Vocations: Everybody's Business

“Thou art a priest forever…”

Priestly Ordination, like Baptism and Confirmation, is a sacrament that can be received only once in a lifetime because these sacraments change us forever. They confer an indelible spiritual character. Even if for some reason a man ceased to function as a priest, he is still a priest forever.

This fact underscores the seriousness of the commitment to Priesthood. One cannot receive Ordination with a tentativeness or “I’ll try it” mentality. One must embrace the Priesthood knowing that there will be trials, disappointments, and suffering but also knowing that it is worth it. Each day a priest works a miracle by changing simple bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ to feed God’s people; a priest can say, “I absolve you from your sins.” A priest makes the Good News of God’s love known. What could be more meaningful, more important, more beautiful?

Recruitment

During times of war, the recruiting posters depicted Uncle Sam pointing a menacing finger and the caption declared: “Uncle Sam wants you!” Many young people felt a need to respond to the challenge, “to make the world safe for democracy,” or “to defend our shores from the threat of invasion.” Anyone who could not respond to the call had to make an examination of conscience and question why he was not responding.

In the Church, the Holy Spirit is the vocation director who plants the grace of a vocation in a person’s heart. “Christ wants you!” “The Church needs you!” “God’s people need you!” Sometimes the Holy Spirit’s promptings are very clear in a person’s mind and heart; but more often than not, the Holy Spirit relies on the help of other people to encourage and promote vocations.

In our country, the Holy Spirit had very important collaborators in generations of religious women who formed the minds and hearts of millions of Catholic children. I don’t think anyone could come in contact with “the Sisters” and not consider the possibility of a vocation to Priesthood or religious life. The Sisters explained the meaning of religious life, celibacy, Priesthood, and ministry. They challenged our youth to embrace a life of idealism and sacrifice in the service of Christ and the Church, and thousands of young people generously responded.

Catholic Families

Traditionally, Catholic homes have been a privileged place for a vocation to grow and be nurtured by parents who understood the importance of Priesthood and religious life. My own family was a great source of encouragement for my vocation. Today, we need to appeal to parents and teachers to instill a sense of vocation in our young Catholics. They should not confine themselves to asking their children: “What do you want to be when you grow up?” They must also ask “and what do you think God wants you to be?” We must help young people look beyond careers and professions and answer a call from God to be holy.

For most young Catholics that call is going to be to married life. We must do all we can to help prepare them for that vocation. We can also be certain that some of our young people are being called by God to lives of special service in the Church, to priesthood, permanent diaconate, and religious life. It is particularly challenging to present the commitment of consecrated life and priest ministry in the context of contemporary culture. Without support, these vocations will go unheeded.

Parents can do so much by praying with their children and teaching them to seek God’s will in their lives through vocational discernment. Parents need to have a sense of vocation and mission themselves to pass on to their children. Parents receive their children from God and must be willing to give them back to God for service of His people. In faith parents need to understand that their children’s true happiness depends on a generous response to God’s call and that God is never outdone in generosity and love.

Vocations tend to appear in families where the parents are actively involved in the faith formation of their children and instill in them a love and respect for priest and religious. Asking children to pray for priests is a way to signal to the child the importance of priests in our lives and at the same time indicates to the child that priests are human and need the support and prayers of the faith community to persevere in their service to the Church.

Following the Church’s calendar and making the seasons and feasts part of our family rituals is also a way to promote Church vocations. Likewise, by honoring the saints, we provide our children with Christian heroes and heroines whose virtues and lives of holiness and service offer challenging examples to new generations of Catholics. Their lives teach us that discipleship implies the cross, but where there is love and fidelity, life always has a happy ending.

An appeal to teachers

We no longer can count on the large numbers of religious sisters to educate our young people in the faith. Parents are now aided in this responsibility by thousands of lay teachers and catechists who generously serve our Catholic community. I want to appeal to all of our teachers, in all our CCD programs, and Catholic schools, as well as to our youth ministers to speak with our young Catholics about the call to holiness and the importance of discerning one’s personal vocation. I appeal to you as well to speak specifically about the consecrated life and Diocesan Priesthood with our young Catholics. In doing so, you will be cooperating with the Holy Spirit in building up the Body of Christ. If we fail to inspire a sense of vocation in a new generation of believers, we will all suffer the consequences.

Role of Priests

Priests have a special responsibility to promote vocations. This is done first of all by, “stirring up in your hearts the gifts you have received with the imposition of hands.” We need to have a sense of wonder and awe in the presence of this “mystery and gift”, as the Holy Father calls the Priesthood. We are vessels of clay carrying treasures for God’s people. We bring them treasures they need even when they do not know that they need them.

