Why Do We Need Contemplative Convents if we are all called to be contemplatives. . .?

[[Dear Sister Laurel, I often wonder why we need Contemplative convents when God is supposed to want each and every soul to be a contemplative and wants them all for Himself. On the other hand, if being a contemplative and giving God your all, just as He wishes, how can you be like this plus be married and committed to someone
at the same time...! I can't get my head round the Secular Carmelite thing. To me, if one experiences the Presence of God...how can they turn round and commit themselves to another!? Many thanks,]]

My basic answer is that while all may be called to some expression of an essentially contemplative life (a position which can easily be misunderstood, by the way) --- even in their great activity, most are not called to a life dedicated to contemplation and all that requires. Some are exemplars of a dedicated contemplative life, while others exemplify contemplative prayer and contemplative (attentive, mindful) living in the midst of the world. It is similar to the idea that every person is ultimately solitary and called to some degree of authentic solitude, but not every person is called to be a hermit.

Likewise, every person is meant to nurture and foster family and the future of the species, but not every person is called to be a mother or a father in the ordinary sense, for instance. Mothers and Fathers inspire all of us to be nurturing and open to bringing forth new life, despite the sacrifices involved. and they do so with a special vividness and, better perhaps, concreteness. Hermits inspire us to give solitude the place it requires so that human poverty can be transfigured by divine grace in the same way. They each remind us of one dimension or aspect of a fully human life. We could multiply images: Contemplatives remind us that we are meant for union with God and called to become prayer ourselves. Consecrated celibates remind us we are ALL made for an eschatological love which transcends all historically conditioned forms of love. Married people remind us of the holiness of sexual love and the important fact that we all bring one another to God and to completion in him -- though marriage is a privileged way of achieving that. Each focuses our attention on an aspect of truly human life, the nature of human love, etc. Each provides a different lens through which we can see aspects of a mystery far too large to get our minds around otherwise. We need these individual and dedicated examples and exemplars, not least, because we do dwell in space and time, and do not see clearly without them. More, we are not inspired without them.

Another reason, of course, is that as human beings living within the limits of space and time (history), we each must take a specific path to wholeness at a given moment. We simply cannot take all paths. For instance, there is no way I can be both hermit and apostolic religious at the same time, no way I can be consecrated celibate and participate in married or sexual love simultaneously, etc. My own call to wholeness and holiness involves a life given to God in a specific way because historical existence requires it. It is not better than other ways, but it is better for me; other paths, though they could well serve my own growth in authentic humanity, would not serve it as well. For me, for instance, diocesan eremitical life is the context which allows the WHOLE of my historical existence with all its limitations and gifts to make sense and serve others. Life in a Cistercian (or Camaldolese!) monastery, for instance, might function similarly for me, but I don't believe it would do so as well. Apostolic Religious life certainly does not do so despite the fact that it inspires me to be true to the "for (and with) others" nature of the Christian vocation.

Your second question is excellent. The answer is a paradox isn't it? The simple truth is we truly give our lives fully to God ONLY to the extent we also give it to those he loves. As noted above, one expression of part of this truth is marriage. Here two people give themselves to one another body and soul precisely so they may come to God together. In their love for each other they discover the reality of divine life/love. This is the most common or usual way persons come to know God's exhaustive love and to commit themselves to it. But your question comes at things from another direction, namely from a more apparently unmediated experience of this love which then leads to life commitment to another. I think your question is really how can one not make this love of God exclusive, true? But it is completely understandable that one's relationship with God spills over into relationships with others, that this love inspires and empowers us to love others and lead them to share in it.

This is true in lives of every contemplative and even every true hermit I know. It is true in the case of Consecrated Virgins whose relationship with Christ is explicitly spousal. It is true of those Apostolic Religious I know whose relationships with God-in-Christ are described as nuptial or spousal (though also in those whose relationships are not of, course). In fact, it is as prayer lives deepen and relationships with God mature that one is called to share with others. Of course, this does not mean these persons give themselves in marriage to another, but, together with our understanding of the Sacrament of marriage, it suggests that for many people, such a dedicated sharing of lives makes tremendous, even ultimate sense. That may not be true of your vocation or my own, but it is true for these people and witnesses to the mysterious nature of Divine Love and the way we share in it. Because God is the ground of all existence, and because we come to know and love others truly only as we come to know them in and of this ground (that is, in and of God), this leads to the paradox I mentioned earlier: we give our lives to God ONLY to the extent we also give it to those he loves.

Let me add one thing which may further illustrate this paradox. It is based on a prayer experience I once had. In that experience I had the sense that I had God's entire and exclusive attention and love. At the same time, however, I had the sense of assurance that he was caring for everyone else in the very same way, that ALL was well, nothing and no one was being neglected or loved less than I. How is this possible? It is divine love after all, and therefore a very great mystery. What I am suggesting is that we are called to love in the same way. We are invited to give ourselves completely to God, to love him exclusively AND we are called to love others exhaustively as well. This is the paradox and challenge of contemplative life.

For some, this love will involve marriage precisely because these persons experience the presence of God in this way, not in spite of their experience of his presence. For some it will mean apostolic religious life, for some others contemplative religious life, and for others of us, it will even mean eremitical or solitary life, for instance, but the sense that these lives are about loving God AND others exhaustively at the same time does not change --- only the way this is expressed. I suspect that once God is ALL in ALL and we are part of that new heaven and new earth Paul talks about, we will understand more clearly how it is that union with God means a total gift of self to others as well. For now all I can affirm is that God's "wanting us all for himself" is a different kind of exclusiveness than we are used to in merely human terms. As I understand it, he has us all to himself WHEN we also love others --- even when that love is expressed in eremitical life or in solitary contemplative prayer and time alone with God. In other words, it is not exclusive in a competitive way, but insofar as it includes others.

I hope this helps some. If I have been unclear or raised new questions, please get back to me!

Karl Rahner and Everyday Mysticism

[[Sister Laurel, your last post is reminiscent of the mysticism of Karl Rahner, true?]]

Yes, it is indeed. I am probably at least partly indebted to Rahner (and to Jesuits more generally) for my understanding of the world and spirituality --- and strongly so to Paul Tillich as well. Rahner is famous for having made the comment that unless all Christians became mystics, there would be no Christianity. However, Rahner made those comments within the context of what has been called an "everyday mysticism" --- a mysticism which recognized the mystery of God at the heart of everyday reality. What he wanted, and what he saw as imperative, was a mysticism in which Christians discovered the hidden presence of God, the deep and holy ground and depth in and of all created existence.  (Of course I must note that finding the presence of God in ordinary life is also a profoundly Benedictine trait and I am clearly Camaldolese Benedictine in this way as well.)

This form of mysticism issues in a "sober" spirituality "found in courageous perseverance in silent faith, trust, love, and unselfish service, despite life's seeming emptiness." (Egan, Karl Rahner) It also issues in experiences of joy at the presence of God in the most mundane circumstances of life as well as in the more extraordinary or "learned" mysticism of the saint. All of these are specifications of the orientation to God (the ground of being and mystery) which is partly constitutive of every human being. With and in Jesus Christ, we come to celebrate life and its inherent goodness and sanctity. More, we understand creation as sacramental and recognize the myriad ways it reveals and mediates God's presence and Word to us every day. This essential tearing or sundering of the barrier (veil) between the sacred and profane, the mystical and the temporal, this recognition and fostering of the sacramental character of all creation, even the most apparently mundane, is part of the vocation of every Christian and the core of any authentic mysticism. We come to share in this vocation by accepting our place in Jesus' life, death, resurrection, and ascension --- that is, by participating in the Christ Event in which the barrier was sundered and reconciliation achieved between God and his creation. Appreciation of all of this was the reason Rahner spoke somewhat hyperbolically of the imperative that every Christian become a mystic lest there be no Christianity.

Though Rahner affirms these as well, his theology does not completely trust versions of mysticism which stress extraordinary phenomenon, ecstasies, and the like. He does not like the idea of infused contemplation which seems interventionist and possibly elitist. Instead he prefers the idea that some persons, when the experiences are not merely auto-suggestive or psychologically aberrant, learn to allow the Holy Spirit's communications with greater intensity and ease than others do; hence the phrase above, "learned" mysticism or contemplation. But this mysticism is not different in kind from the everyday mysticism he espouses. It is merely different in intensity and clarity and remains rooted in the same ground of mystery which is at the core of all mysticism. (I should note that to the extent these are genuine, they will foster the same reverence and love for others and all of God's creation any experience of or inspiration by God empowers.)

