Fr Stephen Langridge, Vocations Director for the Archdiocese of Southwark, asks whether the current shortage of vocations is a symptom of a more fundamental problem facing the Church.

In 2002 the bishops established a commission to review seminary provision for the dioceses of England and Wales. Among other things the commission recommended reducing the number of seminaries in England from four to two: one for the north and another for the south. The report’s recommendations weren’t acted on, leading some to criticise the bishops for cowardice and, more recently, to compare them unfavourably with the ‘courageous’ decision of the Scottish bishops to close Scotus, the last seminary on Scottish soil. I don’t agree. Having visited all our seminaries, I of course recognise that some of them feel more like the Marie Celeste than a student residence but I don’t think they should be closed because I don’t believe that empty seminaries, any more than empty novitiates, are the problem. They are symptoms of a wider malaise in the Church and the way to deal with the disease is not to kill the patient.

“These world crises are crises of saints”, the words of St Josemaria Escriva always come to mind when I hear people talking of a vocations crisis. If men and women are not responding to the call to priesthood or religious life today, how can we be sure that those entering marriage are choosing that way of life as a path to holiness, a supernatural vocation? How can we be sure that those who remain single in the Church are aware that apostolic celibacy is also a vocation and that they have not been ‘left on the shelf’? Undoubtedly a case can be made to argue that many of the vocations willed by God have been contracepted out of existence but perhaps, by focusing excessively on priestly and religious vocations, we have missed the point that the real vocations crisis is to do with how we are responding to the most fundamental vocation of all: the baptismal call to holiness.

Pope John Paul II was sometimes criticised for making too many saints. For some it was seen as a cheapening of the currency of holiness because in their perception sanctity must be the preserve of a spiritual elite. At the other end of the spectrum the complaint was that in canonising so many people the Pope gave the impression that you had to be someone special to be a saint and so undermined the belief that all of us are already holy. The truth is that both extremes are wrong. The call to holiness is universal and the last Pope emphasised that by canonising ordinary men and women. But we who are called to sanctify the temporal realities should not make the mistake of thinking they are already holy. Sometimes our language obscures the fact that we are called to cooperate with God’s grace. ‘Home is a holy place’ is an aspiration rather than an absolute statement of fact. After all, far too many experience the home as a place of strife, fear and abuse.

The idea of vocation goes to the very root of what it means to be a member of the Church. The Greek word for Church means the assembly of those who have been called. Vocation is at the heart of Christian discipleship for a disciple is one who has been called to follow the Lord. We receive this call in our baptism when we are set apart to live a life of faith, hope and charity. To make progress in Christian life means to grow in these three areas. Through catechesis our intellect begins to know and understand ‘what God has done for us in Christ’. But it is not enough for the disciple to know about God and his works. A follower of the Lord is called to know God. So knowing what God has done leads us to put our trust in him and encourages us to turn to him in prayer and thanksgiving. The Christian experiences communion with God in prayer and draws strength from the sacraments given to the Church for that purpose but he also learns to turn outwards towards his fellow men and women and to give himself in love. All this requires effort on our part. When we are small we depended on our parents’ discipleship but at some point we have to take ownership of our Christian life. In so doing we are faced with the question, “How does God want me to love as a Christian?” In other words, at some point we have to consciously discern our specific vocation.

There are many careers, like nursing or teaching, that are spoken of as vocational but when we speak of a divine vocation we are not referring to a job. There are four specific vocations in the Church. Each of them is a call to love in a particular way. We see this clearly in the most common vocation of all, the call to marriage and family life. In marriage a couple are called to ‘lay down their lives’ for each other and for the children God may send them. Their love, which is called to take on the characteristics of God’s love – permanent, faithful and life-enhancing – will be a concrete reflection of God’s love in the world and the first experience their children will have of that love. Religious life is also clearly a call to love in a particular way. The habit and monastic walls can be a powerful expression of the withdrawal from the saeculum, the secular world, but the religious vows express something more: the gift of oneself to God, and to one’s religious community. Not everyone, however, is called to marriage or religious life and perhaps the most undervalued vocation in the Church is the call to “apostolic celibacy”. To remain single in the Church is also a vocation whether or not it is consecrated in a secular institute or another organisation. No one, to be sure, has a vocation to be a bachelor or spinster in the pejorative sense of those terms, instead a single person is called to give themselves in love by making their time and talents available to those who have need. The fourth vocation is, of course, the vocation to ordained ministry.

The fact that everyone in the Church has to discern the particular way in which God wants them to live out their call to holiness should influence our pastoral approach to vocations. To develop a ‘vocations culture’ doesn’t’ just mean to talk more about the various vocations. Christ’s call needs to be perceived and usually his voice can only be heard in prayer. This simple truth has great repercussions for our pastoral ministry and especially our work with young people. When I was growing up the model for youth ministry rarely seemed to go beyond that of entertainment. Our parish youth clubs offered pool, table-tennis and the occasional disco but most of them have long-since been outdone by the high-tech buzz on offer elsewhere. More recently we have learnt to tap into young people’s generosity and idealism and have become adept at staging fund-raising events for Cafod and other charitable organisations. But we need to ask ourselves what we give them in return. We may be like Peter in the Acts of the Apostles, having neither gold nor silver, but what we can offer is healing in the name of Jesus of Nazareth. If organisations and groups such as the Faith Movement and Youth 2000, as well as the World Youth Day events, have flourished in vocations it is surely because they combine a proclamation of Christ with the invitation to draw close to him particularly in sacramental life and Eucharistic adoration.

Why should we not close down some of our seminaries? Because once we really come to terms with why some of them are empty we will begin to fill them again. Our pastoral effort, particularly with young people, needs to include facilitate both an assimilation of the faith and also communion with God in prayer. After all, Christian discipleship necessarily involves a conscious discernment of one’s vocation because it requires coming to an awareness of our Christian dignity as one who is called.

By permission of the author.

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