As we await the outcome of the playoffs to see which baseball teams will compete in the Fall Classic, we know one team that will still be playing next week: the Padres.
No, not the San Diego Padres, who didn’t even make the playoffs this season, but the D.C. Padres.
Who are the D.C. Padres? They are priests and seminarians from the Archdiocese of Washington who play baseball–for fun and also to promote vocations. They play area high school teams and, as this article from Gazette.Net shows, use this platform to discuss vocations and the priesthood.
Check out the vocation site for the Archdiocese of Washington, which has many engaging features, including a video of the Padres in action. Let us pray that in Washington and elsewhere there will be more young men who are willing to “take the field” as tomorrow’s priests.
This is so cool!
We have had something similar here in my Upstate NY diocese. The priests and seminarians who compete in sports (soccer and basketball) and promote vocations are called the ‘Men In Black’.
In July 2010 I went to a soccer game played by the ‘Men In Black’. They competed against a team from a small private Catholic school-and the ‘Men In Black’ won on penalty kicks!