On the Distinction Between Using Our Gifts and Being the Gift (Reprise from July 2015)

[[Hi Sister. I've been reading what you wrote on chronic illness as vocation. I wondered why God would give a person gifts they could never really use.  And if their gifts can't be used then how do they serve or glorify God? I mean I do believe people who can't use God-given gifts still serve God but we are supposed to use our gifts and what if we can't? Since you are a hermit do you ever feel that you cannot use your gifts? Does it matter? Does canonical standing make better use of your gifts than non-canonical standing? I hope this is not gibberish?]]

These are great questions and no, not gibberish at all. The pain of being given gifts which we may not be able to use because of chronic illness or other life circumstances is, in my experience, one of the most difficult and bewildering things we can know. The question "WHY?!!" is one of those we are driven to ask by such situations. We ask it of God, of the universe, of the silence, of friends and family, of books and teachers and pastors and ministers; we ask it of ourselves too though we know we don't have the answer. In one way and another we ask it in many different ways of whomever will listen --- and sometimes we force people to listen to the screams of anguish our lives become as we embed this question in all we are and do. Whether we act out, withdraw, retreat into delusions, turn seriously to religion or philosophy, resort to crime, become workaholics for whom money is the measure of meaning, create great works of art, or whatever else we do, the question, WHY?! often stands at the heart of our searching, activism, depression, confusion, and pain. This is true even when our lives have not been derailed by chronic illness, but of course when that or other catastrophic events occur to us the question assumes a critical importance. And of course, we can live years and years without finding an answer. I think you will understand when I say that "WHY?!" is the question which, no matter how it is posed throughout our lives, we each are.

One thing I should be clear about is that God gives us gifts because he wills us to use them and is delighted when we can and do so. I do not believe God gives gifts to frustrate us or to be wasted. But, as Paul puts the matter, and as we know from experience, there are powers and principalities at work in our world and lives which are not of God. God does not will chronic illness, for instance. Illness is a symptom and consequence of sin --- that is, it is the result of being estranged to some extent from the source and ground of life itself. Even so, though God does not will our illness, he will absolutely work to bring good out of it to whatever degree he can. Especially, God will work so that illness is no longer the dominant reality of our lives. It may remain, but where once it was the defining reality of our lives and identity, God will work so that grace becomes the dominant theme our lives sing instead; illness, though still very real perhaps, then becomes a kind of subtext adding depth and poignancy but lacking all pretensions of ultimacy.

This is really the heart of my answer to your questions. Each of us has many gifts we would like to develop and use. I think most of us have more gifts than we can actually do that with. For instance, if I choose to play violin and thus spend time and resources on lessons, practice periods, music, and time with friends who also play music, I may not be able to spend the time I could spend on writing or theology, or even certain kinds of prayer I also associate with divine giftedness. This is a normal situation and we all must make these kinds of choices as we move through life. Still, while we must make decisions regarding which gifts we will develop and which we will allow to lay relatively fallow there is a deeper choice involved at every moment, namely, what kind of person will we be in any case? When chronic illness takes the question of developing and using specific gifts out of our hands, when we cannot use our education, for instance, or no longer work seriously in our chosen field, when we cannot raise a family, hold a job, or perhaps even volunteer at Church in ways we might once have done, the question that remains is that of who we are and who will we be in relation to God.

The key here is the grace of God, that is, the powerful presence of God. Illness does not deprive us of the grace of God nor of the capacity to respond to that grace. In my own process of becoming a hermit, as you know, I had had my own life derailed by chronic illness. Fortunately, I had prepared to do Theology and loved systematics so that I read Theology even as illness deprived me of the possibility of doing this as a profession. I was also "certain" that I was called to some form of religious life; these two dimensions were gifts that helped me hold onto a perspective that transcended illness and disability, and at least potentially, promised to make sense of these.

My professors (but especially John C Dwyer) had introduced me to an amazing theology of the cross (both Pauline and Markan) which focused on a soteriology (a theology of redemption) stressing that even the worst that befalls a human being can witness to the redemption possible with God. In Mark's version of the gospel, the bottom line is that when all the props are kicked out, God will bring life out of death and meaning out of senselessness. In Paul's letters I was reminded many times that the center of things is his affirmation: "My (i.e., God's) grace is sufficient for you; my power is made perfect in weakness." Meanwhile, at one point I began working with a spiritual director who believed unquestioningly in the power of God alive in the core of our being and provided me with tools to help allow that presence to expand and triumph in my heart and life. In the course of our work together, my own prayer shifted from being something I did (or struggled to do!) to something God did within me. (This shift was especially occasioned and marked by the prayer experience I have mentioned here before.) In time I became a contemplative but at this point in time illness still meant isolation rather than the communion of solitude.

All of these pieces and others came together in a new way when I read canon 603 and began considering eremitical life.  The eremitical life is dependent upon God's call of course, but everything about it also witnesses to the truth that God's grace is enough for us and God's power is perfected in weakness. When we speak about the hiddenness of the life it is this active and powerful presence of God who graces us that is of first concern. I have many gifts, but in this life there is no doubt that they generally remain hidden and many are even entirely unused while the grace of God makes me the hermit I am called to be. Mainly this occurs in complete hiddenness. I may think and write about this life; I may do theology and a very little adult faith formation for my parish; I may do a limited amount of spiritual direction, play some violin in an orchestra, and even write on this blog and for publication to some extent --- though never to the extent I might have done these things had chronic illness not knocked my life off the rails. But the simple fact is if I were unable to do any of these things my vocation would be the same. I am called to BE a hermit, a whole and holy human being who witnesses to the deepest truth of our lives experienced in solitude: namely, God alone is sufficient for us. We are made whole and completed in the God who seeks us unceasingly and will never abandon us.

So you see, as I understand it anyway, my life is not so much about using the gifts God undoubtedly gave me at birth so much as it is about being the gift which God's love makes of me. Who I am as the result of God's grace is the essential ministry and witness of my life. Answering a call to eremitical life required that I really respond to a call I sensed from God, a call to abundant life --- not the life focused on what I could do much less on what I could not do, but the life of who God would make me to be if given the ongoing opportunity to shape my heart day by day by day. Regarding public profession and canonical standing under c 603, let me say that it took me some time to come to the place where I was really ready for these; today I experience even the long waiting required as a gift of God.

Paradoxically a huge part of my readiness for perpetual eremitical vows was coincident with coming to a place where I did not really need the Church's canonical standing except to the extent I was bringing them a unique gift. You see, I knew that the Holy Spirit had worked in my life to redeem an isolation and alienation occasioned mainly by chronic illness. THAT was the gift I was bringing the Church, the charism I was seeking to publicly witness to in the name of the Church by seeking public profession and consecration. That the Holy Spirit worked this way in my life in the prayer and lectio of significant solitude seems to me to be precisely what constitutes the gift of eremitical life.  (Of course canonical standing and especially God's consecration has also been a great gift to me but outlining that is another, though related, topic.)

