Religious Habits

[BarbTherese]

[quote]Quoting: tnavarro61


http://ncronline.org...ious-life-today [/quote]

Excellent article, thank you for sharing it. Filing it and printing it out for a slower careful read.

Barb

[Antigonos]

[quote name='tnavarro61' date='26 December 2009 - 03:52 AM' timestamp='1261788758' post='2026060']

But on the other side, [i]what I am trying to say[/i] is that we are not just called to wear a habit. We are called to do the will of God and we must still respect the habitless religious...
[/quote]


I agree. But I think it must be a lot harder for the nun herself, to have to worry about what she's wearing, etc. -- a distraction from her focus on her spiritual life. But I reassert, that never having actually discussed this topic with nuns, I don't know how they feel about it.

[tnavarro61]

[quote name='BarbaraTherese' date='26 December 2009 - 01:29 PM' timestamp='1261801770' post='2026119']
Personally I love the religious habit and joy floods in whenever I sight a nun in habit. My spiritual director however is a non-habited nun and ex novice mistress of her Order - she strikes me as most wise and reverant, quietly reserved and yet quite astute and discerning, and also very down to earth and most loyal to the Magisterium and Rome and traditional in her views. It truly saddens me when Charity seems to break down almost completely (Love of God expressed in Love of neighbour) by passionate (even uncharitable) negative criticisms and judgements of non habited religious. It is not the habit that is central to religious life, rather it is Charity.
And it is the witness and habit we all, regardless of vocation in life, need to wear.

Matthew6 : 24 No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. 25[b] Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on[/b]. Is not the life more than the meat: and the body more than the raiment?



Spot on!...........either in habit or out of it.



Barb

Happy Christmas all!
[/quote]

Thank you very much for sharing this, especially with the Vita Consecrata! very very good points!

[vee]

[quote]Religious orders are to follow God's will. I think it's inappropriateto think, "I think I have vocation with them because they havereligious habits." Most and foremost, when we answer the call of ourLord, we are to be focused on following His Will, and less of ourdesires. John 3:30: "He must increase, I must decrease."[/quote]

If the sight of a habit compels someone to start to consider a vocation isnt that a good thing? With everything competing for our attention these days for a woman to consider religious life I think is fantastic. She is considering giving up her worldly beauty by wearing the same drab boring sack everyday for the rest of her life when she has hundreds of stores she could be shopping from at the mall. No more nice suppers out in a fancy dress and salon styled hair. No more manicures, or trips to the spa. These are just a few of the things that come with saying hmm they have a habit am I called to join them.

[laetitia crucis]

[quote name='tnavarro61' date='25 December 2009 - 09:07 PM' timestamp='1261789630' post='2026071']
Yes the religious habits are important. And yes, there might be very good reasons why some don't wear religious habits, so we must still respect their decisions. Probably this is how the Holy Spirit is working with them,and we have to respect what the Holy Spirit does.

I want point out to all that [i]what I am sad about is how people judge all habitless religious.[/i]
Maybe this article would help:

[url="http://ncronline.org/news/discerning-ministerial-religious-life-today"]http://ncronline.org/news/discerning-ministerial-religious-life-today[/url]
[/quote]

I do not mean to be close-minded, but after reading the article, I found it disturbing on many levels.

Sr. Sandra M. Schneider's opening remarks:

[quote]In the distressing ferment generated by the Vatican investigation of U.S. women Religious one question has arisen repeatedly, in various forms, and been “answered,” sometimes quite dogmatically, by people who have no lived experience of or academic competence in regard to Religious Life. Since the question is important, misinformation is not helpful to Religious themselves or to their many concerned lay friends, colleagues, and associates. The substance of the question is “What is ‘apostolic Religious Life’?”

But the question often takes the form of a three-pronged query about lifestyle: “Is culturally conspicuous, uniform garb (habit), fixed group dwelling from which members exit only by necessity and from which non-members are excluded (enclosure, cloister), and a daily schedule including shared meals, work, and especially the oral recitation of prescribed texts and vocal prayers, e.g., divine office, litanies, at several fixed times a day (horarium) essential to Catholic Religious Life as such?” The short answer is “no.” But this answer requires historical, biblical, and theological expansion and support.[/quote]

