PhuturePriest Posted April 17, 2012 Share Posted April 17, 2012 I'm hopefully going to meet up with my Spiritual Adviser tomorrow at three, and we can hopefully talk about discernment, as well as my spiritual life. I'm really excited about it, though I am nervous. Is there anything I should expect? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
she_who_is_not Posted April 17, 2012 Share Posted April 17, 2012 (edited) Don't anticipate or form expectations. Humble yourself, surrender, and listen for guidance. Oh, and have fun. Edited April 17, 2012 by she_who_is_not Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhuturePriest Posted April 17, 2012 Author Share Posted April 17, 2012 [quote name='she_who_is_not' timestamp='1334686553' post='2419571'] Don't anticipate or form expectations. Humble yourself, surrender, and listen for guidance. Oh, and have fun. [/quote] I'm nervous enough that simply speaking will be the greatest experience ever, I'm sure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
InPersonaChriste Posted April 17, 2012 Share Posted April 17, 2012 Go with an open heart! May the road rise up to meet you Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LaPetiteSoeur Posted April 18, 2012 Share Posted April 18, 2012 I suggest taking a journal with you. If I don't write down the important insights Fr. B gives me, I will forget them. Also, I write things in my journal that I want to remember to talk to him about. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HopefulBride Posted April 18, 2012 Share Posted April 18, 2012 What LPS said. That was very helpful for me in the beginning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Emma Posted April 18, 2012 Share Posted April 18, 2012 I think we all have a tendency to show our best side. I remember very well my first meeting with my SD. She teased me later that she thought St. Therese of Lisieux had been reincarnated! I really wanted her to think I had a vocation and was the perfect candidate. She reminded me then and does to this day almost a year later - that we call it "discernment" for a reason. Sometimes it's difficult to distinguish between what you want and what God wants for you, so I think you should be yourself with your SD so he or she can really evaluate whether religious life may be right for you. Share your doubts as well as your certainties; your shortcomings as well as your gifts. Don't try to be the perfect candidate. Be honest and listen to the advice you receive. It will get easier to talk to your SD as you get to know him better and, perhaps more importantly, as he comes to know you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhuturePriest Posted April 18, 2012 Author Share Posted April 18, 2012 Well, I went, and may I just say it went absolutely wonderful. It was very comfortable and relaxing, and he was so great. We started out with a prayer, and he taught me a lot of wonderful things about spirituality. The thing he made sure to burn into my brain the most is this: God loves irony. After sharing with him my doubts and worries, he kept telling me this to make sure I remembered it. After telling him the last thing I ever wanted to do was be a Priest/Religious, he smiled and said this was a very good sign, especially since I stutter (Though miraculously I spoke very fluently during the meeting). He asked me weird questions like how I stack my books and in what order they are, and if they were all the way to the wall or if some went short to make sure they were all in one perfect line. I figured this was to figure out my personality, and I was right. I'm not sure what his evaluation was, but we both had a very good time. Though I didn't read the post above, I thankfully didn't act like I was so perfect. I told him my struggles, my conversion, and how at times I doubted myself. He then asked me what I had done for Jesus today, which threw me off. I said "Well... I prayed today, and something else I suppose I did was I did school for Jesus, even though I didn't really want to." He was pleasantly surprised at that answer, and he explained to me how wonderful it was that I my spiritual level was high enough to realize these things as things done for Jesus. When we spoke about discernment, he asked me about which Communities I was looking into. I told him as of yesterday after watching Therese I had a really big interest in the Monastic life, and so I told him which Monastic Communities I was discerning with. I was surprised as he had guessed I was discerning with the Monks at Clear Creek. This gives me hope that he can read my personality well and already guess what I am interested in. All in all, we talked about discernment, my spiritual life, I answered questions, and it was just a very wonderful experience. I really did not want it to end, but alas, it eventually did. Before we ended, he asked [i]me [/i]to do a prayer, and so we started with crossing ourselves and I immediately thought to do the Hail Mary. After we ended he said that was the exact prayer he was going to do. I feel as if our personalities are very much the same, and I look forward to our next meeting. He said we could write to each other, which usually I would feel nervous about, but he says he is terrible at handwriting, so it makes me feel better to know I'm not the only one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheresaThoma Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 FuturePriest that is really good news! I'm glad that you have found someone you can really be open with. I know how hard it can be to share your discernment and prayer life with someone else. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhuturePriest Posted April 19, 2012 Author Share Posted April 19, 2012 [quote name='TheresaThoma' timestamp='1334799461' post='2420454'] FuturePriest that is really good news! I'm glad that you have found someone you can really be open with. I know how hard it can be to share your discernment and prayer life with someone else. [/quote] Yeah. We were sitting in the pews of a Church, so occasionally people came in and I wasn't able to say what I wanted to for the sake of decency, but it went really well. What helped was we were in a nice quiet Church and we didn't speak that loud, so I was very relaxed. If people spoke at that volume all the time stuttering wouldn't exist. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
elizabeth09 Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 That is very good news Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Antigonos Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 Your report sounds as if a very positive beginning has been made. "B'ezrat HaShem" -- with God's help -- it will continue to strengthen. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marigold Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 glad it went well! so you didn't mention the friars at all? (going to respond to your pm when i have a working keyboard.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhuturePriest Posted April 19, 2012 Author Share Posted April 19, 2012 (edited) [quote name='marigold' timestamp='1334828746' post='2420534'] glad it went well! so you didn't mention the friars at all? (going to respond to your pm when i have a working keyboard.) [/quote] Oh, I mentioned them, of course. He said he knew the Bishop (Bishop Kevin Rhoades) and that he had heard of the Franciscan Brothers Minor before. He asked me if living in such poverty attracted me, and thank goodness I answered truthfully: "Well, sometime days it does and some days it doesn't." He said this was normal and after saying a few words we went on. He said that in Seminary the Seminarians had this saying (Note this is terribly paraphrased): "Religious Communities promise poverty, the Diocese assures it." (In which we both laughed hard at) referring to how many Communities do not live in poverty and have all sorts of iPod's and computers, and really anything a single male would have if he were living on his own. He said they do not own them themselves, but they belong to the Community and they use them frequently for one reason or another, which isn't quite what the founders of their Communities had in mind. Edited April 19, 2012 by FuturePriest387 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PadrePioOfPietrelcino Posted April 23, 2012 Share Posted April 23, 2012 I'm glad to see you had such a great first meeting...I know it can be difficult to find a SD that you "click" with right from the start and that you feel comfortable enough to share everything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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