Showing posts with label contemplative living. Show all posts
Showing posts with label contemplative living. Show all posts

20 December 2019

Authentic Eremitism vs Stereotypes and the Source of Stereotypes

Dear Sister, I think I understand why you insist that in discerning an eremitical vocation there must be a redemptive experience at the heart of everything. If a hermit's life experience is mainly a desert or wilderness experience then life in physical solitude can just be about escaping or not fitting in unless there is a redemptive experience which transforms all of that, right? Most religious vocations require someone to be physically well but you write about chronic illness as vocation and about that maybe even leading to an eremitical vocation. At the same time something has to transform chronic illness into something more which speaks of wellness and that's where redemption comes in. Do you think the stereotypes associated with hermits came to be when the redemptive experience or element, as you put it, was missing?

Really great question. I never saw it coming as I read the comments that led up to it. Almost everything I write about eremitical life depends upon the redemptive element you spoke of and yes, that certainly includes my impatience with and rejection of stereotypes. The stereotypes I can think of have to do with rejection of others, escapism, an individualism which is antithetical to life in community and often to the generosity it requires; they can involve an emphasis on the difficulty of life in solitude without any focus on the answer it represents for the hermit and all of those living with/in desert situations, and also a piety which is superficial and tends to devotionalism, but not to the prayer and deep love of God, self AND others which profound spirituality makes possible. Stereotypes, it seems to me, take one part or side of eremitical life and runs with it while excluding the completing and paradoxical elements or side which a strong commitment to Christ brings.

Eremitical life is rare but it is not bizarre or essentially inhuman; it can be difficult but its deep meaningfulness makes it a life of genuine joy as well. Hermits go away or withdraw from "the world" (i.e., that which rejects Christ), but not simply to be apart from others; they do it so they can come to communion with God, themselves and with others. They do it so they can grow in their capacity for love and proclaim the Gospel with their lives because this is the way solitude works for them; it is a goal toward which these lives are moving. For any of this to be true means there must be a redemptive experience at the heart of hermits' lives, something which transforms all the superficialities into something deeper and more "real". In my own eremitical life I work hard with my Director, and at all the aspects of eremitical life (prayer, lectio, study, etc.,) not because I am (or am looking to be) some sort of spiritual prodigy (I am not!) but because Christ is the answer to the question I am and comes to me in a silent solitude which will eventually be transformed into "the silence of solitude" and a genuine gift to the Church and world.

In my experience, the physical solitude of eremitical life helps sharpen and bring to expression the question each person is while (when turned to assiduous prayer) giving God all the room God needs to become/be the answer in love and abundant life. That is  the very essence of monastic and eremitical life, the very essence of desert spirituality, the heart of Christian theology's "Theology of the Cross". But without the redemptive experience Christ brings to the desert a (putative) hermit is left like a JBap proclaiming repentance without any sense of the Messiah who will succeed and transcend the significant word of repentance he brings himself. We can find examples of such hermits throughout history and even online. They are often little more than stereotypes and caricatures, voices crying in the wilderness witnessing only to their own pain and inadequacy, their own "spiritual" experiences, but living an isolation that gives the lie to their catholicity. A hermit will know suffering and pain -- of course! But yes, as you say, without a profound and abiding sense of redemption of all of that, they will not be hermits in the sense the Church defines this vocation. The answer they seek must also have come to them in the silence of solitude if they are to witness to more than a sterile silence and loveless aloneness.

Without the redemptive element -- and by this I mean without a participation in the Christ Event in a way which brings wholeness out of brokenness, personal wealth (a fruitful and abundant life) out of poverty, meaning out of absurdity, and a loving humanity out of sinful inhumanity --- the hermit can witness to only one side of the human equation, the side of the lone, sinful individual in search of love and the ultimate healing of emptiness and estrangement. It is out of this milieu that we get stereotypes that disedify and make the eremitical vocation irrelevant at best. All of the essential elements of canon 603 I have written about on this blog over the years, but especially "the silence of solitude" as a unique communal reality, depend on our seeing eremitical life in this way. It must be informed by and witness to the redemption of the human person and transformation of the human heart which comes to us in Christ or it is worse than worthless --- especially in a world of rampant individualism, cocooning, and even misanthropy.

