Diocese participates in worldwide Eucharistic Adoration

Intermountain Catholic

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Chris Leonard

SALT LAKE CITY — Chris Leonard, a 2013 graduate of the University of Utah, will spend the next year as the Dominican volunteer at Saint Catherine of Siena/Newman Center. He currently is employed as a receptionist at the Newman Center; his new job will begin in August.

He describes the campus ministry job as partly event planning, "but really the cool part about it is the one-on-one student ministry. That’s what I’m really excited for."

A grant from the Catholic Campus Ministry Association also will allow the Newman Center to set up a small group ministry to engage students in different topics that are of interest to them, such as Bible study or discussion of social issues.

The program, called Jump Start, brings in representatives from the Knights of Columbus and Sisters of Life to get ministry started, and begins with freshman outreach, Leonard said.

"That’s an area where we have lots of room for growth," he explained, adding that the groups will be led by students who will form them according to their interests. The student leaders will be trained to lead the groups.

"The emphasis is really getting student-driven student ministry off the ground," Leonard said.

He also wants to work with students individually because "that is what has been most beneficial to me," he said.

Before becoming involved with the Newman Center, Leonard joined a Protestant organization that had this type of one-on-one ministry.

"It was a time with someone who genuinely cares about you and is concerned for you," he said. That sort of genuine concern is "what I want people to feel when they’ve left the Newman Center."

Leonard grew up near Corvallis, Ore. His mother was Catholic; his father wasn’t. Leonard received the Sacraments of Initiation, but attended Mass only occasionally.

He fell away from the church when he left for college, with a swim scholarship to Davidson College in North Carolina. However, a friend on the swim team encouraged him to join her at Mass, which he did.

When he transferred to the University of Utah as a sophomore after a summer internship at the Huntsman Cancer Institute, he again stopped attending Mass and a friend introduced him to a non-denominational church near his home.

"It was really awkward the first time, because I didn’t know anybody, but then they really embraced me," he said. "It was probably the first time I really personally, meaningfully interacted with people who understood and knew about how to make a relationship with Jesus – people who authentically lived their faith and set it as the center and focus of their life, and there’s something about that that’s very compelling."

As he continued his spiritual journey, he found he was interested in learning more about the Catholic faith. When one of his friends said he wanted to attend Mass, Leonard joined him. They went to the Newman Center and met Jon Dalton, the lay campus minister, who encouraged Leonard to return.

The homilies also engaged Leonard, he said, and "I felt the Holy Spirit so strongly…. I felt very at home in a way that I hadn’t felt at home at any of the other churches I had been to."

That fall he became involved with the youth group events and got to know people. He joined the leadership team in the spring and has been involved since then, he said.

For the next three years, Leonard’s life revolved around school, his work in Dr. Bryan Welm’s laboratory as a research assistant, and the Newman Center, he said.

"College has been a series of really fantastic experiences. I’ve been lifted up by some really awesome people…. Anything I have done has really been a testament to those around me," said Leonard, who is exploring the possibility of enrolling in a doctoral program in cancer biology once his year as a Dominican volunteer is up.