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VOCATIONS
TO THE

PRIESTHOOD
By

VERY REVEREND LYMAN A. FENN, S.S., D.D.



' &

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Ecce a4gnus *T)ei

Vocations to the Priesthood

(Their Discovery and Development)

BY

VERY REVEREND LYMAN A. FENN, S.S., D.D.
President of St. Joseph*s College

Preparatory Seminary of the Archdiocese of San Francisco

Mountain View, California

Nihil Obstat:

J. M. Byrne,

Censor Deputatus.

Imprimi Licet

:

© Joannes J. Mitty,
Archiepiscopus Sti. Francisci in CaUfortUa.

A. D. 1938, die 8 Aprilis.

PRINTED AND PUBLISHED IN THE U. S. A.

BY THE PAULIST PRESS, NEW YORK 19, N. Y.

New York

THE PAULIST PRESS
401 West SQih Sikeet



CONTENTS
PAGE

FOREWORD 3

CHAPTER ONE

WHAT IS A VOCATION TO THE PRIESTHOOD? 5
I. Christ’s Call of the Apostles

A. The Gospel Story 6

B. Analysis of the Elements of the Call of the Apostles 8

1. He Who Called 8
2. Those Who Were Called—^The Apostles 9
3. John the Baptist’s Role in the Call of the

Apostles 10

II. Christ’s Call of the Youth of Today

1. God’s Providence and Vocation 10

2. The Right Intention and Vocation 12

3. The Call of the Bishop and Vocation 13

III. Defination of Vocation 14

rv. Implications Contained in the Foregoing for Those

Who Search for Vocations 15

CHAPTER TWO

THE SIGNS OF A VOCATION 17
The First Sign—

I

ntellectual Talent 18

The Second Sign—

M

oral Fitness 22

1. Humility and Obedience 23

2. Generosity and the Spirit of Sacrifice 25

3. Reverence 28

4. A Kindly Disposition 31

5. Uprightness of Character 33

The Third Sign—

P

hysical Fitness and Home Background 34

II ' ^ i
CHAPTER THREE

MEANS OF FOSTERING VOCATIONS —- 39
I. The Position of Those Who Foster Vocations 39

II. Various Types of Candidates 40

III. Chief Means of Fostering Vocations 43

1. Talks on Vocations 43

2. Frequent Attendance at Mass, Holy Communion,

Sanctuary Societies 45

3. Vocation Week, Retreats, Autobiographical Sketches 46

4. The Confessional 46

5. The Distribution of Pamphlets 47

6. Prayer 47



FOREWORD

A VOCATION to the priesthood is like gold in the hills,

miners who dig for it. Priestly gold lies hidden among the

splendid young boys of the parishes of our land, waiting to

be uncovered by those who would bestir themselves for

the search.

The general law of the Church thrusts the burden of

the search directly upon the shoulders of priests, especially

pastors. But the Sisters and Brothers of our schools, and

those who devote their lives to the teaching of Christian

Doctrine, because of their many intimate dealings with the

children of the parish, and because of the confidence the

children so often place in them, can be of great help to

parish priests in the work of discovering vocations to the

priesthood.

Practical experience reveals the extent of this help.

There are nuns and Brothers who, with intelligent and pru-

dent zeal, are ever on the alert to find priestly timber

among the fine boys of the parish. Their efforts rarely go

unrewarded. They take up their station in a place and

within a few years they direct one, two, perhaps even

more boys to the seminary. Let them be changed, how-

ever, and should no one with like enthusiasm replace them,

vocations drop off, though the parish remains the same,

with the same school, the same families, and the same gen-

which can be brought to light only by the labors of the

eral atmosphere.

5



4 Vocations to the Priesthood

What secret do these consecrated men and women pos-

sess? Have they some strange charism, some mysterious,

mystical aptitude to read hearts and discern vocations, a

gift not given to their fellow priests or fellow religious?

No! They possess, it is true, more prudence and zeal

than others; but they are successful chiefly because they

are interested in the problem, because they use well their

years of experience with the growing boy, and because

they know what is expected in a candidate for the priest-

hood.

No doubt the discernment and development of vocations

offer an exquisite task in practical psychology. How shall

the priest, the Brother, or nun, recognize the signs, if any

appear, or discern amid the complex stirrings of a boy^s

mind the germ of a vocation? And what can be done to

foster that vocation, once it is discovered? It is with the

hope of helping fellow priests, and our nuns and Brothers

in this task that the following pages are offered.

Feast of the Annunciation, 1938,

St. Joseph’s College,

Mountain View, Calif.



CHAPTER ONE

WHAT IS A VOCATION TO THE PRIESTHOOD?

WHAT is a vocation? This is a question which seems
to demand an answer at the outset of any discussion

on the ways and means of fostering vocations. We must

know precisely what we are to look for before we can begin

the search. Yet there are so many factors entering into

the problem that the word ^Vocation,” so often used, may

leave but confusion in the mind.

We are sure of this much: we. know that Christ Himself

called His first priests; their vocation was divine. We

are equally sure that Christ has been calling boys and

young men to the priesthood ever since Apostolic times.

The call to the priesthood always was, always will be

divine. There are certain minor differences, to be sure,

between the vocation of the Apostles and that of the mod-

em boy, but the central Figure in every true call is the

Person of our High Priest, beckoning, inviting, drawing to

Himself those ^^whom He would.”

Here, therefore, is something certain to start with, and

something we may usefully carry all the way through the

discussion. For the purpose, then, of obtaining a clearer

notion as to the nature of a vocation, we shall consider:

I. Christ’s call of the Apostles, as it is told in the

pages of the Gospel;

II. Christ’s call of the youth of today
;

III. The definition of a vocation;

IV. The implications contained in the above for those

who search for vocations.

I



6 Vocations to the Priesthood

I. Chrisfs Call of the Apostles

A. The Gospel Story

John the Baptist was preaching at the ford of the River

Jordan. With him were a few followers, who had gathered

round the Baptist and had begun to receive from him a

special training. They had often heard him tell the won-

drous story of the Promised One. They had listened rev-

erently to his lessons on prayer and on the necessity of

the practice of penance. As the Baptist spoke, there ap-

peared a Figure coming toward him on the opposite bank

of the river. There seemed nothing extraordinary about

the Man. He was dressed in the working clothes of a

Galilean. He now walked down the river bank, as He

had often walked in the lanes of Nazareth, where not a

neighbor had detected in Him anything of note. He walked

on, head bowed in meditation. So ordinary did He seem

that those about John would not have heeded Him, save

perhaps to remark that there passed a fellow countryman,

for John’s followers were also Galileans.

But John recognized Him. He recalled a meeting on

another day, when this same Young Man had presented

Himself for baptism. The heavens had opened and a voice

from heaven had said: “This is My beloved Son in whom
I am well pleased.” John now recognized Him, and could

not let Him pass by, for he was there to bear witness

to Him. The time had come to declare Him. “Behold

the Lamb of God.” On the day previous the same Figure

had passed, and John had pointed Him out with the same

quiet, simple words. This time, however, the “Ecce”

struck a note of curiosity in the hearts of two of the dis-

ciples. They crossed at the ford to the other bank to dis-

cover for themselves what it was that made John single out

the passing Stranger.



What Is a Vocation to the Priesthood 7

Timidly they followed the steps of the ‘‘Lamb of God^'

in silence and at a little distance, until at last He turned

to query: “What seek you?” For the first time they looked

upon the face of Jesus. His eyes met theirs; they were

the glad eyes of a friend meeting a friend. There was in

His manner that which commanded respect; yet there was

a friendliness which invited companionship. They were

caught by Christ’s loveliness. Spontaneously they hailed

Him with the title -“Rabbi,” a name reserved to teachers in

Israel and to those held in high esteem. “Rabbi, where

dwellest Thou?” Then our Blessed Saviour answered in

a way that gladdened their hearts. “Come and see.” “They

came and saw where He abode and stayed with Him that

day.”

Such is the story of the meeting of the first Apostles

with our Lord. In the weeks that followed He searched

out others, now by the shores of the Lake of Galilee, now

while passing a man sitting in the customhouse. To each

He issued the compelling call: “Follow Me,” and when

He had gathered twelve men about Him, He impressed

upon them in a most solemn manner, and after a night

spent in prayer, the fact that the call to the apostolate

went out from Him and from Him alone. Our Lord re-

minded them of this again in that touching hour after the

Last Supper, when He was bidding them farewell. “You

have not chosen Me; but I have chosen you; and have

appointed you, that you should go, and should bring forth

fruit; and your fruit should remain.”

