Tag: discernment

On Discernment

Our God Is a God of Journeys

10 years ago today I entered the convent. I quit my job, said goodbye to everyone I loved, and gave away everything I owned.

9 years and 9 months ago I left the convent.

Leaving was harder.

The whole time I was there, trying to ignore how wrong it all felt, how hopeless I was (a good sign something’s not God’s will), there was a fear: not just that I would fail to persevere in God’s will but that I would leave and everybody would think I had failed.

Leaving gave me greater joy than anything since I entered. Still, it was awful. I felt confused, ashamed, misunderstood. I thought I must have discerned wrong, that the search that had left me with half a dozen closed doors and one open one wasn’t thorough enough.

It was a long time before I realized that God can call you to enter religious life but not to make vows. He can call you to med school knowing you won’t graduate. He can call you to date someone you’re never going to marry. Because our God is a God of journeys, not of destinations. He’s the only destination he’s concerned about, his Sacred Heart and his loving arms in eternity.

He called me to enter a beautiful community that I’m deeply glad not to be a part of now. Maybe so I would become committed to silent prayer, or learn that I wasn’t called to religious life, or be in a grocery store in a funny outfit one day in 2009 because somebody needed it. I don’t need to know why.

I know that God was at work when I entered and when I left. He was at work when I explored consecrated virginity and when I started dating again. He was at work when I quit hoboing for the perfect job and when that job dramatically disappeared and I got back on the road.

He’s working in your life right now, too. In your unemployment, disability, infertility, loneliness, divorce, addiction, uncertainty. He’s working in the false starts and the cringeworthy mistakes.

Discernment isn’t about getting things right, about figuring out the missing piece that turns your struggle into happily-ever-after. Discernment is about following the Lord, even–especially–if you have no idea where he’s leading you.

10 years later, I’m glad I entered. I’m glad I left. I’m glad I followed.

Stop Seeking God’s Will

Want to hear my best discernment advice?

Stop seeking God’s will.

Really. So many of us seek God’s will above all–even above God.

We use him as a Magic 8-Ball, going to prayer only to figure things out and not to worship. We treat his will like a scavenger hunt set up by a sadistic leprechaun who sends us signs and then laughs (or rages) when we miss them. We obsess over ourselves and our skills and our desires and our future and call it prayer.

Stop seeking God’s will and start seeking God. Because if you run after the Lord you will find yourself in his will.

I spend a lot of time making decisions–with no home and no steady employment, there are a lot of decisions to be made. Want to know how I do it?

I spend serious time in silent prayer every day. Then I live my life.

I trust that God is either going to form my heart to desire what he desires, or he’s going to stop me before I do something dumb, or he’s going to fix it afterward. I try not to lose peace over confusion or uncertainty, because I know that God delights in me. If I’m earnestly trying to live in his will, he’s not going to punish me for getting it wrong.

It’s entirely possible that I’m going to go to my judgment and find God standing baffled before me, wondering why on earth I thought I ought to be homeless and unemployed for the sake of the kingdom. There’s a reason people don’t live this way, and perhaps I’ve gotten it totally wrong and I was really supposed to be an accountant in Idaho or something.

Still, I expect to see pleasure mixed in with the bafflement. “Oh, but honey, well done! It was a weird life you chose, but you tried so hard. You got it wrong, but you sure were seeking me.”

I think he delights in my efforts, however ridiculous they might be, and I find great peace in that. I can’t mess up discernment so badly that I ruin his plan for me, because ultimately his plan is for my holiness. If I’m seeking him, he’ll accomplish that, whatever odd paths it might take.

So if you find yourself stressing out about figuring out God’s will, stop seeking God’s will and start seeking God. Spend serious time in silent prayer every day and trust that he loves you. He’ll do the rest.

How I Became a Hobo Missionary

My name is Meg and I’m a hobo missionary. After 5 years teaching religion I quit my job, packed everything into my car, and started driving. For the last 7 years, I’ve been living out of my car (no really, I don’t have a home) going all around the world to give talks and retreats and tell people how much God loves them. I’ve been to 50 states and 25 countries in the past 7 years and driven 230,000 miles.

How on earth does a person make a decision like that?

I loved teaching. And God’s grace was all over it–as bad as my temper is, I only got angry 2 times in 4 1/2 years in the classroom.

The trouble is I taught for 5.

And that last semester the grace was withdrawn. I was ticked all the time. Now I’m not saying when things get hard, run. I’m saying if things are supernaturally hard, pay attention.

So I prayed about leaving and I felt a lot of peace. And then I thought maybe I should pray about not teaching anymore and felt a resounding peace.

I was not thrilled.

What was I supposed to do? Teaching was all I’d ever wanted to do. But a priest friend of mine said, “You’re good at public speaking. Why don’t you do that?”

Cute, Father. You can’t just quit life and become a public speaker.

But I took it to prayer and God said, “Tell me why not.”

I don’t hear voices when I pray. (Some people do, and that’s great.) But I couldn’t come up with a single reason not to move into my car.

Now, if you’re naturally a bum on the couch and you think being homeless and unemployed is a good idea, it’s not. Get a job. But I’m very type-A and achievement-oriented, so when it seemed like a good idea to move into my car, I figured it had to be from God. If you find yourself drawn to something that’s really contrary to your natural inclinations, you have to pay attention to that. So I quit my job and hit the road.

tldr:

It may be God’s call if:
1. everything external is the same and the internal changes.
2. it gives you deep peace.
3. you find yourself drawn to something that you wouldn’t naturally desire.

(None of this works if you’re not in a state of grace. Go to confession.)

Your Body Affects Your Discernment

Some practical discernment advice:

Before silent prayer (and thus coffee) became a daily habit of mine, I found myself starting a school day with a killer headache and 3 hours of sleep. So I grabbed a large iced coffee and took some excedrin before a morning of proctoring exams.

Ten minutes into the first period, I was anxious and jittery and miserable like I’d never been before. Something was *wrong*, I could tell. Maybe I had committed a mortal sin? Maybe I needed to quit my job? Maybe someone was in danger and the Spirit was trying to tell me? I knew peace was a sign of being in God’s will, so I figured my anxiety could only be a sign of the opposite.

Then I remembered my excess of caffeine that morning and realized: I was high.

I wasn’t in a state of sin, I wasn’t in the wrong career, it wasn’t time to end a relationship. I was just exhausted and over-caffeinated. All I needed to do was wait it out and get some sleep that night.

It’s one of the most important lessons in discernment I’ve learned: your body matters. You can’t discern properly in a state of sin and you can’t discern properly in a state of exhaustion or illness or oxytocin euphoria.

Discernment isn’t just a matter of the supernatural but of the natural. So if you’re feeling a lot of anxiety about a particular situation (engagement, grad program, job) and you think God’s trying to get your attention, start by looking at your life.

-Are you overtired?
-Are you doing what you need to be emotionally healthy–eating well, exercising, getting time to yourself?
-Is your life out of balance?
-Is there something that happened that you haven’t yet processed in prayer, something miserable that’s coloring your vision of everything?
-Are you coming up on an anniversary of something traumatic?
-Do you need to meet with a therapist to try to figure out all of the above?

Sometimes what seems like a need for a major life change is just a need for a nap, an iron supplement, a counselor, or a break from your kickball league. If you’ve got a big decision to make, start by getting things sorted out on the natural level and you’ll be in a healthy place to consider where the Lord’s trying to lead.

You Don’t Need a Sign from God

For a while in college I was paralyzed by the need to know I was doing God’s will, incapable of making any decision without divine edict.

At one point I was in a marvelous choir whose rehearsal schedule was making me miserable; truly, I cried every time I had to go. But I don’t quit things, so I kept going.

Finally, to appease my beleaguered roommate (and because they were popular among my friends), I did a novena to St. Thérèse to ask if I should quit choir. I asked for a white rose if I was supposed to quit. I figured I’d be safe–I hadn’t once seen roses in college.

On day 9, there it was. A rose.

A yellow rose.

I promise you, Jesus heard my prayer–a prayer so obsessed with certainty and unconcerned with surrender–and said (with some frustration), “I could give you a white rose if I wanted to. I don’t want to rule your life by botanical memo. Just make your own decision.”

It was a theme in my life at the time: the repeated reminder that God made us free. Yes, his will for us is where our greatest joy and peace will ultimately be, but he didn’t make us puppets or slaves, he made us children. And he trusts us to make our own choices.

Spend time in silent prayer every day. Receive the Sacraments. Get a spiritual director. But then *choose*.

