Why Are There Different Vocations (and is one MORE IMPORTANT than another)? w/ Fr. Gregory Pine, OP

[@MissPopuri]

Poverty, Chastity and obedience are prescriptions even married couples can take to heart. It is only different in how it is executed. We don’t want to gather so many possessions that we lose sight of our family. Our bodies need to be kept for the benefit of our spouse in honoring them. Faithfulness endures when we keep the vows we make to God, to our spouse, and to our families.

[@eduardoschiavon5652]

Exactly, that's the idea behind the Third Orders as well

[@AppealToHeaven]

"Hi, I'm Father Gregory Pine..." Yes. You. Are. BOOM. Always excellent.

[@Mark-re9eh]

Awesome video! God bless Fr Pine

[@robertmarmo1587]

What about the Single Vocation? Why is not spoken more about? I am 47 year Old man that living out the Single Vocation, and thru prayer, I learned that God did not call me to Vocations of Marriage nor Priesthood.. Both are a wonderful Vocations. Plus I am professed member of Dominican Laity, here in the Sothern Province of Saint Martin de Porres. I learn that Single Vocation and serving God in this life is highly misunderstood in Our Church. Serving in the Single Vocation is not a missing up Vocation in following Jesus

[@MissPopuri]

I’m going to make a wild assumption that Single Vocation particularly if it reflects participation in a religious community is supposed to be the third orders laity of religious community before Paul VI’s reforms. They may not talk about it as explicitly as religious life to be a third order Dominican, but Catherine of Siena was inducted into such an order when she became a sister and mystic in religious life if I recall correctly.

[@robertmarmo1587]

@@MissPopuri You are correct. But I notice that Single Vocation is realy preached about

[@myalabasternetwork3578]

Is wonderful that you've embraced your singleness. But the Catholic church does not teach that there's a single vocation. A vocation is something that you embrace and that you want. I have several friends who are single and they want to give up their singleness so it's not a vocation. The singleness vocation is something that's been taught by the world not by the church.

[@myalabasternetwork3578]

@@MissPopuri I work for the Dominicans of the St Joseph Province in Louisville Kentucky. And they have third order Dominicans married, single and widowers. The Dominicans and the Catholic church does not teach that there is a single vocation. That is something in the world that has started because people cannot make up their mind and are not qualified for for whatever reasons for marriage or religious life. You can have a vocation if it's something you want to give up, you can embrace it and live with it, but if you wanted to get married at one time it's not a vocation. Because Sin, ours and other people circumstances some people never get married. There is no documents from the Catholic Church teaching about a Single vocation. Is new thinking this creeping into from the world but nothing to do with the Catholic Church.

[@robertmarmo1587]

@@myalabasternetwork3578 That true to a point. Has A lay Dominican. I had serve Friars and my own Spiritual Director, who is also a Dominican Friar call being single a vocation. and even my own Godmother, who is a nun speak openly about serving God in the Single life. I just wish it was spoken about more from other priests, in connection with to Religious, Priesthood and Marriage. I would love to hear Fr. Pine view on this and what his fellow Friars. On Godsplaining have to say and What my wonderful Order Dominican speak on the Singlehood and in place in the Laity branch or the Order. Vertis

[@Selahsmum]

Thank you, Father, for explaining these concepts with such depth, but still within the grasp of the laymen. I so appreciate your insights, thank you!

[@doreenvandermerwe2027]

thank you, Father Gregory, for explaining the difference between vocations so clearly. Boom! Godsplaining is so enlightening, have you made an episode on Dominican theology or the Rule of St Dominic? If not could you do so?

[@lilamaria4872]

AMEN! Thank you for this catechesis. Dieu vous bénisse Fr Gregory 🙏🙌🙏🙌🙏

[@christinetuthill8249]

Good morning Father Gregory

[@tasha5916]

This is good. I just wonder if the Church can also discuss states of life for those of us who don't have a call to the priesthood, religious life, or marriage. Not saying, some of us never will, but some of us may never... some of us may be in our states in life for a short time, some of long periods, others until we die. Like single people who include widows, single parents, or whoever. It's challenging, not saying it needs to be a vocation, but there are temptations and feelings of loneliness, that come with this state, that can lead to grave sin for some. I just think the Church can help remind us or help us understand how our lives, if in any way contribute. I think for the single parent this may be easier, but children grow up and leave. Jus saying.