Christ—^the Twelve—^John the Baptist—these are the
persons with whom we are concerned in the vocation of

the Apostles. A closer examination of the gospels will
reveal the part played by each.



8 Vocations to the Priesthood

B. Analysis of the Elements of the Call

OF THE Apostles

1. He Who Called

He who called the Apostles was Almighty God. Christ

in His own Person did the selecting; for, as St. Mark

tersely puts it: “He called unto Him whom He would Him-

self’ (Mark iii. 13).

God had prepared these men for their high calling long

before their meeting with the “Lamb of God.” By His

providential design He had made them to be the sons of

sturdy Jewish families, had given them by bent of nature

and training those dispositions of generosity and good will,

of ready sacrifice, of obedience and reverence, which were

to play so large a part in their wholehearted response to

Christ’s invitation when the time came for Him to issue it.

God’s finger, then, was upon them from the beginning,

fashioning in their souls those traits of character, those

signs or marks of a vocation, as we now call them, which

our Blessed Lord was to purify and elevate into priestliness.

With His own designing providence. His divine knowl-

edge, His power to read human hearts, the Son of God

knew perfectly the caliber of the men whom He chose,

their strength and weakness. “All things are naked and

open to his eyes” (Heb. iv. 13). “Whence knowest thou

me?” asked the puzzled Nathanael at first encountering

Christ. “Jesus answered and said to him: Before that

Philip called thee, when thou was under the fig tree, I saw

thee” (John i. 48). He foresaw with divine clarity how

they would develop under His influence and how they would

bear the responsibilities He was going to entrust to them

after their ordination to the priesthood.



What Is a Vocation to the Priesthood 9

2. Those Who Were Called—The Apostles
The Twelve came within the circle of Christ’s friendship

with a fundamental fineness, with solid virtues, and with

a grand spirit of generosity which prompted them under

God’s grace to meet our Lord’s demands. This was their

chief desert—their eager reaching to the heights of Christ
until they followed solely out of a pure love for Him.

But this did not come about in a day or week. Even

though they brought fine qualities to the first seminary,

where Christ was the Master, they were by no means ready

for ordination. They had faults to overcome; for example,

they were inclined to be jealous at times of their own am-

bitions, and sluggish in giving up their opinions. Though

they possessed an innate sense of reverence and piety, it

was vague, with only the beginnings of a love of our Lord,

and with no fixed desires for the priesthood; for they were

as yet ignorant of Christ’s Person and His mission; they

did not yet understand the nature of His kingdom, nor

did they know what wonderful plans He had in store for

them.

They needed training, and our Saviour spent the greater

part of His earthly ministry in instructing and educating

them. The end of His training was Himself, and His pur-

pose was to induce in them utter devotion to Himself,

union with Him, action for Him.

Thus, when they had become priests, no longer did the

selfish desire for leadership in a worldly kingdom intrigue

them. Only their Master and all that was His, His holy

Church and the souls He had come to save, filled their

lives and inspired their actions. Thus was established for

all future generations of priests the single motive that

alone is worthy in one who aspires to the priesthood—the
love of Christ, of His Church, and of mankind. To this

motive we now give the name of “right intention.”



10 Vocations to the Priesthood

3. John the Baptises Role in the Call of the Apostles

It is true that Christ in His own Person, with His voice

and beckoning gesture drew to Himself the first candidates.

But we must not forget that even in so doing, in some im-

portant instances. He had other men, human agents, bring

those candidates to Him or point Him out to them. An-

drew, in his joy at finding the Messias, hurried off in search

of his brother Simon and brought him to Jesus. “And

Philip findeth Nathanael.” St. John the Baptist was never

destined to be a priest; yet in the plan of God he was the

first to encourage vocations, for he directed the steps of

the two disciples to the Source of priestliness. These men

had never before heard of Jesus, and from the human point

of view we may say that the Lamb of God would have

passed unnoticed and forever unknown had not John

pointed Him out. Thus the Forerunner became the type

and symbol of all those human agents, parents, priests,

teachers, whom God uses to bring promising young boys to

Himself. Their motto might well be: “Behold the Lamb

of God."

II. ChrisPs Call of the Youth of Today

Although it is true that Christ no longer walks in the

flesh, that He does not now visit our homes and schools and

playgrounds, going about among our boys audibly, visibly,

tangibly drawing to Himself those whom He would, what a

falling short of faith it would be to think that His influence,

because of that, is now less real. There is, indeed, a par-

allel to be drawn between the call of the Apostles and the

vocation of the youth of our own times.

1. Go(Ts Providence and Vocation

Both reason and faith tell us that nothing happens in

this world by chance, that every circumstance, every detail



What Is a Vocation to the Priesthood 11

of life occurs according to the knowledge, will, and permis-

sion of Almighty God. Let us now apply this general doc-

trine of divine Providence to the case of a vocation to the

priesthood.

It was by God’s design, as we have seen, that the

Apostles were prepared in body and soul for their fruitful

meeting with Jesus, and their subsequent response to His

schooling. Just so, God decrees to bring this or that in-

dividual boy into the priestly state. As a consequence of

this decree He creates and endows the selected person with

fitting qualities of grace and nature. The natural and the

supernatural meet in him to form a happy blending of

physical, moral, and spiritual characteristics that will make

for a successful life in the ministry. He will be ready for

his meeting with Jesus and for the Saviour’s invitation to

'‘come, follow me.”

Most frequently the chosen one is born into a deeply

religious family. His first teacher is a pious mother, who

imparts her own spirit of faith to him and gives him a

respect and reverence for all things Catholic. It may be

that he is sent to a school, where he falls under the influ-

ence of splendid teachers and zealous priests. But however

mysteriously God reveals the working of His plans (and

those plans never seem exactly alike in every case), reveal

them He does to those whose duty it is to have eyes to

see and ears to hear. The selected one has God’s stamp

upon him in the shape of those discernible traits of char-

acter which are called the signs or marks of a vocation.

These signs take on a very great importance to those

who search for vocations. Our Blessed Saviour no longer

treads the lakeshores of the earth to discover with the

glance of God those who are fitted for the priestly state.

He has passed that glorious privilege on to us. His priests

and His religious, poor men, who possess no power to read



12 Vocations to the Priesthood

minds or to peer into the future to see how this little boy

or that will get along in the priesthood. But, as always,

our Lord does not leave us without guidance. Upon His

chosen ones He has placed the telltale signs, which we, with

our prayers, our prudence, and our powers of observation,

must set out to find.

2. The Right Intention and Vocation

Not every fine Catholic boy, who may appear to us

well equipped for life in Christ’s ministry, is destined for

the priesthood. To those fitting qualities of body and soul

must be joined the God-given desire to be a priest.

What the genesis of this desire is we do not know,

for it is pre-eminently the work of grace. We have seen
how Christ attracted His disciples, and how attraction grew

to strong desire, love, friendship. He did so by His own

winning personality and influence, and He who said: ‘‘Be-

hold, I am with you all days” still continues to exercise His

influence upon our boys.

The grace, merited by our Redeemer, although invisible,

is a spiritual reality which swells in the soul, and touches

the mind and will. It inspires thought; it prompts desire

and action. Then there is the Presence of our Lord in the

Holy Eucharist, which is the chief vehicle of grace to the

heart of a boy. In his Holy Communions he comes to look,

as it were, upon the beauty of Christ’s face, and like the

Apostles his interest is caught. Soon will come the ques-

tion: “Master, where dwellest thou?”, and just so soon

will follow the invitation: “Come and see.” When the

spell of Christ’s friendship is upon him, a word is dropped

by his mother or teacher, a sermon is heard, some little

pamphlet is read, some priest attracts him, and the shining

vision of the altar swims into his ken. The desire to be a

priest thus springs into being.



What Is a Vocation to the Priesthood 13

It will not be very clear at the beginning. In some boys

it will be little more than the general reverence and Cath-

olic goodness that prompts them to respect the priest; in

most the desire will be vague and motives obscure and un-

analyzed. More cannot be expected of a small boy in this

regard than that he be generous and that under proper

advice he betake himself off to Christas own school, the

seminary.

