Dating And Discernment: Pros And Cons

[Chiquitunga]

oops! I totally meant to post all of the above in the old Bride of Christ thread! I am going to do so now, as I think it is better to carry on discussion of that over there than in this thread.

 

here we go! :like: http://www.phatmass.com/phorum/topic/122838-bride-of-christ/?p=2608311

Edited July 18, 2013 by Chiquitunga

[FFI Griswold]

Ave Maria!

 

From Vocation.com - Q&A with Fr Anthony Bannon:

 

Why do you seem to stress putting all other considerations aside while one is discerning a vocation?

 

Sean asks:

 

Dear Fr Anthony,

 

Often in your replies, you seem to go with the idea that if one is considering a vocation, nothing else should be considered. You seem very against dating if one is discerning, for example. This is not criticism but an observation. Could you please correct or explain this? Thanks in advance.

Dear Sean,

 

Thank you for your feedback. It is very helpful to get these impressions and I know I am not always the clearest when explaining things, even though I try. Most of the advice I give is the fruit of experience, which I try to connect with valid principles of theology and spirituality, as I formulate the answers, being at the same time as realistic as I can. It is good to keep in mind also, the answers are being given to very concrete questions. Now, regarding the very valid points you bring up, I'll turn them into questions to focus the answer more clearly.

If you are considering a vocation, is it true that you should not consider anything else? I'll have to start with two of the most useful words in our language, it depends. It depends on what stage of considering you are in. Without attempting to write a treatise on the perception of a vocation, we can describe two basic scenarios. One might be an initial curiosity, or the desire to be completely open, a wondering if perhaps I should check out the vocation, an initial discernment to see if God might be calling me. Another might be the inkling that God may be calling me, and of course there is a sliding scale of clarity going all the way from a simple inkling to a full-blown mega-suspicion that he might be. As you go up that scale, as the suspicion or possibility grows, I think we have a greater obligation to leave the consideration of other possibilities aside in order to give the vocation a chance.

Something to keep in mind here is that the common alternative to a vocation, married life, is something that comes naturally to us; so that we ordinarily don't have to force ourselves to consider a call to marriage or to create an attraction to marriage, although we do have to make an effort to enter into the full acceptance of everything God has intended marriage to be, beyond the natural attraction. To consider the vocation takes an extra effort.

Should you date if you are considering a vocation? The distinction we made above will help answer this question also. The more actively you want to discern your vocation, or the further along you are on the scale of consideration, the freer you need to keep yourself from those things that could potentially hamper it. For example, if you are really considering a vocation, it would not help to buy a new house and take on a huge mortgage, or sign an employment contract for five years, or start/continue to date. That is the context that I fit dating into. You see, dating is itself a discernment process. If you have the inkling that you are called to marriage, you will do what you need to, in order to meet the right person. Once you meet the someone, you think might be that person, you zero in on an exclusive dating relationship, in order to see if it really is, and if you are serious about it, and have the occasion to go out with someone else, you probably will refuse to. That's the nature of discernment.

I hope these explanations help a little to see where I'm coming from.

God bless,

 

Fr. Anthony Bannon, L.C.

 

 

Mary, Mother of Vocations, pray for us. Ave Maria!

 

fra John Paul

[MarysLittleFlower]

I found Fr Anthony's replies very helpful on that website :)

 

I think this is a great point:

 

"If you are considering a vocation, is it true that you should not consider anything else? I'll have to start with two of the most useful words in our language, it depends. It depends on what stage of considering you are in. Without attempting to write a treatise on the perception of a vocation, we can describe two basic scenarios. One might be an initial curiosity, or the desire to be completely open, a wondering if perhaps I should check out the vocation, an initial discernment to see if God might be calling me. Another might be the inkling that God may be calling me, and of course there is a sliding scale of clarity going all the way from a simple inkling to a full-blown mega-suspicion that he might be. As you go up that scale, as the suspicion or possibility grows, I think we have a greater obligation to leave the consideration of other possibilities aside in order to give the vocation a chance."

