Vocations: December 2012 Archives

Michel Marie Zanotti-Sorkine.jpg

Can I say this? I want every priest to be like Michel-Marie Zanotti-Sorkine: a sign of unlimited availability to Christ and to humanity.

In Marina Corradi's Avvenire article "The Pope is Right: Everything Must Start Afresh from Christ," (thanks to Sandro Magister for bringing this article to our consideration) she portrays a French priest that is attractive and full of humanity. 

Two paragraphs strike me as important for us to reflect upon: 

  •  "...he affirms that a priest who has an empty church must examine himself and say: 'It is we who lack fire.' He explains: 'The priest is 'alter Christus,' he is called to reflect Christ in himself. This does not mean asking perfection of ourselves; but being conscious of our sins, of our misery, in order to be able to understand and pardon anyone who comes to the confessional.'"

  • "In church, he welcomes everyone with joy: 'Even the prostitutes. I give them communion. What should I say? Become honest, before you enter here? Christ came for sinners, and I have the anxiety, in withholding a sacrament, that he could bring me to account for it one day. But do we still know the power of the sacraments? I have the misgiving that we have excessively bureaucratized the admission to baptism. I think of the baptism of my Jewish mother, which in terms of the request of my grandfather was merely a formal act: and yet, even from this baptism there came a priest.'"

His pastoral plan for those who ask the question about returning to the practice of the faith: "the Marian embrace, and impassioned apologetics, which touches the heart."

A man with Russian-Jewish-Corisican-Italian blood, a singer-song writer, author (his latest is Au diable la tiƩdeur, {To the devil with lukewarmness}), and now an ordained Catholic priest in the Archdiocese of Marseille.

Father Michel-Marie Zanotti-Sorkine is pastor at Saint-Vincent-de-Paul in Marseille.

wanted for work vocations.jpgPray for men to respond to priesthood and consecrated life.

Saint John of Damascus, pray for us.

About the author

Paul A. Zalonski is from New Haven, CT. He is a member of the Fraternity of Communion and Liberation, a Catholic ecclesial movement and an Oblate of Saint Benedict. Contact Paul at paulzalonski[at]yahoo.com.

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This page is a archive of entries in the Vocations category from December 2012.

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