Do You Love Me, Peter? Being Made Fully Human in Dialogue With God (Reprise)

Today's Gospel includes the pericope where Jesus asks Peter three times if he loves him. It is the first time we hear much about or from Peter since his triple denial of Christ --- his fear-driven affirmations that he did not even know the man and is certainly not a disciple of his. After each question and reply by Peter, Jesus commissions Peter to "feed my lambs, feed my sheep." 

I have written about this at least three times before. About four or five years ago I used this text to reflect on the place of conscience in our lives and a love which transcends law. At another point I spoke about the importance of Jesus' questions and of my own difficulty with Jesus' question to Peter. Then, about three years ago at the end of school I asked the students to imagine what it feels like to have done something for which one feels there is no forgiveness possible and then to hear how an infinitely loving God deals with that. The solution is not, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer would have termed it, "cheap grace" --- a forgiveness without cost or consequences. Neither is it a worthless "luv" which some in the Church mistakenly disparage because they hear (they say) too many homilies about the God of Love and mercy and not enough about the God of "justice". Instead, what Jesus reveals in this lection is a merciful love which overcomes all fear and division and summons us to incredible responsibility and freedom. The center of this reading, in other words, is a love which does justice and sets all things right.

But, especially at this time in the church's life, today's Gospel also takes me to the WAY Jesus loves Peter. He addresses him directly; he asks him questions and allows him to discover an answer which stands in complete contrast to and tension with his earlier denials and the surge of emotions and complex of thoughts that prompted them. As with Peter, Jesus' very presence is a question or series of questions which have the power to call us deeper, beyond our own personal limitations and conflicts, to the core of our being. What Jesus does with Peter is engage him at a profound level of heart --- a level deeper than fear, deeper than ego, beyond defensiveness and insecurity. Jesus' presence enables dialogue at this profound level, dialogue with one's true self, with God, and with one's entire community; it is an engagement which brings healing and reveals that the capacity for dialogue is the deepest reflection of our humanity.

It is this deep place in us which is the level for authentically human decision making. When we perceive and act at this level of heart we see and act beyond the level of black and white thinking, beyond either/or judgmentalism. Here we know paradox and hold tensions together in faith and love. Here we act in authentic freedom. Jesus' dialogue with Peter points to all of this and to something more. It reminds us that loving God is not a matter of "feeling" some emotion --- though indeed it may well involve this. Instead it is something we are empowered in dialogue with the Word and Spirit of God to do which transcends even feelings; it is a response realized in deciding to serve, to give, to nourish others in spite of the things happening to us at other levels of our being.

When we reflect on this text involving a paradigmatic dialogue between Peter and Jesus we have a key to understanding the nature of all true ministry, and certainly to life and ministry in the Church. Not least we have a significant model of papacy. Of course it is a model of service, but it is one of service only to the extent it is one of true dialogue, first with God, then with oneself, and finally with all others. It is always and everywhere a matter of being engaged at the level of heart, and so, as already noted, beyond ego, fear, defensiveness, black and white thinking, judgmentalism or closed-mindedness to a place where one is comfortable with paradox. As John Paul II wrote in Ut Unum Sint, "Dialog has not only been undertaken; it is an outright necessity, one of the Church's priorities, " or again, "It is necessary to pass from antagonism and conflict to a situation where each party recognizes the other as a partner. . .any display of mutual opposition must disappear." (UUS, secs 31 and 29)

But what is true for Peter is, again, true for each of us. We must be engaged at the level of heart and act in response to the dialogue that occurs there. Because of the place of the Word of God in this process, lectio divina, the reflective reading of Scripture, must be a part of our regular praxis. So too with prayer, especially quiet prayer whose focus is listening deeply and being comfortable with that often-paradoxical truth that comes to us in silence. Our humanity is meant to be a reflection of this profound dialogue. At every moment we are meant to be a hearing of Jesus' question and the commission to serve which it implies. At every moment then we are to be the response which transcends ego, fear, division, judgmentalism, and so forth. Engagement with the Word of God enables such engagement, engagement from that place of unity and communion with God and others Jesus' questions to Peter allowed him to find and live from. My prayer today is that each of us may commit to be open to this kind of engagement. It makes of us the dialogical reality, the full realization of that New Creation which is truly "not of this world" but instead is of the Kingdom of God --- right here, right now.

Abba John Colobos and the Fruit of Obedience

In the apothegmata (sayings) of the Desert Mothers and Fathers, the story is told of Desert Abba John Colobos' elder (mentor) having taken a dry stick and planted it in the ground. He told Abba John to go every day and irrigate the stick. John did so even though water was a long way away and it meant John had to travel to the spring each evening only to return hours later at dawn. For three years John made this trip every day. At the end of this time, we are told the stick turned green and flowered. John took the flowers to the Church, and shared them with his brethren saying, "Behold the fruit of obedience!" We hear in this story a clear lesson on the importance and the fruitfulness of persisting in obedience, not merely in the sense of doing what one is told, but in the very much richer and more challenging terms of entrusting oneself to the wisdom and loving mentoring of an elder in a way which, over time, produces astonishing fruit despite the evident impossibility and apparent absurdity of the project undertaken.

Variations on the Original Story:

Unfortunately, today few are familiar with the original story but many have heard scaled-down and skewed variations in which religious superiors demand something similar, usually in order to humiliate and bring to heel novices having difficulty submitting themselves to their superior's commands. In such stories, obedience is less about entrusting oneself to the love of an elder as a necessary part of long-term formation in life than it is about a blind "faith" which demands a subject check their intellect at the door or about breaking another's spirit and causing them to submit to one's will. It is less about opening oneself to a God one can trust to be present even in the darkness and more about simply saying yes to the absurd. It is far less about entrusting oneself to the wisdom of one who knows how to live eremitical life and who is immensely savvy in the ways of the human heart and far more about buying into a narrowly authoritarian notion of obedience.

It is not hard to see why believers and unbelievers alike ridicule the notion of religious obedience, and sometimes faith itself. We can hear them scoff: "Imagine someone persisting in the belief that a dead stick will one day flower! Imagine someone wasting their time, and even their entire lives in subjection to superiors (or a "gospel") that command such absurdities! Imagine such blind and entirely senseless 'faith' where someone submits to the punitive or at best, misguided commands of a superior moved by cruelty, ignorance, and even outright superstition!" We believers have not always done well with our foundational stories.

Desert Apothegm as Analogy of the Story of the Cross

I doubt that many of us today could imagine planting a wooden stick in the ground, watering it daily for years, and having anything fruitful at all come from such a project. Fewer still might listen to the story of Abba John Colobos and adopt such a stick as a symbol of profound hope, true wisdom, or supremely Good News. But it occurs to me that right at the heart of our faith is the story of a wooden stake planted in the ground and watered with blood and tears to bring forth astonishing, even measureless fruitfulness.  God takes the very symbol of barrenness, gratuitous suffering, senseless cruelty, hopelessness, and the despair of godless death and through the faithful obedience (the trusting, persevering, openness, and responsiveness) of his Son, he redeems and transforms reality. Through this event, God destroys sin and death, brings about the reconciliation of all creation, transfigures it into a new creation that shares intimately in his own divine life, and prefigures the day of fulfillment when God will be all in all. In other words, it is through Jesus' own obedience that a barren stake of death is transformed by God into what Christians call today The Tree of Life.