There are several books available for those wanting to understand Rahner's everyday mysticism better. These include, Everyday Faith (Rahner), Karl Rahner, Mystic of Everyday Life by Egan, The Mystical Way in Everyday Life (Rahner). More technical articles are available in Sacramentum Mundi and Theological Investigations. A World of Grace by O'Donovan is also helpful. I suspect you have read several of these already but others may find them of assistance. I would recommend Egan's book though as a place to begin and supplement that with The Mystical Way in Everyday Life because the latter supplies prayers, etc which will illustrate what Egan writes about at greater length.

Additionally, people may be interested in Jesuit spirituality more generally, for everyday mysticism is a pillar of this spirituality and Rahner was a key proponent. James Martin's recent book, The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything: A Spirituality for Real Life, would be a great place to start!

Podcasts, Dialogue, Affirmation of the Mystery at the Heart of the World and Contemplative Life

[[Dear Sister, thank you for doing the podcast on A Nun's Life. It was really interesting and surprising in some ways. I had not realized that hermit life was "communal" at its very heart, and the whole idea of chronic illness as vocation was new to me. I also had not realized that hermits could do podcasts!!! I guess I did have the idea that hermits still live in the [modern] equivalent of caves. I wonder if you aren't concerned that people will think doing the podcast conflicts with the eremitical vocation or that you are giving scandal? Also, do other hermits agree with your description of the life as fundamentally communal or "dialogical"?]] (Redacted)

Good questions, and thanks very much for your comments. The experience of doing the podcast was an excellent one for me personally: exhilarating, challenging, a bit taxing physically and mentally, encouraging and inspiring (especially given the responses on chronic illness as vocation!), and just generally good fun! One thing I was especially grateful I was not aware of until afterward, however, was the number of people who tuned in to listen or participated from the chat room. There were almost 450 people participating in one way and another during the hour and I was terrified enough as we began the program!! I came away with tremendous respect for what Sisters Julie and Maxine are doing and how hard they work at it, as well as greater appreciation for their congregation's support for this ministry. As far as I can see, A Nun's Life is of tremendous benefit to the Church and to vocations of all sorts, so the chance to participate in it in some way was very cool --- and a real honor.

I think if I were doing podcasts every week (or every month, for instance) people would have a reason to complain or question. But this was an unusual event and, I sincerely hope, useful in serving the eremitical vocation and also those with chronic illness (or who are otherwise marginalized) who might never consider that their own illness (etc) can be the medium through which the Gospel can be proclaimed to the world with a clarity and concreteness few can match. However, I am not concerned so much with what others think so long as they are clear that this is one of those forms of ministry which result from the silence of solitude and lead back to it as well. It is exceptional but consistent with both the Canon that governs my life, the Rule I live by, as well as the Camaldolese Benedictine charism. It is also consistent with expressions of the eremitical and anchoritic life as found and embodied throughout history. Hermits and anchorites have always been sought out for the wisdom their very marginality witnesses to and helps foster.

Of course, as a hermit, it is important that my own life be defined not primarily by these exceptional instances, but by the essential elements stated in Canon 603: the silence of solitude, assiduous prayer and penance, stricter separation from the world (that which is resistant to Christ and includes the world which lives in one's own heart--- those various soils which stifle or resulting flora which choke the Word of God within and without us!). Even so another essential element of consecrated eremitical life (and any eremitical life, I think!) is that it is lived for the salvation of the world. One embraces this responsibility in a number of ways --- not least in living stricter separation, the silence of solitude and assiduous prayer and penance in the heart of the church so that one's life serves as a kind of leaven and witness to a dimension of mystery at the heart of everything --- but also, in opening up the fruit of these elements to others.

You may have read blog posts that argue a kind of mutually exclusive dichotomy between the temporal Catholic World and the Mystical Catholic World. These posts have argued that a hermit must choose either the temporal OR the mystical Catholic Worlds. I have argued that this stance is theological and spiritual nonsense. The reason I have objected is because Christ, undoubtedly a mystic whose entire life was motivated by the reality of his union with God, was also deeply committed to the temporal world. In fact he could not be a mystic without such a commitment --- and vice versa as well! Heaven (life wholly in union with God) and earth are not supposed to be antithetical realities. Christ came to reconcile them and to implicate heaven within the earthly so that it completely interpenetrates the world of space and time. As I have written before, the result will be what Paul refers to as "A new heaven and earth" where "God is all in all". What mystics affirm is the dimension of mystery which grounds and is meant to permeate all of the temporal world. The affirmation is made for the sake of God's own life and the world of space and time --- God's good creation --- not in rejection of either of these.

Something similar is true of the hermit life, but with an accent on solitude and the dynamic of human poverty and divine grace which defines it. We are not to despise or reject the temporal world in the name of some separate and antithetical mystical world. Instead we commit ourselves to the redemption of all of that reality in God from the perspective of our solitude. Cornelius Wencel, Er Cam, writes: " The hermit does not meet eternity in the way gnostics are tempted to meet it. He does not reject what is temporal. He has his share of eternity by raising all earthly things up to their ultimate fullness by virtue of Christ's redemptive love."

In a section entitled, "Living in Dialogue" Wencel also notes, "The seclusion and solitude that constitute the eremitic life do not aim at negating the fundamental dynamism of human existence, with its entering into dialogue and relationships. On the contrary, eremitic isolation and solitude form the basis of that dynamism. . . . As mentioned before, the hermit's solitude can never be a sign of withdrawal and isolation from the world [used in a different sense than the term "world" in Canon 603] and its affairs. The hermit, since he wants to serve other people, must arrive at a profound understanding of his own nature and his relation to God. That is why his solitude is not at all a barrier, but it is rather an element that encourages openness towards others. . . .His solitude is not therefore a lifeless emptiness . . . it is related to those spheres of human personality that can exist only if they are open to meet God and the world in love." (The Eremitic Life, Encountering God in Silence and Solitude, Cornelius Wencel, Er Cam)

All of this is an expansion of, or variation on, one of the first things I mentioned on the podcast, namely we are each grounded in God and as we grow in union with God, so too do we grow in communion with all else that is grounded in him, all that he holds as precious. Hermits and other contemplatives (and certainly all genuine mystics) know this truth intimately.

A Nun's Life Podcast

Readers may be interested in a podcast I am doing tomorrow with Sisters Julie and Maxine, IHM of A Nun's Life Ministry. We are going to talk about the life of the diocesan hermit and explore some of the ways this life is reflects everyday faith and Christian living, impacts upon, or speaks to these.

The information on the podcast is as follows: On Air: February 3, 2011, from 7 to 8 p.m. Central Time.

Where: www.aNunsLife.org/LIVE (The podcast is under the heading, "In Good Faith")

Details: The broadcast is free and open to the public. You can tune in from any place you have internet access. We also have a chat room for you to use during the broadcast in order to connect with one another and with us.

If new to A Nun’s Life webcasts, a webcast is like tuning into a radio program, but instead of broadcasting it on the airwaves, we broadcast it on our website. All you have to do is visit our website and make sure the volume on your computer is up. The format of this webcast is similar to a webinar where you can ask questions and interact with us and with our guest by using the chat room.

"And When they Saw Him they Begged Him to. . ." (Adapted)

I have to say that tomorrow's Gospel always suprises and delights me. It is first the story of Jesus' sending the demons which possess a man into a nearby herd of swine thus freeing the man from the bondage to brokennness and inhumanity which marks and mars his life; secondly, it is the story of what happens when he approaches the nearby town (Gadara) whose residents have heard of what he has done. Despite knowing how the story goes, I admit to being surprised every time I hear that Jesus is being begged to leave the district and its residents without troubling them further.

Now granted, Jesus just destroyed an entire herd of swine, and they must have been someone's livelihood --- perhaps many people's (and presuming Jesus was approaching Jews, it is a livelihood which contravened the Law as well). Some unhappiness with this would have been understandable. More, Jesus has healed a man whose condition had made travel along a certain route unsafe, so one would expect a mixed response to that -- this man will now need to be genuinely accommodated in some real sense --- not simply treated as a wild animal or alien of some sort who can be chained or otherwise held apart from the community. So, even though there was the recovery of the region and freedom from the man's violence, I begin to have a sense why Jesus was not welcomed here. But I admit to still hearing in the back of my mind cheers of welcome, voices beseeching Jesus to come and change lives, a positive and welcoming response like that in fiction stories where the conquering hero comes back from slaying the dragon, or like the narrative in the New Testament where Jesus is welcomed as King with waving palm branches and cries of Hosanna --- temporary as that moment was! In a way, perhaps in the "back of my mind" I want a costless or "cheap" grace, a "good news" fit for escapist fiction or an incredibly naive reading of the NT --- but not for the real world or for a Gospel whose heart is the cross. Am I really much different than most of us in this?

