The Catholic Church in the United States will commemorate “National Vocation Awareness Week,” November 3-9. Each year, dioceses, parishes, and schools in our country take the opportunity to raise awareness for vocations, particularly those who are discerning a vocation to the priesthood or consecrated life.
We pray with gratitude for those who seek and respond in their daily lives to their vocation, whether that be as husbands, wives, parents, priests and other ordained ministers, and consecrated persons. And during “National Vocation Awareness Week,” we celebrate in a special way, the men and women who offer their lives to God through a life of service to the Church, “sowing seeds of hope and revealing to all the beauty of God’s kingdom’” as the Pope Francis says in his message for World Day of Prayer for Vocations.
Beginning in 1976, the U.S. bishops designated the 28th Sunday of the liturgical year as an opportunity for the Catholic Church in the United States to renew its prayerful support for those discerning an ecclesial vocation. In 2014, the commemoration of “National Vocation Awareness Week” in the United States was moved by USCCB to the first week of November to better engage Catholic educational institutions in the efforts to raise awareness for vocations.
Prayer for Vocations
God our Father, we thank you for calling men and women to serve in your Son’s Kingdom as priests, deacons, and consecrated persons. Send your Holy Spirit to help others to respond generously and courageously to your call. May our community of faith support vocations of sacrificial love in our youth and young adults. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen