Questions to Ask a Priest
Questions for a conversation with a parish priest, whether you are new to the church, returning after time away, preparing for a sacrament, or simply curious about the work. They ask about the ordinary life of the job as well as the pastoral parts.
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The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
When did you first think about the priesthood, and who did you tell first?
Why ask it
The second half is what makes this a real question rather than a formality. Who they told, and how that person reacted, is usually where the story actually starts.
What does an ordinary Tuesday look like for you?
Why ask it
Most people picture only the public parts. The honest answer tends to involve a boiler quote, a school visit, a funeral to plan, and paperwork, which changes how you see the rest of the week.
What surprised you most about the actual work?
Why ask it
Priests are prepared for the sacramental side and less so for the administration, the finances, and the sheer number of small decisions. Expect a wry answer.
What did seminary not prepare you for?
Why ask it
A specific and answerable version of the question about training. Common answers include sitting with anger, managing staff, and being the only person in the room who cannot leave early.
Which part of the week do you find hardest?
Why ask it
Gets past the assumption that Sunday is the demanding day. Many will name the hours after a funeral, or a Monday with nothing in it, which tells you where support would actually help.
What do people assume about your life that isn't true?
Why ask it
Lets them address the misconceptions they choose rather than the ones you might guess at, and it leaves room to speak about solitude, friendship, or money without being interrogated about any of them.
What's a common misunderstanding about what a priest can and cannot do?
Why ask it
Practical rather than personal. The answer usually clarifies what is fixed by their tradition and what is at their own discretion, which is worth knowing before you ask them for something.
How do you prepare a homily, and how do you know whether it landed?
Why ask it
Preaching is craft, and few people ever ask about it. The feedback half is the interesting one, since the usual signal is what someone mentions three weeks later, not what anyone says at the door.
What do people apologize for that they don't need to?
Why ask it
Draws on years of hearing people be hard on themselves, without asking about anything told in confidence. Answers often say more about the questioner's own worries than expected.
What do you say to someone who is angry at God?
Why ask it
A test of whether they reach for a formula or sit with the person. Note whether the answer includes listening before it includes an explanation.
How do you talk with someone who has stopped believing but still comes to church?
Why ask it
More common in any congregation than people admit, and the reply tells you how much room this priest leaves for doubt. Useful to ask if you are that person.
What do you do when someone asks you something about faith you can't answer?
Why ask it
"I don't know, let's find out" and a smooth answer to everything are very different pastoral postures. Ask for an example rather than a principle.
How has what people bring to you changed over the years?
Why ask it
A long-serving priest has a view of a community's shifts that almost nobody else has: what people worry about, who is isolated, what has gone quiet. Worth listening to at length.
What have you learned from sitting with people who are dying?
Why ask it
Ask this quietly and be prepared to say nothing for a while. The answers tend to be plain and unsentimental, and they often concern what stops mattering rather than what does.
How do you carry what people tell you in confidence?
Why ask it
About the weight rather than the content, so it does not ask them to breach anything. What you learn is how they look after themselves, or whether they have not thought about it.
How do you keep your own prayer from becoming part of the job?
Why ask it
A question about the tension between vocation and profession that most people in the pews never think about. Many priests will admit this one is unresolved.
What do you do when you find a teaching of your own church difficult?
Why ask it
Asked without pressing for a position, this invites honesty about living inside a tradition rather than defending it. If the answer is that nothing is ever difficult, you have learned something too.
Who do you go to for guidance yourself?
Why ask it
Priests hear from everyone and are often heard by very few. The presence or absence of a name here is worth noticing, particularly if you are asking as a parishioner who could help.
What do you wish more people would ask you?
Why ask it
Hands the conversation over, and it usually produces something unrehearsed because nobody prepares an answer to it.
If someone wanted to come back to faith after years away, where would you tell them to start?
Why ask it
A practical closing question, and the answer shows whether they begin with a requirement or with a conversation. Ask it in the third person if asking in the first feels like too much.
What did your family say when you told them?
Why ask it
Reactions range from pride to grief over grandchildren who will not exist. This is often the first moment a priest speaks as a son or a brother rather than as a cleric.
Who taught you the most about being a priest?
Why ask it
Usually a named older priest rather than a book. Asking what specifically they learned from him turns a warm answer into a concrete one.
What does the Eucharist mean to you now compared with your first Mass?
Why ask it
The contrast is the point. Most priests describe the first Mass as overwhelming and the present as steadier, and how they explain that shift says a great deal about how they understand grace.
Has being a priest changed how you think about God?
Why ask it
Best asked late, after the easier questions have built some trust. Answers often move from certainty toward mercy, and the specific thing that moved them is worth waiting for.
Have there been long periods when God felt absent, and what did you do then?
Why ask it
Clergy are not exempt from dryness, and many will say so if asked plainly. An answer that denies it entirely may be honest, but it may also be the answer they think they are supposed to give.
Which spiritual writer or saint do you actually return to?
Why ask it
The word "actually" separates the figure they admire from the one they reread. The second answer is more useful, and often more surprising, than the first.
What do you do after a funeral?