But of course the Gospel is good news in a much more realistic, paradoxical, and problematical way and tomorrow's pericope from Mark highlights this for us. Jesus reveals himself to be a man of extraordinary, even divine authority --- a man with authority over nature, illness, the hearts of men and women, and now over demons. He makes whole and holy, feeds the hungry on a profound and lasting level, frees from every kind of dehumanizing bondage, and provides true meaning and dignity for those lost and bereft. He is the Son of the Most High God (a title Mark has on the lips of the demons in tomorrow's story)--- very good news indeed --- but he acts with an authority which is genuinely awesome and which turns the everyday world of politics, religion, simple ordinariness, and comfortable respectability on their heads. The Garasenes in tomorrow's Gospel see this clearly and they are unprepared for it. Far from misunderstanding Jesus and refusing to welcome him on those grounds they understand precisely who Jesus is and want no part of him --- just as the Scribes and Pharisees understand him all-too-well and reject him. Far better to simply ask Jesus to leave the district than to have to come to terms with who he is and what that truly challenges and calls forth in and from them! How familiar this pattern is for us!

One of the current complaints by some traditionalists is that Vatican II gave us a God of love (they frequently spell the word "luv" to denote their disparagement of it) and lost the God who inspires fear, etc. They may well be correct that there has been some "domestication" of God and his Christ in popular piety --- but then this is not because of Vatican II; it is a continual temptation and sin besetting the Church. Afterall, how many of us when faced with the daily prospect of renewed faith recognize that acceptance of Jesus' authority -- expressed as an unconditional love which is stronger than death -- will turn our world upside down and call us to a radical way of living and loving which involves renunciation, self-sacrifice, and commitment to a Kingdom that is NOT of this world and often is at distinct odds with it? The equivalent of a herd of swine or the accommodation of the mentally ill is the least it will cost us --- precisely because it is unconditional. How many of us choose not so much to be loved -- with all that implies for growth, maturity and responsibility -- but instead (at least with some part of ourselves) would prefer to be coddled and cajoled? The same is true with regard to choosing to love. How many of us choose not so much to love as Christ, but limit our giving to relatively painless charities which both keep the needy at arm's length and salves our consciences in one relatively undemanding motion? In other words, how many of us buy into (and construct our lives around) a religion which is at least as much OF this world as it is IN it?

So yes, tomorrow's Gospel both surprises and delights me. It does both because of its honesty and because it is genuinely good news, rooted in the awesome authority of the Christ who loves without condition but not without challenge, empowerment, and commission. Such a Christ will never be really popular, I think. Many of our churches and cities are far more like Gadara than not --- though perhaps not as openly. The authority of Jesus over illness, fear, meaninglessness, and the demons that beset each and all of us as well as our society and world is an awesome and demanding reality; unfortunately, our hearts are more often ambivalent, ambiguous, and resistant than pure, single, and open in its regard. I suspect that domestication of our faith is something most of us are guilty of every day of our lives. With that and Mark's Gospel in mind, let us summon up the courage to beg Jesus to enter into our towns, homes, churches, and hearts, and remain with us; let us give him free access to move within and change our world as he wills! That is my own prayer in light of this Gospel passage.

St Anthony, Abbot

Lots of hermits in the calendar these days (well, relatively so!). Today we would ordinarily celebrate the Feast of St Anthony of Egypt (251-356 -- no, no typos in that date), one of the best known hermit Saints -- although we mainly remembered Martin Luther King this year. It is also the feastday of the Motherhouse of the women's congregation of Benedictine Camaldolese located in Rome --- the house where, some may recall, Nazarena, an American recluse and anchoress lived out her life. It follows just two days after the feast of St Paul the Hermit, recognized as the first hermit in the Catholic Church.

There is a good story about Anthony which relates to some of the readings which come up this week, most notably Friday's reading from the Letter to the Hebrews (8:6-13). This text reminds us of the new covenant and the shift from an approach to morality that is rooted in observance of the law as a sign of observing the covenant to one where the person embodies the covenant in their very selves with the covenant written on their minds and hearts. Hebrews notes that when the new covenant is established in this way, we will no longer need to teach one another saying, "Know the Lord," because all will know God in the depths of their hearts --- and, implicitly, be able to recognize him in the lives of each of us.

Once upon a time Anthony was visited by some Greek philosophers or wise men. They had heard stories about Anthony and the way he comforted people with his words. They were anticipating some kind of wisdom they could be convinced of and take away with them --- a new possession of sorts. The "container" for these comforting bits of wisdom, they also thought, were words and ideas, arguments they could add to an already notable armament of arguments and human wisdom. It seems that these men wanted to cull from Anthony's life what they considered admirable. The rest, however, the hermit or monastic life, the asceticism, the "foolishness" of following Christ exhaustively in material as well as spiritual poverty and obedience they rejected as the foolishness they considered it to be --- the foolishness Paul himself speaks of when he measures the scandal of a Crucified Christ against the wisdom of the "Greeks".

Anthony asked these men why they came to him, someone dressed in animal skins, and living a subsistence life of faith in the desert as a disciple of the crucified Christ. They reassured him that they thought he was a wise man. Anthony realized what these men wanted from him and refused to play their game. His challenge was clear and cut to the heart of the matter: If you truly believe I am a wise man, then live as I live. Become what I have become in Christ, for I am a Christian. This is open to you, but it is not the way of human wisdom, not even the way of external observance to Divine law. The philosophers left, no new lessons to teach others, no wisdom to add to their armament of human wisdom, no new arguments or consoling words they can pull out of their collection of platitudes and aphorisms. Despite superficial differences, the choice Anthony gave them was the same one Christ gave the rich young man, and the same one Hebrews 8:6-13 presents us with, namely, to leave the old way of living behind, the way of external legal observance, possessions, human wisdom and achievement and become a new creation in Christ from the heart outward. Not all of us are called to be hermits, but we are all called to emulate Anthony in this matter.


Those interested in knowing more about Anthony of Egypt should check out his rather "stylized" (it is typically hagiographical) biography by Saint Athanasius, The Life of Anthony. It is available in a number of editions and online as well. A book which is not about Anthony only, but which is fascinating in light of his (and others') well-known battles with demons, and which might interest some readers, is David Brakke's, Demons and the Making of the Monk, Spiritual Combat in Early Christianity. Chapter 2, however focuses on St Anthony (via St Athanasius', Life of Anthony) and references to him occur throughout.

Meanwhile, all good wishes to Camaldolese men and women everywhere, nuns, hermits, oblates! Prayers especially for the community at St Anthony's of Egypt in Rome.

Writing a Rule of Life, More Questions

Dear Sister, what does a diocese expect in an eremitical Rule of Life? How brief can it be, and how individual?

This is a great set of questions. When one reads about Rules of Life in Raven's Bread, a newsletter for hermits, or in the Fredette's associated book on contemporary eremitical life, for instance, one gets the impression that a Rule of Life can be as brief as several paragraphs (or even less), or relatively lengthy. When one looks at historical examples, for instance St Francis' Rule for hermits or the VERY brief "Brief Rule" of St Romuald, one gets the same idea regarding brevity. However, canonists and dioceses do have certain legitimate expectations of a diocesan hermit's Rule of life --- certain things it should cover in order to truly 1) reflect the nature and quality of the vocation in front of the diocese, and 2) govern and inspire an authentic eremitical life. It should be remembered that diocesan hermits' Rules or Plans of Life are approved with a "Bishop's Declaration of Approval" and become legally (canonically) binding on the hermit on the day of profession. They become quasi public documents which are representative of the solitary eremitical life as the Church understands and validates it. Thus, they should not only cover the essentials of the life, but serve to inspire and guide the hermit in living it with integrity as well as creativity and legitimate flexibility. They may also do the same for others who may draw on them for insight.

There is a challenge then in making the Rule sufficiently general and also personal enough to accommodate the various ways the Holy Spirit calls us to live our lives. Still, the first thing the candidate for profession must remember is that this is a Rule for eremitical life lived under Canon 603, and it must therefore address all the requirements of the Canon. These specify a publicly vowed life of stricter separation from the world, the silence of solitude, assiduous prayer and penance, lived according to a Rule approved by and under the supervision of one's Bishop all for the salvation of the world and the glory and praise of God. Consider how many elements are involved here, and how profound and integral the vision of life it describes. Consider the elements which are not specifically mentioned --- not least the charism of the diocesan hermit and how this eremitical life is a gift to Church and world! A hermit's Rule must address all these elements and more.

