On Merton, Suffering, Solitude, and the Making of the Hermit

[[The contemplation of the Christian solitary is the awareness of the divine mercy transforming and elevating his own emptiness and turning it into the presence of perfect love, perfect fullness.]] [Merton's ideal solitaries] are thus, [[the paradoxical, tormented solitaries for whom there is no real place; men and women who have not so much chosen solitude as been chosen by it. And these have not generally found their way into the desert either through simplicity or through innocence. Theirs is the solitude that is reached the hard way, through bitter suffering and disillusionment.]]

[[Dear Sister, I have wondered for some time what makes a person want to be a hermit. It just never made sense to me unless the person was broken and embittered by life and needed to withdraw from that by giving up on people and even on God. It's the solitude that I can't justify. Community made sense but not solitude unless hermits were people who were unable to participate in community for some reason. When you have written about the creation of the hermit heart in your own life it sounds like it involved a lot of suffering but you don't come across as bitter or broken. Thomas Merton has written about this very thing (please see what I quoted from "The Hermitary" site); have you seen this already? But I wondered what makes your heart a hermit heart and not the heart of an embittered survivor of suffering. Is the answer in what Merton wrote about mercy?

Do you think Merton is correct in characterizing the "ideal solitary" as he does? If this is true it must be really difficult for dioceses to "discern" this kind of vocation. Do you know what I mean? In religious life candidates are screened for their health and wholeness and backgrounds involving suffering raises red flags for the vocation personnel. But if ideal hermits are "tormented solitaries" what does a diocese look for in determining authentic eremitical vocations?]]

Thank you for your observations and questions. I have written recently again, though briefly,  about fraudulent hermits; what you are asking about is really one of the more significant ways people betray the eremitical vocation or substitute an inauthentic version of the life for the real thing. What Merton was saying first of all, as I read him, is that solitude must open the door to the one wishing to live an eremitical life; one cannot simply decide to live solitude and do it without such an opening. The second thing I believe Merton is writing about is how the door of solitude is often opened to a person. One of the main ways is through suffering that isolates in any of the many ways this occurs. But I agree with you that suffering is not sufficient to truly discern an eremitical call; it is a beginning and might be suggestive but it is not definitive.

On Unredeemed Suffering and the Door to Solitude:

Moreover, if a person has nothing but her suffering and if that suffering  remains unredeemed or un-transfigured by the grace and love of God, she will never be a hermit in the proper (Christian) sense; instead she will remain an isolated, broken, and possibly embittered person but one who is largely, if not entirely incapable of proclaiming the Gospel with her life. Such a person ought not be admitted to profession as a canonical hermit because while she may "not have a place" --- one element of Merton's description --- neither can she live out the mission or charism of the canonical hermit. Genuine solitude is redeemed and transformed isolation. It is marked or characterized by its relational tenor, a unique but very significant and paradoxical form of relatedness, of ecclesiality and community. The place the hermit has is unusual but very real. The door solitude opens to us is unlocked in part by significant and long-term suffering a person experiences through the first half of her life, but at the same time the door of Solitude can only said to be opened if the person has come to know the potential healing and transformation of her woundedness by the unqualified love and eternal life of God.

While persons whose first half of life may be marked by significant suffering are sometimes important and illustrative of the way some eremitical vocations are born, as you say they are sometimes also difficult cases in regard to discernment by dioceses. This is especially true if suffering remains the defining dimension of the person's life.  When I began this blog more than a decade ago I wrote about one needing to be a hermit in some essential sense before one approached a diocese with a request to be professed. What I meant then and still hold is that one has to move from being an isolated person for whom physical solitude may merely mirror or even exacerbate the alienation that can come from and be a source of suffering to being one for whom solitude is a relational reality which heals isolation and is the context for real reconciliation. Hermits know more than physical solitude; they know communion -- with God and others. And this means they can (and in fact must) know the healing of whatever suffering marked their earlier years. When dioceses work with potential candidates for profession they must look for those persons for whom physical solitude is a unique form of communion and symptom and source of healing.

My Own Healing and Growth Work:

In my own inner work I have become even more convinced of this truth.  Both of the quotations you cited are important but in regard to becoming the hermit I am called and consecrated to be I especially resonate with the first one. [[The contemplation of the Christian solitary is the awareness of the Divine mercy transforming and elevating [her] own emptiness and turning it into the presence of perfect love, perfect fullness.]] This is the one which mirrors my profession motto, [[(God's) power is made perfect in weakness]] --- a motto I chose precisely because it reflects first the nature of the Christ Event and then my own story with and in light of the grace of God. My own story involves suffering, yes, but far more than that it is the story of God's grace, a grace which, as I have said here many times, brings light out of darkness, life out of death, and meaning out of senselessness and absurdity. What Merton says, what Paul says, what the Christ Event makes real in space and time, and what authentic hermits of all sorts also say is that suffering plunges a person into the depths of isolation and readies her to hear God's invitation to depend on God alone. When, and to the extent that invitation is accepted one's life is entirely transfigured into one of wholeness and holiness, one is defined in a new way. Suffering may not ease entirely and may even increase in some ways, but it will no longer be the thing which drives and defines the person.

 And this means, of course, that one whose defining experience is the mercy of God will show this to those discerning her vocation. The one who wishes to become a diocesan hermit will reveal the mercy of God as the ground and source of her suffering's redemption and her life's transfiguration. Without this her solitude will be nothing more than physical and maybe spiritual, and emotional isolation. She will be a lone individual --- her suffering will have made her this on a number of levels, but she will not be a hermit in the sense the Church uses the term. On the other hand those individuals who have made the journey that Merton describes, the journey through serious suffering and into the mercy and love of God, may well have discovered the eremitical world solitude herself (and only "Solitude" herself) admits them to.

Summary: A Note to Dioceses on the Charism of Diocesan Eremitical Life

To reiterate then, Dioceses which are careful in their discernment will not eschew a person whose life is full of suffering so long as that life is also one defined and clearly transformed by the grace of God experienced in eremitical solitude. Such a diocese is careful to look not only at the suffering but at the fruits of that suffering which would  demonstrate it has been transfigured by the mercy of God. When the latter is not clearly present, when for instance, the person's message is self-centered and full of expressed pain but little else, when, that is, her life is defined by her suffering and not by the grace of God, the diocese will have to wait and watch to see what kind of vocation is actually present. They will give the person some reasonable time in physical solitude to see what changes occur. Generally speaking, if the person is called to be a hermit, isolation and a focus on suffering will be transformed by the love of God into genuine solitude (a unique but very real expression of reconciliation and community in Christ)  and the proclamation with her entire life of the healing and redemptive love of God.

