ELLIO OTT ELLIOTT
ELLIO OTT ELLIOTT
OPTICIANS PICCA PIRTH ILIYAR4DF
OPTICIANS
John flliott mssEx-11larisF Bros' Sluded
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SEVENTY-SECOND YEAR.
' Vocations
Marriage is a-sMuch God's Will as the Religious Life all girls in such a way that he wants willed its to be saints, not all in the her of all the world, that he wants to same measure or in the same way of give all of himself to her and receive life, but according to the measure of all of her in return unto a perfect our gifts and in a very definite field of unity. Iknow now, after many years, service. That is our vocation. It has that love is a desire of oneness to be to be so, for God needs and His achieved only by mutual complete givneeds and His world needs ing; but I do not know yet why she saintly priests and nuns, but also saintshould desire that complete oneness Iv husbands and wives, saintly mothers with me of all the men in the world, and fathers, saintly doctors and nurses and I with her of all the women in and politicians and so on. So voca. the world. Or maybe I do know. whether you put an adjective in front. tion to me means God's own choosing By FREDERIC FRANS. of a way of life in which a man or a Ilaybe that last unexplainable thing is of it or not, they think you are talking God's finger, God's voice His vocation, woman will achieve sanctity, serve God of a religious vocation. The Priests and the Nuns have been His calling. 1laybe it is not quite so and serve his neighbour. In this deWho Has a Vocation? having their say recently about the finition, there would he only one basic silly after all to say that marriages are Perhaps I'm unique ( I don't think shortage of religious vocations, and a made in Heaven. reason for the following' of any voca. so, honestly), but the impression so very good say it was, too. It may ( Incidentally, 1 am weary unto tion, and that would be a reasonable often left on me by talks on vocation seem presumptuous of a layman to death hearing so many talks on marconviction that such is God's will for was that God called some very ;special offer his views on the same subject; riage that degenerate into tirades Inc. A Catholic boy should become few and gave them for good reasons but agreat-grand-uncle of mine on my against birth control and divorce and a priest because, in the final analysis, of His own a vocation in life. The mothers side was until the day of his juvenile delinquency. I am tired even he is convinced that God wants him rest of its apparently had no vocation death in his ninety-first year what is of the so-called "practical" talks on to achieve his sanctity and render his known in certain parts of Ireland as a in life, but were put here to shift for marriage. When and if Iget to Heaservice in the priesthood. A Catholic ourselves and make the best of a bad "Priest's Boy:' He " clarked" for ven, the first thing I'm going to do is girl determines on marriage basically bargain. If we wished to serve God the priest of the parish for upward of because she is convinced that she has buttonhole Saint Paul and ask him to with all our heart and soul, if we sixty-five years; and there is a tradiexplain fully that way he had of commet the man with whom God ravishes had a really deep love of Christ, we tion in our family ( no doubt started paring the love and unity of Christ her to achieve sanctity and render her were told, we would follow Our Lord by this same uncle) that the parish for and with His Church to the love need of service to God, His Church in the religious life. Seemingly only priest himself said on my great-grandand unity of husband and wife.. Did and His world. the religious life was a life consecrated uncle's fiftieth anniversary as " Priest's he imply that outside the love of a The Vocation of Marriage. to God. Boy" that he had found the " Boy's" man for his God, the closest and most Too little, I am afraid, has been Jlaybe I am now transferring the comments on the world, the flesh and perfect cif all human loves is the love made of this vocational view of marthoughts of maturer years to a schoolthe devil of more value in the preparaof husband and wife? Certainly it is riage, of the will of God in marriage, boy's only slightly questioning mind; tion of his Sunday sermons than all the most complete and the most enof the deliberate choice from early but it seems to me that even then I the learned commentaries on the Gos(luring. Did he mean that it is above years of marriage as a saintly vocapels. In the family they say that I thought there was something not exand more complete than the love of tion. God, we are told, calls priests actly wrong but incomplete about this am a throwback to my great- grandfriends, than love of parents for chiland nuns and brothers. IIe does, and approach to the question of vocations. uncle on my mother's side. dren and children for parents? Else sometimes in strange ways, but I also Every human being, as I understand 130 that as it may, we of the laity are why did God say: " For this cause like to think that Ile " called" my wife religion, is bound to consecrate to God very much interested in the problem of and me, and all husbands and wives to shall a man leave his ' father and his his.life and all his living. The very religious vocations. We love our marriage. \Iy wife won't mind if I mother and cling to his wife, and the pagans understood the notion of sacpriests and brothers and nuns. We two will become one flesh?" I wontell you that 1teas first drawn to her rifice: and surely the holy Sacrifice are deeply devoted to them. We hold der Saint Paul, if you would agree by a charming little lilting note that is of the Klass teaches us that we are them in the highest esteem. We know maybe a little bit with me when I part of her laughter and that to me all- bound to unite the sacrifice of our how much we need them, how lost we think that a man reaches a better unat least makes her laughter fresher own lives with the Sacrifice of Christ well (I be in a dreary world without derstanding of the phrase, " the love of and happier and more delightful than on the Altar. The big motivation of them. What in the world would beGod," through an understanding o1 Others every Catholic life is supposed to be a any laughter in the world. romc of us without our priests to married love, Otherwise why the tra mac not think so, but Ido; and Ilike steep personal love for Christ, a love offer up the Holy Sacrifice for its, withditional insistence that the Church is to think that God gave her that laugh. deep enough and real enough to move out our Religious teachers and nurses Why ter, and IIe so fashioned me that I the spotless bride of Christ? us to the closest possible imitation of and counselors? that mvstical phrase applied to Reliwould be drawn to that laughter. When Him. If there is anything in the world we gious, " Spouse of Christ?" But I'm I knew her better, I came to love all Every human being must have a can do to foster in our children not a theologian and I'm getting into that was womanly in her, a gentleness vocation, if vocation means that religious vocations, we certainly shall deep water, so I'd better get back to of mind and heart, a ... well, all those mnnner or -state of life in do it. Yet, there are not a few of things that make her her. I know things I know.) which God wants us to offer u who think that part of the proGod called us ( Mary and me and all that God made her so, that Ile gave to Him the best of our service. God blem, at least. lies with the holy peomarried people) to that pure, beauticreated me to serve Him, not in a her the parents and home and schoolple themselves, especially in the reful, complete union, that oneness of ing and friends and circumstances devague way, but in a very particular stricted way they talk about vocalove which is to stand before the world signed to develop all those beautiful way. In creating me fie put into me tions. Of course, they make it polite, as the perpetual symbol of the Mystitraits in her. And to me Ile gave all those qualities and gifts and atpassing bow now and then to the sincal Body, of the close oneness that parents and friends and training that tractions that would enable me to find gle vocation and the vocation of marwould make me appreciate and love exists between Christ and His Church. my place in life and to fill it in a holy riage, but for the most part they have Ile called us to a sharing in a Sacraall of her. way. From all eternity God destined taken the word vocation almost exclument, one of His seven holy Sacra. What she saw or sees in me I do not some people to be priests, nuns and sively to themselves. They talk and merits. More than that, Ile called us yet really know, but I do know this, brothers, other's to be husbands and act a general rude as though there to be the ministers of a Sacrament to that none of your treatises on love will wives, others to serve Him in a special werc'in life only one vocation, and that each other. Not many laymen have ever exactly put a finger on just what way outside both, the religious and the the religious vocation. Alention the (Continued on Page 9.) it is that makes aman love one girl of married state. From all eternity, God word vocation to most people and,
Vibrant Mystery of Christian Love
Take Care of Wedlock and the Church Cloister Will Look After Itself —
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