‘The call within a call’: Everyone’s vocation matters in the Church

MADISON  Each baptized believer has a “personal vocation” — a call from God to help build up his kingdom on earth in a very particular way, within a specific state in life, such as priestly life, religious life, married life, or single life. That “call within a call” is each person’s individual response to God’s universal call to holiness, which invites us not only to sanctify ourselves, but also to sanctify the Church. The discovery of a personal vocation, and committing to live it authentically and generously, will impact the way that one moves through the world. With this deep commitment to Christ, one has the freedom to fulfill one’s true calling as a Catholic: to evangelize others and invite them into a relationship with Jesus through companionship and informal mentoring in the faith.

That is what Father Paul Manning, executive director of St. Paul Inside the Walls: the Diocesan Evangelization Center here and diocesan vicar for evangelization, told a small group of lay Catholics, ranging in age from young adults to senior citizens, on the first night of “Why Am I Here? Exploring My Personal Vocation,” a workshop series held at St. Paul’s on three consecutive Wednesday evenings, ending Nov. 17. Co-presenting the workshop, which unpacked many of the Church’s teachings about personal vocations, was Jerilynn Prokop, a graduate of St. Paul’s three-year certificate program in Catholic Evangelization and the Avila Institute’s master’s-level program in spiritual theology, who now serves on the spiritual direction team at the Shrine of St. Joseph. They used materials from “Personal Vocation and the Mentor­ing Relationship,” part of “Francis­can at Home,” an online text and video formation program developed by Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio.

The workshop series emphasizes the central importance of a personal vocation, which is intended to become a central and integrating principle of a life lived in and for Christ. In the first encyclical of his pontificate, Redemptor Hominis, or The Redeemer of Man, St. Pope John Paul II writes that the human person, each unique and unrepeatable, is “the primary and fundamental way for the Church.” The late pontiff taught the faithful that they are all called to a “graced path”: to eternal divine beatitude and to live as a person devoted to the good of his or her neighbor. Therefore, the Church needs to integrate teaching about personal vocation into all formation. In addition, God calls Catholics to become mentors, who “help those in their care further clarify and deepen their own personal vocations,” according to the workshop materials.

“Ongoing religious formation is essential. Knowledge serves love. You can’t love what you don’t know,” said Prokop, a member of the Office of Evangelization’s staff. She and Father Manning led participants in reading the texts and responding to the reflection questions afterward. “We want to help you move that discipleship dial. We are called to help other people find their vocations. Throughout our lives, God is moving us up, not just forward, perfecting us as we strive to live out our own vocations all the while helping others,” she said.

During this advanced course, Father Manning and Prokop explored teachings about vocations from Scriptures and documents of Church including the Catechism, the Second Vatican Council, the popes, and other notable Catholic writers, to emphasize God’s call to discipleship, which is aimed at conversion of our hearts. The workshop was intended for Catholics, who knew the basics of the faith and had a sense that God has a bigger plan for them in the mission of his Church. The materials included videos by Joshua Miller, who at Franciscan, helped build the Center for Leadership (CFL); leads a freshmen seminar, Personal Vocation and Christ Centered Leadership; and coordinates the CFL vocation coach program.

“Why are we here? God calls us to become missionary disciples, who go out and make disciples, just as Jesus called his Apostles,” Father Manning said. “There is a crisis of vocation in the Church. It comes from a lack of awareness of and response to God’s call. Today, there is a vocation crisis in any life that calls for permanent commitment — not just in priesthood and religious life, but also in marriage and parenthood and chaste single life,” he said.

In one video on the first night, Miller said that the acts of mentoring and evangelizing start with encounter. St. Pope John Paul II could remember personal details of people he only met once, demonstrating his ability “to see the face of Christ in every face and every encounter.” Because humans are social beings, they can neither live nor develop their potential unless they relate themselves to others, he said.

“In this regard, the fact that God created human beings as man and woman (cf. Gen 2:23), and in whom the spirit of God the Creator is also alive, can satisfy the need for interpersonal dialogue, so vital for human existence,” Miller says. “God calls us to help people find their personal vocations through their own personal holiness. He gives each person graces, special abilities, to help build up the kingdom of God.

The workshop also urged participants to spend time in “careful attentiveness to the Holy Spirit in prayer and in real listening” to hear the call of the Lord, best heard in silence. One of those participants was Nicholas D’Souza, 26, who works in finance and is an author.

“We need to discern our vocation in contemplation in the silence. We also learned that we have a vocation as part of the larger Body of Christ in the Church with Jesus as its head,” said D’Souza, a parishioner of St. Anthony Parish in Belleville, who was invited to the workshop by a friend. “Now, I want to start evangelizing others, which is difficult, because it’s tough to cut through the noise of society today. But I saw so many people at the workshop taking their faith seriously, which encouraged me,” he said.