Called to a Union Most People only Realize in Heaven? Yes and No!

[[Dear Sister Laurel, In regard to your last blog post, I saw a video of a Nashville Dominican novice saying that, as a religious, she was called to a complete union with Christ that "most people only have in heaven." I'm not sure how that unpacks for her, but at best, I find it misleading. How does it comport with what you have been saying here?]]

Really great question and without clarifying some of what I have said already more carefully, this novice's comment might seem, at first glance at least, to agree with what I have written here recently. However, we are not in agreement; at least I don't think we are. As the CV whose emails I have shared some here wisely remarked, "An experience is not a vocation!" Conversely I think we have to say that a difference in vocation does not necessarily mean a difference in experience either. Let me say that if we are ALL called to union with God,  and every vocation is meant to witness to this eschatological destiny in some way, then this union CAN be experienced and I think we have to conclude that it is therefore MEANT to be experienced in every vocation in some substantive way. For ALL of us this union is experienced partially, fragmentarily, and with distortion here on this side of the eschatological divide**. But I honestly believe it is available to all of us nonetheless; if it is not, the universal call to holiness becomes absurd or relatively meaningless. At the same time, while experience and vocation are not identical, neither are they entirely separate from one another.

It is important that those called to Religious (or other forms of consecrated) life realize their actual experience of union in prayer may be no different from the Mother's in the line ahead of them at the grocery store --- or of the man bagging their groceries!! We simply cannot presume to know what kind of prayer lives or experiences of God these persons have, and we must not presume we are somehow "more advanced" or that we experience a kind of union they will never know this side of heaven. Further, to the extent these experiences of union DO differ, it may (as Rahner would agree) have more to do with our practice at the skills involved in cooperating with prayer (God's work within us) as well as with a kind of internal permission we are giving or withholding from ourselves than it does with the kind of prayer God gifts  (or desires to gift) us with!.

While it is true that God can gift any person with infused contemplation and break through the obstacles we present, that is a rare thing; more often what is true is that the obstacles we put up to various prayer experiences either by believing we are unworthy, by suggesting these belong "only to Religious", by believing prayer is only about saying prayers, by failing to commit to prayer as a regular, disciplined, and significant part of our lives, or by simply not even knowing or imagining such things as experiences of union with God are possible for us, --- all of these and more have a detrimental effect on our prayer's scope and depth. Given the commonness of these situations we can hardly conclude that anyone subject to such obstacles is not called by God to the same union with God here and now which a Religious man or woman is any more than we can say someone who is deprived of access to music lessons is not really called to know the ecstasy of music like someone with access is. It would be analogous to saying that because someone grows up with inadequate nutrition and health care, this translates into the conclusion that they are not called by God to know wellness and real vigor as is someone living a more privileged life here and now. Deprivation, for whatever reason or in whatever form it occurs, does not automatically translate into an objective lack of vocation.

If what this novice meant was that few people subjectively experience what she has experienced and will not do so until they exist in heaven, then her statement is a true one. If what she meant was that objectively God calls some few to experience union with him here and now (especially those who are called to be Religious), but not the majority of people, then I strongly disagree. Lives of prayer and service, lives of authentic love participate AND culminate in union with God. All the paths to this goal share intimately and integrally in the goal. One of the things we teach most poorly (if at all!) is prayer. One of the things we model least well is the universal call to prayer and holiness. Prayer is not merely for specialists, not for experts. Prayer is for human beings who realize they are called to union with God and that they are called to allow that to be as real as possible this side of heaven. On this Feast of the Presentation, a Feast which originally meant "encounter," that is surely something we should help every person in every vocational path to understand and embrace seriously.

Unfortunately, it is precisely in the area of prayer, precisely  in our approach to union with God, as well as in regard to the evangelical counsels that support prayer and to which all Christians are called that we have made things most elitist. The truth is that each of us are called on to serve our brothers and sisters as a paradigm or model of some dimension or expression of this union and of the place prayer serves in the life of the Church.  Married people witness to the incredible union of exclusive (but not exclusivistic) and fecund love in ways my own life can never do, for instance. Religious serve as paradigms of a more universally available love centered in and empowered by community and expressed in the relation between commitment, prayer, and service to the whole human family in ways a married couple may not be able to do. Hermits witness with their lives to the complete sufficiency of divine love alone, to the solitary nature of prayer, and to a quies or hesychasm the world cannot give; it is important to remember that solitude is a dialogical or communal reality however, and that this is a vocation of service lived for the salvation of others.

Priests witness especially profoundly to the Sacramental nature of our world, to the priority of the Word of God and the ministry of reconciliation the whole Christian People is entrusted with, as well as to the need for every Christian to serve their brothers and sisters in making all of these real in their own lives and in our Church and world. CV's living in the world witness to the reality of spousal union here and now and remind us each especially that heaven means the transfiguration of this world by the sovereign and spousal love of God. Those among the laity are called to witness to the profound presence of God in ordinary reality and model lives of faithfulness and prayer/union which transform their families, friendships, neighborhoods, businesses, etc. It is probably the most challenging and least commonly esteemed vocation I have mentioned thus far.

Meanwhile all of these vocations and others overlap and support one another in the gifts, graces, and challenges they bring to our church and world. None of them are exclusive to one vocation or another (with the exception of marriage and the sanctity of sexual love). At the heart of each is a call to union with God even when each serves as a paradigm of the different ways this can be reached and expressed for the good of others. I think we really have to embrace this notion of paradigmatic service wholeheartedly and reject the elitism which still so riddles some of our approaches to "states of perfection" and vocations to the consecrated state.

** eschatological divide, a phrase I like very much,  is a term I got from a friend and CV.

The Greatest Risk to the Eremitical Vocation?

[[Sister, what is the hardest thing for a new person becoming a hermit? You write about it as a risky vocation. What is the greatest risk do you think?]]

It seems to me that the hardest thing about becoming a hermit is making the transition from being a person who does things associated with being a hermit to actually being one in some essential sense. One approach to becoming a diocesan (or a lay) hermit seems to be that of adding in pious and devotional practices without changing one's general environment. In this approach silence and solitude, for instance, are treated as things one adds in to one's life rather than being embraced as the very environment in which one lives. But becoming a hermit is not simply about living more or less of this or that: more prayers, more silence, more time alone, less contact with family or friends, less (or no) TV, etc. It is about a life with God alone which humanizes one and makes of one's life a prophetic presence in a noisy world devoted to self, dissipation, and distraction. Nikos Kazantzakis once said that, "Solitude can be fatal for the soul that does not burn with a great passion." I think that the movement from doing the things a hermit does to being a true hermit --- and the danger of never making this transition --- is a piece of what is behind this quote.

The process of becoming a diocesan (or, for that matter, a lay) hermit involves a transition to being at home in an environment of the silence of solitude. It involves a transition from being a person who prays occasionally (or even often) to being a person who is prayer in some fundamental and conscious way. Because this transition is so all-encompassing, and because it cannot be engineered, the time frame for becoming a diocesan hermit is ordinarily lengthy and individualized. Negotiating this transition is one of the more difficult aspects of becoming a hermit, it seems to me --- particularly if one is not willing to let go of one's previous life, or, similarly, if one is trying to accommodate "hermiting" to a more normal parish or religious life. The call to eremitical life is different not simply in degree, but in kind; a candidate to diocesan eremitical life must understand and embrace this difference.

