What Are Bad Reasons To Join An Order

[osapientia]

[quote name='Luigi' post='1745207' date='Jan 7 2009, 11:26 AM']"I think this subject/question was posted/proposed with all good intention as were the responses but I'm a bit concerned that it might do some damage (that may be too strong a word but it's late and I can't think of another) to a possible vocation out there."

O Sapientia:

This question was, indeed, posted with all good intention, and it never occurred to me that it might do some damage (I agree that may be too strong a word, but I know what you mean, and I've had the same -late-night-can't-think-of-a-better-word experience).

Ciao.[/quote]

Luigi,

Point well taken. My response was more about prudence around statements like "if this, then that"

I do think that a "list" could steer someone away from further discernment (if too many of their "reasons" are on that list) and that would be harmful and sad thing in my opinion because, as I said in my post last night, sometimes "real" reasons lie deeper than an expressed or articulated motivation. Some people need help to bring them to the surface.

Some people will make lists and do very well with that kind of process, others among us avoid lists at all costs. For me a list would be a disastrous form of the discernment process.

It's fine for persons to use a list, but it can be harmful for the list to use persons. Maybe that's what was really wanting to come out last evening and I couldn't find the words to articulate it. Methods are fine as long as we leave room for the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Last night I believed this thread to be a little too close to absolutes with one of the posts I read and that's what prompted my response.

By the way, in her autobiography, what St. Teresa de Avila says (paraphrase of course) is that she was so attractive to and attracted by members of the opposite sex that she determined that if she did not enter a convent, she would go to hell. Give that determination she further "discerned" that it would be better to be a nun than go to hell, so she entered religious life. So technically Teresa De Jesus' initial motivation for becoming a nun is a form of one of the items on the bad reasons list: she simply wanted to avoid hell.

I think more of us could offer to Jesus just whatever it is we have in our hands......whether we think it's good, bad or even ugly....if it's all we have, it's all we have.....it still belongs to Him....maybe He will do something amazing with it.

Pax

[Norseman82]

I also think part of the problem is that people don't have a proper understanding of what the Church teaches about vocations. We are not "vocationless" until we are hit over the head with a "grand sign" from above. According to CCC 1603, the vocation to [b]marriage[/b] is what was written into our very nature, so if we start out with the premise that marriage is our natural - some may even call it our default - vocation, we can better understand why the celibate vocation aka "virginity for the sake of the kingdom" has been traditionally referred to as a "higher calling".

Once we have a proper view of vocations, the next step is to ask ourselves two questions:

1) What am I eligible for?
2) What can I handle? Specifically, if you are considering a celibate vocation, do you feel you can handle lifelong celibacy? This point is important, because the "C word" is prominent in this part of the discussion, and I think the celibacy aspect of discernment sometimes may not be given enough attention, as some people encourage recklessness by telling people "don't worry, God will give you the grace to handle whatever state of life you are in" or people who bully others with the "whatsa matter, don't you trust God?" type of comments.

Once we see that as the foundations of vocational discernment, we can look to such things as what are talents are, what we are good at (our strengths and weaknesses), what attracts or repels us, etc.

[tinytherese]

Can't vocation directors usually detect when an inquirer might be discerning to their community for superficial reasons and guide them on to discerning more maturely?

[Norseman82]

[quote name='tinytherese' post='1745395' date='Jan 7 2009, 05:48 PM']Can't vocation directors usually detect when an inquirer might be discerning to their community for superficial reasons and guide them on to discerning more maturely?[/quote]

They should. After all, priesthood preparation is a [b]minimum[/b] of 4 years (I say minimum because some may need to fulfill pre-theology or pre-philosophy requirements, and orders may require longer novitiates), so hopefully there should be ample time prior to ordination.

[CatherineM]

[quote name='DameAgnes' post='1744993' date='Jan 6 2009, 11:29 PM']I think it is remarkable that some can discover that while they joined for "the wrong reasons" they've discovered they had a vocation. It tells us that they were hearing God...just, perhaps not hearing Him so perfectly, at first! :-)[/quote]

I went to law school to make my mom happy. I didn't really want to be a lawyer. I hated law school, but ended up being a pretty decent lawyer, and begrudgingly admit that I enjoyed it as well.

