A young and energetic Catholic priest, who serves in the Diocese of Sandhurst, Victoria, Australia, Fr Rob Galea uses every social media platform to proclaim the Word of God. From his daily short reels on Instagram and Facebook, Fr Rob takes the message of love, compassion and healing to a live audience through his concerts. Fr Rob Galea will be performing live at the ‘Something About You’ concert today, December 7 and tomorrow, December 8 at Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee Indoor Stadium, Taleigao from 6.15 pm onwards. Sharing the stage with Fr Rob during the two-day concert are renowned Goan musicians, Sonia Shirsat, the Band of Priests, and YU4C Goa.
Known as a pop star priest all around the world for reaching out to youngsters with music and a language that is easy for the young to understand. Over the years as Fr Rob has performed live, he has seen a positive change in the number of youngsters that return to his concerts. “It's quite interesting because we did some research about the different generations. Now we have the Generation X, Generation Y, and Generation Alpha. Generations are changing. Generation X, which is probably my generation, they wanted young people to talk to young people. Generation Y don't want young people to talk to young people. They want a role model. That's why you have your Jordan Peterson, Bishop Barron, Fr Mike Schmitz, GaryVee and Andrew Tate. These are people that the Generation Z want to listen to. And so I've seen, by the grace of God, that my voice has come up in some ways as a voice that people want to listen to, that people want to learn by. And as a result, the following has increased, the consistent following has increased, and a lot of people come back for more. I take that very seriously at the same time, I feel it's a great honour.”
This December, Fr Rob will be performing two concerts on two consecutive days, December 7 and 8. Fr Rob Galea had a huge impact on worship music lovers since his concert in September last year. Since then, many listeners have tuned in to Spotify to go through his discography and listen to his songs. With eight music projects to his credit, what songs from his albums will he be performing in Goa? “This is a much larger set list than last year. We'll be singing some of the songs that we sang last year. But I'll be singing, like, ‘Our God Will Reign’. I'm going to be singing pop songs and a lot of my songs as well like ‘No Greater Love’, ‘Aqui Estoy’ etc. We've got some lovely songs on Spotify,” he informs.
While constantly travelling around the world when does Fr Rob have time to work on his music? Fr Rob explains, “I work on music all the time. I'm reflecting all the time and sometimes, when it becomes heavy enough on my heart, I write down. I'm a melancholic writer. I write usually out of a place of sadness. It sounds depressing but that's where I connect with my inner self, with God, and with others as well. Being an introvert, when I get moments of stillness, and then I formulate and write the songs. I also write books and thank God now for ChatGPT because the process made it much faster. Everything else is faster, writing books and writing songs is faster. The process is faster. I also made a lot of connections now with great producers, great writers where I co-write, and I make sure I make the time to write. I'm working on a new album, and also new songs as I go.”
His message of hope for Goan youngsters is one of realisation. “Life is going to be difficult for everyone. But no one can take your peace away. No one can make you in a bad mood or lose your sense of purpose. Only you can give away your peace. Sometimes, we give people too much credit when we worry so much about what they think of us, what they expect of us. I wish that as young people, we would understand just how much authority we have over our own peace. The stability of peace comes when we believe and we know that it comes from our relationship with the Prince of Peace. Allow Jesus, the Prince of Peace, to give you the stability that you need when life gets tough,” concludes Fr Rob Galea.