Bishop David Konderla, 62, has led the Diocese of Tulsa, Oklahoma since 2016. He grew up in Bryan, Texas, the second oldest of twelve children. He entered seminary for the Diocese of Austin, and was ordained a priest in 1995. In addition to parish assignments, he has served as diocesan vocations director and pastor and director of campus ministry at St. Mary’s Catholic Center at Texas A&M University.
He spoke recently with CWR about the Diocese of Tulsa, his path to the priesthood, the challenge of vocations, ministry to young people, and the necessity of putting Christ first in one’s marriage.
CWR: What was it like growing up in Texas?
Bishop David Konderla: I grew up in what was a small town at the time, the oldest boy of six boys and two girls. We lived on the edge of town, near to a rural area, so I spent my youth playing in the woods and fields swimming in stock tanks and trespassing on my neighbors’ property.
I went to Catholic school up to grade eight and served at Mass. My father was an insurance salesman, and my mother a registered nurse. She worked for two or three years after nursing school, and then took a 19-year maternity leave, going back to work when the youngest was two or three years old. We were 14 people living in a small house; it always seemed that somebody was mad at somebody else and that some scrapping or arguing was going on. Looking back, I can say that it is wonderful to have 11 siblings and all the family that comes from that.
CWR: How did you decide to go to the seminary?
Bishop Konderla: I was not interested in going to college. In 10th grade, I participated in a cooperative education program in which you work half a day and go to school half a day. It prepares you to work in a trade. I worked in the veterinarian toxicology lab at Texas A&M. I continued there two years after high school, then took a night job at a machine shop. I was so enthralled with the machine shop that I quit my day job and went to work as a machinist. Ages 20 to 25, I worked in the shop, managed it and was part owner. I could see with some clarity what that track in life was going to look like for me. I would buy out my partner, own and operate my own shop, and work as a machinist.
At the same time, I was volunteering at my parish. I had a good friendship with my pastor, and he asked me at age 20 if I thought about becoming a priest. I told him no, that I had no interest, and that I was working at a machine shop. But just as I could see what my life would be working at the machine shop, I began to see through the parish what my life would be like if I took the path of the priesthood. I began to weigh the two options.
At age 23, I experienced a much deeper conversion to being a disciple of Christ. Serving the Lord became a more important part of my life. By age 24, I thought seminary might be a good path for me. I went to a “come and see” weekend at St. Mary’s Seminary in Houston, where I felt a tremendous sense of peace. I applied, sold my share in the machinist shop, and entered as a freshman at age 25.
While in the seminary, I became interested in Trappist monasticism. I had been on some discernment retreats, and thought about entering the monastery. However, their primary vocation is being a monk, with the priesthood secondary. If I were to enter, I might not be ordained a priest. That knowledge helped clarify for me what my real vocation was. I felt called to live and serve as a priest. At age 35, I was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Austin.
CWR: Can you give on overview of the Diocese of Tulsa?
Bishop Konderla: Whereas the western side of the state is flat, the eastern side we’re located on is hilly, green and beautiful. It is an extremely rural diocese, with many tiny towns. Some of our parishes only have a few dozen people. We have a Catholic population of 60,000 to 80,000; Catholics make up six or eight percent of the state’s population.
We have 80 priests who serve in 77 parishes; about a third of our parishes don’t have resident priests. A number of our pastors serve multiple parishes. These parishes may be small, but the people are faithful. One of my favorite things about the role I have is going out to visit the parishes. I try to visit each one at least once a year, so I might be going to two, three, four or five parishes on a weekend.
But being out among the people and celebrating the Mass is the easiest and most joyful thing I do. I drive myself; I put 30,000 miles on my car each year.
CWR: How is Tulsa doing for vocations to the priesthood and religious life?
Bishop Konderla: We have 17 seminarians, and ordained three to the priesthood this year. We accepted six new seminarians for the fall class. Our numbers our healthy; we’re always looking for men who are called to the priesthood. If a man is called to the priesthood, that will make him happier than anything else he can do in the world.
CWR: You were a vocations director. How do you attract good men to the seminary?
Bishop Konderla: We attract good men by presenting Jesus Christ to them in a way that is immediate and personal. Jesus is the reason there is a priesthood and a Church. If you are a priest, you’ve reached the point where you know who Christ is and you want to serve His mission in the world.
It is part of the masculine personality to have a quest, to be able to pit your life against some challenge that is meaningful, bringing the Gospel to people so that they can come to know and love Jesus as you do. The world, the flesh and the devil fight against you, but you fight back with the tools Jesus Christ gave His Church. It makes for a meaningful life.
CWR: You were pastor and director of campus ministry at St. Mary’s Catholic Center at Texas A&M University. What was that role like, and why it is important for the Church to be active on college campuses?
Bishop Konderla: That school is an outlier example because of its size. When I was there, it had 60,000 students, a quarter of whom were Catholic. So, in a sense, it was the largest Catholic university in the country. During my time there, we estimated that it had 17,000 Catholic students, making it larger than most Catholic colleges in the country.
About 10 percent of our Catholic college students are attending Catholic colleges, with the other 90 percent in non-Catholic schools. Also, not all of our Catholic universities are truly presenting the faith to their students. If the Church is going to be successful reaching college-age men and women with the Gospel, we have to be on secular college campuses.