Thus, when I renewed my petition to the Diocese of Oakland regarding admission to perpetual profession and consecration in the early 2000's, eremitical solitude had already transformed my life. I was already a hermit not because of any particular standing but because I lived the truth of redemption mediated to me in the silence of solitude. I sought consecration because now I clearly recognized this gift belonged to the Church and was meant for others; public standing in the consecrated state made that possible in a unique way. I was not seeking the Church's approval of this gift so I could be made a hermit "with status" so much as I was seeking a way to make a genuine expression of eremitical life and the redemption of isolation and meaninglessness it represented better known and accessible to others. That, I think, is the real importance of canonical standing, especially for the hermit; it witnesses more to the work of the Holy Spirit within the Church, more to the contemplative primacy of being over doing, and thus, less to the personal gifts of the person being professed and consecrated.

By the way, along the way I do use many of the gifts God has given me to some extent. Yesterday, for instance, I was able to play violin for a funeral Mass. I don't do this often at all because I personally prefer to participate in Mass differently than this, but it was a joy to do for friends in the parish. (A number of people who really do know me pretty well commented, "I didn't know you played the violin!") Today I did a Communion service and reflection as I do many Fridays during the year. Often times, as I have noted here before, I write reflections on weekly Scripture lections, and of course I write here and other places and do spiritual direction. This allows me to use some of my theology for others but even more fundamentally it is an expression of who I am in light of the grace of God in my life. Even so, the important truth is that the eremitical vocation (and, I would argue, any vocation to chronic illness!) is much more about being the gift God makes of us  --- no matter how hidden eremitical life or our illness makes that gift --- than it is a matter of focusing on or being anxious about using or not using the gifts God has given us.

In other words my life glorifies God and is a service to God's People even if no one has a clue what specific gifts God has given me because it reveals the power of God to redeem and transfigure a reality fraught with sin, death, and the power of the absurd. A non-eremitical vocation to chronic illness does the same thing if only one can allow God's grace to work in and transfigure them. We ourselves as covenant partners of God in all things then become the incarnate "answer" to the often-terrible question, "WHY?!!"  In Christ, in our graced and transfigured lives, this question ceases to be one of unresolved torment; instead, it becomes both an invitation to and an instance of hope-filled witness and joyful proclamation. "WHY??" So that Christ might live in me and in me triumph over all that brings chaos and meaninglessness to human lives. WHY?1! So that the God of life may triumph over the powers of sin and death in us, the Spirit may transform isolation into genuine solitude in us, and the things that ordinarily separate us from God may become sacraments of God's presence and inescapable, unconquerable love in us!

I hope this is helpful and answers your questions.

In Honor of "Delixit Nos": On the Sacred Heart of Jesus (reprised)

[In his newest Encyclical, Delixit Nos, Pope Francis and the Church] celebrate a feast [and a reality] that may seem at first glance to be irrelevant to contemporary life. The Feast of the Sacred Heart developed in part as a response to pre-destinationist theologies which diminished the universality of the gratuitous love of God and consigned many to perdition. But the Church's own theology of grace and freedom point directly to the reality of the human heart -- that center of the human person where God freely speaks himself and human beings respond in ways which are salvific for them and for the rest of the world. It asks us to see all  persons as constituted in this way and called to life in and of God. [Jesus'] Sacred Heart, then, despite the shift in context, asks us to reflect again on the nature of the human heart, to the greatest danger to spiritual or authentically human life the Scriptures identify, and too, on what a contemporary devotion to the Sacred Heart might mean for us.

As I have written here before, the heart is the symbol of the center of the human person. It is a theological term which points first of all to God and to God's activity deep within us. It is not so much that we have a heart and then God comes to dwell there; it is that where God dwells within us and bears witness to himself, we have a heart. The human heart (not the cardiac muscle but the center of our personhood the Scriptures call heart) is a dialogical event where God speaks, calls, breathes, and sings us into existence and where, in one way and degree or another, we respond to become the people we are. It is therefore important that our hearts be open and flexible, that they be obedient to the Voice and love of God, and so that they may be responsive in all the ways they are summoned to be.

Bearing this in mind it is no surprise that the Scriptures speak in many places about the very worst thing which could befall a human being and her spiritual life. We hear it in the following line from Ezekiel: [[If today you hear [God's] voice, harden not your hearts.]] Many things contribute to such a reaction. We know that love is risky and that it always hurts. Sometimes this hurt is akin to the mystical experience of being pierced by God's love and is a wonderful but difficult experience. Sometimes it is the pain of compassion or empathy or grief. These are often bittersweet experiences, but they are also life giving. Other times love wounds us in less fruitful ways: we are betrayed by friends or family, we reach out to another in love and are rejected, a billion smaller losses wound us in ways from which we cannot seem to recover.

In such cases our hearts are not only wounded but become scarred, indurated, less sensitive to pain (or pleasure), stiff and relatively inflexible. They, quite literally, become "hardened" and we may be fearful and unwilling or even unable to risk further injury. When the Scriptures speak of the "hardening" of our hearts they use the very words medicine uses to speak of the result of serious and prolonged wounding: induration, sclerosis, callousedness. Such hardening is self-protective but it also locks us into a world which makes us less capable of responding to love with all of its demands and riskiness. It makes us incapable of suffering well (patiently, fruitfully), or of real selflessness, generosity, or compassion.

It is here that the symbol of the Sacred Heart of Jesus' is instructive and where contemporary devotion to the Sacred Heart can assist us. The Sacred Heart is clearly the place where human and divine are united in a unique way. While we are not called to Daughterhood or to Sonship in the exact same sense of Jesus' (he is "begotten" Son, we are adopted Sons --- and I use only Sons because of the prophetic, countercultural sense that term had for women in the early Church), we are meant to be expressions of a similar unity and heritage; we are meant to have God as the well spring of life and love at the center of our existence.

Like the Sacred Heart our own hearts are meant to be "externalized" in a sense and (made) transparent to others. They are meant to be wounded by love and deeply touched by the pain of others but not scarred or indurated in that woundedness; they are meant to be compassionate hearts on fire with love and poured out for others --- hearts which are marked by the cross in all of its kenotic (self-emptying) dimensions and therefore too by the joy of ever-new life. The truly human heart is a reparative heart which heals the woundedness of others and empowers them to love as well. Such hearts are hearts which love as God loves, and therefore which do justice. I think that allowing our own hearts to be remade in this way represents an authentic devotion to Jesus' Sacred Heart. There is nothing lacking in relevance or contemporaneity in that!

Hermits and Eucharistic Spirituality, Pointed Questions (reprised from 2011)

[[Dear Sister Laurel,

How is it that hermits reflect the centrality of Eucharist in their spiritual lives if they do not attend Mass daily? I heard you remark in another context that you didn't attend Mass if solitude required otherwise. My understanding is that religious are required canonically to attend Mass daily if that is possible, and you yourself say on this blog that Eucharist is the center of everything that happens at your hermitage. So, how is it you can skip Mass just because it is more convenient to remain in solitude and still claim the title Sister and assert how central Eucharist is in your life? My other question is how do you receive Communion if there is no one there but yourself? Isn't self-communication forbidden to Catholics?]]