And yet, we have not always done well in conveying this rock-bottom foundational story of our faith either. As with Abba John's response to his desert elder, Jesus' obedience was not simply a matter of doing what he was told; it was a matter of faithfully entrusting his entire life --- every moment and mood of it --- to the One whose wisdom was greater than his own and whose powerful and kenotic love he would, over time, come to embody or incarnate exhaustively. Obedience here would mean becoming the actual counterpart of the One he called Abba just as it would mean Jesus' committing his whole self to the service of all those whom this One loved and yet loves with an everlasting love. I am sure there were many times when such openness to his Father's will tempted Jesus to see his mission as marked and marred with futility. I am positive that working with his disciples and with the religious leadership of his day felt like trying to teach brainless and heartless chunks of wood to explode in cascades of flowers and fruit. Perhaps this is part of the reason Jesus was so upset by the barren fig tree.

Over the past 40 some days we have heard a number of similar stories rooted in the power and model of Jesus. Paul's own story is one of a man converted to what must have seemed like a futile project and who persevered in his own obedience nonetheless. Certainly, some of the original Apostles in Jerusalem thought his mission to the Gentiles made as much sense as John Colobos' apparently absurd stick-watering --- especially since they lacked the roots of the Jewish Law and covenant to build on. And yet, Paul and his pastoral assistants brought incredible fruit from what was considered to be Gentile's religious rootlessness and barrenness. Paul in particular entrusted himself to the crucified Christ, rethought Judaism in light of the cross and resurrection, and forever changed the face of Christianity from a sect of Judaism to a worldwide faith with a mission to proclaim the Gospel to everyone without limits or boundaries. Every story of martyrdom, every witness to the Gospel, every call to forgive and be forgiven, every commission to minister to others in the power of the cross, reminds us that what we proclaim is a scandal to religious folks and foolishness to the wise of this world. It is our own revealed version of the stick-watering story of Abba John Colobos.

Applying the Story of Abba John Colobos Today:

In today's readings, both Paul and Jesus entrust the story of the barren-stick-turned-fruitful-bough to us. This is the proclamation or kerygma we are entrusted with by God, a bit of Christian foolishness many will simply deride, the proclamation we call Gospel. This Friday we will hear the story of Peter's "rehabilitation" by the risen Christ and his call to "feed Christ's lambs, feed Christ's sheep." Because he entrusted himself to Christ's reconciling love we have a Church whose highest leadership is summoned to be a model of obedient love and servanthood.

The mission we are given, the obedience to which we are called -- a responsive commission ratified and empowered at Pentecost ---requires perseverance and trust in a love and wisdom greater than our own.  It means being asked to do great things in our world but often it means saying a trusting yes to small, ordinary acts of faithfulness which -- at least in the short term -- seem to be worthless and of no great moment at all. Especially it means opening ourselves daily so that the Holy Spirit of both the Father and Son together may empower a responsiveness that brings life out of death, hope out of despair, and an often pervasively barren world to flower in faith and new life.

Like Paul and Peter, like John Colobos and armies of Desert Abbas and Ammas, like Christians of every age and culture we are each called to labor daily to water all of these tasks and many others with ourselves, with our tears of love, joy, grief, and sometimes even with our very blood; more, we are asked to embrace and persevere in our commitments of self-gift so that the scandal and foolishness of the Cross may continue to cause the whole creation to sing in joy, "Behold the New Creation, behold the fruit of obedience!"

Developing the Heart of a Hermit

[[Hi Sister, when you write about having the heart of a hermit and moving from isolation to solitude do you mean that someone comes to this through some form of trauma or serious personal wounding and alienation? Is this necessary? Can a person who has never been hurt or broken develop the "heart of a hermit"?]]

Hi and thanks for your questions. When I think of someone with the heart of a hermit I am thinking of someone who has entered a desert, been stripped and emptied in all the ways a desert does, and learned to depend upon God for her very life as well as for the meaning of that life. When I speak of God I mean what the Christian creeds mean, what the NT means and who Jesus reveals, but I also mean being dependent on the One Tillich called the "Ground of Being and Meaning", namely a transcendent ground which both surpasses and comprehends our own emptiness and incapacities and is the source and guarantor of life and meaning.

When I speak of a desert I mean the literal wilder-nesses we know as deserts (the Thebaid, Scetes, Mojave, Sonoran, Sahara, etc), but I also mean any extended situation which demands  or forces a person to plumb the depths of their own personal resources --- courage, intelligence, creativity, sense of security, personal  gifts and talents, sense of self, faith, hope, love, etc --- all the things we need to negotiate the world fruitfully and independently. In such a situation, which may certainly include childhood traumatic situations, a person brings all they have and know to the situation and over time are emptied or reach the limit of these resources. At the same time one can, and hopefully will, experience a sense of empowerment one knows comes from beyond themselves, sometimes radically so. When this happens such a person continues to live with a fresh courage and sense of meaning and hope. They embrace their own weakness honestly as they humbly and gratefully accept the life which is received as complete gift in such situations.

All kinds of situations result in "desert experiences." Chronic illness, bereavement, negligent and abusive family life, bullying, losses of employment and residence, abandonment, divorce, war, imprisonment, insecure identity (orphans, etc), serious poverty, and many others may be classified this way. Typically such experiences distance, separate, and even alienate us from others (e.g., ties with civil society, our normal circle of friends and the rhythms of life we are so used to are disrupted and sometimes lost entirely); too they throw us back upon other resources, and eventually require experiences of transcendence --- the discovery of or tapping into new and greater resources which bring us beyond the place of radical emptiness and  helplessness to one of consolation and communion. The ultimate (and only ultimately sufficient) source of transcendence is God and it is the experience of this originating and sustaining One who is Love in Act that transforms our isolation into the communion we know as solitude.

Thus, my tendency is to answer your question about the possibility of developing the heart of a hermit without experiences of loss, trauma, or brokenness in the negative. These experiences open us to the Transcendent and, in some unique ways, are necessary for this. Remember that sinfulness itself is an experience of estrangement and brokenness so this too would qualify if one underwent a period of formation where one met one's own sinfulness in a sufficiently radical way. Remember too that the hermit vocation is generally seen as a "second half of life" vocation; the need that one experiences this crucial combination of radical brokenness and similar transcendence and healing is very likely part of the reason behind this bit of common wisdom.

In any case, the heart of a hermit is created when a person living a desert experience also learns to open themselves to God and to live in dependence on God in a more or less solitary context. One need not become a hermit to have the heart of a hermit and not all those with such hearts become hermits in a formal, much less a canonical way. In the book Journeys into Emptiness (cf.,illustration above), the Zen Buddhist Master Dogen, Roman Catholic Monk Thomas Merton, and Depth Psychologist Carl Jung all developed such hearts. Only one lived as a hermit --- though both Dogen and Merton were monks.

As I understand and use the term these are the hearts of persons irrevocably marked by the experience and threat of emptiness as well as by the healing (or relative wholeness) achieved in solitary experiences of transcendence and who are now not only loving individuals but are persons who are comfortable and  (often immensely) creative in solitude. They are persons who have experienced in a radical way and even can be said to have "become" the question of meaning and found in the Transcendent the only Answer which truly completes and transforms them. In a Farewell to Arms, Hemingway said it this way, [[The World breaks everyone and then some become strong in the broken places.]] The Apostle Paul said it this way (when applied to human beings generally), "My grace is sufficient for you, my power is perfected in weakness."

Hermit hearts are created when, in a radical experience of weakness, need, yearning, and even profound doubt that will mark her for the rest of her life,  she is also transfigured by an experience of God's abiding presence. A recognition of the nature of the hermit's heart is what drives my insistence that the Silence of Solitude is the goal and gift (charism) of eremitical life; it is also the basis for the claim that there must be an experience of redemption at the heart of the discernment, profession, and consecration of any canonical hermit. While she in no way denies the importance of others who can and do mediate this same presence in our world, the hermit gives herself to the One who alone can make her whole and holy. She seeks and seeks to witness to the One who has already "found" her in the wilderness and found her in a way that reveals the truth that "God alone is enough" for us.

