Vocation Visits

If you feel ready for an actual visit, the first step would be to request to come on one of our Vocation Discernment Retreats. You can do this by clicking on the "Vocation Inquiry Form" button above.  Sr. Philomena Clare will then contact you about the possibility of making a retreat. We hold four retreats each year at Our Lady of Sorrows Monastery in Toronto, Ohio. They begin on Friday afternoon and end on Sunday after lunch. (Note: the closest airport is Pittsburgh International Airport, 40 minutes from the Motherhouse).

The weekend includes talks on vocational discernment, the consecrated life and our community’s charisms. During the retreat guests also join the sisters for Mass, Eucharistic adoration, Liturgy of the Hours and a time of charismatic prayer. Also included in the weekend are a tour of the motherhouse, time for quiet prayer, recreation and meals with the sisters, a visit to one of our hermitages, share group with the other guests and an opportunity to meet with a sister one-on-one.

After coming on a Vocation Discernment Retreat and following further discussion with our community, women who are drawn to our way of life can request to come for a more extended Come and See visit of about 8 days. During this time guests can enter more fully into the daily schedule of prayer, work, ministry and fraternal life at Our Lady of Sorrows Monastery. Vocation guests may have the opportunity to work with the sisters in the Motherhouse, minister to nursing home residents with the postulants and novices, have a meal with sisters in a mission house, or minister with sisters doing our downtown ministries. The women who come are able to experience how our life of Franciscan contemplative prayer and penance flows into our spiritual and corporal works of mercy.