Book Review: The Disciples’ Call: Theologies of Vocation from Scripture to the Present Day

Abstract

The Disciples' Call: Theologies of Vocation from Scripture the Present Day. Edited by Christopher Jamison osb. New York: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2014. viii + 247 pp. $24.95 (paper).While almost all mainline churches in North America and Western Europe have in recent decades experienced declining numbers of people expressing a vocation the priesthood or the religious life, the Roman Catholic Church in England has suffered than most, with a precipitous fall in entrants English seminaries, from approximately one hundred and fifty entrants a year in 1980 twenty-two in 2001. Yet there is little hint in this set of essays (formed mainly of English Catholic voices, though also receiving North American and European contributions) of the trauma or soulsearching with regard the idea of vocation that this decline has induced in certain other contexts. Instead, the volume confidently gives a historicallyinformed, theologically-nuanced, and attractive articulation of a broader notion of vocation as lying at the heart of the mission of all the people of God, and explores how this may find contemporary expression.Historical understandings of vocation are explored by a number of essays in the first half of the volume. John Hemers survey of some of the most well-known biblical narratives of Gods call individuals contains a number of reflections or comparisons which would enrich sermons or short reflections on the passages. Richard Price argues that the monastic writers of the early church did not hold an understanding of a vocation the religious life, but simply saw monasticism as the opportunity respond more fully and effectively than is possible in the world Christ's call all people to repent and follow the Gospel (p. 40). Working in constructive mode, Gemma Simmonds ably demonstrates how Ignatius of Loyola's Spiritual Exercises may fruitfully serve as a model for the path of call, desire, response, confusion, and eventual clarity that may be the experience of many Christians discerning their particular vocation.The essays in the second half of the volume focus on the narrow conception of vocation the priesthood and the religious life. Cathy Jones's essay may helpfully remind readers in Anglican contexts of the vast range of expressions of religious life-and accordingly of ecclesial vocations-that exist in the Catholic Church. Yet she also highlights the immense challenges in attracting new members faced by many forms of non-clerical religious life with identities that are less distinct from secular consecration. This is hardly surprising, she suggests: while personal encounter with a religious community is one of the most important pathways into helping individuals recognize a vocation live according the charism of a particular religious community, those communities with a strong expression of the distinctive nature of religious life are likely flourish in future. …