Trying to Understand Our Shortage of Vocations

At the beginning of my summer break, I spent a day at an abbey nearby. I wanted to get away from teaching and colleagues and just get closer to Christ. The abbey is a beautiful place to escape to and find peace. It lies on a large swath of land that the monks used to farm. That was a long time ago. Its numbers have dwindled, and running a farm is probably out of the question. I hadn’t visited the abbey in over a year. The population as usual was mostly older. Not to say old and young monks aren’t equally beautiful, but the faces of some new young postulate brothers gladdened me.

While there, I ate with one of these brothers who graciously joined me, a guest, for dinner while the rest of the order ate in their quarters. We talked about various things, but one topic that came up was the shortage of religious and priestly vocations. The questions linger with me. 

Why is it that so many more people wanted to be priests in the 1970s than do today? What inspired that generation of young men to give their lives to Christ? It seems that everywhere we turn, people are talking about a shortage of priests and religious vocations. But why?

One Modern Explanation

Shedding some potential light is Rich Barlow’s article 2021 “Priest Shortage? Why a Surprising Number of BU Alums Are Entering the Catholic Priesthood” in Bostonia, Boston University’s Alumni magazine states. Barlow states that  “Since 1970, the US Catholic clergy has shrunk from 59,000 to fewer than 36,000, according to Georgetown’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate.” Barlow interviews several recent alumni who became priests and seeks to highlight a relatively high number of vocations from BU–about one seminarian a year according to his research. Arguably, his main explanation of these vocations is the inspiring examples of priests both in the teaching staff and the student body at Boston University. 

He definitely has a point. If we all knew someone or even better had an uncle, brother, or close friend who was a priest or religious, there would probably be more vocations. We would probably be inspired by these people and the leap would seem less great. We would see the beauty of their choice and their lives. These things might mute some of the negative voices in secular society–at least a little. 

Still, Barlow’s explanation for a decline is straightforward and, arguably, somewhat unsympathetic to Catholicism. He reasons, “few want to take on grueling hours in a profession with an enduring labor shortage and a requirement of celibacy.” Though I wouldn’t call the article biased, I think it does a pretty good job of showing how the shortage came about and less about what might be appealing about becoming a priest. In fact, it almost seems surprising that the university is managing to turn out priests at all.  Barlow lists several causes of the decline in the priesthood. Among other things, he mentions changing views on sexuality, an emphasis on science over faith, and clergy abuse.

Becoming a Priest or a Religious is a Calling

First and foremost, becoming a religious or a priest isn’t a career choice, though I think we often view it as such. Would anyone really want to work grueling hours? Would any healthy male really want to give up sex? Most likely, the answer is no, at least in a certain sense. Yet, some feel called to pursue a life that the world sees as a cruel folly. The first priest, Father Leblanc, in the article gets to this idea as he describes his desire for a family. Father LeBlanc explains, “[Having a family] is a desire that I think every priest should have, even before the priesthood, because it means you want to give of yourself in service…. As I surrendered more and more to the Lord, I felt that He was calling me to give myself in another way…and to have many spiritual children.” This gets to a central point. Becoming a priest is a calling that may lead us away from what seem like obvious goods. Put another way, these obvious or natural goods can help pave the path towards the supernatural good of leaving them behind.

Modern Noise and the Difficulty of Hearing the Call

The young brother across from me at the table explained that he felt young people were missing the calling to religious life in a lot of modern noise. This is a valid concern, but first, what is that noise? A lot of the noise isn’t even to have a family. It’s clear that in Europe and the US, the birth rate is declining. That means the noise probably centers on thoughts about one’s self and what one can get out of life. Either that or it is simply centered on a meaningless pursuit of pleasure or money. Or maybe it’s simply the sound of a musician’s pain or worse. There are countless sources of unedifying noise today.

At least, Father LeBlanc felt called to give himself in some way. His desire for a family was ultimately a call to service. What is it that young men and women hear calling them these days? Probably, it is a confusing tangle of things. In a certain sense, it’s hard to imagine that young people have lost the desire to do good. It’s hard to imagine they don’t wish to give themselves. In another sense, it’s easy to see that desire being lost in the selfish mantras of our time. These mantras cry to us to avoid commitments, just have fun, etc.  Thus, we move even farther away from the desire to parent. The idea of becoming a religious or a priest becomes even more unfathomable.

A Purposeful Life

Merton wrote some beautiful words about vocations. In New Seeds of Contemplation, he writes, “Our vocation is not simply to be but to work together with God in the creation of our own life, our own identity, our own destiny…To work out our identity in God.” Have we really lost this desire for purpose? Likely, without a deep prayer life, this longing for purpose becomes confused with worldly voices. Materialism has consistently been shown to be hollow, but many like the young man in the Gospel still walk away from Christ sad because they have many possessions.

I’ll close with another couple of quotes from Merton. In Thoughts in Solitude, he writes, “A man knows when he has found his vocation when he stops thinking about how to live and begins to live.” Clearly, the question is often not how does Jesus want me to live but how can I live in a way that is best for me.  Ironically, this constant search and self-preoccupation destroy happiness.  As Merton says in No Man is an Island, “We know when we are following our vocation when our soul is set free from preoccupation with itself and is able to seek God and even to find Him, even though it may not appear to find Him. “