Mr. Jacob Ramos was ordained to the Diaconate in a Mass of Ordination on Thursday, May 27, at the Cathedral of St. Patrick, Norwich.
Deacon Lawrence Barile, who was ordained last year, called the Elect, Jacob Ramos, forward during the Rite of Ordination before the Most Reverend Michael R. Cote, Bishop of Norwich.
“We all rejoice with you and congratulate you for your generosity and readiness to offer your life to the Lord’s Church,” Bishop Cote told Mr. Ramos during his homily, while both men sat facing each other at the altar.
A deacon, an ordained minister of the Catholic Church, is a minister of the Word, proclaiming the Gospel, preaching and teaching in the name of the Church. They are also ministers of the Sacraments, baptizing, leading the faithful in prayer, witnessing marriages, and conducting wake and funeral services.
“Jacob will draw strength from the gift of the Holy Spirit in order to be an effective helper to his bishop and the body of priests of the Diocese as a minister of the Word, altar and charity,” Bishop Cote said. “Through his ordination he will become a member of the hierarchy of the Church, in the grade of Deacon.”
During the Promise of the Elect, Mr. Ramos was questioned by Bishop Cote and declared before the people his intention to undertake the office of Deacon. Then, Mr. Ramos knelt before Bishop Cote and placed his joined hands between those of the Bishop in the promise of obedience and respect.
During the Litany of Supplication, Mr. Ramos prostrated himself face down before the altar, while the litany was sung. Then, he again knelt before Bishop Cote, who performed the Laying on of Hands, the gesture that signifies divine power being conferred on the Elect.
Following the Bishop’s prayer of ordination, the newly ordained Deacon received a diaconal stole and a dalmatic from Father Michael Bovino. Finally, vested as Deacon, Reverend Mr. Ramos received the Book of Gospels from the Bishop.
Deacon Ramos is originally from Meriden, where he lived with his parents, Noel and Wilma and older brother, Victor. While attending the University of Connecticut for an undergraduate degree, he felt the Lord planted the seeds of priestly service in his heart and gave him spiritual roots in the Diocese of Norwich.
“Living in a vibrant student community of peers seeking after Christ and a life of happiness and holiness was the community that helped me hear the Lord’s call. I was excited to see where Christ was leading me,” he said.
After graduation he tested the call to religious life with the Dominican Order. “It was there that my prayer life grew and a great deepening of my relationship with Jesus happened during my Novitiate year. During that time the Lord made clear He was calling me toward a priestly vocation, not in a religious order, in the Diocese of Norwich.”
In the fall of 2016 he began attending Mount St Mary’s Seminary as a seminarian of Norwich. “During the years of seminary formation, I have been constantly learning more about myself and the path Jesus has been leading me on,” Deacon Ramos said. “In this time of self-reflection and actualization I have done my best to reveal to the Lord and the Church who I am. That way, in full freedom and having stepped into the light of truth I could say to the Lord and the Church, ‘behold me; this is Jacob Ramos, his faults and failings, his triumphs and joys, his striving after holiness by the grace of God.’”
- Ryan Blessing
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