I Go to Prepare a Place for You: Ascension and Jewish Marriage Imagery (Reprised)

So much of what Jesus says about the event we call "Ascension" is meant to remind us of the Jewish theology of marriage. It is meant to remind us that the Church, those called and sent in the name of Jesus, is the Bride of Christ --- both betrothed and awaiting the consummation of this marriage. This Friday's Gospel passage from 16 John prepares the disciples for Jesus' "leaving" and the Church wants us to hear it now in terms of the Ascension rather than the crucifixion. Thus, it focuses on the "in-between" time of grief-at-separation, waiting, and bittersweet joy.

Thus too, especially with its imagery of labor and childbirth, it affirms that though Jesus must leave to prepare a place for us, the grief of his "leaving" (really a new kind of presence) will one day turn to unalloyed joy because with and in Christ something new is being brought to birth both in our own lives and in the very life of God. It is an unprecedented reality, an entirely New Life and too, a source of a joy which no one can take from us. Just as the bridegroom remains a real but bittersweet presence and promise in the life of his betrothed, so Jesus' presence in our own lives is a source of now-alloyed and bittersweet joy, both real and unmistakable but also not what it will be when the whole of creation reaches its fulfillment and the marriage between Christ and his Bride is consummated. The union of this consummation is thus the cosmic union of God-made all in all.

The following post reflects on another Johannine text, also preparing us for the Ascension. I wanted to reprise it here because the Gospel texts this week all seek to remind us of the unadulterated joy of Easter and the Parousia (the second-coming and fulfillment) as they prepare us for the bittersweet joy of the in-between time of Ascension and especially because they do so using the imagery of Jewish marriage. This Friday's childbirth imagery in John 16 presupposes and requires this be fresh in our minds.

The Two Stages of Jewish Marriage

The central image Jesus uses in [speaking of his leaving and eventual return] is that of marriage. His disciples are supposed to hear him speaking of the entire process of man and wife becoming one, of a union which represents that between God and mankind (and indeed, all of creation) which is so close that the two cannot be prised apart or even seen as entirely distinguishable realities. Remember that in Jewish marriages there were two steps: 1) the betrothal which was really marriage and which could only be ended by a divorce, and 2) the taking home and consummation stage in this marriage. After the bridegroom travels to his bride's home and the two are betrothed, the bridegroom returns home to build a place for his new bride in his family's home. It is always meant to be a better place than she had before. When this is finished (about a year later) the bridegroom travels back to his bride and with great ceremony (lighted lamps, accompanying friends, etc) brings her back to her new home where the marriage is consummated.

Descent and the Mediation of God's Reconciling Love:

This image of the dual stages in Jewish marriage is an appropriate metaphor of what is accomplished in the two "stages" in salvation history referred to as descent and ascent. When we think of Jesus as mediator or revealer --- or even as Bridegroom --- we are looking at a theology of salvation (soteriology)  in which God first goes out of himself in search of a counterpart. This God  'empties himself' of divine prerogatives --- not least that of remaining in solitary omnipotent splendor --- and in a continuing act of self-emptying creates the cosmos still in search of that counterpart. For this reason the entire process is known as one of descent or kenosis. Over eons of time and through many intermediaries (including prophets, the Law, and several covenants) he continues to go out of himself to summon the "other" into existence, and eventually chooses a People who will reveal  him (that is, make him known and real) to the nations. Finally and definitively in Jesus he is enabled to turn a human face to his chosen People. As God has done in partial and fragmentary ways before, in Christ as Mediator he reveals himself definitively as a jealous and fierce lover, one who will allow nothing, not even sin and godless death (which he actually takes into himself!)** to separate him from his beloved or prevent him from bringing her home with him when the time comes.

Ascension and the Mediation of God's Reconciling Love:

With Jesus' ascension we are confronted with another dimension of Christ's role as mediator; we celebrate the return of the Bridegroom to his father's house --- that is to the very life of God. He goes there to prepare a place for us. As in the Jewish marriage practice, that Divine "household" (that Divine life) will change in a definitive way with the return of the Son (who has also changed and is now an embodied human being who has experienced death, etc.) just as the Son's coming into the world changed it in a definitive way. God is not yet all in all (that comes later) but in Christ humanity has both assumed and been promised a place in God's own life. As my major theology professor used to say to us, "God has taken death into himself and has not been destroyed by it." That is what heaven is all about, active participation and sharing by that which is other than God in the very life of God. Heaven is not like a huge sports arena where everyone who manages to get a ticket stares at the Jumbo Tron (God) and possibly plays harps or sing psalms to keep from getting too bored. With the Christ Event God changes the world and reconciles it to himself, but with that same event the very life of God himself is changed as well. The ascension signals this significant change as embodied humanity and all of human experience becomes a part of the life of the transcendent God who is eternal and incorporeal. Some "gods" would be destroyed by this, but not the God of Jesus Christ!

Summary

Mediation (or revelation) occurs in two directions in Christ. Christ IS the gateway between heaven and earth, the "place" where these two realities meet and kiss, the new Temple where sacred and profane come together and are transfigured into a single reality. Jesus as mediator implicates God into our world and all of its moments and moods up to and including sin and godless death. But Jesus as mediator also allows human life, and eventually all of creation to be implicated in and assume a place in God's own life. When this double movement comes to its conclusion, when it is accomplished in fullness and Jesus' commission to reconciliation is entirely accomplished, when, that is, the Bridegroom comes forth once again to finally bring his bride home for the consummation of their marriage, there will be a new heaven and earth where God is all in all; in this parousia both God and creation achieve the will of God together as it was always meant to be.
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** Note: the Scriptures recognize two forms of death. The first is a kind of natural perishing. The second is linked to sin and to the idea that if we choose to live without God we choose to die without him. It is the consequence of sin. This second kind is called variously, sinful death, godless death, eternal death or the second death. This is the death Jesus "takes on" in taking on the reality and consequences of human sinfulness; it is the death he dies while (in his own sinlessness) remaining entirely vulnerable and open to God. It is the death his obedience (openness) allows God to penetrate and transform with his presence.

The resurrection is the event symbolizing the defeat of this death and the first sign that all death will one day fall to the life and love of God. Ascension is the event symbolizing God taking humanity into his own "house", his own life in Christ. We live in hope for the day the promise of Ascension will be true for the whole of God's creation, the day when God will be all in all.

The Paradox of the Prophetic Vocation to Eremitical Life in the Church

 [[Dear Sister, I wondered what you thought of the position in the following passage from another hermit; after all, you have status, position, and a role in the institutional Church, don't you? Do you feel that your own vocation is a betrayal of the traditional eremitical vocation? Can your vocation be prophetic in the way this passage suggests a hermit is meant to be?  Thank you.]]

[[Because the Hermit had (should still have) no status, position, authority, power or role in the institutional Church, and would usually be unknown by and not know those who sought her or his advice, such advice was free from any of the often complex subtexts, hidden agendas, personal preferences and prejudices, or politics that almost always intrude into conversations, especially those within institutions, and most especially within the institutional Church. The Hermit spoke freely and frankly, from the heart, always open to the guidance of the Spirit, and without (as it is often phrased) fear or favour.]] City Desert on Eremitical Service

Great question, and one I have approached here before in some ways. For instance, I have written about the supposed increasing  institutionalization of the hermit life as a possible betrayal of the vocation in On the Growing Institutionalization of Eremitical Life and about the eremitical life as prophetic in Hermit Life as Prophetic, etc. Feel free to check these out if you want. In any case, I entirely agree with the spirit of the statement as an ideal for hermits. On the other hand I don't think it is entirely accurate as far as history goes, and in fact, I think it is somewhat naïve in regard to the way anyone relates to their culture or church.