Don’t wait for a sign, don’t assume God’s plan will just happen to you, don’t ignore the need to act and join the Order of Perpetual Discerners. Do something.

You don’t need a sign from God to ask a woman out, to call a vocation director, to apply for a new job, to move to a new town. You need to place it before the Lord, ask him to form your heart, and then make 👏 a 👏 decision 👏.

Now for those discerning a vocation, those for whom there is some desire for priesthood or consecrated life (even if not a consuming one):

You don’t discern in a vacuum. Call the vocation director. Go on a come and see. Heck, just ask to enter! Worst comes to worst, you get a free 6-month retreat, complete with good formation and the space to discern without being surrounded by pretty girls in chapel veils. Enter to discern, enter with open hands, but give it a shot.

You can’t live your life waiting for divine directives. Just act.

(And yes, I quit the choir. If something to which you haven’t irrevocably committed and that isn’t particularly good for you is making you miserable, you don’t need divine revelation to tell you to take a break.)

You Are Called to Be a Bride of Christ

Let me take some of the guesswork out of discernment for you:

You are called to be a bride of Christ.

Everyone is. It’s God’s deepest desire that you give yourself to him completely in love in the wedding feast of heaven. He tells us this in Hosea, the Song of Songs, Revelation. In the Gospels, where Jesus comes as bridegroom. In Isaiah, where he says, “As a bridegroom rejoices in his bride, so shall your God rejoice in you.”

So if you’re entering religious life, it’s not to discern if he’s calling you to be his bride. He is. You’re trying to discover *how* he wants to marry you.1) If you’ve left religious life, it’s not because God broke up with you. It’s because he wanted to marry you in a different way, in a different community or through the love of an earthly husband or through years of wandering and wondering, walking down the aisle to receive your bridegroom in the Eucharist until finally you meet him in eternity.

You’re called to be a priest.

Every Christian is, by virtue of our baptism where we were anointed priest, prophet, and king.

So if you’re in seminary, it’s to discern what your priesthood and spiritual fatherhood should look like. If you discern out, it’s not because God doesn’t want you, because you’re not good enough or strong enough; it’s because there’s a different fatherhood he needs from you, a different life of sacrificial love, a different witness of radical holiness in the world.

You’re called to be a missionary. For some, that looks like a ridiculous hobo life; for others, it’s a witness offered at library storytime or while training for a marathon.

You’re called to be a saint. But the devil wants to convince you that if you live an ordinary life it’s because you’re rejected, unloved, found wanting. That’s not the Gospel. And when we let anxiety about earning or losing God’s love invade our discernment, we act not in freedom but in desperation.

Your vocation isn’t something you’re awarded for having been good enough. He delights in you, just as he does in the greatest Saints. Ignore the lie that God doesn’t want you because you didn’t get a flashy call. You are a bride and an evangelist and a saint-in-the-making. You are loved.

God’s Will Isn’t in the “What If”

Your circumstances aren’t a hindrance to God’s will. Even the ones that are your fault.

The idea that we might discern wrong is paralyzing, leaving us stuck for years, unable to commit to anything.

The idea that we *have* discerned wrong is worse. We think, “Oh, I could be a saint if only I hadn’t made the mistake of marrying that person, having that baby, taking out those loans.” We become bitter, trapped in what ifs.

And yeah. Your life might be better if you hadn’t married that guy, gone to that party, sent that email. Maybe holiness would have come easier.

Maybe it wouldn’t.

It doesn’t actually matter.

God’s will isn’t in the “what if.” God’s will is in the now.

Maybe you shouldn’t have married her. But you did. And so you stay. Unless there’s abuse, you stay. And even if abuse or addiction or adultery means you have to leave, you don’t sit around wishing you’d married someone else. You can’t change the past.

Maybe motherhood wasn’t God’s “perfect will” for you (a concept that’s rather dangerous when it so easily becomes an obsession) but it’s God’s will for you now.

Maybe you ran from what you knew was God’s call and you can’t take it back. Be a saint here. Choose him now.

Sometimes you’re on the wrong path and it’s not too late. You can break an engagement or cancel an ordination or pull your kids out of school. You can change the now.

But some things can’t be changed. Maybe it’s your fault and maybe it’s really not. But it does nobody any good to obsess over the past, wishing we could take it back.

How can you be holy NOW? In this marriage, with this unplanned pregnancy, after this layoff, in this heartbreak?

Grieve the life you wish you had. Mourn and lament at the foot of the Cross, below your broken Savior weeping for you. Then put your suffering into the wound in his Sacred Heart and get to work.

There is no “if only” in the life of one whose master raises the dead. If unchangeable circumstances make something impossible, it’s not God’s will. Figure out where holiness lies for you *now*, with your passel of kids or chronic illness or PTSD or GED or ADD. God works in and through your circumstances. Be the saint he’s calling you to be now.

You Don’t Have to Be Afraid of God’s Will

You don’t have to be afraid of God’s will.

I know he sometimes calls people to scary things. (Living in a car here. Believe me, I know.) I know that many of the Saints suffered terribly. I know that often it seems as though the only way to be holy is to give up everything that makes you happy.

Here’s the thing:

God loves you.

Not smiley-face-bumper-sticker love. Reckless, fierce, tender, consuming, unconditional, life-changing, sacrificial love. The call to follow him is an invitation to take up your cross, but it’s also an invitation to a love affair beyond all imagining. And while the crosses we’re given may be heavy, they’re formed to fit our shoulders, to strengthen us as we walk alongside him bearing a burden so much smaller than his.

So yeah, if you follow Jesus, you’re going to suffer.

If you don’t follow Jesus, you’re going to suffer.

I’m sorry, but regardless of what you do, you’re going to suffer. It’s the human condition. The question is whether your suffering has meaning, whether you’re loved and held in your suffering or left feeling abandoned and alone.

God isn’t constructing a call that will crush you, though it may seem that way at times. He’s a good Father and he loves you wildly. So the vocation he’s given you is for your good, for your joy, for your holiness, for your salvation.

That doesn’t mean that if you’re in God’s will you’ll be happy all the time. That’s never promised us in this vale of tears. And it doesn’t mean that he’ll give you everything your heart desires, if only you check all the boxes and do what he’s asked. He loves us too much to give us everything we want.

It means that you don’t have to be afraid of his will. He’s not out to get you. He offers peace and joy in some measure in this world and perfectly in the next.

So trust him. Give him space to speak in your life. Let him be the one to tell you who you are. Stop running from his call, stop hiding behind busyness and using prayers to hold him at arm’s length because you’re afraid of what he might say if you’re silent. Be still before him. Ask him to show you what it is that he loves you.

If you let him in, if you let him lead, you will not regret it.

Following When You Can’t See Him

How do you follow when you can’t see that he’s leading you? Or even that he’s with you?

I know a lot of you are hurting, feeling abandoned in your pain. I know you wonder why God has allowed it, when he’ll deliver you, how he could possibly work this mess for good.

They’re natural, those questions. But they’re the wrong questions. When we’re lost or suffering or alone, the question is not “When?” or “How?” or even “Why?” The question is “Who?”

Who is this God we worship? If he’s a puppetmaster or a strategist, messing with our lives with no regard for our hearts, we owe him neither trust nor love.

But if he’s the God who is love, the God who calls Israel his darling, the God who was stripped naked, beaten to a pulp, and nailed to a cross to die (and then rise) on the off chance that you’d love him back, we have to learn to say, “The God who loves me is at work in this. I don’t know what he’s doing. I don’t know why. But I know I’m not alone.”

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to see where God is in your pain or wondering when you’ll be released. The danger is when you’re seeking those answers because you don’t trust that God is who he said he is: the Lord and Lover of souls.

When people are suffering, I don’t often have answers. I can begin to see the way their pain is working to make them holier and happier—ultimately. But in the moment it doesn’t feel like enough. And so I find myself saying, “I don’t know. I don’t know what God’s doing, but I know who he is. I know that he’s for you. I know that he loves you more than you can imagine. I know that there’s nothing he wouldn’t do for you. And so if he’s not stepping in to save you, I have to trust not in what I can see and understand but in who I know him to be. He is yours and you are his. There is nothing to fear.”

As you struggle to follow him through whatever situation is trying your soul right now, take this to prayer: Who is God? What has he done in the past to reveal his power, his mercy, his love? What has he done in salvation history and what has he done in your life?

When we remember what he’s done, we understand better who he is. And if we know who he is, we can trust him. We can follow.

