4. What is a vocation?

[John]

4. What is a vocation and how do you think one discovers if he/she has one? Read the following quote and discuss what your vocation might be.

"This means, in practice, that there is only one vocation. Whether you teach or live in the cloister or nurse the sick, whether you are in religion or out of it, married or single, no matter who you are or what you are, you are called to the summit of perfection: you are called to a deep interior life perhaps even to mystical prayer, and to pass the fruits of your contemplation on to others." Epilogue, p. 458

[Jill]

I love his experience of freedom when he doesn't know whether he will be drafted or enter Gethsemani. "What was the difference between one place and another, one habit and another, if your life belonged to God, and if you placed yourself completely in His hands? The only thing that mattered was the fact of the sacrifice, the essential dedication of one's self, one's will. The rest was only accidental." That's the kind of detachment Ignatius recommends. I experienced it in the process of deciding whether I wanted to be single for the Lord or open to marriage.

Within the monastic vocation, though, he is conflicted about his writing, which his superiors encourage but which seems to be troubling to him, perhaps a temptation to pride?