I know my experience of religious life has been somewhat limited, but having been a temporarily professed member of an apostolic missionary community, and having experienced the life of a few semi-contemplative (or "contemplative active") orders it seems that the "three-pronged" lifestyle fits very well in religious life. Why must there be a divorce between that lifestyle versus the one that Sr. Schneiders sees as being "apostolic Religious life"? How can the "apostolic Religious life" be completely separated from that of the contemplative cloistered nun? Are not all religious called to be living tabernacles bringing Him to others, but also continually bringing themselves to Him in contemplation and adoration? Or as St. Catherine of Siena said about her "apostolic" time of life: "Make yourself a cell in your own mind from which you never need come out."? Are not all apostolic/active religious called to be "contemplatives in action"? (Not that contemplatives are inactive, by any means! )

I know this is a very subjective thing to say on my part, but in all the communities I've visited (which includes, but is not limited to, the Franciscan Sisters of the Renewal, the Sisters of Life, the Dominican Sisters of Mary Mother of the Eucharist, the Franciscan Sisters of the Immaculate, the Missionaries of Charity, the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matara, etc.) they've lived that "three-pronged" lifestyle and saw each element as essential aspects to their Catholic Religious Life. It's a beautiful way of life and fulfillment of their vocations as spouses of Christ. Never did they see their way of life as this:

From the same article:
[quote]Women Religious are, in general, deeply committed to the egalitarian, non-authoritarian, collegial exercise of authority and practice of obedience that Jesus inaugurated among his original band but we live and minister in a Church that is not only rigidly hierarchical but functions as a divine right monarchy in which authority is functionally equated with coercive power and is entirely monopolized by men. Living situations in a first world urban culture are not conducive to flexible and mobile community in mission nor supportive of shared spirituality. Liturgy is increasingly oppressive when it is not completely unavailable. Ecclesiastical support, financial or psychological, except from other Religious and the laity, is rare at best.[/quote]

Anyhoo. I realize this reply is somewhat off-topic to the original post, but I second the reading of [url="http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/apost_exhortations/documents/hf_jp-ii_exh_25031996_vita-consecrata_en.html"]Vita Consecrata[/url] in regards to not only the habit, but to the entire religious (and consecrated) life.

Edit: typo

Edited December 26, 2009 by laetitia crucis

[DameAgnes]

Forty years after the sisters shed their habits, we're still debating it. It seems to me you know a thing by its fruit. Those orders who modified their habits (see the Daughters of St. Paul) into something very "normal" but still distinct, seem to be doing fine with vocations. Those orders that kept their habits are doing okay, too. Those orders who shed the habit are struggling, but I am not sure it is solely because of the habit that their numbers are dwindling. I suspect that some of the orders shed not only the habit but a mindset of obedience and humility, and that is why their communities are struggling or disappearing now.

http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/theanchoress/2009/05/03/may-3-world-day-of-prayer-for-vocations-the-habit/

"Habits are not necessary to the life of a religious; that is absolutely true. They may well be necessary for the life of the world."

[HisChild]

[quote name='laetitia crucis' date='26 December 2009 - 09:16 AM' timestamp='1261844194' post='2026222']
I do not mean to be close-minded, but after reading the article, I found it disturbing on many levels.

Sr. Sandra M. Schneider's opening remarks:

...
[/quote]

laetitia crucis (and of course, tnavarro61),

The reason you found the article to be disturbing is, well, because it is disturbing. NCR is considered a VERY liberal 'Catholic' publication. I've read some completely non-Catholic topics there, or rather, those topics which perhaps claim to be Catholic but incorporates some pretty non-Catholic (read: anti-Catholic) subjects, which is offensive to those who are trying to live authentically Catholic lives. If you look at those who have regular articles there, you will see that these are the 'liberal nuns' that tnavarro61 in fact states he is not referring to (ie: Schneiders and Chittister). This leads me to wonder why he (tnavarro61) used the NCR as a platform on which to stand as it not only does not support what I’m gathering is his opinion but further enforces those he claims judges the habitless sisters.

Sandra Schneiders is an incredibly liberal religious. I won't start in on her various affiliations, but I will say she is one of the most vocal dissenters of the Vatican Visitation who has urged others not to cooperate, and has said to others in an email that the visitators should be treated as “uninvited guests who should be received in the parlor, not given the run of the house.”

In one of her books [i]Finding the Treasure: Locating Catholic Religious Life in a New Ecclesial and Cultural Context[/i]2 she states that in religious life "all of its members believed in all of its dogmas and espoused all the moral and spiritual practices of that tradition (whether or not this was actually true of any particular religious) is caught up today in the post-modern theological whirlwind in which no tradition can remain hermetically sealed and serenely confident of its own unique validity and superiority.”

