In his message for the World Day of Prayer for Vocations released yesterday by the Vatican, Pope Francis drew a comparison between the vocation to the priesthood and religious life and the experience of the “exodus.”
The pope was clear that entering a religious or priestly vocation is a difficult choice that requires a great deal of courage:
Responding to God’s call, then, means allowing him to help us leave ourselves and our false security behind, and to strike out on the path which leads to Jesus Christ, the origin and destiny of our life and our happiness.
The pope also affirmed that the vocational call is about leave one’s ego behind and living a life centered on Christ. Every Christian vocation is a special vocation rooted in Christ since “belief means transcending ourselves, leaving behind our comfort and the inflexibility of our ego in order to center our life in Jesus Christ.”
Furthermore, Pope Francis in his message reminds all the faithful that a Christian vocation is not about hiding from the world or running from it in contempt, but rather finding God’s presence in the world in a new and exciting way. He also rooted the Christian vocation in a life of loving service to the world. Quoting Benedict XVI, Pope Francis says that:
The Christian vocation is first and foremost a call to love, a love which attracts us and draws us out of ourselves, “decentring” us and triggering “an ongoing exodus out of the closed inward-looking self toward its liberation through self-giving, and thus toward authentic self-discovery and indeed the discovery of God.”
Pope Francis further confirmed the social dimension of priestly and religious vocations in his reminder that all Christian vocations are for service to the Church and the world. Therefore, those with a religious or priestly vocation must, in a special way, be in solidarity with those who are on the margins.
The full text of his message can be found at Vatican Radio. This year the World Day of Prayer for Vocations will be celebrated on April 26.
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