Also generally speaking, all of this reflects the way the heart of a hermit is created and the door to eremitical solitude is opened when there is a background or history of significant suffering. It reflects the way a life comes to reveal the charisma or gift to Church and World c 603 calls "the Silence of Solitude" in such cases.  Suffering of all sorts can hollow one out and make one yearn for answers to the question of self that only God can provide. One lives the questions associated with meaning: does my life make sense? Is it meaningful? Is it moved by love, both as giver and receiver? How can I make sure my life is meaningful by ministering to others in a way which is redemptive for them?  Why have or am I suffering in the apparently gratuitous way I have or am? Where is God in all of this and how can I live for God and others? As important as living the questions is, through the grace of God mediated to one in all the ways it comes to us, one will also come to live the answer: namely, I have lived/am living all of this so that the Gospel of God in Jesus Christ is proclaimed loudly and clearly (or silently but with clarity and poignancy!) and the God whose power is perfectly revealed in weakness resonates within my heart causing it to sing a Magnificat of gratitude and praise.

Alone a Lot: A Call to Eremitical Life??

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

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

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

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

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

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

Questions on the Experience of Redemption at the Heart of Eremitical Life

 [[ Hi Sister Laurel, I began reading your blog once in a while a couple of years ago just out of curiosity about hermits. It never occurred to me that this was a meaningful vocation and I held a lot of the preconceptions and prejudices you have mentioned from time to time. But even as I let go of some of these I could not see the real difficulty or significance of the vocation. I mean I knew I was not called to it myself, but it seemed that so long as a person is an introvert then it wouldn't be all that difficult  -- especially if they didn't have something better to do! Like someone wrote you a while back, you just say some prayers, do a little gardening, stay away from people and what was such a big a deal? Okay, so now I am beginning to get it.

When you wrote about the "redemptive experience" that MUST be at the center of the life, or the activity of God which has to stand at its heart I began to see this as a real vocation. Then you said that unless that [redemptive activity of God] is there a diocese would have nothing to discern and nothing they could give to the candidate either. And then you also said that this redemptive experience could make sense of a life that was empty and absurd otherwise and something clicked for me. It's all about God and what we allow him to do with us! I was taught that in religion classes, but I just hadn't seen the hermit's life as an image of or witness to that same truth! And now I see that that is the ONE thing a hermit is called to witness to. The ONE and only thing!! That is really amazing to me! . . . How did you come to know this?  Did you learn about it in theology school? Was it because you were chronically ill? And what is the hardest thing about it, about living as a hermit I mean? Can I write you about this again when my questions become clearer?]]

Thanks for your patience in waiting for me to finally get to this. I think I can hear the excitement of discovery in what you write. The questions you asked are clear enough, I think, but more about that at the bottom! So is the insight you are so excited about (which I will tweak a little here), namely, it's all about God and what God DOES do with our lives if only we allow God to love us as radically as God wills to love us; that is the ONE thing a hermit is called to witness to, the ONE and only thing. Let me start there. There are many ways to describe the general and universal call involved. We can talk about glorifying God, being the counterpart and dialogue partner of God, being radically obedient to God, letting God be sovereign, living the love of God, allowing the mercy of God to do justice in our lives and world, letting God make us holy, "I, yet not I, but Christ in me," conversion, redemption, etc. In some ways we are each and all of us called to this vocation. It is what it means to be truly human.

How Does the Eremitical Vocation Differ?

It seems to me that what makes the call of the hermit different is that it is in becoming and being this [expression of God's redemption] and nothing else, and doing so in the silence of solitude that is the gift (or charism) she brings to the Church and world; it is the one "ministry" she is absolutely called to in the Church. Unlike with most other vocations, it necessarily occurs in eremitical silence and solitude and in some ways is completely hidden from others. She is called to be herself in God --- to be the prayer God makes of her and to do that in stricter separation from "the world" and in the silence of solitude. Everything else, including intercessory prayer, is secondary to this.  In this call she mirrors the radical solitude of Jesus who certainly lived for and ministered to others, but who first and foremost was the unique counterpart of the One he called Abba, and was most truly human only to the extent that he was profoundly and even exhaustively open and responsive to God thus revealing and implicating God in everything he said, was, and did.

Though this was true in the apparent failure of his healing and preaching ministry, it was most exhaustively true in the abject weakness, emptiness, and absurdity of his passion and sinful or godless death by crucifixion. Everything Jesus did and said was secondary to and an expression of his allowing God to be revealed (made known and made real in space and time) in and through every moment and mood of his life. Jesus revealed the extent to which the One he called Abba is "with us". He did so in what must have been a very painful solitude --- a solitude marked by misunderstanding and failure or even a refusal to understand him, by a sense of mission even his closest disciples contradicted, rejected, or betrayed, by the realities of failure, sin, shame, incredible physical and emotional pain, abandonment and godless death, but above all a solitude shaped by a remarkable life-giving intimacy with God. It is this vocation to be God's counterpart, to enter into and witness to a similar intimacy with God that stands at the root of everything else Christians live and do to which a hermit is called.

One point I should address here is the idea of paradigm or, maybe even better, that of icon. I do not mean to argue that the eremitical vocation is something special in the sense of it being elitist. Every human being is called to the same identity as God's counterpart, the same existential solitude, the same dialogue with God, the same humanity which occurs in union with God. Just as I recognize that Consecrated Virgins are icons of the Church as Bride of Christ, and just as I argue that they are equally icons of the nuptial relationship every person is called to eschatologically, so I argue that hermits are icons of the dialogical relationship constituting a humanity where Divine power is made perfect in weakness. They serve to remind people of a universal truth, a universal identity. They are paradigms of this. However, this also means that in many ways the hermit's path to this witness differs significantly from the path of others. Others are called to share God's love via different gifts and talents and to do so in a multitude of forms of active ministry. In other words the mission and charism of their lives is different from that of the hermit but the redemptive reality at the heart of their lives and identity as human is the largely same.

Here Paul's image of the single body with many members and different functions is critically important. The hermit vocation is not a higher vocation, a way in which one is elect and others are not. It is simply a path some are especially fitted for and called to by the combination of life circumstances and Divine love. The Church's proclamation of the Gospel requires priests and religious, mothers and fathers, doctors, nurses, teachers, scientists and others following innumerable paths in service of humanity, and in fact of the whole of creation. None of these are called to a "higher" vocation than any other. Each and all of us are called to know God and to reveal or witness to that "knowledge" to others. I say that genuine eremitical vocations are rare --- and they are. But their rarity is not a denial or contradiction of their universal relevance -- nor of the universal solitariness of human being.  It affirms these even as it poses with a particular vividness the question which human beings are and the answer whom God is.

Your Questions:

How did I come to know this? Was it through school, chronic illness or what? The answer is that I have come to know this in a variety of ways. Certainly college and graduate school were important for learning Paul and Mark's theologies of the cross and otherwise becoming familiar with Scripture. Though this is so much more than lectures and book learning it remains true that lectures and book learning have helped and continue to help keep me related to God, anchored in theological truth, as they provide language, categories of thought, and interlocutors who can help me reflect on my own experience and check my theologizing.