Schneiders also calls Catholicism full of “entrenched patriarchy and antiwoman practice” and believes that feminism, which has deeply penetrated religious life, should be a public commitment to the “subversion of patriarchy, liberation of women…”

Looking, however, to purify religious life as we know it today, she’s not looking to remove those elements of religious life that most on this phorum would consider anti-Catholic, but instead her thoughts are to remove those oppressive elements of religious life that the patriarchal Church has imposed upon women, and I’d hazard a guess that the religious habit is one of those impositions. I'd hazard another guess that, with her various affiliations, she espouses the belief in post-Christian religious sisters (an oxymoron if I've ever heard/read one.)

I will not post links or her affiliations as that's neither the point of this post OR of this very Catholic forum. If anyone wants to do some research on this woman, Google is always a friend in that arena.

I agree with Indwelling Trinity and the others that this particular thread does not belong in VS, but rather in the Debate phorum, as this does nothing to boost up vocations.

The only response I will give to the original post is that yes, there are communities that were formed without habits. There are also other communities who no longer choose to wear habits who are not dissenters from the Church. Saying that, I will say that most of the congregations [i]who are the most vocally active[/i] in their fervency against the habit and other religious life particulars participate in or believe in other issues that comparatively speaking, not wearing the habit is the least of them. Their stance on obedience, not to the Church but to God alone, and other beliefs intrinsic to religious life rank further up the priority chain when considering the issues that have been of concern to the Church for years.

It really is these who are the 'few bad apples that spoil the bunch'. It is these to whom they (who have issues with female habit-less wearing religious) refer.

God bless you in this Christmas season,

HisChild

[Thomist-in-Training]

My mom personally knows a habitless nun (active sister to be more precise), Sister Joan, from some parish volunteering and refers to her every so often. Last year, she told me the unfortunate news that Sister Joan's purse was stolen as she was coming out of a grocery store! The plural of anecdote is not data, and it's sad if ANY old woman is mugged, but would the mugger have thought twice, if she were wearing a habit?

Actually, it's a [i]sacrilege [/i]to lay violent hands on a consecrated person, IIRC (because they formally belong to God). So (this is my slightly dazed/tired speculation here) an active sister who was wearing a habit would be like one of those poisonous tree frogs that are brightly colored as a warning: "Don't touch me! It's not just wrong, it's a sacrilege!"

[BarbTherese]

[quote]Catholic Catechism:

918 From the very beginning of the Church there were men and women who set out to follow Christ with greater liberty, and to imitate him more closely, by practicing the evangelical counsels. [b]They led lives dedicated to God, each in his own way[/b]. Many of them, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, became hermits or founded religious families. These the Church, by virtue of her authority, gladly accepted and approved.458

919 Bishops will always strive to discern [b]new gifts of consecrated life[/b] granted to the Church by the Holy Spirit; the approval of new forms of consecrated life is reserved to the Apostolic See.459

926 Religious life derives from the mystery of the Church. It is a gift she has received from her Lord, a gift she offers as a stable way of life to the faithful called by God to profess the counsels. Thus, the Church can both show forth Christ and acknowledge herself to be the Savior's bride. Religious life in its various forms is called to signify [b]the very charity of God in the language of our time[/b]. [/quote]

As I said before, I love the religious habit - but since I do know nuns that have decided to wear modest and cheap but presentable secular clothing, I can appreciate their reasons also. I really do think that at this point in time we are in a transition period in The Church (not only in religious life) where some can find it difficult to let go in any way at all of the 'old ways' and be open to the new. I prefer to wait during this transition period and if I live long enough to see what The Church has to say in regard to these new ways. Although Pope John Paul II (and perhaps soon St. John Paul II) in :
[quote]“Vita Consecrata” (Post Synodal Apostolic Exhortation – “The Consecrated Life” 1996 – Pope John Paul II)
http://www.vatican.v...secrata_en.html
"where valid reasons of their apostolate call for it, Religious, in conformity with the norms of their Institute, may also dress in a simple and modest manner,[i] with an appropriate symbol[/i], in such a way that their consecration is recognizable.Institutes which from their origin or by provision of their Constitutions do not have a specific habit should ensure that the dress of their members corresponds in dignity and simplicity to the nature of their vocation."[/quote]

