Protestant Vocations

[Hilde]

I study at a theological institution, and many both women and men believe they have a vocation to become priests, most Lutheran but also others like Methodist and pentecostal.
Are these "real" vocations that are just disoriented in some way?

As for myself, I was a lukewarm Lutheran when I first started feeling a calling to religious life. As far as I remember, this came even before I wanted to look into Catholicism, which came as a cause of the former. So both my discernment vocation wise and theology/churchwise has developed together since.

[HollyDolly]

[quote name='Hilde' date='11 April 2010 - 09:05 PM' timestamp='1271034306' post='2091259']
I study at a theological institution, and many both women and men believe they have a vocation to become priests, most Lutheran but also others like Methodist and pentecostal.
Are these "real" vocations that are just disoriented in some way?

As for myself, I was a lukewarm Lutheran when I first started feeling a calling to religious life. As far as I remember, this came even before I wanted to look into Catholicism, which came as a cause of the former. So both my discernment vocation wise and theology/churchwise has developed together since.
[/quote]

Well as you know the Catholic Church doesn't have women priests.But the Episcopal Church has ordained as priests some women, and there have been women evangelists like Amiee Semple mcPherson.
The Anglican Church,over which the Queen of England, Queen Elizabeth is head, does have religious orders of men and women.Recently, the All Saints Sisters of the Poor joined to the Catholic Church and are now Catholic nuns.just like the Franciscans of tthe Atonement started out as an order of Anglican men and women,and later joined the Catholic Church.I understand that the lutheran Church, at least in Germany has deaconesses.These lutheran sisters,teach,nurse etc.just as their Catholic conterparts do.
No, I don't think thse people are disoriented.I think they truly wish to serve God in some way, and it is perhasp as real as a Catholic's calling to the priesthood or religious life in a convent.
By the way, love your photo of the viking bunny.the german in me found it very funny, and i love animals.

[sistersintigo]

[quote name='HollyDolly' date='12 April 2010 - 12:27 PM' timestamp='1271086076' post='2091500']
By the way, love your photo of the viking bunny.the german in me found it very funny, and i love animals.
[/quote]
I thought it was a guinea pig?

[laetitia crucis]

[quote name='sistersintigo' date='12 April 2010 - 12:33 PM' timestamp='1271086436' post='2091504']
I thought it was a guinea pig?
[/quote]

Always a bunneh!

[laetitia crucis]

[quote name='Hilde' date='11 April 2010 - 10:05 PM' timestamp='1271034306' post='2091259']
I study at a theological institution, and many both women and men believe they have a vocation to become priests, most Lutheran but also others like Methodist and pentecostal.

Are these "real" vocations that are just disoriented in some way?

As for myself, I was a lukewarm Lutheran when I first started feeling a calling to religious life. As far as I remember, this came even before I wanted to look into Catholicism, which came as a cause of the former. So both my discernment vocation wise and theology/churchwise has developed together since.
[/quote]

I've wondered the same thing...

I don't know if I'd say they have "fake" vocations, but perhaps like you said, "'real' vocations that are just disoriented in some way". Kind of like when women in the Catholic Church believe they are called to Holy Orders, I suppose... Often for those cases, I always thought that somehow they were just misguided along the way. The desire to serve God in such a completely self-giving way [i]and[/i] consecrated way runs deep within a person... sometimes I can't help but wonder if various Protestant ministers/pastors (especially female) are in fact being called to the Religious life. It seems at times that God likes to call from "outside the ranks" so to say, to bring in Religious vocations to the Church.

Hmmm... Good question, Hilde. I wish I could give a better answer, but in all honesty, I just don't know. I hope others have some helpful insight to this as well.

[cruciatacara]

Some people might get a religious calling before they become Catholics, and this brings them into the faith. It may be that they end up entering religious life in the Church, or it may just be God's way of bringing them in to the fullness of Truth. The problem is that sometimes the call can be misunderstood and then the person goes off in the wrong direction. But God can use everything for his glory, even those things that seem to us to be wrong. His timing is different than our timing.

[Hilde]

Yeah I'm interested in theology and working in the church and devoting my life to it, and working with a lot of things that priests do like administrative things and so on, but actually being a priest is not something I would want even if I could so my situation might be different than my co-students. But I think there are many of them that sincerely think they have a vocation to be a priest in the Lutheran [size="1"]ecclesiastical community[/size], and as I don't think God an deceive I think they have some sort of calling that they misconstrue.

[Hilde]

[CatherineM]

I have a cousin who is an Episcopalian nun. She has given her whole life to her church, much to her parent's dismay.

[Ephrem Augustine]

[quote name='laetitia crucis' date='12 April 2010 - 11:17 AM' timestamp='1271089046' post='2091530']
I've wondered the same thing...

