RESPONDING TO GOD’S CALL A Survival Guide Roslyn A. Karaban, PhD Paper, $17.95 144 pages, 5½" × 8½" ISBN 0-89390-431-7 View Table of Contents View Excerpt Quantity:

This is a book about discernment — tuning in and listening to God’s call, prayerfully reflecting on that call, clarifying what that call is, and responding to what you feel and hear. People involved in all sorts of ministry, and those who would like to be involved but find their calling in discord with the position of the Church, will find this book a valuable tool in determining what is of God and what is not, and how to set their own direction. The book includes a series of personal stories from the author and others to help illustrate the concepts. A unique feature of this process is that it can involve loss — the loss of who you are today in order to become what is your calling. Dr. Karaban carefully shows how this process of loss closely resembles the grieving process, and helps you mourn and move through the losses to become what God (and you) want.

Review

“This rich and eminently readable book by Roslyn A. Karaban helps us to understand the discernment process better, approach it more easily and become excited once again about living the spiritual life ... our spiritual life! I am grateful she has written such a helpful book for us.”
— Robert J. Wicks, author of Touching the Holy

About the Author

Roslyn A. Karaban, Ph.D., is a lay minister, preacher and pastoral counselor committed to expanding the roles available to women in the Roman Catholic Church. She received advanced degrees from Stonehill College in North Easton, Mass., Harvard Divinity School in Cambridge, Mass., and Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, Calif. Currently she is a tenured professor at St. Bernard’s Institute in Rochester, N.Y. She was co-editor of Extraordinary Preaching: Twenty Homilies by Roman Catholic Women (Resource Publications, Inc., 1996).

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Prelude: My Story of Call

Part I: How Do We Know God Is Calling Us?

Chapter One: Experience the Call

Chapter Two: Discern the Call

Chapter Three: Understand the Call in Relation to Loss and Grief

Part II: How Do We Respond to God’s Call?

Chapter Four: Name and Grieve the Losses

Chapter Five: Identify and Work Through Complications

Chapter Six: Become Better Grief Guides

Postlude: Experiencing Resurrection

Endnotes

Bibliography

Following is the introduction to Responding to God’s Call. All rights reserved. Copyright © 1998, Resource Publications, Inc.

Introduction

Very often the concept of “call” has been associated with ordained or professional (ecclesial) ministry. As Christians we are all called to be part of God’s vision. God offers us this invitation in Scripture and through our continuing relationship with God as a Christian people. In Scripture we find both a very broad call to share in God’s life as well as very specific stories of call. (Note 1) The broad call to ministry in Scripture includes all who are called into relationship with God. Today, we live in an “age of discernment” when “every Christian [is called] to a responsible, prophetic role in living and proclaiming the faith” (Green 11). We receive God’s call in baptism, when we become new creations in Christ—who is priest, prophet, and king (“Rite of Baptism for Several Children” 62). Thus, as baptized Christians we are all called to live out and proclaim our faith as we promise to “remain for ever a member of Christ.” (Note 2) Our baptismal promises unite us with a community of faith with a common purpose: to be faithful followers of Christ and witnesses to his Gospel (RBSC 47). (Note 3)

How we are called to live out the Gospel will differ from person to person, for in addition to God’s call to all of us, God calls each one of us in different ways. It is up to each one of us to discern how our piece of the vision relates to God’s vision. Walter Brueggemann describes God’s vision in this way:

“The central vision of world history in the Bible is that all of creation is one. Israel has a vision of all persons being drawn into a single community (Acts 2:11). The most staggering expression of the vision is that all persons are children of a single family ... and bearers of a single destiny, namely, the care and management of all of God’s creation.

“That persistent vision of joy, well-being, harmony, and prosperity is not captured in any single word or idea in the Bible, and a cluster of words is required to express its many dimensions and subtle nuances: love, loyalty, truth, grace, salvation, justice, blessing, righteousness shalom” (Living Toward a Vision 15-16).

In addition to seeing how our piece of the vision relates to God’s vision, we need to discern our particular call. Our faith is our personal awakening and response to this call (Finley 19). In discerning our call it is first necessary to understand how vision is different from call.

“Vision is seeing the big picture; call is the way we can implement the vision in a particular time and place” (McMakin and Nary 203). We discover “glimmers” of God’s vision in reflection and prayer when we discover that which “evokes our most passionate criticism, our deepest grief, or energizes us to new possibilities” (204).

Thus, call is the particular way we implement what we understand our piece of God’s vision to be.

My story of glimpsing God’s vision and discerning God’s call is a story of a vision of inclusivity and equality and a call to implement that vision through priesthood. I believe my glimpse of God’s vision is part of God’s greater story as revealed to us in Scripture, tradition, and personal experience. William Bausch describes a sixfold process for discernment that begins with understanding that our own personal story is part of God’s greater story (203-204). “The call to ministry begins as a story; a story of an encounter between an individual and God” (Myers 7). I have used Bausch’s schema (203-209) as a model for my own discernment and for guiding others in their discernment process:

1. Learn the story: the larger story of God’s revelation and the smaller story of our own personal history.

2. Own our story: Accept the good and the bad in our life.

3. Contemplate the story.

4. Pray the story.

5. Share the story:

  5a. with a confidant,

  5b. through witnessing, evangelizing, and teaching, and

  5c. by tapping into the needs of the poor and oppressed as an advocate of social justice.

6. Share the story by being part of a larger worshiping and witnessing community.

This book describes another sixfold process of discernment—not as a replacement of Bausch’s model or other models of discernment but as an addition to these schemas written from my own particular glimpse of the vision and experience of call. I begin this book with my story of call as one example of discernment. I begin with my own story because it is most familiar to me and because I have discovered in my own story certain obstacles and complications that are common to other stories of call and discernment. If recognized and named, these obstacles can be gotten through and discernment can be more fully realized. Furthermore, I have discovered that, by understanding that the discernment process and grieving process are irrevocably linked, discerners will be able to heal and grow. It is my hope that these discoveries will serve as aids to discerners and to those who guide discerners.