“Good morning, good morning! Let’s learn about vocations,” speaker Daniel Harms sang as eighth grade students processed into All Saints Catholic Church in Manassas. Students laughed as Harms improvised songs on the guitar, describing individual students in the crowd.
More than 1,300 eighth graders from Catholic schools across the diocese gathered March 28 for the annual Mass for vocations for eighth graders. Before Mass, Harms spoke to the students about discernment and listening to God’s call. He demonstrated this by inviting students from St. James School in Falls Church and St. Thomas More Cathedral School in Arlington to reenact the Bible story of Samuel and Elijah. After this exercise, he encouraged students to spend more time in prayer and to grow in relationship with God.
Harms told students to never fear God’s call and to rely on the Holy Spirit for strength. “Brothers and sisters, if you’re nervous of what God is calling you to or what vocation he has planned for you, know that the gift of the Holy Spirit is a gift that empowers and walks with us,” he said.
All vocations involve laying down your life for the sake of someone else, he said.. Gesturing to the religious sisters seated with their students, Harms told the students, “These women have laid down their lives to love and serve you.”
He challenged students to be courageous in their relationship with God. “What the church needs now is bold men and women,” Harms said, “a generation who will stand up, filled with the Holy Spirit, and will say ‘yes’ to the calling of their heart.”
In his homily, Bishop Michael F. Burbidge explained that discernment is a lifelong endeavor in relationship with God. “Young friends, you will only be able to discern God’s will in life if you’re convinced of his great love for you.”
Bishop Burbidge reminded students that God’s call often comes through the words and actions of others.He recalled that when he was young, a priest at his school asked him if he had ever thought of becoming a priest. While he had never thought of it before, Bishop Burbidge said from “that day forward, I could never stop thinking about it.”
“No matter what our vocation is,” Bishop Burbidge reminded students, “on the day that we are called to meet the Lord, he will ask us all the same question: ‘Did you use the talents and gifts and blessings I gave you to love me, to love one another?’ ”
The day before the vocations Mass, eighth grade classes completed a vocations-themed escape room challenge developed by the diocesan Office of Vocations, Catholic Schools and Youth Ministry. Students watched a series of videos themed “Your Life Adventure!” that contained clues to complete challenges and unlock a box of prizes.
Following Mass, Father Michael C. Isenberg, diocesan vocations director, announced winners of the challenge — All Saints Catholic School in Manassas and St. Ambrose School in Annandale — who were the first to be dismissed for a Chick-fil-A lunch with Bishop Burbidge.
While she enjoyed all of the vocations videos, Juliana Franco from St. Ambrose said, “I liked the one that talked about family.” While she felt called to the sacrament of marriage, Franco said that “community is something special” within the vocation of religious life.
After watching the video on religious life, Annemarie Miller from St. Timothy Catholic School in Chantilly said a benefit of religious life is that, “you’re always going to have God with you as a best friend, so you’re never really alone.”
Andrew Snodgrass from the Basilica School of St. Mary in Alexandria said that if he is called to marriage, he looks forward to having “a future family, helping them grow in faith and getting people to heaven.”
St. Timothy student Addie Ross added that the couple in the marriage video inspired her, “because they knew how to work together, and if they needed something, they could rely on each other.”
