We are made for union with God. Saint Augustine expressed it in all simplicity and beauty "You have made us for yourself O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you ."
We came from this God of love. Were known and loved by Him before anyone even thought about us, and will return to God. The traditional teaching that life begins at the moment of conception can not stand up to the light of these most profound truths. Did not God tell the prophet this " “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you " Again we can look at what has become the traditional teaching that the furthest we can go on the spiritual path is to become like Saints. This does not stand up to these simple and yet most profound truths. The two hearts are restless with lovers until they become one heart. One beating heart. One identity, and one existence. That is our destiny. Our eternal destiny through many unfoldings. But we have to at least acknowledge that it is possible in this lifetime for some souls, or it is to deny the reality of the action of the essence of God in our midst, and the unfolding of the energy of God in our midst everywhere present, and filling all things. The very work of the spirit in all diversity. This work of the spirit in our midst is denied by those who claim to lead our Christian, religious, and monastic communities if they tell a person they can not have the calling they have if they are married or celibate in some cases. Or if they have the learning they have or not.The sexuality they have or not.The gender they have or not. If the spirit is in all things, and we are drawn ever deeper into that union with God we can have multiple vocations all that same time, even if they appear to be opposite and contradictory to those of the world who do not understand the real movement and unfolding of God in our midst today. Our silence and solitude of the heart is the setting where we can hold them together, draw them together, and make them one healing all divisions. Here we become the true Priest, receiving the divine light on behalf of all, and for all, by our living out of all the opposites and contradictions, healing of them we become one with God. It is like the sugar cube dropped in the coffee that dissolves away, and becomes on with it.
Richard Smith Hermitage of Saint Michael and All Angels.