In a previous column I discussed "False Fears: How the Evil Spirit Can Undermine God's Call." Later, in presenting this topic to a group of college students, an astute undergraduate raised some thought-provoking questions. He wondered:

• Are all fears bad?
• Aren't some fears in the vocational discernment process legitimate?
• How do you distinguish between legitimate fears and false fears?

I am now in my seventh year in vocation ministry, which gives me the privilege of helping people in their vocational discernment process regarding religious life, priesthood, and marriage. I believe this student raised some important questions that deserve a thoughtful response.

Fear is a natural part of the vocational discernment process, and it is not necessarily bad. However, dealing with fear is tricky, and the discerner will find it helpful to engage in astute discernment of spirits with assistance from a skilled spiritual director to avoid getting sidetracked by false fears.

St. Ignatius of Loyola, in his rules for the discernment of spirits in the Spiritual Exercises, offers this advice:

"When we are intent upon living a good life and seeking to pursue the lead of God in our life, the ... evil spirit proposes to us all the problems and difficulties in living a good life. The evil one attempts to rouse a false sadness for things which will be missed, to instigate an anxiety about persevering when we are so weak, and to suggest innumerable roadblocks in walking the way of the Lord. And so the evil spirit uses discouragement and deception to deter us from growing in the Christ-life.... The evil spirit will subtly arouse dissatisfaction with our own efforts, will raise up doubts and anxieties about God's love or our own response....

"The good spirit, however, strengthens and encourages, consoles and inspires, establishes a peace and sometimes moves to a firm resolve. To lead a good life gives delight and joy, and no obstacle seems to be so formidable that it cannot be faced and overcome with God's grace. The good spirit thereby continues an upright person's progress in responding to God's continuing invitation... The good spirit tends to give support, encouragement, and oftentimes even a certain delight in all our endeavors." (From The Spiritual Exercises - A Contemporary Reading by David Fleming, SJ, paragraphs 315 and 329)

While these observations by St. Ignatius are accurate, they cannot be applied in a simplistic black and white manner. It's not true that fear and sadness always come only from the evil spirit. However, what is true is that the evil spirit can play on even our healthy fears, questions, doubts, and sadness and subtly use them to lead us away from recognizing and whole-heartedly responding to God's will for us.

How do we distinguish when these fears, doubts, questions, and sadness are unhealthy and from the evil spirit and when they are not? For one, we can understand that fear of making a bad choice about how to live our one and only life can be healthy if we don't let it paralyze us.

Fear can raise important questions that the discerner needs to grapple with - questions such as:

• Am I really being called to religious life?
• Is God actually calling me to a life of celibacy, poverty, and obedience?
• Or rather does my desire for a family express God's authentic call to me?
• Could I be healthy and happy as a celibate?

While these are all valid, natural questions, they tend to raise the kind of fear that can leave us confused and perhaps even make us feel sad. A discerner might experience healthy anticipatory grieving that can be part of the experience of opting to forego the possibility of starting a new family sometime in the future by committing to religious life now. This temporary sadness can raise additional questions, fears, and doubts.

So we must then ask, when are these fears, questions, and doubts positive and even helpful and when are they not? When should they, on the one hand, be actively engaged as healthy questions that need to be dealt with and when, on the other hand, should they be countered as a ploy of the evil spirit?

Here, too, St. Ignatius' guidelines for the discernment of spirits are helpful. In paragraphs 331-333 of the Spiritual Exercises, Ignatius tells us to look at where an inner movement is coming from and where it is leading us. If doubts lead to us to address important questions or recognize deeper desires, they are from the good spirit. However, if entertaining these questions consistently leaves us feeling sad, confused, anxious, and paralyzed, we can assume they are not from the good spirit. Some examples will help.

Let's say the discerner has felt joy and consolation over a fairly long period of time. But in approaching the actual making of a vocational decision, suffers the kind of reluctance or "cold feet" that leaves him or her mired in doubts, fears, sadness, and confusion that lead nowhere. I have found a good litmus test is this: If what the discerner is feeling leads nowhere other than to feel stuck and paralyzed, chances are the evil spirit is at work. If, on the other hand, what the discerner is feeling directs him or her to grapple with important questions and issues that need to be dealt with and may perhaps point to deeper desires, then the good spirit is at the source.

So, if we're feeling hopelessly stuck in confusion, doubt, fear and sadness after a significant period of what Ignatius refers to as "consolation," (that is, peace, joy, a sense of rightness and having found God in the contemplated decision), then these fears and doubts are clearly not from the good spirit because they are not leading the discerner toward a good place. No school of spirituality would say "Follow your fears"!

On the other hand, if in paying attention to these fears, doubts, and confusion the discerner is led to deal with important unresolved questions and issues, then that is a good thing.

I have encountered discerners who, after a period of consolation about their desire to enter our community, still had some questions and did not feel ready to apply when the time arrived. Commonly they harbored healthy fears and doubts centering on issues of sexuality and intimacy that needed to be addressed before a good decision could be made.

I can think of other discerners I've helped who experienced real doubts in the middle of working on their application materials and eventually discovered they were being called by God to live their life as a Catholic layman or woman rather than as a religious. This is a good example of a healthy doubt pointing to a deeper desire - a case where doubt is from the good spirit.

Sometimes just the opposite occurs when, in the course of the vocational discernment process, discerners in a romantic relationship experience questions, doubts, and confusion that help them discover that their true call from God is religious life or priesthood rather than marriage.

In summary, questions, fears, and doubts in the vocational discernment process can be positive in two instances:

• When they point to unresolved issues that the discerner needs to deal with before making a good decision.
• When they point the discerner to realize that his or her deepest desire is other than the contemplated decision - for example, lay life rather than religious life or vice versa.

On the other hand, these questions, doubts, and fears are negative if they only serve to lead the person to feel stuck, anxious, sad and confused, and block the person from making a good, prayerful decision. In this latter case, the discerner must recognize these doubts and confusion as "desolation" from the evil spirit leading them away from God's will. Recognized as such, they can, and must, be countered rather than indulged in order to arrive at a healthy decision.

Clearly, engaging in a good vocational discernment process can be a tricky, often challenging business that can include periods of confusion, doubt, and uncertainty. Dealing with the questions that inevitably come up requires skillful discernment of spirits. That is one reason that daily personal prayer, frequent mass attendance, and regular spiritual direction are essential components of the decision-making process - especially in the final, often more subtle stages.