........has already made a statement via Apostolic Exhortation (above) that "dress in a simple and modest manner with an appropriate symbol" is affirmed under certain conditions. What The Holy Father had to say is sure good enough for me. What a religious wears is not central to religious life and The Church is affirming this, but Charity is as stated in the Catholic Catechism. Sometimes those who are different or think different from a person is considered as a challenge and contradiction to that person (which it is not) who is very often seeking a sort of affirmation by having all be and think as they do. Most often the different are neither challenges nor contradictions, they are merely different and made/called to be different by The Holy Spirit. "In Essentials, Unity; in Non-essentials, Liberty; in All Things, Charity," (attributed to St. Augustine)......and the religious habit is not an essential to religious life per se, rather it is a symbol (and a blest sacramental) of a way of life we call religious life. Pope John Paul II in his Apostolic Exhortation (above) has underscored for us that under certain conditions some other symbol may take the place of the religious habit.



Barb
(If of the opinion that a thread belongs in the debate forum [and it probably does], the way to go I think is to alert the moderator of the forum, which may bring about the desired results and shift to another forum.)

Joy this Christmas Season and Feast of The Holy Family here in South Australia and we are a family of the adopted sons and daughters of God who is Love........and many blessings throughout 2010.

Edited December 27, 2009 by BarbaraTherese

[tnavarro61]

thank you for pointing this out. actually i have a hard time reading it on monitor. so i haven't given my full comprehension on reading this one. my bad..!

i'm going to reread this again, but providing the link for this article doesn't mean that i support this article. i simply found online and i thought it would help. sorry!
[quote name='laetitia crucis' date='27 December 2009 - 01:16 AM' timestamp='1261844194' post='2026222']
I do not mean to be close-minded, but after reading the article, I found it disturbing on many levels.

Sr. Sandra M. Schneider's opening remarks:



I know my experience of religious life has been somewhat limited, but having been a temporarily professed member of an apostolic missionary community, and having experienced the life of a few semi-contemplative (or "contemplative active") orders it seems that the "three-pronged" lifestyle fits very well in religious life. Why must there be a divorce between that lifestyle versus the one that Sr. Schneiders sees as being "apostolic Religious life"? How can the "apostolic Religious life" be completely separated from that of the contemplative cloistered nun? Are not all religious called to be living tabernacles bringing Him to others, but also continually bringing themselves to Him in contemplation and adoration? Or as St. Catherine of Siena said about her "apostolic" time of life: "Make yourself a cell in your own mind from which you never need come out."? Are not all apostolic/active religious called to be "contemplatives in action"? (Not that contemplatives are inactive, by any means! )

I know this is a very subjective thing to say on my part, but in all the communities I've visited (which includes, but is not limited to, the Franciscan Sisters of the Renewal, the Sisters of Life, the Dominican Sisters of Mary Mother of the Eucharist, the Franciscan Sisters of the Immaculate, the Missionaries of Charity, the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matara, etc.) they've lived that "three-pronged" lifestyle and saw each element as essential aspects to their Catholic Religious Life. It's a beautiful way of life and fulfillment of their vocations as spouses of Christ. Never did they see their way of life as this:

From the same article:


Anyhoo. I realize this reply is somewhat off-topic to the original post, but I second the reading of [url="http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/apost_exhortations/documents/hf_jp-ii_exh_25031996_vita-consecrata_en.html"]Vita Consecrata[/url] in regards to not only the habit, but to the entire religious (and consecrated) life.

Edit: typo
[/quote]

[tnavarro61]

[quote name='DameAgnes' date='27 December 2009 - 02:13 AM' timestamp='1261847615' post='2026240']
Forty years after the sisters shed their habits, we're still debating it. It seems to me you know a thing by its fruit. Those orders who modified their habits (see the Daughters of St. Paul) into something very "normal" but still distinct, seem to be doing fine with vocations. Those orders that kept their habits are doing okay, too. Those orders who shed the habit are struggling, but I am not sure it is solely because of the habit that their numbers are dwindling. I suspect that some of the orders shed not only the habit but a mindset of obedience and humility, and that is why their communities are struggling or disappearing now.

http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/theanchoress/2009/05/03/may-3-world-day-of-prayer-for-vocations-the-habit/

"Habits are not necessary to the life of a religious; that is absolutely true. They may well be necessary for the life of the world."
[/quote]

actually i don't know why this thread is threading the path of a debate. i simply said that we must respect habitless religious. that is my point.

