Alumni Priests Shape Future of Western Province Dominicans

At its annual provincial chapter earlier this year, the Western Province of the Order of Preachers selected John Winkowitsch, O.P. (’04), to serve as its new director of vocations, succeeding Rev. John Marie Bingham, O.P. (’00), who is assuming the role of novice master. Together, these two Thomas Aquinas College alumni will shape the next generation of Dominicans ministering to God’s people along the Pacific coast. 

Fr. Winkowitsch, who recently served as the College’s Matriculation speaker in California, entered the priesthood in 2020 after a long and dramatic spiritual journey, first to Catholicism and then to the Dominicans. Having walked an adventurous road of faith, Fr. John looks forward to helping young men navigate their own. “When I was a little kid growing up in Montana, I was always inviting my friends over to visit our house,” he tells Mission West, the province newsletter. “As Vocation Director, I cannot wait to make new friends and invite them over to visit our Western Dominican Province.”

When some of Fr. John’s new friends decide to stick around as postulants and novices, they will fall under Fr. John Marie’s watchful care. “As a novice 21 years ago, I enjoyed a graced year of growing in friendship with Christ and of learning to live the apostolic virtues of the Friars Preachers,” the article quotes him as saying. “I am sure I will be asked to die to myself in many ways as Novice Master. But the joy of such death is that it gives way to true life.”