So, what specifically should the solitary hermit's Rule cover? (Please note these are not listed in any particular order.) 1) the elements of the Canon itself (including definitions of significant terms) and how these are lived out in this person's life (prayer, silence of solitude, penance, stricter separation from the world, Scripture, lectio, etc), 2) a brief history and theology of eremitical life, its place in the church and its importance for the world, especially at this point in the Church and World's history (the purpose here is not to demonstrate that one is an historian but rather to allow one to demonstrate she has a clear sense that she is assuming a responsible place in this living history), 3) a theology of the vows, the proposed vow formula itself, and how the vows are lived out specifically and generally, 4) provisions for study, ongoing formation, spiritual direction, retreat and desert days, 5) affiliation with monasteries, predominant spirituality, etc (as applicable), 6) the place and nature of hospitality, 7) work, how much, what type, where it will occur, etc, 8) provisions for future needs (income, burial, insurance, etc).

Besides prayer, one also needs to cover 9) any ministry undertaken and whether in or out of the hermitage, 10) relationship with parish and diocese including not only participation in the parish and the forms that will take, but some consideration of one's relationship with one's Bishop, the place (and person) of a diocesan delegate in the scheme of things, frequency and nature of contact with these, etc, and 11) a horarium which, at least generally, specifies the shape of one's day: rising, meals, prayer, lectio, work, ministry, recreation and errands, hours of rest and sleep. (If one has significant personal exigencies which bear on these (chronic illness, for instance) it is usually a good idea to state these up front and note that these occasionally demand some flexibility with regard to horarium, etc, rather than trying to minimize the demands of the life throughout the Rule. One's descriptions should be about what is generally possible and prudent for one --- not an idealization of what another hermit MIGHT live if they were able.)

I have written here before about writing one's own Rule of Life and how to begin that. It makes clear that one writes a rule based on one's own experience living the life. Therefore, even though the above elements seem numerous and perhaps overwhelming when set out this way, there is plenty of room for individuality and flexibility. No two hermits will write about poverty or obedience or chastity in precisely the same way, for instance, but the ways they live this out will still involve similarities. No two hermits will approach penance in the same way, or hospitality, or stricter separation from the world, but their Rules will reflect on these realities and describe how one honors them on a day-to-day basis.

So long as one includes the essential elements of the canon, remembers what kind of document one is writing, and takes care of the normal needs of a truly eremitical life, one can make the Rule as brief and individual as one needs. One is expressing one's life in this, especially the values and place of Christ in structuring and empowering that. In part, a Rule is an expression of one's faith then, but it also outlines the form and essential elements that make that life a true expression of that faith lived out as a solitary diocesan hermit --- not merely as an individual doing as they like throughout the day. In other words, to some extent, the Rule serves to reflect, govern, nurture, and protect the solitary eremitical vocation itself, not merely the individual's OWN vocation to this life. Stated another way we can say that the Rule makes sure the individual vocation grows as an expression of the vocation to solitary eremitical life itself. This helps explain the tension between institutional expectations and the individuality which also is reflected in such a document. Should, for instance, a person find there is actual and significant conflict between these two dimensions they may well thus be discerning they are not called to canonical profession under canon 603.

Feast of the Baptism of Jesus (Reprise with tweaks)

Of all the feasts we celebrate, the baptism of Jesus is the most difficult for us to understand. We are used to thinking of Baptism as a solution to original sin instead of the means of our initiation into the death and resurrection of Jesus, or our adoption as daughters and sons of God and heirs to his Kingdom, or again, as a consecration to God's very life and service. When viewed this way, and especially when we recall that John's baptism was one of repentance for sin, how do we make sense of a sinless Jesus submitting to it?

I think two points need to be made here. First, Jesus grew into his vocation. His Sonship was real and completely unique but not completely developed or historically embodied from the moment of his conception; rather it was something he embraced more and more fully over his lifetime. Secondly, his Sonship was the expression of solidarity with us and his fulfillment of the will of his Father to be God-with-us. Jesus will incarnate the Logos of God definitively in space and time, but this event we call the incarnation encompasses and is only realized fully in his life, death, and resurrection -- not in his nativity. Only in allowing himself to be completely transparent to this Word, only in "dying to self," and definitively setting aside all other possible destinies does Jesus come to fully embody and express the Logos of God in a way which expresses his solidarity with us as well.

It is probably the image of Baptism-as-consecration then which is most helpful to us in understanding Jesus' submission to John's baptism. Here the man Jesus is set apart as the one in whom God will truly "hallow his name". Here, in an act of manifest commitment, Jesus' humanity is placed completely at the service of the living God and of those to whom God is committed. Here his experience as one set apart for God establishes him as completely united with us and our human condition. This solidarity is reflected in his statement to John that together they must fulfill the will of God. And here too Jesus anticipates the death and resurrection he will suffer for the sake of both human and Divine destinies which, in him, will be reconciled and inextricably wed to one another. His baptism establishes the pattern not only of HIS humanity, but that of all authentic humanity. So too does it reveal the nature of true divinity, for our's is a God who becomes completely subject to our sinful reality in order to free us for his own entirely holy one.

I suspect that even at the end of the Christmas season we are still scandalized by the incarnation. We still stumble over the intelligibility of this baptism, and the propriety of it especially. Our inability to fathom Jesus' baptism, and our tendency to be shocked by it, just as JohnBp was probably shocked, says we are not comfortable, even now, with a God who enters exhaustively into our reality. We remain uncomfortable with a Jesus who is tempted like us in ALL THINGS, and matures into his identity as God's only begotten Son. We are puzzled by one who is holy as God is holy and, as the creed affirms, "true God from true God" and who, evenso, is consecrated to and by the one he calls Abba and to the service of his Kingdom and people. A God who comes to us in smallness, weakness, submission, and self-emptying is really not a God we are comfortable with --- despite three weeks of Christmas celebrations and reflections, and a prior four weeks of preparation -- is it? In fact, none of this was comfortable for early Christians either. They were embarrassed by Jesus' baptism by John --- as Matt's added explanation of the reasons for it in vv 14-15 indicate. They were concerned that perhaps it indicated Jesus inferiority to John the Baptist and they wondered if perhaps it meant that Jesus had sinned prior to his baptism. And perhaps this is as it should be. Perhaps the scandal attached signals to us we are getting this right theologically.

After all, today's feast tells us that Jesus' public ministry begins with a consecration and commissioning by God which is somewhat similar to our own baptismal consecration. His public life begins with an event that prefigures his end as well. There is a real dying to self involved here, not because Jesus has a false self which must die -- as each of us has --- but because his life is placed completely at the disposal of his God, his Abba, in solidarity with us. Loving another, affirming the being of another in a way which subordinates one's own being to theirs --- putting one's own life at their disposal and surrendering all other life-possibilities always entails a death of sorts -- and a kind of rising to new life as well. The dynamics present on the cross are present here too -- complete and obedient (that is open and responsive) submission to the will of God, and an unfathomable subjection to that which sin makes necessary so that God's love may conquer precisely here as well.

Singing our Magnificats, Looking back and ahead

With our celebration of Jesus' baptism the celebration of the Christmas season draws to an end. In a short two weeks we moved from the nativity of Jesus, through readings which marked his growth in stature and grace, and we now approach the feast of his commissioning by God and Jesus' own acceptance of all it means to be Son. But from the beginning of Advent throughout the Christmas season we heard stories of individuals brought from barrenness, silence, and muteness to fruitfulness and the bold speech the Scriptures calls parrhesia. There was Hanna, a barren Jewish woman, whose faith eventually allowed God to act in her so that she might have a son. She gave birth to Samuel and sang her gratitude for the fruition of God's Word in the "Canticle of Anna". There was Elizabeth, a voiceless woman in Judaism who gave birth to John the Baptist, and who stood up against the religious establishment of her day proclaiming, "No! His name will be John!" and Zecharia who doubted God could bring new life out of barrenness and was made mute, but who eventually affirmed with his wife, "No, his name will be John" and regained a powerful voice in bending to God's will. As a result we have the Canticle of Zechariah, another eloquent symbol of the speech or word event a human being can become.

John the Baptist leaps in response to the Word of God and becomes more than just a Prophet, but also the actual forerunner of God's Christ. His own austere song is the call to repentence and purification! There was, of course, Mary whose own virginity and fiat issued --- through the grace of God --- in the birth of Jesus and the magnificat which, like Hanna's canticle, is emblematic of true obedience and the reversals God effects in our lives and world when God's Word and Spirit are allowed to have their way. There was Simeon who saw Jesus in the Temple and sang his praise as he spoke of his own willingness to die now that the goal of his life had been accomplished.

