CHICAGO (OSV News) ─ The Augustinians, Pope Leo XIV's religious order, have a newly elected prior provincial for their Midwest province, a position the pope held from 1999-2001.
Augustinian Father Tom McCarthy was elected prior provincial of the Chicago-based Province of Our Mother of Good Counsel Dec. 22, in a vote by 73 friars from the Midwest, Canada and the Chulacanas Vicariate of northern Peru, according to the province secretary.
"It was kind of surreal in a way," Father McCarthy said in describing his election. "You know, I've always looked to the provincial, but I never thought I'd be the provincial. And I was very honored and humbled that my brothers entrusted me (with) this responsibility. And my ministry is to them."
He reiterated his "main ministry" was "to the friars, the people and the institutions" that the Midwest Augustinians serve. As with all mendicant orders, they go where they are needed, he explained, pointing out that in 1244 when the Augustinian order was founded, it was among the first orders to leave its monasteries and serve the people directly.
Father McCarthy told OSV News that "servicing and building community" ─ a strong charism of the order ─ are a priority in the Augustinians' mendicant work.
"I think as provincial, the exciting part is I get to help lead that. … Something that I'm going to do is encourage us to really look, to really go to our roots and say, 'How can we serve and who needs to be served,'" said the priest, who takes over the prior provincial role in June when the current prior provincial, Father Tony Pizzo, steps down.
Father McCarthy, currently the Midwest Augustinians vocations director, was stepping off a plane to meet with a potential discerner when OSV News caught up with him by phone.
"As provincial, vocations are a priority," he said. "So if I stay involved, that would not be odd. It would be very appropriate because vocations and our young friars are the priority of the provincial. … in general. But I'm going to make it a very, very vocal part of who I am."
This is a priority in an order whose numbers have dwindled due to an aging population combined with an ongoing worldwide decline in interest in the priesthood and religious life.
Especially in these months, since Pope Leo, a Chicago native, was elected pontiff, "vocations are on an uptick," he said.
"I think he's really someone who has opened the door for people to understand who the Augustinians are," said Father McCarthy, 60.
Father McCarthy grew up in the Marquette Park neighborhood of Chicago's Southwest Side, where the Midwest Augustinians primarily serve. He went to St. Rita High School, graduating in the class of '83. He is director of community relations at St. Rita High and also Shrine Chapel director there. He has been in vocations for the Midwest for the last 14 years.
He entered the order immediately after high school, before starting college at Villanova University where he majored in communication arts. A former teacher at St. Rita and the Augustinian-run Providence High School in the southwest suburbs, he also holds a master's in education from Lewis University, a Catholic school in the Chicago suburb of Romeoville.
Father McCarthy completed a master of divinity at Catholic Theological Union, the Chicago-based seminary that the American Augustinians, including Pope Leo, have attended since the 1970s. He professed solemn vows with the Order of St. Augustine in 1993 and was ordained a priest a year later.
Father McCarthy regularly gives parish missions and holds retreats in the Chicago-area and around the country. Throughout all of his years with the order, he got to know his brother and close friend, then-Father Robert F. Prevost, now Pope Leo.
In talking about the "Pope Leo effect" on the order, Father McCarthy said when people first meet him they say, "'Oh, you're an Augustinian. Oh, you're like the pope!' So, what he's done is really just made it a public thing now about who the Augustinians are. We have people who did not know who we were, who now know who we are."
"Vocation-wise, it's certainly getting more people to look at us," he said. "But generally, it's just seeing the good works and I think it's really having more people look into who St. Augustine is, and his writings. I think that's really happening."
Father McCarthy said this has been helped by the pope's frequent reference to St. Augustine's teachings when he speaks or celebrates Mass.
"And, young people are seeing, 'Wow, this is something that I want to be a part of.' It's pretty exciting, that way," he said.
But as the new leader, or officially the prior-elect, of the Midwest province of about 60 friars, with three seminarians and several novices who have a way to go yet before professing solemn vows, he was looking to the near future.
"So, we'd like to do more, but you can only do with what you have. So we have to be patient," he said.
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Simone Orendain is an OSV News correspondent. She writes from Chicago.
