What was your background before you joined the CC?
During the summer of 1973 in Oak Park, Michigan, the four children of Mary and Richard Lowe approached their mother and said, “we want a baby”. She replied, “Oh no, I am too old to have another baby”. They replied, “well then, we will pray for a baby”. Shortly hereafter, the prayers of these children were answered; Fr. Jim Lowe was conceived. He was raised in Troy, Michigan. When he was a small boy, he set up his mother’s dolls around the dining room table and pretended to celebrate Mass. Little did he know at the time what God’s future plans were for his life.
I was very active in high school. I played football, baseball, and was a member of the wrestling team. I sang tenor in the show choir, played trumpet in the marching band, acted in the Troy Athens Theater Company, and was on the executive of my high school student government.
I earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in psychology from Michigan State University. While studying at university, I was a professional disc jockey, a server at a gourmet restaurant, a member of the MSU Men’s Glee Club, and a member of the professional music fraternity Phi Mu Alpha. I also received training and basic certification in substance abuse counseling. Although at the age of 19, I experienced his first concrete calling to the priesthood, I allowed the many distractions and temptations of university living to lead me astray from choosing to answer the call to the priesthood at that time.
After graduating from Michigan State, I worked for two years as a mental health worker in a psychiatric hospital working with children and adolescents with psychiatric disorders. I then worked for Families First of Michigan. This was one of the most challenging jobs of my professional career. I provided intensive, in-home training to parents who were in danger of losing custody of their children due to abuse and neglect. The hoped for result of the intervention was to change the parents’ neglectful and abusive patterns of behavior in order to provide a safe environment for their children. I then worked for a while at a sales and management consulting firm and for a while as a rough carpenter building custom homes. My last job before entering seminary was coordinator of youth ministry at St. John Vianney Catholic Church in Houston, Texas.
What led you to join this community?
It was while ministering in Houston that I encountered the Companions of the Cross at the Catholic Charismatic Center. It was during this time that my call to the priesthood became much stronger. I began to develop a deeper desire for prayer in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, a greater devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, an enthusiastic love for the charismatic renewal, and a craving for the Church’s teachings. When I read the book, “We are called to be Companions of the Cross”, I knew in my heart this community of priests was the will of the Lord for my life. To my surprise, when he showed up at the airport in Ottawa, the founder of the community, Fr. Bob Bedard, welcomed me at the gate. What an impressive witness of humility!
Shortly after this visit, I became a first year applicant to the community at Assumption Farm in Combermere, Ontario. I then spent four years at Dominican College in Ottawa studying philosophy and theology. I then spent a year as a seminarian intern at St. Timothy’s parish in Toronto. I was ordained a transitional deacon at my home parish, St. Elizabeth Ann Seaton in Troy, Michigan. I spent his diaconate year studying at St. Mary’s Seminary in Houston, TX.
What kind of ministry are you doing now?
I was ordained to the priesthood on June 11, 2011. I am currently the pastor at St. Scholastica in Detroit.