The chief purpose of the seminary will be to clarify,

to purify, to elevate that desire into the ‘^right intention,’^

love of our Lord, and love of souls, and to stabilize and

secure the permanence of the intention by all the habits

of obedience, chastity, and the rest that the priesthood

requires. Once in the seminary, removed from the world’s

deadening influence, Christ will have the young man for

Himself. Here He may work His will upon the mind and

heart of the boy, and once again the effect of our Saviour’s

friendship prevails. As in any friendship, the young Levite

by his being daily with Jesus must come to have likes and

interests in common with our Lord. A new flame of love

burns ever deeper in his heart and he is won over gradu-

ally to Christ. As he advances closer to ordination, more

and more the person of the Master comes to the foreground

of his love and affections. Ever more surely he learns to

surrender himself wholly to his jealous Lord, to think with

Christ, to look upon things from Christ’s point of yiew, to

will with Christ. And so, yet another time is the training

of the Apostles in Galilee re-enacted in the case of the boy

of today.

3. The Call of the Bishop and Vocation

Not all desires for the priesthood are God-given. Some-

times boys who are manifestly unfit, who lack this or that

important quality, or who have some serious obstacle block-



14 Vocations to the Priesthood

ing their entrance to the seminary, will wish to be priests.

Not rarely they stubbornly cling to their determination.

Who is to determine finally whether a candidate is a fit

subject for ordination?

As the priest is a public minister of the Church, who

but She, the Spouse of Christ, can decide officially upon

one’s worthiness for the office? She does so through the

bishop of the diocese for which the young man is to be

ordained. The prelate, either personally or through the

seminary faculty, issues what is known as the canonical

or ecclesiastical call.

III. Definition of a Vocation to the Priesthood

Piecing together the various features explained above,

we see that there are two elements in a vocation to the

priesthood—^the divine and the ecclesiastical.
Considered as a divine call a vocation may be defined

as that disposition of divine Providence whereby God,

according to His pleasure, chooses certain men for the work

of His sacred ministry, endows them with the qualities and

graces necessary for the work, and places them amid such

surroundings that they will eventually obey the call that

goes out to them from Him.

The ecclesiastical call places the Nihil Obstat, as it

were, on the divine call; that is, it authoritatively estab-

lishes the presence of the true, God-given calling in a par-

ticular case, giving out the decisive word that the candi-

date possesses the due characteristics, together with a pure

and worthy intention of wanting to become a priest. Thus

the two elements combine to form the complete vocaticMi,

the canonical call being based on the divine call, and pre-

suming and confirming its reality.

All this doctrine has been clearly stated in a decision.



.What Is a Vocation to the Priesthood 15

made on June 20, 1912, by a commission of cardinals and

approved by Pope Pius X. ‘‘In order that one may be

rightly called by the bishop, nothing further is required

beyond the right intention, together with that suitability

which is based on such gifts of nature and grace and which

is proved by such probity of life and sufficiency of knowl-

edge as will give a well-founded hope that the candidate

will be able to discharge the duties of the priestly state

properly and fulfill the obligations of that state in a holy

manner.^^

IV. Implications Contained in the Foregoing for Those

Who Search for Vocations

The priests of the parish and the teachers of the school

will not be concerned with the canonical call, which is the

business of the bishop, nor with the long testing of the can-

didate’s moral fitness and sufficiency of knowledge, which

is done in the seminary. Rather they have to do chiefly

with the boy during that period of his youth before he

enters the seminary. Theirs is the wonderful privilege of

looking for and helping to develop the divine side of the

vocation.

Their task is twofold. They will ever be on the alert

for the promising boy, who gives evidence of being of

priestly timber. They will consequently know well those

positive and recognizable traits which are the marks of

God’s calling. In order to help them toward this knowl-

edge, we shall devote the second chapter to the enumera-

tion and explanation of the marks of a vocation as they

are to be found in the growing boy.

They will, in the second place, be ready to assist the

genesis of a desire for the priesthood, which evidently must

take hold of a boy before he will even dream of becoming



16 Vocations to the Priesthood

a priest. They will hold up the beauty of the priesthood

before the eyes of likely boys; above all they will direct

them to the Person of our Blessed Lord, the Source of all

priestly longings. Behold the Lamb of God’^ will be on

the lips of these John the Baptists of the present day. The

third chapter, consequently, will treat of the various means

of fostering the desire, of reaching the heart of a boy.



CHAPTER TWO

THE SIGNS OF A VOCATION

WHAT signs are we to look for as pointing to thepresence of a call from God? What qualities shall
we expect to find in a prospective candidate that will give

the well-founded hope that he will be a successful seminar-

ian and a holy priest? The gospels have told us what types

and characters Christ Himself deemed worthy and accept-

able; so we can do no better than to make use of the lives

of the Apostles as the basis for an explanation of the marks

of a vocation. We shall consider these signs under three

heads: 1, the intellectual; 2, the moral and spiritual; 3,

physical fitness and home background.

But before considering the particular signs, it will be

well to bear in mind two important facts. The first is that

we can never have ironclad certainty that this or that in-

dividual possesses all the marks. We can never say in

truth: ‘T am positive that he has a vocation—or that he
will surely be a priest.’’ The best we should look for are

those signs which give promise and hope that the boy

will develop well in the seminary. He will have twelve

long years of training, of discipline, of study between him

and his ordination day, and those years, God willing, will

bring to flower the seeds of a vocation which we look for

in the boy in his present stage of development. Too great

certainty in the matter will lead to mistakes, or at the least

to many disappointments.

However, we must remember secondly that while we

can only hope, we must at the same time have high ideals

as our standards of measurement in the search for futme

priests, for the priesthood is the destiny of the finest.

17



18 Vocations to the Priesthood

There must be some personal distinction in the candidate

who will exercise his ministry in this non-Catholic, demo-

cratic American atmosphere, where, too, there is creeping in

the tendency to accept or reject a man on his personal

merits or defects, regardless of his priestly dignity. HencCy

we must expect all the signs
,
described in the ]allowing

pages, to be present to some degree in a boy; complete lack

of even one of them creates a presumption against a genu^

ine vocation. Is this expecting too much? Will our search

inevitably end in failure? No! But it will not produce

the large numbers of candidates that we may dream of.

It will rather single out the chosen few. After all a voca-

tion to the priesthood is rare, and one good priest will do

more than ten bad or mediocre ones. (According to the

latest statistics, as given in Bishop Stockums’ book Voca-

tion to the Priesthood, page 52, there is only one priest

for every 5,678 people in the whole world; only one for

every 1,084 Catholics. Another priest has expressed the

rarity as follows: ^Tn every two hundred Catholic families

with school children, one vocation should be found every

year.’’

The First Sign—Intellectual Talent

A. The Apostles

The Apostles, with the possible exception of one or

two, were not well educated, even according to the stand-

ards of learning of their day. ‘‘Seeing the constancy of

Peter and John, understanding that they were illiterate

and ignorant men, they wondered” (Acts iv. 13).

But if they were unschooled, they were not stupid, for

it took more than the minimum of native ability to absorb

so much of our Lord’s doctrine in three years. To them

“it was given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of



The Signs of a Vocation 19

Heaven’^ (Matt, xiii, 11). It must be recalled, moreover,

that when they joined the ranks of Jesus^ followers, they

were already adults, and there was no time for them to

undergo the slow and long training which the normal

learning process requires. The wonderful knowledge and

grasp of Christ’s teaching which they manifested after

Pentecost was the result of the coming of the Holy Ghost

upon them, '^the Spirit of truth, who taught them all truth.”

In their case it was the Holy Ghost who supplied the

knowledge, even a portion of which under present condi-

tions demands fair intelligence and many years of hard

work.

B. The Boy

The priest, like the Church whose minister he is, has

a mission to man’s spirit. Not by physical force does he

accomplish this mission but by spiritual ways and means.

Mind and spirit, thoughts and ideas, words spoken and

written, these are the priest’s tools that he must use well

or forever be handicapped in realizing the very purpose

for which he is ordained. Definitely he belongs to the

class of mental workers.

Besides, more demands are made today on a priest’s

intellectual and scientific ability than ever before. Our

present Holy Father states these demands as follows:

^^None (of the clergy) should remain content with a stand-

ard of learning and culture which sufficed, perhaps, in other

times; they must try to attain, or rather, they must actu-

ally attain a higher standard of general education and of

learning. It must be broader and more complete; and it

must correspond to the generally higher level and wider

scope of modern education as compared with the past.” A

candidate for the priesthood, then, must have the mental



20 Vocations to the Priesthood

capacity and desire for pursuing a long and strenuous

course of studies.

