Have I been About the Creation of Precedents and Protocols with this Blog?

[[Hi Sister Laurel, I wondered what you make of the charge that you have made up all kinds of precedents and protocols for solitary hermit life under c 603? Is that really what you have been about with this blog? Does the charge have any merit, after all, not everything is written in c 603? Thanks!]]

Thanks to you as well; I am grateful for the question and surprised I have never received it before. Someone asked recently about the age of c 603 given that I have only been consecrated as a hermit for 17 years, but that was not quite the same question. When I look back at this blog over the past 17 years, I see one in which I have explored the nature and implications of c 603 and the vocation it governs.  As far as I know, I am responsible for only two precedents: 1) the post-nominal initials Er Dio (and variations like Erem Dio and ED), which Bishop Vigneron approved in 2008 on the anniversary of my consecration, and 2) a process of discernment and formation for c 603 hermits and their dioceses, drawn from my own experience of the challenging and formative nature of writing a liveable Rule, and which I have outlined here in brief form over the past several years. The first of these is pretty well established as diocesan hermits from a number of countries are permitted by their bishops to use these initials to indicate they are diocesan hermits. Everything else has been a part of my exploring this vocation and looking carefully at the implications of the canon and the public and ecclesial nature of the calling.

I am particularly pleased that these two precedents either already have been or are now being more widely adopted. The second one is by far more important, but I am still working on writing up the process of discernment and formation I have used with several dioceses/candidates thus far, so that is not yet ready for publication. One problem (but not the only one) is that some dioceses, it seems, don't have the staff to create a small team to accompany the candidate. Accommodations can be made, though this (small team with competent c 603 mentor approach) is still an ideal way to proceed to assist a good candidate, 1) to write a liveable Rule, 2) to educate themselves and the diocesan staff on this vocation, and 3) to discern and cooperate in God's formation of a sound vocation. Everything else here, I think, has been a function of my learning about my own vocation, exploring its depths and all of the rights and obligations which I embraced at perpetual profession and consecration. Though perhaps too repetitive, the questions folks ask have been really helpful here. Sometimes they stem from what I have written, sometimes from misunderstandings they are passing on, sometimes from simple curiosity or a hostile spirit, and sometimes they have been the result of someone wanting to become c 603 and asking questions that apply to their aspirations. 

The answers are never simply made up, however. Of course, they don't simply restate c 603 or the Catechism's paragraphs 920 and 921, because these are not the only texts that apply to the c 603 hermit. Other canons apply, whether because of the vows, the use of the term Catholic, garb, not-for-profit status, etc. Hermits' individual Rules also apply here. Too, I know to some extent how my diocese handled things (including frequency of meetings with three bishops and the Vicar for Religious while we had an interim bishop), and I have anecdotal material on other dioceses as well that I can draw from, including from the years before I was consecrated. And of course, the Church's theology of consecrated life applies, as it does to any consecrated vocation in the Church. So, what do I make of the charges that I almost single-handedly created precedents and protocols for c 603 vocations and distorted the canon and the vocation in the process? Well, at best they are exaggerated or significantly overblown, and at worst they are simply made up out of whole cloth while disregarding not only the canon's prehistory beginning with Vatican II, but the 24 years of c 603 life that preceded my own consecration and writing. 

What I find particularly hard to wrap my head around is that anyone could actually believe I have been so wildly influential rather than seeing instead that the Bishops, canonists, other c 603 hermits, and I are both exploring canon 603 in light of the Church's theology of consecrated life and therefore are simply coming to some of the same conclusions!! Yes, I write about the vocation from within it. I explore the implications of this new and ancient form of life. I think I appreciate what is possible for and required by it better than someone looking at the canon from the outside (which would include a lot of chancery staff and canonists), but c 603 already had a history of people living and exploring it before I was consecrated or began to write!  Of course, Bishops can and do certainly imagine, study, speak to others with experience of the canon, and have done so since @1983. And yes, today this might even include a few of them reading this blog, but that is still a far cry from my having been as influential as the "charges" have sometimes made out!

To summarize, when I began this blog, I wanted to explore the vocation and perhaps share it with anyone interested. It was relatively new despite the years since it had been published in the Revised Code and was similarly unknown in parishes or among parish priests. I had not expected to find c 603 beautiful in the way it combines a vision of eremitical life embodying non-negotiable elements with the flexibility of a personal Rule inspired by the Holy Spirit in a way that captures the unique freedom of the consecrated hermit; I had not expected questions and answers would become the basic format of the blog, nor did I anticipate becoming something of an authority on this vocation. If that is what has occurred (and I believe that to some limited extent it has), then I am grateful to God for that. Still, that I have overturned the "traditional" solitary hermit vocation and distorted c 603 with my writing here, or that I have single-handedly established all kinds of precedents and protocols is simply inaccurate!