More heartening news on the vocation front: this comes to us from the innovative website VocationMatch.com, which reports a record number of hits, as more people seek information about religious life:

Vision Vocation Guide and the popular VocationMatch.com website saw a record-breaking 6,930 people interested in Catholic religious vocations complete online profiles and request information from religious communities in the past year.

VocationMatch.com gathers information from inquirers and then matches their profiles against the profiles of religious communities in its database. Inquirers are put in touch with the communities that best match their personal preferences and interests-in much the same way successful dating websites bring potentially compatible couples together.

Prior to the launch of VocationMatch.com those who felt called to religious life were faced with the daunting task of sifting through hundreds of community listings. Keyword searches helped but still didn’t offer insight to discerners on whether they would be more suited for the Benedictines or the Ursulines, the Jesuits or the Marists, for example.

Now with VocationMatch.com discerners are getting a better sense of where they might be called and a narrower list of communities to contact. Vocation directors benefit by receiving inquiries from more qualified discerners who have considered some of the more practical questions of choosing a religious vocation, such as: Do I want to live in a monastery or a house; minister overseas or in a local community; be part of a large or small community; wear a habit or religious symbol; and pray with others once a day or several times a day?

In Vocation Match’s first year, reader profiles jumped from 1,503 to 5,591. This past year, Vocation Match drew in another 6,690 new (unique) visitors. “Vision Vocation Match has become an indispensable tool for Catholic religious vocation discernment,” says Patrice Tuohy, executive editor of VISION Vocation Guide, published by TrueQuest Communications of Chicago on behalf of the National Religious Vocation Conference.

“With fewer Catholics being taught by religious sisters, brothers, and priests, exposure to those living in religious communities has declined but interest in religious life has actually increased in recent years,” says Tuohy. “The internet has played a significant role in getting the word out about religious life. Now Vocation Match has taken things one step further by assisting discerners in sorting through large amounts of information in a more efficient and accessible way.”

You can also read more on the changing vocations picture in this Time magazine piece.