Now the seminary curriculum of twelve years, no

matter how thorough and well planned, cannot take the

place of native intelligence. It presupposes it and merely

attempts to develop it and bring it to actual fruition.

Neither the seminary nor the student (and what teacher

does not know this!) can count on a sudden descent of the

Holy Ghost. Our schools, indeed, cannot train any and

every boy to be the intelligent and practical leader which

the priesthood demands, simply because every boy has not

the inborn ability to become an intelligent leader. Plato

has well said that men are from birth either of gold, or of

silver, or of baser metal. Hence in selecting boys for the

priesthood, great attention must be paid to the factor of

intellectual talent. And no amount of piety, be it noted

well, can substitute for the lack of mental equipment. The

pious dullard may in the course of his years lose his piety,

but his dullness will ever remain.

How, then, are we to judge in practice whether this

twelve- or thirteen-year-old boy has the talent sufficient for

him to carry successfully the seminary studies? It is not

easy to form a judgment concerning the small boy’s in-

tellectual equipment. Pedagogical insight and experience

are necessary; and even with both a teacher may over-

estimate a talent. Leaders in the eighth grade may be

failures or very mediocre students in high school. Here

are a few general hints which may help in coming to a

decision.

1. The young boy should be able to grasp clearly

present class matter, and the meaning of the facts as they

are presented in grammar school subjects. He must be

able to understand, for example, the function of parts of



The Signs of a Vocation 21

speech in English grammar, or the reason for the use of

certain methods in working out problems in arithmetic.

2. He must have a reliable memory. It has been said

that memory is in direct correlation with general intelli-

gence, taking humanity as a whole. This does not mean,

of course, merely the ability to reproduce mechanically

what is said or read (learning “by heart’’) but implies an

ability to apply what is known to new situations, v. g., the

power not only to recall a method or rule of working a

problem in arithmetic, but the power to apply it to a new

set of figures. Reliability of memory likewise supposes the

gift of a practical judgment. There are some little fellows,

diligent in their way, who will sit down to a history lesson,

for instance, with the determination to memorize every

part of it, having no power of selecting the important

items or studying the lesson as a whole. They absorb

part by part like blotters, with no sense of evaluation.

The knack of learning a lesson as a whole has proved to

be a particularly reliable gauge of a student’s intellectual

ability.

These two capacities—the ability to grasp class mat-
ters, and reliability of memory, in the last analysis depend

upon the faculty that a boy possesses to pay attention,

even when the matter is not attractive to him, as quite

commonly happens in arithmetic class. He must have the

capacity to fix his attention on a subject in order to grasp

and understand it, and he must be able to make repeated

efforts of attention in order to remember it. Consequently,

as in any effort-making activity, the will here comes into

play.

As a matter of fact, the strength of a student’s will

may often be a deciding factor in passing judgment on

his intellectual fitness for the seminary. We must ask:



22 Vocations to the Priesthood

has he the earnest will to work, the capacity for sustained

application? The star of a class, who with a richly en-

dowed intellect can obtain a 95 per cent in any subject with

ease, will never become a leader as a man, unless he has

also the quality of “sticking” to his work. On the other

hand, many boys with average or little better than mediocre

mental equipment have gone from year to year in the

seminary, showing steady improvement thanks to their

methodical plodding and their diligent tending to business.

The Second Sign—Moral Fitness

Coupled with an intellectual aptitude our young can-

didate must have a certain amount of moral fitness; that

is, he must possess those fundamental habits of will and

heart which can be developed later into all the priestly

qualities which the Church expects to find in her sacred

ministers. Of course, we shall not find perfection in a

thirteen-year-old. A boy of this age has the defects that

go with his state of development. He is all boy, if he be

healthy and normal. He will be very thoughtless of others

at times, and sdfish. But underneath these faults, which

are more typical than individual, we must discern at least

the beginnings of certain gifts of spirit, which, if absent,

can never be replaced, by training.

The moral and spiritual gifts of a person, even a

young one, form a closely-knit whole which we call “char-

acter.” So closely bound together are they that they act

as a unit in practice, the whole character being made mani-

fest in every act, especially if that act be the result of

deliberation and conscious effort. There is danger, there-

fore, of presenting a one-sided picture if we single out for

description the individual gifts of spirit, when actually

they never occur thus singly or alone. Humility, for ex-



The Signs of a Vocation 23

ample, runs into the spirit of sacrifice, and, if there is any

dividing line between them, it will be very thin. Again,

the obedient boy will have the elements of generosity in

his make-up. However, with this in mind and for the sake

of greater clearness, we shall treat moral fitness under the

following heads: 1, humility and obedience; 2, generosity

and the spirit of sacrifice; 3, reverence; 4, kindliness; 5,

uprightness of character.

1. Humility and Obedience

A. The Apostles

That quality which our Lord looked for in His Apostles

seems more especially to have been humility. He knew

that a proud disposition undermines or rather kills the

spirit of humble and voluntary obedience, an obedience

which is prompted by respect for authority and the will

of another. As the functioning of His Church was to de-

pend upon just such humble submission to authority, no

wonder that He looked for it first among those whom He

would have for His priests. With what scathing words He

condemned the Scribes and Pharisees, who ‘‘love the first

places at feasts, and the first chairs in the synagogue.’’

Although they were the leaders of the Jews, better educated

than the rest, knowing well that Old Law, which Christ

had come, not to destroy but to fulfill, not one of the

Pharisaic leaders was chosen to be among the Twelve.

Rather, He selected men of humble station, men who,

though they made mistakes were quick to admit them.

They were such as could cry so sincerely: “Depart from

me for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” They were those

who would accept Christ’s commands without question,

simply, and in a literal manner.



24 Vocations to the Priesthood

B. The Boy

How do humility and obedience manifest themselves

in an American small boy? When he is faced with the

awesome question, “Do you want to be a priest?’’, the

first reaction of our average Catholic boy is to draw back

in humility with the thought: “I am not good enough.”

In fact, this humble attitude persists in some of the finest

youngsters to such an extent as to become an obstacle to

their deciding to enter the seminary. But the humility

and obedience we look for here are rather those week-day

qualities which show in every move the boy makes—in the
classroom or on the recreation grounds, in the street, in

the church, and in the home. If in all circumstances he

does without grumble or question what he is told by par-

ent, by teacher, or by priests, then obviously he has a boy’s

obedience and the humility necessary to exercise it.

There is one type of boy we must eliminate from the

ranks of candidates. He is the cross-grained grumbler who

chafes under restraint. Every teacher knows him. The

wry grimace, the stubborn little shrug of the shoulders

greet commands or suggestions. Such youngsters have in

their blood a tendency to fault-finding, take exception to

everything, discover each new command as an occasion for

growling, always know better than their superiors, whom

they usually distrust. Characters like these, whose nature

is one of pride and insubordination, are most emphatically

not suited for the priestly state. Their chafing and

grumbling would only grow in the solitary life of the priest-

hood, and the authority of their bishop, to whom every

priest solemnly promises reverence and obedience on the

day of his ordination, would be a source of irritation rather

than of inspiration and comfort.



The Signs of a Vocation 25

2. Generosity and the Spirit of Sacrifice

A. The Apostles

Christ did not choose His disciples from among the

wearers of purple nor from those who were clothed in

soft garments. True, He did issue a touching invitation to

the rich young man to ‘‘go, sell what that hast—^and come,
follow Me.” But the sense of sacrifice was wanting in the

youth, and “he went away sad, for he had great posses-

sions.” He who was to demand of every man who would

come after Him that he deny himself and take up his cross,

wanted generous characters, schooled in adversity and

stiffened by strenuous work and abnegation. So the Twelve

He chose were generous and self-sacrificing. Thus, as a

simple matter of course the Gospel tells us of the readiness

that two of them showed when Christ called them: “And

they (James and John) forthwith left their nets and father

and followed Him” (Matt. iv. 22). They all could ex-

claim: “We have left all to follow Thee,” and tradition

has it that every one of them (Judas excepted) endured the

pains of martyrdom for the sake of Christ.

B. The Boy

Are our boys rugged enough in character to evince this

apostolic spirit of self-denial? How often have we heard

that American life is a soft one, and that the children of

this generation are reared in an atmosphere of ease and

comfort which is anything but conducive to cheerful cross-

carrying? Without doubt, there is much truth in the

statement, but there are many boys, none the less, who even

in boyhood show signs of a sense of sacrifice.

