How did you find your vocation?

[mathematoons]

I’m interested in hearing how others found their vocations.

For me, my spiritual life had been in a rut for a while, in part because I was willing to consider any vocation but marriage (bad history of marriage in my family). Then things got so bad that I finally had to consider changing something about my life. Then, while praying the Psalms, I came across the verses, “Thy wife as a fruitful vine, on the sides of thy house. Thy children as olive plants, round about thy table. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed that feareth the Lord.” (Psalm 127 [128]:3-4.) I thought, “What if God wants to bless me in this way, and I’m the one saying no?” The next day, my mother had a talk with me on the same subject, and I knew it was time to pray about it. So, I spent hours in prayer, and the next day, I heard the call.

How did it happen for you?

 

[Gertabelle]

When I was 18 and just starting my second year of college, I felt called to the religious life. I contacted and visited several communities and entered a Benedictine monastery at the age of 19. I lived that life for over two years, gradually coming to the realization that it simply wasn’t my vocation. I kept feeling like I had something I had to do out in the world.

Super glad I tried my vocation as a consecrated religious, because then I knew that it wasn’t my true vocation, even though I loved the life so much.

After I graduated from college with a degree in music performance, I decided to go back to school and take some music education courses. I have the voice to be a professional performer, but I don’t have the desire for that lifestyle or career.

The first time I walked into an elementary general music classroom, something inside me just came alive and I KNEW this was the career I wanted.

I truly feel that teaching is my vocation.

I ended up leaving the Church for many years, and during that time I married, had a son, and got a divorce.

Being a mom is my primary vocation and my path to holiness.

I have recently been discerning what God wants me to do with my life as my son moves on with his life – single life, marriage. God’s plan in God’s time. Meanwhile, I’m a mom, and that’s my primary vocation.

 

[elohimrules]

I have a good paying job and it is with helping people but I still feel something is missing. I am in my 40’s so sometimes I feel it is too late. But I ask God for help to find a life I am passionate about. I am considering religous life if anybody is willing to take me. I am older and have had a divorce (annulment), and mental illness so im not sure ill find a place to fit in. But i have started to volunteer with people with MI and it has been so very rewarding.

 

[Adam_Cook]

A Vocation is a calling. Yet, it is something that is revealed, slow and in stages. Currently, I am working on founding my own religious community. My time in the military and my time in discernment with other mendicant groups has proved to be very fruitful in this process.

A few years ago, I started feeling the call to the Rule of St. Columcille. He is one of the three greatest Saints of the Irish/Scottish regions. I was living as a Lay Dominican at the time and was not finding a lot of grace there. My family has strong ties to Scotland, my family name is actually Macgregor. It was nothing that I did, I was looking into my roots, trying to figure out how to live my Catholic faith, the right direction for me and my life. I was reading many books at the time, but this particular book was called “The Celtic Monk” by the Cistercians. I read through it, SEVERAL times. I first started following St. Ailbe. He was a Welsh saint, and I found a lot of joy in his writings and rule. The only problem was that it was too monastic. I’m very much a mendicant at heart, I believe in going out and spreading the gospel amongst the people, not just cloistered prayer and manual labor. This was where St. Columba came in. When I read through his rule I saw that it was wholly spiritual and could be easily adapted to the needs of my own life.

I am a married man, I have been married for almost 9 months now. I have been living the rule of S. Columcille for almost two years. I have been given so much grace in this life, and my marriage to my wife has only increased that grace in this calling. The calling God put on me was evangelization and catechesis. That’s what my Master’s degree is in and that’s what I will finish with in less than a year. In the meantime, the formation element takes a toll and it is difficult, but so worth it. I have seen a humility come across me in this life that I did not have before, and I have seen the joy of Christ become fully alive. God’s vision for this community he has demanded of me is a calling for Married men to step up and lay down their lives for the Gospel. St. Adomnan calls the Columcillian disciple a “Soldier of Christ”. That’s how I see myself, as a soldier. My community is my wife, she participates in my calling and supports me as I support her. My calling forces my family to live the precepts of the Church, to establish the family as a community of evangelization by being witness to the sacrifice required of by the Gospel.

So in essence, a vocation is something revealed, not something chosen. I never really chose this vocation, yet God has put it upon me so that man might know the goodness of Him who sent me. For if I gain a reward on earth, then I will lose my reward in heaven. If I do this for myself, then I gain the prestigious reward, but if I do it for God, answering his call, then I gain the heavenly reward of the robe and crown.

 

[oldgraymare2]

Hi mathematoons,

I’ve shared my story here before.

I felt strongly called to the religious life when I was 14.

I was going to an all-girls Catholic high school at the time.

At the same time, I felt an even stronger calling to be married.

That was stronger than anything, but it wasn’t like I ignored the religious calling. I still carefully thought about it.

I just felt that I was too distracted as a person for a religious way of life though, and that I would not personally do well in religious life that way.

I did end up getting married, and I feel like I did fulfill the desire to serve the Lord by becoming a very active parish volunteer in two different parishes over the course of several years.