It can be kind of hard to answer some questions about vocations. Whether there is a vocation to the single life is one question especially relevant to many students and young Catholics now. Are there three vocations in life – marriage, religious life and single life – or only two? I think that we need to look at what each of these states entails before we can reach any decisions.

First of all, each of these states is directed toward a different person. Religious consecration is a union with God, and because of this, is permanent. Marriage is a union with another person, and ends when either person dies. The single life, when lived in sanctity, brings one into communion with all those one meets, but there is no specific covenantal union of persons. Because there is no specific union, it is temporary – one can leave this state by entering another at any point.

In the single life, one can definitely live for others, especially for God – this is the vocation to holiness. However, this vocation to holiness is universal, and doesn’t set apart the single state as extraordinary. Married people and religious are called to holiness as well. All three states demand heroic virtue, if they are to lead to sanctity. All demand chastity – though the single state and [ordinarily] the religious state demand celibacy, while marriage [generally] does not. At the same time, it is interesting to note that covenantal unions are generally epitomized by a sexual gift of self – either in celibacy, to God, or in faithful married love to one’s spouse. A person living a chaste single life reserves this gift.

Religious life and married life seem to balance each other: one is supernatural, the other natural. For this reason, it seems superfluous to posit the existence of a third vocation. However, not everyone is married or religious, and not everyone can become so: think of a little child who dies, through no fault of his own or his parents – God called him to holiness, definitely, but not through marriage or religious life. God does not call us to give what we cannot possess.

The vocation to the single life, then, is a call to life in general – a sort of ‘default position.’ The vocation of marriage is something more, since it continues to demand holiness and integrity in one’s dealings with everyone, as well as a faithful and loving union with one’s spouse. The vocation to consecrated religious life is the ultimate vocation, since it is a union with God Himself – it is supernatural and permanent in a way that no other vocation is. Perhaps this is partly why “vocation” immediately brings to mind the priesthood or religious life, at least in the phrase “I think I may have a vocation.”

Vocation is applied to many different callings in our lives. We are all called to holiness, and to a virtuous single life for a time. Many of us, however, also have other vocations – to marriage or religious life or both. It would be a mistake to say that these states are mutually exclusive, or that they are universal, but it is equally wrong to say that the three states of life are each vocations in the same sense.