Orlando Catholic Church Leaders

As a priest, Fr. Matthew Hawkins does a lot more than just lead a parish in the Diocese of Orlando; his work really centers on being present in people’s lives in a meaningful way. As the Pastor of Annunciation Catholic Church in Altamonte Springs, he handles the day-to-day life of the parish, from celebrating Mass and hearing confessions to guiding families through important moments like baptisms, weddings, and even funerals. It’s the kind of role where he’s constantly interacting with people, not just teaching, but actually walking with them through different seasons of life. Alongside that, he also serves as a Vicar Forane, which means he supports other priests and helps keep different parishes connected within his area, working closely with the bishop, John Gerard Noonan. He’s also involved in helping men discern a possible calling to the priesthood and contributes as a spiritual advisor in diocesan efforts. Overall, the work he does is a balance of leadership and personal connection, guiding the Church while staying grounded in the real experiences of the people he serves.

Father Martin Nguyen has become especially known within the Diocese of Orlando for his ministry alongside families of children and individuals with special needs. In recent years, he began an annual Special Needs Mass at Holy Family Catholic Church in Orlando, later expanding it into a larger diocesan gathering designed to help families feel welcomed, included, and supported within the life of the Church. Over time, the gathering grew into an important space for many families throughout the diocese. The roots of that commitment are personal and, by his own telling, not without regret. During one homily at the Special Needs Mass, Father Nguyen openly reflected on his relationship with his youngest aunt, who had special needs. He admitted that during his teenage years, he often lacked patience with her and now looks back on those moments honestly. Over time, however, that relationship changed. He later spoke about how the Lord softened his heart and transformed their relationship to the point where he eventually became her “favorite nephew.” After ordination, his experiences teaching and serving students with special needs deepened that understanding even further. He has frequently spoken about the kindness, sincerity, and openness he sees in many of the children and families he encounters through this ministry. “These children love very purely,” he once said. “And when they love, they truly love.” During one Special Needs Mass homily, he thanked parents and caregivers for loving their children faithfully and described them as a powerful witness to the dignity of human life. It was the kind of reflection that seemed shaped as much by personal growth as by pastoral ministry. During his seminary years, he was also sent to Washington, D.C. to study sign language after serving in a parish with a small deaf community. He later spoke about falling in love with the language and wanting to help bring the Gospel to those communities as well. That instinct moving toward people who are often overlooked or excluded has remained consistent throughout much of his ministry. Under Father Nguyen’s leadership, the Special Needs Mass has become more than simply an annual event. For many families, it has become a visible reminder that they belong fully within the life of the Church. Through his ministry, Father Nguyen has consistently emphasized dignity, accompaniment, patience, and the importance of creating parish communities where families caring for loved ones with special needs feel genuinely welcomed and understood.

Fr. Martin Nguyen arrived in the United States from Vietnam in 2006 at the age of sixteen. It was the first time he had ever left his home country and the first time he had ever traveled on an airplane. Like many immigrant families, he had to adjust quickly to a different culture, language, and way of life while still young. After settling in Orlando with his family, he found his way to Holy Family Catholic Church, where he became a parishioner and later an altar server. In many ways, Holy Family became his first real home in America, the place where the unfamiliar slowly became familiar and where a quiet sense of vocation began taking shape. Much of what formed him, however, came long before arriving in Florida. Father Nguyen has spoken warmly about the influence of his mother and grandmother, as well as the values he learned growing up in Vietnam, where sacrifice, perseverance, hard work, and devotion to family were deeply woven into daily life. One experience that remained especially meaningful to him was caring for his grandmother while she was dying of cancer. He later recalled sitting beside her reading religious books while he was still young, an experience that quietly shaped his understanding of faith, suffering, and care for others. As he adjusted to life in Central Florida, his connection to the Church continued to grow. While attending Dr. Phillips High School, he remained active at Holy Family Parish and eventually visited the seminary during his senior year. He later entered formation in 2007 and spent nine years preparing for the priesthood before being ordained in 2016 at St. James Cathedral in Orlando. His paten was presented to him by his mother, while his chalice had been given to him years earlier by the late Bishop Norbert Dorsey shortly before the bishop’s death. Years later, many parishioners viewed his return to Holy Family as pastor as a meaningful full-circle moment; the same immigrant teenager who once arrived there looking for community had returned as the parish’s shepherd. Even after many years in the United States, Father Nguyen continues speaking openly about the values that shaped him growing up in Vietnam. Those experiences still appear quietly in the way he approaches priesthood, community, and pastoral life today

