Should I take the job that pays more? Or the one that gives me more time for family? Is it better to move closer to our parents or our children’s school? Which charity should we donate our money to? Most people face ordinary decisions like these throughout their lives, and many feel stumped about how to actually make those decisions.

Unfortunately, many well-meaning Catholics tend to think that aside from encouraging us to pray about such things, the Church has very little to offer us in the way of guidance about such specific choices. In one sense, they are right: Mother Church does not offer Catholics in each city a list of exclusively approved schools or houses or charities. But she does have a tradition of helping individuals discern, and this discernment, contrary to popular belief, is not strictly limited to a Catholic’s One Big Question: what is my vocation?