The Baptismal Priesthood and the the Vocation Shortage

Homily Given at St. Patrick's in Wareham
On the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord
The 1st Sunday in Ordinary Time
By: Fr. Ron Floyd

My friends there is a vocation crisis going on in the Church today I am sure you all know about it. We need more priests in the Church to spread the gospel, and lead the people, and sanctify the world.

Ask a dozen faithful Catholics what the solution to the problem is and you will get a dozen answers ranging from prayer, to advertisements, to ordaining married men.

But the true answer to the problem is that we all have to realize that the shortage of ordained priests stems from a shortage of baptismal priests, Or at least, from a shortage of Christians living up to the vocation that we all receive from Christ in Baptism.

I remember a funny little story I once heard:

After the Baptism of his baby brother in church,
little Johnny sobbed all the way home in the back seat of the car.
His father asked him three times what was wrong.
Finally, the boy replied, "That priest said
he wanted us brought up in a Christian home,
but I want to stay with you guys."

In the Gospel today Jesus went down into the waters of Baptism to share in totally in the human condition. In my version of the Gospel it says nothing about Jesus getting into the clergy baptism line. Rather he went down into the waters with all of us with the multitudes of men women and children there to take on our guilt and the repercussions of our sins but also to give us a share in His life and destiny.

In the waters of Baptism Jesus ordain to share in our sufferings so that we could share in His mission on Earth and His glory in Heaven.

As baptized Christians we are called a prophetic, royal and priestly people because to us is given the commission and command to spread the good news, by governing our lives, our families, and our world according to God's Law and by sanctifying the world by the sacrifices this requires.

Friends we are all priests in Jesus Christ, all of us called to offer sacrifice, to live sacrificially, which simply means to live lives of selfless LOVE. As an ordained priest my vocation is to help you by preaching God's word and offering up the Sacrifice of the Altar which is the same sacrifice of Calvary the Cross of Jesus Christ by which Jesus washes us of our sins and leaves us a model for how to love, and how to live in love.

But your vocation is just as awesome, and just as necessary!

All baptized Christians--having received the gift of faith, and heard the word of God, having been washed clean of our sins in the waters of Baptism and through the Blood and Water that pour forth from the heart of Jesus as He hung on the cross, and having seen the example and model of perfect charity in Jesus' sacrifice for us on the Cross--

All baptized Christians are invited to go and do the same.

The Crisis in the priesthood began, and will end, if and only if Christians begin to live their baptismal priesthood. The day that Catholic Christians begin to see the difficulties of life whether marriage, or family, or children, or work, or illness, or poverty not as something to be loathed and avoided but as an opportunity to Love God and offer our lives as a sacrifice to Him, is the day that our children will again begin to consider in large numbers, the possibility of sacrificing the human happiness of a family, for the spiritual happiness of religious life or the priesthood.

As a culture we have become selfish, that's not to say we make no sacrifices for each other, but how often when we do make a sacrifice for our children or a neighbor
do we do it half-heartily, how often do we complain about it, how often do we fail to risk everything and give all we are and have not just to a stranger, but to our wives and children and families?

One used to hear people talk about offering up their sacrifices to the Lord, today it seems we simply try to run from difficulty and pain! Thats not to say that God wants our suffering, but that He wants and we need to loving hearts in the face of suffering. He wants us to be thankful for our life even when we don't understand why we are suffering!

Jesus our High priest shows us that priesthood is about self-giving which, of course, is simply another name for thanksgiving, love and sacrifice.

And true priest ends at the cross with the total gift of what we hold most dear

As Jesus' priesthood shows us, eventually any authentic priesthood demands that ultimate sacrifice--the total gift of self.

That's what we signed up for at baptism, that's the deal that will get us into heaven
and if it sounds scary it should, because we can't do it alone! With the help of the Holy Spirit, however, we are all capable of this sort of heroic love.

We are all called by our baptism to save souls, by living our life as a heroic self sacrifice. God doesn't ask anything extra-ordinary of most of us He simply asks that we do whatever we normally do extra-ordinarily.

Today as we contemplate the baptism of the Lord I will leave you with a last little story:

A priest and a bus driver both died and went to Heaven .
They get to the pearly gates where Pope St. Peter greets them.
Motioning to the priest, he points to 50 acres in heaven of rolling hills
with a little cottage on the knoll.

St. Peter turns to the priest and says "This will be yours for eternity.
A perfect little cottage, right next to lovely pond, a lush little garden,
and a library full of books."

The priest says, "Thank you so much. This I shall enjoy!"

Next, St. Peter motions to the bus driver.
Pointing to a castles on a mountain in the distance he says,
there are about 500 acres of land,
with mountains and lakes and rivers for you here.

St. Peter says "This will be yours for eternity.
You can live in that castle with servants to wait on you hand and foot,
and you can have everything you want."

The bus driver looks and St. Peter and says
"Well, now, don't think I'm not grateful,
but why am I getting so much more than the priest?"

St. Peter just laughs and says "You brought more souls to Heaven!
When the priest preached, everyone fell asleep.
When you drove your bus, people prayed!"

As the body of Christ we are all responsible for helping each other
get to heaven, will you take this responsibility seriously this year?