In saying this I don't mean that hermits did and do not speak freely, frankly, and without fear or favor in the power of the Holy Spirit. However, I do mean we have always addressed people with minds and hearts that to some extent are shaped by our families, culture, and general historical circumstances and that what we say and do always reflect these influences in one way and another. The Spirit frees us to speak honestly and without fear but we cannot be entirely free of the conditioning qualities and hermeneutics  which guide the way we pray, believe, think, read Scripture, relate to authority, etc. The kind of objectivity pointed to by this passage is simply not entirely possible. All reality is interpreted reality; it is always perceived through a multitude of lenses supplied by our upbringing, education, culture, and so forth. This is true even when we are speaking of spirituality or when the position we adopt vis-a-vis the Church and World is a counter-cultural one.

A second concern I have is that this passage makes it sound like the eremitical life is best lived not merely from a position of radical Christian marginality but from outside the Church. Since I don't know the context or source of the passage** it might well be the case that the author is thinking about the desert Abbas and Ammas when eremitical life was lived in a conscious opposition to the Church's too-complete accommodation of and assimilation to the culture and politics of the time. In those early centuries thousands of desert dwellers participated in a kind of eremitical protest movement and were indeed a prophetic presence challenging the Church to become her better self living in the world while not being of it. Geographically and socially this kind of movement was possible. I don't think that is true today.  Moreover I am a strong believer in the notion that authentic prophecy today is lived from a stance of profound love within the institutional Church, not from outside it. In this too the eremitical element of "stricter separation from the world" means one shuns enmeshment but remains profoundly (if uniquely) engaged; it means a kind of detachment associated with a love which is purified of inordinate attachments. (cf On attachments, Detachment, and Friendship in the Eremitical Life)

Similarly, I believe that eremitical life itself is a gift of the Holy Spirit to the Church and world which, because it lives from and for the Gospel, must be lived from inside the Church. Unless this is the case we are dealing with neither a truly prophetic lifestyle nor one which speaks from an authentically marginal position within the Church. It will have relinquished these and the legitimate authority necessary becoming instead an ineffective gadfly committed to one's own individualist perspective. It is, after all, possible to cease being marginal and simply become an alien. The hermit, it seems to me, is called to a significant marginality from within the heart of the Church. As "ecclesiola" she accepts a very unusual status and role within the Church for the sake of the Gospel and life of the Church herself. Because I believe the Gospel can only be effectively proclaimed and embraced from within the Church I believe an eremitical life witnessing to the redemption of Christ and the Gospel of reconciliation in Christ must itself be lived from a profound place within the Church.

Still, I think the ideal articulated in this passage has to be a guide to any hermit. We must strive to be as free from the kinds of prejudices, agendas, personal preferences and politics that prevent us from seeing clearly or fulfilling the prophetic role of the eremite in today's Church and/or society. So long as the author of the passage cited was stating an ideal perspective to be undertaken from within the Church we are in essential agreement (and probably strongly so). But this requires that the hermit accept she has a role in the Church and that, paradoxically, carrying out this role (which the Church herself actually honors and may even formally commission) may require she accept some kind of standing (canonical standing for instance) and limited authority (for instance, to live this life in the name of the Church as well as on her behalf).

Profound Paradox at the Heart of Eremitical Life:

Here is one of the profoundest paradoxes of ecclesial eremitical life; it is one of the things which makes this vocation so special, so rare, and also so risky and difficult for hierarchs.  Bishops are called to profess, consecrate, and supervise individuals living a Gospel truth and freedom which may necessarily lead to an occasional "butting of heads" or, at the very least a style of obedience some may not be comfortable with. Similarly it is profoundly risky and difficult for the hermit herself. She is called by God and by the Church to act with an integrity in the Spirit that will leave no one untouched by the challenge of the Gospel. This may mean acting in ways which have the potential (remote though that may be) of leading to the eventual dispensation of her vows --- a situation analogous to Aquinas' treatment of the requirements of conscience. Remember that Aquinas said that even should acting in good conscience lead to unjust excommunication, one must act as determined and bear the excommunication in humility. The solitary hermit who takes the prophetic character of her vocation seriously may well find herself in precisely such a situation because the requirements of living the Gospel radically and because the Church's own commission (which is also inspired by the Spirit) may place her there.

Because I recognize this dynamic and responsibility at the heart of my vocation --- a dynamic rooted in love and the summons of the Church and her Lord --- I do not think my vocation is a betrayal of traditional eremitical life. I believe I have embraced an essentially prophetic call which I pray every day I may be worthy of and live with integrity. It is possible, even likely, that most hermits will never be touched by the kind of conflict envisioned here; the prophetic character of our lives will be lived out in a radical witness to what it means to be truly human and thus, in a contemplative dialogue/union with God that consoles and challenges but without serious conflict with, for instance, the institutional Church. But occasionally, precisely because our vocations are ecclesial and because our talents and training serve God and the Church, the hermit will be called by the Church herself to witness to a truth which others in the Church who ALSO have ecclesial vocations will feel they must resist or reject.

It is here that the Love which empowers these persons and the humility which comes from God alone must clearly govern matters. It is here where life experience, competent spiritual direction, and practice in discernment becomes especially critical. It is also here where the relationship between a hermit and her legitimate superiors must be grounded in and seasoned with a mutual respect and trust that allows the charitable and wise negotiation of the situation itself for the good of all involved --- including the good of the eremitical vocation itself. I am convinced that such a prophetic role will not arise for hermits who place themselves outside the purview of the Church and I am absolutely convinced that it cannot be effectively embraced by such a hermit.

** Source was provided and added after I had responded to the passage.

Eremitical Solitude: A Silent Preaching of the Crucified One

Dear Sister how is it a hermit can be a silent preaching of the Lord and at the same time be "hidden from the eyes of men"? You write about canon 603 a lot but why don't you ever write about pars 920-921 in the Catechism? They are richer than the canon I think. [[921  [Hermits] manifest to everyone the interior aspect of the mystery of the Church, that is, personal intimacy with Christ. Hidden from the eyes of men, the life of the hermit is a silent preaching of the Lord, to whom he has surrendered his life simply because he is everything to him. Here is a particular call to find in the desert, in the thick of spiritual battle, the glory of the Crucified One.]]

I agree with you that the paragraphs on eremitical life in the Catechism are quite rich. I don't personally find them richer than the canon but my relationship with the canon is necessarily different. What I mean is that the canon is both legally and morally binding on me in a public way. I am commissioned and directly responsible for understanding and revealing its meaning with my life. The catechism, on the other hand, was actually written for bishops, theologians, and those teaching the faith. It thus presumes a broader knowledge which can adequately contextualize and inform what the CCC says in summary fashion. It is not meant to be the final word on things --- much less on things eremitical! (In this case, for instance, par 920-921 are to be read in light of the Church's theology of consecrated life --- not the other way around.) With that in mind I can say that while the CCC is profoundly instructive, and while I reflect on it as well as on the canon, it is not normative for my life in the same way. Still, if you look at the themes dealt with regularly here I think you would find par 921 is at least implicitly present in almost all of them (par 920 is essentially a reprise of canon 603).

For instance, I write a lot about eremitical life as an ecclesial vocation, a vocation which "belongs" to the Church in a formal way, the charism of the vocation (the silence of solitude where solitude is understood in terms of both aloneness and communion) which is a gift of God both to and from the Church, the hermit as ecclesiola (a la Peter Damien). This is all part of a hermit being a manifestation of the intimacy with Christ which is the interior aspect of the Church's own identity. I write very frequently about the distinction between isolation and solitude, or between silence and solitude and the silence OF solitude; this involves several of the elements mentioned in par 921 including intimacy with Christ, the silent preaching of the hermit, the hiddenness of her life, etc. When I write about the redemptive experience that must exist at the core of the hermit's life or about the theology of the cross, I am clearly writing about the Crucified One, the inner spiritual battle we are each called to participate in, and the intimacy with Christ the Hermit is commissioned to manifest. When I write about the Word Event or Language Event the hermit becomes as she is transfigured and comes to rest in the silence of solitude I am thinking again of her intimacy with Christ and of her life being a silent preaching of the Lord.