[TeresaBenedicta]

You'd be surprised how many people may be called to join an order or go to seminary... just to be called back out of it eventually. And that's perfectly okay. As my priest once said, there's no better place to learn how to be a good Catholic man/husband than at the seminary. I think, for some people, that may be true with the religious life as well.

[Saint Therese]

I think sometimes the devil has a hand in cases where people hide poor motivations in order to enter a community or the priesthood.

[CatherineM]

People have used religious orders to escape for a long time. The problem is they tend to bring their problems with them behind the walls.

[InHisLove726]

[quote name='TeresaBenedicta' post='1745475' date='Jan 7 2009, 08:09 PM']You'd be surprised how many people may be called to join an order or go to seminary... just to be called back out of it eventually. And that's perfectly okay. As my priest once said, there's no better place to learn how to be a good Catholic man/husband than at the seminary. I think, for some people, that may be true with the religious life as well.[/quote]

I know of one such sister that left her order very recently. I met her in person on a vocations retreat, and wondered why she hadn't made her final vows yet. I asked her as such, because she had been there about 9 years, and she didn't have an answer. I found that odd. I wondered if it was because there was something missing from her life that she was trying to find. She left this past December, and all I know is that she knows what she is supposed to do now. Because of privacy and personal reasons, I won't divulge her name. I just continue to pray for her.

Edited January 8, 2009 by InHisLove726

[DameAgnes]

[quote name='TeresaBenedicta' post='1745475' date='Jan 7 2009, 09:09 PM']You'd be surprised how many people may be called to join an order or go to seminary... just to be called back out of it eventually.[/quote]

That's very wise. God calls us where he will and there are a lot of "way stations" on a journey - it's possible that something you need to learn to live in one spot - needs to be taught to you in another.

[johnnydigit]

St. Padre Pio wanted to be a Capuchin because he liked the pointy hood.

i like the big pointy hood, but even more, i want to pretend i'm a jedi knight (for Our King and Our Lady) and make light saber sounds, probably on the day of my investiture, if God wills it.

[VeniteAdoremus]

[quote name='InHisLove726' post='1745861' date='Jan 8 2009, 07:49 AM']I know of one such sister that left her order very recently. I met her in person on a vocations retreat, and wondered why she hadn't made her final vows yet. I asked her as such, because she had been there about 9 years, and she didn't have an answer. I found that odd. I wondered if it was because there was something missing from her life that she was trying to find. She left this past December, and all I know is that she knows what she is supposed to do now. Because of privacy and personal reasons, I won't divulge her name. I just continue to pray for her. [/quote]

I think I know who you mean. And if I'm right, I know of another sister of the same congregation who did the same.

It's tough on the community, but they're very supportive for discerners in general - in whichever state of discernment they might be (and that's until final vows).

I'm joining the Dominican Sisters of St. Joseph because they have the best puddings ever.

[Nunsense]

[quote name='CatherineM' post='1745672' date='Jan 7 2009, 08:25 PM']People have used religious orders to escape for a long time. The problem is they tend to bring their problems with them behind the walls.[/quote]

My sister-in-law asked me if I were joining a convent to escape from life, but only someone who has never been in a convent would think that it is a good way to escape life's cares and worries! Depending on the community, it isn't much of an escape plan!

I also heard one person say that people wanted to enter religious life so they could have a good retirement plan -- WHAT??

Reasons for entering might be various and numerous, but sometimes even [u]staying [/u]in the community is going to be the hard part - and this is where discernment comes in. The vocation might be real but finding where God wants one isn't always easy. Even St Therese's sister, Leonie encountered a lot of trials in her vocation, trying first the Poor Clares and then the Visitation three times before she was able to persevere. God doesn't give up on us - so we mustn't give up on ourselves.

Edited February 9, 2009 by nunsense

[Didacus]

How would any of you respond to this argument in favour of gay marriage?

[quote]First, a prequalifier - I'm talking from the point of view of gay marriage in the United States.

