Newly ordained diocesan priest, Father Joseph VanDenheuvel grew up a block and a half from St. Joseph’s in Bertha. He considered the parish family his second family. From the ages of 8 to 13, he served at Mass nearly every Sunday and had a strong curiosity for his faith.
“As a kid, I had a ton of questions about the faith and I wanted to know everything the Church teaches, just out of a general curiosity,” he said.
In his teenage years, he said he lost that curiosity, and after high school, he enrolled in the National Guard and became an air traffic controller for the United States Army. Later, he started studying political science and pre-law at South Dakota State University in Brookings, South Dakota.
It was at SDSU, through FOCUS missionaries, a group that works on college campuses to form disciples, Father VanDenheuvel reconnected with his earlier curiosity for the Catholic faith.
“I learned more about the Catholic faith and could hear God calling me to the priesthood,” he said.
He transferred from SDSU to Immaculate Heart of Mary Seminary in Winona and finished his graduate studies at Saint Paul Seminary in St. Paul.
“I remember Father Mitchell Bechtold made an announcement at Mass and said, ‘Joseph from our parish is in seminary. We don’t expect that he’ll become a priest. We expect that he’ll grow in holiness.”
It was this message that Father VanDenheuvel believes helped his parents, Russ and Nancy VanDenheuvel, to open up to the possibility of him being a priest.
His journey through seminary allowed him to visit Rome, Turkey, Greece and Mexico and the rigorous study schedule included both academic through the seminary and practical through a teaching parish.
Last summer, he served the Red River Valley Area Catholic Community which includes the parishes of St. Mary of the Presentation in Breckenridge, St. Thomas in Kent and St. Gall in Tintah. During the school year, his teaching parish was St. Andrew in Elk River.
Through this experience, he visited the homebound, preached weekly and spent time “just getting to know the people of God.”
“[A highlight] was taking the youth group to Steubenville Conference,” Father VanDenheuvel said. “I got to know the kids and interact with them, and by the end of the conference, they were opening up and asking questions, so that was really cool.”
As a self-proclaimed extrovert, Father VanDenheuvel will miss going “to the door next to mine and knocking” to visit his seminary brothers, but he looks forward to living within walking distance of his church home, just as he did in his youth, and serving his new parish family as a spiritual father.
“I love to talk to people after Mass – not only on weekends but after weekday Masses – and visiting the homebound. It gives me life and energy to talk to people,” he said.
His first assignment, effective July 1, will be as parochial vicar of the Centered on Christ Area Catholic Community, which includes the parishes of St. Boniface, Cold Spring; St. James, Jacobs Prairie; Sts. Peter and Paul, Richmond; and Mary of the Immaculate Conception, Rockville.
He looks forward to meeting everyone in his new ACC and having the opportunity to have them get to know him firsthand.
And, would he want you to invite him to dinner or to play a game of cribbage?
“If someone is [reading this] — Yes!” he said.
Pictured above: Bishop Patrick Neary places his hands on Joseph VanDenheuvel, symbolizing the calling of the Holy Spirit upon him during the Rite of Ordination. (Dianne Towalski / The Central Minnesota Catholic)
