Skrodinsky described what he
felt as being like “that whisper in
your ear” that doesn’t go away. “I felt
that calling was strong enough in me
that I wanted to try it—I needed to
try it, because if I didn’t, I’d always
be wondering” if that’s what God really had meant for him to do.
So he began collecting information from different religious orders,
and he volunteered to go to Mississippi to teach at a school run
by a religious order. He hoped “to
see whether God was calling me to
something else” besides teaching
and family life.
It didn’t turn out so well.
“I took on too much” with
teaching and coaching, and “I got
overwhelmed with the work down
there,” Skrodinsky says. He left
early, and went back to his parish
in Pennsylvania, becoming first the
director of the church’s day care
center and later working in youth
ministry.
But he kept exploring different
religious communities, trying to find
one whose charism and style seemed
to match his interests. “It was good;
I always had mail!” Skrodinsky says
with a laugh. He narrowed down the
list, then visited several communities. When he got to the Missionary
Servants—an order with a presence
in both North and South America—
“I felt at home. I felt comfortable
with the people. I felt like the mission or the charism was in line with
what I had been taught” and with
the way he wanted to serve.
The Missionary Servants sent
him to California to study philosophy, a precursor to theological
training. He lived in Orange County,
studying and doing outreach in prisons and with gangs. “It was a great
experience,” Skrodinsky says. “I was
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fortunate enough to be open to the
lives and experiences of others who
were drastically different. And probably what most helped me was the
sense that it wasn’t my role to judge
people. Ultimately they were responsible for their relationship with God
and for being forgiven. I was there
sort of to be God’s instrument in
their lives at that time,” to listen and
to speak a kind word—what he calls
“a ministry of presence.”
Call confirmed
Nearly every week he met with a
man who’s now on death row. “He
was accused of committing horrendous acts,” Skrodinsky says. Yet “I
found his faith to be very deep and
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