[Chiquitunga]

Hi MarysLittleFlower,

 

The general question I would have is where did that interior focus come from to begin with?  A lot of people I have encountered dismiss marriage with disdain and only focus on giving themselves only to God because they feel that is the better thing to do.  For example, I was talking to a woman and her daughter about how many children of divorced parents need counseling and healing before they are able to join religious life.  Unbeknownst to me, the mother was divorced and remarried (she was getting an annulment and was living chastely with her civil law spouse).  The daughter absolutely had her heart set on joining the Norbertine canonessses.  She clothed it in the words that religious life was superior and so on and so forth and how she wanted to serve God... but I doubted her "vocation" because she refused to date because she felt that man only betrays and is unreliable.  She was considering a lovely community, had a lovely reason, was a lovely young woman, but she was very wounded and needed healing because she was not free to make that choice in a healthy way. 

 

As for your question, I would simply say that to some, God gives an extraordinary grace either a very strong general inclination towards a vocation, or even a more specific one (like some of the saints who were told which order to join).  Most of us cannot count on this grace and must live the way He designed us, which is to be schooled in prudence so that when the time comes, we may use our heads and grace to discern what is likely to be God's will.  In an age where things are increasingly unnatural and broken by sin, I believe it takes a lot more for a person to reach maturity to the point they are able to make the same vocational decisions a younger person in a more wholesome and Christian society may have been able to make more easily and confidently.  If you see very happy couples with healthy families, it is easier to comprehend what it is you are giving up for Christ in a religious vocation.  If you are the child of a blended family and both parents have remarried four times, you may not exactly have a good grasp of what Christ intended for marriage.

 

Okay, now I can understand a little better where you are coming from in your views on this. I was very blessed to grow up in a strong family with great parents happily married and to witness other marriages that were likewise. But I can see how if it wasn't so, one might disdain marriage from the very start, and have that be the motivation for wanting to discern religious life, rather than an interior call from Our Lord. I understand what you mean now. Personally, while I never specifically dated, I was very interested in someone when the Lord first called me very clearly to belong to Him alone instead, after which I had no interest in (besides being friends) a relationship with any man besides Jesus ever since. I believe this is what many others experience likeness. But again, I can see your point now. Thank you for explaining it.

[abrideofChrist]

Okay, now I can understand a little better where you are coming from in your views on this. I was very blessed to grow up in a strong family with great parents happily married and to witness other marriages that were likewise. But I can see how if it wasn't so, one might disdain marriage from the very start, and have that be the motivation for wanting to discern religious life, rather than an interior call from Our Lord. I understand what you mean now. Personally, while I never specifically dated, I was very interested in someone when the Lord first called me very clearly to belong to Him alone instead, after which I had no interest in (besides being friends) a relationship with any man besides Jesus ever since. I believe this is what many others experience likeness. But again, I can see your point now. Thank you for explaining it.

 

I only gave a broken family as an example of one reason out of thousands as to why a person might look at marriage with disdain.  There are many other reasons, including aggressively recruiting Orders who don't want solid discernment practices and would rather convince a candidate that they have a "higher" vocation and not to bother with thinking about marriage.  Incompetent spiritual direction pushing "pious" people in a direction or to a few pet communities regardless of that person's real vocation or aptitude; plain and simple misdirected pride whereby someone "knows" they have a vocation because it is objectively a better state are some ways I have found people misled.  Fear of what is entailed in the consummation of marriage.  An unwillingness to believe that holiness is actually possible outside of a religious community.  Unwillingness to deal with the world that Christ Himself lived in as a regular mom & pop shop carpenter for most of His life.  If you cannot be happy, holy, and fulfilled as you are in your state right now, there's a 99.99% chance you cannot be happy, holy, and fulfilled by changing your vocational state in life either. I know many holy couples and at least one mom I think is a true mystic.  There is one nun I know whom I think is probably a mystic.  I do not know any priests I believe are extremely holy. 

