Starting the discernment process in the CofE

[MrsTulip]

For a few years now God has been telling me he wants more from me, but that's all he's saying. He hasn't yet revealed what more is, then over the last 18 months a few friends and people I know from currently serving in children's ministry have mentioned I should consider ordination. Strangely this hasn't freaked me out like I thought it would but I do have a lot of questions and uncertainties about it, I feel this may be the way God wants me to go.
For a short while I did think it might be a call to reader ministry and I asked the vicar at a school I'm connected to (not my vicar or my child's school) a few questions about it.
I've also spoke to my own vicar about a placement in another church but have said I want this to hep me develop my current role.
I don't know why but I'm finding it hard to be totally honest with those around me and say outright I think God wants me to start the formal discernment process. Other than praying (cause I'm already doing tonnes of that) has anyone any advice of how to approach my vicar? I also for reasons that would be too outing don't want to talk my church warden. Thanks

Oh, I'm so pleased! What comes next?

Oh, that’s great!! 👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼 So pleased for you 😀

Thanks for keeping us updated.

I meet with the DDO again in two weeks to discuss any action that is need from the report, possibly another church and/or community placement (although maybe challenging due to working in a school so set holidays -which a lot of people don't seem to understand) continue reading lots more books and writing lots more reflections. Then the DDO will start supporting me in preparing to go to a stage two panel (BAP) in the summer.

Met with the DDO at the weekend to discuss report. He's happy with it and has now got me started with preparing for stage 2. Had an email last night with more paperwork to complete. Although I need to prove my right to work in the UK but I don't have any of the documents they have asked for that would prove this so need to ring the DDOs office later this morning.

Also on another note my school has their SIAMs inspection tomorrow so as the lead for worship council and co lead for forest worship, please can I ask for your prayers? Thank you

All the very very best and God bless you on your journey.
I met my lovely vicar friend when she was coming to the end of her curacy, and you would honestly believe she had never done anything else in her life. She is now so confident and will be licensed as priest in charge in the New Year to our church after 6 months of being in vacancy (that came at the right moment) and God working in her life to get her to where she needs to be.
She loves discussing her journey and all the people she has met and things she has learned along the way. But one day when talking about her discernment process (I had asked her how did it all come about, moving from a good 25+ year career into ministry), she just broke down. Not just got a bit overwhelmed, I’m talking big, gulping sobs, very unlike her. I had to hold her tight and just let her get it out, it was so uncharacteristic. She said how lonely and confused she had felt, many of her friends and even her husband very much left her to it, thinking it was ‘a phase’/premature mid life crisis etc. It was one of those niggling feelings that she wanted to just bury in a big hole, but of course she couldn’t ignore God’s calling but saw no way in any direction.
She took huge comfort from Isiah 42 Fear not, for I have redeemed you, I have called you by name, you are mine.

Once she got through that initial stage and started training, she never look back and it felt like sweet relief. But those early vulnerable days of discernment are obviously still painful and difficult memories.
All the very very best OP. Enjoy your journey.

Thank you @Mariposista thankfully I haven't found my journey to lonely as I have been an authorised lay minster (ALM) for 6 years so some of the people who have been ALM are now priests so they have been very supportive plus I work in CofE school that has an experienced priest and 2 curates attached to us so they have been amazing, but I can see how it could be lonely.

I think she was more frightened than anything by what she was being called to do, and vulnerable. You wouldn’t think it now though- she’s so confident and loved by our community.

So had a look at the paperwork this morning and it's so wordy. My mind has been blown. I have appointments with two different vocations advisers in mid December.
Stage 1 was so chilled and lots of time reflecting praying and reading, now it just seems to have gone crazy busy all of a sudden.

Hello OP, I have read your thread from the beginning and also known others go through this process.

I am sure that you are a lovely person with your community’s interests at heart, but please bear in mind that this is a job. A job like any other. This interview process should require no more planning, preparation or prayers (!) than any other job. What is it asking of you? Why so much emotional labour and trepidation? You already work in a school - education is probably the most important service available to society - does being a priest actually serve people any more than teaching or being a TA or social worker or anything else?

Why is this joining process made so ‘special’ by the Church? So difficult? So arcane? Is it made into a special, mystical ‘vocation’ in order to cover up and elide the fact that you will be joining a system where you will probably be underpaid, overworked and in a male-dominated episcopacy with little accountability, where even those who have suffered the most egregious and horrific abuses and wrongs (see the multiple cases of CSA in the Church of England) get no justice and little acknowledgment.

