Reprinted with permission from the Catholic Weekly from an interview by MARILYN RODRIGUES

"I think there's something going wrong if a young Catholic doesn't at least think about a vocation to the priesthood or religious life at some stage," says Bishop Anthony Fisher.

"Maybe it will end up being some other vocation, such as marriage or some kind of committed single life, but if you haven't at least thought about it then you aren't really reflecting fully on the range of options when looking at what God's will is for you."

Bishop Fisher, auxiliary bishop of Sydney, was recently appointed as the archdiocesan vocations director. His job is to boost priestly vocations here.

Sydney is actually doing well compared with most places in the country, and much of the Western world, but not well enough, he says.

"We need to do better if we're going to have enough priests, and younger energetic priests, for our needs, because, while in many parts of Sydney the congregations are ageing and declining at the same rate as the clergy, we have whole new areas where congregations are blossoming, particularly in the west," he says.

"Also, there are people out there who might not be in contact with the Church, but that doesn't mean they don't need us.

"With a bit of doorknocking and evangelising, we could bring a whole new dimension to their lives and bring them back to the Church."

Bishop Fisher believes some of the explanations that people give for the decrease in vocations in the West materialism, smaller families, post- Christian societies fall short because in parts of the US, France and England vocations are thriving.

Bishop Fisher believes one of the real reasons is reluctance on the part of many young people to make any kind of lifelong commitment.

"I think a lot of people of my generation and younger are afraid of commitment," he says.

"We've grown up seeing so many things go wrong; marriages break up, people leave the priesthood and religious life, people changing their jobs every few years, changing where they live, and always looking around for something else.

"Nothing seems to be permanent anymore; nothing is for good or for life, and that goes for causes I might be committed to, or a person I might be committed to.

"But I'm absolutely convinced that most people know deep down they're going to find happiness by committing to someone or to something.

"A big part of the challenge for us as a Catholic community is to draw that out and to really cultivate that in people."

Bishop Fisher was aware of an inclination towards the priesthood when he was 15, but it took a while to mature.

He was born in 1960 at the Mater Hospital in Crows Nest, the eldest child of Gloria and Colin.

The family of seven Bishop Fisher has two brothers and two sisters lived in the western suburbs of Canterbury, Punchbowl and Lakemba, until they moved to Lane Cove when he was seven or eight years old.

His parents, both active in the Church, brought their family up to place prime importance on their Catholic faith.

The bishop was baptised at St Therese Church, Lakemba, where he attended the parish school, and later attended St Michael's Primary School, Lane Cove; Holy Cross College, Ryde, and St Ignatius' College, Riverview.

At school he established himself as a talented debater. He received an honours degree in history and a law degree at the University of Sydney before practising law with Clayton Utz in Sydney.

He then spent some time travelling overseas before entering the Dominican order in 1985. He was ordained in Sydney in September 1991.

Bishop Fisher says two Jesuits from his school days at Riverview, Fr Charles McDonald and Fr Tom O'Donovan, were big influences on his vocation to the priesthood.

One reason he was attracted to the Dominicans was that he could be a priest, a scholar and a theologian.

He is the founding director of the John Paul II Institute for Marriage and Family in Melbourne, and a professor of bioethics and moral theology, and has written many books and articles on bioethics and morality.

He returned to Sydney last year when Cardinal George Pell installed him, along with Bishop Julian Porteous, as an auxiliary bishop of Sydney.

Bishop Fisher's opinion as a spokesman for the Catholic Church on bioethics is much sought after by the secular media.

When the Weekly visited the bishop he was under a deluge of requests and media appointments to comment on the latest IVF story, an embryo created for a Tasmanian couple to provide a perfect bone marrow match for their sick four-year-old.

"It's interesting how when there's a story like this I get phone calls from all over the country for a comment," he says.

"Maybe they just want the one liner to create a bit of aggro, but also I think people are uneasy about some of these questions, and they go to the Church for people who aren't making their judgments out of economic self-interest or desire to get a Nobel Prize or because they're so close to this family that they can't think straight about the issues.

"What I think people want from the Church is a considerate, careful, gentle, compassionate, thoughtful response, rather than just a quick grab to get a headline or one more point in the opinion poll."

As part of his new role the bishop plans to get out to speak to as many young people as he can, in schools, ecclesial movements, youth groups, university groups, wherever "there are young people making up their minds about their future, and at least present this to them as a live option".

"We've got to signal to young people that we really value vocations and that it's worth thinking about," he says.

"I think we were a bit embarrassed in the 70s and 80s to talk about vocations much, so one part of my task will be just getting people to talk about it and not just in an abstract way, but have it presented as a real and fulfilling option, because it can be a great life.

"I love being a priest, and that's the truth of it."

"I want them to know that you can really be happy and do great things as a priest, and at the end of the day the greatest sense that anyone can have is that this is what God wants of me, this is what I'm made for.

"If most of the people I speak to say no to the priesthood or a religious life, but at least have thought about it seriously I'll think I have achieved something.

"At least they'll be more mature, more serious Christians, and hopefully more supportive of those vocations in others."

Bishop Fisher has other initiatives in mind aimed at getting priests to speak more about their own vocations, and parishes to feel a responsibility to try to provide the next generation of priests.

"If it really does matters to us, as Catholics, we have to be looking at our own families, parish, town and city to provide for the next generation ," he says. "One way or another I want to get people to be conscious about that, that it's not just a responsibility you throw back on the archbishop, to find priests from somewhere. It's like a lot families who say priests matter to us very much but we don't want one to come from our family it's not good enough."

The bishop is concerned about the vocation of marriage as well, and hopes to one day set up an archdiocesan office for marriage and the family.

"We have to focus on the vocation of marriage because in some ways the crisis in marriage is bigger than the crisis in priestly and religious vocations," he says.

"Something like 40-50 per cent of new marriages aren't working. That's worse than drop-out rates from seminaries and religious orders. It's a social catastrophe that marriages are collapsing at such a rate.

"Sociologists and psychologists would say that is behind so many of our social problems like youth depression, drug taking and suicide and so many other problems; it's not the whole explanation but a big part of the picture.

"We have got to work harder at helping people with discernment and understanding the theology of marriage and with pastoral care once they are married.

"People spend seven years in theological and practical preparation before we're willing to say they are ready for the priesthood.

"Marriage is every bit as serious a choice in fact you might say, given the enormous impact you have on any children, it's more serious in some ways and yet there's nothing comparable with the years spent preparing for the priesthood."

Profile of Bishop Anthony Fisher OP