A Deacon’s Journey: ‘I felt God calling me to do something more for him…’

Check out this vocation story from The Marshall Independent in Minnesota: 

Travis Welsh of Ghent is experiencing those growth scenarios over the next 10 days. He and his wife, Jessica, were planning to have their third child last Saturday morning, the day Travis Welsh was due to be out of town for his last five days of retreat training for his ordination which is scheduled on Saturday.

But this is something Welsh has been called to do since he was in elementary school, and he will have an opportunity to make up the retreat time.

“In the third grade, I told my priest I was going to be a priest,” Welsh said. Of course he ended up meeting Jessica and decided to get married instead.

But the call of God on his life stayed with him.

“I was on an Emmaus Retreat and felt God calling me to do something more for him,” Welsh said. “I told God I gave him my life to use for whatever he needed, but he would have to show me because I had no idea what he wanted from me. After that, God showed me through a number of ways that he wanted me to become a deacon for him.”

The Emmaus Retreat was hosted by Holy Redeemer Church and held at the Lutheran Bible Camp on Lake Shetek. It is held annually in the fall of the year.

“Being called to serve can mean many things,” Bishop John M. LeVoir wrote in The Prairie Catholic, edited by Christine E. Clancy. “While all members of the church are called to minister to others by virtue of their baptism, some Catholics are also ordained to specific forms of ministry to serve the rest of the church.”

As an active member of St. Eloi Catholic Church, Welsh has already served as lector, extraordinary minister of communion in the church and to the homebound, Fourth Degree Knights of Columbus, confirmation teacher, marriage preparation, RCIA (Right of Christian Initiation of Adults) and Teen Talk facilitator.

“The most significant or memorable part of my diaconate formation (deacon training) was growing in knowledge of my faith that I would not have had the opportunity to do if it was not in formation,” Welsh said. “My personal relationship with God has blossomed in a way I never thought was possible.”

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