Prayer is a second source, especially contemplative prayer in solitude. There's no way to describe briefly all the ways this has been important though I have talked about some of this in the blog piece Central Formative Theological Insights. The insights described there were also profoundly linked to my experience of God in prayer --- or, maybe better said, to the experiences of reality and self supported and empowered by prayer. The notion of a God who is profoundly present within us, who is a constant source of life and meaning even when everything else seems to militate against these is as much a result of prayer as it is a theological insight. The place of prayer in my life is a source and foundation which makes the theological insights a good deal more than clever intellectual constructs. Prayer calls for theology and theology itself leads to and cannot really be done without prayer. The two are inextricable. It is possible to say that together they are a single source of my knowledge of God and the place God plays in my life.

Chronic illness is a third source because it is a significant piece of the context of everything else that happens in my life, of all that I am and do. It put an end to future plans and preparation, made a number of gifts useless, isolated me in significant ways, was often dehumanizing, and confronted me with my own weakness and complete dependence upon God for the redemption and transfiguration of my life. It was in this way I came to know that existing in isolation was dehumanizing while existing in solitude (that is, in communion with God and with others in God) made me truly human. Above all, chronic illness confronted me with the question of meaning; my life was a scream of anguish and in the infrequent times that scream became more or less articulate, the question it clamored for an answer to was, "WHY??!!" At the same time though, it made it important that I not adopt a "solution" which was merely a way of validating my isolation.

Once I became a hermit (long before becoming diocesan) I began to live, read about and reflect even more seriously on the eremitical vocation. That too was an important source of knowing that "it's all about God and what God DOES do if only we allow God to love us as radically as God wills to do" that is the ONE thing hermits MUST witness to precisely in stricter separation and the silence of solitude, the really meaningful and rare gift hermits bring to the Church and world. You see, it was eremitical solitude (not the isolation of chronic illness or the solitude of introversion) that convinced me of the vast difference between these two realities. It also, as you probably know since you have been reading here for a couple of years, taught me the difference between using gifts and talents and being made to be the gift precisely in being redeemed. My illness was not healed, many of my gifts and talents remain essentially unused and unusable but all of these and more become a larger gift which witnesses to the love and faithfulness of God that reconciles and makes whole.

Above all then it was the lesson I was taught by coming to know and be known by the love of God. That love received in faith transfigured my life in so many ways that of course I felt called to witness to this. What the other elements helped me learn was that, as you say, that was the ONE and only thing I was called to witness to with a kind of starkness eremitical life does best. I am not a hermit because, for instance and like some, I am mainly critical of the institutional Church --- though my solitude may provide the perspective from which I, like the desert Fathers and Mothers, may be critical and even prophetic. I am not a hermit because I think everyone is called to something similar --- though I would agree that solitude itself is the most universal of vocations and my life can point to the relatedness of which that solitude consists. It took me a number of years to come to the conclusion that this really was the ONLY thing I was truly called to witness to.

What is the Hardest Thing?

I am not sure how to answer this. Living as a hermit is an integrated whole and sometimes it is all easy while other times it is all hard. Perhaps the single hardest thing (sometimes) is giving myself completely to God in all things; there is such a pull to keep something "for myself" despite the fact that I understand the paradox that I only truly possess myself to the extent I: 1) give myself to God and 2) receive myself from God as complete gift. As I wrote here not too long ago, it is one thing to offer God my entire life in baptism or religious profession and to renew that offer each day, for instance; it's entirely another to actually give my Self to God as exhaustively as possible and as willed by God. But there is another paradox involved here which makes what is sometimes difficult a good deal easier and that is that to the degree I am forgetful of self, to the degree my discernment focuses on the life which summons me. That life is bigger than I am and yet it is something I can attend to and focus on without getting lost in self. Here giving my entire self to God means receiving the gift God gives --- the gift God is! --- and doing so without limit.

This distinction between giving one's life and giving one's' entire self by allowing God to love one exhaustively has always been hardest and is at the root of my writing or talking about the dangers (and temptation) of mediocrity and compromise in eremitical life. It is also at the root of moving from being justified to being made whole and truly holy or of standing in right relationship with God (being righteous) to living in union with God.  Another way of saying this is to point to the difference between praying and being made God's own prayer in our world. How much easier it is to pray at a number of set places during the day than to allow ourselves to become the word event which glorifies God at each and every moment.

Now let me be clear, or at least try to be clearer. I do not mean we are called to an obsessive kind of self-consciousness in which we become incapable of spontaneity or joy. Just the opposite is the case. I mean merely that the tendency to compartmentalize (or individualize) our lives and to see them in terms of the things we do ourselves and the things God does, or the things we do ourselves and the things we do through and with the power of God, is very easy for us. (It is also a symptom of our sinful state of estrangement and alienation.) Much harder to hold onto is an awareness that everything we do or are is meant to be done through, with, and in God. It is easy to think of ourselves as God's partners in this or that. Much harder to hold onto indeed is the truth that we are only human, we are only truly ourselves to the extent it is not us but Christ in us who is living this life.

One person (A. M. Allchin?)  puts it this way, "We are not individuals, we are persons!"  Living from this reality is a matter of mindfulness and real attentiveness, an awareness we can only acquiesce to, in, and through the grace of God. This truth and the process of realizing this truth in space and time is what the Eastern Church termed "theosis"; it is the result of redemption and the remaking of our minds and hearts by God but it also involves our conscious choice to live from and for this remaking. lt involves a trust in its truth, a continuing act of faith that this is really the way things are and are made to be by God's love. It depends on our allowing the true self (what Merton calls, "a spontaneity") to really be when it is more usual to live from the false self and its ingrained habits, resistance, and complacency.

The second single hardest thing is discerning the degree of active ministry I am truly called by God to do. My motives regarding doing active ministry are one of the more conflicted things I experience. Discerning when and where to do active ministry means moving through self-consciousness, to a much deeper consciousness of self-in-God and the ways in which I am called to live, and then finally, to a forgetfulness of self in Christ which empowers whatever choice needs to be made so it is truly for others. I try to live my Rule while staying open to patterns which may signal a need to change that occasionally or make something within it more concrete. I also try to accommodate those ways in which I am asked or may feel called to serve which are important both to those to whom I minister actively and to the enrichment and deepening of my eremitical life. All one can do is to continue choosing what is truly worthy of oneself and one's calling, to do so in God, and thus hone or purify that process with each and every choice.

You may have been expecting an answer about more concrete things that are difficult for me. If that's the case then yes, please do ask any specific questions that have been raised for you. I'll do my best to respond.

Hermits, The Antithesis of the Rugged Individualist or the One Who is a Law unto Herself!

