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Ben McKown - Pastoral Coordinator

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Ben McKown
Pastoral Coordinator

I am a native Floridian, having been born and raised in Lakeland, FL. I was raised in the First Baptist Church of Lakeland and was baptized there when I was 12 years of age.

I was introduced to the sport of tennis at the age of 7 and became actively involved in the sport for the next 41 years beginning as a junior, collegiate and professional player and then as a professional instructor. During the time I began to play tennis competitively I began to drift away from the Lord for various reasons.

It was not until an event many years later that I felt the Lord calling me back into a deeper relationship with him. At that time I began to attend church regularly and rededicated my life to our Lord once again.

A few years after my new found renewal in our Lord, I began teaching tennis lessons to a catholic priest. His name is Fr. Andrew Mallick. What I didn’t know is how this initial meeting would turn into a Christ based friendship and brotherhood, eventually leading me into becoming a convert in the Catholic faith. How mysterious and awesome and wonderful Our Lord and Savior is. Subsequently Fr. Andrew invited me to come up to Ocala and become the Pastoral Coordinator here at Our Lady of the Springs to gain some valuable experience to help me in my discernment process possibly towards the priesthood. My job as pastoral coordinator is one that places me in a position to work with both our priests and laity, to help with any type of causes or concerns they might have regarding church matters. As pastoral coordinator I am being challenged to grow and develop areas of my personality in a more deeply and profound way, through this interaction with the priests and laity. So this has begun a new chapter in my life, one that I hope is pleasing to Our Lord.