Do you think that you might be receiving a call to the priesthood or religious life?

Contact Fr. Norm Carroll at the Vocations Office of the Diocese of Wilmington at vocations@cdow.org or call him at (302) 573-3113 or contact our own Fr. John Solomon at pastor@stmaryholysavior.com or call him at (410) 289-0652 to begin the discernment process today.

What is Holy Orders?

Holy Orders is the sacrament through which the mission entrusted by Christ to his apostles continues to be exercised in the Church until the end of time, thus it is the sacrament of apostolic ministry. It includes three degrees: episcopate, presbyterate, and diaconate.

The essential rite of the Sacrament of Holy Orders for all three degrees consists in the bishop’s imposition of hands on the head of the ordinand and in the bishop’s specific consecratory prayer asking God for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit and his gifts proper to the ministry to which the candidate is being ordained.