These topics, as you apparently are aware, came up on the Catholic Hermits list. One person there argued that hermits, like anyone else, should get to Mass as often as possible (daily!), and should not miss simply because it was "inconvenient" to one's solitude. Since, they argued, religious are required to participate at Mass in this way it makes sense that diocesan hermits are also so required. Others have argued that in today's world of easy transportation and numerous parishes people should be able to get to Mass daily one way or another and that hermits certainly should do so. Some know hermits who attend the parish Mass each day, or at least most every day and argue on that basis. My own argument was that fidelity to solitude sometimes meant not getting to daily Mass. I believe it is possible to develop a strong Eucharistic spirituality in solitude even without getting to Mass daily and that is what I want to look at in this post. 

On the Place of Solitude in the Hermit's Life

However, before I say more in response to your question I need to clarify one critical point. Your comments include a misconstrual of what I said, and a misunderstanding regarding the nature of eremitical solitude. Namely, hermits do not skip Mass merely because it is inconvenient to their solitude; they do so because solitude is their full-time calling and the actual occasion, environment, and resulting quality of whatever union with God is achieved in their life. Solitude is not just a means for the hermit, but a goal as well. In this perspective, solitude (or what Canon 603 refers to as the "silence of solitude") is not a self-indulgent luxury which just happens to provide an environment for other things in the hermit's life (though external silence and physical solitude will certainly serve in this way). It is instead the reality which is achieved together with God when a hermit is faithful to (among other things) long term external silence and solitude. Thus, it is important that the hermit  maintain her faithfulness to this long term external silence and solitude. Solitude is, again, both the means to and the goal of the hermit's existence because eremitical solitude itself is a form of communal or ecclesial existence and an expression of union with God and all that is precious to God.

In saying this I mean that the hermit's life is to give witness to the union with God which is achieved in solitude as well as the "silence of solitude" which is an expression and sign of this union, and so, to the redemption of all forms of human isolation, alienation and estrangement achieved therein. They are called to come to wholeness and holiness in solitude and their witness is to the most foundational relationship present in the human being, the relationship with God who is creator and ground of all existence. In other words, although community is important to the hermit, it is primarily the koinonia (communion) of solitude that is their vocation. They are called by God through the agency of his Church to the very rare and paradoxical reality of eremitical solitude --- a form of union with God and others marked by and grounded in aloneness with the Alone. Unless we understand that solitude is not isolation, not alienation, nor a feeble excuse for the misanthrope, and certainly not a luxury for the hermit, we may believe that it conflicts with a truly Eucharistic spirituality. My argument is that it does not and that the way the hermit approaches attendance at Mass is dependent upon this way of seeing things.

Eucharistic Spirituality in General

When we speak of Eucharistic Spirituality what is it we are talking about then? And for the hermit who claims that the Eucharist is at the heart of everything that happens in the hermitage, what is she really talking about --- especially if the Mass is not (or is rarely) celebrated at the hermitage? Of course it means a spirituality focused on the Eucharist itself and the hermit will usually (not always) reserve Eucharist in her hermitage, pray in the presence of the Eucharist, celebrate Communion services (Liturgies of the Word with Communion), and so forth. But even more than this everything at the hermitage will be geared towards Christ's incarnation climaxed in his cross and resurrection. It seems to me that the focus involves two particular and interrelated processes: first, that, in a dynamic of kenosis or self-emptying, the Word is made flesh, and second, that, in a dynamic of conversion, reconciliation, and transfiguration, flesh (in the Pauline sense) is made Word. Everything that happens is meant to be an occasion of one or both of these and at the center of it all is the Presence of the Risen Christ in Word and Sacrament, reminding, summoning, challenging, nourishing, and consoling.

Eucharistic Spirituality, The Word Made Flesh

God has chosen to come to us as a human person. More than that he has chosen to be present in a power perfected in weakness (asthenia). He is present in the unexpected and even the unacceptable place. He enters into sin and death, the truly or definitvely godless realities and transforms them with his presence. In other words he makes what was literally godless into sacraments of his love, his being God for and with others. For me the Eucharist is a symbol of this specific process and presence (and I mean symbol in the most intensive sense as that reality which does not merely stand for something else (that would be a sign or metaphor) but rather as something that participates in the very reality it mediates). While Mass is the place where we literally re-member all of this, where bread and wine are transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ, where the Word of God is proclaimed with power, Eucharistic Spirituality seems to me to be that spirituality where all this is worked out in everyday life so that every meal is holy, every reality is looked at with eyes that can see God's presence there, and where one is nourished, challenged, consoled, etc, with that presence in the unexpected place and way.

Eucharistic spirituality, is a spirituality which is open to God's presence in ordinariness, not only to his presence at Mass or the more exalted moments of prayer, etc, but in the humbleness of human life generally. And for the hermit this means in the solitariness of ordinary life --- for it is in solitude that we are generally weakest, and our brokenness is most clearly revealed. My own focus in the hermitage is the transformation of ordinariness into Sacrament. This is essentially Eucharistic. Everything should serve this. Everything within the hermitage serves the Word becoming flesh, the allowing of God to dwell within, to love, minister to, and to transform with his presence. Everything becomes a matter of dying to self and rising in God, to learning obedience (hearing and responding to the Word of God) in a way which leads to purity of heart. Yes, often (though not always) Eucharist is present in the hermitage, but whether or not it is present it remains the living symbol of what everything in the hermitage can and is meant to be if given over to the purposes of eremitical life. I sincerely believe that if the hermit practices Eucharistic spirituality she recognizes that her hermitage itself is meant to be a tabernacle situated in the midst of her community and that her own life is bread broken and wine poured out for others.

Eucharistic Spirituality, Flesh Made Word

The second and interrelated process which makes up a genuinely Eucharistic spirituality focuses on what happens to the hermit --- or really, to any Christian for whom Eucharist is central --- namely, that they become a Word Event which embodies and proclaims the Gospel of God in Christ. For the hermitage to become tabernacle, for the hermit to become bread broken and wine poured out for others, the hermit herself must, over time, be transformed and transfigured.

Flesh, in the Pauline sense of the term, means the whole person, body and soul, under the sway of sin. It means being a person of divided heart, one who is enmeshed in processes and realities which are resistant to Christ. It means being less than fully human, and in terms of language, it means being distorted forms of language events which are less than a univocal hymn of praise and gratitude --- screams of pain and anguish, lies or hypocritical formulations and identity, utterances (of anger, prejudice, arrogance, indifference, selfishness, etc) which foster division, insecurity, and suffering for others, a noisy or insecure presence which cannot abide silence and is unable to listen or respond lovingly and with compassion --- all are the less than human forms of language event we are, at least at times. These are also examples of what Paul would have termed "flesh" (sarx).

