 Hey friends, this is Dan and Stephanie Burke. You're watching behind the scenes divine intimacy radio Pretty scary show today And I don't there's no pun intended. There's no Not being facetious. I mean it the more I look at the data The more I think the church in the United States is in trouble. So we're gonna talk about a vocation disaster we're headed towards and and And then The solutions there's a lot of good solutions brewing out there. The Lord always provides answers to the challenges we face so We're looking forward to jumping into the show with you. So If you know anybody any of your friends this show is going to be really important so if you're a regular listener and You appreciate What we do here and you care about this health of the church Share this on your own Facebook. Can they share it off of EWTN on their own Facebook page? So share it onto your own Facebook page. It's gonna be really really important Like it so it'll pop up in your feed like there's feet sure. Yeah like it and share it Few good events coming up great events. They're not just good. Are they know they're phenomenal few marginal events We'd kind of like to share with you, but not really No a few amazing events sorry Virtual silent auction. I don't know is that exciting event for people on Facebook. I don't know The annual Stephanie's like giddy up the rosary crusade divine intimacy and marriage retreat Carmelite pilgrimage to Spain that one all of them are great and the Avalos summit are all out at spiritualdirection.com events events So we're pretty excited about all those Check it out and you'll know where we're gonna be next and what's going on and opportunities for you to be holy last thing I'll say before we jump in the show and talk about Something it's not in any way funny or To joke about a In a man healing the imagination A reading course and in tokens Lord of the Rings Wow You tell them, but it's about Okay, healing the imagination a reading course in tokens Lord of the Rings That's gonna be down soon. So check it out at Avala-institute.org It's part of our School of Spiritual Formation with Dr. Andrew Sealy. It'll be awesome So if you love Lord of the Rings and want to explore its spiritual depths check that out Avala-institute.org Right Okay on your mark and get set go This is Danis Stephanie Burke. Welcome to divine intimacy radio your radio haven of rest your hermitage of the heart Your monastery of the mind where we lift our hearts and minds to heaven to draw on the wisdom of the saints to help us to navigate this very challenging life and Today we have a very sober difficult subject to talk to you about With some good news attached as well but what if You were one of the hundreds of churches in the United States, and I don't know if you know how many there are But recently just in one diocese a Hundred parishes were notified by their bishop a hundred parishes were notified by their bishop that their parish was being closed a hundred How would you feel sitting there in the pew reading listening to that or Reading the memo or reading the letter from the bishop What if that happened to you well It's we're headed for a crisis of epic proportions in the United States and That's our topic for the day St. Stephanie St. Stephanie From your mouth to God's ears, please Lord someday please make me introduce make me a saint Lord our expert in this area Okay, I am very happy to welcome dr. Joseph whole craft. He's one of our own He is taught at the middle school high school and university level and during that period Dr. Whole craft also hosted the radio broadcast seeds of truth He is also an author and Has written a heart for evangelizing and unleashing the power of intercessory prayer The reason he's with us today and he's one of us is because he is a professor With the Avala Institute and he is also our director of the high-calling program most importantly he is married to a beautiful wife and He is a devoted husband and father He lives in Ohio with his wife Jackie and their four children Welcome Joe Dan Stephanie great to be with you. Thanks for the invitation Good to have you. Well, you heard the intro St. Stephanie We're headed we're I so Joe You know we've been We've worked together in this realm for a little while now with some great success Stephanie, of course Ran the high-calling program before you and joined us so she knows it upfront and close But for me until we started working on this solution directly related to finding guys who Have a calling or think they have a calling I Hadn't really focused on this the stats Go ahead. I think before we go there. Why don't we have Joe tell us what the high-calling program is? Yeah Because a lot of our listeners this might be the first time they've ever heard anything about it So just a reader's digest version Joe what is the high-calling program with the Avala Institute and why is this important for a church? Why is it and what if you could just because they did have in mind a sort of sequence what the Speak first of what we're doing now, and then we'll talk about what we're going to do in the future Sure. Yeah, so what we're doing now and what we've been doing over the past six years is The Avala Institute Under the guidance of initially under the direction initially of Archbishop Gomez with Dr. Lily Lillis and a few others Started a live online program to help men discern their call to the priesthood. So what we've established essentially is 12 modules that work that operates three weeks long where the guys gather one night per week where they journey with men across the country this live online form to Really engage the various principles of discernment The program is blessed with some of the top formators in the country From father Hagerty to father Boniface X to father McManus to father Gachansky father Kowali And many others Chris Carson's dr. Mark Mervelli now is on board with Mariology the men are afforded the opportunity to really for the first time by their own testimony And I've had the blessed opportunity to speak with many of them This program allows them for the first time to really Engage the faith think critically about the