Wanting Religious Life for the wrong reasons?

[DL82]

I have recently come to realise just how dull the religious life seems to me. Don’t get me wrong, there are some fantastic religious brothers (I’m temporarily living with 12 of them!) who do some amazing work in the world. I just mean it feels dull to me, and I act in a dull way.

Basically, I think I want religious life for all the wrong reasons - as a single man, only child, and convert, without many close friends, currently taking a PhD with no clear career goals in my late 20’s, I guess religious life is quite secure - I know I wouldn’t ever have to worry about my finances again, or about where I’d live, or about living alone or dying alone. It’s also an excuse for not needing to do anything amazing with my life - I could excuse my failure to make a deep impact on the academic world by saying ‘well, I would’ve changed the face of Catholic education, but 5 years into my magnum opus I had to leave to be provincial bursar’, or whatever. As someone with a history of anxiety disorder, I know I often fear the worst, and religious life would be a way of escaping the worst, a way of settling for security, not so much a sacrifice as a trade-off. It’s true that I don’t sin as much when I’m here, but I also don’t even feel that I do as much good as the average married person, and certainly nowhere near as much good as I do when I’m at home and actively involved in the Legion of Mary! I know we’re called to throw our lives away for Christ, but this just seems like the wrong kind, the wrong definition of throwing my life away. Am I wrong?

Religious life shouldn’t be that way, and Christian life shouldn’t be that way. It’s not about security, but about taking a risk. I feel excited by the prospect of married life, I even feel excited about the thought of single life in the world, if it allows me to dedicate myself completely to God’s work. I’ve started thinking recently about the life of St Benedict Joseph Labre, the wandering pilgrim saint, and the thought of living a life of radical adventure like that, it seems like a genuinely heroic thing to do. Even as a married man or a permanent Deacon living in a local community, I could still be heroic in giving what I can to those around me, being a faithful witness to my kids.

At the same time, this morning’s reading at Morning Prayer was all about the world being subjected to futility in hope of transformation. Maybe I need to accept that, in reality, I probably could have a great career, a happy marriage, an important role building up the Church locally and through my writing, but that at the end of the day it would still be futile unless the One who subjected the world to futility in hope blesses it. In that case, I may as well accept the futility any vocation, and the objective superiority of living the religious life under the evangelical counsels. It would be the sacrifice of not even allowing myself the excitement of finding out whether I could make a go of life in the world, of just accepting that futility in love and hope, the hope that God can bring good out of it.

The one thing that worries me is that I don’t want to waste more of my life. I’m 27 now, and have another year to go of my PhD. I don’t want to find myself, 5 years on, about to get married, on the way to academic tenure and a promising career, finally realising that, now that I have something to sacrifice, God wants me to sacrifice it and go into religious life. I know that my own anxious mind would bring that thought up and dash all my hopes down if I ever did find myself in that position again (I was engaged and in a promising career 3 years ago, prior to my confirmation, and wrecked it because I was afraid that God was asking me to give it all up to become a religious, and tried to run away from that call), though I don’t know if that anxiety would be from God, it certainly wasn’t from Him the first time.

Yes, I know, tell a Spiritual Director - believe me, I will - all the same, I just wondered if anyone else had had a similar experience? Is it always wrong to enter religious life for these reasons? I know, historically, a lot of the people who entered monasteries in the Middle Ages had such an approach, it wasn’t a bad lifestyle, and nobody needed to know. Maybe the ‘vocations crisis’ is in part due to people always examining their motives on such a deep level. Maybe it was easier for the Church to get an adequate supply of adequate priests - true saints have always been few and far between - when people just accepted that it was as well to accept the clerical state as their lot in life?

 

[skallal]

Hey DL82,

Thanks for your deep reflection. I see that you really want to do God’s will and I like that. I feel like your depth gives you the possibility to make a huge impact in the world, and I like that.

I totally find myself in your desire to do something heroic and that’s exactly why I was going: What can I do that’s heroic? the whole time I was reading your post.

What I mean is: you’re right when you say that God can work with decisions that we make for imperfect reasons. And you are right to feel that you can be heroic right now, where you are, by being faithful to your commitment: That’s heroic! even when it feels dull, especially when it feels dull. It’s heroic to give up the joys of married life for the joys of consecrated life: that’s what vows are…

You might just be a watchman. If you come down from your tower, many may perish. That you cannot see the enemy now matters very little. He may still come to steal and kill and destroy. And where will you be hero? Where will you be?

