By Charly SHELTON

In a season of graduations, a local resident is celebrating a milestone of faith and dedication. Thomas Roide graduated as a Catholic priest from St. John’s Seminary in Camarillo.

“It’s exciting. I’ve been something like a perpetual student for a long time, so now exciting that I get to enter into ministry and start work. [I’ll] be able to be in people’s lives and journey with them through all of their joys and sorrows and everything that goes with that,” Fr. Roide said. “It’s a very exciting time to be able to do that and start ministry because there are so many different opportunities, so many different ways to engage and encounter people. I’m very excited to get started in the community of Los Nietos.”

Fr. Roide has been assigned to serve the community of Los Nietos in Whittier through Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church. After ordination at the Los Angeles Cathedral on June 2, Fr. Roide headed out on a much-needed road trip vacation with a classmate during his break before taking up his post on July 1.

Fr. Roide graduated from St. John’s Seminary in Camarillo but prior to that he was a cardiology student and attended Crescenta Valley schools.

“I’ve been in La Crescenta my whole life. I was born at Verdugo Hills Hospital and I went through all the [local] public schools – Dunsmore Elementary, Rosemont Middle School and Crescenta Valley High,” Fr. Roide said. “[I have deep] gratitude for all the experiences that I’ve had in Crescenta Valley and in La Crescenta, and all the people who have been a part of my life, who supported me and crafted – in direct and indirect ways – my journey to this very point in my life. [I’m] so grateful to all those people and the entire community of La Crescenta, and a big special shout-out to all of my church family at St. James [the Less] who’ve been there for me in prayers and support.”

Fr. Roide said he was called to this life with a desire to help people. When his premed college career left him unfulfilled, he entered seminary.

“I always knew that my life would be geared towards helping people. It’s something that I always recognized in myself, and priesthood was just a unique way to be able to help people; perhaps really, in a metaphysical sense, to be able to engage people in the spiritual,” Fr. Roide said. “I wanted to be there for people in those hard parts of their lives. How does someone deal with death? How does someone deal with suffering? And to be able to answer the bigger, transcendental questions, to provide some semblance of hope and just to be there in those moments – that was something I felt myself called to. But for myself, it’s something that God is ministering through me in a very special way and, as well, He can use me as an instrument to minister to other people.”

  Charly Shelton