From Br Tom Junis

The faith was always important for my family and so I went to Holy Trinity for grade school and junior high and then Central Catholic for high school. It was during my senior year I attended a TEC retreat and started to live my faith as my own personal choice. Friendships I made on the retreat led me to get involved at the Newman Center at ISU when I started college. It was there I started discerning my vocation more seriously. The formation and accompaniment of the Servants of the Pierced Hearts of Jesus and Mary was important for me and my discernment. First I discerned the priesthood with the diocese but didn’t feel like this was where I was called. I then discerned marriage and was in a more serious relationship but again this didn’t feel like where God was calling me. I was studying education at ISU and took St. John Bosco as a patron and the sisters knew this and said I should discern religious life and put me in contact with the Salesians of Don Bosco who were at U of I at the time. I worked at a Salesian summer camp and went to Italy for the celebration of St. John Bosco’s 200th birthday. These experiences helped me to discern to start formation with the Salesians. During formation, I have lived in New Jersey, California, and New Orleans (where I taught high school for two years). I am currently in Mexico in my second year of theology studies. This August I will make perpetual vows as a Salesian of Don Bosco.