Father Daniel Stump Ordained Priest for Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph

Mount St. Mary’s Seminary & School of Theology (MTSM) has been celebrating the men from the Archdiocese of Cincinnati and Diocese of Charlotte who had completed their time here this year followed quickly by ordination to the holy priesthood, another MTSM seminarian has completed a different vocational discernment that has ended at the same spot.

Last May, Rev. Daniel Stump from the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph (Missouri) completed his Master of Divinity from MTSM prior to his ordination as a transitional deacon, which took place a couple of weeks later. With his academic obligations complete at MTSM, Deacon Stump took on an assignment in his home diocese as a deacon at Nativity of Mary in Independence and St. Bernadette (Kansas City).

After a year serving as a deacon, the path to the priesthood becomes reality for him on Saturday, May 30, when he was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop James V. Johnston at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Kansas City.

“I am very excited to begin my first assignment as a priest,” Father Stump said. “The parish I have been assigned to (St. Thomas More in Kansas City) is one I have done a summer assignment at and feel like I can hit the ground running at. I look forward to celebrating weekly Mass for the forgotten souls living and deceased, and they have a group that meets for coffee after Daily Mass, which will be a delight to be involved with.”

Father Stump, a native of Kansas City, has always had the priesthood on his mind, though it took some time for his “yes”.

“I was always excited about the idea of living a life in total service to the Church,” Stump recalled. “Through much of my time in high school at St. Pius X in Kansas City, I was set on going into seminary after graduating. However, when it came to apply, I did not feel right about it.”

Stump’s vocation took him to North to Iowa, where he attended Briar Cliff University in Sioux City and earned degrees in Theater and English Literature. Following graduation, he went to work for Caribou Coffee, working his way up to general manager positions in Des Moines, Iowa and Parkville, Missouri before in 2017 he decided it was time to apply for seminary at last.

“It was during those two years before applying to seminary that my awareness off a vocation to the priesthood resurfaced,” Stump noted. “While I had achieved a lot of what I wanted to in my life, I continued to have a feeling I was missing something. I went on a men’s retreat through St. Therese North in Kansas City and during that retreat, I saw a painting from the perspective of the drowning Peter, as Jesus reaches down from the surface of the water to grasp his hand. Through that retreat I contemplated the invitation of Jesus to ‘come and see’ and realized that in order to figure out if I was mean to be a priest, I needed to go to seminary.”

Stump completed his pre-theology work at Conception Seminary College in Conception, Missouri before coming to Cincinnati. However, it was a trip that had one final detour, as during his third year at MTSM, he took some time away, returning to the Kansas City area to work through his calling.

“My story is one of recognizing God’s call to be His priest,” Stump reflected. “I kept running away from that call until I realized there was nothing else that I could possibly want more than to become a priest and be conformed to the heart and priesthood of Jesus Christ.”

Stump returned to MTSM in Fall 2023 and completed his Master’s of Divinity in May 2025, from which he was ordained as a transitional deacon and began to take in parish life at Nativity of Mary and St. Bernadette in the Kansas City Area.

“The pastor (Rev. Bryan Amthor) let me preach every third weekend, Mondays and at the school Masses on first Thursdays,” Stump noted. “I got to baptize five children, three of them in Spanish, I got to teach a couple of OCIA classes and help with Confirmation prep and Youth Groups. It was very fulfilling to apply my formation to real parish ministry.”

Father Stump was able to return to Cincinnati in May to be part of the retreat the men to be ordained to the priesthood take part in each year prior to ordination. In addition to getting to reconnect with many of the brother seminarians he had lived with over the years, he felt it was appropriate to get to take one of the final steps of his formation in a place which had such an impact on his formation.

“MTSM has had such a profound and pervasive contribution to my formation, that it felt natural to go on retreat with my classmates prior to ordination,” Stump recalled. “During the retreat, I was able to contemplate the word of Christ in the Mass ‘This is my Body, which will be given up for you’ and it struck me how the lessons I learned while in the workforce about emptying myself out for my employees and my customers will now translate into a more perfect and total emptying of myself into my ministry as a priest of Jesus Christ.”

While his priesthood will take root in Missouri, Father Stump will always have time for MTSM and the Archdiocese of Cincinnati.

“Over the many years I spent in the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, I was always welcomed into the communities, whether that be at the pregnancy center at Old St. Mary’s or assisting with prison ministry and OCIA in Lebanon,” Father Stump reflected. “Every time I drove away from MTSM when returning to Kansas City, I was a little sad.”