[[Hi Sister, I was looking at the pictures of your hermitage and I wondered about the grey thing in the foreground of one of the pictures. What is it? I hope you had a good Christmas and a Happy New Year!!]]
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you too! I hope these holidays and all of the holidays within the octave of Christmas are fruitful for you. Junior sends you a friendly growl!
Throughout the Gospel of Mark Jesus' invariable title for himself is Son of Man which can be translated as "Son of Humanity" or even "the Human One". One of the things Mark is concerned to show his readers is that Jesus reveals the nature of authentic humanity. Jesus is the One in whom humanity is exhaustively transparent to God. This is one way of seeing how it is he can reveal both the nature of humanity and divinity at the same time. At the heart of this double and paradoxical revelation stands the critical and peculiar openness to God and to all God wills which we know as obedience and also, a radical vulnerability. We see this in the creche and we see the same openness in the events of the cross. One of the most wonderful pieces I have read on the nature of vulnerability and its centrality to authentic humanity is the following piece by David Whyte:
[[Vulnerability is not a weakness, a passing indisposition, or something we can arrange to do without, vulnerability is the underlying, ever present abiding undercurrent of our natural state. To run from vulnerability is to run from the essence of our nature, the attempt to be invulnerable is the vain attempt to become someone we are not and most especially, to close off our understanding of the grief of others. More seriously, in refusing our vulnerability we refuse the help needed at every turn of our existence and immobilize the essential, tidal and conversational foundations of our identity.
To have a temporary, isolated sense of power over all events and circumstances, is a lovely illusionary privilege and perhaps the prime and most beautifully constructed conceit of being human and especially of being youthfully human, but it is a privilege that must be surrendered with that same youth, with ill health, with accident, with the loss of loved ones who do not share our untouchable powers; powers eventually and most emphatically given up as we approach our last breath.
The only choice we have as we mature is how we inhabit our vulnerability, how we become larger and more courageous and more compassionate through our intimacy with disappearance, our choice is to inhabit vulnerability as generous citizens of loss, robustly and fully, or conversely, as misers and complainers, reluctant and fearful , always at the gates of existence, but never bravely and completely attempting to enter, never wanting to risk ourselves, never walking fully through the door. (from Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment, and Underlying Meaning of everyday Words)]]
In Christ authentic humanity becomes a reality in our world and in him it becomes a possibility for us as well. It is truly a humanity which does not "fall short" of the dignity to which we are called by God. (Remember hamartia which is translated "sin," literally means, "to miss the mark" and the mark we actually miss is, as noted in recent posts, that of realizing our call to be imago dei and becoming imago christi.) The birth of Jesus marks the coming of this new possibility into our world. As we approach the Feast of the Nativity may we each recommit ourselves to the vulnerability which allows us not only to say yes to God in the way Mary did, but also to grow in the grace and stature of an authentic and self-emptying humanity as did Jesus.
Best wishes and prayers for a wonderful last week of Advent and a fruitful Christmas! Sister Laurel, Er Dio.
In speaking of "guarding the heart" and "preparing the way of the Lord" Clarke referred to being careful of or avoiding anything causing us to lose sight of who we truly are. What struck me most about this was that it is a very good way to speak of what canon 603 calls, "stricter separation from the world". Ordinarily I define "the world" in the sense used by the canon in terms of anything "which resists or is antithetical to God in Christ (or to the love of God)" but this notion that "the world" could also be defined in terms of "anything causing us to lose sight of who we truly are" and are called to be was new to me. I have certainly approached this insight but never really saw or articulated it so directly before. What I came to see regarding what canon 603's stricter separation from the world requires of us is that it serves our focused journeying toward the realization of our truest selves and that it is primarily a positive element in the canon and in the spiritual life in so far as it helps prevent us from losing sight of who we really are. Also, of course, in and of itself stricter separation from the world can and inevitably will be misunderstood without this correlative and primary focus on the true or authentic self which God summons into being at each moment of our lives.
