Vocations

The basic requirement for applicants to the Filiæ Laboris Mariæ are:

If you meet the basic requirements for applying, how do you know whether you have a vocation to the religious life? What follows are some signs that God may be giving you the grace of a vocation:

The Attraction of the Heart

What God says about Israel applies to every soul: “I drew them …with bands of love” (Hos 11:4). God draws by the attraction of the heart. It may be the case that the attraction is at first overshadowed by fear or even by a distaste for religious life, but, once you abandon your fears and plans, you will sense an attraction. The attraction is not accessory to discernment; it is an essential element because the discernment of our vocation is the response to a call. Those who do not have a vocation to the religious life may very well admire and respect the vocation of religious life, but they are not attracted to it.

Growing Attraction for Prayer

A growing attraction for prayer and holy things in general, together with a longing for a hidden life and a desire to be more closely united to God. For one called to the consecrated life, assisting at Holy Mass often becomes an imperative of the heart, as does extended time spent in prayer, especially in Eucharistic adoration. Time spent in Eucharistic adoration is often a key element in discernment.

Desire Beyond Worldly Life

A desire for more than marriage and the world can offer. Marriage seems “not enough” and this feeling is generally strongest in the midst of worldly amusements. Someone called to consecrated life finds, attractive as marriage and the family are, somehow neither an earthly spouse nor children would be enough for her. She has a longing, both to give herself directly to Jesus Christ and a longing to have innumerable children in the spiritual order.

Zeal for Souls

A strong zeal for souls, and to desire to cooperate in their salvation. Everyone should have zeal for souls and seek to save souls. In someone with a religious vocation, the zeal for souls is particularly strong. Filled with zeal, the soul wants to do as much as she possibly can to save souls.

Joyful Docility

When we enter religious life, we allow ourselves to be molded according to the rules and the spirit of the community we enter. This molding does not suppress or destroy our personality, at all, but we must be willing and happy to change our ways of doing even the most mundane things. It requires a joyful docility and detachment from self to allow oneself to be guided in religious life.

Community Living

Ability to live in community

Generous Heart

There is a certain joy in flinging away everything in order to follow only Him. The generosity to give ALL—all our love, all our energy, is important. Someone who hesitates seriously or becomes sad at the thought of all that she would have to give up to enter the convent may lack the generosity of heart required for the vocation.

You are ready to embrace your vocation when you are ready to make a total gift of self. To make a total gift of self requires a certain (not perfect!) detachment from seeking you own fulfillment, your pleasure, your comfort. You must have a certain amount of self-possession and self-knowledge in order to make a gift of yourself, since we cannot give what we do not know or possess. Such self-possession and self-knowledge does not mean that we have to wait to be an adult: some youths are most capable of making a total gift of self (only need but think of Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus).

If you think you are called to religious life you should:

1. Pray, especially in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament. It is there, in the silence of Eucharistic Adoration that Jesus often speaks, almost imperceptibly and without unusual signs, to our hearts.
2. Read about religious Sisters and religious life.
3. Visit a few communities.
4. Seek counsel. In such an important matter as vocational discernment, it is important that we consult with someone else, especially someone who has experience in such matters, such as a priest of a religious.
5. If you think you are called to religious life you should not wait for extraordinary signs from God. Saint Frances de Sales remarks on the tendency for us to look for extraordinary signs:

To know whether God wants us to be a religious, we must not wait for the Divine Majesty to speak to us in some sensible way or that He send from heaven some Angel to point out His will for us. Even less so is there any need to have some private revelations about it. There is no need to have ten or twelve theologians from the Sorbonne ponder whether this is a true inspiration or not or whether it must be carried out.

However, we must cultivate and correspond with the first impulse. Then we must not be troubled if any distaste or coldness comes after that. For, if we always try to keep our will very firm in wanting to discover the good that has been shown to us, God will not fail to make all redound to His glory.

—Saint Francis de Sales

Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions about vocational discernment. You can contact Sister Mary Imelda, the Guest Mistress, at vocations@filiae.org.