Your point makes absolutely no sense in terms of the history or the law of the United States. There is only one set of conditions that banning gay marriage would be defensible:

A) The only purpose for having sex was to create offspring,
B) The only permissible sex in society was between a unionized mating pair,
C) The only permissible having of offspring was between a unionized mating pair.

Under those conditions, banning gay marriage would make sense. For the most part, this is the rationale used in strict Islamic countries ala Taliban Afghanistan (though it's been debunked as well). Otherwise, banning gay marriage is prejudicial, pure and simple. Why is it prejudicial?

A) Americans are allowed to have sex with people they are not married to, regardless of sexual orientation.
B) Americans that are married are allowed to have sex without creating children.
C) Americans are allowed to have children outside of marriage.

Without banning those aforementioned practices, the only rationale left to ban gay marriage is that it's "perverse", "unnatural", and all the other catch-terms created, which are really all secret code for "God says you can't do it".

The United States has several avenues that would make sense:

A) Remove the word "marriage" from any government-sanctioned union, give all couples "civil unions", and leave "marriage" to the religious organization of your choice. All rights are equal;

B) Do away with government-recognized unions at all; religious organizations can have whatever ceremonies they want, but there will be no special legal rights for any kind of union without those people embarking upon legal journeys just like anyone else (ie no marriage tax deductions, etc).

C) Recognize all unions as "marriage", meaning a government-recognized union.

D) Place into law code just as I've written above, with the rationale that government-sanctioned union between a man and a woman is necessary to perpetuate the species, and that only a committed union can raise such offspring properly. I think it goes without saying that if this path was most desirable, divorce would be banned at least until the children were emancipated.

Bottom line: in the United States, "marriage" is a legal contract, no more and no less in the eyes of the government. It defines who gets what property, rights to death benefits, authority to make decisions, etc and codifies it so that those rights are assumed by spouses - they don't have to go to special lengths to get those rights, and it's beaver dam near impossible for someone outside the union to take them away. There is no legal argument for denying two consenting people (or really three, four, etc if they're all consenting) the right to enter into a voluntary union that gives them equal rights and protections with other people.

The anti-gay marriage people try to spin it as anything but theological, because they understand that simply saying "God says it isn't right" is a quick way to defeat. So they use the same angles continuously:

- Marriage is to create and rear offspring (then why aren't single mother babies killed instantly?)
- Homosexual sex is perverse (sex, or the intention to have sex, isn't a prerequisite of marriage)

Behind every anti-gay is one of two things: a repressed homosexual or a budding theocratist.[/quote]


Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks!

[VeniteAdoremus]

Bottom line: the premises are wrong, which nulls the entire argument.

We don't talk about "sex only being permissible if".

The sexual act should be an act of total self-giving between two people. You can't do that outside of an exclusive bond - because you can't give what you're also throwing at other people. You can't do that with anticonception - because total giving includes your procreative power. And you can't give all if you're the same gender - because of the procreative power, party, but also because we believe that God created us man and woman, and I could offer my whole female sexuality, which is much more than anatomy, only to someone who doesn't already have it.

You can't brush your teeth with two brushes.

I'll try to re-post after the board has rebooted

[Didacus]

[quote name='VeniteAdoremus' post='1779515' date='Feb 12 2009, 04:34 AM']Bottom line: the premises are wrong, which nulls the entire argument.

We don't talk about "sex only being permissible if".

The sexual act should be an act of total self-giving between two people. You can't do that outside of an exclusive bond - because you can't give what you're also throwing at other people. You can't do that with anticonception - because total giving includes your procreative power. And you can't give all if you're the same gender - because of the procreative power, party, but also because we believe that God created us man and woman, and I could offer my whole female sexuality, which is much more than anatomy, only to someone who doesn't already have it.

You can't brush your teeth with two brushes.

I'll try to re-post after the board has rebooted [/quote]
Somehow I don't think that argument will be well met. The forum I'm debating on are adamently atheistic and anti-christian. I need to argue on the atheist level of things.

Thanks for your comments though, and I believe your correct, just that in the circumstance I don't know if it would be very effective.

