Tag Archives: discernment

Discernment, News, Women's Communities

Bethany House: A New House of Discernment For Women

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Bethany House is a women’s discernment house, sponsored by the Office of Vocations in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. Located in Minneapolis, it opened in September of 2017 and is a home for women ages 20-27 who live in community and discern whether they are called to consecrated life

This is a new initiative of the Office of Vocations in partnership with the Handmaids of the Heart of Jesus, a religious community based in New Ulm, Minnesota. The women may work or go to school, but the objective is the same – to sit at the feet of Jesus like Mary of Bethany, listening. “This is about discerning God’s will, and that’s the goal … wherever God may lead them,” said Father David Blume, vocations director for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

Father Blume was inspired to found Bethany House after a young woman told him: “Our men have a path, but for us women, we don’t have a path — we have 500 paths, and it’s kind of confusing.” The Vocations Office takes care of the house’s administration while the Handmaids oversee the formation and pastoral aspects.

Handmaid Sister Mary Joseph Evans makes it clear that this is not a Handmaid discernment house. “They have total freedom to discern any community. … Because we’re diocesan sisters, part of our role in our service of the diocese is to walk with young women in general, in helping them know and discern and embrace the Lord’s will, just like a diocesan priest would for the men.”

Residents at Bethany House commit to nine months of common living as well as a weekday schedule that includes a 5:45 a.m. Holy Hour with morning prayer in the parish’s Adoration chapel. The women then attend daily Mass before heading to classes or work. They share three evening meals each week, and pray night prayer together each night. Then they observe “grand silence” until after Mass the following day. A 2-month summer program is also an option.

One resident described the experience as a retreat. “And that’s how they really set it up to be,” she said. “We’re retreating to Jesus, and Jesus is really retreating to us more, I feel like, because He wants to be in our hearts.”

For more information, please visit: 10000vocations.org/bethany-house

 

Discernment, Men's communities, Resources, Vocations

5 Common Fears As You Discern Your Vocation

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This post, helpful for everyone in the process of discernment, comes from Conception Abbey, a Benedictine Monastery  in Conception, MO . For the complete blog post, visit:  https://www.conceptionabbey.org/discernment-fears/

5 Common Fears with Discerning your Vocation

Many men and women who are discerning a religious vocation hesitate in taking the next step because they are restrained by any number of fears. Listed below are five fears common to men and women discerning religious life and some helpful advice to banish the fear and draw near to the Risen Christ who offers you peace.

  1. What if I am making the wrong (or a bad) decision?

If you are praying daily, striving to live a virtuous life, and remaining close to the Sacraments, you will know if you are making the wrong decision. Religious formation is a process where you continue to discover and realize God’s call in your life. When you enter a religious community, there is a period of one to two years (or longer) that you experience before you profess vows or make any further commitment. Additionally, religious communities are wise in the discernment process and only want candidates who have an authentic call to commit themselves to the way of life, and this call is most fully realized when it is tested over a period of time.

  1. The fear of what others will think, especially parents or friends

Sometimes friends and family members may not understand or completely accept your decision to enter religious life. It is important for friends or family to visit the religious community to meet and interact with its members. If you decide to enter a community and find peace and fulfillment, it often alleviates the pressure that comes from friends or family members, because their opposition diminishes when they see your joy.

  1. Focusing too much on the sacrifices

Jesus assured St. Peter, “Everyone who has given up houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands for the sake of my name will receive a hundred times more, and will inherit eternal life” (Mt 19:29). Do not be afraid to live no longer for yourselves, but for Christ. There are many joys and blessings in following Christ in religious life, and many times you find yourself surprised by how good and generous God truly is!

  1. I’m afraid that I’m following my own voice and not Jesus’ voice

If you truly desire to hear God, the call will not remain hidden, nor will it be presented as a puzzle that you have to ‘figure out.’ Gather all the information necessary to make a well-informed and prudent decision, pray as if it all depends on God, but when it is time to act, place your trust entirely in God. If your decision was made peacefully and with a desire to please God, then you can move forward with confidence. Since it is a real challenge not to be guided by self-will, it is most important to find a priest or spiritual director to listen and guide you throughout the process.

  1. I’m not worthy or holy enough

Religious life is not for the perfect, but for those who desire holiness and strive to call themselves to conversion each and every day. Jesus said, “I did not come to call the righteous but sinners“ (Mark 2:17). Most religious men and women seek community life because they are aware of and readily admit their need for the support and encouragement of others to persevere on the path that leads to God. The call to holiness requires that you embrace your humanity, with both your strengths and weaknesses, to become the man or the woman that God desires you to be.

