It was right around this time in February two years ago that I was sitting in the Yawkey Athletics Center listening to a special video message from Jean Vanier to the Boston College community. He was speaking about his journey to L’Arche, to a life of friendship with people who have intellectual disabilities. I was already familiar with L’Arche and a great devotee because of my own experience of living in one such community during a summer in college. But as Vanier spoke about his simple yet ardent desire to follow Jesus and the two main ways that we encounter Jesus—in the Eucharist and in the poor—something inside me clicked.
I was in the last semester of my Master of Theological Studies degree at BC CSTM, and I was still trying to figure out what to do after graduation. I had decided a few months earlier to defer applications to doctoral programs in theology to the following year because I needed more time to clarify my interests, and I wanted to gain some sort of experiential knowledge that would deepen my spiritual life and inform my future studies. Although I had no idea what I was going to do next, I knew it was the right decision because I felt a profound sense of interior freedom.
But what to do? I knew that I wanted “something different,” and I had specific criteria: It had to involve a one-year commitment, an intentional community with a strong sense of spirituality, regular meeting times for prayer, space for silence and solitude, the opportunity to learn practical life skills and challenge myself to grow in new ways, delving deeper into the human experience, and a fruitful source for theological reflection.
To help me in my discernment, I was making my pilgrim way through the Spiritual Exercises in Daily Life accompanied by a spiritual director. As my encounter with Jesus deepened, I became increasingly aware of a desire to serve God with my whole life. For me, this was not a new desire, but it came to the surface in a way that encouraged me to think about where I needed to grow in order to dispose myself more completely to God’s grace. Over time, I realized that my quest for the face of Jesus needed to coincide with a more radical commitment to love of neighbor.
The reason why Vanier’s words struck a chord within me that evening was because I had been meditating recently on the “Three Kinds of Humility” that St. Ignatius proposes in his Spiritual Exercises. In the third kind of humility, Ignatius speaks of how we might “desire and choose poverty with Christ poor.” That line stayed with me. I felt that I had a strong love for Jesus in the Eucharist, but I wanted to live more authentically into that reality of “this is my body, this is my blood given for you” through a deeper solidarity with the poor. Doing so would allow me to grow in the poverty of spirit necessary for becoming close to the heart of God.
After Vanier spoke, I kept returning to the question, “Who are my poor?” As I spent many hours listening to the word of God, participating in the Eucharist, and gazing upon the crucifix in the CSTM chapel, I reflected on past experiences in my life and recurring themes that might provide an insight into where I could concentrate my efforts at solidarity with the poor. Eventually, I arrived at the conclusion that the particular loneliness of people with disabilities was the poverty that had most touched my life, in large part because of my own experience as someone with a disability from birth—deafness.
Up until this point, I had been weighing a number of options for a year of “something different,” but none seemed to resonate with me. I began to consider more seriously the prospect of applying to be an assistant in a L’Arche community because I realized that being an assistant would be a very different experience from that of a volunteer. I would be engaged in the core members’ daily personal care routines, and that was something I had never done before in terms of the level of intimacy and vulnerability involved. I would actually be feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, clothing the naked, welcoming the stranger, caring for the sick, and visiting the imprisoned. Matthew 25:31–46 was a passage that I had returned to time and again in my meditations throughout the Lenten season, and the challenge for me was clear: To follow Jesus, I needed to make the works of mercy a way of life. Only then would my felt call to theology as my life’s vocation make any real sense.
As I shared my discernment process in conversations with friends and received positive feedback, L’Arche seemed more and more like a viable option for me. I just didn’t know where I should apply. After an inspired suggestion from my advisor to try communities in L’Arche Canada, I applied and found out only the day before graduation where I would be going. Even after graduation, though, I didn’t know when I would be going. I still had to complete a substantial amount of paperwork for my work permit, and waiting for approval that summer seemed interminable. Time and again, I had to place my trust in God when the path ahead was shrouded in uncertainty.
After an extraordinary year at L’Arche—indeed, one of the best decisions I have ever made—I’m now back at BC pursuing doctoral studies in systematic theology. In retrospect, I realize that one of the many gifts from my time at CSTM was learning the art of discernment and developing the spiritual practices that accompany this process. For me, these involved a commitment to daily prayer, steeping myself in Ignatian spirituality, frequent participation in the school’s liturgical life, seeking advice and mentorship from professors, and ongoing conversation with friends about vocation. For those of you discerning next steps, therefore, my counsel would be the following:
1. Commit yourself to a practice of daily prayer and participate in the sacramental life of the church. This is the primary way that we learn to listen to God and dispose ourselves to grace working in us.
2. Ask yourself these questions (inspired by BC professor Fr. Michael Himes):
- What are you passionate about that brings you deep and abiding joy?
- What are your gifts and talents? How have others affirmed you?
- What is the real need of the people around you, and how can you meet that need with your passion and gifts?
- Where do you need to grow? How might you go about doing that
3. Converse regularly with family, friends, and an advisor, mentor, or spiritual director.
4. Tap into memories of times when you felt keenly aware of God’s presence and your desire to live completely for God. Recalling these experiences of striking clarity, of being so in love with God, will help you to ground yourself and stay the course in the journey of discipleship.
The last tip is especially important. I’ve had to do this time and again when I felt lost, discouraged, or uncertain about the future. What are these core memories of your spiritual itinerary?
Whatever the experience is for you, this point remains: When we hearken back to that foundational desire to live totally and unreservedly for God, whatever that looks like in the circumstances of our lives, we’re able to clear the clutter from our vision and grow in the freedom to choose love—especially when it is difficult. Only such a practice of remembering as we pray and discern God’s presence in the mundane of everyday life will sustain us in faithfulness to our vocation. When we recognize the singular love that drives us, everything else falls into place.