‘Race for Vocations’ expands to include Evansville Diocese

Roger Neal, left, Julie Johnstone, Gabrielle Campo and Anthony Campo, members of the 2008 “Race for Vocations” team, pose for a photo after completing the One America 500 Festival Mini-Marathon in Indianapolis. (Submitted photo)

By Sean Gallagher

The “Race for Vocations” team started as a simple idea that Father Rick Nagel had a few years ago.

He thought that more people could become aware of the importance of vocations in the life of every person if a group of people promoted this idea by running in the annual One America 500 Festival Mini-Marathon and its accompanying Finish Line 500 Festival 5K, both held every May in Indianapolis.

The races’ participants would wear T-shirts that invited the thousands of people that ran and walked with them, and the thousands more that lined the race courses to believe that they, too, had a vocation.

But promoting vocations wouldn’t end there. Each member of the team would pray for vocations, and invite family and friends to pledge their prayers while they trained for their race and participated in it.

That was Father Nagel’s idea three years ago. In 2008, there were 90 people on the “Race for Vocations” team. That number increased to more than 200 members in 2009 when the Lafayette Diocese started promoting the team. (Related story: ‘Race for Vocations’ team member seeks to hear God’s call in life)

This year, the Evansville Diocese has come on board, and Father Nagel hopes to see the team increase to more than 300 members.

“I am in awe at how the Holy Spirit has really worked in this initiative to both increase participants and to move people’s lives to a greater awareness of the universal call to holiness,” said Father Nagel, the chaplain at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis and director of the archdiocesan Young Adult and College Campus Ministry.

Evansville seminarian Tyler Tenbarge, a sophomore at Bishop Simon Bruté College Seminary in Indianapolis, is excited about helping to promote the “Race for Vocations” team in his home diocese.

“There are a lot of good seeds [of vocations] out there that just haven’t quite broken through the ground yet,” said Tenbarge. “Knowing that [people from] our diocese are jumping in and going out of their way to come up to Indianapolis, which is a little bit out of our own territory, shows that we’re committed to the idea of vocations and helping people find their call.”

Father Alex Zenthoefer, vocations director for the Evansville Diocese, is pleased that three dioceses in Indiana are working together to promote vocations in an event like the Mini-Marathon, where tens of thousands of people come together.

“It shows that it’s not just the vocations director that’s in charge of getting vocations,” Father Zenthoefer said. “It’s not just a diocese that’s in charge of getting vocations. But it’s really an effort of all the people of God working together to raise awareness [about vocations], and to show that we’re all in this together.”

Those interested in joining the “Race for Vocations” team can sign up or learn more about it by logging on to www.HearGodsCall.com and clicking on “Race for Vocations.”

A link to the team’s Facebook page—where prayer pledges can be posted—is also found there.

While registration for the One America 500 Festival Mini-Marathon is closed, those who have already signed up to run in it can still become a member of the “Race for Vocations” team.

Registration for the Finish Line 500 Festival 5K is still open. To sign up or learn more about it, log on to www.500festival.com/marathon and click on “Finish Line 500 Festival 5K.”

All are welcome to participate in a “Mass for Vocations” that will be celebrated at 6:30 p.m. on May 7, the night before the Mini-Marathon, at St. John the Evangelist Church, 126 W. Georgia St., in Indianapolis.

For more information about the “Race for Vocations” team or to make a financial donation to support the effort, call 317-236-1490 or 800-382-9836, ext. 1490. †