You Can’t Irrevocably Ruin God’s Plan for You

You can’t irrevocably ruin God’s plans for you.

Sure, maybe you’ve ruined God’s “perfect plan” for you 15 times. Every time God worked with you. Every time you refused to follow or failed to listen or became paralyzed by indecision, God sent grace upon grace and a new path to holiness.

Nothing you’ve done and nothing that’s been done to you makes you irredeemable. PLENTY of Saints were on plan G (or Z) by the time they finally found the Lord:

-St. Matthew Le Van Gam may have been called to enter seminary. He may have been called to leave seminary and get married. He was NOT called to cheat on his wife. But God’s grace is bigger than our sin; they found healing and he found a martyr’s crown.
-Bl. Saturnina was called to religious life but a bad spiritual director told her to get married. So God gave her a vocation to marriage (and 2 wonderful stepchildren). When she was widowed after only 12 years, her call to religious life returned and she founded a new community.
-Bl. Victoire Rasoamanarivo thought she was called to religious life, but when the Sisters convinced her to get married, her lay status made it possible for her to keep the Church running when all priests and religious were expelled from the country.
-Bl. Mary of the Apostles didn’t find her vocation till she was 55. She entered and left 3 communities and founded a 4th that left her before she finally founded the Salvatorian Sisters. Maybe that was all plan A. Maybe not. Either way, it’s what made her a Saint.
-St. Mark Ji TianXiang was an opium addict till the day that he died. That wasn’t God’s desire for him, but he continued to pour out grace that culminated in St. Mark’s martyrdom.
-Sts. Louis and Zelie both wanted to be consecrated. But God wanted the world to have St. Therese (and wanted them to have each other) so they got married and thank the Lord for that!

This is why we don’t have to panic about discernment: God will work with you. If you’re not called to marriage and you get married, he’ll give you a vocation to marriage. If you pick the wrong career, he’ll bless you in that. If you’re wandering and confused and just keep false starting, my friend, you’re in good company. Be at peace.

Love God and then Act

Discernment shouldn’t be terrifying or paralyzing. It isn’t just for enormous decisions and it isn’t waiting for a sign telling you what to wear each morning.

Discernment is falling in love with the God who loved you first and desiring to be in his will.

Discernment is a habit of silent prayer and an attitude of openness to the Spirit.

Discernment is trusting that the God you’ve given your heart to has formed that heart, is speaking in your peace and through your desires, and isn’t going to give up on you even if you get it all wrong.

So what do we need to remember?

-God loves you wildly, recklessly. No matter what.
-It’s more important to seek the Lord than to obsess over his plan. Ultimately his plan is for you to be his.
-God speaks in the silence we carve out for him. Silent prayer is hard but it’s not optional.
-Our God is a God of journeys, not destinations. Just because you don’t know where he’s leading doesn’t mean he’s not leading. Just because you took a detour doesn’t mean he isn’t blessing you in the wandering. Just because you can’t feel him doesn’t mean he’s not there.
-If you find yourself drawn to something you wouldn’t naturally desire, pay attention. If something gives you resounding peace or unnatural anxiety, pay attention.
-Don’t try to discern when hungry, angry, lonely, tired, etc. Deal with your mess (as much as you can) and go from there.
-Just make a decision. God can reroute you far more easily when you’re moving. And he won’t punish you for earnestly trying to follow him but being sort of an idiot.
-Stop rediscerning decisions you can’t alter. It doesn’t matter what you should have done. What matters is what you do now.
-Every call from God is an invitation to love him better, to experience greater joy in him, to be made holy. Even in little things he’s working to make us saints.

Don’t let discernment make you anxious. Just run after Jesus and make the next move. Listen to the longings of your heart, but only after giving him permission to form them through daily silent prayer and regular reception of the Sacraments.

Trust that he loves you, that he’s working, that he won’t abandon you. Then make a decision. That’s discernment.

  1. (Consecrated life is a different sort of bridal relationship, of course, a realization on earth of what we’re all promised in heaven. And the ministerial priesthood isn’t the same as the priesthood of all believers. But one is not a prize and the other is not a rejection. The goal of every vocation is the same: heaven. [↩]

Calling All Women Discerning Religious Life (Men, Too)

A few months ago, a friend from high school reached out to me wanting to hear about my discernment process from when I entered religious life. I was happy to discuss but surprised that she was asking, as she’s not a Christian. Discernment–particularly vocational discernment–is something that we usually talk about only with other Catholics. But I’m generally happy to discuss anything about Jesus, so I was game. It turns out that Eve is working on a piece for The Huffington Post investigating the way young Millennials discern. She’s a brilliant writer and a beautiful soul and I think her contribution to this conversation (especially when it’s published on a site like The Huffington Post) will be a gift to the Church. Here’s what Eve has to say:

I’m a Jewish-American writer based in Johannesburg, South Africa, who’s profoundly interested in the spiritual experience throughout history and how it occurs in an age many people think of as thoroughly secular, science-minded, data-driven, and beyond the reach of the mystical or necessitating the presence of faith. For a long essay I’m writing for The Huffington Post, I’m looking to talk with American women under the age of 25 in the process of discernment to enter the religious life. I’m interested in how you experienced your call, the tangible ways that changed how you interacted with the world (for instance, did you come to use Facebook differently? The push to have a good “career” differently? Did it change how you related to the uncertainty of the contemporary economy and the loneliness often present in contemporary friendships?). I’m deeply interested in the kinds of experiences of the modern world, and of God, that led a young woman to pursue a vocation. If you’d be willing to chat with me by phone, FaceTime, or Skype about your journey, please get in touch with me on Facebook. I’d ideally love to speak with women from a range of backgrounds, including families that were not religious or professed a different religion, and different parts of the country or economic backgrounds. We can speak casually first and then discuss if you’d like to be quoted by name in the story. While my interest is primarily in young women, I’d also REALLY love to talk to some young men discerning about the priesthood, too.

Here’s a brief example of my work. Among others, this piece, from an experiential point of view, argues hard against the modern conception that we are the best, or real, architects of our own lives.

If you’re interested in speaking to Eve, leave a comment here (anonymous or not) or send me a message and I’ll put you two in touch. Please DON’T tag a friend or share it to her Facebook wall–her discernment might not be something she’s ready to be public about. Send it in a private message and she can contact me herself. I know that Eve is particularly interested in speaking with a diverse group of young people discerning with traditional communities, especially people from non-religious families, people of color, immigrants, and the very poor and very wealthy. She’s come to the right Church, hasn’t she? You’ve never met a body more diverse than the Catholic Church, and I’d love to help her write a piece that shows how the love of Christ breaks down all the divisions we erect between ourselves to call hearts to deep holiness and deep joy. Plus she’s offered to let me look it over before publication to make sure the theology’s on point, so you don’t have to worry about the Church being misrepresented. What a great opportunity to witness to the Love of Christ that invites us to be completely his! Who’s in?

Duplicity

How cute were we?

I wrote this song a decade ago (with my brilliant sister‘s help on instrumentation and harmonies) but it came back into my head with a vengeance last week and I haven’t been able to get it out. All I could think is that one of you needed it, so here’s my very honest depiction of what my fancy words in prayer are often masking.

Feels like these days every time that I pray I seem to lie to you.
I say I want and I need and I love you completely, but it’s not true.
Cause when I raise my hands and close my eyes,
My lips can speak what my heart denies:

I want you!
        Or at least what you give me.
I need you!
        But just if it’s easy.
I’ll follow you!
        If you take me where I want to go.
I love you!
        Just don’t tell me no.

Looking for feelings or just understanding, it’s me I seek.
And if I want and I need and I love me completely, it’s not complete.
And if I raise my hands and close my eyes,
My lips can speak what my heart denies:

I want you!
        Or at least what you give me.
I need you!
        But just if it’s easy.
I’ll follow you!
        If you take me where I want to go.
I love you!
       Just don’t tell me no.

Cause if it’s all about me then I can’t even see your face.
And if I’m trying to prove you how can I be moved by your grace?
This is not what you planned when you held out your hand
And said, “Give your life up to be free.”
And I’m not the one with the work to be done.
All I can do is surrender to you and let your will be done to me.

Till I say, kneeling before you, I’m here to adore you. You’re all I need.
And to want you and need you and be yours completely, I’ve gotta let you lead.
I’ve gotta raise my hands and close my eyes,
Let my lips speak what my heart cries:

Shake me! Tear me from all my weakness.
And break me till I’m torn into pieces.
Then take my heart, make me what I’m meant to be.
I love you–this can’t be about me.