I encourage you to visit the Conception Abbey website/blog posts for more information on discernment.

https://www.conceptionabbey.org/monastery/getting-started/

 

 

News

Five Ways to Discern a Religious Vocation

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This practical advice was written by Fr. Paul Sheller, OSB, Conception Abbey Vocation Director. To find out more about discerning religious life at Conception Abbey, visit their Monastic Vocations website or contact Fr. Paul, the Vocation Director.

  • Take time for personal prayer

Prayer is the foundation to discern your vocation and deepening your relationship with Christ. You can listen best when you remove yourself from the things that distract us and compete for our attention (cell phones, the radio, computers, traffic, and other noises) and place yourself in an environment of silence so as to listen to God. The time spent in silence may be difficult, or even uncomfortable at first, but perseverance is key. God speaks to you in the stillness of your heart. Do not be concerned with asking yourself “what should I do, or what should I be thinking,” but desire above all to be in God’s presence and allow God to be the one who acts.

  • Celebrate the Sacraments of Reconciliation and Eucharist

The Holy Spirit works powerfully when you approach the Sacrament of Reconciliation with humility and openness. Prepare for the Sacrament by making a good examination of conscience, and do not be afraid or embarrassed to confess your sins to a priest honestly.  This is an opportunity to trust more in God’s mercy than in your own sinfulness. You should get into the practice of going to confession frequently, at least once a month.

Certainly, you should be attending Mass every Sunday and on Holy Days of obligation, but it is very important for you to make an effort to attend Mass during the week when possible. Due to school and work schedules sometimes making it to daily Mass is not feasible. Whether you attend Mass during the week or not, you should take the time to prayerfully read and reflect on the Scripture readings from the day’s Mass. Christ speaks to us powerfully through the words of Sacred Scripture.

  • Find a Spiritual Director

Discerning the action of the Holy Spirit is much easier with the help of a priest or religious who can give sound spiritual guidance. Discerning your own motivations is difficult alone, and God’s action comes to light when you are able to express your intentions aloud to someone experience in the spiritual life. The spiritual director’s primary role is to listen to the movement of grace in your life. The foundation of this relationship must be in trust and honesty. Whenever you place your trust in your spiritual director, it shows humility and a sincere desire to see clearly God’s will in your life.

  • Contact the Vocation Director

Almost all monasteries and religious communities have someone appointed as the Vocation Director. The role of the Vocation Director is to help you further listen to what God is calling you, to answer your questions, and eventually discern whether or not you are being called to the community. Beginning the dialogue is important because it can help alleviate your fears and doubts. It is important to dialogue with the Vocation Director, especially since he or she is a professed religious who lives the joys and challenges of the particular way of life each and every day. Vocation Directors often ask important reflection questions that you may not have considered, which can be tremendously beneficial in your process of discernment. After talking with the Vocation Director, he or she may invite you to visit the community for a personal retreat or as part of a “Come and See” weekend experience.

  • Visit the Religious Community that Attracts You

Only so many questions can be answered on the Internet or addressed on the telephone, and at some point, you must experience firsthand the environment, encounter the community, and try the life (even if it is just for a weekend). Take the leap of faith, and do not be afraid to place your trust wholeheartedly in Christ. Before your visit, do not be weighed down with expectations of how you should feel or what you ought to experience. Simply be open and receptive to the Holy Spirit. It does not help to visit a community with an attitude that is closed off and says, “I’m just going so I can check this off of my list.” God’s grace is at work when you follow the Lord joyfully and cultivate praise and gratitude in your life.

Remember that there is no commitment or obligation when you initially explore religious life. It is a process of understanding how God is speaking to your heart. To explore your vocation is an exciting journey of faith!

 

Women's Communities

Ten Misconceptions About Discernment & Religious Life

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The Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary of Wichita have a list on their website of the top ten misconceptions about discernment and religious life that was one of the most perceptive and at the same time the most obvious set of points I have ever read. They likened the discernment process that a young women goes through before marrying to the discernment process a young woman goes through before choosing a community.

For example, #1: You are called to a particular Community

If you are called to Religious Life, you are called to a particular Community.  When a young woman feels called to marriage, she doesn’t say, “I am called to get married.  Any man will do, as long as I follow my vocation.  I’ll marry the first one I meet.”  Just as in marriage God has a plan for your partner, He has a plan for the right Community for you.

Example #9:  How do you choose from so many Communities?