 

Whenever disdain or fear is in the picture, there is the real possibility authentic discernment is not being done.  Hate the idea of people being truly consecrated but lay and not wearing habits?  Then you've just knocked out the beautiful vocation to be a lay consecrated person in a secular institute.  Don't like the idea of being a simple brother as opposed to a priest?  Well, you've just dismissed a vocation that's higher than diocesan priesthood.  Don't think marriage is good?  You've just kicked out the vocation St. Joseph and Mary excelled at.  Think the evangelical counsels are limited to religious and best lived by religious?  The Church would disagree and point out secular institutes and hermits.  Hate the idea of the Bride of Christ not wearing habits?  Then you just tossed the most ancient form of consecrated life out the window (one reason why that sentimental nonsense about habits equaling bridal gowns needs to be purged from the Church... if habits were bridal wear, then why would St. Clare wear her best clothes and jewels before receiving a habit and why do men wear habits?).  Authentic discernment involves much more than glib quotes from saints or men from a religious community founded by a bi-sexual rapist incestual con man without a conscience who recruited vocations for an empire to support his drug and sex desires.

[Sister Marie]

abrideofchrist, maybe you can answer this question for me.  In another thread people were talking about the habit being your wedding dress and why would you ever want to take it off and I asked where that sentiment came from.  Unless I missed it, I cannot recall reading that in any church document on religious life.  I've only heard it come from the same few religious communities.  I just think its important for discerners to know where this idea has come from... is it an invention of the leaders of some of these religious communities?  If that is the case, that's fine for them but they cannot hold other religious up to a standard that was never put forth from any authority.  

 

Thank you for taking the time to answer when you have the chance.

[abrideofChrist]

abrideofchrist, maybe you can answer this question for me.  In another thread people were talking about the habit being your wedding dress and why would you ever want to take it off and I asked where that sentiment came from.  Unless I missed it, I cannot recall reading that in any church document on religious life.  I've only heard it come from the same few religious communities.  I just think its important for discerners to know where this idea has come from... is it an invention of the leaders of some of these religious communities?  If that is the case, that's fine for them but they cannot hold other religious up to a standard that was never put forth from any authority.  

 

Thank you for taking the time to answer when you have the chance.

 

It is difficult to know where the rumors started about habits being wedding dresses.  Certainly, I would suspect the first monastics to have thought it a very odd idea, particularly since the first rules passed down to us were written by and for men.  "Brethern, we wear a rough tunic with a hood because this signifies being wedded to Christ."  Nope.

 

I argued earlier in a different thread that it was inappropriate for people to call the practice of wearing a mantilla at Church "veiling" because of the weight the Church puts on it.  Velatio and veiling have the primary significance of the veil being conferred upon virgins and (later) nuns.  Even in this thread, someone I think referred to the Solemn Profession and Veiling of Carmelite nuns.  Why?  If any communities have even a smidgen of a right to call themselves Brides of Christ (with the idea that habits or at least veils could signify a spousal relationship), they would be cloistered communities who are the "heirs" of the virgins.  One could say, well, if my veil reminds the Church of the Velatio of real consecrated virgins, then obviously my habit does too.  It must be a wedding garment.  Faulty reasoning.  I have already mentioned that since the Consecration Rite exists for certain enclosed communities, they are Brides of Christ.  And for those enclosed communities that don't have it, they are like "heirs".  But since 1970, these "heirs" are heirs to what, precisely, since what they are "heirs" to, is in existence, namely, consecrated virginity lived in the world?  I would suspect that the only part of the habit that could remotely be construed as "bridal" is the veil and the ring, and only in enclosed communities.  The rest of the habit is common to men and women.

