I was thinking about his points while reading Brother Sean Sammon’s letter to his Marist Community, Rekindling the Fire. Sean is the Superior General of the Marist Brothers. The letter was an opening letter to begin ‘Marist Vocation Year.’ He begins with a quote from Catherine de Vinck (1967) that strikes a prophetic chord even though written so many years ago..

We have come a long way,

a long waterway of motion,

prayer, thought,

a long river way of pain.

Shall we not see

the great golden shaft,

the arm of light reaching down,

slicing the water,

touching our nakedness

with new, tender joy?

In his letter, he makes a number of recommendations about vocation promotion and recruitment and he speaks directly about recruitment to the vowed life within the Marist Family. Much of what he says is not new, but there a few quotes that might be helpful to all of us as we ponder the vocation scene in our area of our congregation. He begins with his own story to point out that it is the lives of the individual brothers that is the greatest influence on vocation recruitment.

"Even with the distance of years, I can still remember what it was about those men that first captured my imagination and my heart. They were obviously religious people, and appeared happy in their work together and committed to it. There was also an evident spirit of sacrifice among them that somehow appealed to my adolescent soul. ...

And, finally, there was the question of passion. We cannot overlook this important element for it rests at the heart of any vocation worth its salt. Though I might not have recognized it at the time, I realize now that there were some very passionate men among the members of that small group of brothers. In retrospect, I can see that in their love for Jesus Christ and his Good News and for those of us who were their students, they shared with us all some of the very same qualities that the founder ...

Even now, I find myself surprised at how subtly God was at work in my life, though I surely would never have thought to use that language when I was fourteen."

"Vocation promotion should never be undertaken solely for the sake of survival. ... Our zeal for mission, then, rather than a desire to survive "come what may" must be our reason for awakening vocations."

And he poses the question directly and poses some challenges to his brothers and to the wider Marist Family and ministries: "And, so, I ask you: do you believe as I do that the mission of our Institute is as vital and urgent today as it was during (the Founder’s) time in history, and that it will remain so for the foreseeable future? If you do, then let us agree that the awakening of new vocations can no longer be a sideline attraction for you or for me. A few challenges before we go on. First a challenge to my brothers in the Institute. If you and I want to make vocation promotion a top priority during the year ahead, the majority, if not all of us, will need to rearrange our other commitments so as to free up 20 percent of our best time to devote directly to that work. Why 20 percent? Because there is a lot to learn and a great deal of work to be done.

We can all beg off citing some very good reasons not to get involved. Lack of time, the demands of ministry, age; who among us has not heard that litany before? However, if you and I want a future for the mission and life of our Institute, we need to avoid making excuses and instead enthusiastically commit ourselves to the work of this year set aside for the promotion of vocations."

And he speaks directly to the lay partners of the Marist Brothers, associates, partners in their schools, administrators of schools.  He poses a challenge of invitation: "I ask you to join us during this important twelvemonth period as we work to educate parents, the young people entrusted to your care and ours, and the Church at large about who we are as brothers as well as the nature of our life and ministry here at the dawn of the 21^st century.

You know us and know what we cherish and hold dear. Help us to find the means to let others come to know us in the same way. And, help us, too, by inviting young people who have the qualities needed to consider making our way of life their own.

I have no hesitation, therefore, in asking that the work of inviting new members to join us be given top priority. All who share the founder's charism should be eager to promote vocations to the brotherhood he established. God's Good News remains to be proclaimed to more children and young people than we might imagine.

And what happens if all of us-brothers and lay partners alike-take a decision not to make vocation promotion a major concern or to provide sufficient time to work in this important ministry? What are the consequences? Some would say that at the very least a failure to act and act decisively would probably diminish the possibility of a vital and vibrant future for our way of life and ministry. Others would be harsher in their judgment: if we fail to act, they would tell us, perhaps we don't really deserve a future after all."

So, the challenges he presents are time, passion and collaboration inviting not just the brothers, but the schools, the staff, parents and students on the journey to seek new members for the work still yet to be done.

We in religious life in the developed world are being broken as the quote from Henry Nelson Wieman states in on our opening page of our website this month.  We are being broken because we must be broken.  Our congregational engagement in restructuring is the act of breaking us so that we may be remade, reinvented from the very sources from which we began.  Do we have a passion to do so and invite others to join us on this passionate journey?