By Landon Allison, Staff Writer
St. Bonaventure University currently offers the Residential Discernment Program for men considering religious life.
“This Residential Discernment Program is about people who are actively considering the possibility that God might be calling them to be a Franciscan friar, a priest, brother or something like that,” said Fr. Ross Chamberland, O.F.M., executive director of the Lateran Center for Catholic Identity. “The term used for that is religious life, taking vows as a member of a religious order and priesthood, ordination.”
Five St. Bonaventure students currently reside in Serra House, the designated living space for discerning students, located on the west side of Francis Hall; there are at least two more committed incoming residents next year.
Emman Bibiano, a sophomore environmental studies major, is in the program.
“The process is just you thinking about joining the religious life in a very active way,” said Bibiano. “That would involve you talking to the vocations director or another spiritual director, some kind of priest in the order you want to go into and someone who oversees your spiritual development.”
Bibiano said he always felt a calling to the religious life and the Franciscan order seemed to fit him. Fr. Ross expressed similar roots in his discernment.
“I experienced a call much earlier than [when I entered the Franciscan order at 25 years old], but I didn’t really understand it,” said Fr. Ross. “My experience of young life in discernment was kind of all over the place because sometimes, I think, I was trying to pay attention to what God wanted for me in my life; sometimes I wasn’t paying attention to that at all and I’d do whatever I wanted.”
Fr. Ross said that if he had some sense of the Franciscan friars and guidance, like what the program at St. Bonaventure offers, then that might have helped him better focus earlier in his life.
Timothy Walter, a sophomore psychology major, is another Serra House resident.
“The process can be increasingly difficult and tiring, but it has always been rewarding,” said Walter. “It involves large amounts of personal and community prayer, as well as spiritual direction from the friars on campus. Discernment involves searching inwardly to better conceptualize how to live outwardly.”
Fr. Ross said that, in order to join the discernment program, the students have to first be accepted into the university. Then, students have to cover four components that the Catholic Church puts forth when it talks about discerning a priestly or religious vocation: human, academic, spiritual and ministerial or apostolic development. The students in the program do a self-assessment on these traits and Fr. Ross evaluates their progress throughout the year.
The students in the program also have weekly group sessions with and without Fr. Ross, where they discuss what they are struggling with, see as a blessing and are looking forward to. They regularly meet with Fr. Ross individually, as well.
“I think the best parts [of the process of discernment] are the people I met, the insights I gained and just how differently I see the world now,” said Bibiano.
Still, one concern Bibiano admitted he had with the discernment program was that he initially worried he had to keep it a secret that he is gay. He added that, as he got to know the Franciscan order more, it was made clear to him that there was no reason to worry.
“There are two paths ahead of me,” said Bibiano. “I could either go to postulancy, which is the first step into joining the Franciscans, or I could take another route, which would basically be me just living my life and making a family eventually.”
Walter said that discernment can be increasingly wearing, but it has also been rewarding for him.
“Discerning religious life has allowed me to more fully come to terms with who I am as a person, as well as how I want to live my life,” said Walter. “It has strengthened my devotion to the Eucharist and to the greater Church around me.”
Walter plans to finish his four-year degree at St. Bonaventure and enter initial formation with the Franciscans after graduation.
Fr. Ross said that a primary factor to the continuance of the program is that it is a part of the reason for the university’s founding. Educating students in the Catholic tradition has been a focus of St. Bonaventure from the start.
“My hope for the future of the program is that we continue to respond, should it be God’s will, to young men who are wanting to be undergraduates here and at the same time wanting to discern whether or not God’s calling them to [Fransiscan] life,” said Fr. Ross.