Again, great question; thanks very much for that. The Church understood well what eremitical life was and was not about when it composed this canon Thus, those claiming to be hermits (whether lay or consecrated, canonical or non-canonical) cannot speak only (or even mainly) of pain or struggle; there must be a sense that in Christ isolation is transformed into solitude and the pain and struggle present has been (or is on the way to being) transfigured into the joyful silence we call shalom and stillness the tradition knows as hesychasm. This, unlike in apostolic or ministerial religious life, is the very purpose of eremitical life. Canon 603, after all, describes a redeemed and essentially generous life, not a selfish one dominated by struggle and suffering and certainly not one populated by stereotypes! It is about who we are when God alone is truly allowed to be sufficient for us. It is the hermit's life and who she is made by God to be that is the gift, not the ministry (even that of prayer!!) she does. It is not merely or even primarily about what she does (not even a life of piety and devotionals or suffering and deprivation); these, by themselves, are the makings of disedifying stereotypes. Instead it is the prayer that sings of God's victory over sin and death that she is made by God to be that is the essence of an eremitical vocation.

28 October 2018

Once Again on the Requirements of Age and Self-Support for the Diocesan Hermit

[[ Dear Sister, your post on c 603 and bankruptcy brings up the question of hermits who seem unable to provide adequately for themselves, whether that has to do with housing, medical care, or other needs. I wonder what you would say about a hermit who lives in abject poverty, housing which is not sanitary or habitable, or who has inadequate medical insurance. Catholic Hermit  writes all the time about her living conditions and now has gone to live with family, at least temporarily; she also writes about not having adequate medical insurance. How can her diocese allow her to represent a public vocation as you say, "in the name of the Church," and yet seemingly have none of her real needs taken care of or even live in eremitical solitude?]]

I have written fairly recently in response to a similar series of questions. Here is the link to that post: Questions on Catholic Hermit blog and Hermit.  I have not written recently about the need to live in eremitical solitude rather than with one's family, for instance, so perhaps I can say a bit more about that here; the question affects anyone aspiring to be professed as a solitary hermit so it might be important to discuss at this point. Otherwise, please check the link provided and get back to me if you don't find it answers your specific questions.

Some very few dioceses have broken with received wisdom and professed young hermits (in their 20's or early 30's, for instance) who may then live with their families. I think this is a mistake for several reasons. First, the eremitical vocation, but especially the solitary eremitical vocation is generally understood as a second half of life vocation. It requires individuals to have lived a rich and independent life before giving over everything to a life of such unusual community ("living together alone"), depth, and intensity. It takes time to negotiate all the ways God calls us to fullness of life, to achieve true individuation, develop an essentially contemplative prayer life, and then move to the kind of depth of listening contemplative life requires.

We will try many avenues to develop our personal capacities and serve others and usually, only along these various intellectual, psychological, social, professional, and other avenues will we learn to hearken to the deep inner reality which is at the heart of contemplative life. Secondly, eremitical life under c 603 means one lives alone and deals with all the exigencies of solitary (not isolated) life. It is not ordinarily lived in the midst of one's family, and certainly not by someone who has not achieved true adulthood apart from their families. Again, it takes time to learn to live one's faith in community with the kind of maturity, depth, and intensity necessary before one embraces a solitary vocation which is truly sensitive to and responsible for an ecclesial identity.

As I have noted before, Karl Jung once wrote that solitude could be lived by those with significant early experiences that suited them to solitude, but at the same time, these are rare individuals since the experiences we are speaking of wound and are more likely to make the person uniquely unsuited for eremitical solitude (it can isolate and make isolation relatively comfortable, but this is not the same as eremitical solitude). In either case, the person will need to work through the woundedness that leads to various dimensions of isolation and allow the love of God and others to transform these into the conditions for authentic eremitical solitude.

In the main this will happen before one can discover a genuine call to eremitical life; in some cases one will need to continue this work at deeper levels of healing and transformation once she is professed. (Because one commits to  live eremitical solitude or "the silence of solitude" in the name of the Church, diocesan hermits are obligated to undertake the healing work necessary to be sure isolation is transfigured and transformed into eremitical solitude and the quies, or stillness of hesychastic silence.) In any case, those who continue to live at home with their families have not yet lived eremitical solitude, and in my opinion, have not yet discerned nor been sufficiently formed to live eremitical solitude.

Even diocesan hermits can run into situations which make temporary living arrangements with family, friends, convents and monastic communities necessary. These need to be discerned and embraced as truly temporary. If they are made necessary by health problems or finances, a diocese will need to discern with the hermit whether or not she will be able to once again live as a solitary hermit. (Living on the grounds of a monastery is not the same situation; in such communities it is typical that the diocesan hermit lives a significant solitude while being a significant part of the monastic and parish or diocesan community.) After years of living as a solitary hermit it may well be one will need caregivers or be required to live in a care facility (especially where one where other religious and priests retire!) and some degree of healthy solitude can be maintained. In such instances no diocese will dispense the hermit's vows; however, if the hermit is relatively young, has many years before her and is simply incapable of living alone or of supporting herself adequately as a solitary hermit, a diocese may well decide her vows should be dispensed (or never allowed or received in the first place) --- and rightly so I think.