 

[DL82]

Hey DL82,

Thanks for your deep reflection. I see that you really want to do God’s will and I like that. I feel like your depth gives you the possibility to make a huge impact in the world, and I like that.

I totally find myself in your desire to do something heroic and that’s exactly why I was going: What can I do that’s heroic? the whole time I was reading your post.

What I mean is: you’re right when you say that God can work with decisions that we make for imperfect reasons. And you are right to feel that you can be heroic right now, where you are, by being faithful to your commitment: That’s heroic! even when it feels dull, especially when it feels dull. It’s heroic to give up the joys of married life for the joys of consecrated life: that’s what vows are…

You might just be a watchman. If you come down from your tower, many may perish. That you cannot see the enemy now matters very little. He may still come to steal and kill and destroy. And where will you be hero? Where will you be?

Thanks Brother Scott - are you saying that the most heroic thing I can do is accept the dullness and stick with the religious life, even though I don’t see how it would make an impact in the world, and even when I can see how I could serve God in a more obvious and attractive way as a lay person? The real problem is that the religious life just doesn’t motivate me to do good, and I can’t see how giving up on something that would motivate me and make me excited about doing God’s will can be doing God’s will?

It feels like I’d be giving up the chance to be a saint (but also face temptations) in order to be an adequate priest who’ll never amount to much because he’s not really suited to the style of life. When you think of some of the people who were priests and religious before the ‘vocations crisis’ - people who often went into religious life because it was the only way to be actively involved in the pre-Vatican II Church, people who often burned out and became bitter and sometimes did so much damage to the Church by taking out their frustrations on those who they were charged to look after in love (I’m not talking about the child abuse scandals, but about the physical and emotional violence associated with some schools and orphanages in bygone ages, the alienating effects of aloof priests who always preached hellfire and damnation, to name but two) - I almost wonder whether the smaller number of more dedicated priests and religious we have now is in fact a blessing by comparison. I know I have the ability to swell the ranks of the priesthood by 1, and I know I could be a better priest than some people who became priests in the past, maybe the witness of someone saying ‘hey, it’s not perfect but it’s good enough’ would help others to embrace a similar excuse for ordination (though in all honesty, I think an attitude like that would destroy more vocations than it would encourage), but I don’t know that that amounts to a vocation. I honestly don’t believe God’s Church is that desperate! I also know my real talents, and the real attraction, the thing that gives me the drive and ambition to become a saint is to be a dad, a married man, and someone involved in bringing a culture of life and hope and human dignity into policy work in education.

You are clearly further along the discernment process than I am, please help me out here.

 

[Hidden_One]

There is a saying - one I heard from Abp. Fulton Sheen - that if you do God’s Will, you will know God’s Will (but if you know God’s Will, you won’t necessarily do God’s Will).

Were I you, DL82, I would focus on doing what you know He wants you to do, right now, and to try to constantly remember that I know full well that He has commanded me to be holy as He is holy.

The question of your vocation is not about you, merely asked by you. And when you listen to God’s answer, you will be bound to obey it, whatever it may be.

I’ll be praying for you, DL82.

 

[DL82]

There is a saying - one I heard from Abp. Fulton Sheen - that if you do God’s Will, you will know God’s Will (but if you know God’s Will, you won’t necessarily do God’s Will).

Were I you, DL82, I would focus on doing what you know He wants you to do, right now, and to try to constantly remember that I know full well that He has commanded me to be holy as He is holy.

The question of your vocation is not about you, merely asked by you. And when you listen to God’s answer, you will be bound to obey it, whatever it may be.

I’ll be praying for you, DL82.

I don’t know what that means. I don’t know what He wants me to do right now, that’s the problem. I am here with the Salesians, but I’m not living under their rule, except for taking part in common prayer and meals. I don’t feel a connection to the rest of their rule. I’ll be working all day in schools from Monday (not Salesian work, my PhD work - now that much I do know I ought to do).

The idea that you just live your life and God does the rest doesn’t seem to ring true to me. For example, if I have a vocation to marriage, I may just trip over my wife-to-be some day, but far more likely I’ll need to be looking for her. I met a girl that I get on really well with and would like to take things further, but I can’t if I think I might be called to religious life. I wouldn’t have got in touch with her in the first place if I hadn’t been looking into married life, just as I wouldn’t have got in touch with the Salesians if I hadn’t been looking into religious life (although, if I’m honest, I came here not for that reason, but because my University wouldn’t pay for anywhere more costly for me to stay while I carry out my fieldwork).

