed by Bishop Wendelin J. Nold at St. Cecilia Parish in Houston.

After his family moved to Austin, he attended St. Edward's Catholic High School there and graduated in1967. He then enrolled at St. Edward's University, where he graduated in 1971 with a bachelor's degree in Business Administration.

Following his decision to pursue the priesthood, the North American College in Rome was his next destination and the place he called home for a number of years. Eight of the men in his class have also been ordained to the episcopacy and many others have stayed in contact with him over the years.

His studies from 1971 to 1974 earned him a bachelor's degree of Sacred Theology from St. Thomas University, also known as the Angelicum, and from 1974 to 1976, he earned his licentiate, a master's degree, in Sacred Theology from Gregorian University.

A very great moment

Bishop Mulvey said there have been many memorable events in his life and more are to come, yet "being ordained by Pope Paul VI was a very great memory that I have now."

It was a moment he shared with 358 other priests who were ordained by the pope on June 29, 1975 in St. Peter's Square.

He admits that at that time "I probably was a little more proud about it. When you are 25 years old and being ordained by the pope you think you are ‘hot stuff.' I think looking back at it now, it was a great moment of church, it was an experience of church with 359 candidates there with the pope. I think he is very misunderstood, but I think he is a great man. To know that you are part of that experience of the church has been very memorable."

He said another significant memory was formed the following year when he ran into Mother Teresa coming out of an elevator at a conference. "It was a chance encounter that was a special moment."

Meeting and visiting with Chiara Lubich, founder of the Focolare Movement, left a lasting impression as well. He called her "a great woman for the life of the church, for the future."

Preconceived notions shatter quickly

"I basically had a very uniform way of looking at the priesthood and at priests as though there was a certain mold I would be fitting into," said Bishop Mulvey, recalling the notions he had of the life he would be living as a priest.

"I guess the image, if you want to use a graphic image, is that I would be stationed in a small town in central Texas with arching oak trees over the streets and sidewalks."

He compared it to the genre of the "Beaver Cleaver" television show. "I would be walking down the streets and greeting the Garcias over here and the Joneses over here and just being everybody's friend. I never thought of sitting in an office." That's where he soon found himself more often than not.

Looking back now he said he found it interesting that his first mental image wasn't behind the altar, "it was out greeting people where they were, in their homes, and that image lasted about three days into my first assignment and that was wrong. If there was a false assumption, it was more about the form of what a priest does and how he leads his life."

Yet, it was in the priesthood that he has found an abiding happiness.

His parish assignments for the Diocese of Austin included serving as Associate Pastor of St. Mary and Our Lady of Guadalupe parishes in Taylor from 1976 to 1977. From the remainder of 1977 to 1980, he was the Associate Pastor of St. Louis Parish in Austin.

He then furthered studies on a sabbatical with the Focolare Movement from 1980 to 1981 and then became Chaplain to Reicher Catholic High School in Waco, where he served through 1986.

In 1984, he had also taken on the position of Pastor of St. Joseph Parish in Waco, where he served until 1986.

The next six years were spent as the Director of Spiritual Formation at St. Mary's Seminary in Houston. He returned to parish ministry in 1992 and became Pastor of St. Thomas Aquinas Parish in College Station.

His growing involvement in the Focolare Movement and the positive effect he saw it had on his own life and his brother priests led to a 1995 to 1997 term of serving as the Associate Director of Center for Spirituality for Diocesan Priests of the Focolare Movement in Florence, Italy, followed by two years as the Director of Center for Spirituality for Diocesan Priests of the Focolare Movement in Hyde Park, N.Y.

In 1999 he became Pastor of St. Helen Parish in Georgetown and stayed there until 2004, when he was appointed Chancellor of the Diocese of Austin, a position he served in until 2007. He was next Vicar General of the Diocese of Austin and in August of 2009 he served for just three weeks as Vice Rector of St. Mary's Seminary until he was called to return as administrator of the Austin diocese when Bishop Gregory Aymond was named to lead the Archdiocese of New Orleans.

