Discerment With Indifference

image from WIX

"The angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream..." (Matthew 2:13)

My entire life is filled with discernments that were -- well -- wrong. As a young man, I felt I was called to ordained priesthood; what other way was there to minister to God's people?  As a young adult, I found myself working in the hotel industry; isn't a well-crafted banquet a message from God? As a lay pastoral minister, it seems every day there are choices to be made based on the circumstances that are set before me; how do I make the right choices?

Following God's initiative and doing God's will isn't something automatic or mindless. We won't have dreams like St. Joseph, in which an angel speaks God's will to us clearly. Most of us have to discern God's will in the myriad of motives and circumstances that surround our everyday lives. Thomas Reese, S.J., notes that  "We must approach discernment with humility, recognizing our biases can easily taint the discernment process. St. Ignatius, the great teacher of discernment, notes how we must approach discernment with 'indifference,' a readiness to accept God's will, whatever it may be."  

If we practice the virtues extolled in this past Sunday's scriptures, we will have the ground from which to discern good choices for doing God's will. Living virtuously is already a discernment of God's will. This is how we are holy: being open to God's initiatives, and responding with graciousness and courage.