Recruiting Posters Featuring Catholic Priests Send Out A Call That??S Being Answered

On the door of his room at Conception Seminary College in northwest Missouri, Adam Haake has a poster that reminds him of the other local men walking the same path toward priesthood.

It pictures 2007-08 seminarians from the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph.

Haake is one of them. He stands in the back row of the group shot, photographed last summer in front of the ornate altar of Our Lady of Sorrows Catholic Church, next to Hallmark.

When he looks at the poster, Haake, 23, sees "a whole array of men who have answered the call," he says. "So many people tell us that when they see the poster, it causes a great hope for them."

Walk into any seminary and you'll see movie posters like this from dioceses all across the country.

The posters have been around for years. They are marketing tools, used to encourage men to answer the call to the priesthood. They are a source of pride for church members who see the faces of their sons and brothers and neighbors.

And, as Haake said, they give hope to those same church members who worry about the church's lack of priests.

Wait, the posters seem to encourage.

New priests are in the making.

The posters have undergone makeovers in recent years. Many have shed their informational, utilitarian - OK, let's just say it - "churchy" formats and become more graphic, polished and modern.

As the posters evolve to appeal to a generation raised on cable TV and the Internet, vocations directors realize they are walking a line between appealing to and speaking the language of today's youth and commercializing the call to the priesthood.

"I think you want something that is attractive, that is going to reach people and it's going to speak to a target audience," says Brad Watkins, assistant to the director of vocations in Raleigh, N.C.

"And frankly we would like to get younger people thinking about or considering or even just remaining open to the idea that God might be calling them to the priesthood, that God has a plan in their life, that God has a plan for all of us.

"And the reality is he is calling some men to the priesthood."

Some of the posters wouldn't look that out of place in a movie theater lobby. For example:

?In the Roman Catholic Diocese of Raleigh in North Carolina the faces of this year's 20 seminarians appear against the black of a priest's cassock and the words "Heroes of Sacrifice."

?In the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston last year, seminarians were photographed holding a giant fishing net to illustrate a "Fishers of Men" theme.

?In Austin, Texas, photos of this year's seminarians are displayed on a "Pirates of the Caribbean"-like treasure map. It exhorts: "Discover the Priesthood."

Cool posters. Promotional videos. Web sites featuring seminarians' blogs.

Think of it as Promoting the Priesthood 2008.

Jesse Garcia, programs coordinator for the Galveston-Houston Archdiocese, says he hasn't had one seminarian say he decided to enter the priesthood because of a poster.

Instead, he says, "I think it's part of an ongoing culture of vocations we're trying to foster."

April 05, 2008