The Increasing Need for Priests

THAT Vocation Exhibitions A and special prayers for vocations should be necessary is, of course, a sign of the times.
The situation is by no means confined to this country. Matters, indeed, may well be worse in France, Spain, and, most of all, Italy. where we are told, vocations are far too few while far too high a proportion of those who enter seminaries are unable to persevere.
There is no doubt that today's greater opportunities for satisfactory employment and advancement in life. together with the sense of freedom and autonomy so marked among young people, deter very many good Catholics who in a former age might have become excellent priests and religious. On the other hand, the marked progress of the Church, together with its enhanced liturgical and apostolic progress, increases the need for vocations.
THIS last point may surprise some people. With the fuller apostolic opportunities for the laity, with perhaps the availability tomorrow of deacons who could be married men, could not the Church in different countries manage with fewer priestly vocations ?
The plain answer is : No.
It may well be that the priest of tomorrow could be spared some of his present duties. It may be that many of his present administrative and financial worries could be lessened, that he need give less time to catechetical and other instruction, that he might be spared some of the visiting which today falls on him. A better trained laity in which a full confidence could he reposed and the revival of the function of minor and major orders could enormously ease the responsibilities borne by the priest, and the priest atone, today.
But the key-word is " better trained ". Who is to do the training
If the priest can be relieved of some of his present responsibilities it will only be because he has been prepared to carry the burden which only he can carry — the burden of sufficiently spiritualising and training the laity of tomorrow.
This, of course, is not just a matter of picking and choosing and training. The laity of tomorrow capable of easing the present burdens of the priesthood can only come from parishes of the highest liturgical and apostolic standard, " living parishes ", as they have been called, where the people have grown up to realise the fullness of their Christian vocation in the secularist world of today. From cradle to grave, one might almost say, and with the understanding and co-operation of Christian families and schools, this apostolic training is needed, and no one can give it but the priest.
We shall never have enough effective lay apostles and aides unless these arc given real responsibility and initiative. But this real responsibility and initiative cannot be given unless the training is sufficient.
The priests available today are far too few to undertake the training that is necessary. Even the specialised forms of Catholic Action find it hard to obtain the needed chaplain on whose spiritual formative work success absolutely depends.
WE can therefore see clearly that insufficiency of vocations is the biggest obstacle today to the great opportunity of apostolic expansion of the Church, whether we think of this expansion in terms of better Catholic formation or of conversions and preventing drift away from Catholic life and worship.
It may be that the training of the clergy could be more directly adapted to the special pastoral needs and opportunities of our times with their special requirement of a laity qualified to share with the priest in the apostolate. Perhaps this is a subject that will occupy the corning General Council, especially after the experience of the Synod of Rome under the Holy Father's immediate attention.
But the plain truth must be faced that in constant prayer to God for the increase of vocations lies the great hope of the future.
A Vocation Exhibition is not just an item of Catholic news. It should be, above all, an occasion for reminding us all to foster, within our opportunities,
more vocations. Prayer, the most powerful of all methods, lies within the opportunity of all.