I do believe all of these fit neatly together (though not without the paradox present whenever Christianity is lived out in our world) and I believe that the hiddenness of the life is completely consistent with being a silent preaching of the Lord. You might want to look at the following article Hiddenness of the Hermit Vocation and others with the label "Eremitism and Hiddenness" for what I have written in the past years.  What is clear to me is the work of the hermit is to allow the silent and entirely hidden work of the Lord within her heart, mind, and spirit to come to fruition in her life. She witnesses to this presence and to the redemptive work of God that occurs in each and every person in the silence of solitude. No active ministry is needed here. One simply lives in intimate relation with God and is made whole and holy in the process. It is to this power perfected in weakness to which the hermit especially  witnesses with  her life.

But all of this is also implied in the elements of canon 603. Assiduous prayer and penance combined with stricter separation from the world in the silence of solitude conveys a sense of essential hiddenness and of something special happening in that hiddenness. The Evangelical Counsels and the hermit's Rule do likewise. How could she live these otherwise? Even the supervision of the bishop required by the canon and the hermit's delegate witness to this; it is, in fact, what they are called to ensure for those who never see or come to know the hermit -- and for the whole Church. I do appreciate the CCC paragraphs and I actually love the reference to a hermit as a "Silent preaching of the Lord" (or, as I tend to think of it, a silent preaching of the Crucified One).

The salvation of the world occurs  through the solitary life of the One who lives in an ineffably intimate dialogue with the Father in the power of the Spirit. While it may seem his life is filled with people and certainly filled with love, Jesus' entire life is a solitary life in the desert. He is, except for his relationship with his Abba, alone --- alone in a crowd, perhaps, but still ultimately alone with only God as the One who knows him intimately in the biblical sense and completes him. And of course, at the end of his life he experiences the absolute aloneness of even an experience of God's absence. Jesus' 40 days in the desert was, as I understand it, a snapshot of the character of his entire life. Likewise, there is no doubt in my mind that par 921 of the Catechism sees the hermit's life reprising this aloneness which is lived, as c 603 says explicitly for, "the salvation of the world", the reconciliation of all of creation.

While the two sources are complementary and while both are rich resources for reflection on the nature of eremitical life, canon 603 functions to order and govern my life in ways the CCC paragraphs neither do nor can. Also, its elements are most often misunderstood and misunderstood not only by candidates but even by professed hermits and chancery personnel. For instance, the Silence of Solitude is often misread as "silence and solitude", while the specific charismatic nature of this element is often missed. (The silence of solitude functions not only as context and goal of the hermit's life, but as the gift the hermit is empowered to bring to both the Church and World.) For that reason, because I personally need to be in touch with this notion of charisma and because misunderstanding of this element of the canon  leads to a failure to esteem to specific gift this vocation is, as well as to professions of solitary persons who are not and may never be hermits, I have spent more of my time and attention on the canon which mentions it explicitly.

Lay Diocesan Hermit???

Dear Sister, what is a diocesan lay hermit? How do they differ from conse-crated diocesan hermits?

Thanks for your question. From time to time folks search this site using various terms and one of those is "diocesan lay hermit". There is  simply no such thing. All diocesan hermits are professed and consecrated canonically under canon 603. What this means is that if one is publicly professed and consecrated as a diocesan hermit, they live as a hermit OF a specific diocese rather than living as a privately dedicated or non-canonical hermit IN the diocese. The distinction between being a hermit in a diocese and being a hermit OF a diocese may seem like a petty distinction but it really is not. It involves the difference between doing something privately within a diocese and being commissioned to do something that publicly represents the diocese and her own discernment and trust in this specific way.

For instance, I lived for many years as a hermit IN the Diocese of Oakland; only when I was admitted to perpetual profession and to consecration as a canon 603 did I become a diocesan hermit OF the Diocese of Oakland. A legal document (analogous to a sacramental certificate) testifying to this fact was issued by the diocese and given to me on the day of profession; such affidavits represent ecclesial affirmations of a public vocation and have been provided for many diocesan hermits over the years upon their admission to perpetual canonical profession.

You see, once one attaches a term like diocesan or Catholic or consecrated or professed to one's eremitical life one is necessarily talking about being a publicly or legitimately committed and commissioned hermit OF the diocese. The diocese must share in the individual's discernment and admit them to canonical profession and consecration. When this occurs the person so consecrated is a diocesan hermit, a hermit living her eremitical life in the name of the diocesan Church and too, the Church Universal. (Remember the diocese is a local Church and the publicly professed hermit lives her life in the name of the Church --- both local and universal). Through profession under canon 603 alone does one become a diocesan hermit. A lay hermit in a diocese, whether privately vowed or not vowed at all, is not a diocesan hermit. She is a hermit IN the diocese but she is not a hermit OF the Diocese of [N___].

Again,  the professed (i.e., the canonical) hermit is not necessarily better than the lay (i.e., the non- canonical) hermit. However, they differ in the rights and obligations they have assumed. Both live their baptismal promises in the silence of solitude. A canonical or consecrated hermit --- whether under c 603 or professed as part of a congregation (or institute) like the Camaldolese or Carthusians, for instance, --- is extended and embraces canonical obligations and rights which are additional to those associated with baptism alone. The word diocesan in your question points to an ecclesial vocation in which the Church admits one to canonical standing as a hermit under the direct supervision of the diocesan bishop.

Addendum, Followup Question: If I am a Catholic and a lay hermit don't I also live my life in the name of the Church? Why not as a hermit?

Lay persons do indeed live their lives and vocations as persons in the lay state in the name of the Church. The Church commissions them to do this not only at baptism or other Sacraments of initiation, but at the end of Mass (Go and proclaim the Gospel with your lives, etc), and at other times as well. Such a sending forth is something we may take for granted but it is an act of commissioning which serves to renew the call associated with one's state of life.

However, a lay hermit (with or without private vows) does not live eremitical life itself in the name of the Church. She has undertaken this life according to her own discernment in her own name. It is a private undertaking unless and until the Church specifically commissions her to live it in her name. You, for instance, are entirely free to live as a lay hermit in this way, just as you are free to live your lay vocation in any number of ways with various commitments (e.g., to the military, law enforcement, education, medicine, politics, etc) in light of your baptism as a lay person alone.  While all of these and any number of other similar commitments are significant callings ordinarily embraced by persons in the lay state, they are not ecclesial vocations and are not commissioned by or lived in the name of the Church. If you should also wish to live eremitical life in the name of the Church you (or any lay hermit) must submit to a process of mutual discernment and, should the Church determine you are called to this vocation, they will act to profess, commission, and eventually consecrate you to live eremitical life in her name.

Feast of Catherine of Siena



My Nature Is Fire

 

In your nature, eternal Godhead,

I shall come to know my nature.

And what is my nature, boundless love?

It is fire,

because you are nothing but a fire of love.

And you have given humankind

a share in this nature,

for by the fire of love you created us.

And so with all other people

and every created thing;

you made them out of love.

O ungrateful people!

What nature has your God given you?

His very own nature!

Are you not ashamed to cut yourself off from such a noble thing

through the guilt of deadly sin?

O eternal Trinity, my sweet love!

You, light, give us light.

You, wisdom, give us wisdom.

