How the Lives of the Faithful Can Bring Us Peace in Vocation Discernment
By Abigail Bargender
What’s my vocation?
That’s a question that can make anyone freeze, especially when we have no idea which vocation is our purpose. I know how it feels as a single Catholic woman who knows which vocation she would like but hasn’t seen anything promising it on the horizon. It can be a spiritual battle.
The question of vocation reminds me of the anxiety surrounding career and college major. Senior year of high school was stressful enough with finishing out high school strong, seemingly filling out scholarship applications endlessly, applying for colleges, etc. Many teachers just added onto that anxious time with questions about career and major. What are you going to major in? What are you hoping to do after college? At a senior dinner two of the teachers at my school wrote down everyone’s major, college, and career goals so they could reference it when we got out of college. They all stressed it so much that it seemed like we had to figure it out then and there, otherwise we’d be lost in college–lost in life. No one ever told us that if we changed our mind, we might be lost trying to figure out how to do what we’re really meant for.
When I think about vocation, the worry that comes to mind is that I may end up in the wrong one–or worse yet, He might not have planned the vocation I want. Consecrated singlehood, religious life, or marriage. Each of them has their fruitfulness, each has their struggles, and each is a path to eternal life. When we don’t simply know or we may be subconsciously ignoring His call, our vocations can be a source of distress when it should actually be one of peace.
There’s good news. If we don’t know our vocations, we don’t have to worry about it. That doesn’t sound that helpful at first but let me explain. In one of Fr. Mike Schmitz’s homilies, he mentioned that when you seriously don’t know your calling, it’s because you haven’t yet been called. We don’t have to worry about answering Jesus’ message when He hasn’t even sent it yet! This is a time to explore talents, practice loving God and neighbor, and learn our faith. Sure, it’s a season of waiting and some of us are impatient, but as they say, slow seasons are for planting seeds. We could learn to do something or improve in our talents so that when the time comes to use it, the waiting wasn’t wasteful but essential.
Yet there are times when we have discerned and are afraid we will choose wrong because we could see ourselves in each vocation or at least two of them. Or we know which one we have always preferred, but He might have a different plan. This is a thought that can cycle out of control particularly when we are worrying. Here’s where looking to the Church’s faithful can be especially reassuring.
St. Elizabeth Ann Seton first served God as a mother, then later as a religious sister. Though it wasn’t until her husband passed away that she had her Catholic conversion, she had brought up children and her grandson became the first American monsignor. She prayed for her own children and their faith as a mother but also cultivated education and faith in school children throughout her vocation of religious life.
Mother Antonia Brenner, born Mary Clarke in Beverly Hills, was married and divorced twice and had seven children between her two husbands. According to Larry Peterson, in his article “The inspiring story of the great Catholic woman who was a twice-divorced nun,” after meeting a priest while doing charity work, she went with him to Tijuana and served prisoners at La Mesa Penitentiary for a decade, traveling back and forth to raise her children and show prisoners the love of Christ. She became a religious sister and later started her own religious order. Peterson also writes that when her children were grown, she moved to the prison and lived there with the inmates for three more decades and was known to them as “La Mama” and the “Prison Angel.”
Dr. Félix Leseur had been raised Catholic, but according to Maria Grizetti quoting his own accounts, he lost his faith when studying medicine. However, his wife, Élizabeth, was extremely devout. In their marriage, faith was a battlefield. Upon her death, Félix traveled to Lourdes intending to expose the healing miracles occurring there as fake, but he instead had a conversion. Upon rediscovering his Catholic faith and reading his wife’s diary, he eventually became a Dominican priest in 1923 and advocated for the beatification of Élizabeth, who is now considered a Servant of God.
Perhaps we know of married men who have discerned the call to become deacons. Or our parish priest was once married. Maybe you have met a nun who pursued religious life after the death of a husband. It may be that not all are meant to have been blessed in partaking in two different vocations in their lifetime, but it does happen, and we don’t have any reason to believe that was a mistake. Otherwise, St. Elizabeth Ann Seton would not have had a devout grandson if religious life had always been her calling. Mother Antonia may not have been able to see Christ in criminals and mother them as a religious sister if she hadn’t first learned how to lovingly sacrifice for her seven children. Fr. Felix Leseur could not have been later spiritually and religiously inspired by his wife’s diary if he had never first married her.
Regardless of whether a blessing such as theirs could be a part of our individual stories, we know that the Author of each and every one of them is good. He will not force us to do any vocation that would make us miserable. His plan is greater than ours, which could lead some of us to a realization that we have to let go of our own plans to be able to accept His and live it to the full. For others, it could mean long seasons of waiting and loving as His perfect timing comes to pass. Giving Him our all, our lives, can be a terrifying concept but always remember His goodness and faithfulness, for He has promised in Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know well the plans I have in mind for you—oracle of the LORD—plans for your welfare and not for woe, so as to give you a future of hope.”
He purposely made our lives for a purpose. If you have worries over your vocation, take a moment today to pray.
Jesus, I trust in You.