In the power of the Spirit, these can be transformed, transfigured into articulate expressions of Gospel wholeness, joy, peace, hope, and challenge. That which is less than human can become authentically human; sinners are reconciled to become persons who are truly and wholly authored by God. As one steeps oneself in and seriously contends with the Word of God one is transformed into an expression of that Word. In silence and solitude flesh can become Word just as the Word becomes Flesh. All of this is genuinely Eucharistic spirituality I think, and it remains Eucharistic even if the hermit does not celebrate Eucharist with her parish community daily. For the hermit, those privileged celebrations lead back to silence while solitude and the silence of solitude prepare for the hermit's participation at Mass. But they are all part of a single spirituality in which Christ is received as guest and gift and ordinary reality is transformed into an expression of his presence. Such a spirituality is open to anyone who cannot actually get to Mass more than once a week, and sometimes less frequently.  It is inspired by the Eucharist and modeled on Eucharistic transformation, life, and hope. In fact, I suspect it may well be an instance of genuinely Eucharistic spirituality our world truly needs.

Hermits and Self-Communication

Your last question was also raised on the Catholic Hermits list. It is customary that people do not self-commu-nicate and there are very good theological reasons for this, but solitary hermits are an accepted exception. Canonists are apparently clear (according to a clarification offered on the Catholic Hermits list) that this is a unique situation which calls for such an exception to general custom and theological wisdom. It is also, it seems to me, a sign of how truly esteemed and unusual is the hermit vocation for such an exception to be made. The Church allows this exception precisely because of the importance of eremitical solitude lived in the heart of the church. I would argue that eremitical solitude, to whatever extent it is lived authentically, is essentially Eucharistic --- even when the hermit is unable to leave her hermitage to attend Mass --- and is therefore a very good reason for this singular exception to be made.

In any case, hermits should certainly be careful of their use of this permission. Their own communions must always be seen as extensions of the parish and/or diocesan liturgy, their hermitages must be understood as tabernacles of Christ's presence, and the silence of solitude must be embraced as a natural expression of communal life and love. While the hermit does not literally receive Eucharist from the hands of another during Communion services in the hermitage, she does receive this Sacrament as a gift of the parish community and so, from their hands. The communal nature of the eremitical life is constantly underscored by the presence of Eucharist in the hermitage, and the quality of being "alone with the Alone" FOR the salvation of the world is underscored in this way as well. Eremitical life is not selfish, not individualistic or privatistic, and emphatically not a matter of merely living alone -- much less doing so in whatever way one likes. The presence of Eucharist both symbolizes and so, reminds and calls us to realize this (make this real) more and more fully everyday. I should note that it is entirely reasonable to expect that should a hermit ever tend to take the Eucharist (and especially the reserved Eucharist) for granted or become arrogant or simply lax in her praxis and perspective, then, at least for a time, she should forego even the reservation of the Eucharist, and get to Mass more often, until she recovers her proper perspective and devotion.

Summing Things Up

For me the bottom line in all of this is that while the celebration of Eucharist is indeed the source and summit of ecclesial life --- and it certainly is that for the hermit as well --- a truly Eucharistic spirituality does NOT necessarily require that one go to Mass daily. (It does require one celebrate with one's faith community regularly and frequently!!) The hermit's life will be imprinted with the cross, be emptied, broken and given to others precisely insofar as she is faithful to eremitical solitude lived in the heart of the Church. She will celebrate every day, and do so with her parish faith community, even when the demands of solitude mean she cannot be physically present with them at Mass. If this is not the case, then we are implicitly saying to many people who pray, suffer, and love at least as fully and well as do daily Mass  participants (or diocesan hermits!) --- but who cannot get to Mass so regularly --- that they cannot be said to have or even be able to develop a truly Eucharistic spirituality. I am positive we do not want to do that, wouldn't you agree?

Postscript: Since this was originally posted the question has come up about people who never get to Mass for reasons of illness and disability. In such situations reservation of Eucharist is not a good idea. A better solution, including for hermits, is to depend on EEM's who bring the person Communion from the parish Mass. This maintains a necessary and vital (living) link between the person and the faith community as well as the essential linkage between Eucharist received in the home or hermitage and Eucharist celebrated at Mass. Since solitude is a communal reality, it cannot be devalued and allowed to devolve into isolation (eremitical reclusion is a different animal and profoundly communal); the link with the faith community, especially with an ecclesial vocation, must be maintained and fostered.

see also: Notes from Stillsong Hermitage: On the Reservation of Eucharist by Hermits and Feast of Saint Peter Damian

Follow-up to Who Can Live c 603 and in What Sense?

[[Sister Laurel, if a lay hermit insists c 603.2 applies to them because they were consecrated by God, how would you respond? I can see where none of the elements of c 603.2 apply to her situation except the term consecrated, but how should one respond to such an assertion?]] 

Thanks for your follow-up question. I am assuming the text of (your) first question, Who Can Live c 603 and in What Sense?), so folks should check that post if necessary. First, let me point out that the term used is consecrated life, not merely "consecrated" or even "consecration by God", so we are not merely speaking about a single event whether or not God did indeed consecrate the person. We are speaking about a stable state of life in which one is initiated not only by God but by the Church, to which (state of life) one is publicly committed, and in which one perseveres and thrives.  Divine Consecration is critical, of course, but the canon speaks of consecrated life (that is, a life at every moment witnessing to God's consecration in an ecclesial vocation) and the structural elements that constitute that "in law" in the Roman Catholic Church. 

Secondly, these structural elements involve those elements binding on both the individual and the larger Church itself. So first of all, the hermit makes a public profession in the hands of the diocesan bishop of the three Evangelical Counsels and is thus bound in law. In other words, this life is not a private one, hidden though it may be essentially. It is not anonymous. It is a canonical vocation with public (legal) rights and obligations the hermit takes on in the immediate presence of the bishop and the local Church. Such vocations are celebrated (mediated and received) for the sake of the Church's own life and holiness, not only for the sake of the individual hermit's life and growth in holiness. All this means the Church (the People of God) have the right to hold certain expectations of such a consecrated person. (Again, this is not a private dedication nor, generally speaking, is it one that allows the hermit to say, "No one needs to know I'm a hermit" as though no one has a right to know this!! Actually, in usual circumstances, people have every right to know that one is a Catholic Hermit because one is recognized in law in this way.)

Canon 603.2 continues by declaring that such a dedication is [[confirmed by vow or other sacred bond and observes a proper program of living (Rule of Life) under his direction]]. Again, these are essential elements pointing not only to the individual's most profound commitment to God made explicit in sacred bonds, Canon law, and Rule (proper law) she writes herself, but to the Church's acceptance of responsibility for this vocation. It includes mutual commitments on the part of the one consecrated and the Church mediating this consecration to live (or assist the person to live) this commitment under the Church's ministry of authority, both legal and moral. 

