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Building a culture of priestly vocations
By Natalia Schumann
On Sunday we celebrated the Baptism of Our Lord and began the week-long celebration of National Vocation Awareness Week. The Church set aside this week, Jan. 9-15, to focus on vocations to the priesthood and religious life.
Often the only response for lay people supporting priestly vocations is to pray. Prayer is essential to more vocations because it is the Lord who calls men to himself, but it is truly just the beginning. We can do much more.
A culture of vocations is built on three levels.
Call to holiness
First, we must nurture our personal call to holiness. As described by Second Vatican document, “Lumen Gentium,” “this holiness of the Church is expressed in many ways by the individuals who, each in his own state of life, tend to the perfection of love, thus helping others to grow in holiness” (Chapter 5, 39). The lives that flow from a true relationship with God will be the witness needed to move hearts toward the priesthood.
Family
The family is the second building block of a culture of vocations. Families are so often a foundational element in nurturing one’s vocation. Specifically a family can teach children to be open to the Lord and his call for their lives. This openness is demonstrated by the parent’s continual seeking of the Lord’s will in decisions, big and small.
If a young man must be open to receive the Lord’s call, then those around him must also be open to the possibility this young man could be a priest. If your son said that he was considering college seminary out of high school would your initial response be one of support and encouragement?
Often a man’s choice to go to seminary is for further discernment rather than a definitive call. One first-year seminarian said the “priesthood was on my heart and I knew it would not leave my heart until I applied.” It’s hard to discern something supernatural in a natural world; hence the need for the prayer, studies, silence and brotherhood found in seminary.
Parish
Finally, a culture of vocations is nurtured within a parish community. The best recruiters for the priesthood are priests themselves. Not just the man that runs the parish, but the pastor of a soul. They are instrumental in moving guys to consider seminary with their personal relationships and invitations. Their fatherly guidance and zealous, joy-filled witness of their vocation is compelling to a young man. Many first-year seminarians mention that the encouragement of a priest was the most influential factor in their applying to seminary.
Parish priests are the real deal, the true face of what it means to live a vocation to the priesthood. As lay people our prayers, gratitude and service to them is a contribution to allowing them to continue to foster more vocations in our local church.
Furthermore, parishes open the doors to a variety of ministries such as Bible studies, discipleship groups and small faith communities, mostly led by the lay faithful.
A majority of first-year seminarians cited these types of groups and organizations as contributing to their ultimate decision to, not only discern the priesthood, but also to enter seminary. The participation of lay people in these groups is fruit for vocations because more men will be drawn to experience the Lord through faith communities.
In building this culture of vocations, one person, one family, and one parish at a time, we can then together increase vocations across our diocese.
As we heard in Sunday’s psalm, “the voice of the LORD is powerful”, let us remember that our vocations come from the Lord and to the Lord we should listen.
Read more vocation stories in next week's Jan. 26 Denver Catholic Register.
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