It’s a very rough recording, but there’s something about that line in the bridge, that image of Jesus gently reaching out his hand and saying, “Give your life up to be free,” that’s been speaking to me lately, or at least trying to. I go through phases in prayer, often just trying to sound good or to excite emotions or to *discern discern discern*1 and usually all he’s asking is for me to let him be God. Pray for me, will you?

  1. Goodness but I’m sick of discerning; when you have no constants in your life, though, there’s really no way around it [↩]

Big Ugly Buts

When people ask me how I got started with this hobo thing, the heart of it goes like this: I knew I needed to quit my teaching job and a priest friend said to me, “You’re good at public speaking and you’ve wanted to do more of that.” “Father,” I guffawed, “you can’t just quit life and be a public speaker!” And then I took it to prayer. And God said, “Tell me why not.”

I do a lot of reasoning with God. I tell him why it’s a bad idea for me to do something hard, how it’s really going to make me less holy, how I’m not going to be effective. I keep throwing up objections, like he hadn’t already thought of them. Turns out I’m in good company. Moses was much the same.

burning bushGrab your Bibles, friends, and flip to Exodus 3.1 Moses’ first encounter with the living God is no laughing matter: a bush that’s on fire but not consumed. God demonstrates his power by doing something that’s impossible, using something frail for his glory without destroying it, and then tells Moses he’s going to do the same through him:

“Come, now! I will send you to Pharaoh to lead my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.” (3:10)

A disembodied voice from a miraculous vision. And Moses’ reaction?

But.

That’s right. Moses objects.

But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and lead the Israelites out of Egypt?” (3:11)

The minute he’s called by God to do something great, Moses starts thinking about himself. He’s unworthy, he thinks, and so he corrects God.

“I’ve been feeling like I need to teach Sunday School, but I don’t know enough to teach anybody.” “I know I need to go to confession, but I’m just going to mess up again.” “They begged me to join the choir, but I can’t sing in front of people!” “I can’t be called to the priesthood, not with a past like mine.”

“I’m unworthy!” we cry. The problem is, it’s not about you.

God answered, “I will be with you.” (3:12)

“Who am I?” you ask? Nobody. It’s who God is that matters. And if he’s calling you, it’s because he’s going to use you. Even in your brokenness.

But.

“But,” said Moses to God, “when I go to the Israelites…if they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what am I to tell them?” (3:13)

But I’m ignorant. I don’t know enough. I can’t evangelize–I don’t have all the answers! I can’t encourage people to be holy–they’ll see through me!

God replied, “I am who am…. This is what you shall tell the Israelites: I AM sent me to you.” (3:14)

Jesus said it best: “I myself shall give you a wisdom in speaking that all your adversaries will be powerless to resist or refute.”2 Yes, you’re ignorant. We all are. But he has all the answers. More than that, he is the answer. The Way, the Truth, and the Life. You can be inadequate. His grace is enough.3

God gives Moses all kinds of explanation and defense and even a detailed plan for fame and riches and a life of ease.

But.

“But,” objected Moses, “Suppose they will not believe me, nor listen to my plea?” (4:1)

successful-faithfulWhat if they reject me? What if they hate me? What if I’m a failure? God can’t be asking me to risk that–there’s got to be something more comfortable I can do.

This time God gives Moses miraculous proof–a staff turning into a snake and back again, a leprous hand, water turning into blood. He shows Moses once again that he’s in control. “I’ve got this,” he says to Moses and to us. “Just follow. Remember that I’m a God of miracles and just follow.”

Moses, however, said to the Lord, “If you please, Lord, I have never been eloquent.” (4:10)

Good one–let’s fall back on humility. Figure out all the things that are wrong with you, all the things that keep you from praying or serving or witnessing like you should. Make a list and put it before God. “You see? I don’t have to do your will. Because I can’t.”

The Lord said to him, “Who gives one man speech and makes another deaf and dumb? Or who gives sight to one and makes another blind? Is it not I, the Lord? Go, then! It is I who will assist you in speaking and will teach you what you are to say.” (4:11-12)

call the qualifiedOver and over he tells Moses, “It’s not about you.” God doesn’t call the qualified, he qualifies the called. So while grace builds on nature, it can do a lot more with a lot less than we think. If God is calling you to tithe or put your kids in Catholic school or discern religious life or stop using contraception or go to daily Mass, he will make it possible. You’ll be given what you need–extra time or prudence in spending money or trust in his providence or talent or virtue or whatever. You are already enough in him. Stop grasping at straws for why you “can’t” do what he’s asking of you.

Finally, Moses does just that. He stops making excuses and just refuses.

“Please, Lord, send someone else.” (4:13)

Through all the objections, God kept promising, kept explaining, kept showing Moses how he was enough because God was enough. He kept telling Moses that the Great I AM wouldn’t call him without preparing him first. He kept asking Moses to trust. When Moses stops negotiating (with a booming voice from heaven) and just says no, God gets a little miffed. (4:14) This is when God tells him that he already knew his concerns and his shortcomings, that he already took care of them.

“Have you not your brother Aaron the Levite? I know that he is an eloquent speaker. Besides, he is now on his way to meet you.” (4:14)

See that? All that time God was trying to convince Moses to follow, it was because God knew what he was doing. He didn’t tell Moses at first because he wanted Moses to trust him for who he was, not for what he had done. But his call was perfect, even down to the backup plan that was already in motion when he first called Moses. Aaron was already on his way to support Moses before Moses even started doubting his adequacy to the task.

I’ve heard these called “big ugly buts”–objections to God’s will that stand in the way of our following him. They’re rational and prudent and completely self-serving. They’re natural and faithless. They ignore the fact that God knows you, that he loves you, that he wants what’s best for you, and that he does the impossible every day.

Set the world ablaze Catherine SienaI’d be willing to bet there’s something in your life right now that you know God’s putting before you. Something that’s nagging at you: a job you need to quit, a donation you need to make, an enemy you need to forgive, a sin you need to forsake. You were made for greatness but most of us are pretty mediocre. Moses was pretty mediocre–until he became the greatest prophet of the Old Testament. Peter was pretty mediocre–until he became the first pope. David and Esther and Augustine and Teresa were all pretty mediocre until they decided to get off their big ugly buts and start being who were made to be.

No, you’re not good enough. You’re not smart enough or holy enough or loving enough to set the world ablaze. Fortunately, it’s not about you. If God is calling you to some service or prayer or sacrifice, it’s because he’s going to do great things in and through you. You may not see how–or why–but you’ve seen him work again and again in your life. Stop wondering what he’s going to do and trust in who he is. Trust. Follow. Even when you don’t know where he’s leading. Because you may have to walk through the Red Sea and a whole lot of desert, but eventually you’ll get to the Promised Land. Get off your big ugly but and go.

  1. Dust it off. I’ll wait. I’m not kidding–get your Bible and a pencil and start marking that thing up. [↩]
  2. Lk 21:15 [↩]
  3. 2 Cor 12:9 [↩]

I Didn’t Choose the Hobo Life

I get a lot of ridiculous questions, ranging from the confusing to the totally strange. For example:

Q: “Did you know I was born in California?” (from a 4th-grader I’d never met.)

Q: “Do you do birthday parties?” (from a middle school boy following a chastity talk.)
A: “If you have a chastity-themed birthday party, I will be your best friend.”

Q: “Has anyone ever told you that you sound like you’re from Alabama?”
A: “No…. Thank you?”

Q: “Are you really a hobo cause you don’t look like a hippie and you don’t have hair down to your butt.”
A: ….

Most of these questions merit an eye roll at best. There’s one, though, that I often hear and try to answer thoughtfully:  How did you know God was calling you to this?

I don't have any pictures where I look like a hobo. But what's a blog post without a picture? So....
I don’t have any pictures where I look like a hobo. But what’s a blog post without a picture? So….

I suppose I ought to establish first that I don’t know that God is calling me to this funny hobo life—not in the way that I know that he exists or that the Eucharist is truly him or that he wants me for his own. There are different kinds of knowing, of course, and some decisions require that sort of certainty. But what I’m doing is a good thing, so feeling confident that this is his will is good enough for me. If I never did anything until I knew God was calling me to, I’d accomplish very little in life. That being said….

I loved teaching. Loved it. For four and a half years, I would get excited Sunday nights because I got to go to school Monday mornings. I loved sleeping in but hated summers—I missed my kids! And while I’m naturally a very irritable person, I got angry in the classroom only twice in four and a half years.

Unfortunately, I taught for five.

