Trust God's Plan

[bardegaulois]

Greetings, Phatmass. It must have been five years since the last time I checked in here.

For some reason, I felt a hankering about a week ago to come back and check some of those things that I had written over the course of the 2010s, when I felt eager to serve, but my place in the Church and in society never quite seemed to present itself. I can't say it's presented itself since, but I am much closer to where I believe the Lord would have me.

I hope you don't mind if, certain situations considered, I speak mostly in generalities for the sake of discretion.

In the intervening period, I entered priestly formation and went through a pre-theologate before discerning that God was not offering me the grace to serve within this context. However, I became more broadly known by many good priests, deacons, and seminarians and had the lion's share of a master's degree in philosophy paid for during that period. I don't want to go into too much detail about my departure on stellar terms with the diocese, but I left within a year after Francis' recent motu proprio curtailing Latin Mass permissions. Being a liturgical minister who travels broadly to participate in TLMs, that greatly stung me. Of course this was not the only factor that led to my departure, as there were personal situations as well, but it did have a strong impact on my trust of the Holy See and the local ordinary.

Oddly, on the day that I choose to withdraw, a job administering the same office at a small public college where I had worked for over a decade opened, and I was doing that on a temporary basis within a week and then on a permanent basis within a few months. The college eventually decided to "build back better," leaving me with no option but to depart, but working as an educational administrator for over a year certainly has enhanced me professionally, especially as I consider a move into Catholic schools and colleges.

I also found myself briefly engaged during that period, though we both saw that it would not work out well in the end.

One might think me morose after all of this happening, and I will admit that I had my moments (especially after the job and the girlfriend were gone within a month of one another). However, my general attitude is sanguine at this point. I think these experiences have shown me a lot about what vocation in life truly is, and how often we think about it wrongly.

I did not become a priest; I did not even make it to major seminary. Nevertheless, my experiences have placed in both formal and informal positions of trust and leadership within my diocese that seem almost tailor-made for me, at the same time as new foundations are coming into being that appear very promising. The Lord has certainly not left my hands empty, and my capabilities and various callings show all signs of being able to bear fruit, especially as a shrinking priestly corps means that much of the work I can do would soon have to be ignored if I weren't doing it, which might profoundly affect the quality of the pastoral care the faithful receive.

Moreover, I think I'm well primed to weather a few storms in the universal Church that we can see on the horizon now, something I might not be able to do if in seminary formation or as a parochial vicar (if I even made it that far). It's a grace that I discerned out when I did.

In short, God always provides work well suited for your hand if you are willing to be generous with Him. Too often, we gaze at our navels and fuss about things, calling it discernment. The best way to discern is by actually doing what we think we ought to be doing, and trusting that God will fill in the rest.

I write in the hope that this helps someone. God bless.

Le Barde Gaulois

[chrysostom]

Thanks for the words. God bless.