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How to Discern

• Prayer and Silence

• Regular Reading of Scripture

• Spiritual Direction

• Visiting Communities

• Healing and Conversion

• Knowing You are a Beloved Child of God
   

Prayer & Silence

The first and most important step in discernment is prayer. The prophet Elijah described God as a “still, small voice” (1 Kgs 19:12). Prayer is a conversation: talking to God and listening for his gentle voice. Growth in prayer is lifelong . . . it is really a journey of deepening love between you and the Lord.

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Silence is critical. Silence helps us to clear distractions out of our minds and hearts, and uncover what God is working deep within us, to hear that “still, small voice.” He plants desires in the deepest parts of our hearts which lead us to our vocation. Often, surface noises (the distractions around us and within us) drown out God’s voice. Make a commitment to set aside quiet time each day for prayer to help move away from the distractions. Trust that God will lead you to a place of peace, joy and freedom where you will discover if indeed He is inviting you to religious life.
 

Regular Reading of Scripture 

The call to Religious Life is most fundamentally a call to a life of intimacy with Jesus - following in His footsteps through the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. A call to Franciscan life is an invitation to an even more intense life-long process of converting our lives to Jesus Christ and His Gospel. As St. Francis wrote in the very first line of his rule of life, "The rule and life of the Friars Minor is this, namely, to observe the holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, living in obedience, without anything of one's own and in chastity." 

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Frequent reading of and prayer with Scripture should be at the forefront of every Christian's life of prayer - all the more so for those discerning a call to Religious Life and Franciscan Life in particular. Making time to regularly read and pray with Scripture, especially the Gospels, is an essential component of discerning one's vocation. If you're not sure how to get started, you can simply begin with the Gospel of Matthew and pray your way through all four Gospels. You also could follow along with the Church's daily readings - click here for a calendar of readings of the day. Supplemental resources like a good Scripture commentary, the Bible in a Year podcast, or another Scripture study might also be helpful as you develop a practice of regular reading and praying with Scriptures. Just be careful that study doesn't replace your time to directly encounter Jesus through His Word. 

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Spiritual Direction

A spiritual director is invaluable when discerning your vocation. This is a trained person – priest, religious sister/brother, or certified lay person – with whom you meet regularly to talk about what God is doing in your prayer and in your life in order to become more and more sensitive to His movements and voice in our life and be increasingly ready to say yes to what He is inviting us to, in matters both big and small. The role of a spiritual director is not tell you exactly what to do. Rather, a good spiritual director listens well, asks good questions, reflects things back to us, and points out dynamics that we may have missed on our own to help us go deeper into understanding the Lord's movements in your life. This helps us to be more attentive and listen more deeply to what the Lord is asking of us and to discern what thoughts and desires come from God, which ones simply come from us, and which ones are from the enemy. Sorting through all this with another person, who is trained and who can often see things that we cannot see on our own, is an immense help, especially in times of more intense discernment. 

 

The need for spiritual direction is great, and it can unfortunately be difficult to find a spiritual director who is available to take on a new directee. Don't lose hope - keep looking and ask the Lord to send you someone to help you. A good first step is usually speaking to your parish priest or chaplain to see if they offer spiritual direction or can connect you with a director in your area. There are also several very good training schools for spiritual direction who are sometimes able to connect you with current students or graduates of the program. Examples of these include the Lanteri School of Spiritual Direction, Franciscan University's School of Spiritual Direction, and Cenacle of Our Lady of Divine Providence School of Spiritual Direction. No matter what, remember that the Holy Spirit is ultimately the true director of our souls, and He is always with us to guide and strengthen us. 

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Visiting Communities

If the Lord is inviting you to religious life, you will be attracted to a specific charism - that is, to specific style of religious life and specific works. As you go visit the pages on our website, be attentive to how you respond to what you read and see. Share what comes up with the Lord and notice what stirs within you as you do so. While God does lead us through our desires, it is normal if these are mixed with some fears and doubts, especially in the beginning. If the Lord seems to be speaking to you or encouraging you to take the next steps in discerning with our community, don't be afraid. Keep exploring, and contact us to learn more about our life and discerning with our community. Actually speaking with a vocation director and making a visit to a community are essential steps in discernment and can often help to bring great clarity. Click here to learn more about getting in contact with our vocation team. 
 

Healing and Conversion

The call to holiness and wholeness isn't just for a privileged few - no matter our state in life vocation, we are all first called to the vocation of holiness. As we go through our lives, all of us incur some level of wounding or brokenness as a result of the effects of original sin, our own personal sins, and the ways that we have been sinned against. Our areas of hurt can easily become places of unhealthy self-protection and ungodly self-reliance. In John's Gospel, Jesus tells us that He came that we might have life and have it to the full - and He offers that same fullness to us today when He encounters us in our sin and brokenness and invites us into healing and conversion. As we take this call seriously and say yes to the journey of partnering with God to grow in greater self-awareness, self-acceptance, repentance, humility, and authentic self-love, we also grow in our capacity to become a self-gift for others.

 

In discerning the call to religious life, our past wounding or past sins can sometimes become an obstacle to our going forward in pursuing God's will. There will likely be some aspects of our ourselves that are in need of deeper healing and conversion before we are free enough to enter into our vocation fruitfully, but at the same time, perfecting or fixing ourselves is not the goal. Our goal is pursuing union with God, saying yes to His invitations great and small, and little-by-little allowing Him to bring order, peace, and authentic love to our places of shame and brokenness. Conversion, healing, and growth in true freedom and holiness is a lifelong journey - if your past sin or wounding or brokenness is coming up on your discernment journey, the Lord is likely inviting you into greater healing and freedom. The more you entrust yourself to Him and begin the journey now, the more prepared you will be to offer yourself as a gift in whatever vocation the Lord calls you to. 
 

Know You are a Beloved Child of God

Our world and culture send many confusing and false messages about our true identity and what love truly means. Where others may try to tell us that we are defined by what we do, how much we produce, or by whatever we decide is true about ourselves, we know that our true identity flows from our creation in the image of God and His choosing us as His beloved sons and daughters through the sacrament of Baptism. The enemy tries to convince us that we aren't really chosen, aren't really loved, that God isn't really there for us or isn't truly for our good - the goal in this is to try to keep us locked in shame and despair or perhaps in pride and self-reliance. If the Lord is inviting you to a religious vocation, we can expect doubts and seeming obstacles to come against us and try to deter us from following God's will. This is normal, and with God's grace, our willingness to persevere, and the help of others He sends to accompany us, we can find and claim the truth and go forward in following God's call in our life.

 

Another possible obstacle might feel ashamed of past choices and feeling unworthy of a call to the religious life or priesthood. Every saint has a past - don’t let your past prevent you from saying yes to God today or limiting the ways that God wants to use you in His plan of salvation. There is no ‘unforgivable’ sin so long as we seek His love and mercy. If you are struggling with past choices, take it to prayer, talk to a priest, and if you haven’t done so already, go to the sacrament of Reconciliation and allow Jesus to heal and restore you through the power of this beautiful sacrament. No matter what, your fundamental identity is this: you are a beloved son or daughter of God the Father. You are worthy, not because of anything you have done or earned on your own, but because you are made in God's image and likeness. No matter what comes against us or what we have done, we can always stand firm in this truth.