I suppose I would conclude this response by saying that a person arguing as you describe has made a critical error in focusing on the idea of being consecrated by God while suggesting she does indeed live c 603.2. Yes, Divine consecration is presupposed here, but that is not the focus of this section of the canon. What c 603.2 does is define the necessary structural elements for someone to be admitted to the consecrated life in an ecclesial vocation, that is, one established in law --- which is the only form of consecrated life the Church recognizes or gives her name to. Further, these essential elements include the concrete way the Church itself nurtures, protects, and governs such a life and gift of God. One cannot cut them out of the picture and still have c 603.2. So again, while such a hermit can live c 603.1, c 603.2 is a different matter.

Once again on "Illegal Hermits" as a Mistaken and Destructive Term

[[Hi Sister, I am a privately professed hermit but heard I am really illegal because I am not c 603. I also heard that I can't think of myself as Catholic though I am baptized and confirmed. I am really sure God has called me to be a hermit and to be a Catholic but I don't understand why I can't be a Catholic Hermit or have to consider myself illegal. I don't want to have to give up being a hermit in order to be a Catholic. I think all this vocabulary confuses me. Can you clarify it for me? What can I do to make myself a Catholic legal hermit? How do I get myself changed from being an illegal hermit?]]

Thanks for your questions. I have written extensively about all of these in the past so I encourage you to look at pertinent posts, especially those in the past month or two. One post you might want to check out is Why God allows Many Forms of Hermit Life. The following article  might also be helpful to you: Crash Course in Language. Let me summarize the situation as it applies to you.

You are a non-canonical hermit only in the sense that c 603 and the canons applying to religious (or consecrated life) do not apply to you. However, you are a lay hermit and all of the canons applying to laity apply to you until you are admitted to profession (a public act changing one's state of life) and then consecration as a c 603 hermit or member of an eremitical institute of consecrated life. Once that happens canons are added to those already applying to your lay life. Both states, lay and consecrated, are governed by canon law. To call one a non-canonical hermit is a shorthand way of saying the additional canons do NOT apply to them (yet). It does not mean that hermit is illegal since you are free to live as a lay hermit while honoring the canons that apply to all laity.

If you decide God has called you to live as a consecrated hermit, you must apply to be admitted to a process of MUTUAL discernment and formation with your diocese. Because this is an ecclesial vocation and belongs to the Church before it belongs to you, the Church herself must discern that you are indeed called to this. Our own discernment is important, but it is not sufficient when dealing with ecclesial vocations. This is a difficult point for most folks to "get". Meanwhile, if, in time, the Church agrees with your discernment and also that you are ready for public profession, then she will admit you to temporary profession and eventually to perpetual profession and consecration as a c 603 or diocesan hermit. At that point you accept the rights and obligations of a public and ecclesial vocation and MAY (i.e., are permitted by the Church whose vocation this is first of all to) call yourself a Catholic Hermit. This is because you would then have been called by God and the Church to live this vocation in the name of the Church.

Currently you are a Catholic AND a hermit. Another way of saying this is to say that you are a (Catholic) lay hermit (that is, you live hermit life in the lay or baptized state alone as you are entirely free to do), or you can say you are a non-canonical hermit because you haven't (yet) been admitted to eremitical life in the consecrated state; for this reason, the additional canons of consecrated eremitical life don't apply to you. You are entirely free to call yourself Catholic; you are entirely free to call yourself a hermit (if you are one); you are even free to say you are aspiring to becoming a Catholic hermit if that is also so, but you are NOT an illegal hermit or somehow not Catholic. To use the term illegal is demeaning of yourself and all Lay Hermits. Please let go of it!! You can read more on this or get back to me if it raises additional questions or confusions. I sincerely hope it is helpful.

N.B., a reminder that the term lay can be used in two different senses. In the hierarchical sense anyone who is not ordained is lay or part of the laity (from the Greek laos (λαος) for People as in People of God or laos tou theou). This sense includes religious and consecrated persons. In the vocational sense of the term lay, it is one of three basic states of life: lay, consecrated, and clerical. We have hermits in all three states of life and honor them all. In using lay above I am mainly speaking about the vocational lay state.  For the present, and until a diocese admits you (or anyone else living as a hermit) to profession and consecration, you (they) are a lay hermit in both hierarchical and vocational senses of the term lay/laity.

Returning to "i am a little church" as a Source of Contemplation

 Dear Sister Laurel, many thanks for putting up e e cummings i am a little church!! I have been thinking about the imagery and how well it fits a hermit. I don't live out in the country or near mountains but as a hermit, I think I understand what e e cummings was saying --- even if he was not writing about hermits himself. For example, I love the line about the perfect patience of mountains or "winter by spring i lift my diminutive spire to/ merciful him Whose only now is forever!! They are images of eremitical life!! Does that make sense?? What are your favorite lines?

Oh yes! It makes wonderful sense! Thanks for sharing. I agree with you completely and love the entire poem. All of the lines have struck me profoundly at one time or another. Right now, because of work I am doing in direction it is, perhaps, the last line that has resonated within me most this past week  ---(welcoming humbly His light and proudly His darkness). What I am coming to know deeply is that there is a profound rhythm to human growth and while I love God's light I am coming more and more to trust the darkness as well, because (as Bonhoeffer says) while "not everything is the will of God,. . . nothing is outside the will of God," and God does indeed bring light out of darkness so that even evil can become the source of grace. And sometimes, of course, the darkness is our own, for many different reasons. We cannot know the whole plan of God in our lives; sometimes we see light whereas other times we only see darkness. The ability to stand tall in both is surely a grace of genuine humility; for me this line encapsulates the very goal, not only of spiritual direction, but of spiritual life as a whole.

The other piece of this poem, that I think fits eremitical life very well is the following verse: around me surges a miracle of unceasing/birth and glory and death and resurrection:/over my sleeping self float flaming symbols/of hope,and i wake to a perfect patience of mountains. Because of Peter Damian's cosmology I am reminded that contemporary theologians and spiritual writers remind us we are made of "star stuff". Each hermit carries within herself that miracle of unceasing birth and death and find echoed within us the flaming symbols, the stars, that cummings envisions floating above us as we sleep (or pray). 

And each day is a new opportunity to share in the amazing life and dynamism of life with and in God who creates, sustains, and recreates us every single day by minute by second by nanosecond. I certainly do not have the perfect patience of mountains, but they speak to me of this call to monastic (eremitical) stability. Especially, I recognize that the rhythm of monastic and eremitical life helps situate us with the deeper rhythms of the cosmos and helps us hope in God despite the "smaller rhythms" that make us either fear change or align ourselves with the chaos of our world's disorder or the frenetic pace and choices of the adrenaline junkie!! Situating ourselves within this deeper rhythm and accepting we have a significant place in it despite our fragility and the apparent fleetingness of our lives, it seems to me, is the source of perfect patience.

