Love VS. Vocation

Do all fairytales always have princes and princesses living happily ever after? Not all. Let us read on a fairytale where princesses and queens are left behind… a fairytale where the princes are in search for their lifetime partner.
Welcome to the kingdom of the seminary… where the characters deviate from the normal flow of the times.
These princes are those valiant young men trying to pursue the road which only a few dare to go. People call us “seminarians”. We are formed to become holy and chaste religious and priests someday. Holiness is a great deal in our world. And so is chastity. Every human structure inside the seminary is looking forward to these. But can he resist the pleasures the world offers? There enters the conflict. People see us as perfect beings, invulnerable from sin. This is one thing that needs to be elucidated here.

WE DO FALL IN LOVE.
Everyone experiences that mutual feeling of falling in love. Seminarians are in no immunity. We get struck by the arrow of cupid most of the time. We seldom see women with stunning faces. And once we find one who really gratifies us and who has an overly pleasing personality, we could not help but fall.

DON’T GET US WRONG!
Our being seminarians does not make us emotionless creatures like robots. We are still humans who emotions and feelings. These we cannot really deny. There were many instances in the past where seminarians left the seminary because they realized that they were not meant for religious life. And yes they did not regret their decisions. Everyone who enters the seminary is not yet assured that he would go out as a successful priest. Now and again, the seminary would become an avenue for one to truly find himself.
In the seminary, it is never a sin to fall for someone. What makes falling in love wrong is when a seminarian already wants to settle into a relationship with the woman he loves. Seminarians will always be boys. And boys will forever have links with girls.

BUT WE HOLD BACK THIS EMOTION…
Being men in formation we ought to curb this liking towards the opposite sex. This is so to avoid future disturbances when we already become priests and religious. We cannot afford to add more dilemmas to our Mother, the Church. We do not totally detach ourselves from the world outside for no one can really escape from the reality. And in our future ministry, we will still go back and be immersed to the world. What is meant here is that instead of entertaining the thought of being in love, we are to diffuse this love to other people who are more in need. All we need is prayers that little by little we grow to be holy and chaste formands. And that, just like any other fairytales, we arrive to that happily-ever-after ending with the lifetime Partner we have sought for, chosen and fought for, God.