Father Clarke's presentation began with Mary Oliver's poem, "The Journey", which set the tone and key of the entire presentation:
Fifty years ago at Vatican II the messiest, most passionate, and often "dirtiest" fighting to occur during the council took place during discussions of the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium. Out of nearly 2400 bishops the fight was divided almost exactly evenly between two factions, those nicknamed the maximalists and those nicknamed the minimalists. Both factions were concerned with honoring the greatness of Mary in our faith but their strategies in this were very different from one another. The maximalists wanted the council to declare Mary Mediatrix of all Graces and to proclaim this as a new dogma in the Church --- never mind that the thrust of the Council was not toward the definition of new dogmas. They wanted the council to write a separate document on Mary, one which effectively made her superior to the Church.
The minimalists also wanted to honor Mary, but they wanted to do so by speaking of her within the document on the Church. They desired a more Scriptural approach to the person and place of Mary which honored the dogmatic truth that Christ is the One unique Mediator between God and mankind. The Church would be spoken of as Mother and Virgin, for instance, and Mary would be seen as a type of the Church.
But there was a deeper story. Remember that Juan Diego's people were an essen-tially subjugated people. The faith they were forced to adopt by missionaries was geared toward the salvation of souls but not to what we would recognize as the redemption of persons or the conversion and transformation of oppressive structures and institutions. It was more a faith enforced by fear than love, one whose whose central figure was a man crucified because an infinitely offended God purportedly willed it in payment for our sins. Meanwhile the symbols of that faith, its central figures, leaders and saints, were visibly European; they spoke and were worshipped in European languages, were dressed in European clothes, were portrayed with European features, etc. At best it was hard to relate to; it's loving God was apparently contradictory and remote. At worst it was incomprehensible and dehumanizing. Moreover, with the "evangelizers" who had forcibly deprived the Indians of their own gods and religion came diseases the Indians had never experienced. They were dying of plagues formerly unknown to them, working as slaves for the institutional and patriarchal Church, and had been deprived of the human dignity they had formerly known.
Additionally, last Sunday as part of the first Sunday of Advent I prayed with the ecclesial community of a couple of friends of mine who celebrated their 55th wedding anniversary during the week and who renewed their vows last Sunday. As part of the celebration they asked me if I wanted to renew my own vows and I did. As part of doing that I had to compose a renewal formula which led me to thinking once again about the term "stricter separation from the world" and how I would say that for a community who would be likely to misunderstand the canonical phrase in terms of a rejection of God's good creation. I borrowed the overall structure of the formula from that of the Sisters of the Holy Family, and for the c 603 elements of my commitment, including "stricter separation from the world," I promised to: "devote myself to the service of God and all God holds precious in stricter separation from anything resistant or antithetical to God's love, in the silence of solitude, and in assiduous prayer and penance."
In both of these activities what canon 603 calls "stricter separation from the world" played an important role. Sabbath itself is a way of standing aside from "the world" which often holds us bound by its values and perspectives, its way of viewing God, ourselves, and others, while making commodities of them (cf., Walter Brueggemann, Sabbath as Resistance); it is a way of resting in God and both being and becoming the ones we are called to be in God. It is a symbol of freedom and is given to us as gift and responsibility in the Decalogue, the charter of freedom and covenant in the OT. but this freedom plays off against the bondage of something canon 603 calls "the world" --- again, that which is resistant or antithetical to God's love.
Pharaoh's Egypt was, for Israel, the very epitome of "the world" canon 603 calls me to separate myself from more strictly. The Jewish people were made to toil endlessly without even time to pray or worship. When they sought the time and space to worship their God, they were punished and the toil they were made subject to became even more demanding, even less fulfillable, and even more dehumanizing. Hours were long, food and time for rest short. Relationships deteriorated as did the Jews' own sense of their own dignity. Their behavior likewise deteriorated then and they fell into the kinds of things we expect among the dehumanized and starving: unhealthy competitiveness, theft, covetousness, dishonesty, murder, the failure to honor one's inheritance as one born with infinite dignity or to honor others in the same way, etc. In short, this bondage and dehumanization marked by endless toil and insufficiency was incapable of putting God first, resting in God's love, and loving oneself and others in God as a natural consequence. Israel became bond to an ethic of idolatry (for this was the Pharaoh's system and Pharaoh was a divine figure) and dehumanization --- an ethic resistant and even antithetical to God's love. (These two elements, idolatry and dehumanization, always go together.)
