Signs of a Vocation

The Claretians are missionary evangelizers.

The following are criteria that indicate what we are looking for in a candidate who desires to be a Claretian. A candidate must show evidence that his life and behavior is in harmony and drawn to an initial appreciation of the following:

  • A candidate must have an active faith life in Jesus Christ and must be a member of the Catholic Church for at least two years

  • The candidate must manifest a desire to participate in the missionary work of the congregation and a desire to share his life and faith with others

  • A candidate must have an openness that springs from a real conformity with Christ, the Evangelizer and from a close communion and friendship with him

  • A candidate shows an openness to become a missionary who is on fire with charity and spreads its flames wherever he goes

  • A candidate shows an openness to mission and in following Christ in the likeness of the Apostles

  • A candidate is someone sufficiently in tune with the events of his own life who has an appreciation for God working in his life. A candidate comes to the community with a desire and ability to bring his faith to bear on the world we live in

  • A candidate is immerse in the diverse reality and culture of people we live with and yet is available for the universal mission of the congregation

  • A candidate is one who is called to bring Good news to all, especially for the poor, and share their hope and sorrows and be obedient to mission wherever the need is most urgent, timely, and effective

  • A candidate is open to evangelization that is missionary, inculturated, prophetic, and liberating, from the viewpoint of the poor and the needy and aimed at multiplying leaders

  • A candidate is especially open to serve the poor, youth, families, and the unchurched

  • A candidate is graced with a particular vocation that unfolds progressively in conscious and free response to the inspiration of the Spirit
  • A candidate is a free and responsible person who is equipped to give a personal response to the call of God

  • A candidate manifests a personal love for Christ which becomes the very center of his being with humble recognition of his own gifts and limitations with an openness to the complementarity that comes from others

  • A candidate has a close relationship with the world and with the situation that surrounds him

  • He acknowledges a diversity of gifts that are brought to community life and enables it for missionary service

  • He is prepared for liberating and prophetic mission in that he knows himself and frees himself for assuming the commitments for missionary life

  • He is open to sharing the hopes and joys, the sorrows and the trials of the people, especially those of the poor as we join in efforts to transform the world according to God’s plan

  • The experience of vocation consists of the gift of love and is the one characteristic that the missionary needs most of all

  • The call is to follow Christ and encompasses our whole person and demands of us a response in faith and love

  • The call is to a shared missionary calling, though personal it is also a vocation to community, to form one heart and soul with others who have been called

Traits of a missionary vocation in Mary…

  • Capacity for contemplation

  • Profound adherence to Christ

  • Pastoral charity and mercy toward people in dire need and want

  • Availability

  • Identification with the poor of this world
  • Fortitude in the face of the cross and death

  • Unbreakable hope and transparent annunciation of the Word
  • Shows an ability to grow in human maturity, the life of faith and a sense of communion and mission

Vocation and Claretian Vows of Celibacy, Poverty, and Obedience:

  • An experience of living celibately that is directed toward evangelization and allows ourselves to give ourselves with total availability to the Reign of God

  • Celibacy is witnessing and it expresses an intense way of loving the Father and our brothers and sisters like that of Jesus and Mary

  • Needed to develop spiritual maturity, grounded in a deep faith and an ardent and impassioned love, like Claret’s love for Christ

  • Emotional maturity which allows us to combine sexuality and self-sacrificing love in a normal and unafraid and uninhibited way…

  • Knowledge and integration of our sexuality, ability to verbalize feelings, problems, and crises

  • A capacity for personal love and understanding, love for others, and rightly ordered love for oneself and a concern for harmoniously integrating and developing one’s gifts and capacities
  • Sufficient spiritual maturity to center our life in contemplative loving and following the poor Christ with a true option for the poor which springs from a heart that is poor and that follows the poor Christ

  • Ablility to love and serve the poor and relate with those who are the vicarious presence of the Lord and is essential for a disciple of Christ

  • Claretian Obedience arises out of the demand of the missionary vocation in a personal and communal quest to be in relationship with the will of the Father, to know it and to do it

  • Sufficient spiritual maturity to incarnate the mystery of Christ’s obedience to life a life full dedication to our apostolic project in creatively offering our personal gifts and in acknowledging our common mission

  • Cultivating a fraternal dimension of co-responsibility in the exercise of shared authority and shared mission

  • Capacity for Apostolic Charity that seeks to make God known, loved, served, and praised by all. This is the driving force that moves the missionary

  • To live a life of humility as a way to become conformed with Him who emptied himself and took the form of a slave
  • We are called and are truly Sons of the heart of Mary and we accompany her in love and trust and commit ourselves to her that we may be conformed to the mystery of Christ and may cooperate with her in maternal role in our apostolic mission