[tnavarro61]

[quote name='HisChild' date='27 December 2009 - 03:00 AM' timestamp='1261850407' post='2026248']
laetitia crucis (and of course, tnavarro61),

The reason you found the article to be disturbing is, well, because it is disturbing. NCR is considered a VERY liberal 'Catholic' publication. I've read some completely non-Catholic topics there, or rather, those topics which perhaps claim to be Catholic but incorporates some pretty non-Catholic (read: anti-Catholic) subjects, which is offensive to those who are trying to live authentically Catholic lives. If you look at those who have regular articles there, you will see that these are the 'liberal nuns' that tnavarro61 in fact states he is not referring to (ie: Schneiders and Chittister). This leads me to wonder why he (tnavarro61) used the NCR as a platform on which to stand as it not only does not support what I’m gathering is his opinion but further enforces those he claims judges the habitless sisters.

Sandra Schneiders is an incredibly liberal religious. I won't start in on her various affiliations, but I will say she is one of the most vocal dissenters of the Vatican Visitation who has urged others not to cooperate, and has said to others in an email that the visitators should be treated as “uninvited guests who should be received in the parlor, not given the run of the house.”

In one of her books [i]Finding the Treasure: Locating Catholic Religious Life in a New Ecclesial and Cultural Context[/i]2 she states that in religious life "all of its members believed in all of its dogmas and espoused all the moral and spiritual practices of that tradition (whether or not this was actually true of any particular religious) is caught up today in the post-modern theological whirlwind in which no tradition can remain hermetically sealed and serenely confident of its own unique validity and superiority.”

Schneiders also calls Catholicism full of “entrenched patriarchy and antiwoman practice” and believes that feminism, which has deeply penetrated religious life, should be a public commitment to the “subversion of patriarchy, liberation of women…”

Looking, however, to purify religious life as we know it today, she’s not looking to remove those elements of religious life that most on this phorum would consider anti-Catholic, but instead her thoughts are to remove those oppressive elements of religious life that the patriarchal Church has imposed upon women, and I’d hazard a guess that the religious habit is one of those impositions. I'd hazard another guess that, with her various affiliations, she espouses the belief in post-Christian religious sisters (an oxymoron if I've ever heard/read one.)

I will not post links or her affiliations as that's neither the point of this post OR of this very Catholic forum. If anyone wants to do some research on this woman, Google is always a friend in that arena.[/quote]

thank you for pointing that out. i do not know sr. sandra, and as i've said in one of my posts her in this thread, i'm going to reread this again, but providing the link for this article doesn't mean that i support this article. i simply found online and i thought it would help. sorry! sorry! sorry!

[quote]
The only response I will give to the original post is that yes, there are communities that were formed without habits. There are also other communities who no longer choose to wear habits who are not dissenters from the Church. Saying that, I will say that most of the congregations [i]who are the most vocally active[/i] in their fervency against the habit and other religious life particulars participate in or believe in other issues that comparatively speaking, not wearing the habit is the least of them. Their stance on obedience, not to the Church but to God alone, and other beliefs intrinsic to religious life rank further up the priority chain when considering the issues that have been of concern to the Church for years.
[/quote]
oh i see. then maybe we should lift those communities to Jesus through prayers.

i'm sorry to admit this but please rephrase the last quoted post of yours. i can't understand some english (this is very embarrassing!) but i would like to know your point better.

take care and Merry Christmas!
It really is these who are the 'few bad apples that spoil the bunch'. It is these to whom they (who have issues with female habit-less wearing religious) refer.

God bless you in this Christmas season,

HisChild
[/quote]

Edited December 27, 2009 by tnavarro61

[AccountDeleted]

[quote name='BarbaraTherese' date='27 December 2009 - 11:54 AM' timestamp='1261875256' post='2026386']
As I said before, I love the religious habit - but since I do know nuns that have decided to wear modest and cheap but presentable secular clothing, I can appreciate their reasons also. I really do think that at this point in time we are in a transition period in The Church (not only in religious life) where some can find it difficult to let go in any way at all of the 'old ways' and be open to the new. I prefer to wait during this transition period and if I live long enough to see what The Church has to say in regard to these new ways. Although Pope John Paul II (and perhaps soon St. John Paul II) in :