[[Dear Sister, I have two different questions. 1) You once wrote a piece about hermits, canon law, and herding cats. I remember you both agreed and disagreed with the person who said legislating for hermits was impossible and like herding cats. Recently you said in another piece that hermits were like fingerprints, each unique but with recognizable patterns, whorls, loops, etc. I know you think highly of canon 603 but I wondered if you thought it was sufficient to legislate the life of solitary hermits. Does there need to be canon  law on the formation of hermits, on time frames prior to profession and final profession?  2) Also, why do you see individualism as so completely antithetical to eremitical life?  Aren't hermits the consummate individualists? If each is an 'ecclesiola' as Peter Damian (and you too) say, then doesn't this make each hermit a kind of law to him or herself?]]

Is Canon 603 Sufficient to Govern and Nurture Solitary Eremitical Life?

First of all I do believe canon 603 is sufficient, generally speaking. I think there need to be some guidelines about formation, time frames, minimum ages and experience required for admission to discernment and profession, as well as regarding the distinction between being a lone individual and being a hermit in some essential sense, and also some significant cautions on what canon 603 is NOT meant for. However, at this point in time I don't see any reason these things would need to be codified in canon law or through an actual papal motu proprio for instance.

Bishops  and Vicars for Religious need to be able to discern with each candidate while doing justice to the flexibility of canon 603 and the diversity which is part of the history of eremitical life itself, but they also need additional help understanding the Church's desert tradition and the very challenging history of this canon so that not just anything is called eremitism. Especially they must recognize that not just any form of aloneness is called "eremitical solitude" nor can just any form of living and working alone be called eremitical life. The misuse of canon 603 as a stopgap to profess individuals who wish to be religious while merely desiring or needing to live alone is a significant problem that must be avoided. The vocation must be a truly eremitical one. At this point it seems sufficient that in addition to the canon and the expertise of canonists and theologians (especially ecclesiologists), hermits contribute their own experience in these matters and dioceses do the same. One of the reasons for this blog as well as for something like the Network of Diocesan Hermits is to allow for this kind of reflection in a way which is available to anyone looking for assistance in implementing canon 603.

Solitary Hermits and Individualism:

Some critics of this blog have been very critical of diocesan hermits providing insights from their own living and reflecting on canon 603, the life it governs and nurtures, and therefore, their reflection on the kinds of life it absolutely should not be mistaken for. Whenever I have fielded questions or objections or even quotations from these folks I have the sense that they are most upset by my position that not just anything goes, not just anything can be called eremitical life in line with the Church's own understanding and eremitical tradition. Canon 603 is not meant to profess those who simply could not be professed any other way (though there will be a handful who could not be professed in community and who discover a genuine call to eremitical life). It is not meant to govern a nominally pious life without meaningful theological education and formation in spirituality --- especially in desert spirituality. Neither is it meant for those who want to live some silence and some solitude (even significant amounts of these) or desire mainly to separate themselves from others or from the post-conciliar Church, but who do not really hunger to live a LIFE of the silence of solitude.

It is the notion that "the silence of solitude" is the charism of the diocesan hermit, the gift the Holy Spirit creates in her life and the gift she herself brings to the Church and world that might help me answer your questions about individualism. A lot of people think of a hermit's work as praying for people and while I agree that is an important piece of our lives, I don't think it is the main work we do. Rather, our main work is to allow God to work in us, that is to become God's own prayer --- a prayer that witnesses to the fact that the grace of God is truly sufficient for us and God's power is made all-embracing (i.e., is perfected) in weakness. There is nothing individualistic in this. Instead there is a real dying to self so that one might be fully transparent to God, fully human in God, and witness to all of this so that others might also allow themselves to become who and what they were made to be in God. The hermit is a person in communion; they live in communion with God, with themselves, and in the heart of the Church for the sake of others. There is no room for individualism nor selfishness here.

Like a local Church the hermit is an ecclesiola, a little Church. But this means she represents the whole and is intimately related to the larger Church, first every other ecclesiola (Christian person), then the parish, then the diocesan Church, and then finally the universal Church. Each person, but especially the hermit is a microcosm of what it means to be called, to live the response in a way which is always transparent to the God who calls, and to do so for the sake of others. The hermit lives a life in which she is free to plumb the depths of communion with God. She is free to be herself in the fullest way possible in an intense and all-encompassing relatedness. She is not, however free to do just anything she wants. That is not freedom after all; it is license and it is similarly the hallmark of individualism. Thus I say the eremitical vocation is actually antithetical to individualism. To represent the Church (as any Christian is ecclesiola) and to live this vocation in the name of the Church is to be a person-in-relationship more than it is to be an individual in some senses of that term.

Hermits, A Law Unto Themselves?

The canon 603 hermit is never a law unto him or herself. Her life is given over to the will of God and to the law which that God writes on her heart. She lives a life whose parameters are defined by Canon and proper law (Rule or Plan of Life) as well as by the living eremitical tradition of the Church. It is a life nurtured by the Sacraments, fed by the Word of God and lived under the various forms of supervision of Bishop, delegate, spiritual director, and pastor as well as by an oblate chaplain or other similar figure in cases of oblature or associateship with an institute of consecrated life. She is vowed to God through profession of the evangelical counsels and thus she is bound to obedience to God in the hands of a legitimate superior; she is bound, in other words, both morally and in law. The "hermit" who is not so bound (and who thus mistakes license for genuine freedom) has been a perennial thorn in the side of eremitical leaders and reformers throughout the history of the Church. St Benedict castigated these, St Peter Damian did likewise as did Paul Giustiniani and many many others.

Certainly the notion of hermit as rugged individualist and law to him or herself is common as a stereotype. A few years ago I blogged about a journalist's t stupid identification (sorry but it's true!) of Tom Leppard and one other person as living classic and somehow edifying lives of eremitical solitude. I would suggest you check out those posts with labels like "stereotypes," "Tom Leppard," etc. In contemporary theology (Paul Tillich, 20 C.) we would recognize the autonomous person as antithetical to the theonomous person; that is, we would find the person who was a law unto herself as antithetical to the one who has God as her law (that is, the Lord and driving dynamic of her heart). The hermit is almost a pure paradigm of theonomous life. Certainly this alone is what s/he aspires to and represents when s/he says that by her life s/he witnesses to the fact that God alone is sufficient or that in God we are called and fulfilled as human beings who live for one another. And isn't this also the definition of Church, namely the community of the called who find their fulfillment and missionary purpose in the God of Love who is both their nomos (law) and telos (goal)?

I sincerely hope this is helpful. Your questions are important ones and ones I am keenly interested in so thanks for those!

On Making the Transition from Lone Person to Hermit and then Diocesan Hermit

[[Dear Sister, I have the impression that you did not choose the circumstances that eventually led you to become a hermit. I also get the impression that you stress that those circumstances weren't enough to make you a hermit or to discern a call to eremitical life. What was it that made the difference for you personally? Did your circumstances change? How did you make the transition from being a lone person to being a hermit "in some essential sense," as you put it, and then, a diocesan (Catholic) hermit who embraced not only an individual vocation but a place in fostering the eremitical vocation in the Church? Is this typical of diocesan hermits?]]

