What happens if you reject God's call?

[Cybophonia]

What happens if you feel God has a vocational call for you, but it is not precisely what you want out of life, even if at some point you thought of it?

 

[ProdglArchitect]

Well, first and foremost, it means that your life will not be as fulfilling as it could have been. If God is truly calling you to a vocation then there is noting else in this life you can do that will bring you greater peace and joy.

Beyond that, I’m not sure if it’s considered a sin or not, but if you are truly feeling the call and chose to ignore it then I can’t see a way around the fact that you are knowingly rejecting God’s will… I’m sure there are other posters on the forum with more in depth answers than this, but I just wanted to lay out that first part of my post. What God wants for you will bring you peace and fulfillment, period! No other vocation you chose for yourself will be able to match it.

 

[Regina7]

A nun friend of mine explained it this way: your life will be much more difficult. She knows of several women who knew they were called to be sisters, but got married and had kids instead. These women have a great deal of pain and heartache.

 

[DavidFilmer]

Nobody is required to accept a vocation. It’s a request from God, not a commandment.

So God won’t punish someone for not accepting. God won’t intervene to diminish the person’s quality of living in any way. Nothing will hinder the person from finding satisfaction in whatever s/he pursues.

But the person may experience regret.

 

[Ad_Orientem]

… God won’t punish someone for not accepting. God won’t intervene to diminish the person’s quality of living in any way. …

If our souls are designed for particular vocations, going against the design could make life more difficult without God having to intervene, and indeed without it being a punishment. Do you think vocation is an indifferent matter? Could anyone be anything equally well?

 

[Arizona_Fat_Gir]

It may not be a disaster since God allows for free will. But, I have noticed that some people apparently have everything they want and they are not happy.

Some have swimming pools, money, the latest “stuff”, including diamonds. And I am not talking about regular diamonds; I’m talking about immense rocks that are heavily insured. They don’t make time to enjoy their life even though they could.

Sometimes they even turn away from loved ones. They don’t have time for them either.

As far as a calling from God, it comes in many different ways. Some want to change the way things are on earth. Some just want to go along and find the latest stuff.

 

[BarbTh]

Vocation is always an invitation and not a command. If one chooses some other vocation in which to love and serve God, there is no punishment attached to declining God’s invitation. God is not mean nor petty and if one chooses another vocation, then the Graces of God will be present and abundant to live that vocation to holiness. If later in life one experiences difficulties or regrets, it is something within oneself and a problem to work through which is not related to declining God’s invitation although one might be tempted to think so.

Difficulties and regrets, no matter one’s vocation, are intrinsic to the journey of life…we are all going to experience these two dispositions…aside from miraculous intervention.

An invitation from God, however, is not to be treated lightly and one would be very wise indeed in discernment to seek spiritual direction simply because there is a debt of gratitude I would think. If there was any sort of penalty whatsoever attached to not taking up God’s invitation, then the invitation has something of obligation about it.

If one should think one has a vocation to religious life, but it is not exactly what one personally desires for their life, then it would be doubtful that they actually did have a vocation to religious life. Spiritual direction!

 

[ChibiViolet]

It’s not a sin…I am confused when it has come to feelings I have had that I thought were coming from God. I don’t have them anymore, but I felt VERY strong feelings of being called to be a nun for a very long time, but I know that that could never possibly work out and I usually put common sense before emotions. There are just too many reasons it could never work out.

 

[SMH_2015]

So God won’t punish someone for not accepting. God won’t intervene to diminish the person’s quality of living in any way.

Welllll…Jonah comes to mind…just sayin.

 

[BarbTh]

Because discerning God’s Will and for the rest of one’s entire life is such a major matter, it is best to seek sound spiritual direction.
If one feels one might be called to religious life but common sense seems to indicate that there are “too many reasons it could not work out” MIGHT/COULD indicate that one does not have the vocation - however, again wisdom and prudence would indicate one seeks direction on such a major matter.
If one has chosen a vocation and committed oneself to it and later realises that spiritual direction probably would have been the best course, there is no reason whatsoever to doubt what one has actually chosen - but without any spiritual direction. God is never mean nor petty ever (as sometimes we humans can inclined to be) and Grace will be with one in the chosen vocation.

 

[Regina7]

Satan will always work extra hard to convince a person that s/he is not cut out for religious life.

 

[eazyduzit]

I believe the parable of the talents is about God’s calling. The talent is a form of money, but it represents an opportunity. I think the rest is self explanatory.

Blessings

Eazy

 

[BarbTh]

Undoubtedly, The Gospel parables could have a few messages and not only one exclusive message. The parable of the talents is also, I think, about our gifts - using and building on them no matter one’s vocation in life. What are my gifts is also a question to be addressed in discerning vocation. Matthew 25 14-30 vatican.va/archive/ENG0839/__PVY.HTM
Our gifts (or talents as in the parable) can very often be fruitfully utilized in all vocations, not only in religious life or the priesthood.

I agree that Satan will work very hard against religious vocations, however Satan is never stronger than God’s Grace and sound spiritual direction will identify where Satan is at work. If we read the story of Job and also the CCC, Satan cannot act without God’s permitting.
The story of Job is here: vatican.va/archive/ENG0839/__PEM.HTM See Chapter 1

Catholic Catechism: scborromeo.org/ccc/p1s2c1p4.htm#324 See #309 - #314

Pope Benedict stated that all who desire to take their baptism and The Gospel seriously should have spiritual direction. It is not only for priests and religious, but for all of us. zenit.org/en/articles/pope-recommends-spiritual-direction-to-everyone

 

[PRmerger]

What happens if you feel God has a vocational call for you, but it is not precisely what you want out of life, even if at some point you thought of it?