The greatest risk to eremitical life, in my estimation, is mediocrity because mediocrity is a form of inauthenticity. Because the life is so independent, because there is little direct oversight, it is easy to lose oneself in this or that distraction. No one but the hermit and God knows if the hermit lives her Rule or horarium. No one knows if she shows up for prayer or spends appropriate time in lectio or study. No one knows when legitimate recreation slides into more dangerous distraction and dissipation. And of course, even if she is dilligent in doing all the things she is obligated to in her Rule, she still may not be growing sufficiently in holiness, human maturity, and the capacity to love and serve others. This too can be a kind of mediocrity. Yes, she lives this life under the supervision of her Bishop and those he delegates to serve in this way. But in most ways these individuals cannot do other than take the hermit's word about the quality of the life she is living. (Directors and delegates can and do ask probing questions and challenge to ever-greater fidelity to God's call, but ultimately, they do not live with the hermit and cannot measure mediocrity. Only the hermit can do that.) Here Kazantzakis' quote also is helpful, for the hermit will be one with a great passion and that passion will not allow mediocrity.

This tremendous independence and inner directedness (development of a truly great passion) is also one of the reasons the period of discernment and formation for a diocesan hermit is often quite lengthy. Again,the person seeking to make and live this commitment needs to make the transition from "doing hermit things" to being a hermit in an essential way. They are persons who have come to terms with their own poverty and realized that communion with God is, for them, found only in silence and solitude. Human wholeness and the community necessary for that is for them a paradoxical reality realized in the silence OF solitude. For them the ability to love and serve others requires an unusual degree of silence and solitude, prayer, penance, personal work, etc, and they MUST be committed to that. That is, they must be embracing this vocation because they love, and are committed to loving more and more. Diocesan representatives, the person's spiritual director, et al, must come to assurance not only that all this is true for this person, but that the person is capable of living out this truth with self-discipline and integrity and that she has a track record of faithfulness to the Rule of Life which reflects the truth of her life with God.

By the way, there is no formula for what this faithfulness means in any given individual's life. Canon 603 defines the essential elements of the life but does not quantify these. It says this is a life of the silence of solitude, and that it is marked by assiduous prayer and penance, a living out of the evangelical counsels, and stricter separation from the world, all lived for the salvation of the world and according to the person's own Rule of Life. However, it does not indicate any single picture of what these things mean. Because of this one must find out what each of these terms will look like in her own call to eremitical life. Again, discovering this, building it into a life which genuinely loves and serves others, which leads one to genuine holiness, and which is also consistent with eremitical tradition takes time, discernment, and consistent and focused work.

The risk, of course, (and an ongoing, every day risk in fact) is that one will fail in some part of this challenge, whether that is by buying into a stereotype of eremitical (or contemplative) life which allows one to cease discerning how the life is to be lived lovingly and prophetically in this time and place, or whether it means convincing oneself that certain evasions and compromises are legitimate when they are not. Mediocrity can take many forms and wear many guises (some of them quite dramatic or extreme in normal terms) even once one has made the transition from doing hermit things to being a hermit in an essential sense. It has a number of roots as well: failure to love, disobedience, selfishness, various forms of fear or resistance, arrogance, complacency, etc. In any case, while it is important to deal with each of these roots, I think mediocrity itself is really the greatest overall risk that faces someone trying to live an eremitical life.

On Encouraging and/or Discouraging Canon 603 Vocations

[[Sister Laurel, do you encourage people to pursue eremitical vocations or do you discourage them? For instance, you criticized members of [name of project] for using the Canon for diocesan eremitism as a "stopgap" or "fallback" position. Shouldn't we be happy to have as many people pursuing this vocation as desire to do so? There are so few diocesan hermits, and so few religious vocations today that I am surprised to find people discouraging others from pursuing these.]]

You are correct about my "Canon 603-as-stopgap-measure" criticism and I will explain that in a bit. Surprisingly (for I was surprised by the fact), I have found that I do generally discourage people from pursuing vocations to Canon 603 eremitism; that is, of the people who contact me curious about this as a vocational path I encourage only a fraction to pursue it and tend to suggest other vocational paths for the majority. I have recently looked at my own motivations for this reticence and I think they are worthy reasons. Let me explain, for I think it is a piece of the answer to your questions.

Throughout history there have been hermits from all religious traditions. At some points in this long story there have been more hermits and at other points fewer, but always the vocation has been recognized as a relatively rare one. I don't think this is generally because of undiscovered vocations or human cowardice, resistance, etc, but because of the very nature of both the human being and of the call to eremitical solitude. Human beings are social beings; ordinarily we grow to maturity and achieve individuation only through our relationships with others. The need for community is a part of our very nature. Our hearts are "dialogical realities" as Benedict XVI reminds us, and the God we image is himself a community of love. At the same time we are constituted in dialogue with God not only directly (as the deepest dynamic of our hearts) but through the mediation of and in relationship with other people. This communal dimension of our lives is essential. It cannnot be dispensed with, even for the genuine hermit, and ordinarily its requirements militate against a call to a life of physical solitude. Authentic calls to eremitical life are exceptions to the rule, and therefore, are both relative rarities and paradoxical in that they actually foster or enhance the dialogical character of one's life in these particular cases.

In Christian eremitical life, these insights are reflected in the characterization of eremitical life as the summit of monastic life, and by the insistence of people like St Benedict that those seeking to live in solitude should be well formed in their monastic lives, and no longer in the first flush or fervour of conversion. [[The second [kind of monk] are the anchorites, hermits --- that is those who, not in the first fervour of religious life, but after long probation in the monastery, have learned by the help and experience of others to fight against the devil; and going forth well-armed from the ranks of their brethren to the single-handed combat of the desert, are now able to fight safely without the support of others, by their own strength under God's aid, against the vices of the flesh and their evil thoughts.]] (RB 1) Benedict, who had lived as a hermit understood the vocation and his cautions and qualifications are as valid today as they were when he wrote his Rule.

While the language of combat with demons may seem a bit dated and off-putting for many today, the seriousness (and genuineness) of the enterprise it underscores should not be missed or minimized. One goes into the desert in response to a call to a hard-won conversion and humanization which is accomplished in dialogue with and through the grace of God alone. There is no room for mediocrity here (though there is assuredly great temptation to this!!), no sense that eremitical solitude, for all the joy and peace it possesses (and these are indeed substantial), is merely a pleasant time apart to recharge depleted batteries or balance the activity in one's life. Neither, as I have written several times before, is it a way to indulge one's selfishness, over-developed individualism, insecurities, lack of ambition or success at life, or misanthropy. What is at stake in a call to eremitical solitude is one's very humanity, nothing less. Further, it is a humanity at the service of Church and World, or it is not eremitical life.

For the hermit this is THE WAY to more complete healing, wholeness, and holiness, the way her ability to love others is perfected, the way she is most clearly made into imago Christi in service to others. If one misses the demanding and extraordinary character of this solitariness, one has missed something essential to the eremitical vocation. Above all one should not forget that relatively very few people are called to achieve the goal of their own humanity in this way. For most, the desert as a life choice would actually hinder growth as a person and prevent individuation or the achievement of true holiness. For most, this would be a destructive choice leading to actual dehumanization and illness. For the hermit, on the other hand, it is the necessary or indispensible full-time environment and occupation which God in his mercy and compassion calls them to so that they might achieve fullness of authentic humanity.

At the same time I argue the relative rarity of this vocation then, I recognize that among some groups of people there may be more vocations to diocesan or to lay eremitism than has been appreciated heretofore. The chronically ill constitute one of these groups, as do the bereaved and isolated elderly. So too, as I wrote just recently, may some prisoners in the unnatural solitudes of our nations's prisons. In each of these cases diocesan or lay eremitical life may be ways of redeeming the isolation, bondage, and brokenness of these situations and transfiguring them into genuine solitude thus making them occasions of essential wholeness and freedom. So, while I am convinced vocations to solitary (diocesan) eremitical life are rare, I am more than open to encouraging exploration of this call by those whose life experiences may suit them to such a call apart from monastic formation and life. For those who are younger and can enter a congregation which is eremitical or semi-eremitical to get the formation and challenge which life in community allows, I recommend this option rather than Canon 603.

