Hearing the invitation to “Discover the gift that only you can give because of the gift you are” is one that still resonates, even a few years after my GIVEN Forum experience. When I applied for the 2021 Forum, the opportunity appeared like a light in what was in many ways a year of darkness. COVID’s physical devastation and devouring isolation descended a few short weeks after I first learned about GIVEN in February 2020.
I was attracted both to GIVEN’s mission of activating women’s gifts to serve the Church and to the structure of the gathering—five days during which I’d be equipped to recognize my gifts and give of myself in the context of a small group of women with similar interests. I would be able to choose from the specialties offered to participants, including Artistic, Secular Professional, Catholic Professional, Entrepreneurial, and Care for the Human Person. I would hear inspiring talks and come into contact with women from all over the country, and even from across the world, who were similarly inspired to activate their gifts. During the year following the Forum, there was the promise of a mentor to guide me as I carried out an “action plan,” which would be a concrete and personalized way I would serve a part of the Church that most touched my heart. Little did I know in February 2020 that the year would in short order become one of heavy transition for me as I moved home and struggled through bouts of melancholy and burnout. Little did I know just how much I would need community and help out of a rather deactivated state of life.
When I turned in my application on December 8, 2020, I asked that our Blessed Mother Mary guide the process. Under the title of Our Lady of Guadalupe, she is GIVEN’s patroness. Having recently completed an MFA in Creative Writing, and with a love for poetry and the power of words, I applied to the Artistic specialty. The yes I received in March 2021 to attend the Forum was like sunlight breaking into a dark room.
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In his essay “A Meditation on Givenness,” Pope Saint John Paul II says, “[T]here is a very deep connection between being for oneself and being for others. Only someone who has dominion over himself can become a sincere gift for others.” The GIVEN Forum presented a space in which I could begin to learn to be both for myself and for others. Throughout my life, I have struggled with deep-seated fear. When COVID rocked the world, I saw how those around me were touched by a similar fear. I find that when I am fearful, I’m tempted to abandon myself to the fear and it’s easy to lose “dominion” over myself. Community serves as a counterweight—a place where I can simultaneously come out of myself and be at home with myself. GIVEN provided a joy-infused community of women who were on a mission.
In these rather divisive days in which we live, I look back on GIVEN not with nostalgia for an idyllic gathering, but with awe at the beauty that comes from bringing together women living out a diversity of vocations. A highlight of GIVEN for me was the presence of religious sisters and consecrated women. It was beautiful to encounter them not as women on a separate life trajectory from the single and married women participating in the conference, but as collaborators in the life of faith. At GIVEN, I more fully saw the Body of Christ. I saw that there are as many ways of using one’s gifts as there are women on this earth. The Lord is abundant in his gifts. One moment that continues to touch my heart was a night of Eucharistic Adoration in which religious sisters were available to pray with women. The tenderness that comes with allowing God to work through their religious vocations was a powerful example of spiritual motherhood for me.
My action plan from the forum was to create a retreat for women artists in my home parish. However, 2021 was also a year of transition. I moved from home to a city six hours away. My mentor was a kind constant in this period, and in the fall of 2022 I traveled back to my home parish to lead ten women through a weekend of nourishing and (re)awakening their artistic gifts. It was a delight for my heart to realize that the artist, who spends so much of her creative time in solitude, can find community. This is something I’m seeking to build in the city that I live in now. Without GIVEN, I’m unsure if I would have the confidence to be for myself and for others in this way.
Sister, perhaps you are thinking about attending GIVEN. Perhaps this is the first time you’re hearing about it. Perhaps you’re in a position similar to the one I was in when I applied—unsure if in the brokenness you feel that you have a gift to give. The shift GIVEN enacts is a movement from “I have a gift” to “I am a gift.” The fact is, you are a gift and you’ve already been given to this world by God, and you have a purpose which he is unfolding in you even in the seemingly fallow seasons. At GIVEN, you are called to discover your inherent givenness and to learn how you are being called to give of yourself to others. Most importantly, you are not called to do this alone. We need each other. We need the Church. We need to be reminded over and over of the hope that has been planted within us. GIVEN is a place where these realities come together—community, purpose, growth in faith, hope, and charity. Whether a prospective participant, mentor, or volunteer, I heartily recommend applying to the 2024 GIVEN Forum, and (re)discovering the gift you are.
Author Bio: Poet and writer Lindsey Weishar holds an MFA from the University of Missouri-Kansas City. She writes for a variety of outlets, including Verily magazine. Her column, “My Vocation is Love,” appears in The Catholic Post, the newspaper of her home Diocese of Peoria, Illinois. She writes from Kansas City, Kansas, where she works at Donnelly College.
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