It is in the home where they best give practical evidence

of the trait. Are they habitually thoughtful and helpful



26 VoCATiaNS TO THE PRIESTHOOD

toward their mother, and toward other members of the

family? If so, this already indicates a lack of selfishness

and the beginnings of a generosity that can grow into a

beautiful priestly and self-forgetting love of souls. The

wise and honest mother often gives testimony of the pres-

ence or absence of the quality in her son. In talking to

the priests or Sisters she will remark that her boy Johnnie

is so thoughtful about the house, whereas ‘Hhat other one,

Jim,” thinks of nobody but himself.

The characteristic of generosity also manifests itself

in the school, in the recreation grounds, in Church, in fact

everywhere, so long as the boy is acting naturally, not in

a studied manner as he is apt to do when on parade.

It is a good sign, for example, if the young lad keeps work-

ing with gritty, persistent effort when his lessons are diffi-

cult. It is a bad sign, if he gives up in the face of diffi-

culties and is too easily discouraged by them. The gen-

erous and sacrificing youngster will be reliable in a boy’s

way and with a boy’s sense of responsibility, whenever

duties in school or in the church are imposed upon him.

He will be faithful at serving early morning Masses long

after the novelty of the bell ringing and candle lighting

has worn off.

This type of boy, given, of course, the other necessary

qualities, makes a fine seminarian. Obedience and the long

routine of the clerical training do not frighten or fatally

discourage him. His high-mindedness, his boyish eagerness

to do something worth while will not melt away under the

telltale test of self-denial. There’s the test! Does the boy

deny himself, that is, is he generous and thoughtful of

others in the normal, every-day happenings of his life?

(The passing splurge of self-sacrifice during a Lenten

period may only be his way of ‘‘showing off.”) If so, we

can reasonably expect that our candidate will spend a



The Signs of a Vocation 27

happy priesthood, not saddened and made cynical by its

sacrifices, or long-faced before the hardships it entails.

Perhaps no other single quality of character makes the

priesthood such a congenial and happy existence than this

one of generosity. Most failures seem to come from lack

of it.

We must make sure, then, reasonably sure that the

boy we would recommend to the seminary possesses this

indispensable gift of generosity. If the youngster lacks it,

we must take equal pains to spare the seminary his pres-

ence. And are there any practical warning signs which

would point out that lack? There is one that appears

always to be trustworthy. Beware of the boy who is for-

ever making excuses for himself. Boy language has a name

for him; he is the ^‘alibi artist.” His soft answers turn

away wrath, and his dodges get him out of the way of all

attempts at correction. He is simply never wrong, and has

a way of shifting the blame for failures and mistakes to

others, even to his teachers. (Unfortunately, doting and

foolish parents will often believe his story and take his

side, with the consequent heartache to the teacher.) Such

a boy does not last very long in the seminary, for he will

never stand squarely in the face of his faults, and there is

no way that the seminary influence can touch him. Mak-

ing excuses and shifting blame may not be a serious and

abiding fault in a little boy (especially if he be the young-

est of a family)
;
but, when it persists into the early teens,

it has an ugly way of persisting throughout life. Benjamin

Franklin made the sad remark that one who makes excuses

is never good for anything else.

There is another character trait which renders a boy

very doubtful timber for the priesthood. It is the over-

weening desire to seek attention. It is true that every boy

(and man, unless he be a saint!) enjoys being noticed and



28 Vocations to the Priesthood

is not indifferent to praise. But when this desire inspires

all or most of the little fellow^s actions and dominates his

motives, then the seminary is no place for him. Whether

the trait grows out of his home conditions, where perhaps

he is petted, yielded to in his whims, and generally quite

spoiled; whether it comes from too much attention at

school; or whether it grows out of his peculiar tempera-

ment, makes no difference. When it is present in this

exaggerated form, it is disqualifying. The seeker after

attention is your overcultivated, self-conscious altar boy,

who looks well in his red-sashed cassock on Easter Sun-

day and who knows it. His hands he keeps piously folded

and his eyes demurely cast down, except when he glances

furtively to see if ‘‘Father” or “Sister” is admiring him.

In his games he will play to his audience, and boys have

a name for him, too. They call him the “grandstand ar-

tist.” This boy can seldom, if ever, develop that sense of

independent sacrifice so essential in the priesthood. Rather,

he is more apt to degenerate into that very unhappy person

who lives on self-pity.

3. Reverence

A. The Apostles

The sturdy fishermen of Galilee possessed an innate

sense of reverence and a solid piety even before they met

the Master. They seem to have been faithful in their

religious duties as Jews, going up to Jerusalem for the

celebration of religious feasts. In fact, it was while on one

of these journeys to the South that they first heard of John

the Baptist, and were attracted to the man, who was

preaching the doctrine of penance and the remission of sins.



The Signs of a Vocation 29

No lightheaded or impious men were these who were drawn

by the stem voice of the one crying in the wilderness. They

had a sense of religion which made them put the proper

values on sacred persons and things. And the very first

time they met the Lamb of God, they addressed Him, as

we have remarked, by a name, given only to respected per-

sons in Israel—Rabbi, Master or Teacher. They devel-
oped that reverence and devotion for the person of Christ

as the years of their companionship with Him sped by.

Even though they grew to know Him so well, even though

they were in many ways familiar and intimate with Him,

even though they were called “not His servants but friends,’’

they never lost respect. Such was not the case of all the

followers of our Lord. His very familiarity. His lowliness,

was for many a stumbling block to the accepting of His

greatness. “Is not this Jesus, the Son of Joseph, whose

father and mother we know?” is the jway they dismissed His

teaching on the Bread from Heaven. But with the Apostles

the very closeness to Jesus inspired and increased their

confidence in Him. Faith deepened; love grew to be all-

possessing until it gripped every fiber of their beings.

Priestly, zealous hearts were thus built out of native piety

and they came to be on fire for the love of the Master.

B. The Boy

We turn now to those lively, restless creatures of the

classroom and ask: what should be the small boy’s piety

and reverence? Reverence is a subtle thing, which reveals

itself in little, sometimes intangible ways. In older students

of the college or university level it is more easily discerned,

and its lack is more glaring. We have met with that abom-
inable flippancy, that sophisticated indifference to the

supernatural which some Catholic students affect. But the



30 Vocations to the Priesthood

younger boys, the ones we are more concerned with, still

have their childhood simplicity. In their case it would be

an easy matter to judge reverence, if we had but to count

the number of novenas a boy makes in the course of a year,

or the number of times he frequents the sacraments. These,

however, may or may not of themselves indicate piety.

Reverence, rather, is divined by a particular accent in

voice and manner in the presence of everything sacred, in-

cluding the boy’s own conscience. The chosen lad has a

temple in his heart, a special presence of the Holy Ghost,

creating reverence in him. He will possess the faith and

religion of a boy with a boy’s seriousness. He may be

every inch a boy; we prefer that he is. He may fight with

his companions, and play as hard or harder than the next.

His very abundance of life gets him into trouble and out of

it. He discovers pleasure perhaps not at all in arithmetic

but with all his boy’s real life, he has a capacity for the

love of God which surprises his teachers when an accident

reveals it to them. He may occasionally race with the

other altar boys to see who can light the candles most

quickly, but generally the church will not be a playground

for him. Although he may feel at home in serving at the

altar or in making his visits, he will never show that

familiarity and boldness which boys do evince who lack

the sense of reverence.

He will, therefore, retain that charming reserve which

respect for his consecrated elders inspires, before the some-

times familiar ways and special favors of priests and

Sisters who take a marked interest in him. Were he lack-

ing in reverence, he would follow up the advantages of

their favors by a catlike freedom, thus showing by his

actions that consecrated objects have cheapened in his

eyes. (But may we insert here a word of warning! Rev-

erence in the boy is a beautiful gift, which draws upon



The Signs of a Vocation 31

itself the admiration of older people. But priests, Brothers

and Sisters can spoil or dim its luster by overmuch atten-

tion !

