Photo provided by the Office of Vocations of Fr. Steve Jakubowski’s Ordination, 2024.
Over the years I’ve gotten to hear many different vocation stories from my brothers in Holy Cross. In some ways, each story is unique. Each of us came to know and choose Holy Cross in different ways and at different times, to say nothing of the different personalities that we bring to the community. But there are certainly some themes that show up over and over in these stories.
One theme I’ve heard in just about every vocation story is a certain “gestational” period – there’s some span of time between the first moment when the idea of becoming a priest or brother came to mind and the moment when that idea actually led to a conversation or concrete action aimed at investigating it further.
With this comes another recurring theme – for a variety of reasons, many of us dragged out this gestational period! Many are the Holy Cross religious who spent years thinking about joining the community before getting around to actually making a move to do it! And while it is, of course, good and necessary to give space and time for the seed of a desire for Holy Cross to germinate and mature, it’s not helpful to get bogged down by fears about what God’s call might entail.
So, in the interest of sharing the wisdom of experience, here are three fears that commonly stall vocational discernment:
1. The Fear of Acknowledging the Existence of a Call
This one is pretty common. Everyone has dreams and plans about their future, but most of the time these dreams don’t involve religious life. And so when someone does notice an interest in Holy Cross or the consecrated life, it’s often jarring and comes as a surprise. Many respond by trying to ignore that desire and call – but I can tell you that many C.S.C.s found that the pull wouldn’t go away.
2. The Fear of How Others Will React
This one held me up for a while. I had a sense that God was calling me to Holy Cross, but I was reluctant about becoming “that guy who is discerning the priesthood.” Even though I was discerning the priesthood, I wasn’t interested in the label that I thought might come with it, and I didn’t want my friends and family to treat me differently. Ultimately, overcoming this fear was a matter of getting over myself and not allowing my own pride in my self-image to prevent me from living authentically!
3. The Vocational Version of FOMO
Making a decision always means turning something else down. Choosing to enter formation with Holy Cross means choosing not to do a whole host of other things. And lots of those other things are good! But if we’re not careful, the fear of missing out on them can stall real discernment. “I’ll look into Holy Cross…after I [finish college/finish grad school/work for a few years/have a serious relationship with someone/travel the world].” Of course, sometimes it does make sense to wait awhile before entering formation with Holy Cross – but there’s a big difference between prudently navigating different goods (especially in conversation with others!) and punting on a real response to God’s call by burying it underneath other life projects.
The other theme in these vocation stories is a grace-filled moment of courage and clarity that dismisses these fears once we realize that there probably is something to this desire for Holy Cross. And that is almost always a joyful moment, because it leads to the special kind of fulfillment that comes whenever we make a conscious effort to do what God wills, even and especially amid uncertainty and fear. Thanks be to God, “who works in you both to desire and to act according to his good purpose!” (Philippians 2:13).
By Fr. Steve Jakubowski, C.S.C.
Provided by the Vocations Office, July 1, 2026