Wow, I am impressed! You have managed to summarize so much important stuff in a few sentences, some of it stuff I have not really written about directly here. Your impressions are spot on too. Add to that your questions are good ones and I have to give you kudos across the board! Thanks! But that being said, the question about making the transition from being a lone person to becoming a hermit in some essential sense is not an easy one to answer. That is true because it is not about any one thing that was helpful, but about a number of things which all came together to confirm a call to eremitical solitude. Anyway, great questions. Let me give them a shot!

No, I did not choose the circumstances which eventually led me to become a hermit. As an adult (and while still a Franciscan) I developed or manifested an adult form of  mixed seizure disorder (Epilepsy) which later proved to be both medically and surgically intractable. Coupled with that, probably because of injuries that occurred during seizures, I developed chronic pain, eventually diagnosed as Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy or (the preferred term these days) Complex Regional Pain Syndrome. Both conditions isolated me from others (including from Mass attendance, or contributions to parish and diocesan life), prevented me from pursuing the career I had been educated and trained for (mainly teaching systematic theology but some clinical pastoral work as well), and caused me some serious and extended questioning about the meaning and value of my life more generally. Today the seizure disorder is better controlled for several separate but mutually contributory reasons (including physical solitude and silence!) while the chronic pain remains a daily reality which requires medications and adjunct therapy "to keep the fire down." While this was enough to isolate me from others, including from the local faith community and most friends, you are correct that it was no where near enough to conclude, 1) I was actually called to become a hermit, nor (much less!) 2) that I was actually a hermit in some essential sense! A transition was required!

Making the Transition from Lone Person to Eremite:

The first real shift occurred in my prayer. Over time I began to develop a more contemplative prayer life and I began to trust that more and more. By the early 80's besides my own doctors who continued to try to control both the seizures and the pain, I was working regularly with a spiritual director and was developing the tools I needed to work through the various bits of healing required by having my life sidetracked by illness and injury. At the same time she helped me begin to trust the various ways God was working in my life and I began to imagine this thing called eremitical life as a result of reading canon 603, which had been published in October of 1983, and then Merton's Contemplation in a World of Action and LeClerq's Alone With the Alone. Merton's work especially fired my imagination here. More and more my work with my director had to do with essential wholeness in the face of disability and my work with doctors became less about control of seizures and more about dealing with disability. While I continued medications, etc, for the medical stuff, the work I was doing with my director became far more important in freeing me to embrace life and become open to seeing the good God would bring out of the situation.

I had begun to experiment with living as a hermit in a conscious way and it began to be the focus of reading, discernment, research, and so forth. Early on in this process I began to write for publication (mainly Review for Religious) so it became clear that as a context for my life eremitism of some sort was truly fruitful in these terms and would lead me to contribute to the life of others and to that of the Church more generally.

Within this context then several things happened. Among them, I embraced a contemplative prayer life marked out by monastic regularity and liturgy, I undertook the lifelong work of regular spiritual direction in a focused way which led to my own increasing and essential wellness in spite of disability, I began to understand the importance of a vocation to be ill within the Church as potentially a way of proclaiming the Gospel of God (whose power is made perfect in weakness!) with a special vividness. This meant that I had begun to see my life and prayer as an important opportunity to make God manifest to others where in the past I would not have seen disability as anything other than an obstacle to a life of such significance.  In time I began to consider and write about Chronic illness as vocation and, for some relative few, as a potential call to eremitical life. Additionally then, I began to understand the main focus of my prayer as being there for God's own sake; solitude took on a distinctly communal hue, the silence of solitude assumed a more Eastern and Desert Elders cast of quies or hesychasm, while ministry to others seemed the natural expression of the compassion empowered by the silence of solitude. Thus, over time I also came to understand the terms of canon 603 radically differently than I had in 1983. All of this growth and integration was spurred by reflection on the eremitical life outlined in Canon 603 and expanded on in other texts.

Throughout these years (@1983-1995+) then, my life shifted from being mainly about myself and my own disability along with the lost opportunities or potential associated with disability and grew in this new perspective. The focus on the illness, and all it brought in its wake had been necessary for a time but now it needed to become more of a subtext in my life -- even as it continued to bring a degree of pathos and gravitas to my life. That is the shift that occurred during this period.) It became very clear that whether I eventually lived my life as a lay hermit or continued pursuing perpetual profession as a diocesan hermit,  eremitism was truly the vocational path which made my own life fruitful and other-centered. Thus, I continued to reflect on and research canon 603; I did so within a Camaldolese context now because I understood the threefold good of the Camaldolese (community, solitude, outreach or evangelization) to be a dynamic expression of the very best that eremitical life could be, not only for hermits but for the whole Church and world-at-large as well.

In other words, eremitical life began to be not only the context of a life of essential wholeness and communion with God which embraced disability and transformed it into an opportunity to proclaim the Gospel with my life, but it was the vocational pathway which made essential wholeness as well as real generosity and concern for others possible. It drove my reading and my theology to some extent (though my theology, which centered on the cross in Paul and Mark, supported this vocational pathway at every point), and it challenged me physically and spiritually to become both more truly solitary (in an eremitical sense) and contemplative as well as more open to community. In short, it engaged me on every level in a constructive way; it made me more compassionate and capable of love, more genuinely dependent on the grace of God for the meaning and shape of my life, and, while it did not bring physical healing, it deprived illness of the power to define, fragment, and dominate my life and over time would even make a gift of disability and limitations. It is what allowed me to eventually write here:

[[In the power of the Spirit and from the perspective of the Kingdom --- it is all of a piece:  Mountaintop experiences and years in the desert; a power made perfect in weakness; a  bit of human brokenness and poverty made a gift to others by the whole-making grace of God; mute isolation  transfigured into the rich communion and communicative silence of solitude; a life redeemed and enriched by love. It is all of a piece ---  epilepsy and ecstasy. I am grateful to have learned that. In fact, I am grateful to have needed and been called to learn that!]] Ecstasy and Epilepsy: It is all of a Piece

When I look back at the main stages this journey required it involved (in a pretty simplified form) movement from 1) being a lone or isolated person who merely imagined what being a hermit might mean to 2) being a hermit as the Church herself understands the term, and finally to 3) being a hermit who lives the life in the name of the Church. Each stage was either preceded or accompanied by significant and entirely necessary theological preparation and spiritual formation. This process has taken 31 years so far and exploring the last stage, both in terms of communion with God and the ecclesial implications of the vocation as I continue to grow personally, will no doubt occupy the rest of my life. I am grateful to God for what (he) has done; God is indeed a master story teller who, from the perspective of absolute futurity, weaves amazingly coherent tapestries with the most inadequate and broken threads!