Contrary to the way your questions are framed, this is not about numbers. It is especially not about finding a canonical alternative to an individual's inability to be professed in some other way to get the number of vocations to the consecrated life up, nor is it a fallback position for those seeking to enter religious life or to found a community only to find either that they are unable or that no one else joins them in their project! My criticism of the project you mentioned was rooted in these two concerns. When Canon 603 (which is meant to address and foster SOLITARY eremitical life, not communal or religious eremitical vocations) is used in this way the person doing so apparently demonstrates little or no sense of the nature or significance of this specific vocation, little or no respect for the unique charism it represents especially for our church and world, no real sense of what it truly means to discern a LIFE VOCATION, and a lack of respect for the actual divine vocations the persons being funneled into Canon 603 life are really called to. Add to this an overriding concern with trappings and externals, and other forms of fundamental dishonesty on the part of the head of the project (the specific topic of a previous post) and you have a more complete picture of the basis for my criticism.

While it is common to hear people bemoaning the dropping numbers of religious vocations today, what we should be hearing more of is an accent on authenticity. In the wake of Vatican II we recognize the universal call to holiness and have come to esteem the lay vocation and the vocation to marriage in ways we had not done adequately. Our ecclesiology (i.e, our theology of church) is much improved with decreased clericalization (including no longer treating religious as a semi-clerical caste which can do things lay persons cannot!). Further, we are coming to be increasingly aware that many in religious life prior to Vatican II may not have had genuine vocations, but also had no way to fulfill their needs to minister, etc apart from religious life. The lower numbers of religious vocations today may simply indicate that these remaining and contemporary vocations are mainly authentic and that the desire to serve or minister (an important but secondary concern) is now better met for most persons in other ways. Canon 603 eremitical life is a significant (that is, meaningful and important) vocation with the capacity to witness to aspects of the Gospel in ways other vocations may not do as vividly. It serves (and should serve) the church and world in redeeming unnatural solitudes and in humanizing and sanctifying a rare number of people --- and in witnessing to many many more. We cannot empty it of this significance or witness value by turning discernment into a piece of a numbers game (which is always more apt to be of men than of God) or refusing to wait for genuine (relatively mature, life-tested, and divinely inspired) vocations to walk through the chancery door.

I hope this answers your questions. You might want to check past posts on the unique charism of the diocesan hermit, as well as those on abuse of Canon 603 or the "Lemons and Lemonade" series of posts, for a more expanded discussion of some of the issues that fueled my criticism of the use of Canon 603 as a stopgap measure or fallback position. Articles on the time frames for becoming a diocesan hermit (also cf the "Lemons and Lemonade" series) might explain better the idea that this is generally a vocation for the second half of life. As always, if this raises more questions for you or is unclear in some way, I hope you will get back to me.

Anachoresis vs unhealthy Withdrawal

[[Dear Sister, could you say more about the terms "reactive withdrawal" and "responsive anachoresis" in your last post? I get the idea one is positive and the other negative, but why is one reactive and the other responsive?]]

Hi. I have written in the past about withdrawal as a negative reality and in those posts I offset this against the Greek term, anachoresis the state or act of retiring or withdrawing. Anachoresis is the form of withdrawal associated with monastics and hermits. From it we get the term anchorites: those who are connected to a local church or convent and practice an intense stability of place (living in a single room there off the altar, etc) while still remaining accessible to others in limited ways and degrees via use of a window or grill, etc. By extension anachoresis refers to the withdrawal of hermits and recluses, and not just to anchorites. As I understand this act of withdrawal it is a positive thing which is meant to serve communion with God and with others. Because of this, and particularly because it is a withdrawal which is done in obedience to the call of God in our lives, I have spoken of it as "responsive" rather than reactive.

Reactions and responses are different things after all! We react to stimuli in an immediate, relatively unmediated, and even unthinking or instinctive way. When we are acting up to our potential as human beings we respond to others in a thoughtful, loving, reasoned and generous way with not just some part of our nervous or limbic system dominating, but with our whole selves. Responsiveness can allow us to overcome merely self-protective or selfish impulses and lead to kenosis (self-emptying) and a life lived for others no matter the cost. Reactive "mechanisms" in our lives are more defensive and do not tend to involve the greater awareness of the needs of others (or sometimes the greater needs of our own selves) as human beings; they are, I think, more primitive --- a matter of the preservation of the organism we are and less a matter of attending to the demands of our humanity per se than genuine responses.

Because I recognize and appreciate this difference, I refer to "reactive withdrawal" as the kind of withdrawal from the environment which is defensive or the way we respond to the world when we are clinically depressed or perhaps ridden with anxiety and excessive fears (phobias) for instance. It is a reaction to stimuli, not a response of the whole person to the address and needs of God, another person or even our truest selves. Important as it can be in certain danger situations, apart from these it is less than worthy of the human person than is an obedient response, and this is especially true in the contemplative or the hermit. I distinguish the two this way precisely because while they can look the same superficially (they both involve withdrawal and physical solitude) they are radically different acts (that is, they differ at their very roots). What is difficult is the way they overlap in the lives of sinful human beings. Because they do, those who would be hermits have to learn to discern the difference and be sure their eremitical lives are governed by the responsiveness of a relatively mature and edifying anachoresis, not the reactivity of a more primitive and defensive withdrawal which is disedifying.

I hope this helps!

Even More followup Questions on Becoming a Diocesan Hermit.

[[Sister, thank you for your posts on the time frame, and other matters regarding becoming a diocesan hermit. What I found surprising was the distinction you drew between solitary persons and hermits. I always thought the two things were the same. I also hadn't thought much before about genuine eremitical calls and illegitimate "calls". So, my questions: Can you define hermit for me as you use the word? Also, can you say more about the distinction between genuine and not-so-genuine eremitical vocations? Finally, if a person believes they are really called to be a hermit (not just "solitary persons") how do they go about getting the kind of formation they need if the diocese itself does not provide that?]]



The literal definition of hermit is "one who dwells in the desert ("desert dweller")" but, given all I have said up until now, perhaps that should be revised slightly to read, "one who lives primarily from the grace of God in the desert silence OF solitude." Physical solitude is important, essential in fact to the hermit, but more, it is the genuine communal solitude of the heart which defines her. It is the solitude of the heart (the silence OF solitude) where isolation has been transformed and transfigured at the service of love that is the defining characteristic of the hermit. Saying this reprises a number of themes I have touched on in the past couple of years here: the notion that the eremitical life is always motivated by love and not by selfishness, the idea that solitude itself is an inner reality more perhaps than it is an outer one -- as important as physical solitude remains, the notion that "stricter separation from the world" is as much or more about one's own openness to and communion with the sovereignty or reign of God than it is about closing one's door to the rest of his good creation, the notion that desert can be defined in terms of any environment or situation of relative "barrenness" which separates a person from others and not merely a physical wilderness, etc.

I am not sure what more can be said (or at least what more I can say!) about illegitimate and legitimate calls to eremitical life except that legitimate calls represent calls to wholeness, to humanity which is generous and other-centered, to lives which are marked by love (of God, oneself, and others) and reconciliation, to a life of the freedom of one who lives from the grace of God and not from illness, compulsion, or any other form of bondage. I think it is often clear when someone approaches a diocese because life has broken them in some sense and their very brokenness is the dominant reality in their lives. In such cases the person MAY ALSO (at some point) be called to eremitical life, but they have not yet heard or responded to that call; they have not yet allowed God to heal them or to define their lives in terms of wholeness, mercy, grace, or freedom. And in some cases, the essential wholeness, the foundational freedom I am talking about never becomes visible much less dominant. When that is the case, one is not (yet) dealing with a genuine call to eremitical life, and may not ever be.

