Originally published at Southern Cross
SAN DIEGO — Brother James Lockman, OFM, serves as advisor to the Diocese of San Diego’s Creation Care Ministry.
The 71-year-old Franciscan was born in Santa Monica. Brother Lockman entered the Order of Friars Minor in 1981 in Portland, Oregon. He professed his first vows in 1984 at Mission Santa Barbara and his perpetual vows in Oakland in 1987.
He holds a bachelor’s degree in Botany and a master’s degree in Environmental Horticulture from the University of California, Davis, as well as a master’s in Theology from the Franciscan School of Theology.
Question: What role did the Catholic faith play during your formative years?
Answer: I was baptized Catholic as an infant, was an altar boy for four or five years, and went to Catholic school all the way through high school. I was a seventh-grader when the Second Vatican Council concluded in 1965, so, in my youth, I had one foot in the pre-Vatican II era and the other foot post-Vatican II.
When did you first encounter the Franciscans?
It was in 1966. I was 14 years old and a Boy Scout. I had set out to earn a Catholic Scouting emblem called Ad Altare Dei. One of the things that I had
