DameAgnes Posted November 23, 2015 Share Posted November 23, 2015 This seems very appropriate to many of the discussions, here. A wife and mother wondering if she was actually supposed to have been a nun? I think we always wonder if we might have not heard or understood a call?http://aleteia.org/2015/11/23/trusting-god-when-i-think-i-should-have-been-a-nun/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarysLittleFlower Posted November 23, 2015 Share Posted November 23, 2015 This can be a very difficult topic... I think that our vocation is where God has prepared graces for us and our path to love Him in the way we were created, and many spiritual writers link it to the process of salvation and becoming a saint. I do believe that God's Will is best for us. However, I don't think it means that He wants our discernment to be anxious... If someone does wonder if they made a mistake, I think they shouldn't despair but seek to love God and He can still bring good out of mistakes... He can even bring good out of evil because though He is against the evil, His response to it is good. For me, I often wonder if I would be able to be a nun.. However even if not, I have decided not to marry and still seek consecrated life. There are people who discern religious life and then marry, and I've heard of those who seem sure their vocation is marriage, and others who wonder if it was RL after all, like the person in the article. I think if a person didn't do something that is God's Will, they can still seek to do His Will now where they are, and to come closer to it. God still wants to act in everyone's life I believe and if we've made a mistake, to help make things better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marigold Posted November 23, 2015 Share Posted November 23, 2015 Yeah, I'm glad she went in the direction she did in the second half of the article. Thanks for sharing Dame! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DominicanHeart Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 Thanks for sharing this. This has been something I've been wrestling with. Am I supposed to be a Sister? Am I supposed to get married? I want both. Badly. It's been a challenge for me. I know I only want God's Will for my life. I want to be a Saint. That's the most important thing to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sr Mary Catharine OP Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 On 11/23/2015, 5:53:19, DameAgnes said: This seems very appropriate to many of the discussions, here. A wife and mother wondering if she was actually supposed to have been a nun? I think we always wonder if we might have not heard or understood a call?http://aleteia.org/2015/11/23/trusting-god-when-i-think-i-should-have-been-a-nun/ I'm glad she ended her reflection that way! We can be tempted in whatever way of life we living when it seems difficult or nearly unbearable to think we've made the wrong choice! The "paralysis of choice" is such a big problem right now. In regard to a religious vocation it can seem that God is playing a mystery game and we have to find the clues as we go along in order to pass from darkness into light. As though God is some bogeyman! In my years as novice mistress I've had to do a LOT of studying and praying about this thing we call vocation. There are a number of causes but one of the big ones is a suspicion and lack of "trust" in the freedom of the human person. Another issue is that the notion of "vocation" is really confused right now. We now use VOCATION in a way that wasn't used in the past. Technically VOCATION is used for the priesthood and in canon law the word vocation is used for the priesthood but NOT for consecrated life. This is because it is an extraordinary grace in which the Church CALLS a man out of the body of Christ for the purpose of serving the Church as an other Christ. People used to say they were going to "enter or join religion". St. Thomas talks about "embracing the religious state". It is an ordinary means of holiness. He looks at it from the perspective of "is it good?" Is this a means, according to the Gospel to become holy?" Of course the answer is YES! So, he basically says that if one has the right intention and basic requirements than one can trust that this comes from God. He does distinguish between the grace to embrace the religious state and the grace of final perseverance. Basically, the way one finds out if all this really is of God FOR ME is to test it by LIVING THE LIFE. In other words, responding to the grace by exercising the virtue of religion. Sometimes we have difficulties but it is simply not the life for us. Sometimes what we thought was the right intention was just wishful thinking so we're not really desiring to embrace it with all its struggles and crosses. And sometimes by living the and testing our desires we find that there is another way of life we are meant to live. Whatever way of life we are living in the here and now it is important to acknowledge that I made a CHOICE and to commit oneself daily to that choice today. Sometimes when things are overwhelming it's because we need to make adjustments somehow. It's not the life itself. It is really a beautiful thing that God gave us this freedom. It's a freedom FOR GOD and if in the past we made a choice that was less than worthy of God we can always TODAY make it be one for Him. God really, really and truly wants our happiness. Sometimes that happiness can be found only in the paradox of embracing the Cross. Well, I didn't mean to go on for so long. While discerning where God was calling me was a painful process some of that was my own doing! I remember my spiritual director telling me to reflect on what I REALLY WANTED! When I did that it made all the difference and I found myself FREE to choose the contemplative life! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarysLittleFlower Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 (edited) I read too in a book about discernment that traditionally, it wasn't such a mystery - if you were well disposed and had no obstacles, you could enter religious life and believe it's your vocation. One thing that helped me was a description of how God calls people. For most its by reason, so they could just go with the above method and that's fine. For some they are also intensely drawn to it, and it almost seems like God is really 'pursuing' them. For a few they actually get a revelation of His Will. The article said that the more certainty there is the more responsibility to be open and faithful to it - but for the souls relying on reason, there's less certainty and you just try your best. If God made it more obvious then rely on Him to help you. And if He hasn't but you want religious life and are well disposed and the community accepts you, then you are free to be there and its God's Will too. Maybe the difficulty today is that so often we seek a more obvious call or experience, but its only granted when truly needed... Its not the usual way. This helped me figure out how come some Saints seemed to have a revelation of their vocation, but other times there's so much about choice made through reason. It can be either. Jesus in Way of Divine Love talks about how some souls want to give God everything so He says "give up your possessions..." Etc. That's a response to God's grace though it seems to come from them. For others if God directly asks them, that's a special case but if chosen simply through reason that's just another path to a vocation, not the absense of a vocation. If someone really wants to be a religious they are free to try it, and they don't have to obsess over whether "God might actually be calling me to marriage even though I want RL". The desire can already a call through reason. And if it is marriage, then discernment would show that. In the end the Church confirms a vocation so we can rely on the Church too not just ourselves :) if the community accepts you then you have a vocation with them, if not, its somewhere else Edited November 24, 2015 by MarysLittleFlower Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DameAgnes Posted November 24, 2015 Author Share Posted November 24, 2015 Maybe it used to be less confusing because women had fewer options, and came from bigger families, and the world "understood" that some people had callings to the religious life. Society is very different now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarysLittleFlower Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 Its definitely more complicated now I agree... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
katherineH Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 Yikes I can't imagine receiving a message like that before getting married. That would be difficult. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sr Mary Catharine OP Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 Well, how many times do people give the same sort of message to persons about to enter religious life!? it's very common! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blazeingstar Posted November 25, 2015 Share Posted November 25, 2015 2 hours ago, Sr Mary Catharine OP said: Well, how many times do people give the same sort of message to persons about to enter religious life!? it's very common! I have an uncle who would go to work and cry on his commute praying rosary after rosary in reparation for not becoming a priest. He believed that he missed his calling. Ironically, at the same time his friend who did become a priest saw abandoned children and often wept because he felt God had meant for him to be a literal father to orphans. Eventually, my uncle became a deacon, and the priest left the dioceses to work with an order that cared for orphans. In their 40's they asked an older and wiser priest if this was what God meant, they were still not 100% fulfilled by their turn in vocations. The wise priest said that once a vow is made God never will disrespect that. God's love is so boundless that He recognizes our fiat. And that today, both a good family, and a good priest, are hard to find so we should Thank God that He has provided those paths for us to serve others. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DameAgnes Posted November 25, 2015 Author Share Posted November 25, 2015 This piece spoke to me because I have often wondered if I was supposed to be a nun, even as I played with my kids and enjoyed them. And especially when motherhood bored me or infuriated me. But I know I would have been a terrible nun, because I needed to learn all the things I learned in my marriage and I don't know if I could have learned them any other way. And I'm still much too selfish. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blazeingstar Posted November 25, 2015 Share Posted November 25, 2015 2 minutes ago, DameAgnes said: This piece spoke to me because I have often wondered if I was supposed to be a nun, even as I played with my kids and enjoyed them. And especially when motherhood bored me or infuriated me. But I know I would have been a terrible nun, because I needed to learn all the things I learned in my marriage and I don't know if I could have learned them any other way. And I'm still much too selfish. Yes, I recon there's a bit of "grass is greener" when things are tough. A working wife with no kids finds it hard because she desires motherhood, a mother with toddlers struggles and wishes she had 30 seconds to pray alone, a nun would do anything to go out and get a cup of coffee, as she knows her friends who are married are doing and a nun who has to cook for the convent that night wishes that it was only a family of 6! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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