What do we ask ourselves?

When Brother Nilto first began thinking about religious life, he asked himself, “Is there something more for me to do?” After years of serving in our mission in India, Brother Fulgence said, “Why I’ve been called from the wheatfields of the Dakotas to the city of Dhaka, I don’t know. But we walk with those we serve.”

Our life isn’t “set” when we make our vows. As we grow spiritually, our vocation becomes a response to a continual calling. The variety of apostolates our Brothers undertake in one lifetime also requires great flexibility, creativity, and openness. Again and again, Brothers may ask themselves, “Is my service a response to the most urgent need of the time?” The Province may ask them to serve elsewhere, too, or identify a service a particular Brother can best fulfill.

Like the first glimmerings of our religious vocation, changes in the work we do can sometimes result from a yearning that grows over a long period. After Brother Paul Bray spent 30 years on a farm, he was drawn to work directly with the poor. Although he spent four months working at the Holy Cross novitiate in Brazil, this desire to serve the less fortunate grew steadily over eight years before he discovered his ministry in rural Tennessee.

“Giving people a little bit of hope takes a lot of patience,” said Brother Paul. That is why what others call hopeless, we call our mission. And it is how we strive to make our work a prayer.