The scarcity mentality: Being realistic about priestly vocations

April 2025

By Fr. Robert Mulderink

What are we aiming for when it comes to priestly vocations in our diocese? What are we hoping for with the posters, prayers, talks, and visits to parishes and schools? I think our unspoken goal is usually to have “enough” priests to survive. What a POOR GOAL.

The pitiful goal of having enough vocations for survival comes from having very small expectations for what is possible, and those low expectations come from our outlook on reality. Our unexamined perception of priestly vocations is cynical, and all we can see is scarcity, especially in a year without any ordinations to the priesthood or transitional diaconate. But if we see the reality of the situation as that hopeless, then we have left the Gospel behind.

The Gospel is the lens through which we view the world, the way we interpret reality. The Gospel is the only lens that brings us to the truth, that allows us to live in the real world. And the Gospel, over and over, makes it clear that God provides abundantly for his Church, that he will never leave us without what is needed for us to do what he wants and fulfill the mission he’s given the Church.

What adventurous goals could we have for vocations if our expectations were not crushed by a perspective that forgets the Gospel? Have you ever dreamed not of having enough priests for survival but of what it would be like if we had more than we needed? What good could God do within and beyond our diocese? God calls many more men than we think. The men on our seminarian poster are a very small fraction of those God is calling. I’m trying to be conservative here, but I think that if only half of the men God is currently calling to the priesthood actually responded, we would have 250+ seminarians from our diocese alone.

So, what holds us back? The vast majority of men never listen for God’s call, because they don’t believe they’ll hear anything. An enormous obstacle to a healthy culture of vocations is the pervasive belief that the call to priesthood is extremely rare and has nothing to do with “normal” men. If you believe that, and you’re a normal guy, you will never listen for God to speak to you. You’ll never even wonder if God might call you to the priesthood, all because of a warped understanding of what is “normal.”

Men, you are made for a purpose. And it’s very possible you could be called to priesthood. I’ve been a priest now for six years, and I can say for certain that priesthood is a good life. More importantly, God loves to call normal guys to be priests. At least, I’m pretty sure I’m normal. I pray that you are brave enough to put your life at God’s service, to let him speak freely to you in prayer, and that you will answer when he calls.

Pull quote: “The vast majority of men never listen for God’s call, because they don’t believe they’ll hear anything.”

Father Robert Mulderink is director of priestly vocations for the Diocese of Grand Rapids.