........has already made a statement via Apostolic Exhortation (above) that "dress in a simple and modest manner with an appropriate symbol" is affirmed under certain conditions. What The Holy Father had to say is sure good enough for me. What a religious wears is not central to religious life and The Church is affirming this, but Charity is as stated in the Catholic Catechism. Sometimes those who are different or think different from a person is considered as a challenge and contradiction to that person (which it is not) who is very often seeking a sort of affirmation by having all be and think as they do. Most often the different are neither challenges nor contradictions, they are merely different and made/called to be different by The Holy Spirit. "In Essentials, Unity; in Non-essentials, Liberty; in All Things, Charity," (attributed to St. Augustine)......and the religious habit is not an essential to religious life per se, rather it is a symbol (and a blest sacramental) of a way of life we call religious life. Pope John Paul II in his Apostolic Exhortation (above) has underscored for us that under certain conditions some other symbol may take the place of the religious habit.



Barb
(If of the opinion that a thread belongs in the debate forum [and it probably does], the way to go I think is to alert the moderator of the forum, which may bring about the desired results and shift to another forum.)

Joy this Christmas Season and Feast of The Holy Family here in South Australia and we are a family of the adopted sons and daughters of God who is Love........and many blessings throughout 2010.
[/quote]

I respectfully disagree with your interpretation of the Council's statement "dress in a simple and modest manner with an appropriate symbol" as I believe that this means ALL sisters should be wearing the SAME simple and modest clothing - not whatever they want on the day. The same, uniform habit should be worn by all sisters, with an appropriate symbol or crucifix, etc.... yes, this means to wear a habit.

I also totally disagree (once again very respectfully) with the statement that "and the religious habit is not an essential to religious life per se, rather it is a symbol (and a blest sacramental) of a way of life we call religious life." To me, the very fact that the habit is a blessed sacramental makes it a very important essential to the life, as well as a visible witness OF that way of life. The veil and scapular are kissed every time they are put on - this is a very important symbol of religious life!

Once again, I feel that your statement ... "Sometimes those who are different or think different from a person is considered as a challenge and contradiction to that person (which it is not) who is very often seeking a sort of affirmation by having all be and think as they do." ... is [u]very [/u]uncharitable in its meaning and expression. Sometimes people disagree not because they want everyone to think the same way they do, or because they think others are a contradiction or a challenge at all -- but because they feel passionate about what is being said, and hope that their own contribution will in some small way serve to inform and/or educate others to a point of view that they might not currently be considering. That statement is beneath you and is very dismissive of the opinions of those who disagree with you! I am sure that you did not mean it that way, but that is how I read it.

Sometimes reform is necessary, especially when things have gone too far in one direction or another. What the Council wrote and the way this was put into practice don't always coincide. In some cases the baby was thrown out with the bathwater. It's time to get the baby back. I say once again that if a community has a valid and praiseworthy reason for not wearing a habit (such as religious persecution in their country), then they should be proud to disclose this reason to others. If it is simply because they like to choose their own clothes, or they think that they will feel strange wearing a habit in public, etc.... then they need to think again, and ask what God and His Church are asking of them in terms of self-denial and self-sacrifice. No one is forced to become a religious - it is a choice. Wearing the habit is part of the consequences of that choice, just as is giving up personal money and self-will. There are many lay Societies of Apostolic life that do not wear habits, for those who want to live together in community but who do not want to wear a visible sign of their way of life.

I certainly don't expect everyone to agree with me, especially those who have an agenda (such as those communities who do not want to go back to their habits). And I am making no comment whatsoever on the holiness or worthiness of the religious sisters who choose not to wear the habit. This discussion is not about their interior state, but their exterior state. I will not apologize for my very strong and passionate feelings about this topic, but I will certainly ask for forgiveness for anyone who is offended or hurt by what I have written, since this is not my intention in any way.

[HisChild]

[quote name='tnavarro61' date='26 December 2009 - 09:20 PM' timestamp='1261887600' post='2026457']

[quote]
The only response I will give to the original post is that yes, there are communities that were formed without habits. There are also other communities who no longer choose to wear habits who are not dissenters from the Church. Saying that, I will say that most of the congregations who are the most vocally active in their fervency against the habit and other religious life particulars participate in or believe in other issues that comparatively speaking, not wearing the habit is the least of them. Their stance on obedience, not to the Church but to God alone, and other beliefs intrinsic to religious life rank further up the priority chain when considering the issues that have been of concern to the Church for years. [/quote]

oh i see. then maybe we should lift those communities to Jesus through prayers.

i'm sorry to admit this but please rephrase the last quoted post of yours. i can't understand some english (this is very embarrassing!) but i would like to know your point better.