In a sentence, my whole life right now can be summed up in one phrase:
OH WHAT’S THE POINT?
On one hand, a life where I can see the good I could do, a life I want to live, a life lived for God with loving abandon. On the other, a life where I feel depressed, see no purpose, no good I can do for others, no motivation, yet I am told is ‘objectively higher’. Both would be a sacrifice. Only one seems to be a sacrifice of praise. At the same time, I don’t want to be a slave to my own desires. At the same time, I never have been a slave to those desires. At the same time, I have all my life been a slave to the desire to destroy my own highest good - not in a holy way, but in a self-destructive, and other-destructive way. Doesn’t make sense.

 

[Hidden_One]

I don’t know what that means. I don’t know what He wants me to do right now, that’s the problem. I am here with the Salesians, but I’m not living under their rule, except for taking part in common prayer and meals. I don’t feel a connection to the rest of their rule. I’ll be working all day in schools from Monday (not Salesian work, my PhD work - now that much I do know I ought to do).

So this is good, in this you are doing what you know you ought.

The idea that you just live your life and God does the rest doesn’t seem to ring true to me.

Nor to me. I’m not advocating a passive life, what I’m trying to do is to get you to stop worrying and to be content doing what you ought - progressing spiritually, doing your PhD stuff, and discerning.

In a sentence, my whole life right now can be summed up in one phrase:
OH WHAT’S THE POINT?
On one hand, a life where I can see the good I could do, a life I want to live, a life lived for God with loving abandon. On the other, a life where I feel depressed, see no purpose, no good I can do for others, no motivation, yet I am told is ‘objectively higher’. Both would be a sacrifice. Only one seems to be a sacrifice of praise. At the same time, I don’t want to be a slave to my own desires. At the same time, I never have been a slave to those desires. At the same time, I have all my life been a slave to the desire to destroy my own highest good - not in a holy way, but in a self-destructive, and other-destructive way. Doesn’t make sense.

God will give you the graces to undertake whichever life He has called you to, and He will give them to you when you need them. Don’t be concerned about the cost - amount, type - or what you will do. All that matters here is the Will of God and you attempting to do it. Whatever your call is to, it is better for you than doing anything else, even if it really doesn’t seem that way.

You need peace. Seek it in prayer.

 

[amichelles08]

DL82,
You are quite honest, to which I applaud you.
However, I feel (and it is a feeling), that you are not suited for the religious vocation. Those in the religious vocation do not, in my experience, feel such anxiety. To be in the religious vocation is their only calling in life, it is a holistic feeling and ration of love which completes their union with God to a complete sense.
It is for this reason I am myself no longer thinking of the religious vocation–I feel God and I can complete my work in the secular life, through other means. That while married or single, (married is now my goal), I have purpose.
Find your purpose, but make sure you are open and do not sway from this purpose.
Do not date and intend to marry if you are still “thinking” about the vocations, or if it may be a remote possibility. Find your purpose first.
Only then should you carry on.
Good luck, God bless.

 

[DOShea]

DL82,

May God grant you peace in your search for real purpose through Him.

I am not nor have ever been inclined or called toward the religious life. The only thing I have to offer you is the perspective of a secular life, but I think it may be of some value to you. It may not be, and if not, feel free to discard it.

When I was your age I had similar thoughts of what can I do with my life and will it matter? We all face that great unknown at the start. As I was gaining education and experience in my work, beginning to progress through positions of increased responsibility, I had the feeling I was closing in on something… that “true purpose” I guess… though I really had nothing more than feeling to base it on. When I was at the bottom looking up, I firmly believed that as I attained greater position, my influence would expand, and the greater would be my contribution, whatever that contribution might be.

One day, much later, I discovered that whole idea was defective. It has some basis in truth, I mean you can’t really say the CEO of a corporation doesn’t have more influence than the fellow in the copy room. The question then was, influencing what, and to what end? I began to understand that contributing as the maker of policies had no more real value on the world around me than the newest employee who faithfully carried them out, and perhaps had far less. I began my career working with my hands, going out and fixing things, and I saw the difference I made several times a day. Later, stuck in an office with only the ability to count how many “fixes” were done by the hand of others, I felt as though I was lacking, missing out on where the real difference in the world is made.

