In a letter to seminarians, Benedict XVI affirmed that the priesthood is not something of the past, but is needed for the future, as people will always need ministers to bring them to God. In the message published today, but which was written for the end of the Year for Priests, which ended in June, the Pope recalled a conversation he had with a military commander in 1944, after being drafted for the service. The Pontiff recounted: “The company commander asked each of us what we planned to do in the future. I answered that I wanted to become a Catholic priest.” The lieutenant replied: ‘Then you ought to look for something else. In the new Germany priests are no longer needed.’
“I knew that this ‘new Germany’ was already coming to an end, and that, after the enormous devastation which that madness had brought upon the country, priests would be needed more than ever.” The Holy Father noted that “many people nowadays also think that the Catholic priesthood is not a ‘job’ for the future, but one that belongs more to the past.” Yet, he added, “people will always have need of God, even in an age marked by technical mastery of the world and globalization.Where people no longer perceive God, life grows empty; nothing is ever enough,” Benedict XVI observed. “People then seek escape in euphoria and violence; these are the very things that increasingly threaten young people.”
He affirmed, “God is alive, and he needs people to serve him and bring him to others. It does make sense to become a priest,” the Pope asserted. “The world needs priests, pastors, today, tomorrow and always, until the end of time.”
VATICAN CITY, OCT. 18, 2010 (Zenit.org)