By Adam Burns
HAVE you ever caught yourself over-thinking something?
It could be an embarrassing moment, or a comment someone made about you.
Whatever it may be it replays in your head over and over.
The more you think about it, the more the event blows out of proportion, becoming bigger and worse than it originally was.
What’s lacking is a touch of reality, which can never be experienced if the event lives just in your head. The same can be said of God’s call.
If the sense of calling is only experienced in your head or heart or soul, it can blow out of proportion and become a more confusing mess than it should be.
At some point, the discernment process needs to be externalised, it needs to invite other people to weigh in.
We don’t discern in a vacuum.
Vocation always stems from and leads us back to the Body of Christ. Hence, discernment can’t happen apart from community.
A tagline that Vocation Brisbane has been using is “Begin the Conversation”.
Conversation is absolutely necessary if one is to hear God’s call.
Obviously, the conversation needs to include God – it is, after all, God’s call. It should also include family and friends, people who have known us for a long time and who know us well.
These are the people who know us intimately, perhaps even better than we know ourselves.
They can comment on whether a sense of a call seems true to our prior experiences.
The conversation becomes more daring and more fruitful when it includes people who have experienced the discernment process and who have pursued their vocation.
These are mentors, spiritual directors and vocations directors. They are people whose lives inspire and challenge us.
The work of Vocation Brisbane is to create spaces for these conversations to happen. Whether it be with our Vocations director Fr Morgan Batt, or with our young, dedicated team of officers; we aim to invite people into conversation about where God is calling you.
One such opportunity is our upcoming Hearing God’s Call evening on March 10 at Canali House at 47 Clyde Road, Herston.
The night will feature religious and consecrated men and women from around Brisbane archdiocese, Mass, dinner and a talk from visiting Missionaries of God’s Love.
We invite young adults in Brisbane to join us and to join the conversation, starting at 6.30pm.
Regardless of how far along the discernment journey we find ourselves at, it’s important that the call isn’t just a “voice in my head”.
It is crucial to pair the sense of calling with an awareness of community.
God’s call is never just “my” call.
In this Year of Consecrated Life let’s continue the vocation conversation, inviting young men and women to answer the call to serve as nuns, sisters, brothers, consecrated people and priests.
Adam Burns is a vocations officer for Vocations Brisbane.
Have a vocation question? Contact the team at Vocation Brisbane on 1300 133 544 or at vocation@bne.catholic.net.au