If you have watched Rev all the way to the end you will see how Adam’s views of ministry change.

Remember that Mike Pilivachi (against whom multiple allegations of spiritual abuse have been deemed substantiated by the Church of England) was ‘fast tracked’ into ministry. Why the exception? What was different about him that he didn’t need to go through the same process as you are going through now? He was fast-tracked, feted and rewarded because he seemed to be ticking all the right boxes. What does that say about the church system? And more to the point, why was he eventually allowed to resign from ministry rather than face church discipline?

Please read the blog ‘God loves women’ for more detail on this and more.

I know that you and others will write back with a robust defence of the church - you are probably entering with an intention to serve, improve and ameliorate, I am sure. But please ‘stand aside’ a little. Remain a little observant, a little critical. Don’t put your emotional, spiritual or personal self into this process. You are interviewing them as much as they are interviewing you. Be willing, even at the last minute, to say ‘No, this isn’t for me’.
It is just a job.

Being a priest in the Church of England is just a job. You aren't paid very much, currently around £27-£29k but you do get a house and a non contributory pension. The training takes around six years which is three years at theological college and then three years in curacy. At the end of that you can apply for jobs where you are in sole charge of one but more commonly 3-10 churches. There is usually no paid staff to share the load and you are reliant on volunteers and retired clergy to manage the load. It is tough and stressful and a six day week.

It is however the best job in the world. This week I have had the privilege of being present when someone died and saying prayers with his family. I help people celebrate births and marriages and I help them to say goodbye to loved ones. Every week I celebrate the Eucharist and try to encourage my congregation to study the Bible critically and to spend a few minutes in prayer. Sometimes I'm called out to deal with houses that are unquiet and sometimes I am the one who listens to those that society leaves behind. It is varied and I love it.

If you aren't a person of faith then the element of calling will pass you by. For those of us who are, then what the church is trying to do is work out if someone is called to this by God or whether this application for the training and the job comes from the ego. There is always ego in there and we are all flawed, but the role of priest comes with a lot of authority and a fair measure of power if you chose to use it, so the church is trying to sort out those who are genuinely called. This is not easy. Most dioceses now use psychotherapists in the selection process. It isn't a perfect system by any stretch off the imagination but it tries to weed out those who will damage themselves and others if they were to have sole charge of parishes of maybe 50k people some of whom will be coming to them at vulnerable points in their lives.

How we discern a vocation changes over time. The days of a tap on the shoulder of young men of good families from the right schools is long gone. It isn't perfect and it will look bonkers from the outside as it is built on the premise that there is a God who calls people into this life. It is still the best job in the world if you are called to it.

Thank you @mostlydrinkstea you have put that better than I could xx

Finding the paperwork a bit of a challenge today (full of kid germs from work) so any prayers would be appreciated. Thanks.
Meetings with 2 different VA's this Saturday and next Saturday

🙏🏼

I hope you get what you need from the meetings (and the paperwork(!)). And, I know discernment is important but if you’re too sick to be at your best you can postpone the meeting(s) you know; sometimes it is easy to lose sight of this so I thought I would post a handy reminder.

Thanks, feeling a lot better today so we just met briefly on zoom to introduce ourselves to each other and have rescheduled for next week

Meetings with vocations advisers went really well. One was like talking to an old friend. Back with the DDO in January. References have been received from clergy and non clergy, need to send over some ID documents and finish my paperwork. But the crib service on Christmas Eve is the important thing at the moment.

Paperwork submitted earlier this afternoon, eek!

How exciting! Do you have a BAP date yet?

Yep its 10&11th June at Ammerdown in Bath. Just had the psychological assessment earlier this afternoon.

Oh, how exciting! I do hope and pray everything goes smoothly.

@MrsTulip Do you mind if I drop you a PM? I hope everything continues to go well for you.

I hope its all going well on the discernment front, it's such an intense time preparing for BAP but it's exciting to have a date!

Yes that’s fine but I’m in work so might not be able to reply straight away

Thank you. I’ve had a few more meetings over Christmas and New Year’s and I’m back with the DDO next weekend

That's fine.

All seems to be going ok, had various meetings over Christmas and New Year. Back with the DDO next weekend.