Chances
are they reflect the many moods of you. Thoughtful. Happy.
Prayerful. Searching. Ah, that last one! Searching.
You
have a job or career or perhaps you’re in school. You
pray – maybe not as much as you’d like –
and God’s important in your life. Maybe you volunteer
at church, or give a few hours a month to a food pantry
or homeless shelter. You have friends and maybe you’ve
even fallen in love. Even with all that, you feel that there
must be more to life. You have a lot to offer and you want
to make a difference in the world, but you wonder sometimes
what God wants of you.
What
God wants of each of us is pretty simple. God wants us to
love. Our job is to figure out how we can do that best .
. . as a spouse or a single person or as a sister in a religious
community.
That’s
where discernment comes in. Discernment is not your everyday
word, but getting to know about it could help you answer
that nagging question of, "How can I best love?"
Discernment
is decision-making based on prayer and relationship with
God. It’s about listening to the movement of God in
the every-day circumstances in your life. But there’s
a catch. You can’t discern alone. No one can.
We
all need people who can help us sort through the complexities
of our lives, who can listen and help us to see and to hear
how God’s Spirit is active in our lives. We all need
people who can help us to find our place in the world.
For
more than 125 years the Sisters of St. Joseph of Baden have
been helping women find their places in the world.
Our
Office of Vocation Ministries is committed to helping people
deepen their relationships with God so that they can listen
more attentively and respond more freely to God’s invitation
to love.
We
don’t recruit people for our community. We don’t
even use that word.
In
an atmosphere of mutual respect we provide opportunities
for you to listen more closely to the inspirations of the
Holy Spirit in your life . . . regardless of where they
may lead you.
Look
at the faces again. They’re the faces of women who
are discerning with us, or who are united with us through
our mission and ministries or who are walking with us for
a lifetime as vowed members of the Sisters of St. Joseph
of Baden.
They
all have one thing in common. They inquired within, then
inquired with us. Picture it for yourself.
