I grew up going to the new Mass. My discernment journey began when I was a young teenager, around 13 or 14. I went to a youth retreat run by some good Franciscan friars. Before this retreat I had never encountered any religious in my life. I had read about them in a few books, but never really thought about people actually giving up their lives for Christ. The retreat lasted a couple days, and I was impressed by these men, who had led very normal and sometimes very sinful lives previously. They had given up everything to live a life devoted to Christ and poverty. After the retreat was over, I decided since Christ was so good to me it only seemed right to give him my whole life. Though this thought was always in the back of my head, I was not a good Catholic as a teenager. I never doubted the Catholic faith, but I was definitely a Sunday Catholic. I am putting this in here because I don’t want anyone to think I am this great virtuous person, and only the spotless enter religion. I am a broken sinner in need of God’s love and mercy like the rest of us. Around 16 my faith formation teacher introduced me to the Latin mass.
My father really wanted me to go to college, get a good degree, marry, and have a nice family. I graduated high school and went to discern if college was the right thing for me. All the while, I still had the desire to enter religious life. I had to at least give college a try for my father. My first year there I went to Mass infrequently. It wasn’t until after the second semester I decided to change my life. During my third semester I made an earnest effort to get back to church and change my life. I pursued discerning religious life, and had the opportunity to speak with religious from several different communities. I realized through the conversations we had I was drawn to a more hidden and contemplative order. I began looking into monasteries. A good priest recommended three monasteries to me: Clear Creek, the Redemptorists, and the Wyoming Carmelites. It became apparent after 3 semesters of college I needed to leave. I dropped out to discern the religious life more seriously and spent the next 2 years praying, visiting Clear Creek, and learning about myself and what God wanted me to do. During those two years I read a lot of religious books and my love and devotion to our Lady increased much. The other saints I became interested in were the Carmelites. I read St. Therese’s story, several of St. Teresa’s works and some of St. John of the Cross. The spirituality and way of life of these great saints seemed to be what I was looking for. I really enjoyed my visits to the Benedictines, but I wasn’t attracted to their way of life. Once I figured out the Benedictines were not where I wanted to enter, I reached out to Carmel. I made a retreat at the end of 2017 and knew Carmel was the life I should pursue. I was able to enter in April of 2018.
When I am asked how my time was at Carmel I often say it was the best year of my life. Even after getting married and having children I still say this. The reason being is Carmel is our Lady’s garden. Being a cloistered contemplative is the highest and best vocation there is. God and our Lady blessed me by allowing me to stay in her garden for a year and a month, or a full liturgical year. While I was at Carmel I grew leaps and bounds in knowledge of the Catholic faith, how to practice virtue, and love of God. The monks are all serious in their desire of God and sanctity. Being surrounded by men whose sole pursuit is the greatest Good is incredibly edifying and uplifting. It creates an atmosphere of joy and peace, I believe is unequaled in the world. Not to say it doesn’t have difficulties and struggles, every walk of life in some way imitates our Redeemers. One of the more beautiful virtues at Carmel is the obedience. By study of our Catholic faith and the teachings of the Saints and Doctors we must come to realize the beauty of obedience. Of subjecting our will to God’s is, so to speak, the goal of our faith. Through this subjection to God we love him perfectly and follow all his commands. The problem we have in this life is: how do I know God’s will? Having a superior and order with a clear hierarchy solves this problem. The uncertainty of knowing God’s will vanishes when a superior gives an obedience to follow. Which means one may completely trust legitimate obedience is God’s will for the subject, sin excepting.
I entered the monastery without preconceived ideas of what religious life was going to be like, or how religious should act. This mindset was very beneficial to have as lay people often cannot know realistically how religious life is to be lived. Having ideas of “monks should act like this or not do these things” can be very harmful for fruitful discernment. I say this because the point of discernment is not to judge others action or inaction, but to be docile to God’s will in regard to what He wants, not what you want.
We would be woken quite early in the morning to prayer and begin the day. I was there to discern the lay brotherhood so my schedule was different than the choir monks. It took time to get used to the rigors of the schedule. While they prayed the morning offices, the lay brothers would pray Paters and get breakfast ready. The lay brotherhood is essential to run a monastery. Their vocation is to do more of the manual labor so the choir monks can do God’s work, the office, without worry of temporal things. This isn’t to say they don’t pray as much as the choir monks, the form of prayer is just different. The choir monks have the blessing of the full office and the lay monks have the blessing of offering the sacrifice of their work to God. I think many people look down on the lay brotherhood vocation. This is a terrible mistake. God calls us to a specific vocation and our job is to accept his gift, whatever it may be. The lay brothers have the blessing of living a more hidden life of service and humility, following the example of the Blessed Virgin. After breakfast all the monks went to work. It was fascinating to see how the coffee shop ran and be able to learn to help. Since I did not have a lot of experience with the type of manual labor there, the older monks were always extremely patient with teaching me and making sure I stayed safe. The monks never got angry or annoyed with me when I messed something up or had difficulty with something. When I was having a rough time or was being assailed by temptations, the spiritual director was always available to talk to and guide me any time, day or night. There are many beautiful aspects of the monastery I have not talked about, it would take a whole book to touch on all of them.
Towards the end of my time there I realized I wasn’t quite happy. There are a lot of things to get used to when you enter religion, so rough patches are expected. I thought to myself, “this life is wonderful, the liturgy ancient and beautiful, the brotherhood unbeatable, the Fathers always supportive, the work and the prayer solid, why am I unhappy?” For a little while I struggled with figuring out why and couldn’t quite pinpoint the source. On the last day I was at Carmel I went to speak to my spiritual director about this and he said he was wishing to speak with me also. It turned out we were wanting to talk to each other about the same thing, my vocation there. During the conversation many things came to light. We talked about how I could live the evangelical counsels, the vows, but it would be wrong for me to continue this path if it was not God’s will. We both agreed God was not calling me to this life and I told him I would discern marriage when I left. With the priors blessing I left the very same day. A funny note here. I found out later, the day I left, May 16th, is my wife’s baptismal anniversary. I joke that’s proof she prayed me out of the monastery. It was one of the many gifts of assurance God gave the two of us.
When I got home to my parents I didn’t immediately go out and start looking for a wife. I had been home for a week or two and my mom said she was going to the religious bookstore. I tagged along with her. I remember when I entered the store one of my good friends, from before my time at the monastery, was working the register. She gave me a beaming smile and squeaked out a high pitched greeting, as she does when she is excited to see friends whom she loves. The first thing I thought when I saw her was “I’m going to marry her”. This thought took me aback. At the time I was still adjusting to being back in the world, so I pushed this thought aside. Well, my first thought upon seeing her came to be true. This young woman whom I had known since she was eleven and I twelve was to be my wife. We reconnected after she knew I was home and in November, six months after my return, we were courting. The next March on St. Joseph’s feast day we got betrothed, and the following November we were married.
Comments