How can the crisis be overcome?” “

What can be done to ensure that the fostering of vocations to the consecrated life and to the priesthood becomes a duty for everyone in the Church, and what is needed in normal pastoral care to ensure that the young hear the call of God? These are the questions at the basis of the annual meeting of the European Service for Vocations (ESV) now underway in Warsaw (2-6 July) on “The integration of a renewed vocational ministry in the structures of ordinary pastoral care” which brings together the national delegates of the European vocational offices and centres and the bishops responsible for vocations in the various Episcopal Conferences. The present meeting is promoted by the archbishop of Salzburg and delegate of the Council of the Episcopal Conference of Europe (CCEE) for vocations, Msgr. Alois Kothgasser and by ESV coordinator Reiner Birkenmeier. According to the last Statistical Handbook of the Church (citing data up to 31 December 2000), there are 208,659 priests in Europe, out of a total population of 702,661,000, of whom 280,144,000 Catholics. Of these priests, 145,268 belong to the diocesan clergy, and 63,391are religious. There are 21,691 non-ordained male religious and 366,326 female religious. In 2000 there were 2,321 ordinations to the priesthood in Europe, of which 572 in Poland and 527 in Italy. Spain takes third place, with 235 ordinations. In the same year there were 26,879 major and 14,967 minor seminarians. “At the beginning of the third millennium Europe has a need for new evangelizers”, pointed out Father Marek Dziewiecki, director of the Polish national vocational Centre, on opening the meeting. “It’s a task that belongs to the whole of the pastoral ministry, not just the duty of a few individuals”, added Msgr. Stefan Regmunt, delegate of the Polish bishops, who spoke of a task that requires “the greatest cooperation” between the “national, diocesan and parish dimensions”. Should “a kind of European directory or manual” be prepared for all those who work in the vocational ministry, both for the delegates and for the bishops and local churches? That is the question posed by ESV coordinator Reiner Birkenmeier, according to whom pastoral workers in this field need to be provided with “a clear conception of their own task and a wise definition of its limitations” to avoid the danger of frustration. At a time when “the traditional methods of becoming Christians in the local churches are increasingly becoming ineffective”, it is essential – he said – that “the vagueness from which the vocational ministry suffers” be corrected by “promoting the emergence of three tasks that each person delegated to vocations ought to fulfil: that of fisherman, evangelizer and supporter of vocations to the priesthood and to the consecrated life in present-day culture and society”. One of the most important tasks, in Birkenmeier’s view, is to “furnish a clear image of the priest in a theological landscape in which the definition of the office of the priest is very controversial”. Other tasks are “praying for vocations in the parishes”, and “inculcating and diffusing the importance of celibacy”. That view is shared by Father Amedeo Cencini, professor of psychology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, who argues that “a new vocational culture” needs to be promoted: one that reflects the various national situations, but that involves everyone, from “the summit to the base”. In his view, the “vocational former” should be understood as someone able to “animate other animators” and “coordinate a network of collective and converging responsibilities”. In Birkenmeyer’s view too, the problem that needs to be overcome is that of the “weak position of the vocational ministry at the popular level”, because in many countries – he explains – “there exist vocational delegates at the national and diocesan level but not in the parishes”.