[@tbojai]

Nice talk. I’m a husband & dad. I’ve always found it saddening that there are almost no recognized dad saints in the church. It seems that the Church is prejudiced against the non-religious vocations when it comes to recognizing saintliness. Either that, or it’s nearly impossible to become a saint if you’re a dad (or mom, for that matter, although there are more mom saints than dad saints from what I’ve read). Any thoughts Fr. G?

[@aleenapoulo4654]

St. Louis Martin, St. Thomas More, St. Basil the Elder, and of course St. Joseph are a few…there are older Saints in Church history who were fathers as well! Some of them became religious after they were widowed and their children were grown and able to support themselves! Perhaps it’s a general attitude that with the religious vocations it’s easier to become holy/looks more holy. But in truth if you allow God’s Grace to work in whatever vocation you were called to, consistently asking for His Guidance and keeping Him first, it is supposed to help you become more holy. 🤗 Don’t give up looking! There are so many saints we don’t know of after all, as well as Servants of God, Venerables, and Blesseds!

[@johntuturice7874]

In addition to the married male saints already listed in the responses from Aleena Poulo and John Not Real Name, here are some more: St. Zachary (St. John the Baptist's father), St. Isadore the farmer, St. Gordianus (father of Pope St. Gregory the Great), St. Gregory (father of St. Gregory Nazianzus, a Doctor of the Church), St. Joachim (father of the Blessed Mother), St. Peter (the first pope), Saint Ferdinand III of Castile, Saint Stephen I of Hungary and Saint Henry II, Holy Roman Emperor. There are others. With over 10,000 officially canonized saints, I'm sure that a little research would pull up much more. If you dip into the waters of Blesseds and Venerables the list grows exponentially larger.

[@tbojai]

@@johntuturice7874 I’m not aware of any fathers elevated to sainthood that were born in the past 150 years, and that’s pretty sad when there have been nearly 1 billion Catholic fathers in that time. At least moms have St. Gianna Beretta Molla (who is one of my favorites!). We dads would love to have a more recent father saint to look up to. Most if not all the father saints you mentioned were fathers incidentally - St. Gianna was elevated precisely because she was a saintly mother and model for all moms. Can we not find one father out there worthy of sainthood for being a model dad?

[@anasustar2768]

Thank you!

[@christinetuthill8249]

Father, what about widows and widowers. I was married and my husband is deceased. There is very little instruction for a Catholic on this state in life which results not from a choice but from a death. Men and women of faith who have lived faithful lives and raised families are left without a vocation and the direction such a vocation provides. Although I am still learning a great deal about my marriage since my husband,s death and have written a great deal, the day to day structure of that vocation is gone. I have rebuilt a different spiritual life over the last couple of years but it has been difficult due to lack of instruction.

[@michelegeis2301]

There is plentiful instruction in the four Gospels. Trying to live the words of Jesus Christ it's enough to fill everyday fully. Read absorb and live out his words this is the call for our daily lives. For example, he said you will be judged by every word. He said love your enemies bless those that curse you. He said as you do it to the least once you do it to him.

[@therese_paula]

Fr. Gregory, how about those who are "consecrated laity" who remained in the 'middle of the world'? By the way, always adorable when you catch yourself committing mistake and laughing at yourself 😁 You are in our prayers 🙏

[@cmac369]

"To the unmarried and widows I say that it is best for them to remain as I am [celibate and single]. But if they do not have self-control, let them get married. For it is better to marry than to burn with sexual desire” (1 Cor. 7:8-9).

[@tasha5916]

Yes. Just that today, people may want to marry, but there is no one to marry. A lot of us are just single, having to be chaste. It's not talked about.

[@cmac369]

@@tasha5916 Well, of course, the promotion of premarital sex destroyed society along with the emphasis on careers. Both men and women are disenchanted with each other because they assume each person has been having sex since they were in college. Back in the day people could graduate high school and marry someone because it wasn’t consider bad to be married at a young age and since they weren’t sexually active they would’ve had sex for the first time with their spouse and bonded more strongly. Before pornography came along it was about romance and intimacy in the bedroom. Not doing “It”, how many times, how many ways, which position etc. Just love. You’ve got three groups of people: people who sleep around and want to marry but don’t have the values or skills, even when they do marry they wind up divorced, people who don’t sleep around but can’t find anyone who has the same values unless they go online (which is degrading since we’re not products on a shelf), and people who are comfortable living celibately. My friends and I talk about this a lot. Health class in high school was glad to teach about avoiding STDs and pregnancy, but didn’t talk about healthy relationships (aren’t relationships about health?). The logical conclusion is that each person is taught in school that everyone else is an object, sex shouldn’t have consequences, and that sex is separate from relationships. Sadly, many people fall for that communist/feminist propaganda. It’s seems it’s homosexuals always teaching the class too. I wonder why they seem to interested in promoting contraceptives, maybe they are jealous they can’t have kids themselves. Maybe if they teach men that women are to be used than women will be disenchanted with men and come over to their side. Some of us who were wise understood that relationships are everything and sex without relationships is a deception and counterfeit love. Just unhappy people who were used teaching others to get used to being unhappy. We’ve all heard the college talk, “hey girls, you were taught there’s a prince charming out there from Disney movies, well that was a lie. Men are drunk losers. Get used to it. Don’t look any further.” Well, that’s their experience in their life. It doesn’t have to be everyone’s experience.

