When I hear the word “Vocation” what comes immediately to my mind is: priestly or religious vocation.
But vocation is much more than that. It is deep call or impulse one feels as coming from the divine to follow a particular way of life or career. Each individual is called for a unique way of life and it is not easy to understand exactly what God wants through this call. It needs a process of discernment and accompaniment. We need to help the young person to understand himself/herself and his/her temperament, aptitude and also discern suitability of the candidate for a particular vocation.
As for our understanding and praxis of “vocation promotion,” I feel we as religious currently trying to find “hands for work” to staff our institutions as the candidates’ numbers are coming down. In this process of looking for numbers, there is a danger of losing a genuine religious vocation, either because of joining a particular congregation without proper knowledge and become misfits, because a religious order recruits young people with the hope that they will slowly get used to the particular way of life. In this process, “snatching” of candidates is also done. What I mean is: A candidate preparing to go to one congregation, may be wooed by another congregation and taken in.
Fr Jose Palely SDB
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