You, supreme strength, strengthen us.

Today, eternal God,

let our cloud be dissipated

so that we may perfectly know and follow your Truth in truth,

with a free and simple heart.

God, come to our assistance!

Lord, make haste to help us!

Amen.

 

 

To all of my Dominican friends, all good wishes on this feast day! 

A Contemplative Moment: Courage

 

Courage

 

is a word that tempts us to think outwardly, to run bravely against opposing fire, to do something under besieging circumstances. . .

 

Courage is the measure of our heartfelt participation with life, with another, with a community, a work, a future. To be courageous is not necessarily to go anywhere or do anything except to make conscious those things we already feel deeply and then to live through the unending vulnerabilities of those consequences.

 

To be courageous is to seat our feelings deeply in the body and in the world: to live up to and into the necessities of relationships that often already exist, with things we find we already care deeply about: with a person, a future, a possibility in society, or with an unknown that begs us on and always has begged us on. To be courageous is to stay close to the way we are made.

 

The French philosopher Camus used to tell himself quietly to live to the point of tears, not as a call for maudlin sentimentality, but as an invitation to the deep privilege of belonging and the way belonging affects us, shapes us and breaks our heart at a fundamental level. It is a fundamental dynamic of human incarnation to be moved by what we feel, as if surprised by the actuality and privilege of love and affection and its possible loss. Courage is what love looks like when tested by the simple everyday necessities of being alive. . ..

 

by David Whyte in

Consolations, The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words

On Attachments, Detachment and Friendships in the Eremitical Life

[[Hi Sister Laurel, I have been thinking about attachments and detachment recently and I was remem-bering when nuns had to let go of family ties and "particular friendships". As a hermit do you give up family ties or particular friendships? If you are trying to live a life given to God alone can you have attachments to friends? I know you write about having friends so how does that actually work? As you grow as a hermit will you let these go? If I wanted to develop a strong spiritual life it means being stripped of attachments doesn't it? Should I be letting go of friendships or is that only for hermits?]]

Thanks for the questions. Let me start with the way friendships are viewed today in religious and eremitical life generally and then tackle the nature of detachment and the kinds of attachments we are called to eschew. Then maybe I can say something about the paradoxical nature of giving one's life to God alone and how it is friendships are ordinarily an indispensable part of that. Finally, I can say something about how it is hermit life changes this somewhat, what it retains, and what might be necessary in the recluse. What you should be doing is a separate question which I think (and hope!) will build on these things.

Friendships are Indispensable Gifts of God:

First it must be said that friendships are a gift from God to each of us and one of the primary ways God's own life and love is (for these are identical) mediated to us. Friendships are also one of those places we can learn to truly love as the great commandment requires. We tend to appreciate this a bit better than has sometimes been true in the history of spirituality. Religious today have friends and good friends. So long as this does not detract from the person's love for her Sisters and commitment to her community which will have priority, such friendships add to her own life and can add to that of her community as well. Especially I think, we see better today than sometimes that to genuinely love another does not prevent us from loving God with our whole hearts, mind, and strength any more than loving God in this way prevents us from loving ourselves or others. Love, which is a transcendent reality and of God, is not divvied up or divided into discrete units so easily as this.

What I mean is we can't treat it in pre-cisely the same way we would some sort of finite resource like groceries in our pantry. While it may be we do not have enough bread and peanut butter and jam to feed every kid in the neighborhood and still have enough for our own children, we are more apt to find that love is like the loaves and fishes we read about last Friday --- there is enough to feed everyone with plenty left over --- simply because this is how genuine love really is. Even more, we tend to find with love that the more we give the more we have to give. To spend significant time with a friend listening, sharing, laughing, and loving is really to open ourselves to greater and greater love --- and that means opening ourselves and that relationship up more and more to the living God who is love. To do that, in fact, is to love God himself and to open our whole world to him is to love God in the way the great commandment calls us to.

Real Personal Love Involves Detachment:

I think the real problem comes when we are not really loving others (or letting them truly love us) but instead are relating to them for some lesser reason. To be "attached" to someone because we truly love them (and have been able to allow them to love us) really implies significant detachment. We are delighted to be with them; they console and challenge and inspire us, but at the same time we "hold them lightly" and may need to let go of them in the name of love. We cannot cling to them precisely BECAUSE we love them. This paradox I suspect was not always understood enough --- thinking in terms of paradox is not always easy for us, and often feels very unnatural. We tend to think in terms of either/or --- either attachment or detachment, but love introduces us to relationships that are variously intimate, fiercely loyal and committed ("attached") while at their heart being open to what is best for the other to the point of sacrificing our own needs and desires (detachment) in small ways and large for their sake.

The detachment we want is that of selflessness. The "attachments" we are allowed -- and in fact are commanded to embrace because they are uniquely human and humanizing -- are those of real and personal love. I don't think, by the way, I am meant to live a life which is given to God alone (nor is any hermit), but rather I am called to live a life given to God in all things. Moreover, I am called to live a life given to God in this way in the silence of solitude and which is thus lived for others. Specifically it is meant to witness to the fact that for each and every one of us God alone is sufficient for us, God is the ultimate source of life and love and meaning for each one of us, the source and ground which makes us capable of marriage and family, of friendship, ministry, etc, and the absolute future to which we are drawn. No one and nothing else completes or empowers us in the way God does. We are made for God and in that way we are made for community.

The Witness of the Eremitical Life:

The hermit's life is meant to witness to this fact --- not in an elitist way as though it is only true for her or for the rare vocation to eremitism but in a way which affirms this is truth for all of us. She does it in silence and solitude because, in fact, this strips away many of the things we might use to "complete" us falsely, to obscure our vision, or which we mistake either for God or for our truest selves. She does it in the silence of solitude (and with the silence of solitude as the goal and gift of her life) to reveal the truth of who God is and who we all are most fundamentally --- namely, persons who are always and everywhere in intimate dialogue with God. This is the primary reason, I think, why canon 603 does not define the vocation in terms of individual salvation but in terms of being something lived for the redemption of all. I think Thomas Merton saw this clearly when he spoke of the one first duty of the hermit. You may remember that he said,

[[The . . .hermit has as his first duty, to live happily without affectation in his solitude. He owes this not only to himself but to his community [by extension diocesan hermits would say Diocese, and parish] that has gone so far as to give him a chance to live it out. . . . this is the chief obligation of the . . .hermit because, as I said above, it can restore to others their faith in certain latent possibilities of nature and of grace.]] (Contemplation in a World of Action, p. 242) While I agree completely with Merton I would say that to live happily and without affectation in one's hermitage witnesses to the fact that the human being is made for and incomplete without God and therefore is defined by her potential and capacity for Love.

Maturing in Eremitical Life:

As I grow in my eremitical life I don't think I am going to "let go of friends". It may be that maintaining them will be done a bit differently than is done now, but generally speaking, I need friends to empower me to love --- and that means to love God too. My need for them is not a weakness or some form of inordinate attachment (meaning an improperly ordered attachment --- one that is not ordered to becoming more loving and holy); often I have thought some of my ability to live without them is the real deficiency --- though that is certainly less true than it might have been once upon a time. In any case relationships can make real selflessness possible and selflessness (meaning being God-and-other-centered in authentic love) is both the heart and the very purpose of Christian detachment. It remains true that I am open to being called to reclusion and if that happens the time and contact necessary for friendships will be even further significantly limited, but at this time I don't think this is where I am being called.

