4th Sunday of Easter Year A 2026. Vocation Sunday

Christ chooses to be with us and He does that through the gift of the Eucharist. At least that was the message of last Sunday’s Gospel. He inserted Himself into the despair of the Disciples who were fleeing from what they thought was the failure of Jesus’ political programme.

The means to ensure His Presence is the Eucharist. And the human instrument to make present the Eucharist is the priesthood. Today it is a good time to speak about being called to the sacrament of Holy Orders.

The word order suggests hierarchy, rank, arrangements etc. In terms of arrangements, both the Responsorial Psalm and the Gospel outline the pastoral pattern of what it is to be a priest. God is the Good Shepherd and Jesus calls Himself the Gate of the sheepfold. He is the one who watches over the flock and is prepared to lay down His life for the sheep. Pope Francis echoed this when he said that the shepherds must smell like their sheep.

There have been reports of the increase in the number of baptisms this year at Easter. But the statistics of priestly vocation show stagnation or in some places, the number seems to be dwindling. How shall we approach this sacramental crisis?

There is an inseparable link between the priesthood and the Eucharist. One is unable to exist without the other. In celebrating the Eucharist, the priest is ordained to act “in persona Christi”. The Eucharist, as the source and summit of Christian life, is the purpose of a priest’s ministry. Given by Christ to His Church, the priesthood is for the purpose of confecting the Eucharist to provide the faithful with the means of salvation brought about by Christ.

Very central to the salvation of humanity is the Eucharist that Christ offered us before He returned to the Father. That means He intended the Mass as a way for us to be present at the sacrifice of Calvary. Each one can take part in Christ’s sacrifice and gain inexhaustible fruits from that. For centuries, we have lived this faith.

The crisis caused by scandals notwithstanding, we need to address the issue of the shortage of priests in the local Church. Time flies and passes us by quickly and often without our realising it, we wake up and suddenly we are already in our 60s with the shadow of our past years stretching behind and the prospect of a future that is rather dim. The median age of priests falls in the territory of heart problems or diabetes or any of the debilitating diseases.

Still, the parishes need to be staffed. The solutions of the Anglican communion, of married priesthood or a female clergy have not in any way worked. Their numbers continue to drop. We have increased lay participation as a solution butstill it remains that our theology does not or cannot support the confection of the Eucharist without Holy Orders. We may want to change the theology but that is the topic of a conversation for another day.

What can be done in the meantime?

Firstly, recognise the connexion. If Christ intended the Eucharist as the ordinary means of salvation and the priesthood as the instrument that makes thatpossible, then the lack of instruments cannot be a case of the absence of calling. Christ has not stopped inviting young men to join Him in this sacrifice of praise and worship. It is we who have stopped listening and responding. The vocation crisis is symptomatic of a generation that has not responded to God—ours is an era deaf to God’s calling.

I say this with a kind of apathy. It is not that I do not care. Rather, I am way past the sell-by-date and I am increasingly irrelevant. When I am dead, it is not that I do not care. Rather I cannot care because the dead has no say in this world. And the shortage of vocation is not my problem but it is definitely your problem or the problem of the living.

Second, a vocation is not death. The idea that one sacrifices and loses everything is not true. It is a sacrifice, yes and, it makes a lot more sense for the word “sacrifice” means that we trade our life for the life of others. However, the less we believe in the Resurrection, the less appealing will the idea of sacrifice be because the priesthood is truly an oblation. One must believe that there is more to this life that makes it possible to embrace the loneliness attendant with giving up one’s autonomy.

Thirdly, the model for our economic life is basically driven by production and manufacturing. The metrics of success for us are work and wealth accumulation. Poverty is simply having nothing to shout about. It is not difficult to translate such a model into the priesthood. The same standard for the measurement of success easily seeps into the Church. With wealth inequality, our idea of justice is equitable distribution of wealth etc. Priests are drawn into this endeavour and are supposed to be at the forefront of fighting for justice. It is surely a noble enterprise. But behind this utilitarian mentality, we easily reduce a person’s worth to his or her ability to produce. So what happens when a person has finally outlived his or her usefulness?

The proliferation of homes for the aged is witness to this kind of thinking that a person is valued only when he or she can produce. Thus, our elderly priests are shunted to homes and there, like other elderly, are left to slowly fade away. The point here is that the priesthood is fundamentally a call “in persona Christi”.

Ultimately, he does not need to do anything except to celebrate Mass and make present Christ’s Body and Blood. Sadly, we value people for what they can doand not who they are. A priest is a priest by virtue of his ordination; not by virtue of what he does or can accomplish.

Finally, Christ chose 12 fallible men to shepherd His people. The first amongst them was the first to deny Him. The one trusted with money was the one who sold Him. Without a doubt Christ chose frail and flawed men to stand in His person. However, now what we demand is, as in everything in this world, from politician to priest, a candidate who is perfect. Apparently no one can fail and there is no room in the closet for any skeletons. But whatever our standard, there is no denying that Christ willed for priests to pastor His people. Thus, our job is to pray for more young men to courageously accept Holy Orders and pray for them to grow into the Heart of Christ so that like the Master who laid down His life, we will have holy priests who willingly lay down their lives for the people whom they serve.