Hi, Cybo.

You started a tributary of dialogue on another thread, and then left.

Would you mind addressing the question? Thanks.

I always thought that the beliefs between the RCC and Eastern Catholic(Byzantine) were a bit different. I thought that EC retains more of the Orthodox than it adapted of the RCC.

Perhaps you could give some examples of doctrines which are not Catholic but are Orthodox in the Eastern Catholic rites?

 

[Cybophonia]

Hi, Cybo.

You started a tributary of dialogue on another thread, and then left.

Would you mind addressing the question? Thanks.

It was just an opinion as i am mostly ignorant of both. You can disregard it / delete that post, whatever you please.

I was saying that because the EC are former EO… They should have the Palamite theology. Orthodox saints, Orthodox liturgy, married priests, etc…

 

[PRmerger]

It was just an opinion as i am mostly ignorant of both. You can disregard it / delete that post, whatever you please.

I was saying that because the EC are former EO… They should have the Palamite theology. Orthodox saints, Orthodox liturgy, married priests, etc…

Ok.

Suffice it to say that the Eastern Catholics are Catholic in their theology and doctrines/teachings.

 

[Cybophonia]

Bump.

 

[Bob_Crowley]

I get pretty frustrated with this business of following God’s will, or not following it.

So in the early hours of the morning when I had trouble sleeping, I got up and pulled a book from the shelves, which I picked up in an op-shop some time ago, entitled, “He Leadeth Me” by Walter J. Ciszek. He was a Pennsylvanian born American of Polish origin, and he was a lot tougher than me frankly. I think I’d have been bones in some Siberian Gulag if I’d gone through his experience. But he went to Siberia because he wanted to be a priest in Soviet Russia.

A brief biography is shown below. The book is about his experiences in Russia.

ciszek.org/About_Ciszek.html

Anyway the book more or less fell open at a bit where he has recently been released, and he is “free”. But he went on to write about the contradiction of freedom, that we’re only really free if we do God’s will.

It is in choosing to serve God, to do his will, that man achieves his highest and fullest freedom. It may seem paradoxical to say that our highest and fullest freedom comes when we follow to the least detail the will of another, but it is true nonetheless when that other is God. I could testify from my own experiences, especially from my darkest hours in Lubianka, that the greatest sense of freedom, along with peace of soul and an abiding sense of security, comes when a man totally abandons his own will in order to follow the will of God…

For those who do not believe in God, I suppose, such thoughts will seem sheer nonsense or unexplainable stupidity. For me, however, there could be no doubt: the fullest freedom I had ever known, the greatest sense of security, came from abandoning my will to do only the will of God. What was there to fear so long as I did his will? Not death. Not failure, except the failure to do his will. “For if God is for us, who can stand against us?”…

I could not always fathom the depths of his providence or pretend to understand his wisdom, but I was secure in the knowledge that by abandoning myself to his will I was doing as perfectly as I could his will for me…

So wrote an American Polish Jesuit priest who spent 20 years in Russia, either in the Lubianka, or in a Gulag, or in the mines or doing some other hard, unremitting labour as a “guest” of the Soviet government.

 

[Cybophonia]

I feel I have a call to be a theologian. Theology to me comes natural and easy and sometimes i can find myself debating or reading theological stuff for hours. For I do not know what reason I like. I used to think I was called for priesthood or monasticism when I was younger(in the EOC the priest needs to be married and can marry), I still find this call, as a religious call but I cannot precisely decipher it of what sort it is. I would not like to become a monastic… Nor a priest, cause I also think it is a great burden and responsibility (the souls of all people) and I am yet to be convinced of any theology as the Ultimate Real Truth. In the past few years I tried to run away from it as much as possible and live a secular, materialist life as much as possible. I also realised it is too much time-consuming and energy consuming sometimes in pointless and harming ways. Pondering on religion and religious morality, and the morality of God always somehow make me harm, as respectively at different points i see at least one of those as immoral and senseless. Lately I had some trouble believing God is fair, and had a lot of moments when I thought/think that God is (also) pure evil. Or that he cannot exist. I am mostly like this with ups and downs, back and forward. Pursuing an ultimate fairness and morality deep down. What would your advices be?

 

[PRmerger]

I feel I have a call to be a theologian. Theology to me comes natural and easy and sometimes i can find myself debating or reading theological stuff for hours. For I do not know what reason I like. I used to think I was called for priesthood or monasticism when I was younger(in the EOC the priest needs to be married and can marry), I still find this call, as a religious call but I cannot precisely decipher it of what sort it is. I would not like to become a monastic… Nor a priest, cause I also think it is a great burden and responsibility (the souls of all people) and I am yet to be convinced of any theology as the Ultimate Real Truth. In the past few years I tried to run away from it as much as possible and live a secular, materialist life as much as possible. I also realised it is too much time-consuming and energy consuming sometimes in pointless and harming ways. Pondering on religion and religious morality, and the morality of God always somehow make me harm, as respectively at different points i see at least one of those as immoral and senseless. Lately I had some trouble believing God is fair, and had a lot of moments when I thought/think that God is (also) pure evil. Or that he cannot exist. I am mostly like this with ups and downs, back and forward. Pursuing an ultimate fairness and morality deep down. What would your advices be?

I would suggest, probably, first becoming a believe in God.

It’s kind of hard to be a priest or monastic if you’re an agnostic, eh?

Personally, I am just being truthful… I am an agnostic fella.