What I recognized is that quite often today we buy into the same bondage and the same forms of dehumanization. We buy into "the world" and in fact, we build that same "world" and our own self-definition upon it. We do this in the form of a system that makes commodities of us all--- objects which can be bought and sold, used and disposed of as easily as one would do to a shirt or pair of pants. We become workaholics whose value is tied up with what we do rather than who we are, or shopaholics who fail to be in touch with the really new (kainetes) God is doing in our lives every day and substitute the merely new in time (neos) --- something which has to be replaced almost as soon as we have purchased it, or we become those who treat others in the same way through competitiveness, elitism, classism, an unhealthy capitalism, etc etc. What we are called to instead is the way of Jesus, the way of the Kingdom of God, the way which honors and delights in God's good creation but is also the world of Sabbath and the Ten Commandments, the world of the Great Commandment -- that is, the world of the love of God and all that God holds precious.
When I renewed my vows to live as a diocesan hermit under canon 603 last weekend, it was the all-too-common but destructive meaning of "the world" I rejected and the "way of Jesus" I embraced again more intensely. As we enter more fully into Advent what I want to suggest is that this is the same commitment the Church and God are asking of each us --- not as hermits perhaps, but as those who recognize the Kingdom of God in our midst at the same time. I would encourage you to look carefully just as I am doing, at the way the canon 603 sense of "the world" plays a defining role in your own life, and that you build in real Sabbath rest where you allow yourself to rest in God and be just who he had made and calls you to be.
I am probably not done with this piece, and I know it is not done with me (that is, God is certainly not done with me nor is Mark!), However, I have heard from several people who have worried a bit that I have not written much in the last month so I will at least put this much up this morning and redact it as I need to. In the meantime, please know I am very well. Please stay safe and keep others safe as well. For all in the US, Happy Thanksgiving; in some ways we have new reasons to cherish this fragile but very real democratic republic. May all of us, from whatever country, accept the need for solitude and the possibility of celebrating "together alone" during this pandemic. That is certainly something eremitical life witnesses to!!
Many thanks for your comments and questions. Yes, David Whyte is a really wonderful writer and what he has to say is rooted in a deep wisdom which is only gained through experience. I think you will love his book; I have posted several passages (definitions) from it over the years and it confirms for me that quite often we need to spend more time thinking about the words we use too blithely or facilely. Consolation (and/or solace) are among these.
For instance, in spirituality people speak of experiencing consolations and usually they mean by that that somehow God did something "pleasant" or pleasurable for them in prayer, and sometimes they will mean that something that happened in prayer eased their pain and made them feel better. Thus, they will speak of "sweet consolations" and play these off against "bitter desolations" --- where desolations are unpleasant and, at least momentarily, make one feel worse. But in Ignatian spirituality these words are not so easily defined in this sort of black and white way. Instead, what Ignatius meant by a consolation was anything that helps us grow closer to God (and our deepest selves), and desolation is anything which does the opposite. A consolation in this sense might be immensely painful; it might entail serious struggle and various lesser forms of death (or even death itself), while a desolation might be deceptively pleasant when in reality it draws us away from God, and so, away from the very source of life and meaning which is the ground of real happiness or beatitude. David Whyte's piece on solace understands the complex dynamics of these words and captures them very very well.
To look for solace is to learn to ask fiercer and more exquisitely pointed questions, questions that reshape our identities and our bodies and our relation to others. Standing in loss but not overwhelmed by it we become useful and generous and compassionate and even amusing companions for others. But solace also asks us very direct and forceful questions. Firstly, how will you bear the inevitable that is coming to you? And how will you endure it through the years? And above all, how will you shape a life equal to and as beautiful and as astonishing as a world that can birth you, bring you into the light, and then just as you are beginning to understand it, take you away?
[[The question therefore becomes: How can one at the same time acquire sufficient honesty about what needs to be faced, and sufficient hope that facing it would make a difference, to engage in altering the course of our present world towards life and not death?]] a page later he observes that acknowledging suffering is not enough. What is also required is [[ the trust that something --- the life process or Providence or God --- something “enduring,” as Isaiah put it, is able to take into itself all that does not endure, even things that are not, and give them a future that infinitely transcends the bleak promise of their past.]]