In such cases, cases where brokenness is the dominant reality (whether temporarily or not), solitude is more about physical solitude and not a matter of the heart's own communion with God and all he cherishes. In such a case, physical solitude is really simply isolation, and this serves to protect one from others (or vice versa), from the demands of life and love, and sometimes, even the growth work one needs to do oneself simply to be well. But for the legitimate call to eremitical life, while brokenness may indeed always remain a subtext, a sort of drone or pedal tone beneath the music giving it a special timbre and depth, what stands out are these other characteristics I have spoken of: wholeness, freedom, love, the capacity to relate to others and to be compassionate in their regard, the sense that one is like others not different than they, the capacity for deep joy and gratitude --- characteristics which should be present in ways which define the hermit as profoundly touched by the mercy and grace of God, more profoundly and extensively than brokenness ever touched her. Further, her brokenness will now be the basis of a deep compassion with others, not something which effectively separates her as different from them. Her solitude will not be mainly about physical separation, though this will always exist, but about a Communion with God which then empowers an eremitical compassion, love for, and service of others. For those dealing with chronic illness which itself isolates and establishes one as "different" than most others, this sense that one is really the same as others, etc, is a central piece of growth I would be looking for in determining whether a vocation is authentic or not. I hope this is helpful, but if your question is more specific than this, please get back to me and clarify it for me.

Finally, your question about formation since dioceses are not about providing this: While I think that every case will be somewhat different in their needs for formation (both initial and ongoing, by the way), there are certain broad brush strokes one can suggest as necessary for most candidates for eremitical life:

1) ongoing and regular spiritual direction with a trained or gifted spiritual director who understands contemplative life. Such a person need not be A contemplative (in the sense of cloistered nun, etc), and certainly need not be a hermit, but she should be familiar with contemplative prayer and have an understanding of the basic elements of the eremitical life (the silence OF solitude, stricter separation from the world (rightly understood!), prayer and penance. It helps if this person is open to the surprising ways the Holy Spirit works in our lives --- and of course any good director is! Regular work with such a person for several years at least is necessary as a piece of eremitical discernment and initial formation; ongoing direction is simply a requirement for ongoing formation in the eremitical life.

2) Study. Here I mean primarily the study of theology and spirituality, but other disciplines as well may be helpful too (psychology, art , music, sciences, sociology). One of the greatest lacks I see in some who would like to be hermits is a lack of sound theological and spiritual training or education. Recently I wrote a couple of pieces about the specious division of reality into the temporal and mystical Catholic worlds. One needs enough theology to prevent such blatant errors, enough contact with models of good spirituality (including contemporary spirituality!!) that one reads classic works with an educated eye and heart, enough so that one can read Scripture (and first rate commentaries) with real intelligence and sophistication. This category would also include study on the nature of the vows, monastic and eremitical life per se, the history of the church, etc.

3) Personal growth work to supplement that of spiritual direction as necessary. This might include therapy to help work through and heal past hurts, or simply to understand oneself fully and profoundly in psychological as well as spiritual terms, etc.

4) formation in prayer and spiritual disciplines. One will, over time, come to learn to pray the Office, do lectio divina, journal, pray contemplatively (etc), live in silence and solitude (and the silence of solitude) effectively and faithfully and more, allow all these to assume their proper place in a genuinely contemplative life. Also, one will learn what penance is lifegiving and motivated by gratitude as opposed to that which is actually an expression of self-hatred, and one will build these into her life. Included here too are all the values and practices associated with the evangelical counsels. One may not be preparing for vows, but one still needs to live the values central to Christian discipleship. Finally one's spiritual life includes others. It is lived FOR others, so over time one needs to determine valid and lifegiving ways to relate to one's parish and other communities despite one's solitude. Learning to be sensitive to, as well as to balance the demands of solitude and community effectively are a piece of formation I think even if one continues to learn this the whole of one's eremitical life.

In order to get this kind of formation one really needs to seek out resources for it. It should be clear that dioceses would not provide this stuff, but every diocese will have resources available, and the internet opens up the world to hermits for all of this as well. One just needs to seek these out and do so in discernment with one's director re what one really needs to be a whole and well-developed person, as well as spiritually well-rounded and theologically sophisticated. (One need not have advanced degrees in theology to be well-rounded here, by the way.) In any case, if I were looking at candidates for profession and consecration, those are the basic areas I would be looking for evidence of strength in. Because of that I think formation needs to include these in one way and another depending on the individual involved.

Again, I hope this helps. If it does not, or raises more questions, please do get back to me.

Confusions regarding the notions of "Catholic Hermit", "Temporal vs Mystical Catholic Worlds," etc.

Please note, this article is not meant to answer the simple question about what a Catholic or diocesan hermit is. If you are looking for that kind of post, please see Notes From Stillsong Hermitage, What is a Diocesan Hermit?. The following article is concerned more with the misuse of the term Catholic hermit in contrast to the sense in which the Church uses the term.


Sister, could you please comment on the marked passage? I am confused by some terms, like "temporal Catholic world", but also by the reference to a canonist who seemingly should not be trusted in some of her comments, especially re the definition of "Catholic hermit." Thanks.

[[This was in reaction to being told of some person who may or may not have a canon law degree writing online that hermits who are not canonically approved are not to refer that they are Catholic hermits, for that implies they are canonically approved. Also, such hermits should not have confessors to guide them.... So, we have here an example of someone out in the blogosphere interpreting canon law using personal augmentation and opinion. The reality of a statement of fact can be twisted any which way, but fact is fact. What another wants to think depends upon that others' frame of reference. To be a Catholic hermit means just that: Catholic and hermit. It does not imply or infer the status in the temporal Catholic world known as canonical approval or disapproval. Also, there is nothing in Canon law that states a Catholic hermit ought not be guided or supervised by his or her confessor. Ask a priest canon lawyer.]] (Emphasis added)

Yes, I have actually recently read this very passage even apart from your question, and I also know (as a superficial online acquaintance only) the Canonist who is being maligned and deemed mistaken. She has written that the term "Catholic hermit" necessarily implies canonical status or standing, and I completely agree. I have referenced her comments a number of months back, so you can look for those too if you care to. (The poster who wrote the above passage is correct about frame of reference being important. This person I have cited previously is a canon lawyer who specializes in consecrated life, so she is well-qualified here. She works in and for the Church in this capacity, and her blog is an instance of authoritative information.) But let's look at this now.

On the term Catholic Hermit

If a man says "I am a Catholic priest" does he merely mean, "I am a Catholic and a priest by virtue of baptism into the priesthood of all believers?" No, certainly not, at least not if he means what the Church herself means by this. Does he mean "I function as a priest in the private sector with my minister's web license and am a Catholic, so therefore, I am a Catholic priest? Again, no, of course not. Does he even mean, "I was an Anglican priest, but have since become Roman Catholic; I have not been ordained in the Catholic church, but I am a priest forever, and therefore I am a Catholic priest"? No. Similarly, if a lay woman says she is a Catholic nun, does she mean she is Catholic, dresses simply, is cautious in her spending habits, and prays regularly? Again, not if she means what the church means by these terms.

We could extend these examples further, and perhaps gain greater clarity too: a policeman who resides but does not work in or for the City of Las Vegas is not a Las Vegas police officer according to normal usage, for instance; a platonic friend who is a boy is not a Boy Friend (though young people do play games with language to taunt their parents in this regard!), but the bottom line is the same: The terms Catholic priest, Catholic nun, or Catholic hermit mean that the people so identifying themselves are these things (as the church herself defines them!) through the authority and mediation of the Catholic Church. They mean they undertake and represent these states of life or vocations in the name of the Church who authorizes this, and not in their own names. It means they represent ECCLESIAL vocations in the way I have explained in the past (please see tags below).

