"I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness,
and speak tenderly to her."
Hosea 2:14
Sister M Mark
Perpetually Professed
ocation stories
An Ordinary Life, an Extraordinary Grace
A Vocation Story
Introduction-
This is just one autobiographical narrative among the many that could be told of how a vocation to religious life is born and why one would leave the world and all of its attractions to pursue this call. An invitation to become a spouse of Christ is truly an extraordinary grace, but as this unpretentious story unfolds, you the reader, will come to understand that this call is not necessarily given to extraordinary persons, in fact, quite the contrary. Rather, God calls whom He wills for reasons known to Him alone; He calls with a hidden plan that gradually begins to be revealed as the one called initially responds and continues to respond to all that the good Lord asks of her.
Narrative-
Of course, when I was a little girl I thought nuns were extraordinary creatures that dropped out of the heavens at the will of God. Maybe you thought this too. However, we both found out they didn't come from heaven, and that shattered a little part of our world for the time being.
It was not unusual that I should find the religious life so mysterious as a youngster. You see, I did not go to a Catholic grammar school. Actually, I attended the neighborhood public elementary school in our town, which provided me with a very good education, but no nuns. The war had just ended when my three brothers and I were growing up. We couldn't afford to go to the Catholic school, so the only contact I had with Sisters was limited to a one hour catechism class on Sunday mornings. Also, the Sisters were not seen as often on the public street then (we're talking about the 1940's-1950's) as they are today. But even now, when the Sisters are seen more frequently, we are still a wonder to many children. We Sisters have often overheard youngsters on the sidewalks referring to us in excited tones as everything from a "witch" to "Mrs. God." Nevertheless, more and more children come to the realization much earlier in life than you or I have that nuns are quite normal individuals after all.
As a youngster the only desire I ever had to enter religious life, as I recall, was the time when I thought that by becoming a Sister I might have a chance to be an altar boy. (There were no female altar servers in those days.) Practically every Catholic girl between the ages of eight and ten goes through that stage of idolizing the altar boys. I wanted to be one so badly that I was even willing to be one of those mysterious creatures in black and white just so I could serve mass as did my idols. Well, my mother shattered that dream when I inquired about the chances of being an altar boy under such conditions.
Looking back now, I would say that my vocation to enter the religious life really came to me between my sophomore and junior years in high school, but the whole thing began when I was a high school freshman. Something great and wonderful was going to happen to me the September after graduating from eighth grade. I was going to a Catholic high school, an academy for girls. That was a big event in my life. I was very grateful, very happy, but mostly very excited. This was going to be an experience never to be forgotten.
The Sisters who staffed this girls' academy, the order to which I now belong, were not like the nuns back home in my parish. There was nothing mysterious about them; they were real human beings. I was completely taken up with them and after one month of school at the Academy, I was convinced I was gong to enter the convent.
Well, as you can imagine, the novelty and sensationalism of having nuns for teachers wore off. By the end of the first semester, entering the convent was the furthest thing from my mind. I was going to be a teacher, I was going to get married, I was going to raise a family. The Sisters were okay, but you had to be something special to be one of them. Little did I know then.
My real call to religious life came, as I mentioned previously, during the summer after my sophomore year at the Academy. I turned sixteen then, that magical age. It was a great summer as were all the others. I've always enjoyed a full and active life especially in the summer months. I still do. Somehow this summer was different. I started my first part-time job, I was meeting lots of new people, and I guess I was actually beginning to realize what life really meant. Several times throughout this fun-filled vacation serious thoughts of entering the convent occurred and reoccurred to me. No, an angel didn't come down from heaven and tap me on the shoulder to say, "Come!" It doesn't happen that way in case you've wondered. It was just the constant thought of entering that came during the quiet moments of the summer months-and even during the more active times too.
These thoughts and desires began to increase in frequency and depth as time went on through my junior year at the Academy, the summer that followed, and into my senior year. My vocation to the religious life was proving to be genuine, for the desire to become a Sister would occur at the most unlikely times: at a dance, on a date, traveling along swift waters on skis. I prayed much during these times to know truly if this was really my vocation. It was too great a change in life to enter blindly.
By the time I reached the end of the first semester of my senior year, I was convinced that I did, in fact, have a vocation to the religious life, and in the fall of the following year I pursued this vocation by entering the novitiate of the Sisters of Charity Motherhouse, to which was attached the Academy of the Holy Family where I had received my secondary education. I can truly say that this was God's decision and my response to it, for in no way did any individual attempt to persuade or dissuade my intentions.
I can still recall the reactions of my closest relatives and friends. My dear aunt didn't know how I was going to survive without wearing Bermuda shorts. (She never saw me in anything else.) The mother of one of my closest friends was convinced I'd never make it since I liked boys so much. You see, I was quite normal. I dated up until a few weeks before I entered the novitiate, for it was only then that I gave up my small puppy loves for a greater Love. Unlike the parents of most girls who want to enter the religious life, my parents were quite docile to the fact and accepted the decision that I had my own life to live. I've often been a bit suspicious over the fact that they were so willing to let me go, and I tease them about it once and awhile.
Now you know how it all occurred, but the mystery is why. Unfortunately I cannot give you that answer completely, for much of it is still a mystery to me, and I think it will remain so until eternity.
I will not leave you hanging here with this question of why unanswered at least to some degree. To put the why I entered religious life into words, let me simply say for the same reason most people marry, for love. I want to give back to my Creator as much as I am able the gifts He has given to me. My life, and all I do with it, belongs to Him completely. He has called me, and I have come. To answer why he has called me, I can't. It is beyond my power. Why me rather than so many others more worthy of such a calling, I do not know. Hopefully, someday I will hear another call, that of "Come blessed of my Father, take possession of the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world," (Matthew 25:34) and then I will know.