The Priestly Formation program at Casa Jesús consists of five different components: Spiritual, Psychosocial, Academic, Pastoral, and Community.

Spiritual: The spiritual dimension of the program includes daily morning and night prayer in community, daily Eucharistic celebrations and two retreats a year. The aspirant is also expected to develop his personal prayer life and relationship with God through on going spiritual direction, commitment to self-development as a response to a personal call from God, involving growth in faith, prayer and discernment.

Psychosocial or human: The program at casa Jesus enhances participant’s psychological and social growth through psycho educational reflections. This program’s area encourages each participant’s self discovery as social human beings with cultural and psychological strengths and weaknesses.

Pastoral: Each aspirant is assigned to one of the Hispanic parishes of the Archdiocese for pastoral work on the weekends. He is supervised by one of the parish priests and is expected to be involved in a least three ongoing ministries at the parish. At the end of the year an evaluation is completed by the supervisor, parish staff and parishioners. Each candidate participates in the priestly formation program which includes a weekly session focusing on themes of: inculturation, characteristics of a diocesan priest, theological reflection, personal witness of priests, and vocational discernment. This program includes visits to different parishes throughout the Archdiocese.

Academic: The aspirants study in the Tutorium for Intensive English at the University of Illinois. The program is designed to enable highly motivated individuals to quickly and effectively acquire the language skills necessary to meet their professional and academic goals. The program offers three sessions per year. Classes during the fall and spring sessions meet for 13 weeks, 20 hours a week. Summer session classes meet for 10 weeks, 25 hours a week. To assist them in their studies, the aspirants spend two hours a week in English conversation with volunteers. Once aspirants have acquired enough fluency in English, they begin academic studies at St. Joseph Seminary or Mundelein Seminary.

Community: The aspirants live in community at Casa Jesus with the priests in residence. There is a weekly community meeting to address the concerns of living together, weekly recreational time and periodic social events. Each aspirant has a responsibility within the house which includes jobs such as: director of spiritual life, supervisor of household cleaning, and grocery shopping. There is also a peer evaluation process and periodic conferences with the director.

Click here to download biography form