God's own story was rehearsed twice for us during this season in the prologue to John's Gospel, first on Christmas day, and again last Friday. It is the story of a move from the "aloneness" of the Communion we call God through the Word's sounding in the silence and emptiness of chaos to the resultant coming to be of a creation on its way to being the articulate expression of God's glory. It is a story, and in fact a song, which comes to a particular climax in the nativity and life of Christ as the Word is enfleshed to dwell amongst us. In every case, and in the stories of so many more individuals in the Scriptures --- prophets, judges, etc --- we have God bringing, summoning, to fruition and articulation his own Word --- always out of silence, chaos, barrenness, etc. And now, we approach the feast of the Baptism which marks Jesus' own adult acceptance of divine Sonship, his own commissioning to move out of the silence and privacy of familial obscurity into the public ministry which is his to claim. He will be THE Word of Power for the world and we will be told, "This is my beloved Son. Listen (hearken) to him!"

Theologians use the term "the Christ Event" to refer to Jesus' life, death, resurrection, and ascension. But, because of what happens to the world in these events, the term refers to more than this single life. It refers as well to those who come to participate in Jesus' life and share it, to those who accept their own calls to articulate the Word of God in Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit, to those who literally become part of the body of Christ and share in the dynamic spoken of in Ephesians, "Christ brought to full stature." Each of us have a place in continuing and extending the range and scope of the Christ Event. Each of us can allow or prevent the Word from coming to greater or fuller articulation in our world. Each of us may come to be an exhaustive articulation of the Glory of God, or not.

We are at the beginning of the Church year still, but this weekend's feast challenges us to accept the commissioning which accompanies Jesus' own. With Hanna, Elizabeth, Zechariah, John the Baptist, Mary, Simeon, et al, we are to become expressions of the Word of God within us and reveal the glory of God with our lives. The reversals spoken of by Hanna and Mary, the reversals proclaimed and embodied by Christ are to become the melody of our lives as each one becomes a canticle, psalm, or magnificat of God's power, and no other. My prayer is that each of us will find and assume our place and our voice in the Christ Event and sing those magnificats until every person has joined in the song, indeed until the whole of creation is one full-throated hymn of revelation and praise to God.

Christmas News from Transfiguration Monastery

Transfiguration Monastery, the only Camaldolese Monastery of nuns in the United States, has seen another year of changes. They are exciting and mainly positive. (One is a bit sad, I think.)

In the community's Christmas letter, Sister Donald writes, [[ We hope that by Christmas a permanent chaplain will join us: Fr Robert Dwyer, a retired priest of this diocese and a long time friend of the monastery. We have spent the past several months working on the construction of a hermitage for Fr Dwyer. We've also had visits this fall from a number of women who have an interest in living monastic life --- and we will have two more with us at Christmas time.

Sister Jeanne Marie is now residing at Susquehanna nursing home and is still very much a part of our community, supporting us above all in her prayer. She was with us on the Feast of All Saints and for Thanksgiving. [Contact information is available for those wishing to contact her.]

On December 8th, Mary Fedorchak received the habit and became "Sister Mary Catherine". Mary chose the name Catherine because of the influence in her life of Catherine de Hueck Doherty, the founder of Madonna House in Canada. We are delighted and rejoice in the many talents and good spirit she brings to the community. . . .

Sister Sheila remains our principal cook and bread baker. She is also our liturgist, excellent chant teacher and musician, seamstress, and is teaching us a course on the Book of Ruth. Sister Donald gave retreats, workshops, and talks in Dallas, Kalamazoo, at St John's Abbey, in California, and at the monastery here in Windsor. She is also teaching two courses for the deacon candidates in our diocese: Christology and spirituality.

At the end of September, Sister Barbara, novice mistress of our Motherhouse in Rome, came for a long-awaited canonical visit. Sister Barbara is young, enthusiastic, and was very supportive of our efforts here. She was eager to improve her English and we now have more incentive to work on Italian.]]

I do ask for your prayers for Transfiguration, and urge you to consider supporting these Sisters in whatever way you can. Also, please consider making a retreat there or attending a workshop (or one of the retreats Sister Donald gives in CA or Dallas for those interested in a Benedictine experience). The Camaldolese Benedictine charism is centuries old (almost 10 centuries in fact) and one of the few places eremitical life, cenobitical life, and evangelization are blended in the way that happens at Transfiguration. Those interested in living an expression of Camaldolese spirituality outside a monastery might also want to consider becoming Camaldolese Oblates, whether with Transfiguration or with New Camaldoli (monks) in Big Sur, or Incarnation Monastery (monks, house of studies) in Berkeley. Oblates make their stability with one of these houses, but are always welcome at any of them.

Update 2013: Transfiguration Monastery has ceased to be a Camaldolese Monastery and is formally becoming an American Benedictine house/congregation. Those who are interested in becoming Camaldolese Oblates should probably contact New Camaldoli or Incarnation Monastery. Those of us who are already Camaldolese Oblates with our affiliation with Transfiguration have the option of maintaining our oblature here or transferring it to one of these other houses. The Camaldolese charism will remain a significant part of Transfiguration's inspiration, heritage, and ministry.

Feast of the Epiphany

There is something stunning about the story of the Epiphany and we often don't see or hear it, I think, because the story is so familiar to us. It is the challenge which faces us precisely because our God is one who comes to us in littleness, weakness, and obscurity, and meets us in the unexpected and even unacceptable place. It is truly stunning I think to find three magi (whoever these were and whatever they represented in terms of human power, wealth, and wisdom) recognizing in a newborn baby, not only the presence of a life with cosmic significance but, in fact, the incarnation of God and savior of the world. I have rarely been particularly struck by this image of the Magi meeting the child Jesus and presenting him with gifts, but this year I see it clearly as a snapshot of the entire Gospel story with all its hope, wonder, poignancy, challenge, and demand.

If the identities of the Magi are unclear, the dynamics of the picture are not. Here we have learned men who represent all of the known world and the power, wealth, and knowledge therein who spend their lives in search of (or at least watching for the coming of) something which transcends their own realms and its wisdom and knowledge, coming to kneel and lay symbols of their wealth before a helpless, Jewish baby of common and even questionable birth. They ostensibly identify this child, lying in a feeding trough, as the King of the Jews. Yes, they followed a star to find him, but evenso, their recognition of the nature and identity of this baby is surprising. Especially so is the fact that they come to worship him. The stunning nature of this epiphany is underscored by the story of the massacre of the male babies in Bethlehem by the Jewish ruler, Herod. Despite his being heralded as the messiah, and so too, the Jewish King, there is nothing apparently remarkable about the baby from Herod's perspective, nothing, that is, which allows him to be distinguished from any other male baby of similar age, and so Herod has all such babies indiscriminately killed.

One child, two antithetical attitudes and responses: the first, an openness which leads to recognition and the humbling subordination of worship; the second, an attitude of closedness, self-protectiveness, and fear, which leads not only to a failure of recognition but to arrogant and murderous oppression. And in between these two attitudes and responses, we must also see the far more common ones marking lives which miss this event altogether. In every case, the Christ Event marks the coming of the sovereign, creator, God among us, but in the littleness, weakness, and obscurity of ordinary human being. In this way God meets us each in the unexpected and even unacceptable place (the manger, the cross, human being, self-emptying, weakness, companionship with serious sinners, etc) --- if we only have the eyes of faith which allow us to recognize and worship him!

My thanks to those who have patiently read my blog during my absence over the past couple of weeks. This post is unfinished, and I will complete it later tonight probably, but I wanted to put it up even so. Meanwhile, my best wishes for the rest of this Christmas season! May it be a holy and fruitful time for each of you and your families.

Fourth Week of Advent: Singing Our Magnificats

Today's Gospel is Mary's magnificat while the responsorial text is a similar song taken from the book of Samuel. I have put these up before though not recently. They are contemporary Magnificats. Two or three pieces of Ann Johnson's poetry in particular are especially lovely. They are taken from Miryam of Nazareth, Woman of Strength and Wisdom, Ave Maria Press, 1984. The first is called the "Magnificat of Acceptance." (My apologies that the original formatting does not come through when the poem is published here.)


My soul trembles in the presence of the loving Creator
and my spirit prepares itself to walk hand in hand
with the God who saves Israel
because I have been accepted by God
as a simple helpmate.

Yes, forever in the life of humankind
people will sing of this loving encounter;
through remembering this moment, the faithful
will know that all things are possible in God.