[@moxie3610]

This was so well put. I agree completely

[@StudentsBunnyHome]

Hello I have a question: how to live in chastity in this aggressive world? Can Fr Gregory give some counsels for people who had pronounced a private chastity vow? Please 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻

[@BlessedisShe]

🙏🙏🙏

[@Subzero-hh8ix]

This whole time I thought religious life was just an other term for priesthood but from the talk, it seems like a completely seperate vocation. Can anyone confirm this?

[@angelrivera5231]

Religious life is basically a general term for a life consecrated or ordained for God, which could include religious brothers and sisters, as well as ordained priests. Priests are one aspect of the call to religious life, but they are not two distinct vocations. I hope that brings some clarity!

[@ritavinales6189]

Religious people take vows. They can be religious priests or nuns. Diocesan priests don't take vows, they are not religious

[@michaelmicek]

And then throw in there that married men can be ordained to the priesthood. It isn't the norm in the West, but it is in the East. Ordination to the diaconate also makes one clergy, though. (Married men are not ordained bishops, however.) Ordination involves becoming directly obedient to a bishop. And then there are third orders, such as Third Order Franciscans... the members follow a Rule, although they don't take "solemn" (permanent/exclusive) vows, and they are still referred to as "lay people". So that is where the confusion is. There are lay people and non-lay people, but the latter may be ordained, religious, or both.

[@rolandovelasquez135]

Religious have the easiest life imaginable. They don't have to sacrifice daily for the welfare of their family. What an easy life! 😀 Truth of the matter is, married, family life is far more sacrificial. Religious have got it made.

[@rolandovelasquez135]

@ minute 7:00, "... religious life is an objectively higher state, or religious life is perfect in a certain sense..." If that is the case, then why are homosexuality rates among men in the "religious" life so phenomenally much higher than men in the "married" life? Just doesn't add up. Please enlighten me.

[@Ebradley2351]

Rolando, Here is a relevant quote from the St. Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologiae (II-II.Q184.A4) Question: Whether those who are perfect are in the state of perfection? I respond: Some are in the state of perfection, who are wholly lacking in charity and grace, for instance wicked bishops or religious. Therefore it would seem that on the other hand some have the perfection of life, who nevertheless have not the state of perfection. There is a distinction between what Aquinas calls "the state of perfection" or what Father Pine here calls "the perfect means" vs. actually having perfect charity (holiness, love for God and neighbor). The "state of perfection" does not mean that one is holier or better. Aquinas actually teaches that the ultimate state of perfection is the episcopacy, but that is reserved to few, and many of them have been wicked. The state of perfection, for Aquinas, means making a solemn, vowed, constant orientation towards those means which are most conducive to perfect charity. This does not mean that they are automatically holier, though the state they are in *does* open them up to great graces to live out what they have vowed. But even people who are not in the *state* of perfection can still attain greater charity and merit than those in it. I can scarcely imagine many bishops who are more exalted than St. Joseph, for example, who was not a prelate or a religious. All things being equal, then, the "state of perfection" has a clearer orientation towards charity, but often things are not equal. If you have a culture of homosexuality in many religious orders, then that condition may actually make it *harder* for someone to reach sanctity. But we're talking about it on the theoretical level here, and if we compare religious life at its highest with married life at its highest, then we reach what Father Pine is talking about here.

[@larrymelman]

Sorry Father, but if the Church really believed that "marriage is to be preferred to other states of life" and that "it is what basically everyone is called to", its parishes would back that up. They would have a strong social fabric, which among other things would help singles to meet and marry in the Church. That was once an essential part of all parishes, on equal standing to the spiritual and sacramental activity. But parish social life withered and died in the last generation or two, resulting in a rapid decline in membership and the number of Catholic weddings dropping to practically zero.

