Reflections from Jonah and Mark 1: Being Called

For my people standing staring trying to fashion a better way

    from confusion, from hypocrisy and misunderstanding,

    trying to fashion a world that will hold all the people,

    all the faces, all the adams and eves and their countless generations;

Let a new earth rise. Let another world be born. Let a

    bloody peace be written in the sky. Let a second

    generation full of courage issue forth; let a people

    loving freedom come to growth. Let a beauty full of

    healing and a strength of final clenching be the pulsing

    in our spirits and our blood. Let the martial songs

    be written, let the dirges disappear. Let a race of men now

    rise and take control.

Oh the Places You’ll Go (excerpt) — Dr. Seuss

You’re off to Great Places! Today is your day!
Your mountain is waiting, So… get on your way!

Do you wonder what you are called to do? Whom you are called to be? Are you reflecting on a decision? The Ignatian discernment process may be helpful. Here is a link to an article that outlines this spiritual process briefly, or you can go to the original website for a more in-depth approach.

Or are you looking for a simple way to pray each day, and reflect and be mindful each day? Try the Daily Examen, another Ignatian practice.

Recognizing and Responding to a Call

If you ask me what I came to do in this world, I, an artist, will answer you: I am here to live out loud. ― Émile Zola

If God gives you something you can do, why in God’s name wouldn’t you do it? ― Stephen King

We want life to have meaning, we want fulfillment, healing and even ecstasy, but the human paradox is that we find these things by starting where we are, not where we wish we were. We must look for blessings to come from unlikely, everyday places – out of Galilee, as it were – and not in spectacular events, such as the coming of a comet. — Kathleen Norris, The Quotidian Mysteries: Laundry, Liturgy and “Women’s Work.”

God did not direct His call to Isaiah— Isaiah overheard God saying, “. . . who will go for Us?” The call of God is not just for a select few but for everyone. Whether I hear God’s call or not depends on the condition of my ears, and exactly what I hear depends upon my spiritual attitude. ― Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest

I think it would be well, and proper, and obedient, and pure, to grasp your one necessity and not let it go, to dangle from it limp wherever it takes you. ― Annie Dillard

The crowning fortune of a man is to be born to some pursuit which finds him employment and happiness, whether it be to make baskets, or broadswords, or canals, or statues, or songs. ― Ralph Waldo Emerson

Your profession is not what brings home your weekly paycheck, your profession is what you’re put here on earth to do, with such passion and such intensity that it becomes spiritual in calling. ― attributed to Vincent van Gogh

I believe there’s a calling for all of us. I know that every human being has value and purpose. The real work of our lives is to become aware. And awakened. To answer the call. ― Oprah Winfrey

The women I know with strong personalities, the ones who might have become generals or the heads of companies if they were men, become teachers. Teaching is a calling, too. And I’ve always thought that teachers in their way are holy–angels leading their flocks out of the darkness. ― Jeannette Walls, Half Broke Horses