On Initial Formation as a Diocesan Hermit and Some Attributes of a True Novitiate:

[[Dear Sister Laurel, I am from the Diocese of Lexington and wanted to write you about Brother Christian Matson. He announced on Facebook: [[I have now completed my period of initial formation and professed public vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience as a diocesan hermit for the Diocese of Lexington, Kentucky. I made first vows in August 2022 for one year, and renewed them in August 2023 for a further period of three years.]] I wondered what it means for her to say she had completed a period of initial formation? What is usual for a diocesan hermit? 

I am asking partly because you said Christian Matson could not have experienced a true novitiate but was really participating in a guestship when she was with the Benedictines in Portsmouth. As you might guess, people here are really divided over Christian's life with us here in Kentucky. I have mainly wondered how she could be working in the theatre and be considered a hermit. A lot of comments have had to do with refusing to be open with the people of Lexington about her sexuality or gender or being allowed by Bishop Stowe to become a hermit at all. Some have made accusations of narcissism.]]

This reference to initial formation seems to be another statement that means whatever Cole wants it to mean. The same is true of novitiate (more about that below). Ordinarily "initial formation" means a period of formation leading to first vows, though it can also mean the period of formation leading from entrance to readiness for perpetual profession. In community, the time from first vows to perpetual vows is also called juniorate because one becomes a brother or sister with the limited rights and obligations of a junior in the community. When this is true, we talk about the period after perpetual profession as a period of ongoing formation. 

With regard to diocesan hermits, the tendency is to speak of the years (and I do mean years) from the time the person begins living as a hermit to the time the chancery admits them to perpetual profession under c 603 as the period of "initial formation." Because there are no set time frames for diocesan hermits (generally speaking, these really don't work very well with this vocation), we tend to mark a variety of experiences and the way these mark us. Especially, we develop the capacity to write a liveable Rule of life through this period.  I have not seen anyone do this in less than 3-5 years, and for most of us ten years is more typical of what we count as a period of "initial formation".

But yes, Cole is different in this apparently. Not only had he never lived as a hermit before making vows, he seems not to have written his own Rule of life and was admitted to first vows without any preparation. (I know because he wrote me that the religious Sister writing his vow of poverty  only understood it from the perspective of cenobitical religious life and Cole wondered if I could help her write it; he also noted there were several other places in the Rule he needed assistance with.) In other words, I don't see how Cole can claim to have finished initial formation as a solitary hermit because I don't see where he ever actually began it. Six to eight weeks before his first scheduled attempt at profession in Lexington (25. August.2022) he was still living in a Camaldolese house in San Luis Obispo garnering information on forming a community of artists. 

Novitiate in Portsmouth Abbey, Rhode Island?

In my comments on Cole not having lived a true novitiate I had a couple of things in mind. The first is the mindset with which one enters a novitiate period, namely, one receives a new name, is clothed with some version of the congregational habit, and essentially adopts a new family. One lets go of the dreams and expectations one had in terms of the world outside the monastery to find God and be found by God here. And one does all of this with the intention of allowing this family to be one's own for the rest of one's life. One commits to loving these Brothers or Sisters and to becoming the person this community needs and God calls one to be. There is a commitment to conversion of self as part of the future of this community in their unique embodiment of religious or monastic life. I think this commitment is especially true in a community like that of Portsmouth since in the Benedictine life one prepares to vow stability in this community for the rest of one's life. Cole, however, entered this period without this kind of commitment. He wanted to learn about creating a community of artists, and I believe he took the classes a novice would take to understand Benedictinism and the nature of the evangelical counsels; still, Cole's period of residence in this community was understood to be temporary without the usual mindset or expectations of a Benedictine novice (or the correlative mindset and expectations of the professed monks). 

The second thing I had in mind was the absence of any sense of vulnerability to the prospect of being sent home at any time due to the conclusion that one was not called to this life or at least to this community. Because Cole did not come here with the sense of giving himself over to a mutual process of discernment or eventually being admitted to simple vows, he really did not have the same stake in things as others in his group or class. I don't mean to suggest that novitiate is a period of overweening anxiety or fear that one will be sent home at any moment, but there is both a subtle and not-so-subtle awareness that one is more than a student in novice-level coursework work and there is more at stake than some academic achievement; as a novice, one knows that while one is deeply respected by the other members of the community, one is not a peer, but truly a novice allowing oneself to be socialized by seniors and taking on this role in all humility and hope. 

For both of these reasons, I believe that Cole never had a true sense of having entered a novitiate. I wonder how this long-guestship was financed as well. If Cole was paying for the privilege of learning in this community and paying for room and board as well, then that too would change the dynamics of the process involved. Communities invest in their novices. Novices are not there paying tuition. They allow and in their own way assist the community to grow precisely as a community, and thus too, they are interdependent upon one another in ways guests will never truly be. Finally, a novitiate is not a matter of romanticized role-playing; it is about living one's life at this time and in this place with these specific brothers and/or sisters in response to a real call by God --- a call that will change one into a monk or nun who prays his/her entire life as an act of worship. Yes, there is newness and the novelty of being called Brother or Sister while donning a habit each day, but again, this is not a matter of role-playing; rather, it is a matter of learning that, contrary to life outside the monastery, one is emphatically NOT role-playing. Instead, one comes to appreciate that this is who God calls one to be --- in all of one's potential, brokenness, weakness, giftedness, creativity, and so forth.

Miscellaneous Questions and the USCCB:

There are probably several questions you have heard and even raised yourself that you might want to get back to me on. Right now, (as of today) it is clear that the Bishops of the USCCB are taking on the situation in Lexington in committee (Committee on Canonical Affairs and Church Governance) and will resolve the situation in a way that is consonant with Catholic teaching regarding transgender life and its ability to embrace consecrated life. (Here Bp Paprocki seemed open to allowing transgender individuals who "detransition" as much as possible and truly wish to discern an eremitical vocation to do so.) I sincerely believe the USCCB will find the professions undertaken in Lexington to be invalid for several reasons. I hope that they will refuse to allow the way they address the situation to influence c 603 life more widely than this. This was the single misapplication of c 603 to an unformed individual with an agenda. Both bishops and canonists who advise them need themselves to be advised on the use of c 603 for solitary hermits; they must come to know that this is a significant vocation with clear and substantive content, charism, and mission! From the little I heard and read, Bishop Paprocki sounded as if he wanted to address the given situation and not go further afield. I sincerely hope that is the case!