In the Catholic Church, there are priests and deacons, as well as Bishops, Cardinals, etc. For this edition, I am interviewing Deacon William Necessary, who lives in Tyler, Texas. (note: Deacon Necessary sent me his answers as an audio file, so they are summarized from that.)
1.What was your childhood like? I was born in 1963 in Jacksonville, FL, and moved to Texas 4 years later. I grew up in Tyler, 90 miles west of Dallas. I was an only child. My dad worked for the Maytag Co. and we were transferred there. My family was not church-going people, nor were they even Catholic. My father was baptized in the Appalachian mountains, but my mother was not baptized until I was ordained and then I did it, shortly before she passed away. I grew up in East Texas in the 70’s and 80’s, starting public school in 1976. My parents were displeased with Tyler’s public schools, and I was sent to Catholic school instead, having heard of their reputation for better education. This made me fall in love with the Church, and I graduated in 1982, when I was baptized and made my first communion. So I was a convert from basically nothing.
2. Why did you pursue the deaconate? Ever since I was in high school, I have always been prone to do service and things for other people. When I became Catholic and went to college and became involved in Campus ministry, I had a desire to serve the church. All through college I was involved in extraordinary ministry and was an altar server, as well as lector and usher. When I was about to graduate from college, that small campus group was holding a rosary on the First Tuesday of every month. At that time, the diocese of Tyler had just been created, and the local news had sent out a reporter, who became my wife in 1990. In 1996, I became a permanent deaconate. I was ordained on Fatima Day in 2001.
3. What is your favorite biblical passage and why? My favorite biblical passage is Mark 5:36–don’t be afraid, just believe. One of the hardest biblical passages. It basically says “just believe”, but yet human fear, doubt gets in the way. But if you allow yourself to just believe and allow Christ to guide you, the sky’s the limit. It’s just sometimes overcoming that fear, but that’s my favorite passage.
4. What is a deacon as compared to a priest? What is the difference between the two? The sacrament of Holy Orders in the Catholic Church is in three degrees: Deacon, Priest, and Bishop. A Deacon in the Catholic Church is a fully-ordained minister who can do weddings, funerals, preach, teach, and baptize–basically the equivalent of a Protestant minister. The only things that a deacon cannot do, but a priest can do is consecrate the Eucharist or give absolution from sin. But I can do everything else, and for 17 years I have and do so gladly. I love doing what I do, it’s just so incredible.
5. Who are your favorite Biblical figures besides Jesus? St. Peter–gotta love Peter. He is our first Pope, and the first of the apostles, and was a struggling human just like the rest of us. I mean, this is a guy that on one hand say “Yes, Lord I’m with you always”, but in the next breath, Jesus told him “turn away from me, Satan!” He put his foot in his mouth a lot. He ran away. He denied Christ, but yet he redeemed himself. I think Peter is a great model for us; he reminds us that even the best of the best is just a slog like the rest of us. My second favorite is Moses. Here’s Moses the law-giver, Moses the liberator, Moses who fled Egypt as a fugitive and yet followed God and led his people out of slavery. A people who were oftentimes argumentative and acted like a bunch of children. And yet, Moses was their leader, and I admire hm.
Well, I just finished the fourth book in my friend Clay Gilbert’s “Children of Evohe” series, “Annah and the Arrow”, so I thought I’d review it here.
I’m currently on the final season of Star Trek: TNG, and although I do like the grand finale for the series, I’m at a point where I’m like “could we have skipped to the end?” Granted season 6 did lose a little steam, but it still had some good moments. The problem was at this point, Deep Space Nine was currently in its second season, and Voyager was in its planning stages as the flagship for the UPN Network. This meant that the writers were running out of ideas and too busy trying to work on making those shows the favorites they’d become once TNG had run its course (although both spin-offs did have considerable hurdles before they got there.)
Aspie Catholic 