The writing on the wall

Fr Val Farrel on his blog has a post about praying for vocations. He begins, a little frustratedly, by musing as to whether the Christian religion is really finished, not on the basis of falling numbers but on the worried response of Church leaders and the view that the answer is to pray for more priests. He suggests maybe the present situation is God's response, His plan; and it is our human arrogance that makes us seek our own response instead of His will.



I have a lot of sympathy for the points he makes. We are so locked into "traditional", even automatic responses and behaviour that we probably don't think much let alone seek to discern the will of God. Well,we have the promise of Jesus that the Father will give us all that we need so firstly we need to go back to trusting in the word of our Lord. But Jesus also said that those who have ears to hear should listen and that is what we are not good at. The lay faithful are pointed in the direction of saying a "traditional" prayer in response to the vocations need. Why not just listen and try to discern what the Lord is saying.

It might come as a surprise to some that the Holy Spirit does not just speak to and through professional clergy or canonised saints i.e. dead professional clergy, but to and through every faithful Christian according to the promise of Christ and to the prophecies in the Old Testament.



There are clearly going to be much fewer priests for the foreseeable future but that is not a recipe for disaster: it is an opportunity for the Church to walk in faith to be led by the Spirit and to cast off the old ways that are no longer part of God's plan. I'm not calling for Vatican 111 or anything ridiculous, simply suggesting that the laity need the clergy and the clergy need the laity. Remember St Paul's teaching about our being members of the one body.
And we all need the Holy Spirit.

Much will have to change: attitudes, local, parochial and deanery structures need shaking up. But first let us just pray as a group of faith-filled Christians in the Deanery of Blackpool and the Diocese of Lancaster for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit and then listen.