November 2, 2022

“May the eyes of your hearts be enlightened, that you may know what is the hope that belongs to his call, what are the riches of glory in his inheritance among the holy ones, and what is the surpassing greatness of his power for us who believe, in accord with the exercise of his great might, which he worked in Christ, raising him from the dead and seating him at his right hand in the heavens, far above every principality, authority, power, and dominion, and every name that is named not only in this age but also in the one to come.” – Ephesians 1: 18-21

St. Paul reminds us in this week of National Vocations Awareness that each of us has received a call to share in the riches of the heavenly glory and presence of the Risen Lord and to be with all the holy ones who have lived and witnessed the Gospel of Jesus Christ. By our Baptism, we are the chosen ones who have been called either as mothers and fathers, or called to priesthood or consecrated life, or to be single, and to carry forward Jesus’ mission of living the Good News of Salvation through acts of loving, forgiving, healing, teaching, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, listening to the broken-hearted, working for peace, climate change, etc.

Our baptismal vocation calls us to evangelize and to make disciples in a world that is fast changing and struggles to find God and to find the face of Jesus Christ to those on the margins and even to those who are our next door neighbors.

This National Vocation Week is a call to all of us to “wake-up” to the call of Jesus to know, to love, and to serve Him in a special way to help change the world, to build up the Kingdom of God with greater justice, peace and love. The world needs YOU – to bring Jesus’ love to a broken world, to bring healing to the broken-hearted, those on the margins of life, to those who have no hope or faith in Jesus Christ.

Do you hear His call? St. John Paul II said, “The way Jesus shows you is not easy, Rather, it is like a path winding up a mountain. Do hot lose heart! The steeper the road, the faster it rises towards ever wider horizons.”

How true this is! God’s call takes us to places and situations far from our imagining and graces us to bring hope to a people hungry for Him. People do not know they are hungry for God. We are called to help fill that hunger.
Let us pray for more vocations to the married life, for family life to be strengthened. It is from families that the call to priesthood and consecrated life are heard. We especially need more vocations in this diocese, especially priests to celebrate the sacramental life of the Church, to “pastor” the People of God; deacons to be of service to the people in parishes; consecrated men and women to teach the Catholic faith, to visit the sick and those in prison.

All of us all called to “open the eyes of hearts” longing to really know that God loves them personally and holds them in His heart.

The Church prays this week in a special way for someone like YOU to hear and answer the call: “Follow Me!” As St. Teresa of Avila proclaimed: “God has no body but yours…No hands, no feet but yours…You are the feet with which he works to do good. Yours are the hands, through which he blesses the world.”