Eremitical solitude combines all the elements needed for sufficient honesty about "what needs to be faced" with a defining orientation to God and God's Providence; together these provide significant hope in the midst of suffering in a way which is profoundly consoling. Above all I recognize my own eremitical life as motivated by the desire and sense of a call that, by virtue of the grace of God, can [[shape a life equal to and as beautiful and as astonishing as a world that can birth (me), and bring (me) into the light.]] So this too was on my mind and in my heart, and David Whyte's piece on Solace helped clarify and contextualize all of this for me personally. However, yes, I certainly believed it would speak to readers during this time.
Solace
[[Dear Sister, are canon 603 hermits considered religious?]]
I have answered this question on the blog before so you might look for it in other places here, but the answer to your question is yes, c 603 hermits are considered religious. In the Handbook on Canons 573-746 and in the section on “Norms Common to Institutes of Consecrated Life” looking at canon 603 specifically, canonist Ellen O’Hara, CSJ writes, [[The term “religious” now applies to individuals with no obligation to common or community life and no relationship to an institute.]]
One can argue the case on the basis of the public profession made, the stable state of life entered, the title hermits are allowed to adopt, post-nomial initials bishops approve, and the other canons which also apply to the c 603 hermit that they have entered the religious state. This is particularly true since religious come together in communities because they are called to chastity in celibacy, religious poverty and obedience, not the other way around. Community life supports and elaborates the more original call to live the vows along with a call to specific mission and charism; one does not make vows because one is called first to live in community. That is, the call to chastity in celibacy is an actual gift and call; it is not embraced merely because it is helpful to life in community or to the community's ministry.
Hermits’ need for community support is addressed in the next sentence of the chapter when O’Hara says; [[Groups [of hermits] could use the category of associations of the faithful to have ecclesiastical identity if they wish.]] In this way canonists recognize the character of solitary hermits as religious and at the same time honor the requirement (cf commentators on c 603) that c 603 not be used for communities of hermits.
[[Dear Sister, if someone is professed as a diocesan hermit when they are in their mid to late twenties and their bishop changes down the line, can the new bishop ask the person to leave their vows and "come back when they are fifty"? Also, does canon Law say one has to be at least 30 to become a diocesan hermit? I heard this on a video called Joyful Hermit Speaks and it all sounded a bit off to me.]]
The answer to both questions is no. Once someone is perpetually professed an incoming bishop will become the hermit's legitimate superior and will certainly have a voice in her life --- which will become truly meaningful only when he has gotten to know the hermit, understands her Rule, has met with her delegate(s), and perhaps had conversations with her pastor. However, he has no right or power to simply ask the person to leave her vows, nor would any canonical hermit or diocese allow this. In serious matters public vows may be dispensed, but this is a really serious situation requiring similarly serious grounds. It also requires attempts to resolve things otherwise and allows for appeals should the diocese move toward dispensation.
The bottom line here is that under canon 603 one does not make vows to a specific bishop. One makes vows to God in a bishop's hands so that eremitical life may be a gift to the universal church but especially to the local diocesan church. Bishops may (and do) come and go, but one's vows do not. As I have written before, this is true whether an incoming bishop believes in c 603 vocations or not. To have canonical standing is to have certain protections in law; a new bishop (or an old one) cannot abrogate these rights on a whim.
The answer to the second question is also no. Canon Law requires one have completed their 18th year (or, that is, be 18 yo) in order to enter religious life but apart from this there is no additional or differing requirement re c 603. It is true that eremitical life is ordinarily seen as a second half of life vocation and I personally argue that younger persons (younger than 30 or so) consider entering a community where eremitical life can be lived; in this way they can be mentored and supported in the way a younger candidate for profession will need. Still, canon law says nothing about this specifically beyond the age for entering religious life. I'm afraid the videos you have mentioned are an unreliable resource regarding c 603, consecrated life, and even private vows.