Happiness found by living in true vocation

This June, Bishop Mulvey will celebrate the 35th anniversary of his ordination. It has brought him a great happiness to serve as a priest and believes that living in the vocation God calls a person will bring them a sense of peace and joy.

"I would say to anyone who is contemplating the priesthood, if it's your call—and that's why we discern these calls—then your only happiness will be there, as it is with somebody who is called to be married or somebody who is called to religious life, or any other form of committed life in the church."

He said, "God calls us where he wants us" and to not follow that may bring a degree of fulfillment, "but our true inner happiness is only in following the vocation that God calls us to." There are no other promises "except only the promise of peace and joy that only Christ can give."

He used his own experience as an example. "We can't come into it with preconceived notions. My preconceived notion was destroyed in only three days. Life ‘is.' We only have one and it's a gift." He said that everyone must put their life into the hands of the Lord. "Well, I'll put it the way I used to tell seminarians— just give your life to the Lord and hang on for the ride…he will never abandon you." He noted the Scriptural passage from Matthew, chapter 5 where Jesus speaks of God's love. "He loves us and he'll never abandon us. We have to give ourselves to him exclusively, in whatever vocation and he'll be faithful to us."

Advice to brother priests: The Gospel is more than a theory

Bishop Mulvey said there are real challenges to life as a priest and he knows some things that can help.

He said the first one is "fidelity to prayer, that intimacy with the Lord. He is the one whom we serve and for whom we are ambassadors. If we are alienated from the person of Jesus Christ we will never make it." He encouraged priests to give "primacy to that time of prayer and to stay faithful to that."

Another element of advice he would give is "a re-looking at how we live the Gospel. I think many times as priests we study it, we pray over it, but we don't always apply it to our daily life in the simplest expressions of the Gospel. Over these years, I've learned—with others— to take the Gospel and make it real. We have to verify the truth of the Gospel, not as a theory, but as life. If it doesn't apply to our life it doesn't mean much. I think over the 30-plus years I have been into that practice of making the Gospel real; it's a re-evangelization of myself and that's a real source of joy when at the end of the day I can say the Gospel is true."

An essential part of having a joyful ministry, is trying not to do it alone. He added that sometimes priests feel they are called to be the savior and "we end up kind of lonely and sad." But it is important to keep in mind that "we are called to a fraternity of life with our bishop—now being on the other side I would hope that would be—and one another. Sure, we're different, we may have opposing views, but the bottom-line is we are called to be brothers, disciples with and in the Lord."

The answer to isolation

In keeping with that thought he added, "I think one of the greatest challenges for priest's today is a total sense of isolation, non-communication, which is ultimately non-being. If I don't communicate I'm not. That's very philosophical, but if I don't communicate myself, then I don't exist in a certain sense, because I exist in communion with one another."

He pointed to how society promotes individualism, autonomy and other things that are "tantalizing to the human spirit but ultimately all lead down a dark road" such as isolation. "Isolation leaves me empty. Communion leaves me full. If I am full then I don't want any more. If God is in us and among us then there's nothing more I want. But if I isolate myself and I find that sense of emptiness, I'm going to fill it with something."

What helped Bishop Mulvey enter more deeply into a spirit of communion was his involvement with the Focolare Movement.

Want to please God? Be yourself, strive for communion

Communion and unity are goals and paths to happiness and meaning in life. And while working toward communion and unity, "Everybody has to be themselves." He noted that unity is different from uniformity. "Uniformity means everybody is the same. And so if there is already uniformity, we don't need unity. It is because we are diverse that we need unity."

When people partake in vices, such as envy and jealousy they are actually wishing they were someone else. "Then I am totally avoiding the issue of who I am, which is not pleasing to God, because God created me for who I am and what he wants of me. And so I have to be myself, but it's in being myself that I can also appreciate the other. I think many times when we are not humbly founded in ourselves then we are looking for something outside of ourselves. And that's where we get into the jealousy and envy of others. Once I realize I have a purpose and a meaning and a journey in life that I have to fulfill then as Pope John Paul II says I can see what is positive in others and also to accept it and embrace it not only as a gift for that person, but also for me, so that the other person can also become a gift for me as I am a gift for the other person."