[/quote]


No need to feel embarrassed! I'll try to rephrase. Please let me know if you do not understand. As I've looked at various religious communities, I've seen many who were formed with no religious habit. I understand that. I also know of some who have abandoned the habit without also abandoning Church's teachings. I do not speak of any of these, per se.

There are congregations who have, however, abandoned their habits as well as our Church's teachings/beliefs. Many in those congregations, or their most vocal spokeswomen, also espouse beliefs which are not Catholic, ie: active homosexuality, including in the clergy/religious, married clergy, women clergy, abortion, as well as including other spiritualities in the Mass/Catholic teaching. Think Matthew Fox here. I've also read of several women religious who avow they will never be obedient to the Church but to 'God alone', refusing to see that our Lord has given us the Church to speak for Him while we are on this earth. So by looking at these issues, not wearing a habit is the least of their issues. But saying that, it's these very vocal sisters that one thinks of when one laments sisters in religious life who do not wear the habit. One has become synonymous with the other at times.

As I said before, I'm sure there are many communities out there who, after Vatican II, chose to abandon their habits because they felt it was the 'reform' our Church was looking for. By the 'simple garb' that many have quoted is in reference to the times when sisters' rosaries caught on doorknobs, or scapulars in doors, or veils that were so elaborate that tasks like driving was almost impossible. Reform was meant to simplify the areas of the habit that made daily tasks difficult.

Many didn't realize that the call for review of the habit wasn't for its abandonment but rather for its defense. And now, some feel it's too late. Some have re-reformed and have embraced a common habit once again (among other things like living in community and observing a common life and horarium again), because as you well know, religious life isn't about conforming the life to our will but conforming us to the will of God.

[tnavarro61]

[quote name='HisChild' date='27 December 2009 - 01:58 PM' timestamp='1261889896' post='2026470']
No need to feel embarrassed! I'll try to rephrase. Please let me know if you do not understand. As I've looked at various religious communities, I've seen many who were formed with no religious habit. I understand that. I also know of some who have abandoned the habit without also abandoning Church's teachings. I do not speak of any of these, per se.

There are congregations who have, however, abandoned their habits as well as our Church's teachings/beliefs. Many in those congregations, or their most vocal spokeswomen, also espouse beliefs which are not Catholic, ie: active homosexuality, including in the clergy/religious, married clergy, women clergy, abortion, as well as including other spiritualities in the Mass/Catholic teaching. Think Matthew Fox here. I've also read of several women religious who avow they will never be obedient to the Church but to 'God alone', refusing to see that our Lord has given us the Church to speak for Him while we are on this earth. So by looking at these issues, not wearing a habit is the least of their issues. But saying that, it's these very vocal sisters that one thinks of when one laments sisters in religious life who do not wear the habit. One has become synonymous with the other at times.

As I said before, I'm sure there are many communities out there who, after Vatican II, chose to abandon their habits because they felt it was the 'reform' our Church was looking for. By the 'simple garb' that many have quoted is in reference to the times when sisters' rosaries caught on doorknobs, or scapulars in doors, or veils that were so elaborate that tasks like driving was almost impossible. Reform was meant to simplify the areas of the habit that made daily tasks difficult.

Many didn't realize that the call for review of the habit wasn't for its abandonment but rather for its defense. And now, some feel it's too late. Some have re-reformed and have embraced a common habit once again (among other things like living in community and observing a common life and horarium again), because as you well know, religious life isn't about conforming the life to our will but conforming us to the will of God.
[/quote]

i got it very very clear! crystal clear. :-)

i remember mother angelica saying that some religious misinterpreted the vatican 2. i think vatican 2 stated something like returning to the original ideals of the founders.. and some took it outside the original. so here comes the problem - the misinterpretation of the documents.

i would like to share this one... the religious of the cenacle here in my country is quite popular and are having vocations as well. i think the good shepherd sisters here have the option if they want to wear a habit or not.

thank you His Child!

***
i would also like to make myself clear here. i do not advocate for habitless religious.. what i am after is respect for those who were habitless, since not all habitless religious are liberal. Out of all the habitless religious, it might be 80% liberal and 20% conservative, but still they deserve respect. what i am sad about is how people talk about them very rudely. i love to see ALL in religious habits. that would be awesome