As a child, Deacon Daniel Reuwer dreamed about being a priest. He built a cross out of Legos and stood in front of it to “celebrate Mass” for his family — “including complete homilies,” he said.
He will realize his childhood dream June 4 when he is ordained a priest.
The oldest of six children in a military family, Deacon Reuwer, 30, was born in Maryland but grew up in a lot of places, including England and Naples, Italy. Although his family recently moved, he still considers his home parish St. William of York in Stafford, where he taught middle school religion and social studies for two years while discerning his vocation.
The call grew in his teen years, after he “encountered the Lord in the Eucharist on a retreat” at age 14. The experience “was so palpable and real that I knew it was the Lord, and it demanded a response. Jesus was real, he loved me and wanted me to be a priest.”
He attended Belmont Abbey College in Belmont, N.C., where he studied theology and government. He dated a girl who shared his deep faith and, for the first time, he thought about the possibility of marriage. While discerning whether to apply to seminary, he accepted the job at St. William of York School, and was surprised how much he enjoyed it. He also got to know students’ families, and some began inviting him to dinner “and asking questions about the faith. I found that so life-giving,” he said. It reminded him of how his parents invited priests to their home over the years when he was a child.
Life was good, but he knew he owed it to himself to pursue the pull toward the priesthood. His girlfriend agreed: If God was calling him to seminary, “she didn’t want to get in the way of that,” he said. They parted, and he was ready to apply to the seminary, but his spiritual advisers told him to take another year to pray about it.
“Everything was up in the air for a whole year,” he said, and he prayed a lot. “I learned to rely on (God), and when I went to seminary, I really went,” he added. “I found such peace there, I knew I was supposed to be there. The love you receive from God in prayer is real, and I knew that God could power me through.”
He said it’s been amazing to see “God use me as an instrument in ways I didn’t expect. I’m super excited to be a priest and to see what God’s going to come up with next.”
He will be assigned as parochial vicar of All Saints Parish in Manassas.
