"My name is Paweł Piotr Labuda and I am a Polish priest of the Archdiocese of Gdańsk, ordained in 2015. I grew up in a Catholic family, where the faith was strongly practiced. My father works as a car mechanic, while my mother teaches religion in elementary school. I also have a younger brother and sister. My parents, at the time of my childhood and adolescence, were part of the ecclesial movement for families and were, and still are, very involved in parish life. I can say that in them I received a great gift from God, because from there - from the family, from the faith of my parents and grandparents and thanks to their prayers - my priestly vocation was born.

After receiving my First Holy Communion I was an altar server in my home parish, the parish of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross in Pruszcz Gdański, near Gdańsk, and served there for about ten years, until I was admitted to the seminary. This gave me a further opportunity to deepen my faith, because being an altar server was not limited to service during Masses, but extended to other parish activities. Then, in my adolescence, I also had the opportunity to participate in the meetings of the youth community that was formed in the parish. All this allowed me to observe very closely the life of the priests. With gratitude, I must admit that the priests I knew in my home parish always gave me a good example of the priesthood. Their way of being priests (involved in parish life, close to the people, but above all with a deep faith) also greatly influenced my decision to enter the seminary.

In addition to "religious" activities, my life as a teenager also revolved around music. As my mother played a little piano, she started to pass on this passion to me when I was already 6-7 years old. In the following years, this interest of mine developed and at the age of 13 I decided to attend the music school in Gdańsk, which was a kind of evening or night school: after finishing my classes at the school in my hometown, I went there to study guitar and piano (I was also interested in the organ and thanks to my parish priest I also had the opportunity to practice in the church). After a short time, the first successes appeared, also on a national scale. Thanks to my teacher, I was able to participate in numerous music courses and competitions, where besides competing I could always meet people with the same passion. My interest in music developed to the point that I began to plan my life linking my future to this very activity. I even dreamed of becoming a conductor. And at that moment God started to change everything ....

A year before graduating from high school, when I was about 18 years old, I seemed to hear the voice of God inviting me to discover a vocation to the priesthood. At first I reacted by decisively rejecting this possibility with my reasoning; in fact, I had planned everything and my future, planned by myself, seemed very opportune. But instead of disappearing, this voice grew louder to the point that it was impossible to pretend not to hear it. I knew that entering the seminary meant giving up everything, everything I had planned. I decided to talk to a priest who, having also been a musician years before, encouraged me to listen carefully to that voice and discern where it was coming from. Without dwelling on the details here... finally, after a few months, I decided to apply for admission to the Gdańsk Seminary.

The time of my seminary formation (which then lasted 6 years) was a continuous discovery of God's love for me. In addition to my philosophical and theological studies, I had the opportunity to get to know myself better and to develop my relationship with Jesus. Every day our seminary offered us the opportunity to participate in an hour of adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, which was very important for many of us. In addition, we participated in various diocesan and parish activities with a view to future pastoral service (hospitals, pilgrimages, care for the handicapped, schools, pastoral work in the various communities, nursing homes, etc.). However, there was no lack of hard and truly difficult moments in later priestly life. During formation, each seminarian had to choose an activity in which to participate, and I was part of the vocational music group. With a group of seminarians and our prefect, we visited the parishes of our diocese, leading Masses and asking for prayers for us and for new vocations. So God arranged that I could use what I had learned before.

After ordination to the priesthood on May 23, 2015, the bishop sent me to the parish of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. Catherine of Alexandria in Reda, a city about twenty kilometers from the Baltic Sea. I worked there for three years, with special attention to the youth. The pastoral activities were really numerous, which brought with it a lot of fatigue, but at the same time also the joy that rewarded everything. After three years of service there, my bishop asked me to go to study in Rome. So, in October 2018 I began my studies at the Faculty of Canon Law at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross. In June 2021 I obtained a Licentiate in Canon Law and now I am in the doctoral cycle. In addition, also starting in 2021, I began attending the Study of the Tribunal of the Roman Rota.

I must admit that the studies are not easy. But, on the other hand, they give me a lot of joy, because I can deepen my knowledge of the mystery of the Church, of her Magisterium, in view of my future work after finishing my studies. Studying at the University of the Holy Cross is a wonderful experience, because we students feel welcomed and this undoubtedly has a great influence on our formation. Our professors and all the university staff are always at our disposal. Studying in Rome also opens up many other possibilities: you can get to know the Church in its different dimensions and in its universality, you can establish new relationships with other people and, above all, despite not being involved in pastoral service as before, you can always deepen your relationship with God.

Besides the academic reality, being in Rome means for me to participate in other realities. Every day I have the opportunity to celebrate the Eucharist in the Sisters' house, I also follow the Neocatechumenal Community in one of the Roman parishes, and sometimes, in my free time from classes, I go to help in some parish or do some other pastoral activity. In my free time I can also practice my hobbies. I like to go on trips, especially to the mountains, and Italy offers me this possibility. It happens that in summer, with students from my parish in Poland (where I used to work), we go climbing together in the Dolomites. Besides, my interest in music will always be present. It is true that I have not been practicing for years and cannot play as much as I used to, but from today's perspective I do not consider that time as wasted. Studying music, practicing a couple of hours every day, has helped me to develop some important habits (e.g. in terms of perseverance, concentration, etc.) that help me in my studies to this day. God had foreseen all this in His plan.

Finally, I would like to make a brief mention of the present situation of the Church in my country. It is true that, as I wrote above, in Poland there is still a lot of religiosity and devotion, and it is noticeable both in the life of the families and in the life of the parishes. I believe that we still have more people in the churches than in other European countries. However, this is not and cannot be the only determinant of religiosity, because religiosity is also currently undergoing many changes. Poland, unfortunately, is no longer as Catholic as it used to be. Although there are now many people and families who bring up their children in the right faith, it is no longer as it was 20-30 years ago. We need to pray, because here too there are fewer priestly vocations. Society is changing rapidly (as everywhere), and also the Polish Church will have to learn more in the coming years to dialogue with people, for whom religious value is not always so relevant.

I believe that in this endeavor we cannot overlook the importance of the invaluable help of all those who contribute to the formation of the priests who will have to face this challenge in the future.".