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PARMA, Ohio — The Eparchy of Parma gained a new priest May 5, with the presbyteral ordination of Father Nathan Daniel Adams at the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist.
Bishop Milan Lach, SJ, of Parma ordained Father Adams during the afternoon Divine Liturgy, attended by faithful and priests of the eparchy.
Some of Father Adams’ classmates at the Byzantine Catholic Seminary of Sts. Cyril and Methodius in Pittsburgh, as well as some seminary faculty and the abbot of Holy Resurrection Monastery in St. Nazianz, Wisconsin, where Father Adams and his wife, Ali, were received into the Byzantine Catholic Church in 2013, were also in attendance.
Father Adams discovered his desire to enter the Catholic Church during his seminary studies for the Anglican Church in Nashotah, Wisconsin.
“This day means a lot for both Ali and I,” Father Adams told Horizons after the ordination. “When we first met each other and got married we both desired to be missionaries. So this (ordination) is really the fulfillment of what we’ve long been training for — to bring the Word of God to the world.
“This is an opportunity I believe that Christ has decided to give us out of his great kindness, that is, to be a part of what he is doing to bring his name and his presence to others,” he said.
Father Adams’ road to the Byzantine Catholic priesthood was a somewhat long and winding path, but the beacon, he said, was the search for truth and a firm belief that God was calling him to ministry.
“It’s been frustrating at times,” he admitted, “but well worth the perseverance to find the truth.”
Father Adams was born in Simi Valley, California, July 15, 1982. Upon earning his high school diploma from Monte Vista Independent Learning Academy, he volunteered as a missionary in Australia and Samoa with the organization Youth With A Mission.
Prior to his departure, he met Ali, his best friend’s sister and the young woman he would eventually marry. She left with the same group to Fiji.
“When we returned, we got to know each other and both of us decided to go to Bible college together,” Father Adams told Horizons.
They attended Calvary Chapel Bible College in Murrieta, California, and spent their third semester in York, England, where they got engaged.
They were married three years later in 2004, and are now parents to five girls, aged 10, 8, 5, 3 and 1.
Convinced of his call to ministry, he pursued graduate studies in theology at Reformed Theological Seminary and The Master Seminary. In the process, he worked a myriad of jobs, including in security, as a college instructor, a dairy farm worker, and an outreach intern at a mega church. He eventually moved his family to the Midwest to enroll at Nashotah House Theological Seminary in Nashotah, Wisconsin, to be trained for the priesthood in the Anglican Church.
However, his long-held interest and study of the Church Fathers led him to seek out the monks of Holy Resurrection Monastery, who also had moved to Wisconsin from California at about the same time.
“Thinking they were Orthodox, I went to visit them when I was at Nashotah,” he said. “I was studying to be a minister for the Anglicans. I actually completed the training and even got a certificate in Anglican Studies. However, my heart was always in the East and I desired to be in communion with the saints I was reading. Abbot Nicholas was my spiritual father, so it made sense that once we made the jump (to Catholicism) it was to the Byzantine Church.”
Three months prior to his priestly ordination in the Anglican Church, Father Adams decided to embrace the Eastern Catholic faith. Both he and Ali were received into the Byzantine Catholic Church at Holy Resurrection Monastery in 2013.
After all he had experienced in his spiritual journey, his discernment to the Eastern Catholic priesthood was clear to him, he said.
“I had long believed God was calling me to full-time ministry, since I became a Christian at age 16 actually, which is why I was at so many seminaries. I was just never satisfied with what I was being offered,” he said. “Turns out, I wanted the ancient faith.”
He petitioned Bishop John Kudrick, then bishop of Parma, and was admitted to the Byzantine Catholic Seminary of Sts. Cyril and Methodius in Pittsburgh for the eparchy; he was ordained a deacon last December.
Father Adams said he is very grateful for “all of the support” he and his family received from the eparchy during his studies. “We are very blessed to serve in this eparchy,” he said.
The 36-year-old priest will celebrate his first Divine Liturgy at the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Parma May 19. His first pastoral assignment, he said, will be at St. Mary Byzantine Catholic Parish and School in Cleveland, where he is set to begin after he and his family move from Pittsburgh in early June.
Caption 1: Father Nathan Adams poses with his wife, Ali, and five daughters after his priestly ordination at the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Parma, Ohio, May 5.
Caption 2: Bishop Milan Lach, SJ, of Parma (right) blesses the congregation after the priestly ordination of Father Nathan Adams (left) at the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Parma, Ohio, May 5. The new 36-year-old priest will serve at St. Mary Byzantine Catholic Parish and School in Cleveland, starting in June.
Caption 3: Father Nathan Adams anoints his eldest daughter after his priestly ordination at the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Parma, Ohio, May 5. (All photos: David Bratnick)
As published in Horizons, May 12, 2019.
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