My last semester should have been my easiest. For the first time in my teaching career, I was teaching only classes I’d taught before. Everything I was doing was recycled from past classes. I had no extracurriculars, no responsibilities aside from teaching…and I was miserable. I felt ill on Sunday nights because I knew I had to go in to school the next day. I was exhausted all the time even though I was getting plenty of sleep. And at least three times a week, I had to stop talking, turn around, and pray that I wouldn’t freak the heck out all over my kids.

This is my ANGRY FACE.
This is my ANGRY FACE. In a stocking. Trying to be a robber and still looking entirely like myself.

I had always known that my patience in the classroom wasn’t natural–it was a supernatural gift. And clearly that gift had been withdrawn. When my circumstances are unchanged but my peace of mind is lost, I know it’s time to ask the Lord what’s up.

But I didn’t want to jump to the conclusion that I was dealing with spiritual desolation, so I took a look at anything in the natural world that might be messing with me. Work was good, friends were good, my prayer life was good but I was all anxiety and anger and irrational drama.

So I began to ask the Lord if I should leave my school in Kansas. Praying about leaving gave me great peace while the idea of staying made me tense and miserable. I’m not saying that we ought to discern based entirely on emotions, but I’ve found that it’s important to listen to our emotions, especially when they’re not what we’d expect. I sure didn’t want to leave Atchison, so when that idea gave me such peace, I listened.

My next step, of course, was to make up an Excel spreadsheet with all the schools I might want to teach at. You know, columns for size, uniform, curriculum, apparent fidelity.1 But the thought occurred to me, “What if I’m supposed to stop teaching?”

Now, I had discerned leaving the classroom once before. I had a panic attack and almost crashed my car. More than anything, I thought at the time, I know that I’m a teacher. But this time it was different. The idea of not teaching wasn’t so bad. In fact, and contrary to all reason, I found it rather attractive.

But friends, I’ve been planning on being a teacher, in one form or another, my whole life. Since I was 15 and I found out that you could get paid to talk about Jesus, being a religion teacher was all I really dreamed of. I chose my college and my major and my grad degree all with the purpose of being a high school religion teacher. “What else can I do?” I thought. “This is all I’ve ever done, all I’ve ever wanted.”

“Well,” my friend Fr. Jeremy suggested, “You’re good at public speaking. And you’ve been wanting to do more of it.”

“Father, you can’t just quit life and be a public speaker!” I objected. And then I took it to prayer.

“Tell me why not,” the Lord seemed to say. And I thought about it. I had no debt, no dependents, no debilitating diseases. I had enough savings to cover me for a while and not a lot of bills I’d have to pay. Why not?

And this type-A, plan-the-next-30-years, put-down-roots-and-stay-till-you-die girl got excited about the strangest thing: being a hobo. This life that is so contrary to everything I’d ever wanted was suddenly appealing—more than appealing: it felt right.

Now, don’t quote me as saying “if it feels good, do it.” But when something that we wouldn’t normally consider draws us, we need to pay attention.

Thomas Aquinas had it right when he told us that grace builds on nature. But we don’t know our nature as well as the Lord does. I would never have thought that this kind of life would work for me. After all, I’m all about relational ministry and assigning homework and knowing everybody around me. But I also love meeting new people and socializing. I’m flexible and fairly easy to please and not particular about beds or food or how I take my water.2 I’m extraverted enough that the constant conversation with my hosts energizes me and committed enough to prayer that I still get plenty of “alone” time. As it turns out, this life makes a lot of sense for me. I can work with more people, be as intense as I want, and spend some occasional time writing, which I didn’t even realize I enjoyed. It seems that, once again, the Lord knows better than I.

Which is why I'm in frigid Kansas in April when I could be somewhere glorious and exotic. To be fair, this picture is from South Bend in February, but it's not because the weather wasn't this gross.
Which is why I’m in frigid Kansas in April when I could be somewhere glorious and exotic. To be fair, this picture is from South Bend in February, but it’s not because the weather this week wasn’t this gross.

So I quit my job and didn’t look for another. I wasn’t planning on living out of my car for long, but the Lord seems to have had other plans. I thought I’d find a place to live over the summer. But everything was working out, so I figured I’d travel till October. Then January. Then it began to look like this might be a long-term thing.

I can’t tell you exactly why I’m doing what I’m doing but I can tell you that I’ve seen how the Lord is touching hearts through the testimony of this scatter-brained nomad. I don’t know that people would listen to me the way they do if I weren’t such a fanatic. I do know that the minute I say I’m a hobo, people snap to attention. I know that I’m able to connect with people who wouldn’t otherwise talk with me because they want to ask all the awkward questions about my life. And I know that the Lord is showing me over and over again how he will always provide for me.

How long am I going to be living out of my car? I have no idea. I’m a planner, but God seems to prefer that I trust and follow. So for now, I’m headed out west. Beyond that, who knows?

************

Speaking of heading out west, I have literally nothing scheduled between Wednesday and mid-July. And while I’m sure I’ll find places to stay, I’m going to be really bored! So if you’re in any state west of the Mississippi and you want me to come talk to any group about pretty much anything, let me know. I don’t even want your money, just an opportunity to serve. I’m trying to get to every state out west in the next 3 months and I need some help. Because really, does anybody live in Wyoming?

If you’re east of the Mississippi, don’t feel left out—I’ll be out your way in the fall.

  1. What, this isn’t how you make all decisions? Yeah, well, I didn’t choose the nerd life either. [↩]
  2. This varies more than I thought possible. Options include: bottled water, tepid; bottled water, chilled; tap water, tepid; tap water in a pitcher in the fridge; tap water through a filter, tepid; filtered tap water sitting on the counter; filtered tap water, in the fridge; filtered water  from the fridge door, ice from the fridge door; filtered water  from the fridge door, ice from the freezer; tap water, ice from the basement; tap water, ice from the freezer; jugs of water in the fridge. That may be it. [↩]

Why I Don’t Volunteer at Soup Kitchens

When I was a teenager and even more obnoxious than I am now, if you can believe that, I was obsessed with the poor. Actually, that might be too generous. I was obsessed with what everyone else was doing to help the poor.

Righting wrongs that are none of my business since 1984.

I was born with a violently strong sense of justice1 and raised without much money. Even though we didn’t have much when I was very little, I have distinct memories from childhood of giving to the poor and even volunteering as a family to feed the poor. So I suppose it’s no wonder that with the advent of a more significant allowance came a sense of obligation to help those in need. Which would have been a good thing had I not felt the need to beat people over the head with it.

I distinctly remember sitting in my car after youth group one night sobbing because the people–even the adults–didn’t understand that they had to help the poor. I had even broken it down for them, making it as simple as I could: “If you have two blenders, you should give one away. Nobody needs two blenders.” No, they said, yours might break, and then you’ll need the other one. “Then you can buy another one! Why would you hoard extra things on the off chance that you’ll need them in the future??” But they didn’t care. All I was trying to say was that that they ought to give some of their excess away. But they couldn’t hear it.

In college, I got more extreme. I wouldn’t pay more than $20 for anything but a plane ticket and I judged those who did.2 I didn’t chill out until my wise roommate pointed out to me, “Meg, someone has to minister to the country club.” Oh, I thought, well if it’s wealth for the sake of ministry, I guess that’s okay. But I still brought up the plight of the poor with regularity. After all, as St. Ambrose says, “The rich man who gives to the poor does not bestow alms but pays a debt.” Giving to the poor, he says, is not optional.

But despite my absolute conviction that all Christians have an obligation to serve the poor, I can’t remember the last time I was in a soup kitchen. Or a food pantry. Or a homeless shelter. Or really any place devoted to serving the poor.

I realized my first year of teaching that for all I was telling people to feed the hungry and clothe the naked, I wasn’t doing a lick of it myself. So I resolved to get more involved, do more, be more available to serve the poor.

First year teaching kind of looks like this–overwhelming chaos that you can’t do anything about. Definitely adding another activity was the way to fix that.

You read that right: I decided during my first year of teaching that I wasn’t doing enough for Christ and his people. Somehow, I thought that 14 hours of ministry a day wasn’t enough. I decided that my weekends shouldn’t be spent recharging3 but doing more.

Praise the Lord, he stepped in and stopped me before I drove myself to a nervous breakdown. And I had to realize, in all humility, that I can’t do it all. I can’t sing in the choir and lector and be an EM–I have to choose.4 I couldn’t be a first-year teacher and spend my weekends at the soup kitchen. At a certain point, I had to recognize where my gifts lay and where God was calling me and let the rest go.

