PORT ANGELES — Reddit.com is not typically a place most people think of venturing to when they need to ask a priest a question.

But through the work of several priests on the site, some people are receiving the Catholic answers they’ve been looking for on Reddit.

Origins

r/AskAPriest was created around five years ago.

Father Jacob Maurer, one of the founders of the subreddit, said it stemmed from a need he and fellow priests who posted on r/Catholicism identified.

“We realized people were seeking out Catholic priests to ask us questions,” Father Maurer said. “And we were quickly becoming like, ‘This kind of online ministry that we hadn’t really thought about.’”

One of the priests suggested that they create a sister subreddit to r/Catholicism to specifically address questions that people had for priests.

Around 10 priests ended up creating r/AskAPriest, one of whom was Father Maurer, who said that there continues to be a core of around five or six priests who are active on the subreddit and around 20 others who are on and off, including one bishop.

Each priest on the subreddit has been verified offline through pictures: They’re required to take a picture of themselves with their name and email from an active, ministry-related address to make sure they’re real and in good standing with the Church.

Once verified, they can start answering questions posed by (mostly) anonymous Reddit users.

“I’m always keenly aware that I’m Father Maurer, my username is u/frmaurer, and if you were to click on my profile it goes to my archdiocesan entry and my home page and my parishes — I am accountable and need to be,” said Father Maurer, who serves as pastor of Queen of Angels Parish in Port Angeles, St. Joseph Parish in Sequim, St. Anne Parish in Forks, St. Thomas the Apostle Mission in Clallam Bay and St. Mary Star of the Sea Parish in Port Townsend.

Father Jacob Maurer, one of the founding priests of r/AskAPriest, is a pastor in the Archdiocese of Seattle. (Photo courtesy of Selena Abounader)

r/AskAPriest sees up to a dozen questions a day, including those about the priesthood and going to Mass while in a state of sin, plus questions from non-Catholics about being drawn to the faith and more lighthearted questions about if the Church will acknowledge the act of putting pineapple on pizza as a mortal sin — to which Father Maurer replied in jest: “I'm only willing to go as far as declaring it a venial sin, with the standard reduction in culpability for those living in ignorance or not entirely free in their choice of pizza.”

Though the subreddit accepts many questions, there are some that are not allowed — questions about sin, advice around scrupulosity, in-depth spiritual or vocational advice, and theological questions that could be answered on r/Catholicism.

It’s recommended that people asking the former types of questions go visit a parish priest in person to discuss the matter as it’s more difficult for a priest to simply respond to properly online.

Regardless, the priests of r/AskAPriest try to make sure every single question gets some sort of response, even if it’s just guiding them to use the subreddit’s search function as they’ve previously answered the same question.

Priests from around the world

Father Peter Wierzbicki, another one of the community’s priest moderators, created his Reddit account, u/polski-cygan, three years ago. He’d already been active on YouTube and various Polish forums where he partook in discussions about Catholicism and electronics.

“I’ve heard Reddit actually takes a lot of time from your life. When you start browsing it, you just feel that you cannot stop,” he said. “So I was trying to be away from Reddit for as long as possible.”

But the r/Catholicism and r/AskAPriest subreddits piqued his interest, and he decided to create an account.

Originally from Silesia in Poland, Father Wierzbicki, the pastor of St. Jude Parish in Hopatcong, New Jersey, said participating on the subreddit has helped him become more outgoing in how he uses the English language.

Because it’s not his first language, Father Wierzbicki said he sometimes struggles to find the right English words when ministering to someone.

“That made me, many times, kind of afraid to speak up to tell people what I really think,” he said, “because immediately I think that if I say something, it won’t sound good.”

On Reddit, he’s able to type his answer out in Polish and then translate it to English.

“So that subreddit actually teaches me some of the words which I would never use by myself,” Father Wierzbicki said. “It makes me not afraid to speak up and tell people what they really need to hear. r/AskAPriest actually prepares me for that kind of conversation.”