 

I was re-reading this document from the Vatican and this is what it said about the habit:

34. The totality of religious consecration requires that the witness to the Gospel be given publicly by the whole of life. Values, attitudes and life-style attest forcefully to the place of Christ in one's life. The visibility of this witness involves the foregoing of standards of comfort and convenience that would otherwise be legitimate. It requires a restraint on forms of relaxation and entertainment (cf. ES 1, §2; CD 33-35). To ensure this public witness, religious willingly accept a pattern of life that is not permissive but largely laid down for them. They wear a religious garb that distinguishes them as consecrated persons, and they have a place of residence which is properly established by their institute in accordance with common law and their own constitutions. Such matters as travel and social contacts are in accord with the spirit and character of their institute and with religious obedience. These provisions alone do not ensure the desired public witness to the joy, hope, and love of Jesus Christ, but they offer important means to it, and it is certain that religious witness is not given without them.

 

§37. Religious should wear the religious garb of the institute, described in their proper law, as a sign of consecration and a witness of poverty (can. 669.1).

 

 

Certainly we have already established that being consecrated is one thing.  Being a bride is a particular kind of consecration not shared by all religious.  A witness to poverty and a visible separation from the world appear to be the primary reasons for a habit for religious.  Not. Being. A. Wedding. Dress.  Oh.  And any private revelation is just that.  We can call things - an Our Lord and Lady can- all kinds of stuff for a bridal spirituality.  I honestly don't know if there are any apparitions that are approved where God is saying this is a bridal dress.  And I would take it with a grain of salt.

[Pax_et bonum]

If any communities have even a smidgen of a right to call themselves Brides of Christ (with the idea that habits or at least veils could signify a spousal relationship), they would be cloistered communities who are the "heirs" of the virgins.

The Church is the Bride of Christ, and we are the Church. Can't we say that as members of the Church we are all Brides of Christ? Or does that not really extend to each individual and is instead only us united as the Church? The vocation of Consecrated Virgin may best reflect the Bride of Christ image, but it doesn't seem wrong for anyone to use that imagery who wants to since we are the Church.

[abrideofChrist]

The Church is the Bride of Christ, and we are the Church. Can't we say that as members of the Church we are all Brides of Christ? Or does that not really extend to each individual and is instead only us united as the Church? The vocation of Consecrated Virgin may best reflect the Bride of Christ image, but it doesn't seem wrong for anyone to use that imagery who wants to since we are the Church.

 

Did you read the Bride of Christ post?

[Sister Marie]

It is difficult to know where the rumors started about habits being wedding dresses.  Certainly, I would suspect the first monastics to have thought it a very odd idea, particularly since the first rules passed down to us were written by and for men.  "Brethern, we wear a rough tunic with a hood because this signifies being wedded to Christ."  Nope.

 

I argued earlier in a different thread that it was inappropriate for people to call the practice of wearing a mantilla at Church "veiling" because of the weight the Church puts on it.  Velatio and veiling have the primary significance of the veil being conferred upon virgins and (later) nuns.  Even in this thread, someone I think referred to the Solemn Profession and Veiling of Carmelite nuns.  Why?  If any communities have even a smidgen of a right to call themselves Brides of Christ (with the idea that habits or at least veils could signify a spousal relationship), they would be cloistered communities who are the "heirs" of the virgins.  One could say, well, if my veil reminds the Church of the Velatio of real consecrated virgins, then obviously my habit does too.  It must be a wedding garment.  Faulty reasoning.  I have already mentioned that since the Consecration Rite exists for certain enclosed communities, they are Brides of Christ.  And for those enclosed communities that don't have it, they are like "heirs".  But since 1970, these "heirs" are heirs to what, precisely, since what they are "heirs" to, is in existence, namely, consecrated virginity lived in the world?  I would suspect that the only part of the habit that could remotely be construed as "bridal" is the veil and the ring, and only in enclosed communities.  The rest of the habit is common to men and women.