There will always be more good work to be done for the Kingdom, but you don’t have to do it all. What you have to do is the work that the Lord has put before you today. And the beauty of the Body of Christ is that when you put us all together, we do all the work that must be done. Some of us feed the poor directly, others by tithing. Some of us catechize directly, others through the witness of our lives. Some of us are missionaries, others pray for missionaries, take missionaries into their homes, comment on missionaries’ blogs.5

The gift of this messy, beautiful, holy, fallen Church we’re in is that we don’t all have to be elbows or noses or pinky toes.6 At this point in my life, the Lord has called me to evangelize day in and day out. It doesn’t leave a lot of time for slinging hash. But I can’t be holier than the Lord has called me to be–if he wants me on the front lines for faith and working the supply chain for works, I can do that. Insisting on being in the trenches for every cause that matters is just pride–and stupidity.

Which book do I read? I’ll never read them all! My life is so hard!!!

One of the great temptations when you start getting serious about following the Lord is comparison. You start looking at how people around you are serving Christ and you take your eyes off him. But God doesn’t want cookie-cutter Christians! He wants you to be you and to do the particular work he’s given you. And when we look at all the work we’re not doing or the prayers we’re not praying or the books we’re not reading, it’s easy either to get discouraged or burnt-out. If you’re anything like me, the result of comparing yourself to holy people–not prayerfully emulating Saints but analyzing their resumes–is sin.

There is great humility in saying, “I love the poor but God hasn’t called me to that ministry.” You’re acknowledging your limitations and avoiding the Messiah complex that I’m so prone to. If it’s honest, if it’s truly a result of prayer and prudence, if you’re giving of yourself through some other work or ministry or relationship, it’s a blessing to be able to say no.

My friends, the freedom of being saved by grace is that we don’t have to do everything. We have to do something, certainly (faith and works), but we don’t have to do anything but the work that the Lord has set before us. So stop letting the image of other people’s holiness stress you out. Just because she has 10 kids doesn’t mean you’re a bad mom because you’re struggling with 3. Just because he reads the Bible every day doesn’t mean that has to be your devotion. If you’ve got your hands full with prison ministry, you don’t have to volunteer with the youth group, too.

If this picture doesn’t make you want to do something, you might need an attitude check. But the something you do might not be as obvious as ladling soup.

Now, if our Church weren’t serving the poor, we wouldn’t be the Church of Christ. And if the way you live isn’t informed by the plight of the poor, if you’re not conscious of fair wages and living simply and giving to the poor, then you’re ignoring the Gospel. But each of us is called to serve the poor–and the doubtful and the lonely and the imprisoned and the ill and the sinner–in our own particular way. Sometimes being at peace with that limitation is harder than any mission trip or morning at the shelter.

I’m still kind of obsessed with the poor–Jesus told us we had to be. But I’m not so judgmental any more, and I don’t feel so guilty that my work isn’t directly focused on the poor. Because holiness isn’t about doing everything. It’s about doing what you’re called to do.

So what about you? What are you called to do? And what other ministry do you have to sacrifice to do it?

**********

While you’re wandering the internet wasting time, why don’t you head over to see Bonnie and vote on your favorite Catholic blogs for the Sheenazing Blogger Awards?7 See, I got nominated–twice! Coolest blogger8 and most inspiring, can you believe it? I’m kind of floored. But anyway, you can go vote for me (or somebody else) if you want to and then whoever wins gets to put a cool meme of Fulton Sheen on his or her blog. At least go scroll through the ballot and find some awesome new blogs to read. Because you didn’t have enough going on.

And make sure to check out Bonnie’s miracle baby while you’re there. Stillborn, with no pulse or respirations for 61 minutes, he came back to life and is a normal, healthy little boy today. Incredible!

  1. Particularly as it relates to how other people treat me, but that’s a matter for another post. [↩]
  2. Ironically, I was shelling out a gazillion dollars a year on my education…. [↩]
  3. Or, more likely, grading. [↩]
  4. Or have the choir chosen for me, as often happens. Once, I was passing through a town on Good Friday and stopped in at a church for the liturgy. I literally stashed my suitcase under a pew, I was so transient there. Within 5 minutes, I was standing at the front of the church in a choir robe. Another time, I went to a church I’d only been to once or twice before. I started Mass in the pew. By the offertory, I was cantoring. How do these things happen to a person??? [↩]
  5. Thanks for all the blog love, by the way. I pray for y’all daily! [↩]
  6. You caught the reference, right? 1 Corinthians 12? [↩]
  7. It’s Sheen–Fulton, not Charlie–plus amazing. Get it? It took me four or five times, too. Don’t be ashamed. [↩]
  8. These people have clearly never met me. [↩]

Lines from a Favorite Book

When God made it clear to me that he was calling me to belong exclusively to him, I was miserable. I knew with every fiber of my being that this is what I had to do, but I wanted marriage and motherhood so badly that there was no joy in it. I consented because I knew it was God’s will. I sobbed and said, “Oh, fine.” It was basically the most unpleasant consent to a marriage proposal in the history of ever.

And I’m so glad that it happened that way. If I had been responding to a desire for consecrated life, I don’t know that I ever would have felt fully convicted. I would have worried that my motives were impure or that my discernment was clouded by my desires. Since he drew my intellect first and my affections only gradually, though, I feel confident that I’m following his will and not my own.

A few months after my snotty betrothal, I was beginning to feel some joy in my vocation but only in the tremendous shadow of my perceived sacrifice. And then I was given this book by a vocation director. I think no book has affected me more profoundly (barring the Bible, of course) than Fr. Thomas Dubay’s And You Are Christ’s. Suddenly, I began to realize that I was really terribly in love with Christ. I began to see how my vocation fit the longings of my heart. I began to let myself rejoice in being his.

I love this book so much that I give it to pretty much any woman who I think might maybe possibly ever in a million years have a vocation to consecrated life. But for those of you who can’t bring yourself to order a copy, here are all my favorite lines from the book. After you read it, I bet you’ll want to buy it in bulk for your single female friends, too.1

Excerpts from “And You are Christ’s:” The Charism of Virginity and the Celibate Life

by Thomas Dubay, S.M.

Gospel virginity is a love affair of the most enthralling type.  It is a focusing on God that fulfills as nothing else fulfills.

[A religious vocation is] to be head over heels in love as a divine invitation.

From our mother’s womb, indeed, before we were conceived, each of us has been personally called to the universal and most basic destiny of an eternal enthralling embrace with Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

You and I are to be head over heels in love with God.  All of us in every state of life are to love him as we can love no other: with wholeness of mind, heart, soul, strength (Lk 10:27).  We are to be in such deep love that the eye of our mind is on him always (Ps 25:15), that we pray to him continually (Lk 18:1), that we sing to him in our hearts always and everywhere (Eph 5:19-20).  This is the language of lovers.  Admittedly.  But the Christian virgin is to be a lover before anything else.  This is why one does what he does.  Only one who is in love gives up everything for the beloved.

The virgin anticipates the final age in which there is no earthly marriage (Mt 22:30), the final enthralling fulfillment of all human life.  Even in this world, she gives undivided attention to the Lord as her very way of life.

The virgin who fully lives her vocation is vibrantly alive, much more alive than she could be with an earthly husband, for her Beloved is infinitely more alive than any mere man could be: her heart and her flesh sing for joy to the living God (Ps 84:2).

She can now give herself up to continual prayer “day and night” (1 Tim 5:5)—devotion to prayer and more freedom for this is always the primary New Testament rationale for continence.

The celibate man and woman are thus to be consumed by nothing but doing the Father’s will (Jn 4:54).  They have no other desire, no other ambition.  They are utterly free for the kingdom, completely available to their sole love.

The Benedictines of Mary on profession day–check out the groom on the cake topper.

Actually, there is no more apt and normal image of an intimate, total self-gift between two in love than the spousal one.  Biblical writers inspired by the Spirit knew this, and they liberally used the symbolism to describe the everlasting and unfailing love of the Lord for his people.  Isaiah speaks of Yahweh rejoicing in his chosen ones as a bridegroom rejoices in his radiantly beautiful bride (Is 62:2-5).  Hosea writes of this God wooing his wife in the wilderness that he may speak to her heart and win her back from her infidelity (Hos 2:16).  The Corinthian church is for Saint Paul a virgin bride wedded to one husband, Christ (2 Cor 11:2; cf Eph 5:25f).  Each member of the ekklesia is to cling so intimately to the Bridegroom as to become one spirit with him (1 Cor 6:17), and their love is to be absolutely total—to love with their whole mind, their whole soul, their whole heart, and all their strength (Mt 22:37).  It is a love so profoundly intimate that it brings about a profound inter-indwelling, each living within the other (1 Jn 4:16).

