Father’s Day weekend in June 2024 was especially joyful, and especially fitting, for The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington, as Cardinal Wilton Gregory ordained 16 new priests for the archdiocese, the largest ordination class since 1960.
In his homily at the Mass of Priesthood Ordination, Cardinal Gregory said priests must continue to develop and deepen that vocation, centering their lives on prayer and the sacraments. The priesthood, he said, reflects the mystery of how “God loves each of us unconditionally and calls us into His friendship.”
Concluding his homily, Cardinal Gregory said, “It takes an entire lifetime to complete a priestly vocation… May the Lord who has begun such good work in you bring it to fulfillment.”
Since his own ordination to the priesthood in 1973, he has lived that vocation. And since he was ordained as a bishop in 1983, supporting vocations to the priesthood, the permanent diaconate and consecrated life has been a key part of Cardinal Gregory’s ministry, most recently while serving as the archbishop of Washington from 2019 until Pope Francis announced on Jan. 6, 2025 that he accepted his resignation, which the cardinal had been required by Church law to submit when he turned 75 on Dec. 7, 2022. Also on Jan. 6, 2025, Pope Francis named Cardinal Robert McElroy as the new archbishop of Washington, and he will be installed on March 11.
“Cardinal Gregory has been a huge supporter of the seminarians by his generosity and by his wonderful priestly example, and by spending time with the seminarians,” said Father Carter Griffin, rector of the archdiocese’s St. John Paul II Seminary in Washington.
As the archbishop of Washington, Cardinal Gregory regularly visited the seminary to celebrate opening and closing Masses for each school year, and he celebrated Masses there for the Oct. 22 feast day of Pope St. John Paul II, that seminary’s patron saint. The cardinal also celebrated Christmas Masses for seminarians at the archdiocese’s Redemptoris Mater Seminary in Hyattsville, Maryland, and he would give formation talks for the seminarians from both places, and stay for dinner with them. In one of the formation talks, he spoke on the virtue of hope and on priestly friendship.
“Every time he came, seminarians would comment how warm and paternal he was, and they truly felt his love,” Father Griffin said.
Cardinal Gregory also celebrated an annual Seminarian Family Day Mass for seminarians and their families, and he would join them at dinner and thank the families for their love and support and faith that had inspired their sons to pursue a vocation to the priesthood.
During his years as the archbishop of Washington, Cardinal Gregory ordained 51 new priests for the Archdiocese of Washington, including 16 men ordained in 2024, six priests in 2023, 10 priests in 2022, one priest in 2021, eight priests in 2020 and 10 in 2019. The Archdiocese of Washington currently has 280 priests, including 218 active priests and 62 retired priests, and 63 seminarians studying for the priesthood.
Father Mark Ivany, the director of priest vocations for the Archdiocese of Washington, praised Cardinal Gregory’s priestly example. In addition to the Masses, talks and dinners with the seminarians, the cardinal also celebrated Masses for the annual retreat for men discerning a vocation to the priesthood.
“He just loves being a priest, and you can tell,” said Father Ivany. “Whether at a specific vocations event or (when) preaching about the priesthood, it’s just very genuine. It’s everything when it comes to promoting vocations. People are drawn to something that’s authentic.”
Deacon Don Longano, the director of the Office for the Permanent Diaconate, also praised the support that the cardinal has shown to permanent deacons.
“Cardinal Gregory had a deep and abiding support, friendship and fraternity with his permanent deacons and their wives,” he said. He also noted how the cardinal shared “his wisdom and insights to help us in our ministry as permanent deacons.”
The cardinal ordained 12 new permanent deacons for the Archdiocese of Washington in 2023, and has presided at those ordinations that are held every other year. In addition, he has celebrated annual Masses for deacons and their wives and joined them for dinner. Permanent or transitional deacons served with the cardinal at Masses, proclaiming the gospel and assisting at the altar.
“It’s our privilege and blessing to serve him at all the major Masses at the cathedral and basilica, and when he leads Masses at parishes,” Deacon Longano said, adding, “We are very grateful for his leadership and the friendship he extended to us. He’s also such a pastoral shepherd for the people of God in our beloved archdiocese.”
Currently, 189 permanent deacons are active in and outside the Archdiocese of Washington, and 34 deacons are fully retired.
Cardinal Gregory is also known for his steadfast support for women and men in consecrated life, said Anne-Elisabeth Giuliani, the Archdiocese of Washington’s Delegate for Consecrated Life.
“He understands the complexity of a life given to Christ, because he understands it through his own priesthood and his long experience of being responsible for seminarians as a bishop,” she said.
Giuliani noted how Cardinal Gregory celebrates an annual Mass in February for religious marking milestone anniversaries, and gives personal attention to each jubilarian.
The Archdiocese of Washington includes 560 men in consecrated life living in about 50 communities or individually, and about 400 women in consecrated life living in 70 communities or individually.
Sixteen parishes in the archdiocese are administered by religious orders of men, and eight Catholic high schools here are run by a religious order. Men and women in consecrated life are engaged in a variety of ministries, including education, health care, service to the poor, outreach to immigrants, prayer and retreats.
“It’s very, very diverse. He has been able to support charisms in their diversity,” Giuliani said, noting the cardinal’s concerns for the spiritual and human needs of women and men in consecrated life with varied ministries and serving diverse cultures.
Cardinal Gregory, she said, also has presided at the profession of vows and at Masses marking milestone anniversaries for religious communities.
“He’s very present at all the important moments in their lives,” Giuliani said.
In 2021, the cardinal celebrated a 150th anniversary Mass for the Little Sisters of the Poor, who began serving the elderly poor in the nation’s capital just after the Civil War, and in 2024, he celebrated an anniversary Mass for the 225th anniversary of Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School in Washington, founded by the Visitation Sisters in 1799 as the first Catholic girls’ school in the new United States of America.
SOAR! (Support Our Aging Religious) – a group founded in 1986 by laypeople to meet the needs of aging Catholic sisters, brothers and priests in the United States – presented its Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton Award to Cardinal Gregory in 2023.
Cardinal Gregory – who was elevated to the College of Cardinals in 2020 by Pope Francis, becoming the first African American cardinal – noted the impact of the Adrian Dominican sisters who taught him at St. Carthage School in Chicago and who “helped my family shape my life, nurture my desire as an elementary schooler to become Catholic and then they walked with me in my enduring interest in becoming a priest.”
He said that over the years, many other religious congregations shaped his life, including the Religious Sisters of Mercy, the Adorers of the Blood of Christ and the Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary. “They have tried to make me a better man and a better priest, and their work is not over yet!” the cardinal joked.
