Twenty-two students for the priesthood will start this week at St Patrick's College, Maynooth, Co Kildare - the same number of entrants as last year. In 1996, it reached an all-time low for modern times of 17.

One of the college's directors of formation, Father Stephen Farragher, hopes the corner has been turned. But he still worries about the almost total lack of students coming from the western dioceses - the traditional breeding ground for Irish priests; and about greater Dublin producing only three first-students at the Clonliffe diocesan seminary, who, because of their small numbers, will have to commute to Maynooth for their theology courses.

The content of the courses taken by trainee priests at Ireland's premier seminary has changed radically in recent years, not least because of the impact of the clerical sex-abuse scandals.

One of the course's four components is now a "human formation programme", some of it taught by women, which includes elements like developing self-understanding and self-acceptance; the capacity to relate to people in "a mature and warm way"; mature attitudes to sexuality; and the capacity to assume leadership roles while "avoiding rigidity of attitudes".

A second newish element is a pastoral programme, which involves the seminarians spending time working in schools in disadvantaged urban areas, visiting prisoners, and working with the homeless, AIDS patients and drug users.

The days of the elitist, strictly academic training of Maynooth priests are over.

Sean Cunningham (27), from Mountbellew, Co Galway, is a final year student and thus already an ordained deacon with his vow of celibacy taken; older students are increasingly the norm at Maynooth.

He had been contentedly studying science for four years at Dublin City University when he got the "call" to be a priest. He stresses his belief that what was important was God wanting him to be a priest, rather than anything he desired.

"I felt something calling me towards the priesthood coming from my belief in God. I was attracted towards being able to help people in some way, to tell them God loves them and gives them hope. I'd seen the way people get hope from priests and I knew the encouragement I get from my own faith. I hope to share that with people in some way."

There was no great tradition of priests in Sean Cunningham's family. His parents were very supportive, but not so much in the old "proud to have a priest in the family" way: "They allowed me the freedom to do whatever I would be happy doing."

He admits that there is "an element of self-sacrifice" in promising to be celibate, and does not expect living the celibate life to be easy. But he also sees a positive and challenging element in giving up sexual love in order to devote himself more fully to God, other people and the church.

He finds that his friends, while maybe not understanding his decision, nevertheless respect him for making it.

His pastoral attachments to Ballymun and Wheatfield Prison made a strong impression on him.

"I now see the gap between rich and poor widening in this country and a two-tier society developing. People are really caught in a poverty trap. They don't seem to have any great hope of breaking out of the ghettos of poverty. The church has a duty to be a voice for those people."

Finan Fitzgerald (23), from Ballymacelligott, Co Kerry, is a final-year student and deacon. He was a 17-year-old Leaving Cert student getting ready to study his favourite subject, chemistry, at UCC. "But I felt something was missing in my life. I couldn't put my finger on it. It took a while to dawn, with all my studies, that it might be the priesthood."

In sentiments which sound oddly out of tune with the thrusting values of the "Celtic Tiger", he says he gets "a great buzz and satisfaction out of helping people.

"There are a lot of people who want to be listened to, and there aren't a lot of people around to do the listening. I get a great sense of joy in telling people it's OK because God loves them".

He has friends who have done well in financial services. "They're in the rat race. They work long and hard, late nights, enjoy the weekends - perhaps a bit too much - but don't really relax properly. They start to ask themselves, `is there any meaning to all this?', other than to fatten their bank accounts and pay huge mortgages. They get a big consolation in meeting somebody who accepts them as they are - somehow or other they sense the love of God in this."

He believes strongly that although religious practice might not be what it used to be in Ireland, "there is still a great sense of God in action in the world. There is great respect for someone who listens and brings the love of God to people, and there is a great desire that there will always be priests and religious in Ireland".

Neither of the two young men is unhappy that the days of the all-powerful Irish priest have passed: the kind of Kerry priest who would say from the pulpit that when he came visiting he did not want to get his tea in "a cup with a shirt button in it", says Finan Fitzgerald.

They both stress their confidence that Christianity has a huge future.

"I wouldn't swap studying to be a priest for a million pounds, for the world," says Fitzgerald.