Photos by Patrick Farrell / The Miami Herald Sister Tracey Dugas of the Daughters of St. Paul uses a Facebook page to reach out to friends and possible newcomers to the religious order. "You have to go where the young people are," says Dugas, who is director of vocations for the order in Miami.

On the popular social networking site Facebook, Tracey Dugas flashes a winsome smile and a peace sign. But she is not looking to share photos and send instant messages to friends. Instead, she's using the wonders of the Web to recruit women who might want to follow in her footsteps.

Dugas — or, as she prefers, Sister Tracey — is a 35-year-old nun with the Daughters of St. Paul, and as the director of vocations for the congregation's Miami house, she wants to make herself accessible to those contemplating a commitment to Jesus Christ.

"You have to go where the young people are," Dugas said, "and young people are on the Web."

As technology permeates almost every area of secular life, Roman Catholic communities around the world also are adapting it to their efforts to reach out to youths. Priests blog, nuns correspond via e-mail, and religious orders update their Web sites to attract young people and tell them about the possibilities of religious life.

"If you're not on the Internet, you're missing an entire audience," said Brother Paul Bednarczyk, director of the National Religious Vocation Conference in Chicago. "Forty years ago, a young person would go to the parish priest for more information on religious life. They now go to Google and type religious vocations.'"

When they do, they might find the Benedictine Sisters of Florida, whose Web page asks, "Did you get your IM from God?"

The Marist Brothers, who run Miami's Christopher Columbus High School, maintain a brothers' blog, profiles on MySpace and Facebook, and use YouTube and podcasts for a new campaign called "Real Brothers. Real Stories. A Real Difference." And the National Religious Vocation Conference runs an online Vision Vocation Match Service that closely resembles a dating service, with Christ and religious life as the ultimate match.

"I'm not so great with technology," said Brother Peter Guadalupe of Columbus, who is featured in the Marists' campaign, "but I do know that the present generation is very computer-literate. You can't expect them to tear out a card

from a magazine. You use what's there to get your message out."

Religious community Web sites are nothing new, but younger priests and nuns are slowly expanding their reach and accessibility by incorporating the latest in communication technology.

The Rev. Manny Alvarez, the 31-year-old vocations director for the Archdiocese of Miami, said miamivocations.com is "still in its infancy. We need to use it more, but we already have young guys coming up who are very tech-savvy."

A new seminarian has offered to blog about his life, and others are interested in doing podcasts.

"When they come to us, they're very well-informed because they've already surfed so many different Web sites," Alvarez said. "It's like researching colleges."

In August 2006, when the National Religious Vocation Conference introduced VocationMatch.org — also available in Spanish at www.EncuentroVocacional.org — to help match candidates for religious life with potential communities, the group wasn't sure how the site would be received. But it has surpassed expectations, with more than 4,700 unique visitors logged on so far.

The site features animated guides and addresses such issues as education, age, gender, preferred ministry, preferred community size, prayer styles and whether the person would like to wear a habit. More than 300 religious communities participate.

"It's been hugely popular," said Patrice Touhy, the site's executive director. "For the discerner, it helps narrow their search. It's a great place to start."

Battling big declines

The Catholic Church is desperate to reverse a decadeslong decline in religious vocations. According to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University, the number of Catholic nuns in the United States has plunged from 179,954 in 1965 to 67,773 in 2006. For priests, the figures are only slightly better: a decline from 58,632 to 41,794. During that time, the number of men annually being ordained priests fell by half, from 994 to 431.

The reasons for the downturn are varied: more secular lifestyles, more career options, especially for women, and family pressure not to join a religious order.

But will technology alone help harvest a new crop of priests and nuns?

"Right now, we don't really know if it's recruitment that's making a difference or if we're simply entering a period where there's more interest in religious life," said Sister Mary Bendyna, executive director of Georgetown's CARA. "Either way, we hope it's the beginning of something."

Recent polls have stirred hope within religious communities beset by dwindling numbers. A VocationMatch.org "Report on Trends in Religious Life" notes that 19 percent more candidates were preparing to become nuns and priests than there were three years ago, although the report's authors polled only some religious orders. And 71 percent of the communities polled reported an increase in the number of people inquiring about entering religious life.

Cautious optimism

Primarily they are younger Catholics — precisely the audience targeted by Web sites. Nonetheless, church leaders are cautious.

"The numbers do say that there are more people in formation (the yearslong spiritual process that culminates in vows) than there were three years ago," Bednarczyk said. "But we don't really know if, in the end, they will make that commitment. It's encouraging, but it's a little early."

As always, personal contact — particularly with an admired religious role model at school or church — seems to be the clincher. "The Internet is a helpful resource, but it just doesn't replace the one-on-one, face-to-face interaction," Alvarez said.

So along with her Facebook presence, Sister Tracey has started a monthly coffeehouse night with local bands and an open-poetry mike at her community's bookstore in Sweetwater.

"As great as technology is, there's still this thirst for human connection," she said. "It's not about having the best Web site; it's about what that Web site can facilitate."

— Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune News Service.