The WORD in other words (2021) by Fr. Raymun J. Festin, SVD (Rome)
October 18 — Feast of St Luke, the Evangelist
Luke 10, 1-9
One day I asked a religious sister about the number of candidates or aspirants in their formation house. She smiled and said: “Two. There are very few vocations now, Father.”
Her answer was neither unexpected nor inexplicable. In Europe, almost all seminaries are empty. Many have been turned into hotels, some into bars and disco houses. “Because in secularized Europe, there are no more vocations.”
What a sad, dark, and depressing reality! Some religious congregations have even stopped praying and looking for aspirants. Others have opted to fade away and die out.
“The harvest is abundant, but the laborers are few; so ask the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest,” Jesus says in today’s Gospel.
Surely, there are vocations!
Perhaps the problem is we have grown weary in “fishing” for men and women. Maybe we have become so inert and unimaginative that we don’t venture any more to the high seas and cast our nets into the deep. Perhaps we have become so sheltered in the security of the port that we only fish on the same, still, and shallow waters where only fish of minor importance – tambilawan and butete – swim and float.
The youth need something to live and die for. Look at the young people of Hongkong like Joshua Wong (23) and Agnes Chow (23) – social activists who risked life and limb for freedom and liberty.
Jesus will say to us today: “Give me five Joshua Wongs and Agnes Chows, and I’ll change the world . . .”