The church herself has raised the publicly vowed eremitical vocation to the consecrated state and public standing in law, and because she has, a Catholic hermit is not simply a "hermit" (in the common sense of the term) who is Catholic. (To be very blunt, if that were the case, and were he Catholic, Theodore Kasczynski (the "hermit" Unabomber) could have called himself a Catholic hermit; so could any curmudgeonly loner, misanthrope, or agoraphobic living alone, for instance, so long as they were baptized Catholic). A Catholic hermit, on the other hand, is one whose vocation is discerned and mediated by the Catholic Church in whose name and in direct and real responsibility to whom the hermit lives her life. Both terms, "Catholic" and "hermit," are important and qualify one another. Not just any form of solitary living is authentically eremitical despite the common sense of this term (cf Kasczynski or the misanthrope again). Similarly then, not every form of genuinely eremitical life is Catholic in the normative sense of that term; that is, not every genuine eremitical life is undertaken with the authority and in the name of the Catholic Church. In this matter the Church recognizes certain individuals as publicly representing the vocation, and she grants both commensurate rights and obligations along with the title Sister or Brother to these. The RIGHT to call oneself a Catholic hermit is implicitly granted by the Church in a definitive liturgical act (". . .be faithful to the ministry the church entrusts to you to be carried out in her name"); it is not and cannot be assumed by the individual on her own authority.

Similarly, if the term "Catholic hermit" is used by someone to describe herself, others have have every right to infer that the person has the official standing to act and style herself thusly in the name of the Church. The rights and obligations of the Catholic hermit do not stop at the hermitage door, nor do they fail to impact others. The vocation of the Catholic hermit, hidden though it may be, is still a public vocation. Again, rights have correlative responsibilities and the designation "Catholic hermit" comes with both. Misuse of the label opens the way to misrepresentation of all kinds simply because one who is not canonical may not understand, appreciate, or even care about the commensurate obligations that come with profession and consecration as a Catholic hermit, much less feel bound to exercise them. Accountability, formal, legitimate, and real is associated with the term Catholic Hermit.

The Canonist referenced in these comments has merely pointed out the normative Catholic meaning of such terms, and in this I believe she is completely correct. She has twisted nothing and her credentials are not in question. Neither, as far as I can tell, is she merely offering personal opinion here; she speaks as a Catholic canonist!

Note: after I wrote this article I discovered Canon 216. It says the following: [[All the Christian Faithful, since they participate in the mission of the Church, have the right to promote or sustain apostolic activity by their own undertakings in accord with each one's state and condition; however, no undertaking shall assume the name Catholic unless the consent of a competent ecclesiastical authority is given.]] Thus, the prohibition is present in black and white. The argument that one need merely be Catholic and a (lay) hermit to call oneself a "Catholic hermit" is specious. The same is true of a religious community and the term Catholic. One must be using the term in the way the Church herself does, and be doing so with the authority of the Church, otherwise the usage is illegitimate at best. See also Canon 300 which applies to groups: No association shall assume the name "Catholic" without the consent of ecclesiastical authority in accord with the norm of C 312

Can Hermits be Guided by Confessors?

As for the issue of not being guided by a confessor, you didn't ask about this explicitly, but it is included in the passage and is one of the things the canonist was said to be wrong about so I will address it here: I believe the author of the passage you asked about is referring to the same entry on eremitical life by the referenced canonist, but has completely misread or miscontrued what she said. What was affirmed was that a hermit's spiritual director ought not to also be her superior. Here is the accurate passage, at least from the same entry on hermits: [[. . .Normally, it is best if the superior is not his [the hermit's] spiritual director unless exceptional circumstances call for it and if the extent of the obedience owed is clearly spelled out in the hermit’s rule of life. Otherwise, the private hermit should not make a vow of obedience but should content himself with the vows of poverty and chastity. The vow of obedience more properly belongs to the applicable canonical forms of consecrated life, not to private individuals who are not living in community or under hierarchical authority.]] Despite it not sounding like the correct passage (it does not mention confessors), as far as I know, this is the only reference to hermits in which the same author refers in wisely cautionary terms to specific arrangements re spiritual directors as superiors, but in no way does this suggest a spiritual director should not guide a hermit. Quite the opposite, in fact, is presupposed.

Temporal vs Mystical Catholic Worlds

The term Temporal Catholic World (and its implied "opposite," Mystical Catholic World) can indeed be confusing. It is a neologism of sorts, so is somewhat idiosyncratic and eccentric. In some senses I find it theologically objectionable because in the passages I read at least, it is counterposed with the phrase Mystical Catholic World and the two tend to be played off against one another as though they are completely distinct and oppositional. [The marked passage above does not refer explicitly to "mystical Catholic world" but others did.] But for the Christian this cannot be claimed to be true without emptying the Incarnation of meaning. Is there any question that Jesus was a mystic? No. So was Paul, but neither of these played off the temporal world against the so-called mystical world. Neither rejected one in the name of embracing the other. In fact, Jesus' entire role as mediator is a matter of making sure these two dimensions of the one world interpenetrate one another in a more and more definitive way.

A Catholic is called to live in this world of space and time. She is called to live out her faith in Christ in a world which is yet incompletely redeemed, and in this way to be in it even if not "of it". She is called to understand that with Christ the separation between sacred and profane has been broken down, the veil rent in two. S/he may be called to be a mystic, and yet, his/her contemplative life can spill over into ministry other than prayer. It MUST spill over into love of others! Those who are truly contemplatives or authentic hermits know this phenomenon well. Does it require care in making sure the active ministry one undertakes is the fruit of contemplative life? Yes, absolutely. Should active ministry always be undegirded by and lead back to prayer? Again, absolutely. But union with God necessarily leads to love of others in unmistakable and concrete ways, and therefore quite often to more direct or active ministry, how ever that is worked out by the individual.

It is true that there is a rare vocation to actual reclusion, but recluses are also in communion with the church and larger world -- in some ways to a greater extent than most people. Their reclusion is actually a paradoxical way of assuming responsibility for (and in) "the world", both within and without the recluse's own self. Remember that prayer links us in God to all others (we all share the same Ground of Being and Meaning), and that love of God issues in love of others, a concrete love, not love as an abstraction or pious parody of itself. At the same time, our love for others reveals God to us and casts us back into his arms so that we can be remade sufficiently to love all the more truly and profoundly. As a friend recently reminded me, "In solitude we should hear the cries of the world. It takes strength. And if you don't hear that cry, you are not mature enough. . ."

Mystics though any of us may be, we are all still "temporal world Catholics". Or perhaps the paradox is stronger and truer as it often is in Christianity: to the degree we are true mystics and citizens of heaven, we belong even more integrally to the temporal world loving it deeply and profoundly into wholeness. Never do we abandon it! Eremitical vocations (including reclusion), undoubtedly require "stricter separation from the world," in the sense defined below, but they do not allow us to divide reality into a temporal Catholic world and a separate and opposing mystical Catholic one, especially when that division (which could be used in a more typological sense otherwise) is accompanied by the implication that hermits in the "TCW" (read canonical or diocesan hermits!) are not given to contemplation or union with God, or the direct affirmation that a hermit needs to discern whether she is called to one or the other of these "worlds." [[So what hermits ought consider in discerning their vocation, is if he or she is called by God to be a temporal Catholic world hermit or a mystical Catholic world hermit. . . .]] This kind of stuff is simply theological nonsense, not least because any hermit alive today and every living Catholic mystic is alive in the "temporal Catholic world" (how could she NOT be?); further, both requires much from, and owes much to, that very world --- not least the recognition of its sacramental character as well as commitment to its continuing redemption and perfection in Christ! It is precisely the mystic (hermit or not) who appreciates all this most clearly!

