That's All, Folks! Or So I Thought...

[marigold]

Thank you!

 

I am very interested to hear your thoughts. I know you've been through a lot with leaving communities too. Whether you want to do that here or on PM is up to you - I don't mind.

[cmaD2006]

:)

 

One thought I will leave publically is this:  All things work for the good of those who love Him (Rom 8:28). 

 

I said this to a friend of mine this weekend:  if I had not gone through what I went through with my (most recent) former community, I would not have grown to what I am today.  That is grace.  Not that I would want to do it again -- but God deemed it necessary.

 

Note that I specifically did not say "God willed it" ... He permits us in our humanity to make choices, and He permits others to do the same.  So at times -- things happen that aren't pretty/pleasant, but because we have free will God allows it and God works through it.

 

[brandelynmarie]

^^^^ This. :) In His Permissive Will...yes. I have also been told by a certain someone ;) that God is the Great Recycler...He takes our rubbish & creates wondrous things out of it...if we let Him. :blush:

[cmaD2006]

great recycler.  Nice ;)

[maximillion]

I thought leaving the convent would pretty much finish me off as a person. I was wrong.

I thought I had failed God. Wrong again.

I wondered what on earth I could do to find my place and my vocation, since I had just given mine up. I was wrong on that score too.

 

Of course, leaving of ones own choice is different to having been asked to leave, but ultimately it comes down to the same thing. 

He wanted me to do that, now He wants me to do this......

 

The benefit of hindsight is a wonderful thing!

 

It took time, distance, prayer, tears, anger, anxiety, friends, time, distance, prayer, effort, time, distance, and prayer!!!!!

It was ages before I realised we all have a vocation and I had not lost mine, it had simply changed to being outside the cloister. Finding a way of living my Vows in private was tough. (Still is) Finding my way emotionally and FINALLY seeing a therapist helped a huge amount.

How I wish there had been VS back then, so many wonderfully supportive, accepting and understanding people.......finding community here is wonderful - the best!

People here don't react when I say I was a nun, they don't act scandalised that I left. They even sometimes encourage me to reminisce (thank you!).

 

[Credo in Deum]

^^^^ This. :) In His Permissive Will...yes. I have also been told by a certain someone ;) that God is the Great Recycler...He takes our rubbish & creates wondrous things out of it...if we let Him. :blush:

 

I see what they did there. 

[brandelynmarie]

Yes!

[BarbTherese]

http://www.phatmass.com/phorum/topic/127339-thats-all-folks-or-so-i-thought/page-6#entry2684705

 

Excellent post, maximilion - and thank you very much for sharing your story. When I left religious life in my teens I was told "You have lost your vocation".  That really threw me for a while and then I thought "God will just give me another one" and happily I continued the dance and colourful journey that was to unfold and continues to unfold.  I was probably almost 17yrs old then and back then it was almost heresy in Catholic cultural thought to leave religious life and sometimes even in one's family.

 

Nowadays I know that the Love and Mercy of The Lord embraces absolutely everything without conditions or exclusions no matter how minor or major, negative or positive.  And that the choice of vocation is a choice made personally in complete free will and a commitment made.........and if it seems all wrong, one can simply move on in the dance free of all unjustified guilt and negativity with trust and confidence in Him alone............Mystery and The Dance.

Not to state that leaving a chosen vocation, for example, is always easy.  It can be accompanied by many doubts and struggles - emoting.......and that can be putting it very mildly indeed.  In other incidences it may not be so.

 

It took time, distance, prayer, tears, anger, anxiety, friends, time, distance, prayer, effort, time, distance, and prayer!!!!!

 

 

At 68yrs almost 69, I look back over my journey to date and the above (and all variations of) is what I call "the dance" and the hymn "Lord of The Dance" always reminds me of the process.....to my mind, we are always dancing with the whole gamut of emoting both negative and positive, concluding and deciding, falling and then rising, searching and then struggling with angels etc. and always with The Lord of The Dance......:

 

"Dance, then, wherever you may be;
I am the Lord of the Dance, said he.
And I’ll lead you all wherever you may be,
And I’ll lead you all in the dance, said he."

 

"I danced on a Friday and the sky turned black;
It’s hard to dance with the devil on your back;
They buried my body and they thought I’d gone,
But I am the dance and I still go on."

 

"They cut me down and I leapt up high,
I am the life that’ll never, never die;
I’ll live in you if you’ll live in me;
I am the Lord of the Dance, said he."