)

4. A Kindly Disposition

A. The Apostles

Do we find that a kindly disposition was one of the

characteristics of the band of Apostles? The frank Gospel

account tells of the quarrels they had; how they argued

as to who should be first in the kingdom of heaven. We
know o£ the impulsive outbursts of St. Peter, and of the

rebukes he received from the lips of the Gentle One. But

in spite of these outbreaks which were, after all, infrequent,

we know that the Apostles lived in very close association

with one another for a long period, that they fished from

the same boat for days and nights on end. They shared

one another’s joys and hardships, feats which anyone living

in a community is well aware they could not have ac-

complished were they irascible and quarrelsome. On the

positive side, we hear at the very outset of Andrew’s run-

ning off to the brother Simon to share with him the good

news that he had found the Messias. Philip likewise rushed

away to find Nathanael. And they were all of a funda-

mentally kind disposition to learn thoroughly from Christ

the lessons of Christian tolerance and amiability.

B. The Boy

We usually associate kindliness and self-control with

more mature persons, who have rubbed shoulders with their

fellow men and who by their experiences have learned to

take men for what they are—^weak or strong, easily dis-
turbed or calm, volatile or phlegmatic, courageous or timid.



32 Vocations to the Priesthood

Youth, on the other hand, and especially a boy’s youth,

suggests thoughtlessness and even cruelty towards com-

panions, the more so if those companions are inferior in

physical or mental abilities. No! we cannot expect a

boy* of twelve or thirteen to have mastered an unruly dis-

position or to have acquired a positive and well-thought-out

attitude towards his fellows. That would be expecting the

boy to be a man. Consequently, it will be more practical

to approach the question of kindliness from the negative

side, by describing certain types of boys who so lack the

disposition as to be unfit candidates for the priesthood.

There are some youngsters who cannot get along with

their companions. Constant friction arises out of their

cantankerous spirits and quarrelsome little natures. They

seem to be all barb, with a dubious talent for picking out

the flaws of others, and for drawing attention to them by

biting remarks and offensive statements. What happens

to such boys? Sometimes they manage to sweeten their

dispositions, but too frequently either their companions

avoid them or they in turn give up the attempt to go with

others, falling back upon themselves to become lonely,

isolated, souls—^lone wolves that break from the pack.
Characters of this type will not get on well in the

seminary, where the family spirit must prevail, and where

participation in the give and take of community life itself

furnishes an excellent training in tolerance and fraternal

charity.

It seems unnecessary to add that the same type is alto-

gether unsuited for the priesthood, especially the pastoral

ministry. To be “all things to all men,” to have considera-

tion for human weakness, to sympathize with the unfor-

tunate and to smile with the glad, these put to the test

even the habitually kind, and are utterly beyond the reach

of the irascible man.



The Signs of a Vocation 33

What of the hot-tempered boy? I do not mean the

one who is perpetually cranky or nasty by temperament,

but the one who flares up with fists clenched and voice at

its loudest when provoked? This characteristic forms no

obstacle to the priesthood, provided the boy is making at-

tempts to control his temper. As a matter of fact, it may

become a wonderful asset to him in his maturity if he

manages to bridle his temper. Some of our greatest church-

men, the men who do things for Christ, are those who have

diverted wild tempers into channels of tireless activity.

5. Uprightness of Character

A. The Apostles

Our blessed Saviour seldom used terms of reproach.

Rather, He reached men’s hearts by the method of kindli-

ness and encouragement. But if ever human defect soured

even the sweetness of the Sacred Heart and drew from the

divine lips withering rebuke—it was hypocrisy. ‘‘Woe to
you Scribes and Pharisees, h}^ocrites: . . . whited sepul-

chers. . . . You serpents, generation of vipers.”

It is beyond question, then, that no hypocrites were

found among those whom Christ chose to be His successors

in the priesthood. The Apostles were straightforward,

genuine men. They possessed within themselves the happy

blending of those natural virtues which gave to them a

disarming openness of soul. It is the sum total of such

virtues that we have designated by the general term “up-

rightness of character.”

The Twelve, indeed, were forthright. Nathanael was

the Israelite in whom there was no guile, and St. Peter

was outspoken to the point of bluntness in expressing his

oft-mistaken opinions. St. Thomas was as honest as he



34 Vocations to the Priesthood

was stubborn in clinging to his doubts. And their con-

certed ‘‘Is it I, Lord?’’ at the Last Supper was not posed,

but an unaffected question for all, that is to say, for all

save one.

B. The Boy

Most of our Catholic boys are open and artless char-

acters, whose faces and whose actions candidly mirror what

goes on within them. Most of them are quick to own up

to misdeeds or to admit mistakes. Most of them find it

difficult to hide guilt even when they are tempted to do so,

being poor liars and clumsy quibblers, and most of them

are honest in their examinations and plain dealing in tell-

ing the truth. It is among this majority that we can expect

to find the germs of a true vocation.

However, there is a small minority of boys who lack

that openness of soul, who are furtive, even untruthful and

sneaky. So obviously ill-fitted are they for the priesthood

that one may wonder if the thoughts of becoming a priest

would ever occur to them. But there is no need for won-

derment. Desires for the priesthood have a way of keep-

ing strange company at times; and because the company

is strange and unbalanced, because there is furtiveness and

guile, it is doubly difficult to dissuade the would-be can-

didate that he should not enter the seminary. If dissuasion

is impossible, then at least warning should be given to the

seminary authorities, who can definitely close the doors

against him.

The Third Sign—Physical Fitness and Home
Background

The qualities discussed up to the pr^ent pertain to

the internal make-up of the candidate, and are of prime



The Signs of a Vocation 35

importance. We have now to consider some external traits

and circumstances which, while secondary, have a bearing

upon the fitness of a young man who desires to be a priest.

Canon law sets up certain qualifications of physical fit-

ness and proper home environment and pronounces that

various defects in bodily structure and health, certain social

blemishes arising out of the candidate’s family background

are impediments or irregularities. It is easy to understand

the Church’s attitude. The priest occupies a position of

prominence in society. The eyes of his flock are ever upon

him. Hence physical abnormalities or taints of name and

reputation, which would pass unnoticed or would not

prejudice the work of a man in private life, cannot be

tolerated in the person who is always before the public in

performing his priestly functions. The dignity of the

priesthood and the efficiency of Christ’s work are here

at stake.

A. The Apostles

The Gospels speak little about the physical fitness or

family background of the first priests. But we can be sure

that men who lived so much of their lives in the open,

and who carried on the strenuous occupation of fishing,

were well able physically to be fishers of men and to bear

up under the hardships of their many missionary journeys.

As for the good reputation of their families, in some

instances we know the names of the mothers and fathers

of the Apostles and in each case they are presented to us

as respectable, hard-working people of sturdy stock. More-

over, in the light of Jewish interest in a good or bad name

(witness their attitude toward Mary Magdalen and the

woman taken in adultery) and of the tribal pride in an-

cestry and genealogy, we may suppose that the Jews would

have used any smirch of reputation as an excuse for refus-



36 Vocations to the Priesthood

ing to accept the preaching of the Apostles, had the latter

been unacceptable to their countrymen on this account.

B. The Boy

1. Physical Fitness

A boy need not have the physique of a professional

athlete in order to study for the priesthood, but he should

be a normal, healthy individual. The following defects

would definitely eliminate him from the ranks of pros-

pective candidates: blindness, or eyesight so poor as to

hinder the pursuit of close study; deafness, muteness, or an

incurable defect of speech; privation of a limb, or hand,

or of the thumb and index finger (used in consecrating the

Sacred Species and in distributing Holy Communion)

;

pronounced lameness or serious facial imperfection. In

fact, any defect that would interfere with the offering of

Mass in a decent manner, without involuntary oddity and

without scandal, must be considered as an impediment.

Hence we must also add excessive nervous trembling, epi-

lepsy, and shocking bodily malformations, such as curva-

ture of the spine.

There are other diseases and afflictions which may

render the boy’s immediate entrance into the seminary an

imprudent experiment. Severe heart murmur, anaemia,

glandular trouble that demands a very special diet, and the

like, may be curable, or they may grow progressively worse.

Sometimes youngsters are languid and lacking in physical

energy because of certain organic troubles, for example, an

infection of the lungs. Hence arises the demand on the

part of seminary authorities of a thorough physical exam-

ination by a competent doctor before they will accept the

application of a student.



The Signs of a Vocation 37

Mention must also be made in this place of the mental

health of the candidate. The innumerable disorders of

the conscious life of man, all the phobias and obsessions,

fits of melancholia, hysteria and the many more, usually

develop fully only in later life. But some mental diseases

give warning of their presence in early youth, and the alert

teacher, even though not trained in psychiatry, can detect

the symptoms. If a boy is odd, and given to peculiar

actions, especially if other members of the family manifest

similar peculiarities, if he is always being ridiculed and

mocked at by others and never taken seriously, if, as a

result, he separates from the rest and withdraws into him-

self, the teacher may suspect with very good grounds that

there is here the beginnings of a mental abnormality. The

kindest and most prudent action in this instance is to advise

against entrance to the seminary.

