June is also the month when we celebrate the Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul. We also celebrate the Feast of the Sacred Heart and the Nativity of St. John the Baptist. These commemorations ought to inspire us with great desires to do great things.

This leads to another great event that could lead to future greatness. And that is the fact that in June we celebrate many graduations. Schools generally close their academic doors in June for summer activities. It's a time for parents and their children to seriously consider the future.

Graduation is a time to think about the course one's life is to take. For the most part, young adults are influenced by their parents or their peers. Although we like to think we are independent and make up our own minds, the sad truth is that very few people actually do that. Without admitting it openly, most people allow themselves to be pulled, pushed or just plain shoved into one or the other direction. Unfortunately, those directions generally follow the path of least resistance.

It's like giving a boulder a slight shove and get it started rolling down a hill. Once it gets going, hardly anything will stop it. Fortunately, human beings are not boulders, even though they may have heads as hard as a rock at times.

The world is out there _ recruiting its victims any way it can. And, usually, the world's method of recruiting is to suggest all the pleasures of life, without revealing the heavy price to be paid. The world uses pressures of all kinds. Even tempting suggestions are a pressure, albeit an easily acceptable pressure.

There is only one area of human activity where even the slightest suggestion is met with loud disapproval and shouts of `pressure!' No one gets unduly upset when a young man is seduced by some scheming female and ends up spending the rest of his life either in a self-imposed mental `solitary confinement,' or supporting a psychiatrist for the rest of his life. The same is true, of course, of many young girls.

But, if a young man would even hint at a desire to enter the service of God as a Priest or as a Religious, even Catholic parents are reluctant to encourage such a choice! More vocations to the Priesthood and Religious life are destroyed by parents who say they `love' their children.

Yet, of all the vocations and avocations in life, there is no greater nor more important to society than that of the Priesthood or Religious life.

All the problems in the world can be reduced to questions of morality, or, if you will, to questions of right order.

The reason why there is so much disorder in society is simply because there is a super abundance of false teachers encouraging disorder. You can't teach right order without God. It is simply impossible.

And you can't teach right order if truth is suffocated beneath a superfluity of religious garbage. `Religious garbage' is the stuff false religions are made of.. It's the `fall out' from true religion. This is religiosity.

True religion is meant to transform people from being demon-like into being God-like. Admittedly, it is not an easy job. However, God Himself calls those whom He wishes to represent Him in this essential task. These are the priestly and Religious vocations. A society without God is a society that is doomed to self-destruct. And any society that embraces false religions thinking that "the Church of your choice" is something objectively real is courting an illusion.

There is no such thing as a "Church of your choice". This is an absurdity which can only exist in a warped imagination and an intellect that has abandoned all right reason.

God calls a certain number of young people to His service. The happiness and holiness of many individuals depends upon the fidelity in answering that call. We do not save ourselves. Salvation is a social activity, in a way.

There are souls that have already been lost because some young man has refused to answer God's call. The same is true for young girls whose vocation was to serve God in an authentic Religious life. Many souls have been lost and continue to be lost because parents and peers become obstacles to those called by God.

The motives of parents and peers are usually very selfish. Parents who have pushed their children into marriage generally live long enough to see the terrible mistake they have made. And as for your `friends,' where are they today after you have listened to their `advice'? They have ruined your life. And after having ruined it, they mysteriously disappear and are no longer your bosom friends. They advised you poorly; they abandoned you to follow their own fortunes without a thought of yours.

Why not listen to God Who speaks and calls in the silent depths of your heart and soul? A vocation to the greatest life on earth is a precious pearl of great price. There is no greater vocation than to serve the Divine Master in the Religious life. It is a life of the highest possible dedication to God and to one's neighbor.

It is a calling second to none.

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