Vocation - who, me?

So how did we develop such a ‘warped' view of calling and vocation?

At After Sunday we believe that we all have a vocation or calling from God to some particular mission and for most of us this will be exercised in the world and in our daily lives.  This extract from Alistair MacKenzie's book 'Where is God on Monday?' gives some insight as to how we lost our way on affirming everyone's vocation.

From 'Where's God on Monday?' by Alistair Mackenzie and Wayne Kirkland

Despite the best attempts of both Jesus and the Apostle Paul, it took only a century or so before the Christian church became heavily influenced by the dualism surrounding Greco-Roman culture. (Dualism is a concept that we have two separate natures; in this case, the physical and the spiritual.) As a result, certain ways of living came to be viewed as more "spiritual and holy".

Soon, only religious priests, monks and nuns were considered to have a "religious" vocation. They were called to the "contemplative" life of prayer - set apart from the active life of ordinary, everyday work.

Even Augustine, who praised the work of farmers, merchants and tradespeople, distinguished between the "active life" and the "contemplative life". At times it might be necessary to follow the active life but, according to Augustine, one should choose the other wherever possible.

This type of thinking encouraged both monasticism and professional church leadership. People were supposed to be "called" to these more "spiritual" roles. In other words "calling" or vocation, became exclusively defined by the roles of the clergy and religious orders.

It wasn't until the Reformation that Martin Luther began to effectively challenge this dualism. He promoted the idea that all Christians are called (not just monks and clergy) and that daily work is part of our calling. Monasticism, Luther said, was not a unique class or special order. The work of monks and nuns was no higher in God's eyes than the normal work, performed in sincere faith, of a farmer or housewife.

John Calvin further developed this idea of daily work as Christian calling. However, it wasn't long before particular jobs (like farming and law) became specially identified as Christian vocations. Soon, the concept that our calling is primarily about belonging to Jesus began to drift into the background.

Consequently, while "calling" was once too narrowly defined, it now became so closely identified with particular occupations that the words "vocation", "calling" and "profession" simply became synonyms for "job". And then followed the idea of "career" which resulted in a person's identity and status being defined by his or her paid job, without any reference to God at all.

At the same time, in spite of Martin Luther's efforts, the church has never really freed itself from the clergy/laity distinction. The two tiered value system of the medieval church has largely remained in place. In church circles, a "real" calling is still thought to be one which involves a person in pastoral leadership or cross cultural mission work. And because of our emphasis on being called to "do", invariably a calling is seen as something that takes us out of our current situation (geographical or task) as God "leads" us into a new one.