Last month, the spotlight fell on Atlanta, and its bumper crop of priestly ordinations.

This month, it’s Memphis.

From Rocco’s place:

See, while a handful of dioceses have larger groups of seminarians, even the smallest of those are exponentially more sizable than the West Tennessee church, which’ll ordain six new priests by summer’s end — twice as many as this year’s diocesan crop in New York (Catholic pop.: 2.5 million), just three less than Chicago’s (2.1 million) and the same number as were ordained for the nation’s largest see, the 4.5 million-member archdiocese of Los Angeles.

For the stat-fans among us, LA is 61 times larger than its Elvisland counterpart.

Experience shows that in those places where identity and community are strong, every call in the life of the church is cherished and encouraged and — most of all — a living, joyful Spirit breathes in its members, vocations boom.

He goes on to quote the local paper:

“Memphis is in the growth mode,” said Father John Geaney, spokesman for the Diocese of Memphis.

National numbers for seminarian enrollment for the past 10 years are low and stagnant, according to research from Georgetown University.

Eric Govea receives a blessing from Rev. Adam Rust moments after Rust was ordained as minister. The Catholic Diocese of Memphis ranks in the top five in the nation for recruits, although Catholics make up only 3 to 4 percent of the city’s population.

Seminary enrollment is less than half of what it was in the 1960s. While there were once numbers upward of 12,000, fewer than 5,000 seminarians were enrolled in 2008-2009.

Yet the Catholic Diocese of Memphis, with 25 seminarians and 73,000 parishioners, ranks in the top five in the nation for recruits, said Geaney, although Catholics in the city make up only 3 to 4 percent of the population.

The two reasons for this growth, he said, were Bishop J. Terry Steib and Father Keith Stewart.

“The bishop insists that we keep looking for and doing all we can to form young men for the priesthood,” said Geaney.

Stewart, the diocese’s vocational director, has been called aggressive in his pursuit.

“He goes after people,” said Geaney.

Stewart attributes his success to monthly “Evenings of Discernment” where interested parishioners are invited to pray and reflect on the calling.

“I’m just helping Jesus get his due,” said Stewart. “There’s a lot out there competing for a guy’s attention. It’s the chance to awaken somebody to church vocation, whether it’s religious life as a sister or a priest.”

Stewart also travels to other countries, where the priesthood is growing. Newly ordained priest Jacek Cowal hails from Poland, and the two priests to be ordained in August are both from Mexico.

During the ordination ceremony, the priests vow obedience to the bishop and his successors, meaning they’ll live in diocesan area for the rest of their lives.

Another factor that might help explain the boom in Memphis is age. Memphis recruits are younger than the national average, said Geaney. The four priests ordained in June were in their late 20s.

While former Pope John Paul II had a particular pull with youth, Geaney said the church’s leadership under Pope Benedict XVI did not factor into the overall decline of the priesthood.

“Frankly, it does not have much to do with the personality of the pope,” he said. “It’s the fact they believe they are called by God to do this work.”

He continued to attribute the clergy’s decline, in large part, to the availability of service work one could perform without any religious affiliation.

“America has a lot of people who believe in God, but an increasing number who say they are spiritual but not religious,” he said. “We don’t know why people are not responding to the call.”

Whatever the reason, it’s very good news for the people of Tennessee.