Consecrated Virginity and Secularity, Some Questions

[[Dear Sister Laurel, I don't see how a vocation to consecrated life can be considered secular! When I grew up "secular" was played off against "religious" and was completely negative. It was associated with sin and evil. How could a consecrated virgin be called to secular life?]]

I think this objection is a common one and it is one I anticipated. I had already decided that I was going to write about the notion of Saeculum, the related term "secular" and the vocation I referred to as consecrated (or sacred) secularity because I think that problems with this term might be at the heart of people feeling like consecrated virginity is a second-class vocation or "not as good as" that of the nun or religious sister. After all, many of us remember times when Sisters were not allowed to eat or recreate with seculars (this could include one's family). Some of us may recall being met by the dismayed concern, "But they're not (add the unstated sentiment, "God forbid!") a secular institute are they?" upon informing someone we were joining a new community, for instance. So thanks for the question; your timing was perfect.

First, then, let's look at the term "World." It has several layers of meanings. First it signifies God's good creation, then the ambiguous (essentially good but sinful) world of space and time (history) in which human beings are normally active socially, politically, and so forth, and finally, the clearly pejorative sense of that which is resistant to Christ and unredeemed by him. All of us are called to avoid becoming ensnared or enmeshed in "the world" in the last sense, but mainly we continue to love and to live in the world in the first two senses of the term and minister to "the world" understood in the third sense.

Hermits, who differ somewhat from this general rule, for instance, are bound to stricter separation from the world primarily in the sense of rejection of that which is resistant to Christ, and secondarily and in a less absolute way to a stricter separation from the ambiguous reality of human history and activity. They may also be restricted from many aspects of God's good creation, but ordinarily this is a consequence of things like poverty, stability, etc, not a rejection of this dimension of the term "world." Their ministry is one of solitary contemplative presence with all that implies, and generally they are not called to much, if any, active ministry in the world (saeculum) in this latter sense. In other words, whether consecrated or lay, hermits are not called to be seculars or to secularity (which, it should be seriously noted, is NOT the same thing as secularism!). Thus, as noted, canon 603 spells out the vocation as one marked by "stricter separation from the world."

On the other hand, most Christian ministers are called to the saeculum (that which pertains to the world) as their primary sphere of ministry and presence. They are not called to participate in that which is resistant to Christ, but they are called to minister to it nonetheless. Thus, secular or diocesan priests, who are not Religious and do not have vows of poverty, chastity or obedience, live, minister in, and are primarily committed to the everyday world; most lay persons do likewise, and Consecrated Virgins living in the world are called to do similarly. Religious men and women may minister in the world, but their lives and commitments are qualified in ways those of these others are not. One thing which should be emphatically affirmed is that lay and secular are not synonyms. Another is that a spirituality and ministry worked out in terms of the saeculum is not inferior to that worked out in the monastery (for instance). Since Vatican II and Gaudium et Spes (The Church in the Modern World) the world is appreciated as "an appropriate sphere of the dedicated apostolic involvement of the baptized." (Schneiders, Sandra IHM, Finding the Treasure, 223)

I am going to continue quoting from Sister Sandra Schneiders here, because she says so very well what needs to be heard here, especially in conjunction with the discussion on Consecrated Virgins and some of these women's desire to become quasi-religious. [[. . .because world is not a theological pejorative term despite its long history of largely negative use, secular is not a pejorative term denoting inferiority in the area of spirituality or ministerial commitment. It is a positive term expressing the choice to situate one's committed Christian faith-life and mission primarily, directly, and in an unreserved or unqualified way within the sphere of this world and this time, considered as the locus and raw material of the coming Reign of God. Religious make another choice . . . in regard to their relationship with the world. Neither choice is superior or inferior; neither is more nor less conducive to holiness or committed ministry. They are two different choices made by different Christians in response to different vocations.]]

Sister Schneiders continues:[[To situate one's faith life and mission firmly and resolutely in the world in no way suggests that this world or human history are ultimate values in one's life or the furthest horizon of one's concerns. It means that the way one chooses to serve the ultimate value, God and God's Reign. is through direct and primary involvement in the realities of the "saeculum," in family, economics, politics, social life, and all the other structures and dynamics of intrahistorical existence. . . .Secular Christians [including, I would add, Consecrated Virgins under canon 604] are precisely seculars, and it is at least arguable that only by claiming the term secular in its fully positive, postconciliar sense will we begin to appropriate the theological truth that this world and its history are not called to final destruction but to transformation in the Reign of God and that the human race is not called to escape the human race, but to transform it. The secular vocation in its proper and positive sense. . .is the primary hope for the transformation of the world in Christ.]] (Again, Schneiders, Finding the Treasure, pp 233-34.)

The bottom line in all of this is that the renewal of Consecrated Virginity as a contemporary vocation is part and parcel of the conciliar and postconciliar accent on the world as a highly proper and significant sphere of apostolic involvement. To live a consecrated life of virginity which models the same values as Mary did in Bethlehem, etc, is a tremendous call. To live as spouse of Christ in the world he loves, died for, and seeks to transform in every aspect and dimension so that it might be brought to fullness in and of God is an equally tremendous call and challenge. But it is not religious life and cannot, without betraying its very nature, adopt the trappings of religious life. At the same time it is important to remember that consecrated, lay, or ordained life can ALL be secular depending upon the sphere in which one is called to minister. To say something is secular is simply to say the world is its sphere of concern, activity, and influence. As noted above, it is not a pejorative term.

In any case, I hope this at least begins to answer your questions.