faith, you know So for the first time they are encountering Christ in the interior life for the first time They're experiencing healing that leads to spiritual maturity They come to see conversion as as something ongoing, right? Certainly spiritual direction is a very important part of this And maybe most importantly They enter into a more robust personal relationship with Jesus Christ as they go deeper in their discernment as they receive greater clarity And it's a program that just doesn't operate between professor and and discerner but also Including myself the vocation director, right? So the vocation directors Are directly involved and and the the vocation directors love us because we provide them the content The interaction that takes place between discerner and professor So they have a kind of window if you will into that conversation and it provides them great fodder for their Regular meetings with the guys and so as you can kind of begin to anticipate between The discerner vocation director myself professor everyone involved The young man who thinks he has a call will come to understand what that looks like and from there just takes off So the the problem that we were looking to solve So some people I know not know the divine intimacy radios under the umbrella of the abla foundation Under which also is the abla institute for spiritual formation graduate studies in spiritual theology Personal enrichment studies the high calling program extended out of that So that's why Stephanie talked about how joe is one of us. We're all in the same team but um So the program was established to solve a particular set of problems And if I could summarize them and then maybe tell me where I've missed it One is we got guys who are I have a legit call to the priesthood But come out of a non-catholic culture and it's a culture permeated by All manner of things that that can confuse a young man and keep him from You know his his destiny to be a priest So they so we help them to navigate that entry that one year We give them a one-year ramp into seminary help them ramp up academically spiritually all of that And but so that solves the problem of losing men I mean it helps to solve the problem of losing men before they hit seminary for for a lot of different reasons Then uh, we're also dealing with things in the high calling program That could cause serious problems if not dealt with before seminary while in seminary, right? So we're dealing with issues like human sexuality anthropology Uh social media and all that and then If you deal with those things in the back end, you don't have this continuous It's i'm a little shocked at the number of stories. I hear regularly of how many guys discern out After they're ordained, which is just mind boggling to me And um, so it helps to solve To put a dent in all of the issues related to those problems Does that give a good summary? Yeah, you know i'm i'm reminded of Conversation I had pretty early on with the bishop Who um after I had reached out to the vocation director He had called me back the bishop called me back and we were talking for four or five minutes and he says You know dr. Holcraft. I wish you were were around six years ago This was now a year and a half ago and I said well, what do you mean? He said jokingly you would have saved me three hundred thousand dollars What are you saying and his point was Two men had left late in the seminary And when he asked both men, why did they leave? Both men said In the end, I guess I just never really discerned whether or not I was called to be a priest Wow, you know and I thought wow and again not that we're solving all the problems But no doubt we are stepping into that gap you talk about a ramp But you know we're setting that ramp up so as to help that guy come to a deeper understanding, right? And in the big point here, I think and it gets to the heart of everything you just said dan is that If you were to ask me What is the one theme that emerges in all of your conversations? For me That's easy healing Healing takes place And the one I I've heard it once and I've actually heard it now numerous times just a couple weeks ago Something like I was healed and now I'm free to discern You know the young man a few weeks ago talked extensively about his healing And he was ready to go into seminary and he wanted to just follow up with me on a couple things and it was beautiful It's beautiful. So as you talk about the problems in the church Really what we're talking about dan is a universal problem to the extent that we're dealing with human nature We all need healing so if a man is called to the priesthood Just as we are called to something we're not going to do it well if we are not first healed And and so this becomes and has really emerged. I think as a kind of overarching theme And so this certainly is something that I am excited to speak into So I'm curious if you could give me an example How is it that One of these in one of these conversations. How is it that we aided in the the healing of of of one of these guys? Yeah, so there's a certain professor we have on board named dan burk No, take the example you did not This is not a setup. This is no no, but I'm I'm you know, I'm gonna be honest and transparent, right? This young man you had stirred something in his heart Right in your module into the deep And it was about how how to be a man of prayer That same young man who said I am healed and now I'm free to discern said, you know I I thought I knew how to pray until I didn't so he started to give god time in silence And no longer was the day getting the best of him But he was getting the best of the day and he realized as As he was seeing now his day as an offering to god that he was not right with someone close to him And this was a big thing for him because in fact it was a broken relationship That had scarred a number of other relationships So over time he prayed for the grace. He was walking with our lord and his spiritual director And he was finally able to forgive that that's someone in his life And it just as he explained it to me it just it was like he walked through the door and there was just