What options outside of priesthood are available?
The church today has an enormous variety of ministries available as a lay person and as a permanent deacon. Your local vocation director can help you discern whether your call is to priesthood, or to another form of church service, such as catechist, Eucharistic minister, reader, or parish committee membership. Generally, though, such parish involvement is expected of any serious candidate for priesthood before being accepted by a sponsor.
How does one become a member of a religious community?
The formation program involves several stages. While these vary from community to community in name, length of time, and format, the following outline gives a general view of the formation process:
Contact: A person of high school age or older who is interested in religious life can join a program of contact with a religious community. This is usually a very flexible program. The person meets monthly with a priest, brother or sister and shares experiences of prayer and community life with the congregation in which he or she is interested.
Candidate: A more formal relationship with the community occurs when a person becomes a candidate. The person lives with the community while continuing his or her education or work experience.
This period enables the candidate to observe and participate in religious life from the inside. It also gives the community an opportunity to see if the candidate shows promise of living the life of the community. A person may be a candidate for one or two years.
Novice: The novitiate is the next stage of formation. This is a special one or two-year period that marks official entrance into the community. Novices spend time in study and prayer, learning more about themselves, the community and their relationship with the Lord. At the end of the novitiate, they prepare for temporary promises, or vows.
Vows: Promises of poverty, chastity and obedience may be taken for one, two, or three years, depending on the decision of the individual person. These promises are renewable for up to nine years. Final vows may be taken after three years of temporary promises.
A man studying for religious priesthood also has seminary training, where he studies theology, Scripture, Church teachings, and the skills he will need in order to be an effective priest.
How do you know you have a vocation to the priesthood?
Through Baptism every Christian has a vocation, that is, a call to holiness from God. The Holy Spirit invites all of us to share our gifts, talents and lives in some unique way. It may be as a single person giving witness to Christ by living a life directed by the Gospel message. It may be as a married person dedicating one’s life and love to another and sharing in faith within a family. It may be as a religious brother or sister dedicating one’s life to service and ministry in the Church. Or, it may be as a priest, leading the community of the faithful through the sacraments and sharing in the life-journey of God’s people. You may feel Christ calling you to serve the people of God. Christ doesn’t call us in the same direct way he called the apostles. Christ often calls us from a silent voice deep within: “Come and follow me. Dedicate your life to me and to the spread of the Gospel.”
Why did you become a priest?
“I became a priest because I fell in love with Jesus. When I was in school, I was interested in many possible careers. At one point, I wanted to be a dentist. Later, I thought about becoming a musician. Still later, I thought I might want to be a lawyer. But through all of those confusing years in high school and college, one thing became clear to me – I was falling in love with Christ. My faith, which had been important to me as a child, was becoming even more important to me as a young adult. While I enjoyed college life, with all of its activities and fun, I slowly began to realize that my relationship with Christ was central to my life. My involvement in church and ministry gave me great satisfaction. While other things brought me some happiness, my involvement in ministry was giving me joy, and a deep sense of satisfaction. I became more and more involved in campus and parish ministry, and as I reflected on those experiences, I understood that the gifts which God had given me were well suited to serving others. Not only that, I discovered that I found real joy in reaching out to others with the Good News of the Gospel. For awhile, I thought that God would give me some kind of external sign if he wanted me to be a priest – but then I realized that the answer was coming from within. As I reflected on the gifts God had given me, as I paid attention to the feelings I had when I was involved in ministry, as I thought about the things in life that gave me joy, it slowly dawned on me that God had created me precisely to serve his people. The answer did not come from outside – it came from within, where God revealed my deepest dreams and desires. This process of prayerful discernment helped me to understand that God had created me for a specific reason, and God gave me the gifts and personality that would enable me to fulfill that call. Saying ‘yes’ to priesthood was, in a sense, saying ‘yes’ to the person God had already created me to be.”
– Fr. Michael Renninger.
How might family and friends react to a decision to become a priest?
Most priests were fortunate to have families who encouraged them to do whatever made them happy in life. They supported their choices without pushing, but by asking probing questions that make them think more deeply about what they were choosing.
Friends’ reactions varied a lot– from ridicule, to laying odds on how long they’d stay, to refusal to talk about their choices, to quiet support, to high enthusiasm. Obviously, some of those negative reactions are hard to take from good friends whose opinion are valued. Sometimes they were pretty discouraged about their choice because of the reaction of their friends, and were grateful for the ones who said, “Do what’s best for you.”
What’s the next step?
Because sponsorship is required for seminary admission, contacting one’s diocesan or religious community vocation director is the place to begin. Often your local pastor can be of help in learning who to contact and how to do it.