By Mindy Ragan Wood
Staff Writer
Okarche’s new priest will likely call Holy Trinity Catholic Church his home for years to come.
The Oklahoma-born but Rome educated priest said he is excited to become the church’s new pastor.
“I’m excited to be here,” Father Cory Stanley said. “I would say I am humbled to be asked to be the priest for the church, the school. I’m looking forward to becoming part of the family here and the community.”
Stanley will also be the priest for the Immaculate Heart of Mary in Calumet where he will hold mass early Sunday mornings and return to Okarche for later morning mass.
The 34-year-old was ordained to the Diaconate of St. Peter’s Basilica in 2010 in Vatican City and 2011 at the Cathedral of Our Lady’s Perpetual Help in Oklahoma City.
He spent eight years at Conception Seminary in Conception, Missouri and went on to graduate from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome where he received a European bachelor’s degree in sacred theology and the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross where he specialized in liturgical theology. He speaks Spanish and Italian and considers Latin a hobby.
Stanley said he spent an incredible five years in Rome, praying with hundreds of others with the Pope. He said most of the apostles of the church are entombed in Rome.
“To pray in those churches, to pray at their tombs, to realize that these are the apostles that our Lord chose, it was these men who were able to preach the Gospel in such a way that they were able to set the world on fire with the Word of God and love of God,” he said. “To be there, to be surrounded by history was amazing.”
Stanley served as priest at Prince of Peace in Altus, Oklahoma.
The call to serve as a priest began when he was in middle school and especially high school.
He said his mother, Cindy Stanley, kept their family in church activities including Sunday School and a vibrant youth group at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang.
“I thought about it and prayed about it n high school and by the time I graduated I knew I should go apply for the seminary to see if God was calling me to be a priest,” he said.
Being a young priest, Stanley said he believes he can understand the challenges that youth and young families face today.
“I do think that as a younger priest I am aware of a lot of the struggles culturally that our young people are facing,” he said. “Because many of them are my peers and I do have ideas about how we can be reaching out to them better and how we can serve them better and keep them close to the Lord.”
Stanley said the ideas are part of the vision that the Archdiocese is promoting for evangelization.
Stanley will serve in a church where he will be no stranger to the stories of evangelization in other countries with the legacy of Blessed Stanley Rother.
“To serve in a parish that had a priest who was martyred serving in his ministry to our Lord,” he began, “not only to be here with his example but to be surrounded by so many people who knew him, who are his friends and family. In the Catholic Church to be proclaimed blessed, it doesn’t happen a lot and it’s very likely that in our lifetime the Catholic Church will proclaim him as saint. To have a saint from this town, from Okarche who went to school here at Holy Trinity, to have a man who felt called to serve as a priest and felt called to ultimately lay down his life for his sheep, it’s incredible. It’s something I’m going to be praying about and meditating about during my years of ministry here. He gives us a real example of a humble servant.”
Stanley was struck by Rother’s labor and his love of the Guatemalan people. Rother was killed in 1981 when gunmen stormed the parish and shot him several times.
“He was doing hard work and he loved those people,” Stanley said. “Not only was he teaching them about the Lord and strengthening their faith in Christ, but he was also helping them to have a better life. It’s an incredible example to have for me, an inspiring example of his life and ministry. It will have a huge impact on me during my years here.”
While Stanley is no stranger to the Rother legacy, he is a new face in town, but he said the community has been very welcoming.
“I’ve been welcomed very warmly and I’ve eaten lots of fried chicken,” he said with a smile. “Archbishop (Paul S.) Coakley told me he wants me to be here for a long time and I’m looking forward to serving them and being part of their lives.”