I don't know if I'd say they have "fake" vocations, but perhaps like you said, "'real' vocations that are just disoriented in some way". Kind of like when women in the Catholic Church believe they are called to Holy Orders, I suppose... Often for those cases, I always thought that somehow they were just misguided along the way. The desire to serve God in such a completely self-giving way [i]and[/i] consecrated way runs deep within a person... sometimes I can't help but wonder if various Protestant ministers/pastors (especially female) are in fact being called to the Religious life. It seems at times that God likes to call from "outside the ranks" so to say, to bring in Religious vocations to the Church.
[/quote]

What if there were no Reformation? what if there were no defectors from the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church? I would be thinking the same thing.

Many men and women who broke the communion wanted to find an authentic form of discipleship, and it was not unlike Hermits, Monks, and Friars that never needed to break communion. But that is a whole other discussion.

Hilde, only God can judge the heart. I have met a few men and women preparing for ministry in other protestant churches with a sincere faith. I mean the only thing is their options are incredibly limited.
Options in Protestant Churches:
Minister.

Options in Catholic Churches:
Priesthood
Permenant Diaconate
Monastic Life
Apostolic Fraternities
Cloistered Communities
Eremetic Life
Apostolic Institutions
Lay Collaborators in Apostolate.
There may be more that I am missing.

[IgnatiusofLoyola]

[quote name='Ephrem Augustine' date='02 May 2010 - 05:08 PM' timestamp='1272838131' post='2103778']
What if there were no Reformation? what if there were no defectors from the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church? I would be thinking the same thing.

Many men and women who broke the communion wanted to find an authentic form of discipleship, and it was not unlike Hermits, Monks, and Friars that never needed to break communion. But that is a whole other discussion.

Hilde, only God can judge the heart. I have met a few men and women preparing for ministry in other protestant churches with a sincere faith. I mean the only thing is their options are incredibly limited.
Options in Protestant Churches:
Minister.

Options in Catholic Churches:
Priesthood
Permenant Diaconate
Monastic Life
Apostolic Fraternities
Cloistered Communities
Eremetic Life
Apostolic Institutions
Lay Collaborators in Apostolate.
There may be more that I am missing.
[/quote]

FYI--For Anglicans of either gender who feel called to the religious life, there are many, perhaps most, of the same options available as those available to Catholics, including cloistered Orders, active Orders, Third orders, Permanent deacons, etc. Unfortunately, I'm not sure what all the options listed under the Catholic church refer to--I hope you'll forgive my ignorance. As might be expected, there are more religious Orders of Anglicans headquartered in the UK than in the U.S.

Catholics may believe these calls to the religious life are "disoriented" or "misguided" if they so choose, but the Anglicans (obviously) view them as real.

Sorry, I don't know anything about other options for the religious life offered by Protestant denominations, such as the Lutherans.

Edited May 3, 2010 by IgnatiusofLoyola

[Thomist-in-Training]

Well, I just started reading John Henry Cardinal Newman's [i]Apologia pro vita sua[/i] (which is a LOT more lively and interesting than I expected before opening it). He says
[quote]
I am obliged to mention, though I do it with great reluctance, another deep imagination, which at this time, the autumn of 1816, took possession of me,--there can be no mistake about the fact; viz. that it would be the will of God that I should lead a single life. This anticipation ... was more or less connected in my mind with the notion that my calling in life would require such a sacrifice as celibacy involved; as, for instance, missionary work among the heathen, to which I had a great drawing for some years[/quote].

So God gave him to understand, thirty years before he became a Catholic, that he needed to remain celibate. I am sort of coming at the question slantways. Because he remained celibate he was able to become a Catholic priest and later Cardinal and reestablish the Church hierarchy in England (I think that last part is right).

Do I think people are called by God to spread Protestantism? No. Yet does He call people to become Catholics from among Protestant clergy? Yes. Does having been clergy affect their futures as Catholics? Yes... I don't know fully how to explain this part.

For a [i]Beautiful [/i] account of a woman who had a deep, real spirituality before becoming Catholic, (hmm, it might be very difficult for you to get... well, perhaps you can get it somehow) look for [url="http://www.amazon.com/Mother-Seton-Saint-Elizabeth-1774-1821/dp/B002EUKE3M"]Fr. Feeney's life of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton[/url].

[Hilde]

Your slantways approach reminds me of Paul, and how he decided not to throw the stone even though he hadn't met Jesus yet.

But there are girls who feel this way too. That they are called to be a priest, to preach. Srsly, We had a female bishop that now lives with a danish female priest. A little extreme, I know, and I sort of used to be a fan of her when i was little because she was in kids shows. Anyways, so yeah my female co-students. Many of them want to be priests.
No, I would never think God would call someone to spread heresy. He does not deceive.