[Didacus]

bump

[TradMom]

+Praised be Jesus Christ!

A quick reply:

The "bad reasons" to join an order are the same "bad reasons" to do anything. Bad reasons usually include some sort of selfish or self centered pull and/or unrealistic expectations.

I would hope that all of us, in whatever stage or place in life, are focused on getting to heaven, being better people, living the Gospel message and finding Christ in the center of our lives. We don't always have control over how we meet Him, but we do have control over what we do once we encounter Him.

As for taking advantage of the privilege that is afforded religious in "trying out" the life before making solemn profession (or in the case of men, receiving the Sacrament of Holy Orders), this should never be seen as a failure or loss, or even an indication that someone entered an Order or particular way of life for a "bad reason." As Jung would say, "Called or not called, God is present."

I hope this helps!

TradMom

[cmotherofpirl]

[quote name='Didacus' post='1778851' date='Feb 11 2009, 03:18 PM']How would any of you respond to this argument in favour of gay marriage?
First, a prequalifier - I'm talking from the point of view of gay marriage in the United States.

Your point makes absolutely no sense in terms of the history or the law of the United States. There is only one set of conditions that banning gay marriage would be defensible:

A) The only purpose for having sex was to create offspring,
B) The only permissible sex in society was between a unionized mating pair,
C) The only permissible having of offspring was between a unionized mating pair.

Under those conditions, banning gay marriage would make sense. For the most part, this is the rationale used in strict Islamic countries ala Taliban Afghanistan (though it's been debunked as well). Otherwise, banning gay marriage is prejudicial, pure and simple. Why is it prejudicial?

A) Americans are allowed to have sex with people they are not married to, regardless of sexual orientation.
B) Americans that are married are allowed to have sex without creating children.
C) Americans are allowed to have children outside of marriage.

Without banning those aforementioned practices, the only rationale left to ban gay marriage is that it's "perverse", "unnatural", and all the other catch-terms created, which are really all secret code for "God says you can't do it".

The United States has several avenues that would make sense:

A) Remove the word "marriage" from any government-sanctioned union, give all couples "civil unions", and leave "marriage" to the religious organization of your choice. All rights are equal;

B) Do away with government-recognized unions at all; religious organizations can have whatever ceremonies they want, but there will be no special legal rights for any kind of union without those people embarking upon legal journeys just like anyone else (ie no marriage tax deductions, etc).

C) Recognize all unions as "marriage", meaning a government-recognized union.

D) Place into law code just as I've written above, with the rationale that government-sanctioned union between a man and a woman is necessary to perpetuate the species, and that only a committed union can raise such offspring properly. I think it goes without saying that if this path was most desirable, divorce would be banned at least until the children were emancipated.

Bottom line: in the United States, "marriage" is a legal contract, no more and no less in the eyes of the government. It defines who gets what property, rights to death benefits, authority to make decisions, etc and codifies it so that those rights are assumed by spouses - they don't have to go to special lengths to get those rights, and it's beaver dam near impossible for someone outside the union to take them away. There is no legal argument for denying two consenting people (or really three, four, etc if they're all consenting) the right to enter into a voluntary union that gives them equal rights and protections with other people.

The anti-gay marriage people try to spin it as anything but theological, because they understand that simply saying "God says it isn't right" is a quick way to defeat. So they use the same angles continuously:

- Marriage is to create and rear offspring (then why aren't single mother babies killed instantly?)
- Homosexual sex is perverse (sex, or the intention to have sex, isn't a prerequisite of marriage)

Behind every anti-gay is one of two things: a repressed homosexual or a budding theocratist.





Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks![/quote]
This is not vocation related. Did you post this on the wrong board?
I think it needs copied elsewhere.

[DameAgnes]

Nunsense wrote: Even St Therese's sister, Leonie encountered a lot of trials in her vocation, trying first the Poor Clares and then the Visitation three times before she was able to persevere. God doesn't give up on us - so we mustn't give up on ourselves.

You know...perhaps you should ask Leonie to help you in your discernment with her prayers...who knows, maybe someday you'll be Sr. Mary Leonie!