 

I was re-reading this document from the Vatican and this is what it said about the habit:

 

Certainly we have already established that being consecrated is one thing.  Being a bride is a particular kind of consecration not shared by all religious.  A witness to poverty and a visible separation from the world appear to be the primary reasons for a habit for religious.  Not. Being. A. Wedding. Dress.  Oh.  And any private revelation is just that.  We can call things - an Our Lord and Lady can- all kinds of stuff for a bridal spirituality.  I honestly don't know if there are any apparitions that are approved where God is saying this is a bridal dress.  And I would take it with a grain of salt.

 

Thank you for your response!  I didn't think that there was any church teaching that upheld habits as "wedding dresses" but consecrated life isn't my area of study so I didn't want to make that statement falsely.  I think it is dangerous when individuals spread an idea, especially such an overly romantic idea, about religious life as fact and not as what it is - personal opinion/particular community tradition.  

 

Most religious communities have sayings that have been passed on from their founders and superiors that the sisters cherish, even if they aren't law and don't apply to other communities.  Those customs and sayings are good because they are part of the community's spirit and history but it isn't fair to extend those things to other communities or to say all sisters who wear a habit are wearing their wedding dress, especially when this statement is used to shame other religious into conformity with something that isn't mandatory.  

 

I can't tell you how many times people and sisters have said to me, "Why wouldn't you want to wear your wedding dress all the time?!?" when they hear that my community allows for leisure clothing at appropriate times.  Besides the fact that the habit is not a wedding dress... I don't know any married women who garden or clean in their wedding dresses.  Yes, the habit is blessed and is a sacramental but it is not a wedding dress.  I just often feel like this statement is passed on and repeated over and over again without any critical research being done into how it originated.  All the communities I have heard pass on this belief are viewed as very traditional but this is an example of something that is not traditional at all and is something they have made up on their own (which is exactly what more liberal communities are accused of doing).

 

I know this won't be a popular post but I really think people need to know that what they are quoting is not church teaching but only the opinions of some sisters.

[abrideofChrist]

Thank you for your response!  I didn't think that there was any church teaching that upheld habits as "wedding dresses" but consecrated life isn't my area of study so I didn't want to make that statement falsely.  I think it is dangerous when individuals spread an idea, especially such an overly romantic idea, about religious life as fact and not as what it is - personal opinion/particular community tradition.  

 

Most religious communities have sayings that have been passed on from their founders and superiors that the sisters cherish, even if they aren't law and don't apply to other communities.  Those customs and sayings are good because they are part of the community's spirit and history but it isn't fair to extend those things to other communities or to say all sisters who wear a habit are wearing their wedding dress, especially when this statement is used to shame other religious into conformity with something that isn't mandatory.  

 

I can't tell you how many times people and sisters have said to me, "Why wouldn't you want to wear your wedding dress all the time?!?" when they hear that my community allows for leisure clothing at appropriate times.  Besides the fact that the habit is not a wedding dress... I don't know any married women who garden or clean in their wedding dresses.  Yes, the habit is blessed and is a sacramental but it is not a wedding dress.  I just often feel like this statement is passed on and repeated over and over again without any critical research being done into how it originated.  All the communities I have heard pass on this belief are viewed as very traditional but this is an example of something that is not traditional at all and is something they have made up on their own (which is exactly what more liberal communities are accused of doing).

 

I know this won't be a popular post but I really think people need to know that what they are quoting is not church teaching but only the opinions of some sisters.

 

There is nothing wrong in spinning a spirituality around something as long as people know it is the personal spin of someone.  For example, St. Therese prepared her "wedding trousseau" for the few months she had to wait for her entrance to Carmel.  Do we really label doing good works as a trousseau or do we normally just label them by the virtues they are?  An act of kindness.  A mortification.  Likewise, it is certainly not wrong if someone chooses to be romantic about something inherently non-romantic like an ugly habit (I've seen some pretty ugly ones in my lifetime) or even a pretty one. 