Holy is the place within me where God lives.

God's tender fingers reach out from age to age
to touch and soften the inner spaces of those
who open their souls in hope.

I have experienced the creative power of God's embracing arms
and I know the cleansing fire of unconditional love.
I am freed from all earthly authority
and know my bonding to the Author of all earthly things.
I am filled with the news of good things:
my favor with God,
faithful trust in the gentle shadow of the Most High,
the mystery of my son, Jesus,
the gift of companionship with my beloved kinswoman,
Elizabeth, who believes as I believe.

The place in my heart I had filled
with thoughts of fear and inadequacy
has been emptied and I am quiet within.

God comes to save Israel, our holy family,
remembering that we are the ones who remember
. . . according to the kinship we have known. . .
remembering that we are the ones who remember
and that where God and people trust each other
there is home.

The second Magnificat is called, the "Magnificat of Friendship" and calls to mind not only my own journey, but those who have made it with me, and especially (in light of this Magnificat) those women who have assisted and accompanied me, whether in religious or consecrated (eremitical) life, medicine, ministry, etc. I am excited about continuing this journey into ever fuller and more abundant life, and I can't say how grateful I am to God for these friends, sisters, mentors, directors, physicians, etc.

My soul flowers in the light of your love, my God
and my spirit sings Alleluia in the reality of your joyful presence,
because you have chosen my kinswoman and me with the
summons of your eyes.

Yes, we are known now and for all time. We are known as women,
blessed.
Holy is your name.
The tenderness of your hand rests on us as we journey in your way.
Your power in my life has led me into the embrace of loving arms.
You have exposed my lonely pride that I might turn my head to your
nurturing breast.

You have revealed the hollowness of achievements and have opened in
my heart a space filled with simple, loving moments.
My hunger you have satisfied,
my excess you have ignored.

You are my help as I remember your tender love for me,
. . .for we have touched each other you and I
and we have made promises. . .

I remember your tenderness for all that you have begun in me
and in those with whom I walk
and I respond with all that I am becoming
in this hour and in all times to come.

As the quote I like so much reminds us, "God sustains us as a singer sustains a note." Let us each spend some time before and during Christmas discovering the unique Magnificat God has made of our lives and sing it anew with Mary, Hannah, Elizabeth, and all those without whom our lives would be barren indeed!

In Memoriam, Tim O'Neal b.1954 d. 2010

On Friday, and quite unexpectedly, my brother, Tim, died. Tim had had some back surgery done on Monday, had been in the hospital until Thursday, and spoke with my sister Cindy that night for over an hour. He seemed fine. The next morning his wife and daughter kissed him goodbye as they left for work and school. He did not wake but was snoring. When they returned that afternoon they found him dead.

Tim could be incredibly funny and had one of the best capacities for telling jokes I have ever seen. He was an accomplished cook (sometimes cooking on cruise ships), and animal lover (he worked as a veterinary tech until a few years ago). He also had his problems including drugs and alcohol for much of his youth and young adulthood. However he had turned that all around and become a husband and really devoted father. His family was, without doubt, the thing he was proudest of. He was the primary caregiver there, the stay-at-home father, and he took genuine delight in caring for his daughter Allie, taking her to dance recitals, lessons, school, activities of whatever sort, etc. He is survived then by his wife, Olga, and his 6 year old daughter, Alyson, as well as by his sisters, Cindy and myself.

The whole family is stunned, of course. My sister and I would ask that you please keep Tim and all of us in your prayers, but most especially Alyson who may well feel, and be affected by, this loss most keenly of all.

A Bit on the Relationship of Hopes to Hope: Hopes as Obstacles to Deep Hope

Thursday, Third Week of Advent
Isaiah 54:1-10
Luke 7:24-30

Advent is a time for preparing our hearts for the coming of God in any way he wills to do that. For this reason it is a time in which we prepare ourselves to be surprised by and grateful to a God who is truly unimaginable. At bottom then, Advent is a time for cultivating a deep hope which carries us through and beyond every exigency in life and opens us to reality which transcends all the specific hopes we hold onto. This deep hope is an orientation of our hearts. It is what traditional theology calls a virtue, an habitual way of approaching reality, an approach in which we see what is truly present and the God who grounds that.

There is therefore a distinction, and often a tension, between specific hopes and this deep or profound hope, this virtue which sustains us even when specific hopes have been dashed or shattered. The ironic thing is that among the obstacles to the virtue of Hope we might identify are the specific hopes we cling to --- sometimes all-too-tightly. This distinction and tension is at the heart of the readings for today.

In Isaiah we see this played out as the author lists the various seminal hopes we each have and the ways those are shattered. Women who dream of having children, and in fact, whose self-worth and significance in the People of God (Israel) is bound up with child-bearing remain barren. The hopes of married couples to live together to the end of their days are disappointed by the death of one of the spouses. Those who look to the intimate and exclusive love and commitment of a spouse are abandoned instead. Youth whose lives are full of personal promise ruin their futures by somehow shaming themselves and becoming bound to and by that failure and shame. Hopes here can block the development of deep Hope instead of being opportunities for inculcating the virtue. And yet, in spite of the ways hopes disappoint or are disappointed, Israel is called to something deeper, something transcendent and more eternal and sustaining. In particular, Israel is called to be open to a God who will surprise her with a life with him that is beyond imagining. Specific hopes are expressions of the imaginable. Hope opens us to the surprise of the unimaginable. Thus Isaiah outlines some really outrageous pictures of what Israel will come to know: a barrenness that will be made fruitful beyond all telling, an abandonment which is contrasted with a commitment which is undying and without limit or end and is redeemed by that covenant, a national smallness and marginality which will be transformed into centrality and worldwide scope as Israel is made a light to the nations.

Today's Gospel also contrasts Hope with hopes, the unimaginable with the imaginable, and it does so by pointing out a second way hopes may be an obstacle to deep hope, namely by our allowing our individual hopes to make us blind to the larger and more surprising ways in which God really does visit and dwell amongst us. In today's text from Luke Jesus turns to those who have been out in the desert to see John the Baptist and he asks them three times, "What did you go out to see?" The first two times the question is ironic: did you go out to see a reed swaying in the wind or someone in soft/rich clothes, someone who dresses as a King, for instance? Only the most foolish would have done this and most would easily answer, "Of course not!" The third time Jesus enlarges the question, "Did you go out to see a prophet?" and explains that yes indeed, that is precisely what they saw, but even more besides. In meeting John Bp people saw not JUST a prophet but the one who would prepare the way for the Messiah and Israel's reception of that Messiah. And of course, implicitly, the people to whom Jesus is speaking must begin to entertain the possibility that something even more unimaginable has occurred, namely, that they are looking at Emmanuel right here and now.

But, while Jesus focuses explicitly on the surprise and significance of John the Baptist, the text is also clear that some people allowed their hopes to prevent them from seeing what God was doing in their midst. The Pharisees and scholars of the Law "knew" what the Messiah and the final Prophet would look like and they grasped this hope a bit too tightly to allow themselves to recognize and be surprised by a God who would do the unimaginable in their midst.

The challenge of Advent is to prepare our hearts for Christmas. To that end we take time to become people who hold our hopes a little less tightly or rigidly so that profound hope may be the motive and orientation of our lives. We prepare ourselves in a way that 1) prevents the shattering of our hopes from overwhelming us with disappointment, and 2) allows us to see beyond those hopes to the deeper ways in which God surprises us. This preparation prevents our being disappointed or even scandalized or offended by the way he works his will among us. If we are not truly surprised by Christmas it is probably right to ask ourselves if we have not either let go of hope altogether or clutched at hopes so tightly we remained closed to the God of the surprising. In either case, we will have failed to be people of profound or deep hope, people whose God goes by the unimaginable name, Emmanuel!

NB: With gratitude to David Steindl-Rast, OSB, and his book, Gratefulness, The Heart of Prayer. Therein David draws the distinction between Hopes and Hope and speaks of the imaginable vs the unimaginable as well as Hope as unitive and hopes as potentially divisive. I have drawn liberally on his insights in this reflection. If you have not read this book, please get it for Christmas. It is one of the best books on the nature of prayer I know.