Whether the Church is right in her stance on the self-support of diocesan hermits or not (and in general, I believe she is), those who developed c 603, write about it in an expert and canonical capacity, and who live it in season and out,  understand that living with one's family and being generally incapable of living solitary eremitical life as self-supporting does not allow one to witness to the essence of the eremitical vocation, namely, that God alone is sufficient for us. Only very rarely have bishops departed from received wisdom in this matter and professed the too-young or yet-too-dependent. My sense from these professions is that c 603 is still insufficiently understood or appreciated and esteemed even by some among the hierarchy; as we have greater experience of diocesan eremitical life and through the wisdom gleaned from this experience, educate the Church and others on the nature of this vocation, I believe the situation will change.

04 July 2018

On Contemplative Prayer and Living


[[Dear Sister, hi there! Do you think of yourself as a contemplative? I wondered if there is a way to justify living as a contemplative. I grew up in a Protestant family and was taught to distrust contemplative prayer and maybe contemplative living too. This had something to do with distrusting prayer rooted in an inner and unverifiable mass of feelings. Too subjective I guess. Later I became a Catholic and more and more came to appreciate the accent it has on active ministry. But my pastor also talks about how important it is to cultivate a contemplative way of living and praying. He reads your blog by the way and suggested I look at it; he also said you might answer any questions I had. imagine my surprise to find you had written a piece called "A Contemplative Moment: How I become Myself"! So I was wondering how you can justify not working and being a contemplative. Can you answer this for me? Thank you.]]

Welcome to this blog! I realize you don't know me and I also understand something of where you are coming from when you say that you learned to distrust contemplative prayer and life. Despite what Catholics say "officially" I suspect many of them really don't trust contemplative life and think contemplative prayer itself is for an elitist few. Some Protestant ecclesial groups tend, as you say, to distrust the subjectivity of contemplative prayer. Some speak outright about the devil tricking folks to believe they are communing with God when really they are, at best, only navel gazing.

If you check under labels for my posts you will find a number dedicated to the heart. The way we conceive of the human heart is an important part of why we consider contemplative prayer a critical piece of Christian spirituality. For me and for other Christians the human heart is the center of the human being and the place "where God bears witness to Godself''. This idea or description of the human heart recognizes that the most central, sacred, and inalienable part of ourselves is an event rooted in the continuing gift/speech of God. We must learn to listen to and with our hearts and that is an essentially contemplative  thing. Our culture esteems rationality, thinking, busyness, but is not too comfortable with matters of the heart in this sense. Thus it takes real work to learn to listen to one's heart, and more, to listen with one's heart. Quiet or contemplative prayer is really about this. It allows us to truly be present to and for another --- something our world needs desparately.

I am reminded of a poem by Wendell Berry. Berry captures a sense of the work of contemplation and contemplative living. It is counterintuitive and contrary to our usual Enlightenment ways of approaching reality. Berry writes in Standing by Words:

The Real Work
 
It may be that when we no longer know what to do
we have come to our real work,
 
and that when we no longer know which way to go
we have come to our real journey.
 
The mind that is not baffled is not employed.
 
The impeded stream is the one that sings.
 
 
So, what I can say to you now is that contemplative prayer and contemplative living are vastly different things than most people know or have experienced. I suppose I would be surprised that these are not distrusted by some, especially by those who cannot trust subjectivity, paradox, or who overestimate external authority. However, contemplatives tend to take our stand in discernment as Jesus described it: by their fruits you shall know them. That said, the folks I know who are contemplative value truth, are loving and compassionate, and are incredibly committed to personal integrity. Their way is non-violent and respectful of others and the whole of creation. They work quite hard pouring out their lives for others and exploring an inner landscape most may not even imagine exists. While contemplative living may be relatively rare today this does not mean such lives are elitist; no, the truth is all are called to this kind of living and prayer. It is a focused way of living, attentive, and care-full. There is nothing strange or unworthy of trust about it. It is, quite simply, authentically human.
 
In saying all of this please be aware I am not writing a justification of contemplation or contemplative living. I don't think I need to do that. Instead, I believe folks who distrust these things need to re-examine their objections. Eremitical life is fraught with stereotypes and sometimes authentic hermits suffer when otherwise intelligent folks hold such stereotypes. I guess the same is true with regard to contemplative prayer and life. Stereotypes get in the way of real understanding. Fortunately, your questions indicate you are not allowing that to occur here.