Archbishop Mitchell Rozanski has appointed Father Paul Hoesing as president-rector of Kenrick-Glennon Seminary, effective July 1, for a five-year term.

Father Hoesing, a priest from the Archdiocese of Omaha, Nebraska, currently serves as vice-rector for formation at the seminary. He succeeds Father James Mason, who has served as president-rector since July 2015.

Father Hoesing joined the faculty of Kenrick-Glennon Seminary as dean of seminarians and director of human formation in August 2015 and was named vice-rector in 2019. He earned a bachelor of arts in biology from the University of Saint Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1998, and a baccalaureate in sacred theology and a licentiate in dogmatic theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome in 2001 and 2003, respectively.

Since his ordination in 2002, Father Hoesing has served in parish ministry, taught in Catholic high schools and at the Institute for Priestly Formation, and worked as director of Catholic Campus Ministry at the University of Nebraska at Omaha.

Father Hoesing was named director of the Office of Vocations for the Archdiocese of Omaha in 2008 and was elected president of the National Conference of Diocesan Vocation Directors in 2013.

Father Hoesing said he looks forward to continuing the seminary’s efforts to raise up “holy, healthy, joy-filled parish priests. And they’re parish priests — not just holy, healthy, joy-filled priests — but parish priests.”

As the archdiocese embarks on a major strategic pastoral planning effort, Father Hoesing said seminarians will be formed to take on their priestly vocations in an Apostolic age.

In cultures of Christendom — where Christianity prevails in society — we had all of the structures in place to support a priestly vocation, he said. “In an Apostolic age, the man’s going to need the wherewithal to start a home church without a lot of help. Do they have all of the tools for preaching and teaching and discernment in order draw people to Christ?”

Archbishop Rozanski also announced that Father Shane Deman, vocations director for the Diocese of Sioux City, Iowa, has been named vice-rector of formation at the seminary. Father Deman also is chaplain of Bishop Heelan High School in Sioux City. He was ordained to the priesthood in 2008 and earned a doctorate in fundamental theology at the Gregorian University in Rome in 2015. Father Deman will begin his new role in late August.

“You will learn it is a sacrifice for any bishop to allow one of his priests to serve the wider Church,” Archbishop Rozanski said. “Let us keep all of them in our prayers as they continue to serve the Lord and His people, particularly in the formation of our future priests.”

During his tenure as president-rector, Father Mason established several new formation programs at Kenrick-Glennon Seminary, including the Augustine Way and Behold the Man. Father Mason also started Forming Men for Christ and the Fiat women’s group, monthly gatherings for lay men and women to grow in their faith. Father Mason will return to his home diocese of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, for a new assignment.

Kenrick-Glennon Seminary began the academic year with 131 men and currently serves 19 dioceses.