Vocation

Many of us run from the idea of a vocation.

For some of us, it offends our sense of autonomy: that we should listen and follow a voice other than our own.

Others may think that vocations are only something for nuns and priests: not for those already with spouses and children.

Still others of us may avoid the idea of a vocation because we suspect - and deep in our hearts we know - that God is calling us to leave behind our lives of independence and freedom and to follow him, leaving behind desires for romance or family so that we may serve God and his people totally and completely in the vocation of priesthood or consecrated life.

And some of us answered our vocation - to priesthood, marriage, or the consecrated life - but the path seems harder than we had thought.

And so we run.

Yet God still calls.

From behind, a voice shall sound in your ears:

"This is the way; walk in it"...

So we hear in today’s first reading (Isaiah 30:19-21, 23-26).

We cannot run from vocation.

God calls you and he calls me.

He calls people to the devout married life: not with the purpose of putting together just another household in suburbia, but to witness boldly to the world as husband and wife the joy, power and peace of mutual self-surrender, openness to new life, and building up of the kingdom of God.

He calls people to the devout single life: not the comfortable life of pleasure without attachments, but to witness boldly to the world that individuals can make a difference, can live without self-absorption and decadence, and can walk faithfully in the footsteps of Christ even in the very gut of the workday world.

He also calls people to the consecrated life: to give oneself totally to the love and the service of God and his people with solemn vows and to be bound in love to a community committed to the imitation of Christ.

He also calls men to priesthood: to be bound in an especially close way to the sacrifice of Christ, to his Body and Blood, to his Word and his Forgiveness, and to the struggles and pains of his people.

And so we hear in today's Gospel (Matthew 9:35-10:1, 5a, 6-8):

At the sight of the crowds,
his heart was moved with pity for them
because they were troubled and abandoned,
like sheep without a shepherd.
Then he said to his disciples,
"The harvest is abundant
but the laborers are few;
so ask the master of the harvest
to send out laborers for his harvest."

Let's stop running.

Let us listen…

And pray....