It should be clear from all that I have said that growth in the spiritual life does not necessarily mean letting go of authentic friendships. It is far more likely to demand their cultivation --- something we should be aware of in this time and culture of superficial and utilitarian "friending!" Sometimes the literature of exclusion and separation was simply selfish (and not particularly Christian); it failed to see that love of God and love of others are inextricably intertwined and, in some ways, it prevented even the genuine friendships that are so necessary for growth. That is as true for the hermit as it is for everyone else.  In fact, it should be noted that the capacity for authentic friendships and relationships generally is presupposed in eremitical life; this is one reason it is considered a second half of life vocation or is perceived as being possible only after years of formation in monastic life. For the hermit the relationship with God is always given absolute priority, and this must occur in the silence of solitude -- which limits and conditions the friendships which are possible. Still, so long as the hermit is faithful in observing these priorities, she may very well find her vocation calls for a few really special friendships as well. The hermit may not see these friends often, but their love supports and challenges her in ways a solitary vocation really requires.

Followup Questions: Aloneness and the Experience of Transcendence

[[Sister Laurel, can you explain what you mean by experiences of transcendence during periods of isolation? Are you talking about mystical experiences in prayer? This makes sense to me but not for everyone and maybe for very few people. It wouldn't happen for younger children or for families (or persons) where there is no religion would it? I don't think you are talking about things used to escape the pain of such isolation so if I am right about that what do you actually mean? Also, when you speak of unchosen periods of isolation could this include solitary confinement in prisons? Could prisoners also have such experiences of transcendence? Could they become hermits? Lastly, if an experience of solitude is healing and inspiring why would a person still need therapy or other help to deal with the harm done to them by being isolated?  Thanks.]]

Yes, an experience of transcendence is one which 'comes from' beyond the person herself,  but ('works') through her and with her, and thus, also draws her beyond herself to some extent.* It may occur when we have reached the end of our own resources to lesser and greater degrees. I tend to identify such experiences with God but we can use the language of beauty, truth, depth, etc., as well. One of the best conversations on such experiences I have ever had was a brief exchange between my violin teacher (Laura Risk) and myself. We were working on the Bach Double and had talked about allowing the notes to be transformed into music; as part of preparing the piece we had gone through various passages and noted the emotions or feelings we wished to communicate and also planned the actual memories we would each access to allow this  to be realized. We were talking about transcending the notes and other instructions on the page by tapping into our own emotional and inner lives. At the same time that our memories and emotions gave a fresh life to the music some of these memories were redeemed (given a new value and meaning) by becoming part of this music. This too was part of the experience of transcendence --- though not the heart of it.

Our conversation morphed into one on what it was like to play and compose music and especially to combine these skills to improvise (because both of us were talented in this and did a lot of "just playing" apart from written parts and scores). In doing so we drew upon our own inner lives in the same way, but we recognized something more as well. Laura commented that for her playing in this way was about "tapping into the music of the universe" --- something that was ever present there beyond and all around us, but also something which could sound within and through us. I commented that in my language (theological or spiritual) I would describe this experience as being in dialogue with the Transcendent or even touching into the Divine and allowing that to work in and through me. I said I might even call this prayer.

Whether we used the language of "music of the universe" or of "God" and "prayer," we were both describing an experience of mediating the Transcendent through our own minds, hearts, spirits, and muscles --- for we, with all our limitations and gifts, were still the ones playing and improvising. Both of us, I think, had a clear sense of something "living", something greater than ourselves sounding and singing itself through us and doing so in ways which challenged and stretched us musically and as persons. We both knew in an intimate way this reality which could sustain us even as it transformed and let us transcend the concrete circumstances of our lives --- even  as it inspired us to create amazing music and in the process empowered us to become more than we were. A somewhat similar experience is associated with art and literature of all kinds. In How Does a Poem Mean? John Ciardi once referred to a piece of this experience of empowerment and transcendence when he wrote that (reading and writing) poetry, like karate, had the power to save us as we wandered some night through a dark alley. The transformation of our lives from those of inarticulate suffering (when that is our experience) and struggle, to amazingly articulate expressions of beauty, truth, and meaning is at the heart of genuine experiences of transcendence.

Mystical Prayer?

While I am not speaking of mystical experiences of prayer per se I am certainly speaking of the dynamics and reality of prayer itself. Although I never really thought of the improvisational violin playing I did through Junior High and High School as prayer, there is no doubt in my mind that it was during these years that I learned something absolutely fundamental about prayer.

Today I speak of that by saying God worked or spoke (or sang!) Godself in and through me --- though in no way did it cease to be my own playing! I was open to that for many reasons --- some having to do with talents and gifts and others with yearning rooted in great need and deficiency. I was disposed toward "obedience" in our Christian language and the result of all that was the prayer God accomplished within me via violin. Of course, I experienced the Transcendent in many ways during those same years --- just as most of us do. Only later did I learn to pray in more explicit ways and only much later did I experience what might be called "mystical prayer". But at bottom, from violin, to lectio divina, to study and writing, to contemplative or mystical prayer, and all the ordinary moments in between, it was the Transcendent experienced mainly in silence and solitude that defined all of these.

While I don't think children (or the majority of adults for that matter) will have mystical experiences per se, I do think every child experiences the Transcendent, knows what it means to transcend their everyday lives, and can understand the mediation of transcendence through experiences of play, storytelling and reading, imagination, art, etc. As children the experience of transcendence is central for us. Everyone who has watched (or tried to deal with!) the incessant "WHY?" of children has been watching little explosions of transcendence and the drive to transcendence. The same is true of watching the rapt face of a child hearing her first Dr Seuss or (later maybe) reading a Harry Potter book, or a small child humming to herself as she colors. Such experiences use the deep resources of our own minds and hearts, the capacity for joy and play and spontaneity we have, as well as our own talents and skills, but they also can come from beyond us just as they lead us beyond ourselves.

As children (and as adults!) we read stories, we imagine ourselves in different worlds and different roles; we see and are inspired to see ourselves as capable of great feats of courage and creativity, of love and generosity. We develop the skills to bridge the gap between the "real world" and the world of our imagination and to create a different future for ourselves and others. We write symphonies and novels, create and test scientific hypotheses, develop new medicines to vanquish old enemies, build cities (starting with the ones we made of dirt and toy cars), and philosophical systems, and homes, and families and in every conceivable way we become witnesses to and mediators of transcendence. It is what we are made for, after all.

On Prisoners and Solitary Confinement:

I have written about solitude and prisoners once before a number of years ago now in Notes From Stillsong: Prisoners as Hermits. I did not write specifically about solitary confinement and am ambivalent about the possibilities of experiences of transcendence within solitary confinement or in regard to some there becoming hermits. While I do not want to limit God and either his will or power to bring life out of death, meaning out of the absurd, or, in this case, solitude out of isolation, it remains true that the person requires certain resources to help this process. Transcendence  implies not just being open to the Transcendent but also having some means to express this and to develop our openness further. Access to books and Bibles, paper, writing implements, a musical instrument, art materials, etc, are just some of the tools (resources) I have in mind here. Ordinarily God works in and through such things.

Prayer is a privileged way to the Transcendent but usually this develops in stages. We see this when we move from meditation to contemplative prayer. It is usually a mediated reality. Entering the biblical story frees our minds and hearts to some extent and opens us to the Word of God. It provides characters, values, relationships, and situations we can imaginatively interact with --- interactions which both encourage the growth of the light and help check the darkness in our own hearts. Drawing, Writing, and Reading all do something similar. Occasional conversations with others is also usually an important and even indispensable resource here as well --- especially when that someone has the capacity to help us negotiate the trap of living in our own heads and hearts, and thus too, of believing everything we think or experience is the voice of God.

