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First year was a blur. Sometimes, seminarians left. Many times, there was no explanation as to why, and really, they didn't owe us one. But France was burned into my mind: they had struck me down without warning. In France, I had been the first to leave. Here, I was seeing better men than myself leaving and I couldn't understand why. Nor why I was still here and they weren't. A poor parallel would be to combat soldiers who come through a battle while some others don't and there's nothing but the mystery of the bullet's path to answer why. But vocations aren't mere chance. So I asked my spiritual director how one knew whether someone had a vocation or not. His response was vague: he was waiting. For what, he wouldn't say. And I became paranoid. It seemed to me just a matter of time until the carpet would be pulled out from under me. For every seminarian that left without a why, I became ever more fearful my turn was coming. The attrition rate for vocations when I was there was around 75% to 90% depending on the class...that's huge, and when no one can articulate how you become part of the 10% to 25%, you worry. This was a deadly worm in my mind: my trust for authority figures would never fully recover after France. Investing everything you are in something that you believe can explode at any moment is a horrible mental anguish, like hugging a bomb to your chest and running, hoping you'll finish the race before it goes off. I would live like this for the next four years, my mind raw with worry and expectations of betrayal.

Year three. There was a new rector. I thought nothing of it at the time as the shuffling of personnel was normal and the previous rector had had an unusually long run at the seminary. The new rector was not a bishop, and he brought in a new regime and new ideas on priestly formation.  

I was now head of the Guest Department, a great privilege as I got to meet and talk with everyone who came through the seminary. However, there was a dark flip side: when a seminarian left, he did it through me. I had to arrange transportation. It was soul-crushing work. Too many times I’d open my door and be met with those eyes, those lost, defeated eyes. There were a few who left voluntarily, but even these rarely expressed or displayed any peace at their decision. Too many were just told abruptly…they had had no warning, no slow build of problems or cautions. You couldn’t prepare it seemed: the axe had just fallen and they didn’t understand why. And I felt it keenly, because I had been exactly where these men were – I was through the looking glass on this one. They deserved better: you have to give a man something to fix, or he’ll just dig into himself.

In that year, only one seminarian left with ease, with true peace. The rest specifically asked that I drive them out when the community was at prayer. They didn’t want to be seen. They didn’t want to say good bye. Some didn’t even tell anyone (but me) they were leaving. Those that did make it public had this aura suddenly around them, like a leper. It was heart-breaking. I began to have little anxiety attacks when someone knocked at my door – who was it this time? Whose eyes was it going to be? Why was leaving the seminary such a drama? If it wasn’t your vocation, there should have been such relief and rejoicing – you could go on with your life – you had put in the time! What friends you had made! You had been willing to make the sacrifice but were meant for something else! But I didn’t see this. Most were in shock. The car rides were silent. When was it going to be me again?

I knew the new rector. I knew that he would take the first year and watch, get the pulse of the place. I saw seminarians cozy up to him and knew they were cooked. He didn’t rebuke them, he let them hang themselves. Miserable. I gave warnings, but no one heeded them. Maybe they had to go. We all did in the end.

But the most horrible thing [the vice-rector] ever did was start telling me who was going to get kicked from the seminary. I don’t know why he did that. That was hell. I knew before the seminarian knew. I would leave his room and I’d see that seminarian, laughing and talking and doing his duties. He didn’t know it was over. Once I was told 3 months in advance of the actual culling of someone. There was no reason why. That ex-seminarian, to this day, doesn’t even know why he was asked to leave. He was just “unsuitable”. I knew the knock was coming. Oh, the rage, the helplessness. These were not humanities or first years he was name dropping, these were men who’d already put in 3 or 4 years, men who were committed. How can a vocation not be discerned after 2 years? That is a massive disservice. Sure, there might be exceptions, but this was becoming the norm. Their dreams were dead all over their face. Their efforts destroyed, reasons mysterious, and I felt party to it by my silence. But what was I to do? Tell them? What would that solve? I felt powerless.