this great light And it just meant the world to him and he experienced this new joy. He said and But he went back to some of your words dan that you shared with him and just the importance of You know And I don't know if this is you exactly but essentially to neglect prayer is to neglect life itself Right. So how can we be the man that god's calling us to be if we're not praying? Right. That's right. And and so he then kind of Soaked himself in that truth by entering into Uh, the great thing that is silence with god, right and it was just uh transformative for him Awesome. Well, we're we're ready to go to the break. We get back We want to talk we shift gears and talk about uh new spiritual direction formation program for priests So extending the high calling program and then another exciting announcement. We'll be right back So 1242 we can probably just go to 1245 next time in your market set go Welcome back. This is danna. Stephanie Burke with divine intimacy radio. We're talking to dr. Joe Holcraft who heads up uh an incredibly important program for the sake of rescuing helping serving healing vocations in the church And before the break we were talking about One man's one of the guys experience In our program. How many guys do we have now joe in the high calling program that we're forming? Yeah, so last year what were the numbers 37 diocese and 96 guys and i'm in the middle of onboarding right now so Numbers for this fall stay tuned here in a few weeks, but uh Yeah, there's uh been a nice swell of momentum I think we'll match if not exceed last year's numbers. So i'm excited and for me to really the important thing that I've been pretty intentional about it's just to make sure that um The guys who are coming to us are intentional on their discernment um because certainly What i'm focused on is uh the quantity will come when the quality is there right and uh the guys coming to us Man this year the guys coming to us are just Awesome awesome dudes. I'm so excited. That's great. 38 dioceses, right? We added a new one as well Well, that's I mean that was last year. So diocese as they send us guys They don't always have guys to send us right and then there's transition within diocese new vocation directors and so sometimes you try to re-boil and that stalls but um Yeah, so we'll lose a handful of dioceses, but certainly we're gaining new dioceses too. So um, yeah one of the things I love about the high calling program and I was just so honored to Take that on for a while until you know, the lord made it obvious that It was way beyond my capacity because I was doing a whole lot of other things as well And that it was really needed to be um Directed by you, you know by by someone like you who had discerned the priesthood who had properly um entered into the fullness of His call as a man of God and ended up getting married, you know for you Um, which kind of speaks to what I love about the program is that you were talking about the quality of the men coming in And what I love is When they properly discern one of two things is going to happen They're either going to go forward into the seminary and become Hopefully healed awesome incredible priests, right the priests that we need Or they're going to discern out properly and become the men That we need them to be as husbands fathers In the business world in the education field in all the other ways because we need men to be fully Who they're called to be you know entering fully into that relationship and that calling of authentic manhood and what it looks like Because wow we need our guys We need our guys. We need strong guys whether it's in the priesthood or in our homes So I just love what it what it gives our man Amen. Well jackie, uh agrees with you The lovely mrs. Lowcraft agrees with you and it's to say too we talk about numbers with with the men who come to us It's just an odd or you know probability I don't know what it is But it always just comes out as 70 of the guys kind of stay with us and go on the seminary 30 don't but 70 30 makes 100 right so 100 of the guys are getting You know a quality formation that as you were speaking to Stephanie will transform them and praise be jesus christ for that So I want to turn the corner joe and we're running out of time. So I think we'll Save we're doing a webinar sometime soon. We'll save the The the spiritual direction piece. I want to jump to vocations development We have 38 dioceses in 2021 Ordained zero priests and that we're not talking about small obscure dioceses in this list One of them is the archdiocese in new york one of them is the archdiocese of detroit Zero priests in 2021. They ordained zero priests zero. Wow The average age of the u.s. Priest is 67 Yeah, so the crisis coming is that Priests priests are aging out We don't have enough to guys fill in the pipeline And there's more pressure on existing priests Which that doesn't often lead if they're not unless they're really well formed Often lead to a priest who's well-balanced it leads to a priest that's busy and and and you know dies of exhaustion So we have an epic issue coming And we were talking together and I don't remember how the idea came up, but we've got to help We're already coming alongside vocation directors and that's that's our mission really is to support those guys, right? Yeah, but we've got to figure out how to help because we're very good at digital reach How do we find guys so many diocesan programs are You know designed by older guys like me They don't know where the younger guys are. They're building websites. Nobody, you know under under 35 under 30 goes to websites They use their phone and they have to be phone Phone sites if you will or apps or whatever So we have this amazing capacity because We have guys who are consulting you who are the ones who are actually coming into seminary So we're designing vocation's outreach based on The men themselves the direct research with guys who are brand new across multiple dioceses I don't think this has ever been done with this much Wisdom available because of our broad Interaction with so many different dioceses and so many guys talk about the vocation's