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COMPASS is sponsored by a group of Roman Catholic Religious Orders and Congregations. It offers both personal spiritual support and residential experience of community life while allowing people to continue their normal life and career. Visit their website to find out more.

Director of the US Religious Vocations Center delivers a message of hope and encouragement at Westminster Cathedral

The Religious Life Institute and the National Office for Vocation were delighted to welcome Brother Paul Bednarczyk, a Holy Cross brother and Executive Director of the National Religious Vocations Conference in Chicago, USA to Westminster Hall on 16 June for a study day on religious life. This event was an opportunity to explore characteristics and trends among young Catholics, in particular those entering religious communities. The day provided a platform for discussion of best practice in vocations ministry in the current vocational landscape. The day was attended by over 100 religious men and women, several diocesan vocations directors and Bishop George Stack, Chairman of the National Office for Vocation.

Brother Paul and the NRVC were responsible for a major research project: “Recent Vocations to Religious Life” conducted by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University, published in August 2009. Fr Christopher Jamison of Worth Abbey, West Sussex and founder of the Compass programme for vocations discernment said:

"What happens in the American church travels over here in time. The study day promoted a sense of optimistic purpose among those of us working to promote a culture of vocations to religious life. There were challenges, too, amid the good news, but we know that young people continue to seek a deeper relationship with God, being part of something larger than themselves and being a witness to God for others. Brother Paul’s visit has reminded us that God offers us ‘a future full of hope'."

Some of the trends identified in the USA survey mirror the situation in England and Wales. Trends common on both sides of the Atlantic included those characteristics which make a religious congregation attractive to young people: community life, community prayer, a shared mission and a clear Catholic identity. As Br. Paul highlighted the fact that the large numbers of vocations in the nineteen-fifties to nineteen-seventies was an anomaly rather than the norm and the overall decline seen in recent years was a return to the long-term average. The overall number of people entering congregations has now stopped falling and has even exhibited a modest upturn in the last few years, though this is not a uniform trend.

Religious Life is still very much on the radar for young people, with an online poll revealing 10% of all Catholics considering this possibility at some stage in their lives. This rises considerably among young Catholics who practise the faith. The numbers responding to the call to religious life is inextricably linked to practice of the Catholic Faith among young people. Judith Eydmann from the National Office for Vocation said:

“Vocations ministry and evangelisation are different facets of the same mission - helping people discover and journey towards a life in Christ so that they may find their true selves in Him. It is perhaps no coincidence that so many of those religious congregations which are attracting and retaining younger members have evangelisation at the heart of their ministry. They live out the Gospel in a radical and visible way which is deeply attractive to today’s young Catholics”.

During his stay in England, Brother Paul also facilitated a study day organised by the Compass project. The Compass project is a residential discernment programme sponsored by a wide range of Religious Congregations. Having run for six years, the project has seen half of the participants enter seminaries and novitiates. This year’s participants each gave a testimony and it was noted that the community element of Compass and contemplative space was essential to discernment, even if the call was not to a contemplative order. In light of this and the study results, the National Office for Vocation has identified spiritual accompaniment and discernment with a contemplative dimension along with evangelisation and strong Catholic identity as the main strands of ‘best practice’ in vocations ministry.

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