Monastic Immersion Experience 2017-2018

Upcoming Monastic Immersion
Experiences:

  Thanksgiving Weekend
November 24-26, 2017

New Year

December 30– January 1, 2018

Holy Week and Triduum

March 25-31, 2018

Corpus Christi

June   1-3, 2018

Additionally, women are
welcome to come at other times as their schedules permit

"the thrust of a vocation."

In creating us, God implants with in the depths of our person hood the thrust of a vocation. From inception, we begin becoming who the Lord calls us to be. From the womb already, we start inching toward how God wills us to become our true selves. From the outset too, we commence groping toward what the Lord destines us to do. Throughout life's journey our self-identity, lifestyle and mission develop and interact along the lines of the Lords's calling. 

Called by God, pg 115  Frances Kelly Nemeck adn Marie Theresa Coombs 

The Lord persists...

Easter Sunday Mass Cor Jesu Chapel  Fr. Boniface OSB

The Lord persists in seeking us out in love. God irresistibly draws us until we desire only to surrender ourselves freely and joyfully to the Lord.

Called by God, by Frances Kelly Nemeck and Marie Theresa Coombs pg 96

Vocational Awareness

Vocational consciousness, ...completes the cycle

1 of the Lord's willing and calling,

2 of our being set in motion toward God, 

3 of our reaching awareness of the Lord's calling.

At this point, voluntariness burst forth in earnest. Once we are aware of our vocation and of our personal history already proceeding in that direction, we can then begin to commit ourselves to God.

With increasingly enlightened faith we can assent to and deliberately foster our self-inedtity, vocational lifestyle and mission. 

Called by God, Frances Kelly Nemeck and Marie Theresa Coombs 

An Individual's Vocation and the Callings of Other people

The unfolding of our vocation occurs amid intimate relatedness not only with God but also with others. Vocation develops within a communal setting. While the Lord calls each of us to a specific self-identity, a lifestyle and a mission, God is also calling every person who influences our spiritual journey to his/her own vocational who, how and what. Many of those vocations interconnect and converge upon one another, forming an unbelievably complex network:
 
        The life and death of every one of us influences someone else (Rom 14:7)

Called by God by Frances Kelly Nemeck and Marie Theresa Coombs

Christian Vocational Lifestyles

As the biblical authors put it: Willing us to exist, God knows us and chooses us to be. Having chosen us, the Lord calls us each by name and consecrates us. That choosing, calling and consecrating we term "our vocation."
Our vocation is both eternal and temporal. It is eternal because even before forming us in the womb the Lord had already consecrated us (Jer 1:5). Moreover, our eternity will consist in the everlasting realization of that consecration-unending, ever-deepening communion with Father, Son and Spirit. Our vocation is also temporal because it unfolds in space and time. It extends from the moment of inception to the instant of death. Thus, we experience a vocation within a vocation- a temporal particular calling within an eternal universal call to holiness.

Called by God A Theology of Vocation and Lifelong Commitment by Frances Kelly Nemeck and Marie Theresa Coombs

The Particular Calling of Each Person

Sisterly Love..... 

  While the call to holiness is universal, God nonetheless calls each individual to a particular self-identity in Christ Jesus, to a specific vocational lifestyle and to a special mission. The Lord gifts everyone with a unique person-hood. God calls each to become his/her true self through some way of lift. God sends each individual forth to contribute in a unique manner to the building up of the Body of Christ (Eph 4:12).

Called by God A Theology of Vocation and Lifelong Commitment pg 65 by Frances Kelly Nemeck and Marie Theresa Coombs 

We are all loved by God in a way that He knows we need it the most. 

Consecrated unto God

The Lord consecrates us for a reason: to transform us, to deify us. Personal holiness, therefore, remains as divinely ordained goal of every human life.