To make a long story short, I have peace now. What I have come to accept is that in this secular work, it isn’t so much what I do that defines my purpose as much as it is how I do it and the faithfulness with which I do it. My CEO, who could put me doing anything in the company, decided I am best serving the needs of the company right where he put me. To ever sense harmony, I must then accept that my work is fulfilled in its maximum right there, and nowhere else.

It is ironic, and I accept it as a gift from God, that my secular struggles and changes in viewpoint are a close match to my matters of faith. As a young man I wondered how could I possibly contribute to a community of faith where there is such a marked distinction between the leaders and the followers? See, I viewed “follower” as an almost derogatory word, presuming that following had little, or at best, a second-class value. Now I know that is the farthest thing from the truth one could possibly imagine.

There are more needy in the world than all the Bishops and Priests could ever uplift on their own. That’s where I come in. I don’t need vestments and incense to be there for my neighbor when they grieve, when they don’t have money for food because they lost their job, or when they stress over things that the world convinces them are the most important. No, the simple and humble acts we each can do are the most profound, to paraphrase Blessed Mother Theresa.

So what I have come to know, and what has brought me great peace, is that I don’t need position, education, or circumstance to manifest the profound in this world. I just need whatever God gives me and the situations He places me in to do that, whatever they may be. The Genesis account of the life of Joseph bears this point out better than my own life. Joseph, from start to finish, never changes. He is always the same Joseph no matter if he’s running a household, in jail, or running the whole nation of Egypt. Only his circumstances changed, and it was by being true to himself, true to and trusting in God, that he always seemed to come out smelling like a rose no matter the depth of the manure pile he landed in.

May God grant you His peace.

 

[JReducation]

I have recently come to realise just how dull the religious life seems to me. Don’t get me wrong, there are some fantastic religious brothers (I’m temporarily living with 12 of them!) who do some amazing work in the world. I just mean it feels dull to me, and I act in a dull way.

Basically, I think I want religious life for all the wrong reasons - as a single man, only child, and convert, without many close friends, currently taking a PhD with no clear career goals in my late 20’s, I guess religious life is quite secure - I know I wouldn’t ever have to worry about my finances again, or about where I’d live, or about living alone or dying alone. It’s also an excuse for not needing to do anything amazing with my life - I could excuse my failure to make a deep impact on the academic world by saying ‘well, I would’ve changed the face of Catholic education, but 5 years into my magnum opus I had to leave to be provincial bursar’, or whatever. As someone with a history of anxiety disorder, I know I often fear the worst, and religious life would be a way of escaping the worst, a way of settling for security, not so much a sacrifice as a trade-off. It’s true that I don’t sin as much when I’m here, but I also don’t even feel that I do as much good as the average married person, and certainly nowhere near as much good as I do when I’m at home and actively involved in the Legion of Mary! I know we’re called to throw our lives away for Christ, but this just seems like the wrong kind, the wrong definition of throwing my life away. Am I wrong?

Religious life shouldn’t be that way, and Christian life shouldn’t be that way. It’s not about security, but about taking a risk. I feel excited by the prospect of married life, I even feel excited about the thought of single life in the world, if it allows me to dedicate myself completely to God’s work. I’ve started thinking recently about the life of St Benedict Joseph Labre, the wandering pilgrim saint, and the thought of living a life of radical adventure like that, it seems like a genuinely heroic thing to do. Even as a married man or a permanent Deacon living in a local community, I could still be heroic in giving what I can to those around me, being a faithful witness to my kids.

At the same time, this morning’s reading at Morning Prayer was all about the world being subjected to futility in hope of transformation. Maybe I need to accept that, in reality, I probably could have a great career, a happy marriage, an important role building up the Church locally and through my writing, but that at the end of the day it would still be futile unless the One who subjected the world to futility in hope blesses it. In that case, I may as well accept the futility any vocation, and the objective superiority of living the religious life under the evangelical counsels. It would be the sacrifice of not even allowing myself the excitement of finding out whether I could make a go of life in the world, of just accepting that futility in love and hope, the hope that God can bring good out of it.

