Pedro Figueiredo
Management Alumnus 2010-14
After finishing my business degree, I entered the Seminário maior de Caparide in 2014, taking a chance on what I felt was a "calling", a vocation to be a priest.
What led you to follow a different path?
It was unexpected, really. When I entered the Catholic University, I wasn't even a practicing Catholic. After a Country Mission in February 2011, I started attending the university chaplaincy, as well as a parish in the center of Lisbon. But it was much more than that. It was the experience of beginning a great search for the meaning of life, which I found in Jesus Christ. The seriousness of the journey made me get to know the Church in a broader dimension. After many experiences of pilgrimages, missions and growth in faith, I ended up falling in love with the Catholic Church and began to glimpse the possibility of giving myself entirely to God in this way. The challenges of the academic journey continued and tested me in every way: human, psychological, intellectual and spiritual maturity. The path led to a completely new outlook on life. From going out at night and living a more “bohemian” lifestyle, I started praying, attending church, going to Mass and preaching the importance of praying the rosary. I was absolutely passionate about it. While I was studying, I changed my lifestyle substantially. My parents' reaction to my conversion to Catholicism was good on the part of my mother and bad on the part of my father. Then, when I entered the Major Seminary, it was good on both sides. Of course, my mother didn't find it so funny that I was leaving home so soon. In other words, the roles were reversed a little. Almost all of my friends were very enthusiastic because they realized that this was what made me happiest and, above all, many understood this call to a vocation as a priest. There were many obstacles. It's a risk, going to the seminary. Because everything can go well, or not. The community I had supporting me both at university and in the parish helped me a lot. And, above all, my family, who always supported me even when I didn't understand.
His “C Side” Today
I currently have three assignments: vicar-parish priest of two parishes in Olivais and chaplain of the CUF Descobertas Hospital. On a day-to-day basis, I have the challenges of a city parish with a good number of children in catechesis, two youth groups (one with around 50 kids, the other with 15), and I also accompany the youth ministry of all the parishes around here, where we do - roughly - one activity a month. I have the day-to-day challenges of two parishes with around 20,000 inhabitants: baptisms, funerals and sacraments (Masses and confessions, essentially). Accompanying couples' teams, scout groups, parish prayer and Christian life groups (of which there are many), organizing pilgrimages and nights of prayer, etc. On top of all this, I also have the challenge of being chaplain to a hospital where around 5,000 people pass through every day. From accompanying health professionals to caring closely for patients and their families who, for obvious reasons, are going through moments of greater fragility and vulnerability. In this hospital we also have many births of babies. And some families ask for a pre- and post-birth blessing.
My experience at Católica was decisive because it was thanks to the University that the faith I received developed and the great group of friends was created.
The impact I feel I'm having is absolutely brutal, much greater than I ever thought. Not because it's me, but because I'm a sign of God in people's lives. Every day I realize the greatness that passes through my hands, either because people entrust me with what is most intimate and vulnerable in them, or because what I transmit to them is eternity. It's something that doesn't depend on me at all. On my side, my presence is enough, and Jesus does the rest through my hands.
Final reflection
Resilience, above all. I have to confess that, around 2012, my interests had changed completely. So I went to talk to the university chaplain at the time. I told him I wanted to go to seminary. He gave me a good answer, totally disarming me: "Okay, I can see that you want to go to seminary. But is that God's will for you now? Have you thought about asking Jesus Christ in prayer?" And after this punch in the stomach, I decided to do it. And I soon realized that I needed to finish a course that was so hard for me. Because it was difficult, and because my interests lay in other subjects. This became fundamental in order to grow as a person in the human maturity that needed to be developed.