I was a participant! It was very chaotic and the organizers seemed a bit overwhelmed by the massive turnout. By next year, I’m hopeful it will be a well oiled machine. 99% of attendees are called to the married life, not religious life, and yet the vast majority of vocational exhibitors at Seek are religious orders. This was the only experience really focused on practical support to discernment of the 99% vocation! Hopefully next year they’ll break it up by regions or ages over several days, and offer a few more age brackets for Young Professionals (23-35 is just too broad).
I'm inclined to think that, to some degree, this is because there is significant reason to be skeptical that 99% are actually called to marriage. I think probably 99% *want* marriage, and since marriage is a much more socially normal and conventional than any form of celibacy or vowed/consecrated/ordained life, there is insufficient opportunity for people to pause and be challenged to reconsider the assumption that the desire for marriage is the same as a genuine vocation. Religious life and holy orders have structures to help filter out folks who do not seem to have a genuine vocation: marriage has no such structure, effectively letting anyone who wants it in as long as they find a spouse. (Sure, marriage prep is a thing, but to compare that to a seminary application is disingenuous.)
I tend to think that the share of folks with genuine vocations to marriage is actually a much, much smaller share of the population than we assume, but many genuine vocations to religious life, holy orders, and other forms of celibate life are lost because of the general conflation of desire with calling, and a lack of both support and challenge.
In my experience, discerning a religious vocation ended up being what gave me clarity that I had a vocation to marriage. It’s through praying and using Ignatian discernment with these vocations that God can speak to how he made your heart. If every Catholic did this, we would have more priests and religious in my opinion.
There's nothing wrong with a dating event, it sounds fun. However, you better hope more than 1% of attendees are called to a religious vocation, or those getting married and having children are going to have great difficulty finding priests to administer the sacraments to themselves and their families.
1% would be great! Even 0.25% (ie adjusting for women and men called to religious life but not priesthood) Catholic young people being called to the priesthood would be ~5x as many priests per Catholic in the US as now (1:2000)
In my youth we used to go out in mixed groups of 10 or 20, so that people could get to know each other as part of a group and if they wanted to get to know each other better they were already friends so it was easier to talk to each other.
I admire the guts it takes to try to break a speed dating record set by the Mormons with your own attempt in Salt Lake City. It's akin to breaking into their house and taking a pee on the rug that makes the room hang together. Too bad it didn't work.
Whoever figures out how to get men and women into relationships with each other will control the culture and the country.
People are going the way of the panda bear and forgetting how to pair up with opposite sex. If people will gravitate to churches for friends and relationships, they can be molded more perfectly in the faith
I agree with how the Catholic dating scene is described in this article. There is definitely a lot of pressure to determine if who you are dating is “the one”. It should be less about young people figuring it out and more about God guiding them. Was there any prayer as part of the event? That would have been a nice addition if not.
I was a participant! It was very chaotic and the organizers seemed a bit overwhelmed by the massive turnout. By next year, I’m hopeful it will be a well oiled machine. 99% of attendees are called to the married life, not religious life, and yet the vast majority of vocational exhibitors at Seek are religious orders. This was the only experience really focused on practical support to discernment of the 99% vocation! Hopefully next year they’ll break it up by regions or ages over several days, and offer a few more age brackets for Young Professionals (23-35 is just too broad).
I'm inclined to think that, to some degree, this is because there is significant reason to be skeptical that 99% are actually called to marriage. I think probably 99% *want* marriage, and since marriage is a much more socially normal and conventional than any form of celibacy or vowed/consecrated/ordained life, there is insufficient opportunity for people to pause and be challenged to reconsider the assumption that the desire for marriage is the same as a genuine vocation. Religious life and holy orders have structures to help filter out folks who do not seem to have a genuine vocation: marriage has no such structure, effectively letting anyone who wants it in as long as they find a spouse. (Sure, marriage prep is a thing, but to compare that to a seminary application is disingenuous.)
I tend to think that the share of folks with genuine vocations to marriage is actually a much, much smaller share of the population than we assume, but many genuine vocations to religious life, holy orders, and other forms of celibate life are lost because of the general conflation of desire with calling, and a lack of both support and challenge.
In my experience, discerning a religious vocation ended up being what gave me clarity that I had a vocation to marriage. It’s through praying and using Ignatian discernment with these vocations that God can speak to how he made your heart. If every Catholic did this, we would have more priests and religious in my opinion.
There's nothing wrong with a dating event, it sounds fun. However, you better hope more than 1% of attendees are called to a religious vocation, or those getting married and having children are going to have great difficulty finding priests to administer the sacraments to themselves and their families.
1% would be great! Even 0.25% (ie adjusting for women and men called to religious life but not priesthood) Catholic young people being called to the priesthood would be ~5x as many priests per Catholic in the US as now (1:2000)
In my youth we used to go out in mixed groups of 10 or 20, so that people could get to know each other as part of a group and if they wanted to get to know each other better they were already friends so it was easier to talk to each other.
I admire the guts it takes to try to break a speed dating record set by the Mormons with your own attempt in Salt Lake City. It's akin to breaking into their house and taking a pee on the rug that makes the room hang together. Too bad it didn't work.
"Too bad it didn't work."
-Could've pulled it off if they had been playing The Eagles in the background.
That's just, like, your opinion, man.
Sounds like the record will be easily broken next year!
Whoever figures out how to get men and women into relationships with each other will control the culture and the country.
People are going the way of the panda bear and forgetting how to pair up with opposite sex. If people will gravitate to churches for friends and relationships, they can be molded more perfectly in the faith
I agree with how the Catholic dating scene is described in this article. There is definitely a lot of pressure to determine if who you are dating is “the one”. It should be less about young people figuring it out and more about God guiding them. Was there any prayer as part of the event? That would have been a nice addition if not.
"A young gentleman hands his date a rose..."
Lol. That's my son...and he met one of his dates again only just today. Is there love going on out there? Thank you Pillar.