 

Full lyrics: http://www.hymnlyrics.org/mostpopularhymns/i_danced_in_the_morning.php

 

(For me "community" "unfold" and "journey" are important words and definitions......and probably fast creeping into my list is "Catholic cultural thought")

[marigold]

Excellent post, maximilion - and thank you very much for sharing your story. When I left religious life in my teens I was told "You have lost your vocation".  That really threw me for a while and then I thought "God will just give me another one" and happily I continued the dance and colourful journey that was to unfold and continues to unfold.  I was probably almost 17yrs old then and back then it was almost heresy in Catholic cultural thought to leave religious life and sometimes even in one's family.

 

Nowadays I know that the Love and Mercy of The Lord embraces absolutely everything without conditions or exclusions no matter how minor or major, negative or positive.  And that the choice of vocation is a choice made personally in complete free will and a commitment made.........and if it seems all wrong, one can simply move on in the dance free of all unjustified guilt and negativity with trust and confidence in Him alone............Mystery and The Dance.

Not to state that leaving a chosen vocation, for example, is always easy.  It can be accompanied by many doubts and struggles - emoting.......and that can be putting it very mildly indeed.  In other incidences it may not be so.

 

 

At 68yrs almost 69, I look back over my journey to date and the above (and all variations of) is what I call "the dance" and the hymn "Lord of The Dance" always reminds me of the process.....to my mind, we are always dancing with the whole gamut of emoting both negative and positive, concluding and deciding, falling and then rising, searching and then struggling with angels etc. and always with The Lord of The Dance......:

 

"Dance, then, wherever you may be;
I am the Lord of the Dance, said he.
And I’ll lead you all wherever you may be,
And I’ll lead you all in the dance, said he."

 

"I danced on a Friday and the sky turned black;
It’s hard to dance with the devil on your back;
They buried my body and they thought I’d gone,
But I am the dance and I still go on."

 

"They cut me down and I leapt up high,
I am the life that’ll never, never die;
I’ll live in you if you’ll live in me;
I am the Lord of the Dance, said he."

 

Full lyrics: http://www.hymnlyrics.org/mostpopularhymns/i_danced_in_the_morning.php

 

(For me "community" "unfold" and "journey" are important words and definitions......and probably fast creeping into my list is "Catholic cultural thought")

 

Thanks BarbaraTherese, you've got that song stuck in my head now! We used to sing that in primary school, along with the amazingly depressing When I Needed A Neighbour. Strange choices for a really secular school :hehe2:

 

The dancing thing - one of the sisters at my former community told me about a Chinese image that had been interpreted as a type of Christ. A huge dragon reared up his head, and instead of fighting it, the warrior leaps up on his head and dances him to death.

[BarbTherese]

Thanks BarbaraTherese, you've got that song stuck in my head now! We used to sing that in primary school, along with the amazingly depressing When I Needed A Neighbour. Strange choices for a really secular school :hehe2:

 

The dancing thing - one of the sisters at my former community told me about a Chinese image that had been interpreted as a type of Christ. A huge dragon reared up his head, and instead of fighting it, the warrior leaps up on his head and dances him to death.

 

Hi Marigold

I don't know (and it sounds fortunately so) "the amazingly depressing When I Needed A Neighbour".  The other hymn besides Lord of The Dance that can stick in my head and just wont go away for days on end  is "Go tell everyone".  Gosh in a secular school there was no hymn singing and back in the days prior to half an hour weekly RI - and now efforts are being made to ban a school chaplain.

 

Leaving Mass in my previous parish one Sunday, it was our final hymn and right down the back near the door was a little girl probably 5 or 6yrs old standing on a chair, arms waving around, singing on top note:

 

"And go tell everyone the news that the Kingdom of God has come,
And go tell everyone the news that the Kingdom of God has come"

 

,,,,,,,,,, her absolute emphasis was on "everyone"............("At that time Jesus answered and said: I confess to thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them to the little ones.")

 

LOL Loved that 'Chinese anecdote'................warrior image interpreted as Christ -who "dances the dragon to death after leaping on its head".............. quite an image, quite an image! :bike:
 

Edited July 10, 2014 by BarbaraTherese

[Hemma]

I'm so sorry to hear that. It's so hard to know what to do, how to react. *hugs*

 

Well I knew what to do. I wrote my own report for the visitator. But it was hard for me to know what to think about the whole thing. She can't be lying, but in some parts obviously she is. What about the other parts? As it is my former community and not my future one, I decided not to think about it any more but to leave things open. What should I do? It's also sad that we can't be friends like this, because she's so full of her fighting against the community.

Edited July 11, 2014 by Senensis

[brandelynmarie]

:weep: :amen: Peace be with you...

[TheresaThoma]

Senensis I'm sorry. Prayers for you and for your friend.

[AveMariaPurissima]

The image of God as the "Great Recycler" reminds me of another image that a priest friend of mine used:  God is like a GPS: even if we mess up the original path He had planned, God will always "recalculate our route." ;)

[brandelynmarie]

Love it...yes!