The statistics are alarming.
The population of priests in the U.S. has fallen by at least 25,000 since 1965, according to data from the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate. Over three thousand parishes were pastor-less in 2022. Around the country, parishes are closing, merging, and struggling to meet the needs of their parishioners.
But when the National Conference of Diocesan Vocation Directors polled seminarians in 2019, they discovered something surprising — more than one-third of U.S. seminarians indicated that FOCUS had impacted their discernment.
Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS), an organization that trains and disperses missionaries to 193 college campuses across the U.S., offers hope to a nationwide priest shortage.
Encouraging priestly vocations
“If there is another apostolate in the Catholic Church that does more to encourage and support vocations to the priesthood and religious life, I don’t know who it would be,” said Msgr. James P. Shea, president of the University of Mary, in a FOCUS press release.
FOCUS ministers to students at 216 locations around the world, including eight international campuses and ten digital outreach campuses, as well as 23 parish locations. Prayer, a dating fast, and discernment are integral to the formation of its over 800 missionaries.
As of this year, 871 men have pursued the priesthood after their involvement with the organization, according to FOCUS.
Discovering a priestly vocation in Togo
Samuel Gerbic, age 26, a seminarian at Kenrick-Glennon Seminary near his hometown of St. Louis, is one of them.
Gerbic earned his bachelor’s degree in Engineering from Bradley University in Peoria, IL — a secular campus that does not have FOCUS missionaries. It wasn’t until his sophomore year in college when he heard about the organization from a friend, who recommended a FOCUS mission trip to Africa to Gerbic.
Gerbic spent July 2017 in the small West African nation of Togo with a group of FOCUS missionaries led by Father William Ryan, who operates a mission there full-time.
“It was really receiving the gift of Christian fellowship and the clarity of the proclamation of the Gospel that inspired me with the desire to share that with everyone when I got home,” Gerbic said.
Gerbic’s faith was invigorated by his time in Africa. He entered FOCUS when he graduated in 2019 and began serving as a missionary at Wright State University in Fairborn, Ohio, that fall.
| About FOCUS |
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FOCUS is an international Catholic outreach organization, serving nearly 200 college campuses and more than 20 parish communities. Through Bible studies, one-on-one mentorship, mission trips, conferences, and partnerships with priests, bishops and parishes, FOCUS missionaries walk alongside students and parishioners in their journey of faith, inspiring and equipping them for a lifetime of Christ-centered evangelization and discipleship. Since FOCUS was founded in 1998, more than 1,000 people have entered the seminary or religious orders after connecting with a missionary on college campuses. More than 50,000 FOCUS alumni serve in parishes and communities across the world to continue their lifelong mission of evangelization and leading others to pursue lives of virtue and excellence. |
In January of Gerbic’s second year serving at Wright State, he asked God in prayer what needed to change in the hearts of men to accept the Gospel.
“(In prayer) it became clear, in the context of FOCUS, that the Lord had been inviting me to share this gift of friendship and secure relationship and accompaniment, but that my desire was to give more than just friendship, then just accompaniment. It was to build this place, to provide a space of healing and security that only a father can provide,” Gerbic said.
Shortly after this experience in prayer, Gerbic began the application process to the seminary. He has four more years of study ahead of him before he will be ordained for the Diocese of St. Louis.
From missionary life to seminary life
Noah Orham, a 25-year-old from Savage, Minn, also experienced the call to priesthood through his faithfulness to prayer while a FOCUS missionary.
“If we are just being rooted in prayer, we will be free to say yes to the Lord, be free to say yes to the Holy Spirit because we actually know how the Holy Spirit is working in our lives,” said Orham, who graduated from North Dakota State in Fargo, North Dakota, in December of 2020 with a degree in civil engineering.
Orham’s three years as a FOCUS missionary helped him realize that he desired to be on mission full-time in only the way that a priest can.
“Your whole entire day, your whole entire life, your whole entire schedule, is organized around prayer and the sacraments, which is why I think FOCUS has been so successful in encouraging vocations. Because it is not just trying to get you to do something, but it is encouraging you to be something,” said Orham, who now resides at the St. Paul Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Learning to abide in Christ
Gian Gonzalez, 28 years old, from Springfield, Virginia, is also among the one-third of seminarians who were impacted by FOCUS.
“FOCUS provided the space where I was able to listen to God’s voice, understand that I was created for a purpose, and discover my vocation,” Gonzalez wrote in an email. “Discernment begins with the first task of abiding.”
Gonzalez graduated from James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia, in 2017, where he studied philosophy and economics. He served as a FOCUS missionary for five years, first at Boston University followed by two years at Mount St. Mary’s University. Gonzalez has also directed or participated in over 10 mission trips including to Honduras, Mexico, Togo and Guyana.
It was on one of these mission trips — a pilgrimage to the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico — that he received the impetus to act on a call to the priesthood, which he had felt since childhood.
| A prayer for vocations |
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O Father, you desire all of us to be happy. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops |
“After a challenging knee crawl, I prayed at the feet of Jesus and the Holy Spirit reawakened this call to the priesthood in a way that allured a response. It was Jesus in the Eucharist who asked, “Wilt thou refuse?” A few moments later, I was amazed to see Fr. Ivany, my vocations director at the Basilica in Mexico. From there I prayed about the call and shortly applied,” Gonzalez wrote.
He is currently a seminarian at Mount St. Mary’s University in Emmitsburg, Maryland, for his propaedeutic year. A propaedeutic year is a time of intentional formation and prayer.
Gonzalez said that it is no surprise that FOCUS has borne so many vocations to the priesthood, religious life, and holy matrimony. According to FOCUS’s April 25th press release, more than one thousand people who were involved in FOCUS have entered the seminary or formation in religious life — a figure that FOCUS predicts will double in the next ten years.
“I believe it comes down to our three missionary habits: divine intimacy, authentic friendship, and clarity and conviction in spiritual multiplication,” Gonzalez wrote. “FOCUS has created a culture of encounter that forms missionary disciples who courageously live out their vocation to the fullest.”
