Sydney
10 August 2003
Home
Archive
Subscribe
Links
Contact
Catholic MPs told to oppose same-sex ‘marriage’ moves
Medical equipment shipped to islands
Honour a ‘bolt from the blue’
Blessing for the infertile
Your gifts send Susan to Lourdes
Landmark dates for Fr Joe, escapee
Bishops applaud refugee move
Liberal arts focus at Campion College
Faith, ecology network
Editorial: Tale of a tiger
Letters: Move the world?
Vocation Awareness Special: Are you doing what God’s calling you to?
Living ‘in the spirit of Mary’
Mercy at the heart of a vocation
Marie’s Song of Mercy
Children of the rock - John Paul II
Kim received faith ‘through God’s words’
People you meet are the ‘best thing’ for a priest
Divisions cast aside
Voice of youth: Downside to benefits of plurality
Tribute to the man in the bus shelter
Vocation Awareness Special: Are you doing what God’s calling you to?
By Effie Caldarola
He told me about waking up from a sound sleep, sitting upright in bed and thinking: “I should be a priest.”
This happened to him four or five times over the course of two or three years, despite the fact that he really wasn’t giving a priestly vocation much thought during the daytime.
He didn’t know what was causing these wake-up calls. But finally he thought: “I’d better check this out.”
And after seven years at Mt Angel Seminary in Seattle, Scott Garrett is about to be ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Anchorage.
Wouldn’t we all love to hear a message so loud and clear that it insistently wakes us up from a sound sleep? Whether we’re trying to discern a vocation to the priesthood or agonising over which college to choose, we’d love to get that clear sign from God.
The Archdiocese of Anchorage, where I live, has two seminarians being ordained this year. That may not sound like a lot if you live in Chicago, New York or Sydney, but for Anchorage it’s a jackpot.
Like most places nowadays, Anchorage greatly needs priests. We don’t have a large Catholic population - around 30,000. But we’re spread over a vast area and many of our 14 rural parishes are remote, and some are inaccessible by road.
And out of 16 diocesan priests, only nine are actively working in the archdiocese, supplemented by priests from religious orders or other dioceses.
That means the ordination of two priests is like finding a new well on dry land.
The other man to be ordained, Tom Lilly, had what might be considered a more typical “call”.
Tom was in his mid-30s and happy in a US Air Force career he planned to see through to retirement. But something tugged at him.
He found himself asking: “Am I doing what God’s calling me to? Am I doing enough?” He didn’t want to just mark time and let the years pass by, he said.
So he too decided to give the seminary a try. Both men said their time of indecision came before they entered. Once in the seminary, they didn’t look back.
When Scott and Tom had their experiences of feeling called, they went to people they respected and shared what they were hearing.
They also noted what people were saying about them. Both of them were active in their parishes and heard people say: “You would make a good priest.”
They realised that this might be another way that God was speaking to them.
The parishioners themselves contributed to Tom’s discernment.
“My call was validated by a praying community,” Tom said.
The high school and college years are times of tremendous thought about “what comes next”.
Sometimes we hardly know where to begin.
Few of us will be fortunate enough to be awakened from a sound sleep with a ready answer.
It’s good to listen to those insistent desires in our hearts or those nagging questions at the back of our minds. It’s good to hear friends, parents and teachers when they tell us what they perceive to be our gifts.
Experts tell us that today’s kids probably will go through two or three careers in their lifetime.
Maybe that means the priesthood or religious life is somewhere in your future.
But no matter what lies ahead, keep Tom Lilly’s question alive in your heart: “Am I doing what God’s calling me to?”