Talk 7
THE FUTURE OF SERRA: THE POPE SETS THE TONE AND THE PACE
Elden Francis Curtiss
Archbishop of Omaha
Episcopal Advisor for Serra International
As Cardinal Pio Laghi (prefect for the Congregation of Catholic Education) pointed out recently, Pope John Paul II has recognized the importance of Serra world-wide in promoting vocations. The Pope considers Serra to be the primary lay organization for the support and promotion of vocations to priesthood and religious life throughout the Church.
In Pastores Dabo Vobis (I will give you pastors), the apostolic exhortation of Pope John Paul following the 1990 Synod on Priestly Formation, the Pope encourages us to stimulate and support vocations to priesthood, and to support those who share their priestly ministry with us. At the same time, he recognizes the circumstances of the present day which complicate vocation ministry.
Traditional Feeder Systems Failing
Recently I had a long conversation with one of the young priests of the Omaha archdiocese. He told me that he graduated from one of our Catholic grade schools and a Catholic high school. He came from a vibrant parish in the city, from a strong Catholic family. But it was not until he attended the University of Nebraska -- at a secular campus -- that he was first invited to think about priesthood by the campus chaplain.
This young priest went through a totally Catholic school system without anybody inviting him to be a priest. He had heard about vocations to the priesthood and the religious life, but no one had specifically invited him to think about a vocation personally.
This is the reason we have to build new feeder systems in our arch/diocese to replace those that are no longer working. The main participants in these new systems will be lay people who are willing and ready to promote vocations to priesthood and religious life.
Serra plays a crucial role in the development of these new feeder systems because of the history, experience and commitment of Serrans to foster vocations to priesthood and religious life. But the process today takes many new strategies and new methods in reaching young people.
New Feeder Systems
Serra meetings are important, so that individual members can be motivated to continue their commitment to vocation ministry. But the Pope is calling us to be pro-active in vocation ministry directly, to find new ways to invite more and more people to think about priesthood and religious life. This means a personal, nose-to-nose, heart-to-heart invitation by a Serran to a prospective candidate. This means active vocation ministry in our own parishes first of all, and then throughout our arch/dioceses. This means leaving the Serra meeting and the Serra activity to do hands-on recruiting for priesthood and religious life.
A New Serra Requirement
I would like to see a written requirement in every Serra club in the world that each member is expected to contact personally eight people every month (two a week) to invite them to consider priesthood and religious life.
A seminarian told me recently that a Serran whom he admired very much had invited him to think about priesthood in the Call by Name Program. This young man had been flattered by the invitation from the older man and he began a discernment process. This experience needs to be repeated hundreds of thousands of times in every community in which Serra is active.
The Pope's Call to Serra
In Pastores Dabo Vobis - I Will Give Your Shepherds, the Holy Father reminds us that a vocation is not only an action of God; it demands our response and cooperation. As he tells us in the introduction to this apostolic exhortation, "The Church must never cease to pray to the Lord of the harvest that He send laborers into the harvest (cf Matt. 9:38). The whole Church must propose clearly and courageously to each new generation the vocational call, help people discern the authenticity of their call from God and to respond to it generously, and to give particular care to the call of candidates for the priesthood."
How are we of Serra to respond seriously to these challenges that the Holy Father offers us?
I think several opportunities are open to us:
- There is an ongoing need to recognize how very essentialthe ministry of priest is to the Church. This calls the entire christian community to live out its vocation to encourage and support vocations to ordained ministry. As members of Serra, our ministry only has integrity when we not only talk about vocations to priesthood but when we seek out, invite and encourage quality candidates. If we would have seminarians who have passion for ordained ministry, our ministry as Serrans must have a passion which characterizes our commitment to priesthood. Will you take advantage of the opportunities in your own arch/dioceses and your own parish communities to pursue these goals?
- Vocational ministry must be truly incarnational, which calls us to be evangelizers to the culture in which we live. It is far too easy today to reduce religious practices and doctrine to the lowest denominator which results in a mere humanism with little or no ecclesial identity. World Youth Day this past August in Denver became an example of what can happen when young people celebrate their identity in faith with unabashed pride and enthusiasm. Will Serrans everywhere take advantage of the opportunities which World Youth Day has offered to all of us to promote vocations?
- More and more it is obvious that before we call or invite young people to consider a vocation, we must call them first to the experience of conversion in their relationship with Jesus. Religious faith introduces young people to Jesus and enables them to hear his call to "come and see". Do we recognize the rich resources in our local churches of successful pastors whose assistance we need to help inspire candidates to the priesthood? For many of us priests, the call to priesthood was the result of the example of a dynamic priest who called us to conversion of heart and mind. Will we Serrans find every possible way we can to encourage our priests to be the primary vocation promoters in our arch/diocese?
- A pressing need for all of us Serrans is to watch and listen to the people who comprise our local churches. When we take the time to do so, we see multi-cultural and multi-racial communities with different languages and identities. What opportunities do we provide for young people from these communities to consider a vocation to priesthood while helping them to preserve their culture, language and identity? Do we really know the young people in our cities and towns that we are inviting to consider priesthood and religious life?
WE ARE ON THE CUTTING EDGE
It seems to me that we Serrans are on the cutting edge of the Church in developing the essential ministries we need for strong vibrant Catholic life in the coming years. A powerful symbol for me in my own vocation ministry are the mountains of Oregon and Montana with which I am so familiar. When I was living in Portland, it could happen that we would spend weeks and never see either Mt. Hood to the east or Mt. St. Helen to the north. But even though the clouds and rain and mist covered these mountains, they remained as majestic symbols of God's ongoing presence and beauty. At times all of us may experience the same sense of the absence of God, but God is present to us and has called us to be instruments of His ongoing call for vocations. We must not lose heart.
A dozen years ago Mt. St. Helen erupted and gushed forth lava and destruction. In the aftermath, not a sign of life remained. But last year visitors to Mr. St. Helen could see that new life has been waiting beneath the surface and was slowly pushing itself above ground to yield new growth and beauty beyond imagination. Within the Church and society there have been many such eruptions over the centuries. But we now live in a time when the God of surprise and hope is so obviously at work in our midst, and we see new life and new possibilities everywhere about us.
We as Serrans instinctively know that the God of hope and surprise is calling forth new shepherds to lead God's people. It is our ministry to seek out these potential shepherds and to call them and name them and encourage them to follow the Lord's call. We must never lose heart in this ministry. Our objectives and goals are too important for our Church and for our world.
