Originally published at National Catholic Register
The day of Pope Francis’ life-changing experience also happened to be the day the Church celebrates the feast of St. Matthew, the tax collector whom Jesus called to become an apostle.
Seventy-one years ago, on Sept. 21, 1953, a young Jorge Mario Bergoglio’s priestly vocation was born. He would enter the novitiate of the Society of Jesus on March 11, 1958, and be ordained a priest on Dec. 13, 1969, just days before his 33rd birthday. On March 13, 2013, he would be elected pope.
In a homily given in May 2013, Pope Francis shared the story of when he felt the stirrings of the call to the priesthood: “I passed by the parish where I was going, found a priest, whom I did not know, and felt the need to go to confession. This was an experience of encounter: I found that someone was waiting for me.”
The pope explained that he didn’t know why he felt so called to go to confession, especially since he didn’t know the priest. After confession, he felt “that something had changed.”
“I was not the same. I had heard something like a voice, a call: I was convinced that I should
