When you hear the words, "Follow me!" what do you think of? Do you picture in your mind a tuxedoed head waiter leading you into a dining room where there awaits a sumptuous feast, or do you imagine your teacher leading down the long hall at school to the office where there awaits a "grump-tuous" principal? You may hear those words with joy or fear. To follow someone else is always a bit of a challenge because it means giving up control – you’re not in charge anymore – you are following and you have to go where someone else leads! Whether it leads to something terrible or even if it leads to something wonderful, we are still reluctant to turn over the reins to someone else and to have to rely on trust that where they lead will be good for us.

The apostles decided that they could trust Jesus so completely that they would follow him, even though it meant leaving their boats and their nets behind and even though they had no idea where it would lead. Our challenge today is to match that behaviour and to try to follow Jesus, even when it leads into the unknown. God knows that it is hard to follow someone who we don’t trust, but surely we can trust His own Son!

Before Christmas, I talked about how Joseph had to change all his plans and trust in the Lord, and now we see these brave fishermen doing the same. Where are we in today’s world when it comes to trusting God and being ready to follow Him. The apostles heard the call and found their vocation by trusting God, have we found our calling yet?

I’d like to take the chance today to talk about vocations, what is happening today and what we can do about it.

Here at St. Mary’s, we have a special program where four families or individuals have taken home a special Benediction Cup for vocations, and with that chalice as a reminder, they promise to pray every day for vocations. We are doing this because the situation is rapidly becoming critical and I really don’t think that most of us really understand that.

If you go to St. Augustine’s seminary, you see that the longs walls outside the chapel that lead to the dining room have all the class pictures up on the walls. In 1915, just after the seminary was built, there were typically 100 or more priests being ordained for a city of only hundred’s of thousands. As the size of the diocese and its wealth and prosperity increased over the years, the pictures get smaller and smaller.

The graduating classes for the last ten years have typically had 6 to 10 priests and two or three of them are here from Eastern Canada for training and are going back to Nova Scotia. When the permanent deacon program began in 1972, there were 32 in the first class and nearly 30 in the next. Today we have 10 or 12 every two years, and what was a growing number of deacons is already shrinking.

When a priest or deacon is ordained, even if they still enjoy their work, when they reach age 75 they have to submit a resignation to the bishop, but the bishop may let them keep working if their health and spirit is still up to it. This has delayed our crisis but only by a few years. We will soon be facing a diocese where one priest has to service two or possibly three parishes. We risk turning these already hard working men into virtual sacrament machines who are simply on a never-ending round of masses, baptisms, weddings, anointings, communions and confessions and funerals with no time left to be the pastor, the one who leads us and cares for us as a shepherd does his flock.

When I was ordained a deacon in 1994, I was curious and did some research and found that from nearly 3400 families in over forty years, not a single priest and only two deacons were ordained. I read the very interesting history of St. Mary’s parish that is posted on the parish website and in over a century, and although there were several priests from here before World War II, there has been only one in the last forty years. (Father Jack Lynch of the Scarborough Foreign Missions) We have nearly 1600 families. Two parishes, 5000 families and two entire generations and only one priest and two deacons. Imagine if both our parishes had to get along with just that?

Why has this happened? Why have our large rich North American urban centers turned into the spiritual third world that has to import priests from India, the Philippines, and Africa (which may be the economic third world but nowadays is the spiritual FIRST world), in order to meet our needs in ministry? Has God stopped calling us? Or are we too busy or too afraid to listen? What can we do about it?

A major study in the USA showed that the number one reason why the majority of young people who were considering a vocation in religious life decided not to try – was because their parents discouraged them. Discouraged them! How can that be? What used to be considered one of the greatest blessings that a family could have is now something to be discouraged! If Jesus appeared right now at the front of the church and announced to all that he was going to walk out through the congregation and choose ten young people to follow him, would you ask your children to stand up so that he could see them, or would you hide them under your coat?

It’s too easy to simply say, times have changed. Why are parents doing this? Is it selfishness because I want grandchildren? Is it misguided love for our children because we want them to be powerful and important like the prime minister? We forget how important it is to serve God! Are we afraid that the life of priest is too hard nowadays. It is hard, but it is also one of the most fulfilling and rewarding life there can be. We don’t have the faith to trust that God won’t abandon them. Give them a chance to have those rewards. Are we afraid because it seems such a thankless task sometimes and there has been so much scandal and so little respect? Well, where did that start? 

With us! 

We can change that by changing ourselves! We need to stop teaching our children to look out for number one and teach them about serving others first. Teach them by showing them how we serve others first. There are so many volunteer organizations in the parish; surely each of us can find a special gift we have to help one of them!

We need to volunteer to take that Vocation Prayer Chalice home and pray that God will choose someone from our family to call, not just some stranger from somewhere else. We need to talk to our children about service and encourage them to pray about their own futures and to listen to God. We need to go ahead and encourage each other’s children when we see them acting kindly to others, when they look like good candidates for a religious life. Put the idea in their minds; don’t frighten it away.

There are lots of issues, I know. I’m sure some of you are thinking, "If they let priests get married, there would be lots of them!" Perhaps some of you are thinking, "If the church would ordain women, there would be lots of priests!" Many of us have serious questions around these issues and the teaching of our church about them.

What can you do? Start by trusting God that he is asking us to follow him in the right direction. Show him that trust by praying to Him, not by giving up on him. If you don’t understand, then come to communion and in that quiet moment back in your seat try this prayer, "Lord, I’m having a hard time right now believing what I am taught. If we are wrong, then send your Holy Spirit to bring our leaders back to the right path with the changes they must make, and if we are right, send your Holy Spirit to me to help me understand what I am missing and to have the faith to accept what I can’t understand right now."

We can hear Jesus’ words with joy or fear. It seems that the words "Follow me!" have frightened us away. Let’s listen to them today with new ears.

- Deacon Steve