Priests just keep getting younger…

‘Tis the season for ordinations, and what a season it has been! According to a survey from the Georgetown University-based Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate, the “2012 priesthood ordination class continues a six-year trend towards younger priests.” Two-thirds of the men ordained this year are between the ages of 25 and 34!

When speaking to the priests, religious, and seminarians in Malawi in May 1989, Blessed John Paul II said:

In a special way I commend to you young men the closing words of this evening’s Gospel: “You did not choose me, but I chose you” (John 15:16). Yes, the gift of a vocation to the priesthood is not something you seek for yourselves. It has nothing to do with status or privilege as the world understands these things. Your great privilege will be to lay down your lives with Christ the eternal priest if you are truly called to this vocation. May God help each of you to discern His will so that you too may “Go out to bear fruit, fruit that will last.”

Congratulations to all of our new priests, and thank you. We will keep you in our prayers here at the Blessed John Paul II Shrine.