outreach. I think it's so important Yeah, so it's first to say Dan that There are a lot of men out there who want to discern and anonymity All right, they're just not ready to Take that next step and engage the vocation director And so this is really I think where the website steps in to to start that conversation for a lot of guys and to meet the guys where they are at So in the build of the website to be able to have a focus group of men And I picked a Large number of guys who have been with us to just kind of pick their brain pick their mind with what we're doing Actually sending them some physical copy of what we've done and what we've built and it's really interesting because the guys Whether they be, you know 1924 32 because we do cover the whole range really 35 plus two They're all on the same page. You know, I don't like that so much. I love that and Long beard is the outfit that we're you know, we're working with them. They they've been doing a great job of Of uh being patient with us and and just as far as the feedback goes and uh, so I'm excited because it's a website that is Going to meet the guy where they're at which includes That sense that you know what we we need to journey with this with these guys be patient with them Uh, and yeah, there's a real excitement about this. There's a real excitement We've got a resource page. We're also building. That's going to be Something we add on to on a weekly by weekly basis That's going to be very engaging super excited we're we're actually Getting some content and copy from some of some Vocation directors as well So we're working with vocation directors and their experience of working with guys. So So it's just not serving the men who are discerning and anonymity But it's also allowing us to continue to work on a deeper level Deeper level with the diocese that we are already in relationship with Yeah, I love this and when we first started talking about this years ago and and and planning on this What I loved about it was the idea of of thinking about how many men are out there who Are this is like a thought this is this little whisper in their head Maybe i'm called to be the priest to be go to the priesthood, but I don't want to have to tell my mom Right and I don't want to tell my girlfriend. I don't want to tell anybody about this So what this allows is for them to go explore in a safe manner You know at least the a way that they can do it without having to tell the world And and then we can enter the dialogue with them and provide resources for them to look at explore think about pray with Talk about and then when they get the courage and go. Yeah, I think this is it I think this is the path i'm supposed to follow until the lord says no Then we can enter into that more personal relationship with them to help them connect with their vocation directors and get plugged into high calling But I just loved that we were going to meet the men where they were And and not feel like they were going to get sucked into the diocese by an imaginary vacuum cleaner that was going to then Highlight their entire life and that they want to feel like they couldn't get out of you know Stephanie guys don't want to be stats You know and this is something that came up quite a bit You know diocese will post their numbers and I get it. There's 29 guys in the seminary and we have You know this number and that number Guys don't want that expectation on on some level that at some point the guy needs to enter into his vocation He says yes, right, but if out of the gate they become a stat They don't like that Right, so to be able to accompany them in its proper definition right and journey with them Um, it is really important to get them to a point to say yes I have a quick story as you were sharing and I know we don't probably have a lot of time but I got a call from a young lady last year when we were onboarding and She was you know somewhere from the west coast and on the west coast and she calls and she says who is this and I said, uh, joseph. Oh crap. You know, she's like joseph. What do you do? and I told her what I did and she dropped an expletive because She grabbed her boyfriend's number Her boyfriend reached out to me because he wanted to do the high calling program But he didn't want to tell her Lord Yeah, yeah, she thought he was cheating on her and well, maybe wasn't cheating, but he wanted to inquire Quite literally didn't want to tell his girlfriend And so we had a conversation. I had a conversation with the young man, but anyhow, yeah true to form. I mean this is Yeah, and in Yeah, real time this stuff happens. All right. Well, we're we're running out of time It's what I folks if your heart is moved by this We really do need your help when we have a special offer for you. You can find this out at avala dash institute.org under the donate button and basically We're we're willing to give you courses that you'd normally have to pay for One at a time and take them in a formal setting If you would begin to help us on a monthly basis or even one-time gifts To join in this This effort to really turn the tide And solve this vocation crisis. I don't believe that god Leaves his church without shepherds. I just just not in his nature. They're out there. We've got to find them But we need your help. We are not sufficiently funded. We're making a lot of progress as joe You know revealed But please go out to avala dash institute.org and the donate page and help us out To find these guys help them to discern Formate form them work with vocation directors and dioceses So we can turn the tide and we don't end up with hundreds or even thousands of churches with notices that they're being closed This is really vital for our time Vital for the church and vital for the future of the church particularly in the us So avala dash institute.org Forward slash donate and with that we're grateful for you joe and all the great work you're doing. Thanks for being with us Thanks joe until next time may the god of peace make you perfect in holiness May he preserve you whole and entire spirit soul and body Irreproachable at the coming of our lord. Jesus christ. Amen. Amen