Father Peter Wierzbicki celebrates Mass in this undated photo. (Photo courtesy of Father Peter Wierzbicki)

Father Maurer added that, among the new priest moderators since the creation of the subreddit, there have been seminarians who asked questions and read threads on r/AskAPriest before joining on as moderators after they were ordained a priest.

He said most of the priest moderators on the subreddit are in their 30s and 40s, with a few in their 20s as well.

Ministering in their free time

Though it’s an activity each priest chooses to partake in when he’s able, it can quickly eat up available time.

Often questions require the priests to do their own research to make sure they’re answering the original poster correctly, whether that means searching through canon law, sifting through their own notes or just simply doing deeper online research.

Despite this, Father Maurer tries to get on the subreddit every day, and Father Wierzbicki nearly every day.

“There have been some really great conversations, and it’s often a lot of fun. It forces me to look up things,” Father Maurer said. “We also have a moderator conversation that’s private, and we’ll ask each other: ‘What about this question?’ ‘I’m not entirely sure I got this one right,’ or ‘It’d be nice if somebody else brought in another perspective here.’”

Sometimes a Redditor will make a post about some of the more controversial topics within the Catholic Church. Father Maurer noted these as questions about sexual sin, gender issues, attractions issues and feelings of despair.

He said he enjoys these types of questions as he can use them as a chance to relay Church teaching yet also let the original poster know that they are welcome in the Church.

Father Wierzbicki added that these questions are things many young people in the Church wonder about.

r/AskAPriest “is excellent for many priests to learn [from the] younger generation, what kinds of questions they have and to extend our own knowledge about the Catholic Church to make it more youthful,” he said.

“This is an excellent tool, an excellent way to prepare yourself for questions in the real world from young people because they have that kind of questions,” Father Wierzbicki continued. “Sometimes they have questions about if their sacrament is valid or if Canon Law says this, or ‘am I in trouble or something?’ I’ve met these kinds of questions in the parish as well.”

But answering questions online creates its own problems.

Messages are easily misinterpreted, and some of the questions they receive revolve around contentious world issues.

“You would answer certain questions a little bit differently when you are in confessional, a little bit differently when a person just approaches you and asks you that kind of question, and you have to also adjust your answer when you answer on Reddit because you don’t see that person, you don’t know their reaction,” Father Wierzbicki said.

Father Maurer noted that, over his five years on the subreddit, he’s learned to use language that comes off more neutrally as to not accidentally send the wrong message.

“I like to think my tone has evolved,” Father Maurer said. “It’s so easy to misinterpret over text. We’ve all experienced it, especially through email and text messages.”

A digital ministry

Regarding the digitization of our society in front of an audience at St. Peter’s Basilica July 29, 2025, Pope Leo XIV called for people to always “look for the ‘suffering flesh of Christ’ in every brother and sister you encounter online.”

“It is not simply a matter of generating content, but of creating an encounter of hearts,” Pope Leo said. “This will entail seeking out those who suffer, those who need to know the Lord, so that they may heal their wounds, get back on their feet and find meaning in their lives.”

While much of the work r/AskAPriest’s priests do on the forum could be seen as a forward-thinking way to reach people in need of Catholic guidance, Father Maurer doesn’t want to take that much credit.

“I don’t know that I can attribute any great virtue or vision as much as just, ‘Boy, this is really cool.’ I liked r/Catholicism and now we have r/AskAPriest and it’s kind of fun,” Father Maurer said.

“It isn’t so much of a coordinated effort of like, ‘I’m going to minister right now,’” he said. “It’s just really fun. I don’t stop being a priest, I don’t stop being who I am, but it’s also like this kind of relaxed ministry [where] people are putting themselves out there and I get to care for them.”

“An opportunity came up and now it seems to be bearing some fruit and I still enjoy it,” Father Maurer continued. “And in all honesty, the day that it becomes too heavy, the day that it becomes more of a burden [is] probably the day that I’m going to log off and go, ‘All right. That’s enough for me.’”

Check out r/AskAPriest here.