Why ask it
A specific, ordinary question that gets at how someone metabolizes other people's grief week after week. The answer is often a walk, a phone call, or nothing at all, which is itself worth hearing.
When someone comes to you in the middle of a crisis, what do you actually offer?
Why ask it
The honest answer is often presence rather than answers. How they describe those moments shows whether they feel the need to fix things or can sit with something unfixable.
How do you work with clergy and believers of other traditions here?
Why ask it
Local practice varies far more than official statements suggest. Ask for an example rather than a principle: a shared food bank, a joint service, or nothing at all.
What is the most common misunderstanding you hear about the Church's teaching?
Why ask it
You will learn both the teaching and where they think the Church has failed to explain itself. If they answer only with a correction and no self-criticism, that is informative too.
How do people usually start when they do not know where to begin?
Why ask it
A useful first question if you are nervous. Priests field this often, and the answer tells you what an ordinary conversation with them looks like, which is less formal than most people expect.
What is the difference between talking with you and going to confession?
Why ask it
Worth settling early. One is a conversation, the other is a sacrament with a set form and a different rule about confidentiality, and knowing which you are in changes what you say.
What is said here, and what stays here?
Why ask it
Plain and reasonable to ask. The seal of confession and ordinary pastoral confidentiality are not the same thing, and a priest will tell you where the line falls.
How would you suggest praying when I do not feel like praying?
Why ask it
Most priests answer this practically rather than devotionally: shorter prayers, a fixed time of day, saying the words without waiting for the feeling to arrive first.
How do I tell whether a decision is the right one?
Why ask it
Questions about discernment get vague answers unless you bring the actual decision with you. Bring it. Priests are generally more useful on a specific choice than on a method.
What does the Church teach on this, and where is there room to disagree?
Why ask it
Separates settled doctrine from discipline from personal opinion, three things that get blurred in ordinary conversation. A good answer names the source it comes from.
How do I forgive someone who is not sorry?
Why ask it
The hard version of the forgiveness question and the one people actually carry. Watch whether the answer distinguishes forgiveness from reconciliation, because those are not the same act.
What do I do with doubts I cannot resolve?
Why ask it
Doubt is treated either as a fault to correct or as an ordinary part of belief. Which framing you get tells you whether this is the right person for you to keep talking to.
How do I raise children in the faith when I have doubts myself?
Why ask it
Specific and widely shared. Look for whether the answer allows honesty with children or asks you to conceal the doubt, because that difference will shape your household for years.
What do you say about suffering when there is no lesson in it?
Why ask it
Asks for the version they would use at a hospital bedside rather than the version for a homily. If the answer still arrives as a lesson, that is worth noting.
What happens at a funeral here, and what do I need to decide?
Why ask it
If you are arranging one, this is the practical question. Readings, music, who may speak and what is permitted vary by parish, and it is easier asked before you are grieving.
Is there anything I can pray for, or anything the parish needs?
Why ask it
Reverses the direction of the conversation, which almost never happens for clergy. Many priests spend every conversation being asked for something, and being asked what they need lands differently.
Having the Conversation Well
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Practical Notes
Ask for a time rather than catching them at the door
After a service a priest is greeting a queue and thinking about the next thing. A parish office will usually book twenty minutes midweek, and midweek is when they can actually talk.
Bring one question, not the list
Pick the one you most want an answer to and let the rest follow if there is time. Working through a list turns a conversation into an interview and closes down the digressions where the good material is.
Say plainly why you're asking
"I'm asking because my father is ill" or "I stopped going about ten years ago" changes the answer you get entirely. Priests are used to people circling the real question for twenty minutes.
Say so if you disagree
Most parish clergy would rather hear an objection than a polite nod, and they hear plenty of both. Disagreeing without arguing keeps the door open for a second conversation.
What to Avoid
Asking about anything told in confession
The seal is absolute in the Catholic and Orthodox traditions and taken very seriously in others. Questions about the weight of hearing confessions are welcome. Questions about what anyone said are not.
Treating the conversation as a debate to win
If your aim is to test their arguments, say so at the outset and expect a shorter conversation. Using a pastoral appointment for that is a poor use of a limited resource.
Expecting counselling or legal advice
A priest may sit with you at length, but for depression, addiction, safeguarding, or a legal matter the appropriate response is a referral. Being asked for one is not a failure on their part.
Assuming their tradition matches your assumptions
Practice around marriage, communion, confession, and who may do what differs between Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, and other churches, and sometimes between dioceses. Ask what is true here rather than in general.
Sequences for Different Reasons to Talk
New to the parish and getting to know them
- 1"What does an ordinary Tuesday look like for you?"
- 2"What surprised you most about the actual work?"
- 3"How has what people bring to you changed over the years?"
Returning after time away, or unsure what you believe
- 1"How do you talk with someone who has stopped believing but still comes?"
- 2"What do people apologize for that they don't need to?"
- 3"If someone wanted to come back after years away, where would you tell them to start?"
Facing an illness or a death in the family
- 1"What have you learned from sitting with people who are dying?"
- 2"What do you say to someone who is angry at God?"
- 3"What can the parish do that families don't think to ask for?"