Do you not want to use a Servlet specifically or do you mean you don't want to use anything that involves a web application? The Java EE 5 approach just depends on using the web application initialization callback (ServletContextListener.contextInitialized) as a way to be notified when the container is starting. The code that implements the callback can use either injection or a lookup to acquire the Stateless session bean reference. There isn't any other portable way to get an initialization notification in Java EE 5 and earlier outside of a web application.
[Message sent by forum member 'ksak']
http://forums.java.net/jive/thread.jspa?messageID=469448