The term, "world" in the phrases "hatred for the world" or "stricter separation from the world, " as I have written before, needs to be defined with care to prevent such theological nonsense. In Canon Law the term refers to "that which is yet unredeemed and not open to the salvific action of Christ," not least, I would add, that reality within ourselves! (A Handbook on Canons 573-746, "Norms Common to All Institutes of Consecrated Life," Ellen O'Hara, CSJ, p 33.) I have referred in the past here to "the world" as that which promises fulfillment apart from Christ. Neither of these complementary definitions suggests the wholesale renunciation of temporal for mystical, or supports the invalid and simplistic division of reality in such a way. Instead, both look to a certain ambiguity in temporal existence, and look to its perfection and fullness of redemption in Christ; rightly they expect Christians to open the way here. I hope you will look past relevent posts up --- especially re the notion that the world is something we carry within us, and not something we can simply or naively close the hermitage door on!

Again, I am reminded of several passages from Thomas Merton in regard to this last issue,

"When 'the world' is hypostatized [regarded as a distinct reality] (and it inevitably is), it becomes another of those dangerous and destructive fictions with which we are trying vainly to grapple.

or again,

And for anyone who has seriously entered into the medieval Christian. . . conception of contemptus mundi [hatred for or of the world],. . .it will be evident that this means not the rejection of a reality, but the unmasking of an illusion. The world as pure object is not there. it is not a reality outside us for which we exist. . . It is only in assuming full responsibility for our world, for our lives, and for ourselves that we can be said to live really for God."

as well as,

"The way to find the real 'world' is not merely to measure and observe what is outside us, but to discover our own inner ground. For that is where the world is, first of all: in my deepest self.. . . This 'ground', this 'world' where I am mysteriously present at once to my own self and to the freedoms of all other men, is not a visible, objective and determined structure with fixed laws and demands. It is a living and self-creating mystery of which I am myself a part, to which I am myself my own unique door. When I find the world in my own ground, it is impossible for me to be alienated by it. . ." (The Inner Ground of Love)

or again:

"There remains a profound wisdom in the traditional Christian approach to the world as an object of choice. But we have to admit that the mechanical and habitual compulsions of a certain limited type of Christian thought have falsified the true value-perspective in which the world can be discovered and chosen as it is. To treat the world merely as an agglomeration of material goods and objects outside ourselves, and to reject these goods and objects in order to seek others which are "interior" or "spiritual" is in fact to miss the whole point of the challenging confrontation of the world and Christ. Do we really choose between the world and Christ as between two conflicting realities absolutely opposed? Or do we choose Christ by choosing the world as it really is in him, that is to say, redeemed by him, and encountered in the ground of our own personal freedom and love?" (The Inner Ground of Love, Emphasis added)

And finally (I have quoted this before):

"Do we really renounce ourselves and the world in order to find Christ, or do we renounce our own alienation and false selves in order to choose our own deepest truth in choosing both the world and Christ at the same time? If the deepest ground of my being is love, then in that very love and nowhere else will I find myself, the world, and my brother and my sister in Christ. It is not a question of either/or, but of all-in-one. It is not a matter of exclusivity and "purity" but of wholeness, whole-heartedness, unity, and of Meister Eckhart's gleichkeit (equality) which finds the same ground of love in everything."

I think, unfortunately, it is possible to read a lot of medieval mystical theology which is built on a notion of the world and contemptus mundi or a mundo secessu (as used today in Canon 603) that does indeed falsify the situation and makes difficult to see or make the real choice before us Christians. Yes, we must discern whether we are called to contemplative or active life (or to which of these essentially or primarily), to eremitic or even reclusive life or to apostolic or ministerial life, and of course, if God gifts us with mystical prayer, we need to honor that, but again, all this happens in the temporal world and as a gift to that world. In light of the incarnation, and especially in light of our own relational human constitutions as imago dei trinitates and grounded in God who speaks in and through us, that is precisely where God is to be found. Heaven and earth interpenetrate one another in light of the Christ Event and our task is to allow that to be more and more the case in Him. Setting up false, absolute, simplistic, and destructive dichotomies is no help at all.

I hope this helps. As always, if it is unclear or raises further questions, please email me.

Humanity as Covenant reality: "If you See me, you see the Father who sent me"

In today's first reading from the "letter" (it is more a homily) to the Hebrews, as a piece of extolling the fullness of the revelation of God in Christ, the author contrasts this with the "partial" revelations associated with the prophets, with Israel more generally (and even, some commentators suggest, with other religious traditions).

Now revelation is a tricky word. It has a number of meanings including some of progressive depth, extension, and intensity. For instance, it can mean to show or make manifest, to divulge, or lay bare, and is often limited to the idea of telling us about something or someone. A magician may reveal the secret of a signature trick. The last few pages of a mystery novel may (and we hope does!) reveal the killer of the Lord of the Manor. A Catholic catechism may reveal truths about God that some religions simply don't reflect and so, in this sense, be a "fuller revelation" of God than those other traditions. As important as this sense of revelation is (and it is genuinely important!), it is relatively superficial, partial and fragmentary. Discipleship therefore includes this kind of knowing and revelation but is not limited to it.

Another (and related) meaning of the word revelation is to make known. Thus, a child who is loved deeply and effectively by her parents will make that love known in many ways throughout her life. In such a situation we can know about the parents’ love without ever really knowing the parents except as the author of Hebrews describes as partially and in fragmentary ways. A person of faith will make known the effects of God's mercy and grace in her life, and so forth. Revelation in this sense is a matter of witnessing to something WE KNOW, something that is real for us in more than an intellectual or notional sense. It goes beyond divulging information or laying bare secrets, and it goes beyond simply sharing things (like the identity of the murderer in the novel, or even the idea that God is Triune, for instance), but it remains a partial or even fragmentary revelation, and once again, Christian discipleship includes but is not limited to this sense of revelation.

But in the New Testament revelation has another meaning as well, a meaning which includes, but also deepens, and intensifies both of these other senses of the word while going beyond or transcending them. It is this sense especially that refers to the Christ Event and revelation in its fullness. For revelation in the NT also means to make something (in this case, GOD) real in space and time. By analogy, at some point, for instance, a bud will spring forth as the realization or making real of something which was only potential before. A human being who is deeply loved or known by another will become someone she only had the potential to become apart from this being loved, and will, to some extent, actually become an image of the one who has loved her so. This is similar to revelation in the example of a child loved by parents above, but it goes beyond it as well. What the author of the letter to the Hebrews is concerned with is a spectrum of meanings, but especially this last sense. This form of revelation, this making real, is not merely about knowing God, therefore, but about being known by him in that uniquely intimate Biblical sense of the term "to know", and then living out that reality, that BEING KNOWN so exhaustively that God himself is met in the one so known.

According to the author of the "letter" to the Hebrews, the prophets were revelatory and spoke God's Word into their own situations with power, but this revelation was partial or fragmentary. Sometimes it was merely about God, often it witnessed TO God, and in ways it was God's own word as well, but never was it more than partial. God was not incarnate here, he was not allowed to actually live amongst us fully, nor were the prophets known fully BY God. The Scriptures themselves tell us this about the prophets by making the Word they spoke foreign to them and often spoken in spite of themselves. Similarly the covenant they and their people celebrated was still somewhat external to the Israelites; it was not exhaustively embodied by them, their humanity itself was not a matter of BEING covenant (though it clearly pointed to this and called for it as its own completion and perfection). Again, it was a more partial or fragmentary revelation of God’s presence and power.

Jesus, on the other hand, concerned himself with making God real among us in a way God willed to be, but could not be apart from another's cooperation. Jesus gave his entire life and his entire self to this. He was attentive and responsive to (that is, through the power of the Holy Spirit he ALLOWED HIMSELF TO BE ADDRESSED AND KNOWN BY) the Word of God in a way which put God first and gave him unhampered access to us and to our world. Jesus was human in a way which defined a new and authentic humanity in terms of complete transparency to God and this meant in terms of covenant or communion with God; likewise it defined God similarly --- as Communal or relational, dialogical, and covenantal. He was human, that is, he was one who was KNOWN BY GOD in a way which allowed God to be Emmanuel, someone he had not been before. In the process this BEING KNOWN by God made of Christ a new Creation, the new and everlasting covenant, a new and exhaustively human being which makes God real amongst us in a fresh, authentic, and definitive way.

