How do I help someone discern a vocation to the priesthood?

[Colm_O_Higgins]

I’m not sure how to respond to someone who appears to be struggling with a call to the priesthood. On the one hand, he claims he wants to be married, but, on the other, he mentions entering the seminary if he is single at age 35, 40, or 45. I know he briefly discerned a calling several years ago, but the details of that occasion are unknown. Any suggestions other than prayer?

 

[Michelle_Arnold]

Two suggestions:

First, gently explain to your friend that ordination is not supposed to be a consolation prize for a failure to marry by a certain age. Both ordination and marriage are vocations that require discernment and should not be treated as escape hatches if one of them doesn’t pan out. For a woman, the same would hold true for the consecrated religious life and for marriage. A woman should not contemplate joining a religious order because she failed to find a husband; nor should she consider marriage to be the solution for not being able to remain in a religious order.

Second, if your friend is serious about discerning a call to the priesthood, suggest he speak to his parish’s vocations committee leader or to his diocese’s vocations director. Either of these people can put him in contact with people who can assist him in his discernment process.