Detroit — It was only a difference of 15 minutes, but it led to a life-changing vocation with the Capuchin friars.

When Zoilo “Zoy” Garibay decided about 10 years ago that he wanted to try to deepen his prayer life and grow closer to God while discerning a vocation to the religious life, he decided to start attending daily Mass.

When he searched the Internet for the earliest Mass he could make it to after getting off his night-shift job, he found was a 7:45 a.m. Mass at St. Bonaventure Monastery on Mount Elliott Avenue. That was a quarter-hour earlier than any offered at any of the parish churches he had checked.

“My shift as a registered nurse at Henry Ford Hospital ended at 7 a.m., and I would be out of the hospital by about 7:20, so I figured why have to wait around somewhere until 8 o’clock,” said Bro. Garibay, now a Capuchin friar studying for the priesthood.

Although he knew about St. Francis of Assisi and had encountered Franciscan in his native Philippines, he knew nothing of the Capuchin branch of the Franciscans. But he had driven past St. Bonaventure Monastery on his way to the Immigration office on East Jefferson at Mount Elliott.

The friars had a strong and lasting impact on him from his first visit.

“When I walked through the big doors of the monastery, the lights were still off in the chapel, even though it was already 7:40,” Bro. Garibay recalled.“But then I noticed a light coming from a room off the main chapel, which turned out to be the small chapel where that early Mass would be celebrated. And what I could see through the door was one friar sitting very prayerfully in his habit, waiting for the Mass to start. He seemed to have such a spiritual aura about him.”

When Fr. Patrick McSherry, OFM Cap., the celebrant, welcomed him after the Mass, it helped him decide he would be coming back.

“I was impressed by how hospitable they were; it is one of the charisms that endeared the Capuchins to me,” Bro. Garibay said.

And he did keep coming back for daily Mass after work.

“I’d even go on my days off, and sometimes pray at the tomb of Fr. Solanus Casey or spend time before the Blessed Sacrament,” he added.

Bro. Garibay said he also conferred with the pastor of his parish, Our Lady Queen of Peace in Harper Woods, Fr. James Bilot, who encouraged him. (Fr. Bilot later served as vocation director for the archdiocese, and is now pastor of Divine Child Parish in Dearborn.)

After about a year, the Capuchins’ vocation director, Fr. Rob Roemer, invited him to join the friars once a week for supper and their community prayers. And when he was invited to become a candidate, “I decided to give it a try.”

He was accepted as a postulant in August 2004, and did his year of postulancy at a house of formation in Chicago, followed by a year of novitiate in Pittsburgh. He returned to Detroit to make his temporary vows in 2006.

Since 2007 Bro. Zoy has been in Chicago studying for the priesthood at the Catholic Theological Union, a graduate theology school sponsored by about two dozen religious orders.

“God willing, I will graduate in 2012 and be ordained a deacon, then be ordained to the priesthood in 2013,” he said.

To Bro. Garibay, the Eucharist is “the focal point of the life of a priest and all who claim to be followers of Christ — the fountain from which we draw our inspiration, our strength and life.”

That the priest should be the instrument of God’s grace in bringing the Eucharist to the people is a wondrous thing, in Bro. Garibay’s view.

“I am constantly reminded that I must let my thoughts, my actions, reflect the will of God,” he said.

“It’s as St. Ambrose says, ‘Receive what you become, and become what you receive,’” he added.

Looking forward to his priestly ordination, Bro. Garibay said he will, of course, go wherever his superior sends him “to build up the Kingdom of God.”

He said his hope, however, is “to minister in the Detroit area and make use of my nursing skills, perhaps to add a healthcare dimension to the services offered at the Capuchin Soup Kitchen.”

Asked for his advice to a young person considering a vocation to the religious life, Bro. Garibay said, “I’d tell them to consult with their pastor or spiritual director and to really give it a try — God deserves a chance.”