Some young women say, “But there are SOOO many religious Communities out there.  I give up before I even start because I don’t know where to start.”  Well, there are a lot more men in the world than religious communities.  Why hasn’t this stopped women from getting married?  Because it only takes ONE man, the RIGHT one.  When you meet him, you stop looking.  Take it one at a time and trust God to lead the right one to you, or to place him in front of you.  The same applies to Convents.

All of the examples cited on this Top Ten list are equally perceptive and instructive. It really takes the mystery out of the discernment process when you liken it to choosing a spouse. If God is calling you to religious life, then He will lead you to that right community where your vocation can blossom and be fruitful.

The IHM Sisters are an IRL Affiliate Community with a Carmelite spirituality and an emphasis on Eucharistic and Marian devotion. The sisters engage in the works of Catholic education on all levels, including spiritual retreats. In union with Mary, the sisters pray for the Church, especially for the conversion of sinners and the sanctification of priests.

 

 

Resources

Discernment Retreats

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A discernment retreat is a prayerful visit with a religious community, perhaps for a weekend or even a week. Such a retreat is a good way to test your vocation. You can get to know the community and its charism, and consider whether God may be calling you to its way of life. Many communities hold retreats for groups for just this purpose. Or you may be able to visit them as an individual.

One of the most important outreaches of the Institute on Religious Life (“IRL“) is assisting those who are discerning religious vocations by directing them to opportunities to “come and see,” often in the context of a retreat.

The IRL provides information on retreats for men and women alike. In addition, the IRL offers online vocation retreats, consisting of daily meditations and reflections sent to you via email to help you discover your vocation in life.

Visit the IRL site today for more vocation-related resources!

General interest

Project Andrew . . . for Parents

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Project Andrew, named for the apostle who invited his brother Simon (Peter) to come meet Jesus (see John 1:40-42), has become a popular vocation-related events for potential seminarians. While the format varies from diocese to diocese, the idea is to have young men “come and see” by spending an evening with the bishop, sharing a meal, discussion, and prayer.

The evenings encourage young men to actively seek out what God wants of them (maybe priesthood, maybe not), and then challenge them to be heroically generous in embracing and living out this vocation. In that sense, it’s about discernment, not recruitment.

Given that context, I wanted to share this article from my own archdiocesan newspaper regarding a Project Andrew event here in Kansas City. What I found to be particularly valuable was the addition of a parent component, as parents of the young men in discernment are invited to hear from parents of some current seminarians.

While the Church extols the great gift that vocations to the priesthood and consecrated life are to Catholic families, the fact is that many parents are opposed to this way of life for their children. There may be fears of “losing” their children or they may simply harbor misconceptions about the priesthood, consecrated life, or the Church in general–just the sort of things that dialogue and friendship with other parents could help resolve.

As Catechism, no. 2233 provides:

“Parents should welcome and respect with joy and thanksgiving the Lord’s call to one of their children to follow him in virginity for the sake of the Kingdom in the consecrated life or in priestly ministry.”

Reflection

Deception in Discernment

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The following essay by Br. Gabriel Torretta, O.P.,  first appeared in Dominicana 60:1 (Spring 2011), 7-9, and it and was recently reprinted in its online edition. We reprint it here because of the excellent insights it provides on the subject of vocational discernment.

If you’ve ever thought about a priestly or religious vocation, perhaps this prayer has passed your lips: “God, if it’s your will that I do this, just give me a sign!” The prayer is easy, natural, and ubiquitous among those ‘discerning.’ But this little prayer may also be the single easiest way to short-circuit a vocation and leave a man dead on the waters of life.

The problem with this prayer is that it pits God’s will against mine, as two discrete entities, one of which must give way to the other. Will looks like a zero-sum game: if I win, God loses, and if I lose, God wins. The danger is that when I compete with God, whoever wins, I lose.

Moreover, the prayer assumes that God’s will is an inscrutable mystery that I must implore Him to reveal. My will bears no sure relation to God’s, and I have no way of knowing if my desires are really holy or just selfish. My desire and my will are like a mercury thermometer with all the numbers rubbed off; I could be edging toward spiritual hypothermia or burning with zeal, but I’ll never know unless God puts the numbers back on. As a result, I have to ask God to give me extraordinary signs so that I can know what to do and how to do it.

