Today is Good Shepherd Sunday.  We reflect on Vocation within the church.  Vocation at its widest, includes every man, woman and child of us, who tries daily to respond to God’s Call to be a better person and a sign of His presence.  We focus too on vocations to priesthood, permanent diaconate and religious life.  It is from here, these few lines come.  I wondered yesterday what I had to say that might not have been said before and realised that I’ve nothing new to bring to the people, other than a belief that priesthood is still a call worth hearing, considering and responding to.  Deeply aware of my own limitations but also still happy that I made the decision to travel this road, I wanted to say something but wasn’t sure how.  The idea of writing a letter came to my mind – a letter to the people but then, I thought maybe a letter to myself might be worth looking at ….. this is how it worked out!

Dear Vincent,

Thought I’d drop you a line.  It’s Vocations Sunday and I know you’re wondering how to rise to it again, to encourage and pray for vocations when, for more than thirty years, you’ve done the same and nobody seems to have responded.  I know that at times, you find yourself going through phases of self-doubt about the effectiveness of your own vocation.  I’m sure you’re wondering who I am!

I’m that boy in you who knew priests to be decent people who seemed to bring happiness to your family home and who showed themselves to be friends. I’m that teenager in you who, in St Nathy’s College, came to admire the priests on the staff – for the bits and pieces they did “beyond the call of duty” to encourage students to do their best, not just in the classroom but on the sports field too.  I’m the son in you who heard your mother’s prayers to Fr Casey a priest who died back in 1939, when your mother was scarcely a teenager herself, but remembered forever his kindness to her family, after her father’s death when she was just seven years old.  I’m the Spirit in you that made you think there was a place for you in priesthood and encouraged you to go ahead – to give it a try.

I am the family and neighbours around you who wished you well that September and who cared more about where you were going than your leaving cert results.  I am a grandmother of a school friend who lit candles for you every time she passed the church throughout your years in Maynooth.  I am the friends you met – men and women – who made you feel special and loved.  I am the dream within you that accompanied you through the years and assured you that the road chosen, like the one to Emmaus, was an open road but a safe one too where you’d not walk alone.

I am the twenty-four year old in you who knelt before Bishop Flynn in June 1987, put your hands in his and promised to do your best and who lay mouth-under, on the floor of Gurteen Church, as the saints were called down on top of you in a litany of prayer – “Bless this chosen man”, “Bless this chosen man, make him holy”. “Bless this chosen man, make him holy and consecrate him for his sacred duties” …. I am that young priest who was welcomed to his first parish by decent people who helped him believe he’d done the right thing with his life, though he had much to learn.

I am the fifty-five year old in you.  Standing this weekend in a parish, surrounded by a community at prayer.  People looking to the priest in you to offer a word, to be a friend and above all to break open the Scriptures and to nourish through Eucharist.  I am the priest in you who wants you to push yourself and to have courage and self-conviction.  I am the ongoing dreamer in you who believes the Church can find her voice a-fresh and that the world can be a better place and will be a better place when it opens itself to see again the presence of God and the real difference a lived faith can make.

I am your vocation Vincent, encouraging you to take all that’s good from your past, to accept your mistakes and to reach out again and again, to hope and believe again and again, that the story, the dream of the boy may find words in the mouth of the man and say, even if you’ve lost count of how many times you’ve said it …. “this is a good life”.

They’re listening Vincent, speak to them!

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Vincent

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