Transition to Diocesan Eremitical Life:

The last question you ask has to do with the last piece of transition, namely embracing canon 603 life in a way which allowed me to be concerned not only with my own vocation, but with the eremitical tradition itself and diocesan eremitical life as a piece of that living reality. I pursued canon 603 profession beginning in 1985 or so and continued doing so right through perpetual profession in 2007; this is a complicated story and there is no reason to detail it here or now. What is important is that until a few years prior to admission to perpetual profession in 2007 and the years immediately after that, I did not have a particularly strong sense that I was part of a living eremitical tradition, much less that I would have some (small but very real) place in handing on or nurturing that tradition.

Oblature with the Camaldolese certainly was important here but I found that with perpetual canonical profession one comes to know that one has been gifted with rights and obligations beyond baptism; this sense developed especially as people asked questions about the difference between private and public vows or between personal dedication to God and public consecration by God. The difference between validating one's isolation and allowing God to redeem it so that it is transfigured into eremitical solitude was another huge piece of my developing sense of the gift and obligation held in my own eremitical life. It also developed for me as I became more sure I not only understood canon 603 but embodied it in my own way.

Something similar happened with regard to the Camaldolese charism as I moved from understanding it intellectually to having the sense I was a living expression of it and the dynamic within the threefold good which is so characteristic of it. (My life in my parish during the past 8 years contributed greatly to this bit of internalization and integration; in fact it would be hard to overstate its importance here.) A final piece of all this, and one which is not yet solidified within me has to do with my own Franciscanism and where that actually fits. You see, St Francis lived as a hermit for a time and wrote a Rule for hermits which is pretty different from the monastic approaches to eremitical life. I have the sense that my own Franciscanism is stronger than I realized and I am freer to explore that now that I have not only understood but internalized the Camaldolese charism in a foundational way.

I don't know how this Franciscan piece of things will actually shake out but it is part of my own history and life which I am currently examining more closely; in one way or another it will be another piece of becoming responsible for the living tradition we call eremitical life in the Church. It seems to me this concern with the vitality of the tradition itself is really a normal culmination of the movement in my adult life. I moved from an active and largely other-centered life of ministry and preparation for ministry, to a life isolated by chronic illness and concerned with making sense of itself; from there my life shifted again to a solitary and contemplative one which, through the context of eremitical life, was empowered to be lived for God and others in the silence of solitude. Next my life shifted to one which consciously embraced and reflected the place of the Camaldolese charism in achieving this movement, and finally, it involved canonically and publicly embracing eremitical life more generally as a gift of the Holy Spirit to the entire Church and world. Many things mediated the grace of God and brought me to embrace eremitical life; it is this vital if rare and fragile tradition which has made a gift of my life. I am responsible for it both morally and legitimately (in law) --- a responsibility I accept with real joy and not a little awe.

Is this Typical of Diocesan Hermits?

To be honest I don't know if there is a "typical story" for diocesan hermits. I do know that a number of us contend with disability and chronic illness of various types and severity. I also know that none of those with whom I am acquainted believe it is enough to be chronically ill or disabled and isolated in the way this can bring about to conclude one has a vocation to eremitical life! Still, over time each of us discerned that eremitical life created the potential for significantly meaningful and fruitful lives when our illnesses militated against that. We each recognize that eremitical life allows us to live an authentic religious life which is not self-centered even while it requires signifcant physical solitude. Moreover my sense is that each of us has come to an essential wholeness and even holiness in which illness is deprived of its capacity to define and dominate our lives despite the symptoms that trouble us every single day. (This is one of the reasons I personally have very little tolerance for self-labeled "Catholic hermits" for whom eremitical life is little more than an opportunity to justify and wax endlessly about their own "God-willed" isolation and unrelenting physical problems.) Here as in everything in Christian life the truth is, "By their fruits ye shall know them!" --- that reflection of what God has done in one's life in the desert is, perhaps, the only really typical (and compelling!) piece of any genuine hermit's story!

I hope these answers are helpful. It is unlikely I will write about some parts of this again very soon. Still, if I have been unclear or raised additional questions, I hope you will get back to me with those.

More on Hermits and Private vs Public Obligations, Relationships and Witness, etc.

[[Dear Sister, am I right in saying you are in charge of determining how much solitude is healthy for you, or how much is allowed while maintaining other ecclesial obligations? What if you wanted to spend three months or more in absolute reclusion? Could you do that? How does that work? Your own life is governed by a Rule which you wrote. Could a lay hermit (I mean a hermit who is not a canonical hermit) write a Rule which allowed her to be completely reclusive and not go to Mass regularly? Would this be an example of the competing obligations you spoke of earlier today? My guess is this wouldn't work even though she is doing it to be a hermit --- a good thing and pleasing to God as the Catholicam blogger wrote! I say that because it seems kind of elitist to me.]]

Really great questions and points, especially because they tie into yesterday's posts and the discussion begun on two other blogs and continued here.

Yes, I am largely the one responsible for discerning how much solitude and what kind God is calling me to, what I need for a healthy eremitical life as well as what degree and kind of solitude honors other (sometimes competing) ecclesial and personal obligations. However, neither do I do this alone --- nor could I. I couldn't even say that God alone and I determine this without need for others because it is so easy to delude oneself about what is of God, what God is saying, etc. That was one of the reasons people like Peter Damian and Paul Giustiniani had a healthy caution when it came to the solitary eremitical life which they both esteemed; they saw this life as fraught with peril. One really does need to discuss things, consider what others see and hear (especially what they observe in terms of growth in the hermit's own life and the fruitfulness of her solitude), weigh the consequences, engage in mutual prayer, and so forth. The stable relationships canonical standing creates are necessary for truly discerning what God is calling one to. When a large change like that of reclusion is being considered (and even for a diocesan hermit already living substantial physical solitude reclusion is still a significant change and commitment, and not just for the hermit herself  --- more about that below).

You see, complete reclusion is difficult for a diocesan hermit because she really is responsible for her own upkeep, shopping, errands, and sometimes a limited degree of ministry. For me that means I do regular spiritual direction and assist at the parish for a brief time about one morning a week. However, if I were to determine that I really needed to do something like what you suggest, what I would be likely to do to begin anyway, is to 1) take one or two days a month to see clients during the three month period (I cannot responsibly stop working with people while I am discerning this matter), 2) ask for others in the parish to take on what I am doing there while I continued doing maybe one morning a month for that three month period (if someone can take over that day as well, then that would be fine), and 3) request parishioners to help me by shopping for me, bringing me Communion for the week (there are some alternatives to this but something needs to be worked out), etc. I would probably also elect to meet with my own director at least once or twice during this time. This would not be complete reclusion but it would be the closest to which I could responsibly come right now; if after this kind of period of discernment I determined I was being called to even greater solitude for a longer time then I would need to find ways to achieve that. But, again, all this needs to be discerned.

