 Br. James Cuddy
I was born in Boston, MA and grew up in a big Irish family. I grew up Catholic but
just sort of went through the motions for most of my youth. I wasn't an altar
server, or really involved in our parish beyond attending Mass on most Sundays. If
you had told me during those years that I would be a professed religious in formation for
the priesthood, I would have thought that you were crazy!I attended Providence College
in Rhode Island and met the Dominican Friars there. Their preaching, teaching, and love
for the students entrusted to them really made an impression on me. It was then that I
started to realize how much a good priest can do. I got involved in Campus Ministry and
began to develop a deeper relationship with Christ. In 1998, as I approached graduation
and the completion of my Marketing degree, I discerned that God may be calling me to serve
Him as a Dominican Friar and priest.
Before entering the novitiate for the Eastern Province, I worked with an AmeriCorps
program as a wildfire fighter, teacher, carpenter, and painter. I also spent a year
working as a youth minister in South Boston, MA.
I thank God for the gift of my Dominican vocation. I have known greater peace and joy
as a friar than I had ever imagined possible. That's not to say that it has been easy
(after all, no vocation is) but it has always been right. I pray that He might give
me the strength to follow Him in the way of St. Dominic all the days of my life. |