Solitary confinement of itself is certainly an example of an enforced and unchosen isolation, and God can certainly move through the walls and bars of this cell as through any other. Some few may well need little else and be gifted with relatively unmediated or direct experiences of God. Generally, however, such confinement must also have some minimal resources which allow for both the mediation of the Transcendent and for our own  experience of transcendence. When this is true, when there is both physical solitude and sufficient even if minimal resources allowing for mediated reception, response, and expression, then yes, it is entirely possible for the prisoner to find him or herself transfigured into a hermit or someone with the heart of a hermit.

The Continuing Need for Healing and Therapy:

One of the indisputable truths of physical solitude, especially as isolation, is that it tears down before it builds up. When that isolation is forced on us then it becomes doubly damaging. Consider what happens when someone's family shuns them, especially if that is an extended event. Not only are they cut off from the ordinary source of formation and education as a person capable of real intimacy, but they have been rejected and hurt by those who, more than any other (except God) are meant and assured to love them. Even when one discovers and experiences the Transcendent in a way which redeems the experience of shunning, the hurt and pain are real and will need to be dealt with. Often, it will take serious healing before one can even understand the extent and import of the experience of transcendence that was also involved. The pain and loss is simply too great.

Moreover, genuine experiences of the Transcendent take time to bear recognizable fruit. Unless healing occurs, this fruit may never be fully realized or realizable. One may survive the immediate experience and have been transformed by it, but whether that is more ultimately for the better or worse will ordinarily take time to really manifest --- not least because the capacity for good and bad, creativity and destruction, are both contained in the experience of physical solitude or isolation. Still, I can speak of developing the "heart of a hermit" in some essential or fundamental sense during (for instance) a period of enforced and extended isolation whenever transcendence is experienced in ways that overshadow the destructive dimension of the isolation. Such a heart is ultimately necessary for any genuine hermit.

But whether that heart (which has been shaped both for ill and for good, so to speak) will lead to the life of a self-deceived and self-deceiving individualist, that of a misanthrope, or a narcissist with room for no one but herself, or whether it will mature into the edifying heart of a true hermit who responds to God's call and chooses the silence of solitude because she loves God, herself, and others --- the heart of one who (appropriately) persists in that response with courage and fidelity --- is a question only time and real healing will answer. As with the parable of the weeds and wheat or better maybe, the parable of the soils, we simply can't see or know what the tender green shoots of that heart will grow into; we do not know whether they will be truly nourishing to others or merely weeds, whether they will prove to be rootless or deeply rooted in God. We must let (and assist) them grow to maturity and for that to happen care of all sorts, often including therapy, is necessary.

Meanwhile some will eschew healing (including therapy and spiritual direction) and play at being hermits while their woundedness keeps them psychologically and personally crippled. The "witness" they give to the Transcendent is superficial at best and entirely unconvincing. Others will avoid such pretense but, no less crippled, act out their loss, anger, and pain on the world around them in other ways. And some will seek healing in all the ways it is necessary so that their own witness to the God who transfigures a disedifying and barren isolation into an edifying and fruitful solitude is profoundly convincing and helpful to others.

* One of the most profound and cogent analyses of "the transcendent function" in the human person is Carl Jung's. I am not unaware of this analysis but my focus here is a specifically theistic model or notion of transcendence and experiences of "the Transcendent". In fact, I think the two models, especially with their similar notions of dialogue and teleology are profoundly complementary. Jung's analysis certainly explains the above example of the "music of the universe." Jung himself, while speaking of the unconscious used the words numinous or holy to describe dimensions of the experience of transcendence and "the transcendent function" to describe the dimension of the human person that mediates between conscious and unconscious; I do so in a deliberately and explicitly theological sense to describe the dialogical nature of the "communion with God" whom we know as the authentically human being.

Alone a Lot: A Call to Eremitical Life??

[[Dear Sister, if a person is alone a lot in their life or have been alone a lot, does this mean God is telling them they should become a hermit? As an older adult I am dealing with chronic illness but I have also been alone a lot in my life because of a dysfunctional family and other circumstances. It never occurred to me that living as a hermit was something I could do, and honestly I never would have wanted to do that, but now I am wondering if maybe I haven't missed God's call and that maybe he is saying, "I want you to be a hermit!"]]

Thanks for your questions. They are important. I may have answered something similar in the past so look through posts on discerning an eremitical vocation for further responses. (I have definitely written a lot about chronic illness so I will not do that here.) The first question has to be answered no. If a person has been alone a lot, especially in the circumstances you describe (dysfunctional family and chronic illness) this does not necessarily mean they are being called to be a hermit. Most of the time it will mean just the opposite. In the case of a dysfunctional family it may well be that what God is really calling a person to is healing from the trauma and woundedness occasioned by the family dynamics and from there moving forward to real family life and a strongly social life of generosity and compassion. Certainly God is calling such a person to healing and wholeness, to the capacity to really love others and to receive love. Where that is to be achieved and what one is called to do once that healing is largely in hand is another question which will need to be carefully discerned.

The point is that God did not will the family dysfunction nor does it automatically point to a vocation to be a hermit. God can and will use the circumstances of one's life to create something wonderful and unexpected but what that is in any individual case is not always easy to discern. It is not necessarily obvious. What has to be discerned in determining whether one is called to be a hermit or not is how one thrives or fails to thrive in physical solitude and external silence. For instance, in some cases where family dysfunction leads to the isolating of children and adolescents, physical (and emotional!) solitude itself becomes mainly or primarily a destructive force in those persons' lives. It also becomes self-reinforcing: isolation leads to personal dysfunction in relating to others which leads to further isolation, etc. etc. Short periods of solitude may be helpful as in anyone's life but in such a case as this, to choose a life of eremitical solitude would be contrary to what God wills; it would lead to the further crippling and stunting of the person's human capacities.

In some instances of serious family dysfunction and related isolation, however, individuals may find that despite the isolation (which will still be harmful in such a situation), they somehow also managed to thrive in their physical solitude --- typically through experiences of transcendence which sustained and even inspired in profoundly creative ways. In such cases some healing will still need to be secured and some therapy will probably be necessary, but should such a person feel inclined to embrace eremitical solitude it will be because, to some extent, they developed "the heart of a hermit" during those difficult years at home and have a sense that they can and might well even be called at some point, to thrive in solitude as a result. Again, at the heart of such a sense is the fact that Solitude herself (solitude as hermits understand it) has opened her door to them and that physical solitude is a (and perhaps the) privileged place where God will speak to them and love them into wholeness. Some of these folks might well discern other vocations which require long periods of prayer, thought, study, solitary work, etc without ever becoming (or wanting to become) hermits. But to some extent or other, they will still have "the heart of a hermit" --- just not the actual vocation to eremitical life itself.

Eremitical solitude is neither a way to avoid the healing work needed when one has experienced serious occasions of unchosen and extended isolation, nor a way of validating these (much less extending them) and the harm they do; neither are these periods of themselves signs of a call to eremitical solitude. Because eremitical solitude is not the same as isolation, because it involves a profound (sense of) community and communion with God, a call to eremitical solitude must come to one in spite of such experiences of isolation and can only build on and further occasion healing from the damage done by such experiences. Again, the criterion for discernment in such instances is that the person thrives in eremitical solitude; it is an essentially creative environment or context where the person's capacity for creativity, and even more especially, for loving others and living in communion with God and all that is precious to God grows and matures.

When we ask what God is calling us to, the specific state of life and pathway (religious life, priesthood, marriage, dedicated singleness, lay or consecrated eremitical life, teaching, writing, etc) is heard only after we hear God say, "I want you to be whole and loved and capable of loving others with your whole self! I want you to be yourself and supremely happy in that!" Only then does God "say" (so to speak), "I want you to do this AS A hermit (etc)" The bottom line is the same: if a person does not achieve holiness, personal wholeness and deep happiness and joy in eremitical solitude, if they do not truly thrive there as compassionate and generous human beings, then that is not where God is calling them.