BRAINTREE -- Growing up in Santa Cruz, California, Deacon Peter Brau had a family of faith.

"It wasn't a faith that was simply performative, showing up at church," he said. "My mother and father, they lived their faith. The idea of being engaged in your community and being engaged in charitable work and all of that was part and parcel of how we grew up."

When the pandemic struck, Deacon Brau was able to step off the "hamster wheel" his life had become. He started to rethink what was most important to him as he spent more time with his wife, Beth Brau, his daughter, and his father, who was in the final months of his life.

"He and I talked a great deal about what is it that you want your life to be about?" Deacon Brau said. "What is it that you want to look back and say, 'This is the thing that meant the most to me?'"

Those conversations with his father made him realize he was being called to the permanent diaconate. After years of formation, Deacon Brau was ordained at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross by Archbishop Richard G. Henning on Sept. 12. He was joined by five other men -- Deacon Dustin Batista, Deacon Aaron Giard, Deacon Brian Gregory, Deacon Richard Kearns, and Deacon Kenneth Moriarty.

Derived from the Greek word "diakonos," meaning servant or minister, the deacon is the first of three ranks of ordained ministry in the Church. Among their many functions in parishes, deacons may assist the priest at Mass, proclaim the Gospel, deliver homilies, and preside at baptisms, weddings, and rites of Christian burial.

"The last 24 hours have been a whirlwind for sure," Deacon Batista told The Pilot on Sept. 13.

He added, "It's very emotional. It's overwhelming. I feel very blessed that God has called me to this part of my life and to have so many friends, family, and church communities be there for me to support me and love me through it all."

The Rite of Ordination began with the presentation of the candidates before Archbishop Henning, as they were called forth as ordinands. The assembly, filled with family and friends of the candidates, applauded to show their approval. In his homily, the archbishop said that while the Church provides a homily for bishops to give the candidates, he wished to give them a "more personal" message with his own preaching. He praised them for selecting the first reading, Jeremiah 1:5-9, when God tells the prophet he has called him to serve despite his feelings of unworthiness, as the first reading at Mass that day.

"It tells me that you understand something very important about this moment," Archbishop Henning said.

While the candidates spent years in formation, the archbishop said that an entire lifetime is not enough to prepare them for what they were about to do.

"None of us are ever worthy by our own gifts or actions," he said. "We are made worthy by the Lord who calls us to himself."

He said "the very foundations" of the diaconate rest on Jesus's own ministry and his call that the Church heal a divided world.

"He sees those that the world would ignore," the archbishop said. "He responds with love. And he has entrusted that very mission to his Church, and this order of diaconate was established to help us as a Church to do this work of the Lord."

He told the candidates that their vocation is to be with people, "suffer with them, walk with them." Like Jesus offering himself in the Eucharist, the archbishop explained that the deacons offer themselves in both their ministry and in their married lives.

"In just a few moments, you will offer not something, but someone," he said. "Not outside you, but the very gift of yourself."

The candidates made the Promise of the Elect, that they would obey Archbishop Henning and his successors. Then, they lay prostrate before the altar, showing their obedience to God, as the assembly prayed the Litany of Supplication. As the Apostles did to the first deacons, Archbishop Henning laid his hands upon the candidates' heads, ordaining them to the diaconate.

The newly ordained were then vested with stoles and dalmatics -- the vestments of the deacon -- and received the Book of the Gospels, with the instruction to believe, teach, and practice the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

The new deacons then assisted in the celebration of the Eucharist.

Deacon Brau told The Pilot that it still doesn't feel real.

"This was literally day one," he said.

Many of his friends in the Catholic Community of Gloucester and Rockport, where he will serve, have asked for his blessing.

"It chokes you up, and it's overwhelming," he said. "It's beautiful, right?"

He said being a deacon has nothing to do with his own accomplishments, but is all thanks to Christ working through him.

"That's a beautiful sacramental gift."

For Deacon Batista, who will serve in St. Matthew the Evangelist Parish in Billerica, becoming a deacon is the culmination of a lifelong journey. He was active in parish life and teaches religious studies at Central Catholic High School in Lawrence.

"I think I've felt a pull on my heartstrings for a really long time to try and understand what that meant, working in parish ministry or in Catholic education in schools," he said.

He said he "literally could not have done it" without his wife Jamie Lee Batista and children.

"It's tough to put one particular person, one particular event at the heart of that, but certainly it's been years of God working in my life," he said.

As a deacon, he is excited to serve people in any way. Many of his friends have asked him to renew their wedding vows or baptize their babies.

"It's definitely a special joy to be able to do that for people who I know personally and love and care for so much," he said.