I have written here before that one of the things a diocesan hermit must be open to is the possibility that God is calling her to reclusion and I am quite serious about that. If I were to discern a call to reclusion, then my Bishop would need to agree and an arrangement with my parish and pastor made to ensure regular reception of the Sacraments, occasional Mass here in the hermitage, and some way to get provisions and have errands run. My expectation would be the diocese and parish would assist with some of this but, as you can see, a lot would need to be worked out and other people would need to make commitments to enable my reclusion. A hermit can never forget the love and faith of those who allow  and often help support and empower her to live solitude in their midst; the situation with reclusion is, again, even more dependent on others as she is given the freedom to explore communion with God. Remember that when, and to whatever extent, we are in union with God we will be called and empowered to regard and treat our brothers and sisters with greater love and solicitude, not with less, and certainly not with a mere abstraction of the word love (e.g., "I love humanity; it's people I despise!" "I love souls, but embodied historical persons are not my concern!") even as we spend our time navel-gazing in the "contemplation" of our own existences! Communion with God fires our hearts and focuses us outward even as it draws us in and requires a real and creative introspection. In my experience, that introspection is meant to be at the service of a greater outward focus toward real people.

Private vs Public Commitments, Rights and Obligations

I am sorry if I was not clear regarding what happens when a lay hermit takes on private obligations (as opposed to the public obligations assumed in public profession); let me repeat some and try to clarify as I go. Since a lay hermit is a baptized Catholic she will have assumed and been charged with the public rights and obligations associated with that commitment. The obligation to attend Mass (Sunday obligation) is part of this. These rights and obligations are legitimate ones meaning the person is bound in law to make them a true priority in her life. If a person makes a private dedication as a hermit she or he remains in his/her current state of life and assumes no additional (or potentially modifying) rights and obligations. Additional rights and obligations are extended to a person by the Church and assumed by that person in public professions and consecrations as well as in ordinations and marriages (!). In Public (canonical) vows the Church mediates God's call and the person's response in a way which binds both the person and the Church in a public act and a new ecclesial relationship.

This means that if a non-canonical or lay hermit decides to write a Rule which demanded she miss Mass on Sundays, for instance, she would be putting an entirely private commitment over a public and ecclesial one she has already accepted as a life obligation. She would be putting an entirely private commitment over a public (legal and moral) one she accepted freely and was charged or commissioned with by the Church. One could not do this apart from other really significant extenuating circumstances and remain a Catholic in good standing --- at least not without seriously deceiving oneself. In such a case, the extenuating circumstances would themselves need to be serious enough to permit the person to miss Mass; being a lay hermit who is privately dedicated to solitude simply wouldn't be sufficient in this way.  In other words, public rights and obligations trump private rights and obligations while legitimate or canonical rights and obligations trump non-canonical rights and obligations in this regard. Because of the differing weights or seriousness of the person's commitments (that is, some that are public and canonical or legitimate, and some which are entirely private) this would not be a good example of what I was speaking about when I mentioned competing obligations; in my usage about that I was referring to competing public and canonical or legitimate obligations all of which publicly (legally and morally) bind the canonically professed hermit.

Public Commitments, A Matter of Relationships and Witness

The reason public vs private are "weighted" in this way is important because of the correlative relationships and witness which attach. Private commitments are, while not unimportant, of less social consequence. After all they are called called private for a reason!  Public commitments issue in public responsibilities to live one's ecclesial commitments in an edifying way and thus, with integrity and with an eye toward how one's actions affect others; this is true even of the hermit whose life is essentially hidden! They involve others, not least in the expectations they allow others to necessarily hold in the committed person's regard; further they are either a witness to others or they represent a betrayal of one's responsibility to witness appropriately to those others. If an avid soccer fan (and a Catholic) sincerely believes God is calling her to watch every game of the World Cup no matter her obligations to spouse, or children, or parish (Church) or God via these other relationships, and decides she is justified in this way, she is lying to herself in one way or another.  Nor is the example she is giving particularly edifying.

To take a  more serious example, if a wife decided she no longer wished to take part in marital relations, nor to care for her family because God was calling her to embrace celibacy and live as a hermit, once again she would be lying to herself and others and failing to witness to the sanctity of marriage and sexual love as she has PUBLICLY committed herself and been commissioned by the Church to do. The Church no longer effectively devalues the Sacramental and legal state of marriage nor profanes marital love in the name of religious life or celibacy as higher values. What then of someone who is legitimately allowed by the Church to call herself a Catholic Hermit and who, without the mutual discernment or approval of legitimate superiors, thereafter claims that God has blocked her way to participate in any significant way in normal ecclesial life (including Mass and the Sacraments) or who contends that the abstract (bloodless) "love of souls" takes the place of concrete love of others? Is this really the message of the Gospel entrusted to the Church? Does this constitute an edifying example of Christian witness? Does it even witness to the vocation of the Catholic Hermit and the way the Church understands that today?

You see, what is also true is that the public commitments in each of these situations is presumed to be an expression of God's will! This is especially so because, as ecclesial realities, they are sanctioned and blessed by the Church. That means there must be pretty significant indications when one proposes changing them for what one privately experiences as the will of God! It also means in some way these private experiences and determinations need to be corroborated or affirmed by others in the Church (meaning pastors, Bishops and their delegates, etc) as well. In the situation you referred to --- a privately dedicated hermit determines she is called by God to reclusion and to cutting herself off from the Sacramental and ecclesial life of the Church symbolized in the minimal obligation of Sunday Mass -- I  was not struck so much by the elitism of the determination (though I certainly agree this person would never allow other Catholics to make the same determination in the name of private revelations and discernment) as I was struck by the extreme individualism, and even narcissism of the situation.

Canon 603 allows for the first time ever in universal law for individuals who are not part of religious communities and congregations to live and explore the depths of the vowed life within the realm of eremitical solitude (communion with God), that is, a life which says God alone is sufficient for us human beings. But it does this with ecclesial vetting, oversight, and support. Far from getting in the way of the individual's relationship with God the structures and relationships set up in canonical standing create a realm of freedom where the individual may truly live a life of assiduous prayer and penance without real concern that she ought to be about something else, some more active ministry, some money-making project for the sake of others, etc.

But the paradox is that this solitary enterprise is taken on for the sake of others and as a specifically ecclesial reality. While other people do not occupy the hermitage with the hermit, their faith and support make this life possible; moreover they look to the hermit for a witness which illumines some dimensions of the Gospel in a particularly sharp or compelling way. The Church has given the faithful this right when it called, professed, and consecrated this hermit from their very midst and then established her hermitage there as well. The bottom line truth here is that the hermitage is a still point in an often chaotic world and this is not for the hermit's benefit alone! She is there at the service of God and others. Not all hermits' lives are good and pleasing to God. A misanthrope's (or other individualist's) isolated shack is not the same as the hermit's dwelling which is always situated in profound relationship to God and others in the heart of the Church.