The one thing that worries me is that I don’t want to waste more of my life. I’m 27 now, and have another year to go of my PhD. I don’t want to find myself, 5 years on, about to get married, on the way to academic tenure and a promising career, finally realising that, now that I have something to sacrifice, God wants me to sacrifice it and go into religious life. I know that my own anxious mind would bring that thought up and dash all my hopes down if I ever did find myself in that position again (I was engaged and in a promising career 3 years ago, prior to my confirmation, and wrecked it because I was afraid that God was asking me to give it all up to become a religious, and tried to run away from that call), though I don’t know if that anxiety would be from God, it certainly wasn’t from Him the first time.

Yes, I know, tell a Spiritual Director - believe me, I will - all the same, I just wondered if anyone else had had a similar experience? Is it always wrong to enter religious life for these reasons? I know, historically, a lot of the people who entered monasteries in the Middle Ages had such an approach, it wasn’t a bad lifestyle, and nobody needed to know. Maybe the ‘vocations crisis’ is in part due to people always examining their motives on such a deep level. Maybe it was easier for the Church to get an adequate supply of adequate priests - true saints have always been few and far between - when people just accepted that it was as well to accept the clerical state as their lot in life?

I have a question and a comment.

Question: Are you in vows? If you are, are you in perpetually professed? If not, you are always free to leave.

Comment: Religious life is like everything else. You know that you belong when you are happy. This does not mean that everything has to go well. Trust me. Community living and obedience can be quite challenging and frustrating at times, just like being in any family. But in a family where one belongs, one feels happy even during difficult times.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[DL82]

I have a question and a comment.

Question: Are you in vows? If you are, are you in perpetually professed? If not, you are always free to leave.

Comment: Religious life is like everything else. You know that you belong when you are happy. This does not mean that everything has to go well. Trust me. Community living and obedience can be quite challenging and frustrating at times, just like being in any family. But in a family where one belongs, one feels happy even during difficult times.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

Answer: I’m not in vows, except for the Total Consecration to Our Lady. I feel, like Our Lady, whatever the Church decides for me, I will say ‘yes’ to God, not to my own will. For that reason, I will not leave of my own will. If God wants to say ‘no’ to me, He’ll have to say no through someone else who has the authority to do so.

As to your comment, the problem I have is that I’ve become too used to getting my own way. I grew up as an only child, the son of an only child and a step-mother who insisted on her own way. I’ve come to think of happiness as what happens when nobody else is demanding anything of you, but I know that’s the wrong basis for happiness.

Another thing I’ve realised lately is that, as a convert and an only child, what I’m really looking for is a Catholic culture I fit in with, not necessarily a religious order.

Furthermore, I found myself really looking down on someone I know of who did the discernment year for the diocesan priesthood, was invited to become a priest, and said ‘no’ to the Bishop’s invitation. I couldn’t see how he could do that as a faithful Catholic, particularly in the current vocations crisis. I know another friend who left the novitiate because he wanted to ‘live out’ his own desires, which are not entirely in keeping with Church teaching, and I’ve always felt that he is risking his soul. I also know that he often regrets the decision and feels a lack of purpose in life. I know I’m judging, I know that’s a sin, mea culpa, all the same, I don’t want to become like them.

 

[Hidden_One]

Furthermore, I found myself really looking down on someone I know of who did the discernment year for the diocesan priesthood, was invited to become a priest, and said ‘no’ to the Bishop’s invitation. I couldn’t see how he could do that as a faithful Catholic, particularly in the current vocations crisis.

He may well have that sort of discerned certainty that he is not called. Then it would be improper for him to say yes.

 

[JReducation]

Another thing I’ve realised lately is that, as a convert and an only child, what I’m really looking for is a Catholic culture I fit in with, not necessarily a religious order.

If you’re not looking for a religioius order and you’re not happy, you are doing the religious community an great injustice by staying. Life will only become more difficult for you and for those who have to live with you. You cannot think only of what you want. You must also think of what is good for the religious community. In the end we join the religious life for the perfection of charity. Charity cannot be perfected in an environment where we’re unhappy, where we know that we do not want to be, and where we do not contribute to the happiness of our brothers in community.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[wina]

HI DL,

I will not give you any comment because I think many have given you good advise.
I just want to share with you that I may have similar situation with you but little bit different because I haven’t tried to live in monastery because I don’t want that I join it because I run away from my life now.But I went to personal retreat and talked to sister who has authorisation to give advise to aspirants.
And she told me that you will not know God’s will even when you are already in the monastery until you take your final vow and you will always struggle it all the time. But you have to believe in God through community.Because you can’t just follow your feeling but you should believe the church authority to help you finding your way in life. but one thing you should do is to be honest to God and your self if not then you will suffer joining the community. Some people are afraid to go out after they live with community. That’s wrong and they will suffer when they still live in.

