prayer & discernment
FATHER
Andrew Carl
Wisdom, O.P.
embraces his
father at his
ordination in
Rome.
How to stay
open to God’s call
Discerning a vocation is about trusting in what God, who knows you best,
wants to give you through your life.
s THERE sUCH a thing as “spiri-
tual genetics,” a spiritual gene that
can be passed on? i wondered that
as i made my way through the stream
of students in the high school my father
had attended. Here i was a priest and
vocation director walking with young
men discerning a religious vocation
through the same labyrinth of hallways
that my father had passed through 55
iBYFATHER ANDREW
CARL
WISDOM,
O.P.
Father Andrew Carl Wisdom,
O.P. is promoter of vocations
and vicar for Mission Advancement for the Dominicans,
Province of St. Albert the Great.
His book, Tuning into God’s
Call, was published last July by
Liguori Publications.
years earlier, dreaming about being a
priest.
He had been firmly resolved to be a
priest ever since early childhood, even
leaving his senior year behind to enter
seminary so as not to waste another
minute delaying his vocation. But after
a year and several months, an increasingly unpredictable asthmatic condition persuaded the seminary faculty
that he could not pursue a vocation to
the priesthood. He was devastated and
confused to say the least. did God not
want what he wanted? After all, wasn’t it
God’s will that he was following?
As determined as my father was to
become a priest, i was determined not to
be. While he had run toward his poten-
30
VISION 2013