Anyway, I love this poem and and the way it reflects on the mysteries of life. Almost any line speaks to me of God and eremitical life, of finding ourselves witnessing to the larger perspective of eternity and the ultimate security we share because of life in God. The verse I therefore come back to often is this one: i am a little church(far from the frantic/ world with its rapture and anguish)at peace with nature/ -i do not worry if longer nights grow longest;/i am not sorry when silence becomes singing. I found it spoke to me when I was younger and it speaks to me now in a different way when I am older. I always found silence culminating in singing, whether that was the way Office was chanted well because it grew out of silence, because of the way the rests in a line of sound create music (remember, I am a violinist), or, much more personally, because I as a person moved from a kind of muteness (and sometimes being a scream of anguish) to becoming the very different "language event" I associate with Mary's Magnificat. 

And finally, there is the verse that captures the profound way eremitical life is a life of deep compassion and bonds to every part of God's creation in and through God!! my life is the life of the reaper and the sower;/my prayers are prayers of earth's own clumsily striving/(finding and losing and laughing and crying)children/whose any sadness or joy is my grief or my gladness. For me, one of the greatest gifts of eremitical life has been growth in compassion -- in the ability to feel and share in the suffering of the world so that I might also be able to convey the hope of God in ways that convince with its authenticity. And like cummings, I have come to this clumsily. receiving, giving, sometimes harvesting, other times experiencing drought, in both joy and discouragement (or other suffering). Cummings was always concerned with the truly human person, and when I apply what he said to hermits, it is because we are striving for the same thing cummings so esteemed! One way to define Jesus is as the compassionate One, the truly human being who suffers for and with others. I think this verse of cumming's i am a little church captures this really well!

So much more could be said about this poem and the gift it is to the person of faith!! So much more could be said about the way it echoes the Magnificat (or the Te Deum!!) of the hermit life!!! But I will leave this here for now. I originally offered this poem as an incentive to contemplation. Thank you for taking it in that direction and for allowing me to return to that as well!!!

Postscript to i am a little church(no great cathedral)

Apparently, in an attempt to "truth check" me Joyful Hermit has apodictically claimed Peter Damian never called hermits "ecclesiola" (little churches).Cf., Joyful Christian Hermit (beginning around 10:24) I would ask Joyful to please be more careful in her "Truth Matters" videos. No one can read everything out there on Peter Damian's ecclesiology (at least not in a single afternoon!) but to pronounce unequivocally that he never said something based on a quick Google search while implying someone else made the matter up is both irresponsible and uncharitable. (This is really akin to declaring that references to Zebras are not found in an encyclopedia because one looked for them in volume A, while then blaming the authors for lying because they claim the encyclopedia has a great article on Zebras.) Though I have posted this before here (cf., Feast of St Peter Damian), here is the most pertinent passage from Damian's letter # 28 (Dominus Vobiscum), section 25:

[[Just as in Greek man is called a microcosm, i.e., a little world (cosmos) because in essential physicality the human being consists of the same four elements of which the whole world is made, so also each one of the faithful [including hermits, Peter Damian's special interest in this letter] is a little Church (ecclesiola),. . . because without violating the mystery of her inner unity, each person also receives all the sacraments that God has given the universal Church. . .]] Dominus Vobiscum, Letter #28 par 23 (Belisle marks this par 23 but the CUA edition differs with par 25). Trans. Peter-Damian Belisle, OSB Cam, Camaldolese Spirituality, Essential Sources p 191 (A similar translation is also found in Fathers of the Church, Medieval Continuation, The Letters of Peter Damian 1-30, Letter #28 par 25) CUA Press, p 270 of pp 255-289.

A Contemplative Moment: i am a little church(no great cathedral)

 

i am a little church(no great cathedral)

far from the splendor and squalor of hurrying cities

-i do not worry if briefer days grow briefest,

i am not sorry when sun and rain make april

my life is the life of the reaper and the sower;

my prayers are prayers of earth's own clumsily striving

(finding and losing and laughing and crying)children

whose any sadness or joy is my grief or my gladness

around me surges a miracle of unceasing

birth and glory and death and resurrection:

over my sleeping self float flaming symbols

of hope,and i wake to a perfect patience of mountains

i am a little church(far from the frantic

world with its rapture and anguish)at peace with nature

-i do not worry if longer nights grow longest;

i am not sorry when silence becomes singing

winter by spring,i lift my diminutive spire to

merciful Him Whose only now is forever:

standing erect in the deathless truth of His presence

(welcoming humbly His light and proudly His darkness)

by e e cummings

So often in the past weeks, my thought and prayer have returned to the public and ecclesial nature of the c 603 vocation. Even in my work with my own director or with candidates for c 603 profession, the Holy Spirit has been working to emphasize this theme. I tend to begin with St Peter Damian's thought on the hermit as ecclesiola (little church, cf., Feast of St Peter Damian) and move from there to the consecrated vocation as a gift of God entrusted to the Church; this same vocation is then entrusted by that same Church to individuals called by God to this specific vocation through ecclesial mediation in the hands of her bishops.

In all of that, Christian reflection on the ecclesial nature of the consecrated eremitical vocation includes the sense that true spirituality is always incarnational; it must be embodied and realized in space and time, not cut off from the materiality of the spatiotemporal realm, but profoundly involved in it in a way that redeems and recreates the whole of reality in Christ. This is the way God moves us towards the new heaven and new earth the Scriptures promise us as our ultimate hope. I believe that these themes are at least implied and encapsulated in e e cummings' poem, i am a little church(no great cathedral). At the same time, I hope you enjoy it on its own terms!!

On Working with a Diocese Toward the Discernment and Formation of c 603 Hermits

 [[Sister Laurel, I want to become a diocesan hermit but my diocese doesn't have the personnel to work with me. Is that common? You said you sometimes work with dioceses who are unfamiliar with c 603 or don't have the personnel to work with the candidate sufficiently to discern and help in the formation of an eremitical vocation. Would you consider doing that with me or does my diocese need to contact you first? What do I need to do to get this started? Thank you for taking the time to answer this. I am fine with you doing that on your blog except for private information of course!]]

Hi there, and thanks for your questions. In the main, though you gave permission to post this on the blog, I'll answer you privately; at the same time, there is some general information I can post here which may help others so thanks for your permission. First of all, it is not uncommon these days that dioceses don't have sufficient personnel, especially in dealing with other than priestly vocations. There are shortages of both priests and religious and vocations offices tend to be less fully staffed than was once the case. Some dioceses no longer have Vicars for Religious or Consecrated Life, The work of these offices is taken on by Vocation Directors working mainly with priestly vocations. As you can imagine, this leaves gaps re c 603 vocations. At the same time, DICLSAL has published Ponam in Deserto Viam (The Hermit's Way of Life in the Local Church) Libreria Editrice Vaticana (2022), which, among other things, encourages the use of qualified c 603 hermits to mentor or collaborate in the discernment and formation of such vocations.