2. Home Background

A boy may get his red hair and blue eyes from his

mother, and his tall stature from his dad, but oh! how

much more than mere bodily traits does he receive from his

parents! Their culture and traditions, their faith and

sound Christian principles, all these are poured into his

being from his cradle days. And, under God, it is most

frequently in the home that there are implanted in his

soul, the virtues of obedience and generosity, the spirit

of self-sacrifice, humility, and reverence, which, as has been

explained, constitute the moral fitness in a worthwhile

candidate.

It is not surprising, therefore, that the Church desires

the candidate’s home surroundings to be examined in detail.

She wants to know what kind of parents he has and what

is the depth of their Catholicity. She inquires, too, about



38 Vocations to the Priesthood

possible marriage difficulties, for an aspirant must have

been born in lawful wedlock.

Even the economic situation in the home will have a

bearing upon the boy’s fitness. Not that the family need

belong to the so-called upper class of society or to be well-

fixed financially. If that were a condition, our seminaries

would be depleted; for, as our present Holy Father has

remarked: ‘^It hardly does honor to those higher classes of

society that they are on the 'whole so scantily represented

in the ranks of the clergy.” No, most of our seminaries and

priests come from the middle or poorer class and very

few of them are able to meet fully the costs of a clerical

education.

However, there are poor and poor, and this is the point

to be stressed. There is a respectable and ‘^proud” pov-

erty, which maintains its independence in the face of hard-

ships and carries itself in Christian resignation. And there

is the poverty which is degrading, which comes to look upon

charity as its due, which forgets how to say thank you, and

which loses the sense of responsibility. When the sense of

gratitude and appreciation is missing, how can we expect a

boy ever to value the finer things of the priesthood? In-

deed, it is but very rare that a suitable candidate will emerge

from such killing surroundings.



CHAPTER THREE

MEANS OF FOSTERING VOCATIONS

I
N this chapter there remains the task of indicating ways
of fostering vocations, that is, means of arousing interest

in the priesthood, of helping a boy come to a decision about

his vocation, and of advising him to enter the seminary.

We shall first try to mark out clearly the position of those

who use the means. Next we shall consider some types of

candidates with whom we have to deal, as their varying

reactions will largely determine the way we choose to ap-

proach them. And thirdly, we shall treat of the chief

means of fostering vocations.

I. The Position of Those Who Foster Vocations

‘‘Behold the Lamb of God.’^ These directive words of

John the Baptist, as was pointed out in the first chapter,

are big with meaning for us. The humble Precursor di-

rected two of his disciples to our Lord, but he did nothing

more than direct. He merely bore witness to our Saviour,

as though saying to the men who were with him: “There

is the Fountain Head of all true vocations. Go to Him!”

The next step was left to the disciples themselves.

Christ intruded on no man, for He respected the dignity

of human freedom, which He Himself had created. He

issued an invitation, and then waited for a response. He

would have willing faith only, spontaneous allegiance. But

once that faith was given, then the more graciousness, the

more intimacy, the more love He bestowed, thus drawing

by affection, not forcing by any moral persuasion.

The present-day John the Baptists, priests and teachers,

39



40 Vocations to the Priesthood

bear witness to Christ. Theirs it is to direct the boy to

our Lord as to the One who issues the real invitaticwi to

“come, follow Him.’’

Theirs is not, therefore, to urge the boy to enter the

seminary by that constant encouragement which amounts

to moral force. No good can come from pressure thus
exerted. Under its influence the boy without any vocation

may try the seminary for a time, until with a growing sense

of responsibility he wakes up to the fact that his entering

never was his own personal idea. On the other hand, a

boy whom God has destined for the priesthood may fight

against the desire precisely because there is so much urging

that he cannot be sure whether the desire is his own or

that of an overzealous adviser. Boys have been known to

put off entering the seminary for four years or even longer,

because they were bewildered by too much advice or be-

cause they resented what seemed undue interference in so

personal a concern.

The grace of a vocation to the priesthood is given to

the one called and to no other. As a result he himself must

correspond with it and all its attendant divine helps. Like

the Apostles, he must answer the call personally. As we

know, the desire for the priesthood comes into being under

God’s grace and waxes strong by many contacts with the

Person of Christ in prayer, in the Confessional, in Holy

Communion, in visits to the Blessed Sacrament. What a

wise adviser will do, then, is to get and keep the desirable

candidate in touch with our Lord in as many ways as

possible.

IL Various Types of Candidates

It is commonplace to remark that each likely boy pre-

sents a problem in himself and that no two can be ap-

proached on the question of a vocation in exactly the same



Means of Fostering Vocations • 41

manner. Let us take some of the typical cases we meet

with among the youngsters of an American parish.

There is first of all the boy who is not reluctant to

disclose his desire to be a priest to responsible persons.

The wish has teased him from early boyhood, perhaps since

the day of his first Holy Communion. He has never wanted

to be anything else. His mother knows of his ambition, is

secretly overjoyed, but tries to hide her gladness for fear

of influencing her son in a decision which she insists must

be his own. His teacher and all who have to’ do with his

training take it almost for granted that he will enter the

seminary when he is old enough. The only problem pre-

sented by such a boy is to ascertain that his hopes are not

built upon a pious illusion, but are well founded upon the

proper qualifications of body, mind, and spirit. His longing

will easily be kept alive by the ways to be presently

suggested.

There are many splendid boys, however, who shrink

from laying bare their secret ambitions to any one. Sacred

and timid hopes may often be in their hearts, but not

often on their lips. They have at their tender age already

acquired the American aversion for wearing one’s heart on

the sleeve, and while they in their innermost souls have

been dreaming of one day wearing the sacred vestments,

how shame-faced they would be if ever one of their com-

panions discovered this secret. Then they would be

branded as ‘‘pious,” the “minister’s son” of Protestantism,

and that would mean breaking with the common run of

boys. In public, in the classroom of all places, what

squirming chagrin would be theirs, if ever they were singled

out as among those who were “going to be priests”!

An imagined lack of talent may sometimes be respon-

sible for the humble boy’s unwillingness to unburden him-

self of the secret that is dose-locked within his breast. His



42 Vocations to the Priesthood

past report cards are not landmarks of" triumphs in his

studies. He never did take first prize in any subject, and

he entertains an abiding fear that he would “never make

the grade” in the seminary.

Or his reticence is much more frequently due to that

exalted idea of the priestly state, which he has inherited as

part of his Catholic birthright and in the light of which his

own small faults and shortcomings loom large. He is not

“good enough” to be a priest; he dare not cast his lot and

hope upon so high a destiny. And thus the very quality

which is so charming and which presents so much priestly

promise—a Catholic boy’s humility—^seals his lips and
makes him loathe to tell his secret.

Again he may be reluctant to speak of his hidden long-

ings, because of a refined sense of responsibility to his

parents. There may be many children. Dad doesn’t make

much money, and Mother is always trying to find ways to

save. Not realizing that it is chiefly from homes like his

own that the Church recruits her clergy, not knowing that

financial difficulties can always be ironed out when a boy

is really worthy, he guards his secret with the fear that the

expenses of the long seminary training put the priesthood

beyond his reach.

These sturdy little chaps with such fine priestly po-

tentialities may pass out of the primary grades into high

school and eventually out into the world without ever dis-

closing their youthful dreams. With wistful regret they

may put aside their boyhood ambitions and thus would

that germ of vocation, which should have matured in the

seminary, meet the same sad fate as that of the good seed

which fell among thorns. “The Lamb of God,” the Maker

of* priests, would pass by, not unnoticed but unreached. A

few words of encouragement from us, priests or teachers,

what would they not have done for them!



Means of Fostering Vocations 43

These boyish difficulties we must bear in mind in

planning our approaches. We must somehow break through

the barrier of shyness; we must put into words the chief

perplexities that, harassing the heart of a boy, may keep

him mute. But any method we use must be employed with

great discretion and prudence, else we may tamper with

the youth’s freedom by overinsistence, betray his secret by

divulging our own hopes for him or get ourselves into em-

barrassing situations by strongly encouraging boys, only

to discover later that there is present some disqualifying

trait or some insoluble family difficulty.