But asking for signs from God is a dangerous endeavor. More often than not, “God give me a sign” really means “God, do what I tell you,” or “Give me the kind of sign I want you to give.” Jesus himself addresses this problem in the Gospels; after a series of remarkable miracles and authoritative teachings, the disbelieving scribes and Pharisees tell Jesus, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You,” to which Jesus responds, “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet” (Mt 12:38-39; cf. Mk 8:11-12, Lk 11:29). The question betrays the blindness of the questioners, because Jesus’ entire life is the sign they claim to be looking for. The Pharisees refuse to observe the reality unfolding before them and instead ask for a sign on their own terms. The honest men among the Pharisees may have asked the question in earnest, hoping that God would help them decide whether or not to follow Jesus. But their purported ardor for God’s will blinded them to the marvelous ways God was actually working in their lives.

This is the blindness of moralism. The moralist ‘discerns’ as if to wrest the secret of God’s will out of His hands by brute force; dashing from one spiritual program to another and from one vocation event to the next, he pours out novenas, rosaries, and mass intentions, begging God to reveal the mystery of his vocation. All the while the moralist ignores the actual signs God has been pouring into his heart. For God’s will is not radically opposed to my will; rather, God’s will works through mine, moving it by grace to respond to Him with a total gift of love. Jesus spoke of this to the great Dominican mystic St. Catherine of Siena after a period of spiritual darkness: “Your will is a sign to you that I am there, since I would not be within you by grace if you had an evil will” (Letter T221/G152). Formed by a life lived with God, my will can be the signpost by which God directs me where He wants me to go.

Vocation is not a shell game in which I have to outwit God and find the perfect life He has hidden among all the options in the world. Vocation is a call of love to love. God moves our hearts to love Him, to answer the one, universal call to holiness. The Christian’s task is to respond to that love concretely with the complete gift of himself. To give himself utterly, he needs the honesty, generosity, wisdom, and prudence that come from God, for which he must pray. Then, when his heart burns with a specific desire to love God with this woman, or this religious order, or in this diocese, then he decides and commits himself irrevocably into God’s hands. This is the mystery of vocation. This is the mystery of love.

General interest

How Do I Know?

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Last week the editors of the National Catholic Register offered the following response to the question, “How do I know what my vocation is?” In doing so, they quote Servant of God John A. Hardon, the beloved founder of the Institute on Religious Life.

“A religious vocation is a special grace that God gives to certain persons, calling them to a life of the evangelical counsels,” wrote Jesuit Father John Hardon, whose canonization cause is under way, as chronicled at EWTN.com. “What are some typical features of a true vocation to the religious life? I would emphasize especially three: 1) a strong faith in the Catholic Church and her teaching, shown by a firm loyalty to the Vicar of Christ; 2) a love of prayer, at least the capacity for developing a desire for prayer; and 3) a readiness to give oneself to a life of sacrifice in the footsteps of Jesus Christ. . . . I believe that if every prospective candidate were to make a private retreat, even for a few days, under a competent priest, it would help immensely. The retreat could be especially geared to a person who thinks that he or she has a vocation to the religious life. Then, during the retreat, in an atmosphere of silence and prayer, ask God to enlighten one’s mind as to whether or not he is calling the person to a life of Christian perfection. This, in fact, is one of the original purposes of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius: to discover and decide on one’s state of life.” Continue reading How Do I Know? →

General interest

New Vocation Survey Probes the Heart

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A new survey aims to help single Catholic women sort out what is one of the most common questions about religious life: How do I know if I’m called?

The seven-question survey, developed by Kevin Banet in cooperation with the Dominican Sisters of the Immaculate Conception in Justice, IL, plumbs one’s desires and interests to help a young woman discern whether she is called to become a sister.

“The survey offers probing, thought-provoking questions about the interests and desires of the heart,” notes Kevin Banet, a vocation promotion expert who serves religious communities. “It asks questions and then has answers, or affirmations as, ‘The zeal to live and share God’s love is something that won’t lie dormant within me,’ and ‘When I see a religious sister, I think about what it would be like for me to become a sister.’” Continue reading New Vocation Survey Probes the Heart →

General interest

Vocation Vision

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I just noticed that Vision, the blog of the National Religious Vocation Conference, has graciously linked to our site.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has especially commended Vision, also known as the Catholic Religious Vocation Network, for its innovative “Vocation Match” feature to assist the discernment process. The USCCB has also praised the site for connecting visitors to dioceses, religious communities, and retreat opportunities.

Vision has several other interesting features. One feature I really like is its “Religious life timeline,” which is downloadable here.

I think the simple name of the site is most appropriate. Men and women discerning God’s personal call in their lives are invited to “come and see” (John 1:39). We need grace-filled “vision” to see the wonderful plan God has for our lives.