Jesus and John the Baptist: Two Approaches to Repentance and Forgiveness

Gospel Reading for Friday, 2nd Week of Advent: Matthew 11:16-19

Recently I watched story of a woman (Eva Moses Kor) who survived the holocaust. She was one of a pair of twins experimented on by Dr Mengele. Both she and her sister (Miriam) survived the camp but her sister's health was ruined and years later she later died from long term complications. Mrs Kor forgave Mengele and did so as part of her own healing. She encouraged others to act similarly so they would no longer be victims in the same way they were without forgiveness and she became to some extent despised by a number of other survivors. What struck me was the fact that Eva had come implicitly to Jesus' own notion of forgiveness and justice (where her own healing is paramount and brings about changes in others and the fabric of reality more than other notions of justice) while others clung to the Jewish teaching which states that amendment and restitution (signs of true repentance but more than this as well) must be made before forgiveness is granted. What also struck me was that she was indeed freer and less a victim in subjective terms than those who refused to forgive saying they had no right, for instance. Further, her forgiveness and freedom freed others (including another doctor at the camp (Dr Hans Munch) who had, until he met Eva and heard of her own stance towards Mengele, been unable to forgive himself) --- though it also pointed up the terrible bondage of either refusal or inability to forgive which other survivors experienced, especially as this became complicated by their newfound anger with Eva.

Today's Gospel reminds me of this video (and vice versa) because of the close linkage of John Bp and Jesus, and so of two very different (though still-related) approaches to repentance and forgiveness. On the one hand, a strictly ascetic John the Baptist preaches what John Meier describes as a "fierce call to repentance, stiffened with dire warnings of fiery judgment soon to come." (A Marginal Jew, vol 2, pp 148-49) In general John's preaching is dismissed and John himself is treated contemptuously as being mad or possessed by a demon. In the language of the parable John piped a funeral dirge and people refused to mourn.

On the other hand we have Jesus of Nazareth preaching the arrival of the Kingdom of God and offering "an easy, joyous way into [that] Kingdom" by welcoming the religious outcasts and sinners to a place in table fellowship with himself. Meier characterizes the response to THIS call to repentance in terms of the parable, [[With a sudden burst of puritanism, this generation felt that no hallowed prophet sent from God would adopt such a free-wheeling, pleasure-seeking lifestyle, hobnobbing with religious lowlifes and offering assurances of God's forgiveness without demanding the proper process for reintegration into Jewish religious society. How could this Jesus be a true prophet and reformer when he was a glutton and a drunkard, a close companion at meals with people who robbed their fellow Jews . . .or who sinned willfully and heinously, yet refused to repent. . .?]] In other words, in terms of tomorrow's parable Jesus piped a joyful tune, a wedding tune, and people refused to join in the celebration and dismissed Jesus himself as a terrible sinner, worthy of death.

There is wisdom in both approaches to repentance and forgiveness. Both are part of the Judeo-Christian heritage. Both approaches are rejected by "this generation" --- as Jesus calls those who refuse to believe in him. Both lead to greater freedom. But it is Jesus' model which leads to the kind of freedom Eva Moses Kor discovered and which is supposed to mark our own approach to repentance and forgiveness. After all repentance is truly a celebration of God's love and mercy, and these we well know are inexhaustible. Still, entering the celebration is not necessarily easy for us, and we may wonder as some of the other survivors wondered about Eva's forgiveness of Mengele: do we have the right to forgive? Is it wise to act in this way towards someone who has not repented and asked for our forgiveness? Isn't this a form of "cheap grace" so ably castigated by Dietrich Bonhoeffer --- also a victim of the Nazi death machine? (cf The Cost of Discipleship) Where does forgiveness become enabling and does it demean others who have also been harmed? What about tough love: isn't John Bp's approach the better one? Am I really supposed to simply welcome serious sinners into my home? Into our sacred meal? To membership in the Church? To my circle of friends?

And the simple answer to most of these questions is yes, this is what we are called to do. The Kingdom of God is at hand and Jesus' example is the one we follow. It is this example which leads to the freedom of the Kingdom, this example that made Christians of us and will in time transform our world. In particular, it is this example which sets the tone for Advent joy and festivity and allows the future to take hold of our lives and hearts. It is not merely that we have the right to forgive in this way, but that we have been commissioned to do so. It is an expression of our own vocations to embody or incarnate the unconditional mercy of God in Christ.

Most of us will find ourselves caught between the prophetic example of John the Baptist and the Messianic example of Jesus' meal fellowship with sinners. We have great empathy both for the approach of Eva Moses Kor AND those survivors who could not forgive Mengele --- often because they felt that doing so was contrary to justice as spelled out in the Scriptures and elaborated in rabbinical tradition, as well as because it demeaned his victims. We know that "tough love" has a place in our world and that "cheap grace" is more problem than solution. Today's Gospel underscores our own position between worlds and kingdoms, and it may cause us to recognize that there was a deep suspicion of Jesus' table fellowship which was grounded in more than envy or fear. We may see clearly that the Jewish leadership of Jesus' day had serious and justified concerns about the wisdom of Jesus' actions and praxis. Even so, it is also clear regarding which model of repentance and forgiveness we are to choose, which model represents the freedom of the Kingdom of God, and which model allows us to be Christ for others. As Matthew's version of this parable also affirms, the wisdom of this approach will be found in its fruit --- if only we can be patient and trust in the wisdom of Jesus, the glutton, drunkard, and libertine who consorted with serious sinners.

John Haught, the Future, and Advent

As a result of a panel discussion I listened to yesterday or the day before, I was reading God After Darwin again and came to an interesting passage on time and the idea of a metaphysics of future. In this book John F Haught tries to reorient both theology and science from an over dependence on (or bondage to) the past and turn them to a notion of future which is very different than the notion we are so used to. He is convinced this new perspective is (literally) the hope of both theology and science. For me personally his ideas imply a shift in the way I think of "the present moment" or the way I celebrate Advent or look to the Feast of Christ's Nativity.

Haught begins this section by describing faith as the state of being grasped (a la Tillich!) by "that which is to come." He then speaks of the future as having some kind of "efficacy" --- hard as this is to conceive of. He goes on to refer to a famous passage by Tillich in which he refers to being grasped by the "coming order." [[ The coming order is always coming, shaking this order, fighting with it, conquering it and conquered by it. The coming order is always at hand. But one can never say, "It is here. It is there!" One can never grasp it, but one can be grasped by it.]] (Shaking of the Foundations, p 27)

We are so very used to thinking of the future as that which is not here yet (because it has not yet been built out of the building blocks of the past and present), and the past as that which has been completed and gone (scattered building blocks, mostly turned to dust). We think of the present (the building blocks we can pick up and work with) as the only really real. But the situation is more complex and also more exciting than this. What we call present is the eternally-coming-to-be-and-also-passing (the eternally vanishing and ephemeral). It cannot really be fixed or pointed to, for the moment we identify it, it is gone and a new present has come into play (and gone again too). Meanwhile it is the future that takes hold of us and calls us to be. Haught writes:

[[In the experience of faith, it is the "future" that comes to meet us, takes hold of us, and makes us new. We may call this future, at least in what Rahner calls its "absolute" depth, by the name "God". In Biblical circles the very heart of authentic faith consists in the total orientation of consciousness toward the coming of God, the ultimately real. Beyond all our provisional or relative futures there lies an "Absolute future." And since our own experience cannot be separated artificially from the natural world to which we are tied by evolution, we are permitted to also surmise that "being grasped" by the absolute future pertains not just to ourselves but to the whole cosmic process in which we are sited. Theology can claim legitimately, along with St Paul (Rom 8:22), that the entire universe is always being drawn by the power of a divinely renewing future. The "power of the future" is the ultimate metaphysical explanation of evolution.]]

Later Haught explains: "by a metaphysics of the future, I mean quite simply the philosophical expression of the intuition --- admittedly religious in origin --- that all things receive their being from out of an inexhaustibly resourceful "future" that we may call "God" this intuition also entails the notion that the cosmic past and present are in some sense given their own status by the always arriving but also always unavailable future. . . . It should not be too hard for us to appreciate, therefore, why a religion that encourages its devotees to wait in patient hope for the fulfillment of life and history will interpret ultimate reality, or God, as coming toward the present, and continually creating the world from the sphere of the future "not-yet". . . .The past and present may seem to have more "being," in the sense of fixed reality, than does the future, which apparently has the character of not-yet-being. . . . In fact many of us think intuitively of the future as quite "unreal," since it has not yet arrived fully. [Haught notes this is a difficult and confusing idea at first, then says,] . . .perhaps this confusion is the result of our having been bewitched by a metaphysics either of the past or the eternal present. . . .]]

It seems to me that Advent is the perfect time to ask ourselves if we have been so bewitched, and to what degree we are really believers in the summoning call, promise, and power of the future which dwells within us and summons us from all sides as well. To what degree are our own lives an expression of the hope this future provides? (I would note that nothing unreal has this same kind or degree of power.) How truly attuned to the future are we? How truly capable of waiting, not in the grim sense of being stuck in the past, but in terms of orienting all we are and know TOWARDS the future that IS in God and is breaking in on us at every moment?