III. Chief Means of Fostering Vocations

1. Talks on Vocation

Teachers of high schools and of the upper graces oi

grammar schools have wonderful opportunities to present

the question of vocation to their young charges and to hold

up to them the divine beauty of the priesthood. In God’s

Providence they may be the very ones destined to arouse

the curiosity of the small boy in the priestly life. They

have many chances to explain what a vocation is and to

set forth its various marks. They may often propose the

priesthood as a life of utter devotion to our Saviour, and

of self-sacrifice for the salvation of souls, a life, at the same

time, which brings great happiness to those who live it.

They may point out the grand powers given to ^‘another

Christ”; his power to offer the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

and to distribute the Bread of Life to hungry souls; the

power to heal wounds in the confessional and to bring

Christ’s strength to the sick and dying. It will be well-nigh

impossible in our talks to make the round of the many-

sided beauty of the priesthood.



44 Vocations to the Priesthood

And let us not suppose that the twelve- or thirteen-

year-old boy cannot appreciate, at least vaguely, the sub-

limity of the priesthood. Underneath his restless, mis-

chievous behavior, there is an unspoiled taste for goodness

and an attraction for things that are noble and of good

reputed. We who have lost so much of the spirit of child-
hood may fail to realize the capacity of a child’s heart

for the love of God. With God’s grace the boy can and

will, if he has the stuff of which priests are made, respond

to his teacher’s suggestions.

If he is a hero worshiper, then propose Christ as his

Hero. If he dreams of conquests, and what boy doesn’t,

let human souls become his prey. Urge him to join the

ranks of the recruits of the Church Militant to battle as

a brave warrior under Christ’s standards against the world

of malice and deceit. Thus we may assist the genesis in the

heart of a boy of that proper and fitting desire which leads

him of his own decision to the portals of the seminary.

There are difficulties, however, that will probably arise

out of these public talks. A teacher, or any one with any

degree of cleverness and enthusiasm will be able to stir a

great many boys, at least in the beginning. The sixth and

seventh graders will come running; but the crowds in the

sixth thin out in the eighth. Your eight graders lean to

the side of the sophisticated; they begin to be conscious of

their dignity, and, as adolescents, in their boyish methods

weigh values and count the costs of the priesthood. Many,

like the young man in the Gospel, turn away sad.

As this thinning out process itself serves as a sifting

of the desirables from the undesirables, it is useful to begin

talks on the priesthood in the lower grades, even the fifth

or sixth, so as to be able to watch boys over a period of

years. This enables the teachers to discern the stable from

the unstable, the persistent desire from the passing fancy,



Means of Fostering Vocations 45

and also gives time to check whether a boy has the requisite

qualities that mark out a vocation.

Some of the undesirables who lack this or that neces-

sary trait will, nevertheless, arrive at the end of the eighth

grade still persisting in their desire to enter the seminary.

Perhaps they come from good families of the parish, or

perhaps younger brothers or sisters will be in the teacher’s

class in a year or so, and it will be necessary to keep in

the good graces of the family as far as possible. This is

embarrassing for the pastor, the teacher or the principal of

the school who, when asked to write a letter of recom-

mendation, cannot in conscience do so. At least a non-

committal letter may be given to the boy, so long as a very

pertinent one is sent privately to the seminary, disclosing

the reasons that render the boy’s application unacceptable.

The seminary can find means of rejecting the applicant

without betraying the confidence of the pastor or teacher.

2. Frequent Attendance at Mass, Holy Communion,

Sanctuary Societies

Love and intimacy with our Blessed Lord beget a

yearning to do Christ’s priestly work, for true love always

begets action. And how can we better help to foster that

love than by encouraging the frequent attendance at the

sacrifice of the Mass and frequent reception of the Body

of Christ. By this means once again we are directing the

promising boy to the very Source of holiness. Pointing

out Christ’s loveliness we ask the young and generous

soul to draw near, to ^^come and see.” By his frequent

contacts with the holy and powerful personality of our

Saviour, the little fellow’s affectionate nature is drawn to

the Sacred Heart, and there springs up that friendship

with Christ which is so vital in the priesthood. Our Blessed

Lord, you will recall, kept His chosen ones close to Hin>



46 Vocations to the Priesthood

self. ‘They were with Jesus.’^ So, too, is the heart of a

boy kept close to Him through the Sacrament of the

Eucharist. With his Holy Communions and his little visits,

the spontaneous allegiance to Christ takes root in his soul.

Thus, when the invitation comes to spend his whole life

in the company of our Lord as a priest, his will be a

ready and personal response.

Another means of bringing promising youngsters closer

to Christ and to things sacerdotal is to get them into the

sanctuary society. Serving the priest in all things con-

nected with the Sacrifice of the Mass gives the young lad a

proximity to the Altar, which does much to interest him

in the priesthood; for, as we know, “wings grow in flying.’^

Besides, altar boys participate in a very special manner in

the fruits of the Mass.

3. Vocation Week, Vocation Retreats,

Autobiographical Sketches

In many dioceses one week of each year is set aside as

“vocation week.” Schools are expected to participate in

the movement and many do so by having little retreats or

tridua. Some teachers seize the opportunity for asking

their students to write autobiographical sketches, stating

their ambitions and what they wish to be.

All such methods are useful in keeping the vocation

question alive. They serve to make the young people

face the problem of their future, set them thinking about

it, and act as so many wedges to reach into the heart of a

boy.

4. The Confessional

“Talk to your confessor.” “If you are thinking of be-

coming a priest tell your confessor about it.” Here is



Means of Fostering Vocations 47

advice which should frequently be given to those who are

inclined to the priesthood. This in no way compromises

the hidden hopes of a timid boy, whose Catholic instincts

prompt ^utter confidence in the secrecy of the confessional.

Moreover, a candidate for the clerical life should first

obtain the approval of his confessor, who, perhaps best

of all, knows what virtues or what faults lie rooted in the

innermost recesses of his soul.

On the confessor’s own side, his confessional will prove

a most practical and fruitful means of contacting boys.

When a sterling youngster, clean of heart and earnest of

soul, comes into the box, the question, “Have you ever

thought of becoming a priest?”, often elicits a negative

answer. One missionary priest uses this suggestion effec-

tively: “Say three Hail Marys every night to our Blessed

Mother to learn God’s will and your vocation. Then

write to me in a month, and I’ll be praying, too.” Again

the shy boy’s secret is respected; yet it serves to draw him

out or set him thinking.

5. The Distribution of Pamphlets on Vocations

The distributing of pamphlets on vocations, or the

leaving of them in the sacristy, in the church, in the class-

room rack, or in some readily available place, where the

boy may take them unknown to his companions, further

serves to keep the vocation question fresh. There are

dozens of such pamphlets on the market, paper-covered

booklets that are inexpensive.

6. Prayer

We have left to the last the most powerful means of
fostering vocations. To busy ourselves with the work of

discovering and developing vocations, yet to neglect pray-



48 Vocations to the Priesthood

ing *to God to grant them would, at the lowest estimate,

betray an idea of the priestly office which is lacking in

supernatural vigor. A vocation to the priesthood is God’s

work. As in any other grace, and much more explicitly in

this special one, God expects us, yes, even commands us

to ask Him through our prayers to send laborers into the

harvest. There is a boy, there are several, whom you be-

lieve God has moulded to be vessels of election. You have

suggested the priesthood to them. You have them fre-

quenting the sacraments and raising their boyish minds

and hearts to God in prayer. You have given them little

books to read. There remains but one thing more for you

to do, and it is more important than all the rest. But if

your zeal has carried you thus far, surely you have been

doing it all the while. Beseech Almighty God in prayer

that He will sow the seeds of a vocation in good ground

—

in the souls of these young boys, ‘Vho in a good and per-

fect heart, hearing the word, keep it, and bring forth fruit

in patience” (Luke viii. 15).

Prayer for the Increase of Vocations to the Priesthood

Antiphon. Why stand ye all the day idle, go ye into

my vineyard.

V. Ask the Lord of the harvest.

R. That he send laborers into his vineyard.

Let Us Pray

God, who wiliest not the death of the sinner, but rather

that he be converted and live; grant, by the intercession of

blessed Mary ever Virgin, and of all the saints, laborers

for Thy Church, fellow laborers with Christ, to spend and

consume themselves for souls. Through the same Jesus

Christ, Thy Son, our Lord. Amen.

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