Archdiocese to resurrect vocations promotion club

By RAMON GONZALEZ
WCR Staff Writer
Edmonton

Father Sylvain Casavant, director of vocations, has set up a meeting with that purpose for early July.

Catholic laymen founded Serra International in 1935 in Seattle, Wash. Now there are more than 500 chapters around the world with over 17,000 members.

Serra Edmonton was founded in the 1970s but folded in the mid-1990s due to lack of direction.

Pope John Paul has called the Serra Club the lay arm of the Church for vocations promotion. It was this club that created the successful Called By Name vocations program.

"They have worked the hardest since the 1930s on building vocations in the Church," noted Casavant. "So in recognition of that I thought I need people that will help me to create an atmosphere that's conducive to vocations."

An informational supper meeting to resurrect the club will be held July 3 at St. Joseph's Basilica. The event will begin with Mass at 5 p.m. and supper at 7 p.m. Tickets for the supper are $10. Archbishop Thomas Collins and Berry MacNeil, leader of the Vancouver Serra Club, will address the meeting.

All interested Catholics, men and women, are being invited to the meeting. Those who are interested in joining the club will be asked to fill out a form at the meeting, Casavant said. An organizational meeting will be held in the near future.

The role of the club will be to help promote vocations throughout the archdiocese, to be in contact with seminarians and to serve as contact people for the vocations office, said Casavant. "They'll be a little bit like my hands."

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