Fifth annual Bishop Bruté Days is set for June 16-19

Several campers make a human pyramid during the 2008 Bishop Bruté Days, a vocations camp and retreat experience sponsored by Bishop Simon Bruté College Seminary in Indianapolis. The camplers are, from left, bottom row, Joe Linginfelter, Marshall Tobin and Vincent Jansen, and middle row, Byron Woods and Joseph Cole. On the top is Patrick Lockhart. Seminarian Tim Wyciskalla looks on from behind. Jansen and Cole are expected to be freshmen at Bishop Bruté in August. (File photo by Sean Gallagher)

By Sean Gallagher

Bishop Simon Bruté College Seminary in Indianapolis will hold its fifth annual Bishop Bruté Days on June 16-19 at the Indiana Future Farmers of America Center just outside Trafalgar in Johnson County.

The retreat and camping experience is for junior high and high school-aged boys who are open to the possibility that God might be calling them to the priesthood.

The schedule for Bishop Bruté Days includes sports and other outdoor activities in addition to Mass, eucharistic adoration, praying the rosary, opportunities for confession and spiritual conferences.

“The kids are awesome. It’s a lot of fun,” said Father Robert Robeson, the rector of Bishop Bruté. “It’s something that gives hope to myself, and the other priests that are there and the seminarians, because these young kids are all at least open to the possibility of the priesthood.”

Father Robeson has facts to back up his hope. Three of the four young men from the archdiocese who are expected to begin their freshman year at Bishop Bruté in August were previous participants in Bishop Bruté Days.

“It’s really satisfying,” Father Robeson said. “It just speaks to the fact that young boys and young men need the support to know that thinking about the vocation to the priesthood is a good thing, to feel like this is something good that you’re pursuing.”

At the same time, Father Robeson recognizes that a large number of the several dozen boys who have participated in the vocations camp in the past will discern a different vocation in life.

But he knows that Bishop Bruté Days will benefit them, too. It introduces them to many forms of prayer.

“A lot of kids have never participated in adoration or a holy hour before,” Father Robeson said. “They don’t pray the rosary a whole lot. Certainly, the Liturgy of the Hours is something new for probably 90 percent of the kids.”

Bishop Bruté Days has attracted participants from more than 20 archdiocesan parishes as well as parishes in the Lafayette Diocese, Ohio and Illinois.

Father Robeson shared the story of a mother who sent her high school-age son to the vocations camp to show him how participants learn about the faith at the vocations camp.

“She was driving her son and some of his friends to a basketball practice, and one of the kids was asking something about the Church,” Father Robeson said, “and her son went into this long and complex and accurate answer to the question the kid had asked.

“She was just shocked that he knew all this. Afterward, she asked him where he had learned that. And he said, ‘Bishop Bruté Days.’ ”

Underlying these advantages of the vocations camp, Father Robeson said, is the way in which it shows the participants that prayer and having a love for the faith is something for everyone.

“It sort of normalizes prayer by putting it into the context of sports and that sort of thing,” Father Robeson said. “It helps them to see that you can be a good athlete and involved in sports and fun activities and, at the same time, make prayer and learning about your faith a part of your life.”

The cost for Bishop Bruté Days is $60. Seminarians from Bishop Bruté College Seminary and other adult chaperones will help oversee the vocations camp. Several archdiocesan priests will also be present at the vocations camp.

(For more information about Bishop Bruté Days, log on to www.archindy.org/bsb, send an e-mail to sburris@archindy.org or call 317-924-4100.) †