“I certainly love what I’m doing,” he said. “I know this is where God wants me.”
“It’s the best of both worlds because I can serve God’s people in a very unique setting,” he said, noting that he felt God’s call “very strongly.”
“As Jesus says in the gospels to his disciples, ‘You have not chosen me. I have chosen you,’” he emphasized.
Both Fr. Kirk and Fr. Hinkle don military uniforms that signify their role as officers and priests.
“In chaplain terms, you call it ‘mastering’ both sides of the collar,” Fr. Hinkle said, before pointing to two pins on his shirt collar. “On one side I have my rank insignia, on the other side I have my cross.”
“In professional naval chaplaincy we’re called the master both,” he added. “To be both an officer and also represent our faith.”
Fr. Hinkle’s father, a retired Navy admiral, saw the chaplain’s mission as imperative.
“If they have this opportunity to spread the Gospel, if you will, and the sacraments, that’s what they’re there for,” Jim Hinkle said.
Fr. Hinkle’s mother, Meredith Hinkle, said she was happy with her son’s vocation.
“We’re just happy because we know he’s doing what God called him to do,” she said. “You can just tell, he’s just very, very happy.”
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