You are in my prayer

 

[meigui98]

If you’re not looking for a religioius order and you’re not happy, you are doing the religious community an great injustice by staying. Life will only become more difficult for you and for those who have to live with you. You cannot think only of what you want. You must also think of what is good for the religious community. In the end we join the religious life for the perfection of charity. Charity cannot be perfected in an environment where we’re unhappy, where we know that we do not want to be, and where we do not contribute to the happiness of our brothers in community.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

I quite agree.
http://www.photosnag.com/img/4713/n09x0302vnsn/clear.gif

 

[irisfromohio]

Ironically, I so long for consecrated life and have been turned away, feeling separated from what I feel is God’s Will. Yet, I do have lingering questions in my heart as well. I was once told that in the past, women were forced into religious life, because they were too ugly to get a husband. I am someone who has always struggled with self esteem and feel that an aesthetically appealing appearance was not one of my gifts. My attempts at romance have been disastrous (to put it mildly). I feel a sense of peace if I see myself living as a bride of Christ and there have been times when I pray on it that I smell roses.

I am left with the confusion: Am I considering religious life just to “hide” my unattractiveness from the public or am I submitting to His Will?

Iris Marie<><

 

[moonletters]

Do not forget, through all of this, that God wants you to be happy. Those in religious life are usually happy to be there serving the lord and others, those with families are usually happy with their lot.

I always dreamed of having children and a family, and now that I am engaged, find myself thinking more and more about a religious life (which I had also though about before, but now seems to be really pulling me some days) as I get closer to my wedding. I have no qualms about marrying this man, we’ve been together for five years, and I think we can stick it through another fifty or more. So I made a promise to God: When, or if, my husband dies before me, I will join a convent or the like. I have expressed this to my fiance and to God and surprisingly it has left me calmer and, well, happy.

Maybe this isn’t going to help you, I just felt I should write it down. If you have any questions, feel free to ask!

(I also want to add that most things in life are not easy. While those who have taken vows may be happy, they may also be struggling, just as a poor family who loves one another struggles. I would caution you that what you seem to see as an easy road may not really be.)

 

[Ceil-1]

Brother,

You sound depressed. I believe it may be your location, at least in part. I have no doubt your future is in jeopardy, as is ours, these days. I don’t believe you should seek out religious life for the purpose of security, because when the times get tough, and they will, if things don’t turn around soon, you will want to bail. There are plenty of things to do. If you need some ideas, let me know.

 

[Sister_Rose]

There is a saying - one I heard from Abp. Fulton Sheen - that if you do God’s Will, you will know God’s Will (but if you know God’s Will, you won’t necessarily do God’s Will).

Were I you, DL82, I would focus on doing what you know He wants you to do, right now, and to try to constantly remember that I know full well that He has commanded me to be holy as He is holy.

The question of your vocation is not about you, merely asked by you. And when you listen to God’s answer, you will be bound to obey it, whatever it may be.

I’ll be praying for you, DL82.

I second this!

Personally, as a fellow “worry-er”, I have found that I can argue myself into pretty much anything, so dwelling on and over-analyzing things tends not to be very fruitful.

 

[Angel_Bradford]

Perhaps the religious order you are discerning with is not where your vocation lies. Any spiritual director will encourage you to experience different orders to see which one, if any, is the right fit for you.

 

[Pro_Domina]

I just want to leave something clear to you. If have a vocation to something ( religious or married, etc) and do something else, some saints say that with great difficulty you will save yourself. Others say it is IMPOSSIBLE.

If you go into the cloister because you don’t want to take up your cross, because you don’t want to wield the sword and go into battle, then you would be sinning.

If you go because you want to protect your “little” soul and you don’t want to go to Hell so you rather shut yourself inside than that is a sin and pure cowardice.

It is no heroism to be called to be a chaste and militant catholic in society and then hide in a monastery.
The same for a man called to convert the world to say it is impossible and succumb to a the mediocre life in society. Heroism is to to fight in the battlefield God gave you.

I said if. You see if that if is correct.