Mark Wajda

Father Mark Wajda came to the priesthood the long way around. He was already well into one life, in his fifties, when he finally answered a call he had carried for years, and he still speaks about his ordination as the fulfillment of a vocation he calls long overdue. Being named a pastor, he says, was the honor on top of it, "a little icing on the cake."

Warm, humble, and refreshingly practical, Fr. Mark is the kind of pastor who will talk plainly about the things others might tiptoe around, money included, and then lead by quiet example. He gives a tenth of his own paycheck back to the parish and does not make a show of it. He is generous about the people around him, too. When a fellow priest left Blessed Sacrament after twelve years, Fr. Mark used his bulletin column to praise the man's dedication rather than talk about himself. It is the kind of thing that has parishioners describing him not by his title but by his homilies and a simple sense that they are fortunate to have him.

There is a nice symmetry to where his path has led. Years ago, before his own ordination, he sat in a room full of men weighing whether the priesthood was for them, and he spoke with real hope about the young ones coming up behind him. Today he helps carry that work himself as the diocese's Assistant Director of Vocations, looking for and forming the priests who will come next. He came to Blessed Sacrament in 2020 and was installed as its pastor two years later, stepping into a role the parish had wanted filled for some time.

Much of his heart now goes into holding his community together, uniting Blessed Sacrament with its mission at Santo Toribio Romo and staying close to local Catholic life through school and retreat ministry. He is honest about the ordinary, unglamorous work of keeping a parish running, the leaky roofs and the light bills, but it is clear what he is really after underneath all of it. "What I really hope for," he says, "is that I can help shepherd the people of God to heaven, our true home."