The individual virgin embraces a way of life in which she so exclusively focuses on her one beloved that she declines a marital relationship with any other man.

A communion of love, deep prayer, and absorption in the Beloved must be the primary purpose of the virginal life.

The young woman could reject the charism and marry, but she can not reject it without doing some violence to her being.  God has captured her as only he can capture.  If she rejects his divine desire to possess her in an exclusive manner (God forces himself on no one), she hurts herself in that she turns her back on something that has been done to her.  She refuses an interpersonal gift.

The virginal charism so focuses the young woman on God that she cannot give marital attention to another person.  She has her fullness in the Lord.

Spiritual motherhood, courtesy of the Dominican Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist.

Just as a faithful married woman may be attracted to another man, and yet focuses on no other than her husband, so also a virgin may be attracted to marriage and motherhood, but she knows that she can really give full attention only to the Lord Jesus.

[On John Henry Newman, an Anglican priest considering marriage] He could not, he said, give the attention to the world that marriage requires.  God had already captured his heart with the celibate charism, and he experienced the gift whereby he could not be concerned with the things of the world.  His heart was too wide and deep, too centered on the divine.

Signs of a healthy religious vocation

  1. The first sign is a joyous non-reluctance regarding the sacrifices implied in the renunciation of all things for the sake of the kingdom. …The virgin has given up earthly marriage and motherhood, yes, but she has entered upon a still greater marriage and motherhood.
  2. The inability to give to the world the attention that marriage requires.  Even if the celibate is at a considerable distance from heroic holiness, he should feel at least something of being captured totally by the Lord for the concerns of the Lord.
  3. An ability to see through the superficiality of superficial things.
  4. A love for prayer: the priest (or nun) who is drawn to long (even if difficult and dry) prayer well understands his way of life.

The virginal heart is a large heart, too large to be satisfied in focusing on one man or woman.

God is her first choice.  He is more than first (for any person God must be first)—he is the only center of her being.

The Christian virgin is a woman in love.  I do not say simply a woman of love.  That, yes; but more.  Because her heart has been captured by her Beloved, in at least a beginning manner, she is absorbed in him.  As Paul puts it, she is not concerned with the world and its business, but with the affairs of the Lord.  As anyone really in love does, she gives her undivided attention to him (1 Cor 7:34-35).

Virginity aims at living the being-in-love Scripture everywhere supposes: “My eyes are always on the Lord…my soul yearns for you in the night…ah, you are beautiful, my beloved…with my whole heart I seek you…sing to the Lord in your hearts always and everywhere…” (Ps 25:25, Is 26:9, Sgs 4:1, Ps 119:10, Eph 5:20).  This is why the virgin puts prayer first in her life.  She is in love with God and with his people.

God calls all men and women of whatever vocation to a deep communion with himself.  He invites everyone to a prayer so profound that one becomes radiant with joy; the person tastes and sees for himself how good he is (Ps 34:5, 8).  He wants everyone to hunger and thirst for him (Ps 63:1), to pant after his word (Ps 119:131), to meditate on his message day and night (Ps 1:1-2), to rejoice in him always (Phil 4:4), to experience a joy in him so amazing that it cannot be described (1 Pt 1:8), to pray continually, all day long (Lk 18:1, Ps 84:4).

Because she is literally in love, the consecrated woman is before all else a woman of prayer.  Like Jesus himself, she is drawn irresistibly to long, frequent times of solitude with the Father.  Anyone in love desires to commune long and lovingly with the beloved.  No one has to urge her to it.

“The contemplation of divine things and an assiduous union with God in prayer is to be the first and principal duty of all religious” (Canon 663, §1).

What did the mystics write about?  A breathlessly beautiful love affair with God, a prayerful enthrallment in him, a being lost in love, immersed in it.

“Too late have I loved you, O Beauty, so ancient and so new, too late have I loved you….  I have tasted you, and I hunger and thirst after you.  You have touched me, and I have burned for your peace” (St. Augustine).

The virgin is one who wishes a lifestyle tailor-made so that she may more readily attain that life of prayer to which Augustine refers, so that she may be “already filled with a joy so glorious that it cannot be described” (1 Pt 1:8).

“Virgo est quae Deo nubit” (A virgin is a woman who has married God—St. Ambrose).  This formulation well expresses what is implied in the life of complete chastity: exclusive, total love, intimacy of intercommunion, unreserved self-gift, unending fidelity, service to the beloved, mutual delight.

All men and women are called to this utter fullness of God and the primary purpose of virginity is a readier path to it.

Signs of the Vocation

Can a young man or woman know with a reasonably well-founded assurance that God is calling him or her to consecrated chastity?  Given that the Lord does beckon “in a special way, through an interior illumination” (an expression of Pope Paul VI), we now ask just what this inner enlightenment may be and what signs may accompany it.

Ordinarily, the indications of a vocation to celibacy are neither flashy nor extraordinary.  The interior illumination is not a vision, not a tap on the shoulder, not a voice spoken in audible sounds waves.  Not everyone is assailed, as was Saint Paul on the road to Damascus, by a light and voice from heaven (Acts 9:3-6).  Yet we may still ask whether there is some perception of the call, some psychological awareness of the divine invitation.

The answer is yes, even though the awareness may not be what the recipient might expect.  We may, therefore, profitably reflect on it.  The young person called to consecrated chastity will have a greater than usual bent toward God, an attraction to him.  This young person will often readily see that a mere earthly existence is insufficient, fundamentally unsatisfying, basically empty.  He may indeed enjoy parties, dances, and dating, but they invariably leave him with a sense on incompleteness.  Young women attract him but he senses that none of them, no matter how beautiful, will ever fill his heart.  He wants more, much more.

During her consecration, a consecrated virgin wears a wedding dress and prostrates herself in surrender to the Lord.

We must return to what we spoke of earlier, virginity as fullness.  The young person with this gift has been given by God, at least in an incipient degree, a love-gift, a focusing on God that excludes a similar centering on anyone else.  This love-gift may be weak and dim at the beginning, but it is there.

This first sign will be accompanied by a second: an attraction to a particular celibate lifestyle (private dedication, secular institute, active or enclosed religious life), and/or a persuasion that God wants him in that form of dedication.  Some youth feel a clear, strong attraction to the active or cloistered life and together with it, a strong persuasion that God wants them there.  With these people, there is little or no doubt about the matter.  Others feel only the persuasion, more or less insistent, that God is inviting them.  Their mind is that if he wants it, they are willing, even if a felt attraction is absent.  The inner illumination of which Pope Paul speaks seems in this second group to be mostly an intellectual matter, whereas with the first group it is accompanied by a perceived drawing toward the life.

Sound motivation is the third sign of the virginal charism.  Desiring celibacy for the reasons described here is a strong indication that one possesses this love-gift from God.  The virgin does not have a negative view of sexuality, nor is she fleeing the sacrifices of marriage or the responsibilities of life in the world—these motives are inadequate.  She is a woman in love and she is pursuing her Beloved with a greater freedom.  She also wishes to do something to help her brothers and sisters reach God—either by a life of prayer, solitude, and penance or by a life of prayer and apostolic involvement.

The final sign is capability.  When God gives the celibate gift, he also gives the physical, mental, and moral health necessary to actualize it in a specific lifestyle.  Necessary health need not mean absolute perfection, but it does mean a basic sufficiency.  Each institute determines the minimal capabilities required for its life and work.

Preparation in Prayer

The young woman and man called to celibacy are inclined by the beckoning Spirit to a more than minimal interest in prayer.  If they are fully open to God’s gifts, this inclination will be strong and persistent, and it will be actualized in practice.  There is no better preparation for an eventual embracing of this vocation than a fervent, growing communion with him who is the whole purpose of the life.  This private prayer will be fed and furthered by a vibrant liturgical life, by devotion to the first Virgin, by regular, well-chosen spiritual reading, and, when it is available, by competent spiritual direction.

Here is a woman so taken with God that he is the top priority in her life.  She lays down her entire being in loving adoration of him.

When a Passionist nun takes vows, she wears a crown of thorns and carries a cross to show her union with her Beloved Crucified.