To that end, yes, over the past seven or eight years or so, I have worked with people from several dioceses in the US and Great Britain. As I have noted here in recent years, there are a couple of ways c 603 can be approached to assist with discernment and formation of vocations. One is to add canonical layers to things (requisite time frames, required canonical hoops to jump through usually drawn from established approaches to religious life more generally). This tends not to work in my estimation. The second is to develop a workable and individualized process of discernment and preparation (formation) from within the canon itself with minimal extraneous requirements.

That latter is the approach I have taken with these others based on my sense of the adequacy of the canon itself and its history (especially in terms of the dozen monk-hermits who preceded c 603 in time as its forebears with Bp Remi de Roo, who was their Bishop Protector and made the initial intervention at the Second Vatican Council to see the eremitical vocation, but particularly the solitary eremitical vocation, recognized as a state of perfection). What this approach provides is a process of supervised growth in the vocation based on the requirements of the canon, especially that of writing a liveable Rule of Life, and a minimal set of formal time frames (minimum time to temporary vows, writing of a liveable Rule, readiness for perpetual vows and consecration). While every diocese can approach this differently, the candidate still needs to negotiate certain things to be truly ready for profession as a c 603 hermit. All of those things can be achieved while assisting the candidate to write a liveable Rule of Life that truly reflects his/her own experience of c 603 eremitical life and the way God works in his/her life.

Sometimes dioceses (the Vicar for Religious or Consecrated Life, or the Vocations Director) contact me directly, most often they ask the candidate to contact me and then we (all) go from there. It is the case that you (or any potential candidate really) will need to write (email) me personally AND also speak with your diocese about working with me (more about that in a moment). Before this, however, you will need to check with these persons to see if they are open to professing anyone at all who shows themselves to be a suitable candidate who is adequately prepared for profession under c 603. If they are open to implementing the canon under these conditions and will commit to that, then you (or any potential candidate) are in a position to take next steps. Unfortunately, nothing can be done if your diocese is unwilling to implement the canon at all, but if they are open to it, then there are several ways of proceeding. All of these require someone from the diocese who will meet with you regularly and (less frequently) with me as well. Meanwhile, (mainly depending on the personnel the diocese has available) you and I would meet periodically as is helpful to us both.

What is optimal is to have a couple of people from your diocesan staff (a small team from the Vicar for Religious, or vocations office and perhaps a canon lawyer) meeting with you regularly or periodically (though not particularly frequently) to assess your progress. I can serve as mentor to you and/or consultant to your diocese or diocesan team for the process. We would need to work out the best and most helpful arrangement for all concerned. The idea, however, is that based on your background, your experience with eremitical life and c 603, and your ability to write a liveable Rule, the Diocese follows you either directly or more indirectly as we discern and help form you in a c 603 vocation. (All this presupposes you have already been living as a non-canonical hermit for at least a couple of years.) Once the diocese has determined you are a suitable candidate for a mutual process of discernment and for formation (not everyone is), the ongoing project of preparing to write and writing your Rule and covering how you do and will live the elements of the Canon provides the basis for regular conversations with and assessments by your diocese.

The next step would be for you to write me and tell me your story. If your diocese is open to implementing c 603 at all, they will need the same information as well as your sacramental records, etc. From there we will see how to proceed. (The details of this include working out general arrangements between you, your diocese, and myself to make sure we are on the same page.) It will partly depend on your theological background and background with religious life (if any), eremitical life and spiritual direction, and your age and motivation; it will also depend upon your own and your diocese's openness to working together in collaboration with me (and/or another c 603 mentor) in this way.  The process to be worked out will represent a journey of several years since it is based on your (or any candidate's) ability to write a liveable Rule of Life that adequately reflects c 603 life and its quality as a public ecclesial vocation. 

To do that you need lived experience of the elements of c 603, and you need to understand all of these well enough to write about them and determine how God is calling you to live them in a healthy way in a public and ecclesial vocation for the sake of God, the Church, and the salvation of others. (An ecclesial vocation is one that belongs first of all to the Church to whom God has entrusted it, and who then entrusts it to you first by admitting you to profession and then by mediating God's own consecration of you in the hands of the local bishop.) Meanwhile, by healthy I mean you will live the solitary eremitical vocation in the heart of the Church, in ways that edify and represent the eremitical tradition to and for the entire Church because this is the way God has called you to achieve human wholeness and holiness. In all this, you become a silent preaching of the Gospel of God in Christ. An adequate mutual discernment and formation process helps ensure all of that before admission to perpetual profession and consecration.

I  hope this is helpful. I'll be in touch. 

"From Trash to Triumph": The Importance of Beauty and the Landfill Harmonic Orchestra

 In our Bible class, we are reading NT Wright's Surprised by Hope.  Last week we read chapter 13 where Wright begins to speak of reshaping the Church in terms of Hope. One of the most striking pillars of creating hope in our world is the pillar of beauty along with two others Wright describes, justice and evangelism. And yet, this pillar is one not all churches pay much attention to --- either to the destructive power of ugliness or to the uplifting power of beauty. In preparing for the class I asked folks to watch the second of the following videos and to see if they could explain how it tied into the week's reading. My own sense is that in these children and the larger community, we implicitly see the power of Jesus' resurrection, the power of hope at work shaping their world through the presence of beauty. In this way, we also see human beings coming more fully alive to and with the potential with which they are created and re-created, the realization of the potential that makes them the very image of God.

The second video is a TED Talk done in Amsterdam. Here you meet the teacher who started all this and a few of the players of the Landfillharmonic, including the 19-year-old cellist from the earlier video playing the Prelude from Bach Cello Suite #1 for unaccompanied cello.

One person spoke about this video and said, "Music is a human right." Another noted that she thought Ada (13-year-old violinist) is now studying veterinary medicine (she is likely finished by now)! I read an account of the community (Cateura) that noted before the introduction of music to the children (and to the work of making musical instruments out of garbage!!) parents would come to school and take their children out to work on the landfill. Schooling was clearly not important because the horizon of the community's life was the mountain of garbage everyone sent their way; that defined their lives and it was a narrow, deadly discouraging horizon. Now, however, given the fruits of the music program, it was said that taking kids out of school to work on the landfill never happens. It is said to be "unthinkable" or "inconceivable". These folks have been given a view of a much larger world and moved by beauty of all kinds and have come more fully alive as a result. They are capable now of dreaming in ways they were never capable of before.

In Surprised by Hope, Wright makes clear that the resurrection of Jesus (and his ascension presence) empowers us with a vision of a new heaven and new earth already present to us in a proleptic way. (I have sometimes remarked that in Jesus, the crucified and risen one, we find God in the unexpected and even the unacceptable place; the recycled orchestra in Cateura certainly reminds us of this truth!) Wright reminds us that we too should come alive and build for the Kingdom. We are capable of new dreams and freed to see and act in light of the beauty present here and now among us because God has revealed himself in the crucified One as Emmanuel. The bodily resurrection and ascension of Jesus has begun the definitive interpenetration and interlocking of heaven and earth. The horizon of our own vision is no longer just our sinful "temporal" world any more than the mountain of garbage is the sole horizon of the children in Cateura, Paraguay. We have been granted a different vision of a "reality made new" in Christ and are called to live in light of that!

