Father Pablo Andres Villa Jaramillo – one of six men ordained June 17 as a priest for The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington – says he first felt the call to the priesthood while on a pilgrimage and discerning whether or not he even saw a need for the Catholic faith in his life.

“I grew up in the Church, and in my teenage years, I was growing discouraged with being in the Church, for I felt like it did not make a difference in my life, nor did it give me an answer to the problems I had. I was planning to go to college and most probably leave the Church,” he said.

Father Villa, a native of Colombia, said that despite the fact that he and his family were members of the Neocatechumenal Way, “I didn’t see the need for the Church, I wanted to study music.”

The Neocatechumenal Way is a Catholic movement dedicated to adult and family faith formation. “I wanted to be like the others who could do whatever they wanted. Inside of me was a desire for the world,” Father Villa said. “I always liked music and was moving into a very bohemian world, very relaxed and nonchalant.”

It was during this time, while still a high school student and on Neocatechumenal Way pilgrimage, that the future priest said “the Lord found me.”

“There was a question mark inside me that even though I wanted to leave the Church, people from the Way are always very happy. Even though I had my life and I had my girlfriend, deep down I thought I was missing something. There was a sense of emptiness,” Father Villa said. “I said to the Lord, ‘Listen, I’m not ready to do this, but if this is what you really want me to do, then do it for me.’”

After that, Father Villa said, “I remember praying, and I felt very much at peace. God marked the way clearly. My girlfriend told me, ‘if you were leaving me because of another woman, I would fight against this, but I am not going to fight against God.’”

The son of Ramon Villa and Lucero Jaramillo, Father Villa, 32, has two brothers – one who is married and expecting his first child, and other who is not married.

“In the community, God helped me to rediscover the beauty of the Church and of a life of faith. With the help of the community and by participating in different pilgrimages, I found my vocation to the priesthood,” Father Villa said. “Getting to know some missionary priests, seminarians, and laymen from the Neocatechumenal Way, ... I thought ‘if they are willing to be sent around like that all the time, and be happy, I want to have whatever it is that they have.’ I wanted to have a taste of that kind of freedom.”

During his time of preparation for the priesthood, Father Villa spent three years in the Holy Land, working at a house for pilgrims near the Sea of Galilee and the Mount of Beatitudes. “This gave me a special perspective on Holy Scripture and on the places of the Bible, and while being there, I also learned modern Hebrew,” he said.

“It was beautiful. I loved it. It was a time when I discovered the humanity of Jesus – to see that I am not following a ghost or an ideology, but real man who lived and laughed and walked and died,” Father Villa said. “The Holy Land is like the fifth Gospel – it puts everything in a different light. You understand things that you cannot understand just by reading.”

Following his ordination, Father Villa celebrated his first Mass on June 18 at the Church of the Nativity in Washington, D.C. And, as he embarks on his own priestly mission, Father Villa said he is inspired by the pastor of his childhood parish Nuestra Señora del Pilar in Buga in Colombia’s Valle del Cauca department.

“Father Melquisedec Salcedo, was the most frequent contact I had with a priest when growing up because he was for many years the pastor of my parish in Colombia, Father Villa said. “There was a priest who has always very happy. I thought, ‘How could he be happy without a wife, without children and always giving to the Church?’ But he was.”

As he prepared for the priesthood, Father Villa said he discovered that “God will not take anything   away from you.”

“At first, I thought that God was going to steal something from me –I wanted to travel, study music and languages. And yet, here I was involved in music for the seminary, I speak Italian and English and Spanish and Hebrew, and I have been all over the world,” Father Villa said. “I learned God wants to give more to you than you expect – and in a way that will make you much happier than you could ever know.”