By: By Jennifer Willems

Deacon Johnathan Steffen knows that prayer has power.

While practicing law in Pontiac, he started going to daily Mass at St. Mary’s Church. One morning, as he walked from his car to the church, he prayed that this would be the Mass that changed his life.

Msgr. Thomas Mack, the pastor, was the homilist that day and he talked about priestly vocations.

“I started praying about that,” Deacon Steffen said. “Six months later I entered the seminary. It really was just to have a more focused opportunity to discern the priesthood.”

He didn’t have any expectation that he would be ordained, but said he wanted to pray about it.

Deacon Steffen was familiar with changes in life’s road.

The son of the late Earl Steffen and Betty Steffen Zimmerman, he grew up in Fairbury and attended the public schools there. He earned a bachelor’s degree in education from Illinois State University in 1995 and taught English at Streator Township High School before studying law at Northern Illinois University.

While he was Christian, Deacon Steffen was not exposed to the Catholic Church until a friend invited him to Mass during those college years.

“When I went it was so different from what I was used to,” he said. “The beauty of it. It was a way of worshiping God that involved the entire person. . . . It was clear to me during the consecration where the focus of my attention was, where the Mass was leading. The mystery of the Mass itself prompted me to look more at Catholicism.”

After being received into the Catholic Church in 2004, Deacon Steffen said he was aware of a “spiritual sensitivity, a spiritual awakening, looking for direction from God.” Discerning the priesthood has given him a sense of peace he didn’t have in any of his other career choices, he said, adding that his summer assignments have helped him to get a good day-to-day perspective of what priestly life is all about.

“The number of people you can share your life with and have them share their life with you — it’s very comfortable to me,” he said. “It has united all of my experiences in the past — teaching, justice, the search for truth, law. Parish life is where everything fell into place for me.”

Not only has Deacon Steffen worked in the Office of Divine Worship with Msgr. Stanley Deptula, but he has been involved in pastoral ministry at St. Mary’s in Pontiac, Holy Cross in Champaign, St. Vincent de Paul in Peoria and Sacred Heart in Moline.

He will return to St. Mary’s in Pontiac for his first Mass on Sunday, May 27, at 10:30 a.m. There will be a reception at 3 p.m. for him and Deacon Hepner, who also claims St. Mary’s as his home parish.

Deacon Steffen’s vesting priest at the ordination liturgy will be Msgr. Mack. The homilist at his first Mass will be Msgr. Mauro Cionini, a member of the Vatican diplomatic corps and secretary to the permanent observer of the Holy See to the United Nations.