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Jan. 11,
2007 |
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| Vocations ministers seek
to ‘Give God a Chance’
New vocation education initiative
reaches out
to high school youth |
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By Marilyn Jozwik
Special to your Catholic Herald |
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MILWAUKEE —In an age of complex, high-speed technology, the Milwaukee Archdiocese’s Vocations Office has turned to a method used in the time of Christ to help young Catholics determine God’s calling for them.
Last fall, Vocation Ministers of the Milwaukee Archdiocese (VMMA) visited each of the archdiocese’s 13 high schools to discuss vocation education and programming at each school. The initiative is called “Give God a Chance!”
“They went out two-by-two, just like the disciples,” said Fr. James Lobacz, archdiocesan vocations director. “The goal of the whole effort is to establish a healthy, creative relationship with the high schools.”
A letter to each of the schools from Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan explained that the project, a collaborative effort of the vocations office and VMMA, “will result in a deepening appreciation of God’s voice calling your students to marriage, priesthood, religious life, the diaconate, or professional church ministry.”
The Vocations Office hopes to glean from the assessments being administered by VMMA better ways to serve the students’ vocations needs.
“What it is they want, and what it is we need to change,” said Fr. Lobacz. “If we don’t have it, we’ll get it.”
About half the assessments are in and Fr. Lobacz reported that the high schools were “very open and very creative about what they might want to take from this.”
Fr. Lobacz said the idea for approaching each high school individually came from VMMA and that the vocation directors “are doing all the legwork. I’m the wheels and pulleys and gears, doing the mechanicals,” he said.
Dominican Sr. Karen Vollmer, a member of VMMA, is taking part in the assessment project. VMMA includes vocations directors from 30 religious orders of women and men who provide ministry in various places throughout the archdiocese. Sr. Vollmer visited St. Catherine High School in Racine. As a former teacher and board member at the school, she felt most comfortable returning.
“The best part is that we were so well-received,” she said.
During Vocations Week, Jan. 8-12, Sr. Karen and another vocations director talked to each religion class at St. Catherine.
“We’ll go in and tell our own stories and how God calls each of us to single life, married life or community life,” said Sr. Karen. She added that high school is the best time to discuss vocations because students are “discovering their talents and making decisions about their futures.”
Years ago, when priests and nuns taught and ministered daily in the schools, the need for vocations programs in the schools was not as great as it is today.
“They were a presence in the schools,” said Sr. Karen.
VMMA’s program is intended to re-establish that presence.
“It is a concentrated effort to truly do what we need to do to be a presence, what we need to do to be a voice in the schools,” she said.
Fr. Lobacz said that each school will have different needs for vocations programs. One size does not fit all.
“St. Lawrence at Mount Calvary has many of their own programs,” said Fr. Lobacz. “Marquette also does an enormous amount (of vocations programming). A school like Divine Savior Holy Angels is different from St. Joseph’s in Kenosha or St. Mary’s Springs in Fond du Lac. We have to respect the uniqueness of the pastoral settings.”
At St. Catherine, Sr. Karen said she will lean heavily on the Dominican tradition in ministering to the students’ vocations needs.
“We are realizing it’s a Dominican school,” said Sr. Karen, explaining that the founders of her order came from Germany with strong traditions, which included valuing education and a “commitment to truth.”
After meeting with principals, religion teachers and campus ministers at the schools, the vocations directors are completing the vocations needs assessments. This is the first phase of the project, and it is expected to provide a full picture of the state of vocation education at each of the schools.
“The religion curriculum, retreat programs, mentoring situations and service projects (currently taking place at the school) might all relate to the goals of ‘Give God a Chance!’” said Fr. Lobacz in his letter to the schools.
After the assessments have been completed and reviewed, VMMA and the archdiocese’s vocations office will undertake the second phase of the process — design vocations programs for each of the schools. The third phase of “Give God a Chance!” is the implementation of the programs, most likely to begin this fall.
“This will be a rather large undertaking for our small organization,” said Franciscan Sr. Rose Sevenich, president of VMMA, in the Vocation Spirit News newsletter at the archdiocese’s <thinkpriest.org> Web site. “Yet in the end, the many new relationships that this project establishes will become a priceless resource.”
Sr. Karen also sees a big job ahead for VMMA as it completes it visitations.
“This is only the beginning,” she said. |
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