Contemplatives often speak of living in the present moment or attending to the present moment and sometimes we have the sense that the present moment is a kind of static reality of some breadth and length. We may also think that this kind of spirituality locks away the past and blocks us from looking towards the future. But really, the contemplative "present moment" is precisely what Haught is speaking of here: the powerful and continual grasping of our lives by the power of futurity -- a futurity grounded and realized in the living God. To truly dwell in the present moment is to give oneself over to this absolute future, this God who creates by summoning us forth from death and the despair of the past-only into the hope and freedom of the dawning-future we call present. This I think is preeminently the spirituality of Advent.

Our own approaches to Advent will differ one to the next, but we should ask ourselves to what degree have we become bewitched by another metaphysics than the one Haught describes, a metaphysics of the past or of a static eternal present, for instance rather than a metaphysics of future. For some that may mean spending some time rethinking our own ideas of the nature of time. We must at least, I think, begin to get our minds around this idea that the future is more real than we have allowed thus far in our conventional wisdom re time, and that IT is the reason there is a present (or really, anything at all). We, our world, the whole of the cosmos is not SIMPLY the consequence of a series of past causal events. Instead we are the result of God summoning the real out of the unreal, the more perfect out of the less perfect, the more complex out of the less complex, etc. We are here because the future opens the way for us to grow to fulfillment, not as a void into which we might merely move or expand as the weight of the past pushes us onward, but as an effective reality which empowers and summons to encounter and surrender. For me this is a really new way of thinking or seeing --- something, despite my reading of Haught, Moltmann, et al, I had not really "gotten" before now in doing theology. And so, the prospect of exploring this is new and exciting. Personally, I love beginnings and the excitement linked to them! That is what Advent (and the power of future) are all about! Apparently that is also what remaining in the present moment is all about as well!!

P.S., for those looking for a challenging and very exciting read, check out John Haught's, God After Darwin, A Theology of Evolution. If you are not up to the whole thing (and I personally am not myself right now) at least read chapter 6, "A God for Evolution." Of all of Haught's books the one I have liked best to this point is Is Nature Enough?. Great ideas, central themes, but readable. There you might want to look at the chapter on "Emergence" or the last short chapter on "Anticipation".

Questions, Lay Hermits and Canons 604 vs 603

[[I am a little confused by some of the things you have written on your blog. I remember [someone] talking . . .about living as a lay hermit and your response was " good, the world needs more lay hermits" but it seem at times on your blog that you are against lay hermits, that you look down on them, that they are not a true expression. On another note, can you explain the difference between code 603 and 604? I'm sure you've written about it before but if you could " dumb it down" for me. ]]

Thanks for the questions. I think it is probably important to read everything I have written about lay hermits, or at least to read about it apart from what I say about canonical or diocesan hermits. If one reads JUST what I say about diocesan hermits one could get the impression you have gotten. I am passionate and enthusiastic about my own vocation and I argue for its importance in a world which generally neither esteems nor understands it. Thus, I devote more energy and time to it than to the lay hermit vocation. If, however, you read what I say about the need for lay hermits, the dignity of the lay state, the need for all hermits to discern between calls to lay or diocesan eremitical life, I think the impression is more balanced and positive.

To restate briefly what I have said before on this, the two vocations are both valid expressions of the eremitical life. (Religious eremitical or semi-eremitical life is a third valid expression by the way.) Both are important and each may speak to different segments of the Church and world more effectively than the other. They have different rights and responsibilities within the church per se, though they overlap and may be identical in terms of the foundational elements of the life. Despite their hiddenness, one is a "public" vocation and one is not. The obligations of one flow directly from one's lay vocation and state, the obligations of the other do not but come from public profession and initiation into the consecrated state as well.

Yes, the world needs more lay hermits. It is my impression that in general lay hermits could speak to the problem of isolated people in unnatural solitudes better than canonical or diocesan hermits do (though I haven't seen or heard any lay hermits doing that, more's the pity)! They stand directly in the shadow and line of the desert Abbas and Ammas --- who were also lay hermits, and witness to a different kind of relationship with the local church than diocesan hermits do. They witness to the simplicity and freedom of the eremitical life in ways the diocesan hermit perhaps cannot do as easily or effectively (here some of the criticisms or concerns re institutionalization of the vocation may come into play --- at least in a cautionary sense). Lay hermits model the universal call to holiness, the universality of the call to contemplative prayer (which many people still believe is ONLY open to specialists), and the call to the silence of solitude (union with God) which every person is meant to embody in one way or to one degree and another; they can do all this better than the diocesan hermit who is perceived as a religious and, unfortunately, therefore somewhat distinct from the laity. I should note that lay hermits, precisely because they live without the benefits of habit, title, etc, also call diocesan hermits in a poignant way to live the life without becoming caught up in the approval/status game which is more typical of "the world" hermits and other Christians reject.

Regarding the distinctions between Canons 603 and 604, they are significant. Canon 604 is the canon governing the conse-cration of virgins living in the world (i.e., not religious or hermits). It establishes them as consecrated women and brides of Christ and is thus a renewal or revival of this ancient vocation in the Church. (Some cloistered nuns have historically used the Rite of Consecration of Virgins on the occasion of their solemn profession and continue to do so today. Canon 604 revives the practice of consecrating women living in the world to a vocation which both predated and stood side by side this practice until about 1200. Consecrated Virgins living in the world are thus not nuns or "quasi nuns.")


The life of a consecrated virgin under Canon 604 may be fairly contemplative or quite active. She is expected to serve the Church by her life in whatever way suits and may do appropriate ministry with her gifts. She does not make vows but instead makes a proposal to live a chaste life; like diocesan hermits she is consecrated by God through the act of the diocesan Bishop. (All religious enter the consecrated state because they are consecrated by God and so do consecrated virgins living in the world.) She therefore lives the evangelical counsels in a way which fits her secular state despite not making vows to do so and has what is described as a "special relationship" with her Bishop.

Canon 603 is the canon governing the life of diocesan hermits. Hermits do not live in the world but rather in stricter separation from it. Like consecrated virgins they are in the consecrated state. Besides "stricter separation from the world", their lives are characterized by "the silence of solitude," and "assiduous prayer and penance," all lived for the glory of God and the salvation of the world. They also live the evangelical counsels and are obligated to do so by vow or other sacred bond. Their legitimate superior is their Bishop who may appoint or ask the hermit to select someone to act as a diocesan delegate, a quasi superior who meets with the hermit regularly during the year and serves both the hermit and the diocese on the Bishop's behalf. Diocesan Hermits write their own Rule or Plan of Life which becomes a morally and legally binding Rule on the day of their Profession. The Rule is ordinarily approved by a Bishop's Decree on that day and becomes the equivalent of proper law at that time. All of these externals aside, the vocation itself is a call to live the silence of solitude in stricter separation from the world, and this is simply not generally true of the vocation to consecrated virginity which is secular (lived in the world). They really are different vocations despite the similarities that also exist.

Early in the history of these two canons (c.1984-90) we saw people being conse-crated under Canon 604 AND Canon 603, that is, they were consecrated under the second of these canons despite already being consecrated under one of them. (Usually 603 came second because it was not as easy to discern eremitical vocations and Bishops were less willing to profess individuals under it than to consecrate a virgin living in the world.) Those who wanted to be hermits accepted consecration under Canon 604 and were sometimes called "diocesan sisters" and only later were admitted to vows under Canon 603 (if this occurred at all). (Sometimes Bishops used Canon 603 to profess individuals but did not want to indicate these persons were diocesan hermits and also used the term "diocesan sister" to describe or designate them in the diocesan directory.)

However, this is no longer accepted or acceptable practice. The consecration of each of the two vocations is complete in itself and the vocations differ from one another (Cf Statutes of the Bishops of France on Eremitical life); each have their own dignity and character. One is secular, the other is religious. It is not acceptable to celebrate consecration under Canon 604 simply because a Bishop will not use Canon 603 in his diocese any more than it is acceptable for individuals in non-canonical or lay communities to use C.603 as a way to get canonically professed and consecrated. My point here is simply that one needs to truly discern to which vocation they are called (and the church needs to do this as well), for it cannot be both (the exception is when the CV later discerns a call to solitude and becomes a diocesan hermit under c 603; alternately, a hermit might find she is no longer called to solitude, be dispensed from her vows, and seek consecration as a Virgin living in the world).

I hope this is helpful. If it raises more questions please get back to me.