Who can Live Canon 603 and in what sense?

[[Sister Laurel, can someone who is not professed under c 603 live the canon?]]

Thanks for writing! Because I believe the vision embodied in c 603 is normative of eremitical life in the church, my answer is yes, they can. At least, that is, the first section of the canon can be lived by any hermit in the church, no matter their canonical state or form of eremitical life. However, a non-canonical hermit and a canonical hermit in an institute of consecrated life would not live the second section of the canon. I recently cited that second section, but let me put the text of the entire canon up for you to see what I mean.

Can. 603 §1. In addition to institutes of consecrated life, the Church recognizes the eremitic or anchoritic life by which the Christian faithful devote their life to the praise of God and the salvation of the world through a stricter withdrawal from the world, the silence of solitude, and assiduous prayer and penance. 

§2. A hermit is recognized by law as one dedicated to God in consecrated life if he or she publicly professes in the hands of the diocesan bishop the three evangelical counsels, confirmed by vow or other sacred bond, and observes a proper program of living (Rule of Life) under his supervision.

Members of institutes of consecrated life including those properly termed semi-eremitic, are canonical, but they do not fall under the second section of the canon. This is because their professions, consecrations, legitimate superiors, and canonical standing are rooted in other canons and the proper law of their institutes. Non-canonical hermits can fulfill all of the terms of c 603.1 but do not have standing in law as a hermit, nor do they live a "proper program of living" in a strict sense because in c 603.2 this means an approved Rule that serves as their own proper law that is lived under the supervision or direction of the local ordinary.

I've written this before but please note that "proper" in 603.2 is not a Britishism meaning "well or appropriately done" like when someone can make a "proper cuppa" tea for their guests. Proper in the c 603.2 sense refers to proper law and is approved, as an institute of consecrated life has approved constitutions and statutes that form their own proper law in addition to the requirements of universal or Canon law.  (The hermit's Rule is given a Bishop's Decree of Approval and becomes legally binding on the day of profession.) On the other hand, any person could certainly write a Rule that serves as a vision of and means to live their own personal way of eremitical life. It would be considered proper to them alone even though it is not an officially approved Rule; it would just not meet the conditions of c 603.2, however.

Sister Irene Gibson, First Professed Hermit in Ireland

I have posted a video of Sister Irene in the past, but I had never seen these videos before. These are from before the time she left the Vatican II Church. It seems we share a lot on the notion of what constitutes a hermit, particularly on solitude as a form of community that is antithetical to isolation. Our backgrounds are not identical (she comes from a large family, I do not) but there are similarities. I said before that Sister Irene is the real deal --- though I disagreed with her rejection of the VII Church and much of her theology from that time. In these videos, I believe that her eremitical vocation is even clearer. It was only later on that Sister Irene shifted her spirituality in significant ways. I think that is a shame, not least because it leaves her believing things like the notion that the synod on synodality is a form of Communism. I  wonder if she is also critical of the account of the early Church in the Acts of the Apostles where all hold all in common, but her early approaches to eremitical life (shown here) are edifying. Enjoy.

 

Mistaken Expectations Can Lead to Terrible Disappointment

 One thing more struck me about the phrase "canonical approval" today when someone who had lived as a non-canonical hermit for a number of years and who had petitioned to be admitted to canonical standing under c 603 made a chance remark. I am grateful she did! She spoke of a priest advisor who felt that after @12 weeks of waiting the person should have already been sent some sort of paper to sign to be granted approval!! This is a serious misunderstanding of what is being petitioned for or why the wait is an ordinarily long one! It underscores why we do not use the term "canonical approval" so much as we refer to "canonical standing" or "standing in (canon) law".

Recently I wrote a piece about transferring from a non-canonical hermit life to standing under c 603. I noted there that one could not simply transfer from a non-canonical hermit state to a canonical one because the canonical one involves added canonical rights and responsibilities. One enters and embraces these through a public act of profession and then, with perpetual profession, by an act of consecration by God in the hands of the diocesan bishop. One cannot simply sign some sort of piece of paper noting one has been "approved" and given canonical standing. One must be professed and eventually consecrated to acquire canonical standing!! The priest who expected this non-canonical hermit to be given some piece of paper to be signed marking "approval" is, if the statement made is accurate, completely mistaken. To the extent this hermit has believed this, she is also completely mistaken and apparently misled in a way that sets her up for significant disappointment.

Consider what c 603 itself says: §2. A hermit is recognized by [or in] law as one dedicated to God in consecrated life if he or she publicly professes in the hands of the diocesan bishop the three evangelical counsels, confirmed by vow or other sacred bond, and observes a proper program of living (Rule of Life) under his direction. [Note the importance of writing a liveable Rule of Life. Note too that the appropriate words for what the hermit does in this process are dedication and profession in the hands of her bishop.]

When one approaches a diocese to be admitted to c 603 standing in law, the approval involved is approval to be admitted to profession and consecration. This does not constitute canonical approval! Again, one is approved to take on the public canonical rights and obligations of an ecclesial state of perfection (to use an older language); one does this by giving oneself wholly in an act or acts of profession. A hermit petitioning for this opportunity needs to understand she is petitioning to be allowed to give the whole of her life publicly to and in an ecclesial vocation with significant rights and obligations, and the church must discern whether she has the vocation to allow this to occur.

I have been writing about this recently to prevent this non-canonical hermit (or anyone else, for that matter) from being hurt and disappointed by her diocese. I have wanted her to know what she has petitioned for and how serious and lengthy the process of approval for admittance to profession ordinarily is. I have wanted her to be able to tailor her expectations because there seemed to be a serious misunderstanding involved regarding "transferring" from non-canonical to canonical standing. I had no idea that a priest advisor believed the diocese would simply have her sign some piece of paper or that twelve weeks of waiting would be considered an exorbitant length of time! Simply having lived as a self-defined non-canonical hermit, does not necessarily prepare one to live a public and ecclesial vocation. It does not even necessarily indicate one is truly a hermit in the way the Church understands that vocation or will allow from c 603 hermits. All of this and more must be discerned by a diocese when they are confronted by a non-canonical (lay) hermit, and that takes time and most often, significant formation as well. When one petitions for admission to profession, one also petitions to be allowed to participate in this entire process of mutual discernment and formation.

I would seriously encourage anyone considering applying to be admitted to c 603 standing, to drop the term "canonical approval" from their vocabulary. One is only approved to move forward with a process culminating in public profession and consecration leading to canonical standing. One petitions to be admitted to this standing in law. There are many acts of approval (and perhaps some of disapproval) along the way. Think and speak instead in terms of standing in law and misunderstanding and commensurate disappointment will be minimized as one's expectations are made more realistic.