A. The universal Call to Holiness
   The Lord calling us each by our own name and destining us to divinization makes us special chosen and beloved. By calling us, the Lord sets us apart for God. Thus the Lord consecrated us. What we name "vocation" is the milieu in which and the way trough which we become holy as God is holy ( Lev 19:2; Matt 5:48)
   Yet, the Lord does not call and consecrate only a select few. God calls all persons by their individual names and consecrated each one to participate in the inner life of the Trinity.

Called by God  Theology of Vocation and Lifelong Commitment  Frances Kelly Nemeck and Marie Theresa Coombs pg 61

 How have we responded to the unique call from God?
 Our vocations is what leads us closer to the loving relationship with God.
 How is this achieved, by our response to God's invitation to love.

..in the direction of God's will

   "Because discernment begins in faith, proceeds in faith and ends in faith, it remains always shrouded in darkness. We cannot "know" with scientific precision what the Lord desires.  

Thus, rather than say that such and such is the will of God, it seems more appropriate to affirm that a particular choice is in the direction of God's will. The divine will cannot be reduced to human categories, God's will infinitely transcends any thing we can conceive it to be. ...

   Since we can never possess empirical certitude in matters of faith, our discernment always retains an element of darkness and risk. Moreover, faith guides us through this night "more surely than the light of noonday" ( St John of the Cross)   Thus, the vocational imperative which moves us to lifelong commitment is produced by God in us, not precisely by our conviction of proceeding in the direction of God's will. 

   That conviction is rather the effect of the divine activity within us. In other words, instead of the signs guiding us, God moves us forward in our vocation; and, in the process, signs appear -- signs which confirm and affirm."

Called by God, Frances Kelly Nemeck and Marie Theresa Coombs. pgs. 14-15

God's Willing and Our Will

How does the Lord's willing affect our will?

God moves us to move ourselves freely. God's willing moves our will to freely desire what God wills for us. Because we are free, a wide range of responses are possible. Sometimes we experience our freedom with spontaneity and joy. At other times we find our freedom perplexing and painful. Yet, the lord works with each response drawing us, transforming us.
When we say "yes", the Lord incites us to deeper commitment.
When we insist on "no" God works towards conversion.
When we persist with "maybe", the Lord prods us out of indecision.

Called by God by Frances Kelly Nemeck and Marie Theresa Coombs 

Called by Name

Just as the Angel called the Shepherds to give witness to Christ, so too does God call you to give witness to Him.

To be Called by One's Very Own Name
    In Isaiah 43:1, it is significant that God does not call us generically but specifically. The Lord calls us by name; indeed, by our very own name. To be thus called is to be known eternally and to be chosen to exist in time. It is to be created as a unique individual. It is to be loved intimately, personally and faithfully by God. To be called by our own name is to be espoused to the Lord. It is to be drawn into a covenant with God. It is ultimately to be invited to become one with God in participant transformation, while at the same time attaining the pinnacle of self-identity.
   God's call creates each of us into a unique person with a particular way to reach full maturity in Christ. We receive a singular identity as well as the potential to attain maximum development of our personhood. We receive the power to experience, to know and to love the Lord. Integral to the Lord's calling us by name then is the mystery of our being and becoming in God. The Lord has implanted within us a thrust toward the fullness of being: eternal life in God. Our being has a dynamic propensity toward ever greater becoming. To be is to become God by participation. To be fully human is to become divinized.

Called by God, A Theology of Vocation and Lifelong Commitment  pg 51 ~ Frances Kelly Nemeck and Marie Theresa Coombs.

The Will of God and Vocation



Christ the King St Emma Monastery

Vocation is an aspect of the Lord's will as it applies to our developing life situation. God does not impose anything on us--- not even divinization. Rather, the Lord interacts and cooperates with us every step of the way, eliciting our free response to the destiny to which God has gratuitously called us.

Called by God, A Theology of Vocation and Lifelong Commitment Marie Theresa Coombs, Hermit and Francis Kelly Nemeck, O.M.I.

How is God interacting with you? How are you interacting with God?