Scottish Catholic Observer

Do This in Memory of Me is aiming to help young Scots find their way to the priesthood at a time of growing need in Glasgow and across Scotland.

The campaign will be launched on October 30 in Glasgow Archdiocese’s curial offices with the airing of a video package that will be distributed to schools, parishes and youth groups and features priests, students, married couples and schoolchildren talking about vocations.

The video will be distributed along with a lesson plan, posters and a social media campaign, and will be an addition to the archdiocese’s current bi-monthly vocations meetings.

The last ordination to Glasgow Archdiocese took place in 2013, although there are currently two seminarians in Rome with two more involved in the application process.

On World Day of Prayer for Vocations, Archbishop Philip Tartaglia of Glasgow said that as someone ‘nearer the end of my active life than the beginning,’ his dearest wish was that there would be enough priests for the diocese in the future.

“Our story of vocations to the priesthood in recent years shows that the challenge is daunting for young men,” the archbishop said. “Despite the limitations of my own humanity, I am constantly surprised and delighted by working for the Lord as a priest. So I do not hesitate to call all young people to follow Jesus. And I do not hesitate to call young men to follow Jesus in the priesthood and allow Him to make them into good shepherds just like Him.”

Do This in Memory of Me is being led by the archdiocese’s vocations director Fr Ross Campbell, chaplain at Glasgow University. He said that we need to create a culture of vocations. “The whole Church has a responsibility for fostering and nurturing vocations,” he said. “We all have to do our best to promote vocations and I think [the campaign] ties in quite nicely with the current consultation on amalgamating parishes—I think it’s starting to hit home that we do need more priests.”

Fr Campbell said that the archdiocese’s vocations programme involves giving people a gentle, first step into the waters of the priesthood, without any initial firm commitment, and he said it is important people don’t have misconceptions about the priesthood.

“It goes from two extremes—my brother would always say ‘well, you only work one day a week!’—and then you get the other extreme were people think ‘I am not worthy,”” he said.

In April, St Andrews and Edinburgh Archdiocese launched their Come and See initiative in an effort to tackle the problem, with vocations director Fr Michael John Galbraith telling the SCO that the key to new vocations was explaining the Catholic faith in its fullness to young men.

“No priest, no Eucharist, no Church, no evangelisation,” he added. “It’s as stark and simple as that.”

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—This story ran in full in the October 23 edition print of the SCO, available in parishes.