discerning article

Joe at Novitiate Notes pointed out this article - To Be or Not to Be a Priest - in the Chicago Tribune. Interesting read. There are definite differences between discerning to be a priest and discerning a call to women's religious life. Much of that comes from the roles and expectations placed on women and men in our society and church. But there are SO many similarities, which is why I enjoy following my priest-to-be bloggy friends online.

A couple of lines from the article jumped out at me as ringing very true.

In the language of the Roman Catholic Church, it is called "discerning." Young men go to St. Joseph, the college-level seminary of the archdiocese of Chicago on the campus of Loyola University Chicago, to discern whether God is calling them to be priests.

The word fails to capture the intensity of the process. …

Complicating the decision is the belief that it is not entirely theirs to make. They are asked to sense God's decision for them.They are guided and judged by the seminary faculty, who must gauge whether they would make good priests. They must look inside themselves to judge their own potential, their own spirituality and their own needs.The church has been riven by different visions of its character and future. American society has changed in ways that make the notion of a young man volunteering for lifelong celibacy remarkable.Seminarians hear comments about pedophiles. When they tell Loyola students they are considering becoming priests, they encounter blank looks that
junior Roman Rubio translated as meaning, "Who does that?"

I've experienced more than the blank looks. I've actually had people say when I tell them I'm discerning a vocation to the groovy sisters, "People still do that?".

Yes people do. And words do fail to describe the intensity of the process. But they also fail to describe the wonderful gift of this possible vocation. It's pretty amazing.