Saturday before The Epiphany
Vocations Discernment Retreat
St. Mary’s Seminary
January 6, 2024
A Word of Thanks
Thank you for setting aside time and making the commitment to be a part of this vocations discernment retreat. I am happy to see so many of you here today and I look forward to meeting with each of you throughout the day. Thank you also for openness to a priestly vocation and to a life of service to Christ and to his Church. May you continue to open your hearts to the graces of the Holy Spirit as you seek to discern the will of God in your lives.
The Baptism of the Lord
The Gospel we just heard offers to us the basis for your discernment. It is the account of Jesus’ Baptism in St. Mark’s Gospel. John the Baptist is proclaiming the coming of the Messiah. Suddenly, Jesus appears on the scene, asking to be baptized. Even though he is astonished at what Jesus is asking, John complies with his request and baptizes him. As Jesus comes up out of the water, there is a Theophany, a manifestation of God himself. Jesus is overshadowed by the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove, and the Father’s Voice speaks to Jesus, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well-pleased.”
It is on this last line of the Gospel that I would like to focus. As Jesus emerged from the water, the Holy Spirit shined down upon him, revealing him to be the only-begotten Son of the Eternal Father. The Father himself addressed Jesus as ‘his beloved Son’, and added, “with you, I am well pleased.” Here, the Father is not merely praising Jesus for the good things he has done or the good things he will do. No, the Voice of the Father is proclaiming Jesus’ deepest identity to the world: Jesus is his Eternal Son enfleshed in our humanity – body and soul. From all eternity, the Father has taken delight in who his Son is – the perfect reflection of his glory, the one who is God from God and light from light. Now the Father proclaims his delight in his Son who assumed our humanity and stepped into history to save us from sin. The Son of God, for his part, knew from all eternity the delight which the Father took in him and he reciprocated that delight, such that the bond of love between them is the Holy Spirit. But now, with clothed in our humanity, with human ears, Jesus rejoices to hear his Father address him the beloved Son.
Even so, Jesus never took his relationship with God the Father for granted. No, he nurtured that relationship through prayer. In Scripture, we often find Jesus absorbed in prayer to his heavenly Father, listening to his Father’s Voice in the power of the Spirit, then rising from prayer to do the will of the Father – whether it was choosing his Apostles, or preaching the Sermon on the Mount, on undergoing his Passion, Death, and Resurrection. As Jesus said so simply, “The Father and I are one” (Jn 10:30).
Our Status as Adopted Sons
And we may say, what a beautiful thing, this unique, eternal, exclusive relationship between God the Father and God the Son. But what does that have to do with me and with my discernment? It has everything to do with it! For Jesus revealed the inner life of God to show us how deeply the Father loves each of us and indeed to make of us the Father’s beloved children, his adopted sons who share in the eternal relationship of love between the Father and the Son. That is why Jesus came baptizing with the Holy Spirit and fire, and that is the Baptism you and I received, a Baptism coupled with the Sacrament of Confirmation.
In a word, you are the beloved sons of the eternal Father. And he is calling you to open your hearts to the Holy Spirit to deepen your participation in his relationship of love with his Son, and in some way to share in the saving mission for which he sent his Son into the world. For many of you, I hope and pray, it will be the priesthood – a life spent proclaiming the Gospel, renewing the Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, Baptizing, Reconciling – making present in people’s lives the Good Shepherd. I have been a priest nearly 47 years and every day I thank God for my vocation, even as ask for the grace to live my vocation fruitfully as the Lord’s disciple and as his priest.
So you must do what Jesus did. In the power of the Holy Spirit you must take delight in the Father’s love for you. Then, take the time to pray, as Jesus did, to know the Father’s will. Just as he knelt in prayer, often throughout the night, so too you are invited to pray today and every day to discern God’s will and for the strength and courage to carry out his will, once discerned.
Eyes Fixed on Jesus
As you discern God’s will prayerfully, particularly regarding the possibility of a priestly vocation, keep your eyes fixed on Jesus and on the beauty of God’s inner life and love revealed at his Baptism. What a wonderful mystery to share in that life and what a beautiful mystery to be called to share in Jesus’ mission.
Through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, may this discernment retreat bear abundant fruit in your life and in the life of this local Church! God bless you and keep you always in his love!