She declares by her life that no one has here a permanent abode, that we are pilgrims and should live like pilgrims (Heb 11:13-16).  She is also therefore a sign of the Cross and asceticism, of the hard road and the narrow gate that lead to life (Mt 7:13-14).  Her life tells us that the kingdom does not consist in food and drink but in the joy, peace, and holiness given by the Spirit (Rom 14:17).

The virgin is likewise a symbol of joy.  All disciples in every vocation are called to “rejoice in the Lord always” (Phil 4:4), or as Saint Augustine brilliantly put it, to be an “alleluia from head to toe.”  Anyone full of love will be full of joy.  The joy Jesus gives is not partial; it is full (Jn 15:11).  Surely that woman or man who gives undivided attention to him, the very source of delight, can be nothing other than an incarnated alleluia.

The celibate woman and man are persons whose whole attention is focused on Beauty, ever ancient, ever new, persons whose raison d’être is none other than a profound love covenant and communion with the Word and his Father through their Holy Spirit.

 

Amazing, right? Now, quick! Go buy it, read it, and tell me your favorite lines!

  1. It’s really geared towards women. Sorry, guys! [↩]

Back in the Classroom

Last week I got in my car and drove 16 hours to the kids I left in May. Hours and hours I drove to make it in time for Homecoming, to watch the game and see the dresses and hug the queen and let the new alums curse in front of me because they finally can. I pulled up Thursday afternoon and walked up to the school where I quite literally lived for two years.

To girls who shout “You’re my favorite teacher ever” and insist on taking a picture with me.

To girls who screamed and ran to hug me.

To a wide receiver who told the football team they had to win homecoming for me—not to break an eight-year losing streak at homecoming but to thank me for showing up.

To a team that played their guts out and shattered the streak—and thanked me afterwards for being there.

To “I haven’t told anyone else about this, but….”

To “Please come back. Please—we need you.”

To the quarterback who schedules confessions for the team because I convinced him that he plays better in a state of grace.

To dozens of kids who still know all the books of the Bible in order.

To classrooms full of eager eyes and quick smiles, full of kids who still remember what I taught them.

To a volleyball team that yells not “Team” or “Ravens” but “Ms. H-K” when they go for the win.

To girls who stare at me from the bench until I look across the soccer field and see them waving.

To “I miss your homework and your notes.”

To “I took your notebook to college. Everyone else borrows it to study for tests.”

To “Can we talk while you’re in town?”

To “I need your help,” “Please pray for me,” ”I’ve hit rock bottom,” “I don’t think I can try anymore,” “What should I do?”

To a heart that burns with pride and weeps with frustration and fears and loves and despairs and hopes and prays and prays and prays.

And I ache and I cry because I just love them so hard. And when they ask me to come back I want so badly to say yes. I want so badly to be here for them and to love them and yell at them and challenge and console and listen and teach and advise and suffer and just be theirs.

But they don’t need me. Because if they needed me, I’d still be here. So when they ask me to stay, I just tell them, “I can’t. I’m in God’s will. I have to be faithful to that. I’m so sorry.”

I don’t miss grading or discipline or long days or constant disrespect or any number of stupid issues that plague teachers. But I miss my kids so much. I’m so blessed to be so loved by these little ones—these big ones, these “adults” who are still my babies—but their love makes it hurt all the more.

And I wonder if there’s always a longing when you’re in God’s will. My restless heart wants this life he’s given me and wants my kids, too. But the ache reminds me that this world is not my home. It reminds me that I was made for more. I’m glad of the reminder in the midst of a life so full of grace. I’m glad to feel the poverty of earthly joy because it reminds me to long for heaven. I’m glad to suffer whatever he asks me to suffer for the glory of his name and the salvation of souls. I’m glad, I am.

And still I weep for missing them.

Following Your Heart

I stumbled across a brilliant blog post the other day with advice for teenage girls ranging from awkward-but-true (“maybe you should stop offering your own breasts up for the ogling”) to touching (“You are beautiful.  You are valuable.  You are enough.”).  I nodded till my neck hurt and then offered my students presents for reading it.  I gushed about it and raved about it and then I moved on.  Because I am (allegedly) an adult and have learned these lessons.

Today in prayer, though, I was struck by this: “’Follow your heart’ is probably the worst advice ever. “

Amen!  Your heart is stupid!  Don’t look at me like that, you know this.  Remember that guy (girl) with the spiked (long) hair who wore those amazing JNCO wideleg jeans (um…that shirt she looked all cute in)?  Okay, so I was in high school in the 90s.  Forgive me.  But work with me here—that kid’s in jail.  You were so in love and everything would have been so perfect if your parents/friends/less attractive significant other hadn’t gotten in the way.  All you wanted was to follow your heart and be true to yourself but you were stuck following the advice of people who think with their thinking organs and not their blood-pumping organs.  And where did that get you?  Oh, yeah, prom pictures where nobody’s wearing an orange jumpsuit.

Despite the fact that anyone over the age of 12 knows this, though, following your heart is the only virtue left in American cinema.  Josie Geller follows her heart to the pitcher’s mound in Never Been Kissed.  Who cares if she outs an innocent man as a sexual predator along the way?  She’s being true to herself!  Or how about Cher from Clueless following her heart into the passionate embrace of…her stepbrother?  And nobody has a problem with that?

You see, when we’re “true to ourselves” above all else, we’re generally stomping all over someone else.  (Unless you’re so holy that you love others more than yourself.  In that case, may I suggest starting a blog to teach the rest of us?)  Our hearts may want to drown our sorrows, cheat on our taxes, and kick our children to the curb (figuratively, I’m sure).  A well-ordered mind, or conscience, or, dare I say, soul, knows better.

Now, I’m not saying every decision you make should spring directly from an Excel spreadsheet (although that is how I chose my last home).  I’m just saying that your heart isn’t an unfailing compass to happiness.  Because your heart is broken.  Maybe not broken in two, but somehow lost, confused, hurt, stony—broken.   There’s something in you that isn’t as it should be.  This is ultimately a result of the Fall, but more immediately caused by an absent father, a number on the scale, a demanding mother, a best friend who found someone better, a pink slip, a solo Valentine’s Day….  Your heart learns to long for things that will not fill it and runs from the One who will.  You need meat and potatoes but your heart grasps at Snickers instead.  And so following your heart without regard for consequences or kindness or truth, beauty, and goodness just leaves you clinging to the candy while you slowly starve to death.

So when I heard that line, I put a big check mark by it in my head and moved on.  But today, I started to wonder.  Doesn’t God write his plans in our hearts?  Can’t I trust my heart to lead me in his paths?

It struck me that the Christian life is about letting God tear from your heart whatever is not of him, letting him break and remake you.  As I suffer in obedience to him, he conforms my heart to his.  The more I love and seek him, the more my heart leads me in his ways.  The more I pray, the more my life is built on who I am in him, not who I am to others.  When I sit before the tabernacle and ask God to show me his will, I usually just mean that I want him to validate my will.  I grasp at the happiness he has for me without accepting the joy that he is for me.  But when I seek to love and serve and be consumed by him, the hardness of my heart is transformed into flesh—into his flesh for the life of the world.

St Augustine said, “Love God and do what you will.”  Not because the rest doesn’t matter but because your will is aligned with his when your life is about him.  So maybe “follow your heart” isn’t the worst advice ever—if you’re really following God.  Ten years ago, the most powerful desires of my heart were to get married and have babies—two things I no longer believe God’s calling me to.  I don’t think the deep desires of my heart have changed, but I’ve started to recognize what my heart is truly longing for: to be loved as I am, to give myself away, and to nurture others.  Gradually, I’ve learned to see what my heart truly desires and to listen to what God has written there.

I’m not there yet—of course I’m not.  I’m starting to trust, though, that my will is an accurate reflection of God’s will when it comes to the big things.  A friend asked me today how I know that God’s asking me to start this ministry.  I explained that God reveals his will to me in many different ways (more on those soon) but in this situation I felt a deep desire to do something that doesn’t naturally sound appealing.  I like to have plans and safety nets and instead I’m driving away from the people I love, leaving with no job, no home, and no plans to find either—and I’m thrilled!  When my heart rejoices in something that isn’t natural to me, I start to listen for God’s voice in that.

My heart is still divided on pretty much every front and there are many areas where “following my heart” would be as much of a disaster as it was when I was 15.  One day, maybe I’ll be so completely his that my heart is his heart.  Until then, I’ll let prudence balance passion and trust the thoughts of those wiser than I.  Pray for me!

 

Oh, and (because it was stuck in my head the whole time I was writing this) here you go: