Day 5. Friend or Foe?
Vocation Discernment Preliminary Novena
“Am I Ready for Discernment?”
The same night [Jacob] got up and took his two wives, his two maids, and his eleven children, and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. He took them and sent them across the stream, and likewise everything that he had. Jacob was left alone; and a man wrestled with him until daybreak. When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he struck him on the hip socket; and Jacob’s hip was put out of joint as he wrestled with him. Then he said, “Let me go, for the day is breaking.” But Jacob said, “I will not let you go, unless you bless me.” So he said to him, “What is your name?” And he said, “Jacob.” Then the man said, “You shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with humans, and have prevailed.” Then Jacob asked him, “Please tell me your name.” But he said, “Why is it that you ask my name?” And there he blessed him. So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying,“For I have seen God face to face, and yet my life is preserved.”
Genesis 32:22-30 NRSVCE
Every man dies. Not every man really lives.
William Wallace, Braveheart
“Whatever makes me happy.” This is most people’s priority when it comes to discerning a vocation. Another common test is, “Does it bring me peace?” Often, we look for a deep, inner peace in our choice of a life state. That’s the sign, we presume, that a particular direction is approved by God.
There is some wisdom to this approach. There is also error. Our own desires and opinions about what will make us happy are only part of the picture. We are often tempted to view them as God’s will because, of course, pursuing our own goals makes us happy and gives us peace. We present our plans to God and simply expect Him to rubber-stamp His approval. While this may give you peace, it is hardly discernment.
Our vision is always limited by time, place, and the people in our lives. In other words, our view is limited to this world and to the priorities of this world. God’s view is the heavenly vision, and it encompasses both this world and the world to come. His will for us is focused on our eternal destiny and the priority of heaven. As you can imagine, there’s a lot of friction between these two points of view. Still, it’s not an “either/or” situation. It’s much more interesting and more challenging than that. It’s a blending, a union, a forging together of two seemingly opposite directions.
Think of the cross. It has a horizontal piece and a vertical piece. So does your vocation. The horizontal piece of your vocation includes your own desires, gifts, skills, and dreams. The horizontal is the “this world” considerations for your discernment. Be assured that they are important to God. In fact, God gives many of these desires to you so that He can fulfill not all, but some – maybe many – of them.
Still, there is also the vertical dimension of a vocation. This cuts across our own plans and desires. It seems to come out of nowhere like a stranger. We groan. We struggle. We fear that it will ruin our happiness, springing on us in the dark and forcing us to begin a long struggle. A wrestling match, if you will.
You see where this is going. An unknown assailant attacks Jacob in the night. In fear and confusion he struggles with the attacker. Who can this be?! he must wonder, Some assassin sent by my brother? Or maybe just a thief in the night?
A thief in the night indeed. “For you yourselves know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. When they say, 'There is peace and security,' then sudden destruction will come upon them…” (1 Thes. 5:2,3 NRSVCE) God’s arrival is not always peaceful and benign. Sometimes he comes as a thief in the night. And while for a baptized Catholic his arrival does not bring the disaster mentioned above, it may still be an unwelcome intrusion. The divine Thief may steal our peace and rupture our plans. In the agony of the struggle as we watch our dreams crumble we wonder, “Who is causing me this misery?” and “what have I done to deserve this?”
Many, it’s sad to say, immediately give up on the struggle. “This can’t be God!” we may hastily conclude. We attribute our grief immediately to some other source: the devil maybe? We stubbornly clutch our plans, force our own agenda and dismiss any thought that we are struggling with anything worth a second thought. In so doing we may miss the fact that we are locked in a wrestling match with God himself.
By refusing to yield our cherished dreams, we actually run away from the fight. But neither should we abandon our dreams completely. Rather we should allow God to mold and reshape them according to His heavenly viewpoint. This requires wrestling. Maybe a long period of wrestling. It requires prayer. It requires crying out to God, giving voice to our anxieties: “Why!” “How could you!” Feel free to speak your mind (He knows what you’re thinking anyway). But whatever you do, don’t turn away and do your own thing. Are you afraid that in the end you’ll be left empty and poor? No, only those who demand their own way in discernment end up the losers.
The continual irony of the Christian life is that just when you think all is lost, God restores it (or something better) a hundred times over. It never ceases to amaze me. If he takes away your plans, he comes back with better plans. If he takes away one love relationship, he provides – if you’ll accept it – a deeper, richer one. “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) Try Him. He never fails. No one can outdo God in generosity.
Like the clay on the potter’s wheel, we find ourselves in the grip of one more powerful than we are. Like the sword in the forge we are heated, then hammered, heated, then hammered until we are pointed, sharp, battle-worthy. Who will allow themselves to be subjected to such a harrowing ordeal? Who indeed.
In the western Church, there are fewer and fewer coming forward from the ranks of the Catholic faithful to answer God’s call to the priesthood, the sisterhood or the brotherhood. Could it be that God isn’t calling? Or is it rather that we aren’t listening? If things go unchanged in years to come, we can expect to see more and more parish closings. We will no longer be surprised by empty monasteries and convents remade as condos. Many religious orders that once had thousands of members will be only a memory.
And the Catholic faithful will wonder why there are no religious sisters or brothers around anymore to give their children a good, Catholic education, no priests available to hear their confession or to visit them in the hospital when they are sick. The answers will be readily available but really too unpleasant to face. “Someone else’s son, not my son; not my daughter.” And generations will continue to pursue “God’s will” by seeking their own inner peace and happiness.
Who will step up and respond to the very challenging call to the priesthood or religious life? Who will break the cycle?
Novena Prayer
MY LORD GOD, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.
- Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude
© Abbey of Gethsemani
Make it My Own
Daily Discernment Workbook
BRAIN STORM
1. Dare to Dream
Based on my own gifts, what seems a reasonable plan for my future? Do I have a basic blueprint for happiness? What is my plan? What career? What achievements? Dreams are good. So what are mine?
GOING DEEP
2. How Flexible Am I?
We learn a lot about ourselves when we notice our emotional reactions to people and situations. My unexamined, unacknowledged, and unintended expectations have a lot to do with these reactions. To shed a little light on my own responses, I use the list below to identify my planning patterns.
I am…
A super-planner – I live by to-do lists and have my schedule set up long into the foreseeable future.
A scattered planner – my plans often unravel because in my disorganization, I don’t adequately prepare.
A paralyzed planner – I just can’t make up my mind. Just to figure out what I’m going to wear in the morning is a major deal.
A non-planner – I don’t even know what I’m doing this weekend. And it’s Friday night.
A hyper-planner – I organize other people’s lives as well as my own. I hate when other people’s disorganization messes up my plans.
A go-with-the-flow planner – I’m always ready to drop what I’ve got going on for something different.
Other…
If someone messes up my plans (I mean important plans) how do I usually react?
I explode.
I feel sorry for myself for at least a week.
I plot revenge.
I roll with it. No big deal.
I make sure they feel like a worm.
I express my disappointment, but don’t hold a grudge.
Other…
Have I ever experienced God’s will cutting across my own plans?
What were the circumstances? What was the conflict? How did I resolve it?
EXAMINE MY HEART
3. Get Real With God.
Do I fear that God is a thief who will steal my future happiness? Be honest. Write a short letter to God about my struggles with trusting in his plans.
Conclude with
“Glory be to the Father,
and to the Son,
and to the Holy Spirit.
As it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be.
World without end, Amen.”
[0] lead quote - Braveheart, Paramount Pictures, 1995