By Christophe Cole

 Name: Msgr Jason Gordon  – Diocesan
(Member of Living Water Community)

Date of Ordination: March 19, 1991

Portfolio: Vicar for Administration

As the Vicar for Administration in the Archdiocese of Port of Spain, Jason Gordon is respected and admired by most people with whom he comes into contact.  

He can be quite often seen at the forefront of major events and initiatives within the archdiocese such as the Synod and the Caribbean School for Catholic Communications (CSCC). But what is it that has led this man to become the evangelist, lecturer, priest and overall person that he is today?

Msgr Gordon says that his spiritual journey really began while he was a student at Fatima College. His involvement in scouts, which had a spiritual component called “Christophers”, as well as his experience of the Charismatic Renewal formed the foundation of his spirituality.

Upon leaving high school he inherited an underperforming business from his father, which he was able to turn around and make quite a decent living from. He says that he was actually earning more money than many of his friends who were coming back with university degrees.

One weekend, about a year after leaving school, he was unable to find a reason for going to Mass, as he was not able to see the point of the whole “charade”. This led to his attending a youth meeting at Living Water, which felt like a homecoming for him; this sparked a whole new stage in his spiritual journey.

After two years of balancing his business life and his involvement in the community, he reached a stage where he recognised that a decision had to be made and at age 22 he sold off the business and joined the community.

Subsequent to making the decision he was not as yet convinced that this was going to be for the rest of his life, but after years of wrestling with God he began to understand that it meant priesthood and it meant permanency. He says that he had to make the transition in small steps as God knew that he would not have been able to handle the move from business to priesthood in one jump.

He began his studies here in the regional seminary and was later sent to Leuven, Belgium for post-graduate studies. He was not too keen on being ordained at first as he did not want to become what he described as “a sacrament machine” simply performing the sacraments, he wanted his priesthood to mean something more.

Upon his return from abroad, he taught at the seminary for some time before being ordained deacon in September 1990 (his ordination had to be postponed because of the July 27 attempted coup), and then as priest in March 1991.

After ordination he went on to take on a number of projects in the Living Water Community including Fountain of Hope, Marian House and communications projects. He also continued to teach in the seminary and began spiritual direction as well as weekend parish ministry. He was essentially involved in social dimensions of ministry in the Church, which he believes is the best kind of formation.

His most fulfilling experience of priesthood came in 2003 when he was appointed parish priest of Holy Rosary and St Martin de Porres in Gonzales. Gonzales was what Msgr Jason describes as a once loving community that seemed to have lost its way with a number of gangs operating and a very high crime rate.

He had an experience of being shaken by a murder in the community on Good Friday morning of that same year, after five murders in six weeks. This prompted him to call a meeting of all of the leaders of the community – from the imams to the pundits to the sports and culture leaders – to talk about what was possible.

This allowed him and by extension the Church to become a catalyst for the healing of this community starting things such as homework clinics, an Internet café as well as a project called CITY (Community Intervention Transforming Youths). From that experience he was able to understand and value the respect held for the Catholic priesthood which enabled him to work on a personal level with the members of the community to make one of the most dramatic turnarounds in the area.

In 2007 after undertaking a number of projects for the Church, including bringing together the northern vicariate while he was vicar, and the Geographical Information Systems (GIS) project and consultations, he was appointed to a newly-created post to be responsible for the administration of the archdiocese. As the Vicar for Administration he has been able to effect a number of changes, which serve to take the Archdiocese forward in a particular direction.