---

When Father Anthony Ligato was first approached earlier this year about joining the faculty at Pontifical North American College in Rome, he could hardly believe it.

“Nobody was more surprised about this than me,” said Father Ligato, the rector at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Albany and the diocesan Vicar for Vocations. “I think that’s why I was so taken aback by it. I think that is why at first I declined it. I said I can’t even see myself doing this. It was unbelievable.”

After much prayer — and persistence from Monsignor Thomas Powers, the incoming rector of Pontifical North American College — Father Ligato decided to accept the administrative and faculty positions as the new director of Pastoral Formation and director of the implementation of the new United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Program for Priestly Formation (PPF) Edition 6. Father Ligato’s last day as Vicar for Vocations in the Diocese will be July 31.

Bishop Edward B. Scharfenberger first brought the request by outgoing rector, Father Peter Harman, to Father Ligato to consider the positions in March during Lent. 

“I said Bishop, I am humbled by this request but I really need to bring this to prayer,” Father Ligato said. “Really for the rest of Lent, Holy Week was only a few weeks away at that point and Easter, I really prayed about it and ultimately at the end of April I felt that it probably wouldn’t be the right thing for me at this time. I had only been at the Cathedral for less than a year, (and with) my responsibilities as Vicar for Vocations, I respectfully declined at that point and then ultimately the incoming rector had called me.”

Monsignor Powers then asked Father Ligato to reconsider. Every time Father Ligato brought up a reason not to take the position, Monsignor Powers countered. “He matched me reason for reason,” said Father Ligato, who eventually accepted the offer. He will be responsible for “overseeing all the pastoral formation of all those seminarians (at the college) from the United States, Canada and Australia,” as well as implementing the USCCB’s new guide on priestly formation.

“In administration, I oversee the entire Pastoral Formation Program and the pastoral formation sessions at Pontifical North American College that would include practicums from helping men to know how to celebrate Mass, the anointing of the sick and dying, penance as well as marriage preparation, canon law,” Father Ligato said. “We bring in those who specialize in those areas as well. So canon lawyers would come in to present on canon law; how do you deal with dispensations, marriage, annulment processes? How do you approach a family that has just lost a loved one? How are you able to be present to them? Not only in the Mass of Christian Burial but also being able to be present to them in visitation. That would go also for those who are hospitalized, nursing homes, homebound, so it is that whole scope and span of everything that people know of their pastors in their parishes.”

Father Ligato said the hardest part of the decision was leaving the Cathedral and the parish community, where he has been for just nine months. Father David Mickiewicz has been named the new rector effective Aug. 15.

“I really love the Cathedral. I love the Cathedral parish, it is a great parish community. We see that beautiful edifice of a Cathedral but within that Cathedral lives a wonderful parish community,” Father Ligato said. “People who are greatly supportive especially of the community around the Cathedral in helping in outreach ministry with our food pantry and in all areas of ministry to those who are homebound, nursing homes, hospital ministry. People are just greatly supportive of the greater community around them and they come from all over the Diocese. They don’t generally live around the neighborhoods around the Cathedral, they come from other parts of the Diocese for their love of the Cathedral and the Cathedral community.”

Prior to moving to the Cathedral, Father Ligato was pastor at St. Jude the Apostle Church and School in Wynantskill from 2009-21 — while also being named pastor at St. Michael the Archangel Church in Troy in 2018 — and has been Vicar for Vocations since 2014. 

---