Michael Scanlan - What Does God Want?: A Practical Guide to Making Decisions

Michael Scanlan, T.O.R.

What Does God Want?

A Practical Guide
to Making Decisions

SOPHIA INSTITUTE PRESS
Manchester, New Hampshire

With thanks to James Manney for his collaboration on the original work.

Copyright 2018 by Franciscan University of Steubenville

What Does God Want? was originally published in 1996 by Our Sunday Visitor, Huntington, Indiana. The article How I Pray Now first appeared in New Covenant magazine, November 1995. Copyright 1996 by Our Sunday Visitor Publishing Division, Our Sunday Visitor, Inc. All rights reserved.

Printed in the United States of America. All rights reserved.

Cover design by Perceptions Design Studio.

Cover image: Detail of Silhouette of man and sunshine on sky background, by Evdokimov Maxim / Shutterstock (311581259).

Scripture texts in this work are taken from the New American Bible 1991, 1986, 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Washington, D.C., and are used by permission of the copyright owner. All Rights Reserved. No part of the New American Bible may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Scanlan, Michael, 1931- author. | Manney, James D., author.

Title: What does God want? : a practical guide to making decisions / by

Michael Scanlan, with James Manney.

Description: Manchester, New Hampshire : Sophia Institute Press, 2018. |

Originally published: Huntington, IN : Our Sunday Visitor, c1996.

Identifiers: LCCN 2018043451 | ISBN 9781622826544 (pbk. : alk. paper) ePub ISBN 9781622826551

Subjects: LCSH: Decision making Religious aspects Christianity. | Christian

life.

Classification: LCC BV4509.5 .S295 2018 | DDC 248.4/82 dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018043451

Contents

Conclusion:

A.

B.

C.

D.

Foreword

Foreword

In 1996, Fr. Michael Scanlan, T.O.R. (19312017), published the first edition of What Does God Want? to share what he had learned about the art of discernment, even in seemingly small decisions. Many people have told me how this book has helped them in their own life decisions. I count myself among the thousands of people for whom this book proved to be a turning point.

When I first went to college, I had big aspirations, just like my students at Franciscan University of Steubenville today. At first, I wanted to be a medical doctor. That lasted for only about two months. Then I went to pharmacy school and worked as a pharmacist for two years. Finally, I went to law school and worked as a lawyer for about ten years. As it turned out, that career choice wasnt so final after all. God had the final word when He called me to be a friar and priest in the service of His people.

Before I entered the Franciscan Friars, Third Order Regular, I worked in a California law firm with about sixty attorneys. My work involved health-care litigation, representing hospitals and health-care providers in any type of legal dispute in which they found themselves: malpractice, contract disputes, or Medicare reimbursement claims.

This firm expected us attorneys to volunteer our time to support various organizations and nonprofit groups in the area. We were doing good work, but none of these organizations were faith-based. I wanted to do something for my Church, so I volunteered as a lector at my parish. Our schedule for reading was rather fluid, with no apparent pattern. But God clearly set a pattern for me not in the Sundays on which I was assigned to read but in the content of the readings I was asked to proclaim. They all had to do with vocation and discernment. For example, I remember reading the story of the call of Samuel: Speak, L ord , for your servant is listening (see 1 Sam. 3:110). And I began to realize that something much bigger than I was involved here. Part of me felt called to marriage, but there was also a longing in my heart for a more exclusive relationship with God.

I pondered very seriously whether I was at the right place in my life or whether there was something else I should be doing. I began to ask myself the big questions the ones that young men and women dont always ask themselves when they are deciding on a career path questions about what I was looking for, what I was seeking in my life, and how I could live my life with peace in my heart, growing deeper in my faith commitment. These are some of the questions that all of us should consider at some point and should find the answers to in our relationship with Christ. When His first disciples approached Jesus, He asked them, What are you looking for? (John 1:38).

From California, I returned to my home state of Pennsylvania to work for a small firm that specialized in representing health-care clients. At this point, I began seriously to discern whether God was calling me to be a Franciscan friar and priest. I signed up for a Come and See weekend, in which potential applicants to the community live and pray with the friars. I actually signed up to convince myself that the Franciscan life was too difficult for me, so that I could close that door and move on with my life. But obviously God had another plan. In August of 2000, I entered the Franciscan Friars, Third Order Regular, as a postulant, made first profession in June 2002, solemn profession in July 2005, and was ordained a priest in December 2006.

During that Come and See weekend, the Franciscan vocation director gave me a very important gift. Each of the visitors to the friary that weekend received a copy of What Does God Want? by Fr. Michael Scanlan, T.O.R. I spent a lot of time reading that book while praying about whether I was called to religious life. Fr. Scanlans method of discernment provides five tests for helping the reader to make important decisions about priestly and religious vocations, marriage, careers, and family all of which are rooted in prayer and a desire to do Gods will.

Although many years have passed since I first encountered What Does God Want? , I have returned to it over and over again and have recommended it to many people. As you read Fr. Scanlans book and use it to help you pray through important life decisions, you, too, will see its value in helping you to focus on Gods will.

May God bless you as you strive always to be open to what God wants for you.

Fr. Sean O. Sheridan, T.O.R.
President, Franciscan University of Steubenville

Preface

Preface

Will you give me your life?

These words stopped me in my tracks one March morning in 1954 as I was returning home from Mass in Cambridge, Massachusetts. I stood paralyzed on the path I was taking across Henry Wadsworth Longfellows estate. I knew God was speaking to me. I had never heard God speak to me that way before, but I knew it was He.