Jesus' life, death, resurrection, and ascension is the "event" where God is allowed to assume a human face, speak with a TRULY human voice, love and heal and support those he loves with human hands, provide a hearing for those needing it with human ears and a human heart. More, he is implicated into the realm of human sin and death, places he could never go himself (by definition these are literally godless places apart from Christ); he is made real as God-With-Us even there and transforms and defeats them with his presence. It is the place where human and divine destinies are inextricably wed and made one. And all because Jesus, in the power of the Holy Spirit, was exhaustively responsive to the Word of God and embodied or becomes the COMMUNION which is true humanity and (the sacrament of) true divinity all at one time.

In today’s Gospel this fullness of revelation with its call to discipleship, this call to become "fishers of men," is a call to this kind of humanity: a humanity constituted as covenant life where the very nature of both humanity and divinity, different as they are from one another, are revealed as Communion with one another, not as some form of solitary splendor or autonomy; humanity here is defined in terms therefore of knowing and BEING KNOWN BY GOD, not as an activity we engage in (as, for instance, might be true of a prayer period during our day), but as someone we ARE. To be human and to become fishers of men in this sense is not merely to let others know about God, or to bring others to a new religion with doctrines they have never heard; more, it is to bring them to a new humanity, a humanity which is defined as communion with God, and means embodying the Word of God as exhaustively as we are capable of in the power of the Spirit.

It is an immense challenge and vocation, one we share with Christ and only achieve in Him and his unique incarnation of the God who would be God-with-us. This is a humanity where God in Christ will be allowed to walk where he could not walk otherwise, where he is made real where otherwise he would and could not be (the Greek notion of omnipresence notwithstanding!). It is a humanity which itself is a sacramental reality and where --- if, and to the extent, we live out this vocation fully by becoming disciples in THIS sense --- God in Christ turns a human face to the world and that face is our very own.

Followup Question on the Eremitic Vocation and Contemptus Mundi

It seems my last answer on the idea of hermits being motivated by the need to escape the world raised further questions. Here is the followup:

[[ Okay. I get what you are saying about the hermit needing to be motivated by love, not the desire to escape the world in both senses you used the term. But couldn't a desire to escape from the world, or a refusal to understand it, be a form of genuine holiness, or a kind of rarified eremitical vocation? Don't we hear a lot about the idea of "hating" the world in spiritual writing? Are you saying none of this is legitimate?]]

In my earlier post, I wrote that the motivation for the eremitical vocation HAD TO BE love, not a desire to escape from reality. I maintain that is still the bottom line, and that a person who chooses to retreat to a "hermitage" because she cannot relate well to people, cannot delight in the world outside the hermitage, cannot (or does not desire to) understand that reality and sees herself as wholly different than it rather than an instance of it, is not a hermit in the Christian sense of that word. I would go somewhat further and affirm that she is unlikely to be genuinely called to eremitical life (especially diocesan eremitism) so long as this remains her orientation and attitude towards that world.

It is not the case that eremitism is a refuge for those who cannot relate well to the world outside the hermitage. It is a refuge, yes, but the genuinely holy space of the hermitage is meant to act as leaven, an instance of the coming Kingdom of God penetrating and transforming God's good creation. Everything within the hermitage is meant to be at the service of this process and this world, beginning with the hermit's own heart, and spilling over from there. In terms of the monastic concept of "contempt for the world", yes, that is valid, but only when we have defined "world" in the narrower sense of "that which promises fulfillment apart from God," and understand deeply that the world outside the hermitage is fundamentally good and MEANT TO BECOME part of what the Scriptures refer to as the new heaven and new earth.

It is completely appropriate to reject elements of the world outside the hermitage, and to refuse to understand them or seek to "know them" in the more intimate biblical sense of that term. But the idea that the hermit should not understand or wish to understand the very things that drive her neighbors, brothers, and sisters away from their own calls to holiness, or which wound and distort them in the name of this or that kind of fulfillment is something I cannot agree with. Again, hermits are called to love these persons, and I don't know how one can do so without a profound sense of solidarity with them which implies deep understanding. Let me be clear: I am not saying one must embrace the sin one finds in the world in order to love the world, just the opposite in fact. Neither, therefore, am I saying that one understands the world BY embracing its distortions and sinfulness. In fact, one does so mainly by a careful and discerning rejection of them. But, one cannot turn from the task of genuinely KNOWING these things and understanding them (first of all in oneself, and secondly in those one meets, etc) in the name of some supposedly rarified vocation to eremitical life. (Please note that rare --- which the hermit vocation is --- and rarified are not precisely the same terms.)

Thomas Merton once asked, [[ Do we really renounce ourselves and the world in order to find Christ, or do we renounce our alienated and false selves in order to choose our own deepest truth in choosing both the world and Christ at the same time?]] He continued: [[If the deepest ground of my being is love, then in that very love, and nowhere else will I find myself, and my brother and sister in Christ. It is not a question of either-or but of all-in-one. It is not a matter of exclusivity and "purity" but of wholeness, whole-heartedness, unity, and of Meister Eckhart's gleichheit (equality) which finds the same ground of love in everything.]]

I think here is a major part of the answer to your questions. There is a paradox, indeed a series of paradoxes involved in the eremitic life. To name a couple, we leave the world to a greater extent than most in order to love the One who grounds its existence, and to love all that he loves as well. We become contemplatives not to escape from the world, but to confront it and transform it, to bring it to wholeness and fullness of life --- though I grant you this confrontation is different than most would ordinarily conceive. Still, what is true is that eremitic life is a life of profound engagement with the world and its God (or, better said, perhaps, with God on behalf of and in solidarity with that world). One may shut the door of one's hermitage, but not to close out the world (if by this we also mean turning our backs on it in self-centered introspection); instead, one does so to relate to it more honestly and lovingly. One point I think is that engagement does not imply enmeshment, just as escape from the world outside the hermitage does not equal monastic "contemptus mundi". Solidarity does not mean complete agreement; indeed genuine solidarity can be profoundly critical and SHOULD BE deeply challenging even while it remains radically supportive. Conversely, the witness of the hermit is meant to challenge the world outside the hermitage, but that presupposes a significant degree of solidarity with it as well.

So, my answer to your questions (except to the last one) amount to a yes, with serious clarifications and qualification. I have seen persons who desire to be hermits speak of their hermitages as places of retreat from a world they claim openly to neither understand nor wish to understand. In these same instances, I have heard descriptions of not relating well to others, being estranged from and disliked by them, out of step in normal social situations, constantly at the center of misunderstandings and crises, and the like. In such cases, these persons seem to want to get back to the hermitage that makes relatively few personal demands on them in terms of others. The "loving" described" by these persons, when it is mentioned at all, is a safe, abstract, personally-undemanding love that involves little giving of self and no real death to self in Christ. (This is so because, in fact, there is a failure or refusal to recognize the self as at least a partial source of many of the problems described. There is a failure to see "the world" which one carries within oneself, or to confront and seek sanctification and healing of that reality.) These particular retreats from the world are exercises in illegitimate escape, NOT engagement. They represent misanthropy, not eremitism. Such retreat is capitulation to the very world one seeks to reject, not a matter of contemplative engagement or the legitimate "greater separation from the world" mentioned in canon 603.

