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Dr. Anthony Stone is slated to be ordained a permanent deacon for the Diocese of Duluth Friday, May 5, at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Rosary.
Stone and his wife, Teresa, are members of St. Thomas Aquinas parish in International Falls.
Stone is the fifth of eight children and was born and raised in northern California. He met Teresa while studying at the University of Notre Dame. He was studying engineering but later discovered a love for the life sciences and changed to a pre-med major.
After college, he moved to Washington, D.C., to attend the Uniformed Services Medical School as an officer in the U.S. Air Force. He married Teresa after his second year of medical school, and the two have been married for 30 years. After medical school, the Air Force took them to Scott Air Force Base, Illinois, for his residency in family medicine and then to his first assignment in Fairbanks, Alaska. It was there that their daughter, Carolann, was born. After a second tour at Scott Air Force Base, he separated from the Air Force in 2004 and moved to International Falls, where he practices family medicine.
Stone said that he and Teresa were drawn to International Falls by the fact that there were two priests and a Catholic school at St. Thomas.
Stone said his years at Notre Dame were pivotal in his faith journey, where he found the opportunity to make the faith truly his own with daily Mass, time in adoration, and frequent confession, after being raised in a family of strong faith.
He said he has never experienced a crisis of faith or a sense of falling away. He and Teresa have been involved in a variety of ministries since early in their marriage, serving as sacristans and readers, teaching faith formation, and presenting Worldwide Marriage Encounter weekends.
As for his call to the diaconate, Stone said he long struggled trying to discern what God was calling him to do. He felt he was trying to live his faith actively but sensed God was calling him to something more. This changed one Sunday morning when, walking out of Mass, Father Ben Hadrich challenged Anthony to consider the diaconate, something he had never considered and admits he knew little about.
Thinking that Father Hadrich was just kidding with him, Stone responded, “I think you have the wrong guy!” But he says by the time he reached the bottom step in the gathering space at St. Thomas Aquinas, he felt a sense of being called.
The next morning, he started his prayer differently from how he had prayed in the past. He simply said “yes” and told God he would do whatever it was he wanted him to do. Over the ensuing weeks, he began to feel a great sense of peace in abandoning himself to God’s will. He entered the aspirancy program for the diaconate in 2017 and was invited into formation in 2019.
Anthony and Teresa both say the time in formation has been a time of great spiritual growth, fraternity, and marriage enrichment.
Stone looks forward to serving St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Columban in Littlefork and says he particularly enjoys his ministry of outreach to the homebound.