Sam Moore-Discipleship Stage

Introduction/Tell things about you, your family, your Catholic journey
My name is Sam Moore and I was born in Cedar Rapids in 1996 to Tom and Beth Moore.
Something unique about my experience growing up is that I am an only child. I lived in Cedar
Rapids my entire childhood where I attended St. Pius X Elementary School, Regis Middle
School, and Xavier High School. After graduating from Xavier in 2015 I decided to attend Iowa
State University. I studied Agronomy at Iowa State and graduated in 2019. For the four years
following graduation I put my Agronomy degree to use; working primarily as a research
associate in corn yield testing and corn breeding and continuing to attend St. Thomas Aquinas in Ames.

Our Catholic faith was always emphasized as important when I was growing up. My parents and I were parishioners at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton in Hiawatha. Although I did not appreciate it at the time, whenever we were out of town for vacation or sports tournaments, my parents made it a priority to get to Mass. My attendance of Catholic schools also made a large impact on me. To be in a place daily where prayer and study of our faith was emphasized was invaluable.

Between my parents and Catholic school, I was given a great foundation for my faith. This carried through to college where I continued to practice my faith, but really only through weekly attendance of Sunday Mass. Around early summer of 2021 I came across a clip from Bishop Barron in which an atheist that he was having a discussion with had studied Theology at Oxford. When asked why Theology is what he chose to study, considering his atheism, he said something to the effect of, “I want to know if it’s true because if it’s true it’s the most important thing”. That helped motivate me to start taking my faith, both intellectually and spiritually, much more seriously.

Where/when did your sense of call develop?
The first awareness I had that the Lord might be calling me to the priesthood was in January of
2022. It was the day after a particularly grace-filled experience in the Sacrament of
Reconciliation. I suddenly had an openness and desire for the priesthood that I had not had
previously. This was such a radical change in how I viewed the possibility of being a priest that I
knew it was something I needed to look into more deeply. After this continued for several weeks, I reached out to Fr. Kyle Digmann to begin talking about discernment. He helped to guide me in a number of ways, and as this desire endured in my heart, I finally reached a point where I was ready to commit to applying to seminary.

Were you invited by others to enter seminary?
Yes, there were a few people here and there as I was growing up who asked if I had ever
considered the priesthood. Along with this, my pastor in high school invited me to a “Priesthood: Is God Calling You?” dinner with Archbishop Jackels and Fr. Schatz, who was vocation director at that time. It was not something that I was interested in taking seriously at the time, but looking back I think some seeds were certainly planted that allowed me to be more open to the call now.

What was your main motivation in pursuing your call?
My main motivation for pursuing seminary and further discernment was to give the Lord
everything that I have in desiring to do His will. The Bible verse that keeps coming to mind
when I think and pray about why I’m pursuing this is, “Love the Lord your God with all of your
heart, and with all of your soul, and with all of your strength”-Luke 10:27. I believe that if I have
any inkling that it may be the Lord’s will that I become a priest, I need to give Him everything in
pursuing and discerning that.

Who were/are your biggest influences?
My parents as my first catechists, and in creating a Catholic environment in our home, have
certainly made a deep and lasting impact on my faith. All my pastors throughout the years,
especially Fr. Neil Manternach, Fr. Mark Ressler, and Fr. Kyle Digmann have been great
influences on me. Each, in their own unique way, has shown me a great example of living the
priesthood in service of God and his people. I’ve seen how God has worked through them in so
many ways and I desire to be an instrument of His grace just as they are.

What advice would you give other men who are discerning their call?
Really focus on developing your prayer life and getting into a good routine of spending time with the Lord. Take time every day to get away from the noise of life and listen to where God is
leading your heart. Prayer is relationship and the better relationship we have with our God, the
more easily we can know what he wants for us.

Secondly, I would recommend talking to someone about this, most likely your pastor. Having
someone who could listen to what I was feeling, thinking, and experiencing was invaluable to
me. They can ask more probing, insightful questions to help you consider things from a new
perspective and get out of your own head. Along with this they can offer advice and give some
recommendations on things to do to help with discernment.