The first step toward becoming a friar is for you to contact the Vocation Office. Once contact has been made, the Vocation Director will respond with appropriate information and your process of discernment begins.

Pre-Postulancy begins with the initial contact with the Vocation Office and prepares you for admission into the Postulancy Program. The length of this stage depends on your individual needs. No one is rushed through the process. You will be given the time and the space you need in which to discern your calling in conjunction with the Vocation Director.

The Postulancy is a twelve-month program of orientation to Franciscan life and Spirituality. It begins in early July of each year at St. Anthony Friary in Cincinnati, Ohio.

The year of Novitiate is a time of forming your Franciscan identity and intensifying your prayer life. It marks the formal entrance into the Order of Friars Minor (the Franciscans) and culminates in your taking temporary vows of Poverty, Chastity, and Obedience. The novices of Saint John the Baptist Province join with those of other provinces at the House of Novitiate in Cedar Lake, Ind.

As a newly professed friar you will then move to Chicago, Illinois, for a minimum of three years, during which time you will continue to learn about the Franciscan way of life and continue your formal education. What classes you take or which degree programs you enter depends on the type of ministries in which you feel called to serve. Should you feel called to priesthood, you would study at the Catholic Theological Union.

After a minimum of three years of living as a Franciscan in Temporary Profession of Vows, you would make your life commitment by entering into Solemn or Permanent Profession of Vows. This marks the beginning of full, lifelong membership in the Order of Friars Minor. Once you are in Solemn Vows you would either continue your schooling, should that be necessary, or receive your first assignment for ministry in the province.