Physical Solitude as Destructive

[[Sister Laurel, how do what you have called the central or non-negotiable elements of canon 603 rule out people from living an eremitical life? Everyone is supposed to pray assiduously, live more or less penitential lives and I think everyone needs silence and solitude as a regular part of their spiritual lives. Wouldn't you agree? So what is it about canon 603 that helps a diocese determine someone is NOT called to be a hermit? Am I making sense? Also sometimes people say that solitude is dangerous for people. Have you ever seen a case where a person is harmed by living in physical solitude? What happened?]]

Yes, I think this is a sensible and very good question. While all the elements of the canon would suffer in one who was not really called to the life the one that comes to mind first and foremost for me is "the silence of solitude." I have treated it here as the environment, the goal, and the charism or gift of the eremitical life to the Church and world.  I have also noted that it is the unique element of canon 603 which is not the same as silence AND solitude and also distinguishes this life from that of most Christians and most other religious as well.  Just as I believe the silence of solitude is the environment, goal, and gift of eremitical life, I believe it is a key piece of discerning whether or not one is called to eremitical solitude. Perhaps you have watched the downward spiral of someone who is living a form of relative reclusion and who has become isolated from his/her family, friends, and from his/her local parish. Often such persons become depressed, angry, bitter, self-centered and anguish over the meaning of their lives; they may try to compensate in ways that are clearly self-destructive and/or lash out at others. Some turn to constant (or very significant) distraction (TV, shopping, etc) while others use religion to justify their isolation and wrap their efforts at self-justification as well as self-destruction, bitterness, and pain in pious language. One expression of this is to consider themselves (or actually attempt to become!) hermits.

Whatever else is true about their situation it seems undeniable that such a person is NOT called to be a hermit, does not thrive in physical solitude and gives no evidence of living what canon 603 calls "the silence of solitude." In its own way it is terrifying and very sad to watch what isolation does to an individual who is not really called to eremitical solitude or actual reclusion. There is plenty of documentation on this including from prisons where such isolation is enforced and leads to serious mental and emotional consequences. At the very least we see it is ordinarily destructive of personhood and can be deeply damaging psychologically.

Regarding your questions about whether I have ever seen such a situation and what this looked like, the initial answer is yes. Over the past several years (about 7), but especially over the past 3 years, I have watched such a downward spiral occur in someone who wished and attempted to live as a hermit. Besides the signs and symptoms mentioned above, this person's image of God is appalling and has become more so in response to the difficulties of his/her now-even-stricter isolation; in trying to make sense of his/her experiences s/he has come to believe that God directly tests him/her with tragedies and persecution, causes him/her to suffer chronic, even unremitting pain, supposedly demands s/he cut him/herself off from friends, family, clergy, et al (which, at least as s/he reports it, always seems to happen in a way which is traumatic for all involved) and seems to encourage him/her to cultivate a judgmental attitude toward others whose souls s/he contends s/he can read. Tendencies to an unhealthy spirituality and self-centeredness in which this person considers herself to be directly inspired by God while everyone else is moved by the devil, where s/he is right and everyone else is wrong, where s/he is unhappy and feels persecuted when concern is expressed, etc, have hardened as s/he holds onto these "certainties" as the only things remaining to him/her to make any kind of sense of his/her life.

It is, for me at least, both saddening and incredibly frustrating. I want somehow to shake this person and say, "Wake up! When everyone else disagrees with you, when every parish finds certain regular occurrences disruptive and divisive while you contend these are of God, consider you may have gotten it wrong!! You would not be the first nor will you be the last! When the fruits of these occurrences are negative for everyone else and seem to lead to increased isolation and unhappiness for you, please at least consider they are are NOT of God!! When physical solitude is a source of misery and desperation rather than joy and profound hope, when it leads to a "me vs the world" perspective (and I am not referring to 'world' in the sense canon 603 or monastic life uses it in the phrase 'fuga Mundi'!!) rather than to finding oneself belonging profoundly (e.g., in Christ or in one's shared humanity which is grounded in God)--- even when apart from others, consider that what you are living is not right for you. God wants you to be complete and fulfilled in him; more, he wills it! He sent his Son so that you might have abundant life, that you might know his profound love and experience true peace and communion -- even and perhaps especially in your daily struggles! Eremitical solitude can be destructive; it is not the way for you! The personal "noisiness" (physical, emotional, and spiritual) of your isolation is NOT what canon 603 is talking about when it refers to the silence of solitude. Please, at least consider these points!" But of course, she will never hear any of that.

One of the things this ongoing situation has under-scored for me is the wisdom of canon 603's choice of "the silence of solitude" rather than "silence and solitude" as a defining element of the life. It also underscores for me the fact that eremitical solitude is a relational or dialogical reality which has nothing to do with personal isolation or self-centeredness. (Obviously there is a significant degree of physical solitude but this is other-centered, first God and then other people and the whole of creation.) Especially too it says that "the silence of solitude" is about an inner wholeness and peace (shalom) that comes from resting in God so that one may be and give oneself in concrete ways for the love of others. One lives in this way because it is edifying both to oneself as authentically human, and to others who catch the scent of God that is linked to this gift of the Holy Spirit.

A hermit, as I have said many times here, is NOT simply a lone person living an isolated life; neither is eremitical solitude one long vacation nor an escape from personal problems or the demands of life in relationship. In Christianity a hermit lives alone with God in the heart of the Church for the sake of others and she tailors her physical solitude so that her needs (and obligations) for community and all that implies are met. Moreover, not everyone CAN or SHOULD become a hermit any more than anyone can or should become a Mother or a psychiatrist or parish priest or spiritual director. Most people do not come to human wholeness or holiness in extended solitude; further, since extended solitude always breaks down but builds up only in rare cases, embracing it as a vocation can be harmful for one not truly called to it. As I have also written before, the Church recognizes the truth of this by professing very few hermits under canon 603 and by canonically establishing only a handful of communities which allow for either eremitical life or actual reclusion. (Only the Camaldolese and the Carthusians may allow reclusion.) In all of these cases the hermits or recluses are closely supervised and made accountable to legitimate superiors. Medical and psychological evaluations are generally required for candidates and are certainly sought in the presence of unusual or questionable and concerning characteristics.

Please note that the situation I described is unusual in some ways and generally extreme. In every case however, whether extreme or not, a diocese will use the characteristics of canon 603, but particularly "the silence of solitude" understood as Carthusians and other hermits do to measure or discern the nature and quality of the vocation in front of them. They will not use the canon to baptize mere eccentricity or illness and they will look for deep peace, joy, and convincing senses of meaning and belonging which have grown in eremitical solitude over at least several years. Similarly they will look for personal maturity, spiritual authenticity and the ability to commit oneself, persevere in that commitment, and love deeply and concretely. Perhaps I can say something in another post about the other central characteristics of canon 603 and the way they are used to discern when someone does NOT have a vocation to diocesan eremitical life. Assiduous prayer and penance and a life lived for the salvation of others, for instance, can certainly assist the diocese in this way.