There are countless frustrations and difficulties in the Priesthood, and yet the joys and consolations of a priest’s life are part of the hundredfold Jesus promises to His faithful disciples. The more a priest is in touch with the gift and the mystery of the Priesthood, the more his life is an invitation to others to follow Christ in the same way. If each priest were to share his own vocational story, I am sure that the witness and ministry of some priest from his past would certainly figure prominently in every case. Indeed, it is important to share our own vocation stories with young people today. Oftentimes, they are intrigued by the thought of anyone choosing such a “countercultural” way of life; and the affirmation of the need to say “Yes” to God is often a powerful witness.

A priest must speak about vocations in his homilies and in his visits to CCD Classes and parish schools. Youth Ministry is also a crucial venue for a serious discussion about vocations. An understanding of vocation needs to be an essential part of our religious formation.

The witness of priestly fraternity is also an important factor in promoting vocations. Our Catholic people are always disappointed to see disunity among priests and bishops. Jesus’ High Priestly prayer for unity, “that all might be one,” has a special application to the Catholic Priesthood. Collaboration and fraternity are important aspects of a priest’s vocation.

A priest’s sense of mission to lead people to Jesus Christ, is also a powerful motivator in promoting priestly vocations. It is essential to remind ourselves constantly that ministry is not about me, but about Christ. The sense of urgency that fills the preaching of Christ in the Gospels must find an echo in our hearts and in our ministry. Part of that urgency is expressed in the invitation to discipleship and to ministry. The priest, too, must be an “inviter” who challenges young people to search their hearts and to answer God’s call to serve.

Pray to the Lord of the Harvest

Our quest for vocations in the Church is a spiritual one. We need to storm heaven with our prayers. The inexorable link between Eucharist and priesthood must be very clear to our people, and so Eucharistic adoration is a wonderful form of prayer for vocations. Over the last few years, we have tried to encourage Eucharistic adoration in conjunction with the traditional Catholic observance of First Friday and First Saturday. We have also encouraged the practice of perpetual adoration of the Blessed Sacrament in various parishes. I would ask that a conscious effort be made to emphasize prayer for vocations as an important element in the Eucharistic adoration and Holy Hours that take place throughout the Diocese.

Faith and love for the Eucharist cannot allow Christ’s presence in the tabernacle to remain alone. Already in the Old Testament we read that God dwelt in a tent (or “tabernacle”) which was called a “meeting tent.” God desired meeting with His people. The tabernacles in our churches house Christ present among us so that we can have this meeting place with Him. I hope that my priests will be the first ones to enter the meeting tent, to visit Christ in the tabernacle for a “daily talk,” and to pray to the Lord of the Harvest to send more laborers into the harvest.

The Curé of Ars once said: “If we truly understood the priesthood, we would die, not of fear, but of love.” May we discover this great truth each day in grateful adoration before our Eucharistic Lord.

Parish Strategies

Vocations come out of Catholic families and parish families.

It is the young man in the CCD Class, the Confirmation candidate, the altar server, the member of the youth club, and the lector, who will be tomorrow’s priest. The parish community needs to be very attentive to its responsibility to make use of every opportunity to promote vocations.

As Bishop of Fall River, I am asking that: 1) Each pastor initiate discussions with the parish council and parish staff concerning the parish’s role to promote vocations, especially to the Diocesan Priesthood. 2) That every parish should establish a Vocations Committee whose chairperson should be in communication with the pastor, the parish council, and the diocesan vocation director. (The Diocesan Vocations Office is prepared to give some assistance in the formation of parish vocation committees.) 3) That these committees be set up before the end of the Jubilee Year. It is our hope that these committees will help develop parish strategies for promoting vocations and engage the entire community of faith in this endeavor.

We are very grateful to the parishes that have vocation committees already functioning and to the Serra Club International for the good work that they do. We thank all our parents, priests, teachers and youth ministers for all that they already do, and we urge you to redouble your efforts to encourage vocations. We must see this as a crucial part of parish life. It is in the community of faith that spiritual gifts are bestowed and discerned so as to be put at the service of God’s people. We can ill afford to be complacent. We must storm heaven with our prayers asking the Lord of the Harvest to send us holy priests. Pope John Paul II expressed it so well:

We need heralds of the Gospel who are experts in humanity, who know the depths of the human heart, who can share the joys, the hope, the agonies, the distress of people today, but who are at the same time, contemplatives who have fallen in love with God.

Prayer to Mary, Mother of the Divine Shepherd

Holy Mother of the Good Shepherd, turn your motherly care to our Diocese. Intercede for us to the Lord of the Harvest to send more laborers to the harvest. Inspire vocations in our time. Let the word of your Son Be made flesh anew in the lives of persons anxious to proclaim the Good News of everlasting life. Draw them near to the heart of your Son so that they can understand the beauty and the joy that awaits them when the Lord Jesus calls them to be his witnesses. Amen.

Bishop Sean P. O'Malley, O.F.M. Cap
Bishop of Fall River
September 8, 2000
Nativity of Mary