Fr. Ramon Bolatete was born and raised in Tagbilaran, Bohol, in the central Philippines. He is a singer, a brother to seven siblings, and a priest whose ministry has carried him across four countries and more than three decades of service. Ordained in 1985, his journey has taken him from the deeply Catholic coastal city where his mother brought him to Mass every morning, to mission work in Papua New Guinea, seminary studies in Canada, and eventually to parish life across Central Florida, where he has served in the Diocese of Orlando since 2001. He is now the pastor of St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Dunnellon, where he arrived in 2023 after previously serving communities in Lakeland and Clermont. One of eight children, he remains closely connected to his family, several of whom now live in Florida and continue gathering for birthdays, holidays, and major moments together. If you ask those who know him, they will tell you he is easygoing, approachable, and genuinely present in the lives of the people around him. Whether he is singing at a parish celebration, spending time with parishioners after Mass, or quietly learning the rhythms of a new community, Fr. Ramon continues to serve with warmth, patience, and a way of being that makes people feel at ease.

Fr. Miguel González was born and raised in Puerto Rico, where parish life became part of his identity from an early age. As a child, he would play Mass in his bedroom using Ritz crackers as hosts and Hawaiian Punch as wine, while neighborhood children joined him as the congregation. When his mother worried the game might be inappropriate, their parish priest encouraged her to let him continue, believing it could be the beginning of a vocation. Years later, Father González would look back on those early experiences as part of what first shaped his love for the Mass and the priesthood. His family’s involvement in the Catholic movement Cursillo also played an important role in his formation. Through parish life, youth ministry, and service as an altar server and lector, the Church became a steady part of daily life for the González family. That connection became especially meaningful when they later moved from Puerto Rico to Miami. In a completely different environment, the Church remained the place that felt familiar and grounding to them. Father González has spoken openly about how that transition shaped him. While adapting to a new city and culture, he found continuity through the Catholic faith, describing how “church was church, and Mass was Mass.” That experience appears to have deeply influenced the way he later approached ministry within culturally diverse communities, particularly Hispanic and immigrant communities throughout Florida. Much of his priesthood has remained closely connected to Hispanic ministry. He has led Spanish-language media programs, served as spiritual director for the Spanish Cursillo movement, and ministered within multilingual parish communities for decades. His background as a Puerto Rican priest who personally experienced migration, cultural adjustment, and community through the Church continues to shape the way he relates to many of the people he serves today.

Fr. Fritzner Bellonce serves a deeply multicultural parish community at Holy Family Catholic Church in North Miami, where Masses are regularly celebrated in Creole, English, and Spanish. He preaches and ministers in all three languages, reflecting the cultural makeup of the people he serves and the broader diversity of the Archdiocese of Miami. His ability to move between languages has become an important part of his ministry. In a parish shaped by Haitian-American families, longtime Miami residents, and Spanish-speaking communities, language helps create familiarity and connection within parish life. Whether preaching a homily, celebrating a sacrament, or speaking with parishioners after Mass, he is able to communicate with people in the language they are most comfortable using. That multilingual ability also reflects much of his own life experience. Before arriving in Miami, he had already lived in Haiti and the Bahamas, adapting to different cultures and communities along the way. Over time, those experiences helped shape a ministry that feels accessible to people from different backgrounds. Public records do not fully document when he became fluent in all three languages, but his ministry clearly reflects years of living and serving across multilingual communities. Today, that ability remains one of the defining characteristics of his pastoral work in South Florida.

Fr. Bill Zamborsky was ordained on June 1, 1974, for the Diocese of Orlando, and has served there ever since. Over fifty years, his assignments have taken him to St. Peter in DeLand, St. James Cathedral, Blessed Trinity in Ocala, St. John Vianney in Orlando, St. Charles Borromeo in Orlando, Holy Spirit in Mims, Prince of Peace in Ormond Beach, and Our Lady of the Springs in Ocala, where he continues as pastor today. Each place was different. Each one, he has said, became family. That word family comes up consistently when Fr. Bill talks about his priesthood. It is not a metaphor he uses lightly. It reflects something he appears to have built deliberately and patiently in every parish he has served. When he looks back on fifty years of ministry, it is not the titles or the assignments that stand out. It is the people. The depth of those connections becomes visible in small but meaningful ways. When Prince of Peace Catholic Church in Ormond Beach celebrated its 50th anniversary, a parish he had previously served as pastor, Fr. Bill wrote them a letter. In it, he reflected on fifty years of Catholic tradition as barely a blip on the screen of the Church's 2000-year history, and described Divine Mercy as not a benchmark of any sort but the heritage and joy of God's love. It was the letter of a man who had not simply moved on. He had carried the parish with him. He has long ago come to consider Florida his home, and Florida, across eight parishes and five decades, has clearly come to consider him its own.