[quote name='IgnatiusofLoyola' date='03 May 2010 - 04:56 AM' timestamp='1272851787' post='2103909']

I don't know anything about Protestant denominations such as the Lutherans.
[/quote] We have flying ships in our churches.

Edited May 3, 2010 by Hilde

[IgnatiusofLoyola]

[quote name='Thomist-in-Training' date='02 May 2010 - 08:56 PM' timestamp='1272851815' post='2103910']
Well, I just started reading John Henry Cardinal Newman's [i]Apologia pro vita sua[/i] (which is a LOT more lively and interesting than I expected before opening it). He says
.

So God gave him to understand, thirty years before he became a Catholic, that he needed to remain celibate. I am sort of coming at the question slantways. Because he remained celibate he was able to become a Catholic priest and later Cardinal and reestablish the Church hierarchy in England (I think that last part is right).

Do I think people are called by God to spread Protestantism? No. Yet does He call people to become Catholics from among Protestant clergy? Yes. Does having been clergy affect their futures as Catholics? Yes... I don't know fully how to explain this part.

[/quote]

Just as an side note, during the in the time that John Henry Newman was a don (basically a professor) at Oxford, dons were not allowed to marry, and if they did marry, they had to give up their position as a don. And, most of them actually lived and ate their meals at their college, rather than in separate homes. So, Newman was living in a close-knit academic community of men who were celibate. Thus, Newman's anticipation that God was calling him to a permanently celibate life was not an unusual one, and was shared by many of Newman's Oxford collegues. One other factoid that may be relevant or not: At that time, most dons at Oxford were also ordained Anglican clergy, so the fact that Newman was a member of the clergy even before his conversion was the norm, and not unique.

I don't know that this necessarily changes the point of your post, but viewed from a historical perspective, Newman's anticipation that he was called to be celibate was not uniqure or unusual, unlike it might be viewed if he lived today.

BTW--To the extent that I have repeated anything you already know, please forgive me.

Edited May 3, 2010 by IgnatiusofLoyola

[LouisvilleFan]

[quote name='Hilde' date='14 April 2010 - 04:05 AM' timestamp='1271228736' post='2093064']
But I think there are many of them that sincerely think they have a vocation to be a priest in the Lutheran [size="1"]ecclesiastical community[/size], and as I don't think God an deceive I think they have some sort of calling that they misconstrue.
[/quote]

[quote name='Hilde' date='02 May 2010 - 11:09 PM' timestamp='1272852599' post='2103926']
But there are girls who feel this way too. That they are called to be a priest, to preach. Srsly, We had a female bishop that now lives with a danish female priest. A little extreme, I know, and I sort of used to be a fan of her when i was little because she was in kids shows. Anyways, so yeah my female co-students. Many of them want to be priests.
No, I would never think God would call someone to spread heresy. He does not deceive.
[/quote]

I relate to what you're saying, though in a somewhat different way. I grew up Lutheran and attended an Episcopal church for a year or two during college. When I finally decided to pursue Catholicism and was in RCIA, I struggled to think that the Eucharist I had believed in all my life might not have been anything more than bread and wine. I came up with this theory that Christ is also present in the ways any body of Christians understand the Real Presence in order to reconcile what seems like a disconnect between Catholicism and personal experience. To think that the Episcopal church gave me an appreciation of the centrality of the Eucharist in Christian worship and the peace Christ gives in Communion, I thought it had to be more than symbolic for them. We even received on our knees at a Communion rail

After someone guided me to a more thorough understanding of consecration and how it can only occur through a validly ordained minister of Christ, I regretfully retired my pet theory. However, with time I've come to understand that even though the Catholic Church rejects the existence of Real Presence (regardless of how it's understood) in Anglican and Lutheran communions, that doesn't mean God's grace is not present and working. For one, I was right all those years to believe in the Real Presence, and any Christian who believes likewise today is [i]right[/i] to know that Christ instituted more than a symbol at the Last Supper. Only by grace can a person come to know any truth.

The distinction to draw here is between those truths I had learned by grace and those errors I had inherited from my Protestant upbringing. Does that mean God was deceiving me when I felt at peace while receiving Holy Communion on my knees at an Episcopal church? Of course not. God was working through imperfect ministers and a very broken Body of Christ to reach me. I have no doubt he's at work with countless others, including your women friends studying for priesthood in Anglican and Lutheran Communions. Is he specifically calling them to ordained priesthood? I don't believe so, but that doesn't mean the joys of pastoral work, preaching the Word of God, and celebrating liturgies are any less attractive for a non-Catholic than a Catholic. Grace extends far beyond the bounds of the Catholic Church... good news because otherwise nobody would find us! Their ultimate vocation is somewhere within the universal body God is calling all people toward: the Catholic Church.


...feel like I just wrote a TV promo

Edited May 3, 2010 by LouisvilleFan