[@PeterDobbing]

The salvation history rattled off by Fr Pine, as a teacher might run through Newtonian laws of motion for a class of 6th formers, is metaphysical, believed implicitly and literally by some, of course, but incomprehensible as a map of how things are to the majority of people with a modern/postmodern mentality. This talk, I'm afraid, no longer speaks to the condition of people (except the converted). It is too pat and a bit glib. I want something deeper and more authentic.

[@msgoody2shoes959]

Married priest are great, so maybe the eastern rites have something to teach us. Not required, but allowed... and should be normal.

[@msgoody2shoes959]

...yeah, you know it was said the other day by yall, that marriage is destiny for all, or preferred way to transfer grace. Hmmm....yeah, hmm, I have to think about"bout this. Bc I know grace to be granted via sacrifice, but is marriage, preferred??? Hmmm,... I don't know... I know that it is possible to love someone so deeply to the point of life time commitment, but never marry; bc its just not possible. I've seen that deep platonic love grant grace from Christ. Grace via a sacrificial love, softens hardened hearts, tenderizes a self rightous mindset, and opens faith to an abundance of God's mercy.

[@loganw1232]

There are reasons for celebrate priesthoods. Including having Priests focus on Jesus and the Church, and not the world.

[@msgoody2shoes959]

@@loganw1232 I just said.. marriage not required for priesthood

[@msgoody2shoes959]

@@loganw1232 when you say this you completely disregard the eastern rites. I find Roman Catholics who are fixated on priesthood celibacy, are scrupulous, controlling and insecure.

[@PauperPeccator]

@@msgoody2shoes959 as I understanding there is this weird thing about the prophecy of the gentile eunuchs that would become priests at the new altar. Another mystery.

[@rolandovelasquez135]

I've got five questions for you. The priest is "another Christ"? Really? With the current state of the Roman Catholic priesthood, how can you say that? And, you as a "religious" are somehow more perfect before the Lord God Almighty than me, a married man who loves the Lord and his wife and his children? Really? Who told you that? Well, ok, that was six. And one other thing. Be on your guard against spiritual pride. Jesus always condemned the spiritual pride of the scribes and Pharisees who thought they were more perfect than everyone else, when they were in fact, not.

[@ritavinales6189]

You didn't understand anything he said

[@michelegeis2301]

Jesus said sell what you have, give to the poor and come follow me.

[@Carla-IrishCatholic]

It's church teaching that the religious life is the most perfect state. You're being prideful by objecting to it because your ego was hurt by it. Married people don't offer the same sacrifices as religious. Religious leave home, family, language, all the comforts of life (which married people don't do) etc to follow the Lord. Religious pray more and therefore reach an ultimate union with God, most people don't even get to the second level of prayer...so that will all have to be done in purgatory. Religious life is the better path to Heaven. They give themselves fully to God while the married don't. Everyone is called to different paths to Heaven, so if you discerned properly before marriage, then God intends for you to save your soul in the marriage state. Provided that you live it perfectly.

[@Catholic-Perennialist]

The dirty little secret is that outside of the Roman rite, you can perform both vocations simultaneously.

[@Krshwunk]

Dirty?

[@Catholic-Perennialist]

@@Krshwunk Ever heard a trad make a case for clerical celibacy? Do they ever bother to mention that the Catholic Church has plenty of married priests in other rites? If it wasn't a "dirty" secret, they wouldn't try so hard to hide it.

[@Krshwunk]

@@Catholic-Perennialist I've heard trads defend clerical celibacy, yeah.

[@johnnotrealname8168]

Not really a dirty secret at all. As an Eastern Rite Catholic for starters he is in a Religious community which forbids marriage, which there are in Eastern Rite Churchs. Also while you can be a Priest it is generally prohibited to become a Bishop.

[@johnnotrealname8168]

@@Catholic-Perennialist They do mention it. The guy's channel, Matt Fradd, has done interviews with married Priests.

[@misterprogressive8730]

The most important vocation is to serve the society by creating necessary products or services. Priests create none of those, thus priesthood is a useless vocation.

[@kat3299]

Eternity is a lot longer than this earthly exile. Logically speaking, the priest provides us an Eternal meal that will fuel us forever. Wouldn't that be infinitely more necessary than something that temporarily sustains our bodies? Your viewpoint is similar to not saving money for something needed and valuable because you want to spend all of your money at the dollar store. Don't waste your time (money) on garbage.

[@myalabasternetwork3578]

I pray that one day God will touch your heart. Sounds like you in a lot of pain. I will pray for you tonight God bless.