I suppose one thing I have not emphasized enough in this post is the fact that "greater separation from the world" in the canon which governs eremitical life in the Roman Catholic Church implies, first of all, rejection of that reality in oneself. If one speaks of the world as something merely "out there" and runs to the hermitage to escape from that reality, instead one will find that it has been locked inside the hermitage with one --- and it will devour the one who does not recognize and confront it. Too often people have spoken of "the world" as something which exists merely outside themselves, something which can be escaped by shutting the door and refusing to go out. Nothing could be further from the truth. When I read your question, I took it as describing this kind of situation, so feel free to correct me or clarify further if I was mistaken in my reading.

Why isn't it enough. . .???

I received the following questions via email: [[How does one determine one is called to an eremitical vocation? Why isn't it enough to be uncomfortable with the world or to desire to avoid it, and to wish to retire to solitude? Is this at least a sign of a genuine eremitical vocation?]]

In order to answer this (or at least the second part of the question, because I will need to answer the first part separately), I want to first reprise what I wrote in an earlier post (cf Post on January 14, 2008, The Unique Charism of the Diocesan Hermit) : [[One embraces eremitical silence, solitude, prayer, penance and greater separation from the world in order to spend one's life for others in this specific way. Whatever FIRST brings one to the desert (illness, loss, temperament, curiosity, etc) unless one learns to love God, oneself, and one's brothers and sisters genuinely and profoundly, and allows this to be the motivation for one's life, I don't think one has yet discerned, much less embraced, a call to diocesan (Canon 603) eremitism.

[[. . . let me say something here about the phrase "the world" in the above answers. Greater separation from the World implies physical separation, but not merely physical separation. Doesn't this conflict with what I said about the unique charism of the diocesan hermit? No, I don't think so. First of all, "the world" does NOT mean "the entire physical reality except for the hermitage or cell"! Instead, "the world" refers to those structures, realities, things, positions, values, etc which PROMISE FULFILLMENT or personal [dignity and] completion APART FROM GOD. Anything, including some forms of religion and piety, can represent "the world" given this definition. "The world" tends to represent escape from self and God, and also escape from the deep demands and legitimate expectations others have a right to make of us as Christians. Given this understanding, some forms of "eremitism" may not represent so much greater separation from the world as they do unusually embodied capitulations to it. (Here is one of the places an individual can fool themselves and so, needs the assistance of the church to carry out an adequate and accurate discernment of a DIVINE vocation to eremitical life.)

reprise continues:

[[Not everything out in the physical world is "the World" hermits are called to greater separation from. Granted, physical separation from much of the physical world is an element of genuine solitude which makes discerning the difference easier. Still, I have seen non-diocesan hermits who, in the name of "eremitical hiddenness," run from responsibilities, relationships, and anything at all which could conceivably be called secular or even simply natural (as opposed to what is sometimes mistakenly called the supernatural). This is misguided, I believe, and is often more apt to point to the lack of an eremitical vocation at the present time than the presence of one.]]

The simple answer in light of what I have said before, then, is no, it is not nearly enough. We are speaking of a religious (and, in fact, Christian) hermit --- one for whom the heart of her vocation is love, not only of God but of all that God cherishes. I am interpreting your question to mean that avoidance of the world (in this case I mean the whole of reality outside the hermitage) is the dominating, even sole reason for embracing an eremitical life, and no other reason even comes close. Even if one finds oneself out of step with that world, determines she cannot fathom it, is misunderstood herself by it, and desires nothing more than to retreat from it, this is NOT the basis for an eremitical life, nor is it, all by itself, a sign of a genuine vocation. In fact, it is more likely a sign one is NOT called to such a vocation. This is especially true if one who is a novice to spirituality and eremitism takes one's sense of being out of step with the world, misunderstood by and unable to fathom it, as a sign one is radically different than it.

It is true because it neglects the simple fact that we are each and all of us part of the world, shaped and formed by it, and so, to greater and lesser extents, carry it deeply in our own hearts, minds, and limbs. This is true whether one is speaking of the world as all of reality outside the hermitage, or "the world" in the strict monastic sense of "contemptus mundi" --- that which promises fulfillment apart from God. We carry the world within us in both senses, and of course, are called to love, transform and heal the world (in both senses) outside of the hermitage. In the negative or monastic sense of the term (that which promises fulfillment apart from God) we bring this to the hermitage in order to deal with it, to subject it to God's love and healing touch. We bring it to the hermitage not because we cannot understand it --- or it us, but because we understand it all too well and know that God's love is the only alternative to our own personal enmeshment in it. The dynamic you described is of a person running from this reality (and, in fact, from the whole of God's world), but the hermitage cannot be used to run FROM ONESELF, nor from God's good creation; it cannot be used as a place of escape, but must instead be a place of confrontation and transformation, of love and healing.

To attempt to escape from the demands of the physical world outside the "hermitage" is really to actually transform the "hermitage" into an outpost of what monasticism calls "the world." This is so because one of the signal qualities of "the world" in the monastic sense is a refusal to face reality, and thus will also involve an inability to love it into wholeness. Thus, if the "hermitage" is merely or even mainly a refuge from all that one cannot face, understand, or deal adequately with, it has ceased to be a genuine hermitage in any Christian sense and instead is predicated on the very values of distraction, avoidance, escape, and inability to face forthrightly or love truly or deeply that which constitutes "the world". It is itself an instance of that world, an outpost of it and no true hermitage. To bring "the world" into the hermitage in this sense is far and away more dangerous and destructive than bringing in aspects of it openly and cautiously like TV, movies, news programs, computer, etc --- and we know how assiduously careful we must be about (and even generally resistant to) these latter inclusions!

There is a reason hermitages have been characterized as places of battle, as crucibles as well as oases of God's peace. Above all, they are the places where, in the clear light of God's truth and love, one is asked to confront the demons one carries within oneself. Thomas Merton once wrote that the purpose of the hermitage was to allow a hermit to face the falseness, and distortions in oneself: "the first function of the hermitage is to relax and heal and to smooth out one's distortions and inhumanities." This is true, he says, because the mission of the solitary in the world is, "first the full recovery of man's natural and human measure." The hermit "reminds (others) of what is theirs to use if they can manage to extricate themselves from the web of myths and fixations which a highly artificial society has imposed on them." However, Merton knew all too well that the battle is waged inside the hermitage as well. One cannot witness to a world one refuses to understand as though one were really all that different from it. One cannot do so because one has not dealt with "the world" one carries deep within oneself, and which, in fact, one IS until one has been completely remade by God's love.

By the way, it is, of course, true that the hermit comes to love the solitude and silence of her hermitage, and she desires to be there, to go about her daily routine, to do all the small and large tasks and chores that come as part of the life there. A certain degree of discomfort with the world outside the hermitage will exist since she wants always to get back to the sacred space of silence and solitude which is her cell. However, and I cannot emphasize this enough, when she is outside the hermitage, she is completely capable of relating empathetically to others and so, understanding them and what drives them; she is able to delight in this world to the extent it is evidence of God's creativity and wonder, and to care deeply for it when it falls short of that glory. These people, places, and things are given her to love, to cherish in so far as they are God's own, and in so far as they possess the potential, no matter how yet-profoundly-unrealized, to mediate God's presence and love. This is a world the hermit knows to be very like herself in every way. Her vocation may be unique, but she is not. To the degree she is really a hermit she carries these persons, places, and things with her back to the hermitage to continue to love them, to pray for them, and also to let them love and shape her own life to the degree that is appropriate.

In NO WAY is the hermitage an escape from the world in this sense. It is the place from which the hermit lives to allow God's presence greater intensity and scope so that he might one day be "all in all" as the Pauline phrase goes. Again, this all gets back to what I said at the beginning: The basis for the eremitical life must be love; it cannot be escape. We are called to greater separation from the world only because love requires distance as well as closeness. But we embrace this separation in order that we may allow God's love full rein and scope, first in our own lives, and then, in the lives of all those others for whom we live.

I hope this answers the second part of your question! Please let me know if it does not, or if it raises more questions. In the meantime, all my best.