Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

An experiment in discernment of vocation

  • Published:
Journal of Religion and Health Aims and scope Submit manuscript

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

References

  1. Saint Theresa of Avila,Letters, 286 (tr. by Gregory of Saint Joseph, t. II, Paris, 1900).

  2. In general, we shall avoid using the term “psychological aptitude” for vocation. Indeed, the meaning of the word “aptitude” is controverted in psychology and very often covers notions of disposition, quality, and capacity. In Pieron'sVocabulary of Psychology, the wordaptitude is thus defined: “This word, often wrongly used as a synonym for capacity, designates the congenital substratum of a capacity, preexistent to it, which will depend upon the natural development of the aptitude, upon the educational formation, and, eventually, upon exercise: only the capacity can be subjected to a direct evaluation”. In any event, following Pieron's book, the word capacity “represents the possibility of success in the performance of a task or the practice of a profession”. To speak of a psychological aptitude for vocation would, therefore, mean that a specific congenital substratum to vocation exists, which can only be considered, at the present time, as a hypothesis. Whenever these terms are used in official texts, we will, naturally, keep them in the quotation from these texts. Personally, we prefer, according to the cases in question, the termscapacity, orquality, or even better,disposition,—this last term referring back to the vocabulary of Saint Thomas in his treatise on habit (cf. Ia, IIao 61, 1 and passim).

  3. Sacred Congregation of Seminaries and Universities. Letter addressed to the Episcopate on the occasion of the third Centenary of Saint Vincent de Paul, on some important problems concerning ecclesiastical formation (September 27, 1960), inL'Ami du Clergé (November 17, 1960), p. 679.

  4. Cf. Vasse, Denis-Henri,Survey on the Relations between Psychopathology and Religious Vocation, thesis for doctorate in medicine (Marseille, 1960); Salman, D. H., O.P., “The Discernment of Religious Vocations”, and Dr. Parrot, “Point of View of the Medical-psychologist on the Psychological Aptitudes for a Religious Vocation”, inSupplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 52 (ist quarter 1960), pp. 81–108; Beirnaert, Louis, “The Psychoanalytic Investigation of the Candidates,” inSupplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 53 (2nd quarter 1960), pp. 179–186; McCarthy, T. H. N., “The Psychological Investigation of the Personality in the Examination of Religious Vocations”,Supplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 54 (3rd quarter 1960) pp. 340–350; McCarthy, T. H. N., “Scientific Evaluations of Psychological Aptitudes to Religious Life”,Supplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 45 (2nd quarter 1958), pp. 188–196; Del Arroyo, Teodoro, “An Experiment in the Discernment of Vocations”,Supplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 48 (2nd quarter 1959), pp. 183–202; Gratton, Henri, O.M.I., “Some Experiments of Psychological Investigation and of Psychotherapy among Candidates to the Priesthood”,Supplement de la Vie Spirituelle, n0 42 (3rd quarter 1957) pp. 354–364. Cf. Plé, A., “About the Discernment of Vocations”; Bier, William C, S.J., “The Psychological Examination”,; Benko, Antoine, S.J. “Examination of Motivation”,Supplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 29 (May 15, 1954), pp. 115–161; Plé A., “Can Unconscious Attractions to Religious Life Exist?”; Noder, C. M. H., “Psychoanalytic Considerations Concerning the Neurotic Attractions to the Religious Vocation”,Supplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 14 (August 15, 1950), pp. 269–308.

  5. “We define personality as the psychosomatic unity of man in so far as it is determined and governed by the soul”. Address of S. S. Pius XII at the thirteenth Congress of Applied Psychology (April 10, 1958), inPius XII Speaks of Mental Health and of Psychology, Ed. deLumen Vitae, Brussels, 1960, p. 13.

  6. Ibid., “We define personality as the psychosomatic unity of man in so far as it is determined and governed by the soul”, Address of S. S. Pius XII at the thirteenth Congress of Applied Psychology (April 10, 1958), inPius XII Speaks of Mental Health and of Psychology, Ed. deLumen Vitae, Brussels, 1960, p. 13.

  7. Article 487 of the Code of Canon Law expresses it thus: “Status religiosus seu stabilis in communi vivendi modus, quo fideles, praeter communia praecepta, evangelica quoque consilia servanda per vota obedientiae, castitatis et paupertatis suscipiunt, ab omnibus in honore habendus est”.

  8. Cf. Plé, A., O.P. “The Moral Act and the ‘Pseudo-morality’ of the Unconscious”, inSupplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 40 (1st quarter 1957) pp. 24–68.

  9. Cf. Salman, D. H., Salman O.P., “The Discernment of Religious Vocations”,Supplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 52 (1st quarter 1960), pp. 82–83.

    Google Scholar 

  10. Duyckaerts, François,The Notion of Normal and Pathologic in Clinical Psychology, Paris, Vrin, 1954.

    Google Scholar 

  11. Beirnaert, Louis, S.J., “Does Sanctification Depend on Psychic Disposition?”Les Etudes (July–August 1950), pp. 58–67; “Letters from Readers”Supplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 40 (1st quarter 1957), pp. 108–110.

  12. “When there is a question of making a decision of secondary importance, I always found it useful to weigh the pros and cons. But in the vital questions, as the choice of a wife or of a profession, the decision must come from the unconscious, from somewhere inside us”. (Freud, S., cited in Anzieu, Didier,Self-Analysis, P. U. F., 1959, p. 24).

  13. Cf. Plé, A., Plé, O.P., “The Apostolic Action, School of Perfection”La Vie Spirituelle, n0 419 (July 1956), pp. 25–27.

    Google Scholar 

  14. Cf. Saint Thomas,Summa Theologica, IIa IIao, qu. 97.

  15. Cf. especially the Encyclical letter of Pius XI,Ad Catholici Sacerdotii Fastigium (December 20, 1935), and the letter of the Sacred Congregation of Seminaries and Universities,op. cit., Cf. Saint Thomas,Summa Theologica, IIa IIao, p. 679.

  16. Rey, A.,Studies of Psychological Deficiencies, t. I, pp. 16–17, Delachaux and Niestlé.

  17. Saint Theresa of Avila,Road of Perfection, ch. XV.

  18. De Boont, W., O.P.,The Novice's Crisis of Identity. Explorations in a Closed Society (unpublished thesis, Montreal, 1960).

  19. Address of S. S. Pius XII at the thirteenth International Congress of Applied Psychology,op. cit.,The Novice's Crisis of Identity. Explorations in a Closed Society (unpublished thesis, Montreal, 1960)., pp. 19–20.

  20. Letter from the Sacred Congregation of Seminaries and Universities,op cit.,The Novice's Crisis of Identity. Explorations in a Closed Society (unpublished thesis, Montreal, 1960). p. 678.

  21. Cf. Plé, A., Plé, O.P.The Moral Act and the “Pseudo-morality” of the Unconscious, loc. cit., pp. 25–27.

    Google Scholar 

  22. Plé, A., Plé, O.P.. “The Virtue of Chastity, Its Nature, Its Components, Its Stages”,Supplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 36 (February 15, 1956) pp. 23–31.

    Google Scholar 

  23. Saint Thomas,Summa Theologica, IIa, IIea, 32, 1, 1m.

  24. Cf. “Emotional Maturity and Sacerdotal Life”.Supplement de La Vie Spirituelle, n0 46 (3rd quarter 1958).

Download references

Authors
  1. Albert Plé
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Plé, A. An experiment in discernment of vocation. J Relig Health 1, 165–179 (1962). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01532081

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01532081

Search

Navigation