Each year the Catholic Church in the U.S. commemorates National Vocation Awareness Week to raise awareness for vocations; help those who are discerning a vocation, particularly one to ordained ministry or consecrated life; and especially to invite prayers for an increase in vocations in our diocese and country.
This year, as we recognize National Vocation Awareness Week November 5-12, Father Michael Schuetz, Promoter of Vocations in the Diocese of Raleigh, is asking the faithful to join him in praying for vocations.
“Starting on November 3, 2023, I would love for everyone to join me in praying a novena for an increase in vocations,” Father Schuetz said. “God is calling more and more men and women of the Diocese of Raleigh. With your prayers and support we will be able to help them hear his invitation and respond generously to him.”
Recently, in his World Day of Prayer for Vocations message, Pope Francis said, “Our common vocation to give ourselves in love develops and finds concrete expression in the life of lay men and women, devoted to raising a family as a small domestic church and working as the leaven of the Gospel to renew the different sectors of society; in the testimony of consecrated women and men who are completely committed to God for the sake of their brothers and sisters as a prophetic sign of the kingdom of God; in ordained ministers – deacons, priests, and bishops – placed at the service of preaching, prayer and fostering the communion of the holy People of God.”
Bishop Earl A. Boyea of Lansing, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations (CCLV), expressed his gratitude for holy families, ordained ministers, and consecrated men and women.
“During this week, the Church gives thanks to God for the faithful example of husbands and wives, and joyful witness of ordained ministers and consecrated persons,” he said. “We pray that many more men and women will be open to the movement of the Holy Spirit in their hearts as they discern the mission God has for them.”
Bishop Austin A. Vetter of Helena, a member of the CCLV and episcopal liaison to the National Conference of Diocesan Vocation Directors, National Religious Vocation Conference, and Serra International, said that National Vocation Awareness Week offers us a special opportunity to “redouble our efforts of prayer that young people would be able to hear the voice — the quiet, gentle voice many times — of Jesus inviting them into a vocation as a priest or religious.”
Beginning in 1976, the U.S. bishops designated the 28th Sunday of the year as an opportunity for the Catholic Church in the United States to renew its prayerful support for those discerning an ecclesial vocation. In 2014, the CCLV committee elected to move the week to the first week of November to better engage Catholic educational institutions in the efforts to raise awareness for vocations.
For more information:
Diocese of Raleigh Office of Vocations