Marrieds only! Before marriage did you seriously consider religious vocations?

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Binney

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Marrieds only. Did you have a time before marriage when you seriously considered being a priest or nun?
 
Binney,

Yes, I was very serious of entering a convent since the age of 9…so much so that I did enter a convent for 2 years! 😃

Christ is risen…truly He is risen!
Shoshana
 
I desired to have the life of a cloistered nun but didn’t have the resources or support beyond that desire.

The rest of the story …marriage.
 
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Binney:
I desired to have the life of a cloistered nun but didn’t have the resources or support beyond that desire.

The rest of the story …marriage.
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Code:
Well, that is strange! I wanted to enter a cloistered convent also…the Visitandines (St Margaret Mary’s order) and the Adorers of the precious Blood. Because I was told no by the Precious Blood due to my stuttering and the visitandines, well, I had to wait until I was 21…I just entered the Grey Nuns in Ottawa.

Should’ve had a spiritual director then to guide me through all of this…now, being married for 31 years and having had a spiritual director for 20+ years! Go figure…🙂

Christ is risen…truly He is risen!
Shoshana
 
In the past few years, I’ve been wondering about becoming a canon lawyer. However, I’ve always known I’d make an awful priest.
 
When I was younger I wanted to be a nun and then it hit me again in my late teens. Then the guys came into my life and I forgot about it. I loved being married but when I found myself longing and looking for something, it became the church and I again felt that longing.
 
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Shoshana:
Code:
Should’ve had a spiritual director then to guide me through all of this…
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After 23 years of marriage and children I can’t complain - these years have been very blessed and beautiful. Since my children have grown my life has taken a turn and is much quieter now. I have found a group of lay contemplatives and am very thankful. Full knowing that I loved Him, God had plans of His own for me.

I do wonder though about all the people who feel they have a calling to religious life but don’t know exactly how to respond. I would urge anyone with these feelings to search until they find exactly what God is calling them to. There are so many ways of answering this call via the internet. There are so many wonderful religious orders with websites and contact information. All interested people need to do is make that contact via email or telephone. If one religious order doesn’t answer favorably, move on to the next. The right one will come along. By using the computer, people have such an advantage today. Thirty years ago there wasn’t a nun in my sight. There was one busy priest and parents that didn’t support the idea of women religious. Young people today can seek out religious life using the computer. Can a computer serve as a surrogate spiritual advisor? What would I have done with a computer 30 years ago!!?!
 
I can only say…I have had the best of both worlds! 🙂

I believe the Lord has/is using me as much if not more in my marriage than if I was a nun! 😃

But Yes, I would advise anybody interested in the religious life to seek a spiritual director. When we pray to the Lord to grant us one…he always complies! He did with me…and I have been blessed! 👍

Christ is risen…truly He si risen!
Shoshana
 
Yes, I did, and still am. Hopefully I would be found worthy to become a priest in an Eastern Catholic rite.
 
I thought about it but only in the abstract. I had no knowledge of how to pursue this and then became interested in boys and forgot. My husband often teases me that if I had not met him I would be a nun. My best friend and I say that if we become widows we would become nuns. I am very happily married but the call is still with me at times. I fulfil my vocation through my marriage.
 
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Shoshana:
But Yes, I would advise anybody interested in the religious life to seek a spiritual director. When we pray to the Lord to grant us one…he always complies! He did with me…and I have been blessed! 👍
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100% agreement!
 
I did.

Funny story, actually. One semester in college I wanted to spend my spring break discerning what I wanted to do with my life. I had plans to visit a order of lay women, but the plans fell apart at the last minute. I ended up travelling with a male friend, instead (chastely, of course!). Two years later we were married. I definately discerned that spring break! 😃
 
There was a period of time I was not romantically attached. I think if someone would have presented the idea of a religious life to me then, I might have considered. As is I am happily married with three children so far…
 
I didn’t, but my wife did. There is a real possibility that she would have entered the Missionaries of Charity if they had been accepting American postulants in the mid-'80s. (They do now, on rare occasion, did not in those days). Happily this didn’t happen!!

If I were to become widowered, I would consider the priesthood.
 
Yes, I did seriously consider becoming a sister. It was something I thought about as a child and then later in my teen years from high school into college. I met with the vocation director from our diocese and sought direction from him and another priest on my college campus, both of which were huge helps in pointing me in the right direction. Eventually, I did a “nun run” over spring break with several friends and got to experience several different convents and religious life first-hand. It was awesome, amazing, and through prayer I was really at a place of “holy indifference” - whatever God wanted me to do, I would. It was only once I got to that point that I began to see marriage as a vocation in ways I hadn’t considered before. Shortly thereafter I met my husband and the rest, as they say, is history. Discerning that way gave me such a deep appreciation for the religious life and married life as well, and helped me learn the kind of holy marriage I desired.
 
I never considered it before marriage…but I do now. If God chooses to take my husband to heaven and I’m still here, I’d love to commit to religious life. My husband brought me to the church…I could never love anyone else as much as I love Christ…even my husband. My hubby’s the greatest gift God ever gave me…no one could ever fill his shoes, except the Christ he led me to.
 
I considered it pretty seriously my senior year of college. I got to a point where I really thought God was telling me to just pick either path. Since I was “further along” with the marriage path (had been seeing a girl for years), I went with that. Since being married I sometimes think about what my life would like if I had chosen to become a priest. I would probably be getting ordained this year or next. Sometimes I find myself wishing I had chosen that path, and thinking that maybe I made the wrong choice. But I usually attribute these thoughts to the devil trying to use something holy (a religious vocation) to ruin something else that is holy (my marriage). I’m pretty sure he enjoys those kinds of ironies. Besides, when I consider my two children, it becomes obvious that God did want me to be a family man :).

Like some other posters here, I might consider religious life in some form if I were to outlive my wife, but wouldn’t that be weird? I would be the only priest in the diocese with kids. Besides, if I were truly called to the priesthood wouldn’t I have become a priest in the first place? I’m not sure how the seminary admissions office would look at such a case. Doesn’t seem likely they would admit a widower, especially if you have kids/grandkids. Are there guidelines for such a situation?
 
I thought very strongly about becoming a priest. But I was an only child (and my mother had a lot off trouble, miscarriages, etc). I know my parents wanted grandkids.

I used to talk about this with a friend in Opus Dei, and he said that family life is a vocation also.

I have told my wife is that (God forbid) anything happens to her, once ourr children enter college, I probably would take some sort of Holy Orders.
 
Before i met my husband i had considered being a nun and i hadnt even finished my RCIA i felt the pull to the church, before i was even an official member. i began dating my husband in January of that same year, and then felt my pull was to being a wife and a mother. i dont regret my decision at all. i love my husband very much. we are trying to get pregnant now, so i cant wait to fulfill that part of my calling.
 
I never did have the desire to become a nun. My mom was going to join a convent but then her coral group traveled from Cleveland to Cincinnati and she met my dad when they sang with his glee club.
He decided the day he met her he wanted to marry her (she did not know that till later). In fact, he called my Grandma the next day and told her he met his wife!
My mom and he began corresponding long distance and she very early on decided she wanted to marry my dad too. They courted for 4 years, from their colleges.
They have been married for over 33 years. She told me the story growing up and she has said that she has never missed being a nun. I always used to watch the Sound of Music as a kid and imagine it as my parents and would ask me to tell the story again and again about how they met and fell in love. 🙂 Because my mom has always been very much like Maria, with her singing, her guitar and being choir director, even her personality. ~P
 
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