Kern catholic Inaugural Prayer Breakfast was hosted by Monsignor Craig F. Harrison and held at St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church Wednesday, March 21. The event started at 6:00 am in the morning, where the clergy and members of kern county parishes came together to say the rosary before the Mass was celebrated at 6:30 am.

The Principal Celebrant of the Mass was none other than the Most Reverend Armando X. Ochoa, Bishop of the diocese of Fresno. Now to give some meaning to the title of Bishop, in America the Catholic Church has a total of 428 Bishops and 255 of them are active while the others are retired.

Michelle Ming one of the chair persons of Kern catholic had this to say, “We are thankful to Bishop Ochoa an all of the priests and Deacons who are able to celebrate mass this morning… we are thankful to our guests  for choosing to come together as Catholics from various parishes to deepen our faith.”

Proceeding after the Mass all in attendance filled the youth center and was served breakfast and drinks before keynote speaker Father Nathan Cromly had begun. Fr. Nathan is catholic priest of the congregation of St. John and resides in Denver, Colorado. Apart of his ministry is that he offers retreats and teaches philosophy and theology.

Fr. Nathan visits Bakersfield twice a year with his gift of inspiration and spreading the truth of the Catholic faith. The topic Fr. Nathan chose to speak on was, “Standing Strong in Faith with open Arms.” The room was packed with: clergy members, Parish members, parents, high school students, and college students alike.

Fr. Nathan closed his talk with these words, “Missionary zeal is set upon conviction and missionary conviction yields a missionary zeal, that is one of love, peace, and encouragement… the greatness of our response is not in the extension but in the density on how firmly we hold our conviction, it’s this that determines the impact in our life and in our actions. If I want to change the world then I have to change myself and that’s why I am here today because I want to light a fire within Kern County that all you can help spread throughout California and hopefully the world…”

Kern Catholic was founded in December 2017, whose mission is to unite the Catholics of Kern County through faith formation events and social media. Kern Catholic will host three faith formation events a year- a Prayer Breakfast, a women’s Retreat, and a Chili Verde Cook –off. It is there they seek to bring together Catholics from all of the local parishes.