In reading about ministry to college students, I saw there was once an attitude of suspicion in the Church towards Newman Centers on secular college campuses. The thinking was, “Why are you not in a Catholic university?” There is no longer that kind of attitude prevalent; the Church must be the leaven in the world to transform the world, so we need a vibrant and faithful presence on secular campuses as well as Catholic ones.
CWR: Did you enjoy campus ministry?
Bishop Konderla: It keeps you young. You are dealing with the same age range year-to-year, 18 to 23; the faces and names change, but the age range stays the same. I was meeting young people age 19, 20 or 21 who were very devout. I’d say to them, “You’re certainly ahead of me spiritually than where I was when I was your age!”
CWR: What is the Alcuin Institute of Catholic Culture and how it has contributed to the diocese?
Bishop Konderla: The Alcuin Institute is an office of formation for our diocese. It is an evangelization tool to try and reach people, helping them engage in the faith by engaging with the intellectual and spiritual life of the faith. They have small group gatherings and study some sort of text, such as the writings of St. Augustine or material from an early Church council. They then enjoy a Socratic dialogue together about what it means in terms of our lives lived today.
The Institute also provides us with educators for our diaconate program and for our annual catechetical conference. It is a tool we use to build Catholic culture.
CWR: You were the chairman of the USCCB Subcommittee for the Promotion and Defense of Marriage. What do you see as some of the greatest threats nationally to traditional marriage?
Bishop Konderla: I think the greatest problem is our own lack of faith. There are many threats that come to us through the culture, such as erroneous messages that come to us through the media, the use of pornography, and the idea that sex and babies should be separated, but these are not the primary threats. What a person needs to be able to flourish in marriage is a relationship with Jesus Christ that is real and personal to them. It enables them to overcome whatever happens in their daily lives and enables them to make sacrifices and to be faithful to the marriage to which they’ve committed themselves.
If married people depend only on one another for joy and to be strong, that marriage has a weak foundation, as the marriage is only as strong as the people in it. But if they enter marriage as disciples of Jesus Christ, He is going to unite their commitment to one another and provide the strongest foundation possible. Whatever problems they encounter, they can take to Him, and He will give them what they need to move forward.
CWR: I assume your parents gave you a good example of what a marriage should be?
Bishop Konderla: Yes, they were amazing people. I’ve often thought about what it must have been like for them, when they were surrounded by 12 children, wondering, “How are we going to deal with this?” But they did.
When I work with engaged couples, I like to ask them to imagine not just what their first few years of married life will be like, but what they’d like their 50th wedding anniversary to be like. Be specific. Who will be there, and what will happen on that day?
It is true, couples in the early years of marriage with three, four, or five children are going to be exhausted. But the children will grow up and move on. You’re not going to be exhausted for the whole marriage.
I want them to focus on how their relationship will progress, and what kind of people their children will become. What will the dividend or payoff of a lifetime of faithful marriage be? I think a conversation like that can be fruitful and important.
CWR: In 2020, you withdrew the Diocese of Tulsa from the Oklahoma Council of Churches because it would not condemn abortion nor defend traditional marriage. You also cited gender ideology and is threats to religious liberty. How did this situation come about and have any other churches followed your lead?
Bishop Konderla: There is a dynamic tension that pertains to the Church’s life in the world. We want to be part of the world, but not of the world. In an ecumenical or interfaith organization, we have to ask, are we able to be part of that organization that contributes to the good of the whole, without at the same time being overly influenced by, or corrupted by the values of the organization itself?
We reached a point where we felt that the OCC was not representing traditional Christianity in a way for us to continue to be members. If I am part of an organization, but cannot sign on to its statements, am I an important part of that organization? It is a small controversy that happened in our diocese, and I don’t know if others followed our lead.
CWR: There was a shooting at a Tulsa Catholic hospital on June 1 that left four victims and the gunman dead. What effect has this had on the Catholic health system?
Bishop Konderla: In our country we have a heightened awareness about violence such as this, but you don’t think it can happen in your neighborhood until it does. It happened at St. Francis Hospital, part of an excellent hospital system in our area, at the hands of a disgruntled patient. He came in with two firearms and killed two doctors, a receptionist, a patient and then himself. It was a terrible, tragic loss of life.
I came to the hospital the next day to celebrate Mass as a way of praying for all affected by this occurrence. As I walked through it, you wouldn’t have known anything happened the day before. The staff was scurrying about, being the merciful love of Jesus Christ by providing for patients’ health care needs. The hospital staff proved resilient while grieving the loss.
CWR: I saw carpentry was an interest for you. What are some of your creations?
Bishop Konderla: I did carpentry with my dad while growing up. When something broke around the house, we’d have to do our own repair work.
When I went to the seminary, I continued woodworking. My primary type is called wood turning. I use a lathe, like a machinist would use, and I take big blocks of wood with interesting color or grain and turn them into large vases or bowls. Many of these end up in charity auctions for our schools. I’ve also made a number of croziers. The one I use is the fifth crozier I’ve made.
CWR: What major initiatives do you have going on in the diocese?
Bishop Konderla: We are planning for our 50th anniversary celebration next February. We’re in the midst of a nationwide Eucharistic revival, in which our diocese is participating in various ways. We’re building a new church and student center at Oklahoma State University. When it is dedicated, it will be the third new church building I’ve dedicated since coming to Tulsa six years ago. It’s good to see signs of growth.
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