vocation

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A Vocation Journey: meeting St Francis Again

May 14, 2009 in Discernment, Formation, Gregorian Chant, On Calling and Vocation, vocation | No comments

St Martins-in-the-Field, London

St Martins-in-the-Field, London

In the previous post,  A Vocation Journey: meeting Br John-Francis I recalled how I had made contact with Br John-Francis, one of the members of the Society of St Francis’ vocations team. Br John-Francis had invited me to attend a Vocations Day held at St Martins-in-the-Field.

Despite  feelings of ambivalence there was stronger feeling of wanting to know more about Francis and these Franciscans I had begun to learn about. So, on the Saturday morning I headed off to St Martins to join with others who were inquiring about vocations to Franciscan religious life in the Anglican and Catholic Church - the day was jointly hosted by members of both Franciscan communities.

When I arrived I met John-Francis and the other members of the Anglican and Catholic vocations teams. We began, of course, with some time of prayer. Then the brothers and sisters shared with us stories about St Francis and their lives as Franciscans.

As I listened to them share their stories and watched a video about St Francis a particular image jogged my memory. I saw the image of a man with birds surrounding him and my mind immediately went back to my visit to the Chapel of the Holy Cross in Sedona, AZ that my friend Wendy had taken me to. Suddenly shivers went up and down my spine. It was a very eerie feeling. Not long ago I didn’t really know about St Francis or Franciscans and suddenly with a few months I had meet St Francis one two occassions; once in Sedona and now in London.

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A Vocation Journey: meeting Br John-Francis.

May 1, 2009 in Discernment, Franciscan, Franciscanism, On Calling and Vocation, vocation | 2 comments

In the previous post, A Vocation Journey: Discovering Franciscans I recalled how I had first met the Franciscans. I had found a small brochure advertising a Vocations Day run by the Vocations team of the Society of St Francis. After reading the pamphlet I was keen to learn more about St Francis and the Society of St Francis. Shortly after reading the pamphlet I went off to the nearest Internet cafe to check out the Community’s website. I became more intrigued and interested in this man Francis and these Franciscans thus I emailed the contact on the pamphlet to get some more information. The person that replied was Br John-Francis. Read the rest of this entry »

A Vocation Journey: discovering Franciscans

September 15, 2008 in Discernment, Franciscan, Franciscanism, Gregorian Chant, On Calling and Vocation, St Paul's, Uncategorized, vocation | 7 comments

St Pauls Anglican Cathedral, London, UK

St Pauls Anglican Cathedral, London, UK

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Exlploring francsican life

In the previous post A Vocation Journey: meeting St Francis I wrote about how my dear friend Wendy had taken me to visit the Chapel of the Holy Cross in Sedona, AZ. I also wrote about how that place felt like a ‘place of presence’ and that I was particularly taken by a small figurine in the garden of a man holding birds in his hands.

As Wendy pointed out in a previous comment neither of us realized the magic that was occurring that day. It wasn’t until I continued my journey to the UK that the ‘next step in a journey of a thousand miles’ would reveal the next kairos moment in my vocation journey. Read the rest of this entry »

A Vocation Journey: meeting St Francis

September 12, 2008 in Discernment, On Calling and Vocation, vocation | 9 comments

The Chapel of the Holy Cross, Sedona, AZ

The Chapel of the Holy Cross: Sedona, AZ.

According to the ancient Chinese proverb, A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.

In a previous post, A Vocation Journey: the road to Damascus, I wrote of how my Christian journey had gone from one of faith, to no faith, to a re-discovered faith. I recalled how I was challenged to re-think my attitude toward Christianity. Indeed a kairos moment between myself and a colleague led to my returning to Church and being renewed in my faith in a way that would be yet unrecognised.

In this post I want to pick up from that kairos moment to another which would set in motion a series of seemingly unrelated events that would eventuate in my move to religious life in the Society of St Francis.

But as the ancient proverb states, a journey of thousand miles must begin with one step, so I don’t want to jump too far ahead but begin with what became the first step; however unknowingly. Read the rest of this entry »

SSF Video on YouTube

August 25, 2008 in Uncategorized | 1 comment

I have uploaded my first attempt at doing a video to give people a brief overview of our community onto Youtube. Please visist YouTube and comment, rate, the video. Also if you use social networking site such as MySpace, Facebook etc, or have a website or blog, please consider either embedding the video in your site or linking to the site at YouTube. If you’re not sure how to link or embed the video to your website, blog, MySpace, Facebook etc, or to link to it at YouTube please email me and I’ll try and help.

Please feel free to send comments, thoughts suggestions to me also if you don’t want to post to this site, or YouTube. Email Br Nathan-James.

You can view the video at YouTube here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhfkeAj37fU

Inbetween two worlds of vocation and formation

August 22, 2008 in Formation, open space technology, vocation | 1 comment

Last formation weekend we were exposed to method of running meetings called  Open Space Technology.

Open Space Technology enables groups of any size to address complex, important issues and achieve meaningful results quickly.

I have to say I’m not the one to quickly jump on the band wagon of the latest fad to be introduced. And I’m certainly one who is more interested in structured approaches to things. I prefer to know the who, what how, where and when of things; not the whoever comes, whatever happens approach we heard about and experienced on out last formation weekend.

But I’m also one to acknowledge insight from things, regardless of how ‘gimmicky’ it can sound at the time. We had an opportunity to experience this style of meeting leadership. Where you basically ‘go with the flow’ and essentially what happens happens. Read the rest of this entry »