[[Dear Sister, I have always wanted to be a religious but, well, I got married. Now I have thought again about becoming a religious but the places I have checked have an age restriction and I am too old. Am I right that there is no age limitation for becoming a hermit? I am not sure I could live entirely alone (I have lots of friends and my kids come by a lot and sometimes stay over), but is that part of being a hermit? How would I go about this if I decided I wanted to be a hermit? Would I just go to the chancery and ask them? Would they recognize me as a candidate and can I wear a habit? I have lots of questions and I don't know who else to ask. I think it takes two years to become a religious so is it the same to become a hermit? Thank you.]]
I think I have addressed all of these questions before so this will be a kind of summary which, hopefully, will get you started in thinking about what you are proposing to do. Let me begin by saying that what you have described suggests it is far too premature for you to go to your chancery with this. They would not be able to help you much and would be more likely to dismiss you with what one hopes would be some generally helpful suggestions. The process of becoming a hermit even apart from diocesan discernment and eventual profession takes time and there are recognizable stages to be negotiated. Because of this it would be extremely unlikely for a diocese to accept you as a candidate (an unofficial term only) right off, and I honestly could not see them doing this until after you had lived eremitical life under the supervision or at least while working regularly with a spiritual director for several years at least.
A diocese will want to see a pattern of assiduous prayer and penance. They will want to see that you have become a contemplative who thrives in the silence of solitude. They will want to see that you have undertaken the shifts from someone interested in eremitical life per se (not just religious life lived alone) to someone for whom prayer is primary and then to someone called to contemplative prayer. They will want to see at this point an increasing need for solitude and silence and a sense that you believe this is who you are called to be and the way your relationship with Christ is to be shaped and expressed for the whole of your life. They will look for a shift from contemplative prayer to contemplative life, a dependence on Scripture and personal preparation to live and make profession of the evangelical counsels, and that you have undertaken all of this with the assistance of regular spiritual direction. Finally, in all of this they will be looking for the development of your own humanity; they will want to see growth in wholeness and holiness. If they see all of this (or most of it) they may then accept you for a period of discernment regarding profession under Canon 603 as a diocesan hermit. There is no upper limit for admission to profession as a diocesan hermit; it is considered to be a second half of life vocation.
There are a few other things that will need to be explored. Since you were married the chancery will need to be sure you are canonically free to make another life commitment. This means if you were divorced there needs to have been a decree of nullity unless your husband or former husband is deceased. You will need to demonstrate an ability to support yourself (the church will not do this for you). Things like insurance, living expenses, library, retreat, direction, all have to be covered by the hermit. If you receive disability payments that is fine. You should be a member of a parish faith community and be known by your pastor. Most dioceses will ask for a recommendation from your pastor, your director, and sometimes medical personnel. Psychological testing may be required by the diocese and would ordinarily be paid for by them if that is the case. Still, all of that is a long way away for you from what you have described to me.
For those in community, after candidacy (9 mos. to 1 year) two years of novitiate (one canonical year and one ministerial or pastoral) is typical for novices approaching temporary profession with up to another 6 years before perpetual profession. But eremitical life is not as structured or as closely supervised as life in community. Ordinarily bishops do not profess hermits who have not lived the life for less than five years and some need for diocesan personnel to follow the hermit for that long after they approach the diocese and before admitting them to temporary profession if the person is seen to be a good candidate for a discernment process. (Not everyone is.) When this happens it is usually at least another two to three years before perpetual profession. Some bishops require five years in temporary vows. I have read one canonist who uses the same time frame canon law makes normative for admission to profession in community life, but in the main most hermits (and the bishops whom) I know agree that is not adequate for eremitical life.
I hope this is helpful. Other articles on spiritual direction, time frames, formation and discernment as a diocesan hermit are also available on this blog. You are thinking about embracing a significant and sometimes poorly understood vocation that requires significant personal initiative and resources for formation. It is not the same as life in community or even life as a religious living in her own place. There are similarities, absolutely, but the degree of silence and solitude differs significantly as does the relative absence of an active ministry or apostolate. If you are truly interested in pursuing this and perhaps feel a call to do so, and if you do not have a spiritual director, that is the place to start.
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