Bishop Mulvey said the late pope said if "we don't follow this way of communion then all of our structures will be of no avail." At a certain point "we have to say what's good for the whole and not good for the individual only.

"The pope says all the structures, whether it's our local government, our national government, even our own church – pastoral councils, finance councils— if they don't exist with a spirit of communion for people, for the good of the human race, then they're' really ‘a mask of communion.' I think communion, unity in the world is of the utmost importance for us."

Diversity, history, teaching— great gifts of Church

The diversity of the church, its many charisms, and the history of the church, with it's black marks and great saints, is the strength of the church, said the new bishop.

"I think that people don't take the time to consider that the darkest moments in the church were also the moments of the greatest light. Because it's in those dark moments that the greatest saints came to life.

"So the church's history has a tremendous lesson for us to look at. I also think that's one strength, the history, but also the teaching of the church, the fact that we have a tradition linked to Scripture that is unbroken.

"We constantly refer back to that solid foundation of faith, faith and the fact that the church can always reform itself—not to change doctrine of dogma— but to express it in a new way.… Our greatest strength is the ability to always reform ourselves and to look forward with hope."

God is in the present moment

Present moment: We all get frustrated with life on a given day that's just part of human existence, prayer at Euch: deliver us from all anxiety. I think many people live a life of anxiety. What is anxiety" Anxiety is fear of the future. I think many people are anxious. I don't know what's coming and so I am anxious. I think many people are anxious about the church today. They are anxious about their families. They are anxious about the world. They are anxious because they are afraid. I think if we took up that practise, which is really ancient in the church, the pracrice of the present moment, of just living in the present moment. It means doing God's will. Cooking this meal. I can't cook this meal and worry about the future at the same time. You have to live now and then the anxiety's subside. The future is the future. God is only in the present moment. We live our past. Wee look to the future, but God is now, always the eternal now. And so the present moment puts me in front of God. The more we practice that, the more we realize that our life is in his hands, joyfully. It easier with time. If people would think that in very difficult times, such as the death of loved one. – Time stops. You are in front of a reality that is human death and time stops in front of that mystery. There's a mystery to life that we don't appreciate. He talked about the unexpected events, people interrupting, that can be annoying. Maybe there was a plan in that person and if I don't appreciate it, I've missed that moment.

Coming to the Diocese of Corpus Christi as bishop

"My first impressions of the Diocese of Corpus Christi are great," said the new bishop who will officially become its eighth shepherd on March 25, the Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord.

"I'm just so excited to be called the bishop of this diocese, to be here with the people and priests, religious and everybody. I am just very, very grateful. I have a tremendous love already for the city."

Bishop Mulvey said he does not consider his episcopal ordination to be a culmination of his priestly ministry, but rather a continuation.

"What's exciting about being a bishop of the church is certainly a great honor on a human level, but more so what God has given to me, that Jesus, the grace of God has given me in these 35 years of being a priest.

"Sometimes if you don't stop and reflect and look back you don't know what you have. This, just in these past two or three weeks, it has given me an incredible opportunity to reflect back and to see all that the Lord has given to me and to be thankful for that and to say now it's at the service of others and that's exciting."

Bishop Mulvey brings with him a history of parish ministry and administrative assets as well. He calls it "a balance between life and structure."

Being a pastor at a parish, working in a high school, and seminary formation work— "it's like being on the front lines with people."

With parishioners, it's knowing their joys and sorrows. It helps in getting to know what the "ins and outs of humanity are all about" and then developing a pastoral approach to people's questions and needs, including people's needs for correction and to do that in a pastoral way. "I think that learning a pastoral approach is the gift from parish life."

And then to bring that to administration, "It's not just been looking at rules," said Bishop Mulvey.

"Certainly life needs order and structures need order, but it's how we apply that order through laws of the church and guidelines of a diocese that's so important, to do it in a pastoral way so the people know that people can come to understand that the laws are there to help us, they are not there to restrict us. I think that the combining of pastoral experience and the administration is a gift that has been given to me."