Vocation & Journey in Christ
By Mathieu Dacquay
God willing, on June 8th of this year, I’ll be making my final promises in Canada with the Madonna House community.
This step comes after 9 years of living in this family, growing in maturity and self discovery, and making myself more vulnerable and open to God’s graces and movements in the present moment.
We make promises of Poverty, Chastity, and Obedience in Madonna House.
In Poverty we relinquish reliance on monetary gains and depend on begging to allow God to provide for our needs.
In Obedience we are subjected to the will of God and a chain of authority and learn to put our self interests third behind the good of others.
In Chastity we renounce marriage to more fully serve God and our neighbours and strive to find our rest and comfort in God alone. A tall order to try to live up to, but what we gain from these promises is a reflection of Christ’s ministry.
In giving ourselves to Chastity, we can unite ourselves more closely to God’s love for the whole world. In Obedience, we can learn to courageously live the will of God in the small things we do.
In Poverty we see the daily miracles of God’s providence sustaining us, most evidently in meeting our physical needs and less visibly in fulfilling us in our deepest desires, the greatest of which is for God and His presence in our lives.
At this stage, as I journey with Christ to the Father in the Holy Spirit, I have a long way to go before I can truly say that I am fully living out my vocation. I’m sometimes confronted with the emptiness of my former way of life, a life of little faith. Whereas before, such a life had felt comfortable, now it appears vain and dead.
The life I strive to live now, in a daily surrender to God and the seeking of His will for me in every moment, is filled with His grace, peace and joy, though I don’t always fully perceive it.
This journey in Christ is a lifelong spiritual progress needing a continual re-centring on God’s will and regular reviews of where I might have strayed from it. The sacraments and the intercession of our Lady are a necessary part of my vocation. My identity as a child of God, made in His image and likeness, and the death and resurrection of Christ are the loadstones and anchors of my spiritual life, ever reminding me that God is always with me and ever desires my good.
In all, my journey in this vocation has been life giving and I’m so grateful for Him calling me in this family of Madonna House. I hope this journey of mine, with its ups and downs, might inspire those of you feeling God’s call in your life and those of you already in your life’s vocation to live more deeply for Him, counting not the cost but the gains of Eternal life.
Previous Months Letters from Madonna House
October 2023: Ordinary Miracles By Mathieu Dacquay
November 2023: The Saints Are Alive By Jeanne Guillemette
December 2023: Journeying through Advent with Joseph By Carol Ann Gieske
January 2024: Celebrating Epiphany with the Christian east By Fr. Michael Weitl
February 2024: Finding Peace in Surrender to Christ By Mathieu Dacquay
March 2024: Putting everything ‘on the altar’ By Jeanne Guillemette
April 2024: Christ Lives! By Carol Ann Gieske