The original habits were designed with an eye to poverty (what were poor people wearing in their time?), communal uniformity (need to treat everyone the same), and witness (we are people dedicated to God's service).  I have never heard of a foundress designing a habit deliberately upon a bridal pattern.  Usually the explanations you'll get is that this color = XXXXXX (like humility, Mary's color, penitence, etc.).  A lot of habits for women, especially active religious, were patterned after widows attire.  Nothing very bridal about that.  If it helps an individual religious in her own bridal spirituality to pat her habit and think of it as a wedding gown, I have no objections if this somehow encourages her to love God more ardently and serve her neighbor more ardently.  But I certainly would have a problem with this private spin being taught to women who identify this as proper clothing for God's spouses; bridal in fact.  It is dangerous to do this because by saying habit = wedding gown, you get people habituated to looking down on women who do not need a bridal spirituality for their vocation and on women who are brides by consecration and who do not need a habit for them to be completely given over to God.  This is one reason I am vehemently opposed to women calling their purely elective fashionable choice to wear something on their heads under the name of "veiling", because it dilutes the meaning and symbolism attached to the real veiling given by the Church.
 

[OnlySunshine]

This brings to mind an issue a young girl I knew only online had.  She had applied to a community and was accepted to enter that Fall.  A few months before she was to enter, she met a guy and they started hanging out quite a bit.  It inevitably led to them forging a romantic relationship and she decided to withdraw her application and cancel her entrance.  Apparently she is still with this young man and it appears, from what she says, that they might be getting engaged soon. 

 

It was mind boggling to me to read this.  She didn't have a spiritual director at the time so she was really confused when the young man started to flirt with her.  I think she took it as a sign of God calling her to marriage instead of the religious order that already accepted her as a candidate!  I wonder what will happen if she does get engaged to the young man.  Will she be thinking of the opportunity she gave up to try out religious life in order to date?  I don't think I could live with myself if I made that decision.  I think that if a religious community accepts you to enter and they are a stable community, that is a sign that God is opening the door to have you try the life.  Of course, it doesn't mean 100% that you will make vows but obviously there is something for you to learn.  Canceling entrance to date is like saying the community made the wrong decision or the Holy Spirit is wrong.  :(

[abrideofChrist]

 She didn't have a spiritual director at the time so she was really confused when the young man started to flirt with her.  I think she took it as a sign of God calling her to marriage instead of the religious order that already accepted her as a candidate!.  Canceling entrance to date is like saying the community made the wrong decision or the Holy Spirit is wrong.  :(

 

People read "signs" into so many things!  Another reason for someone to be mature Christians.  They wouldn't be swayed by random things they take as signs of God's will.  Not saying your friend was in this situation.  I know one woman who asked what I thought of her attraction to someone while she was firmly on the path to becoming a sister.  It turned out she thought marriage was beneath her.  Thank God she changed her mind before entering a community.

 

Cancelling entrance is like cancelling a really big important date.  No guarantee the acceptance was a work of the Holy Spirit.  Nobody should canonize their decisions as God's will.
 

[Pax_et bonum]

I've posted in the Bride of Christ thread.

 

This is one reason I am vehemently opposed to women calling their purely elective fashionable choice to wear something on their heads under the name of "veiling", because it dilutes the meaning and symbolism attached to the real veiling given by the Church.

This reminds me of people who are vehemently opposed to people using "depressed" outside of the mental illness, but one can feel depressed, use the term to describe his/her feelings, and not have depression. Does that dilute the severity of depression? I don't think so. Taking a run is running; wearing a veil is veiling. It just means it in a different sense than "real veiling." It's also not a fashionable choice.

[abrideofChrist]

I've posted in the Bride of Christ thread.

 

This reminds me of people who are vehemently opposed to people using "depressed" outside of the mental illness, but one can feel depressed, use the term to describe his/her feelings, and not have depression. Does that dilute the severity of depression? I don't think so. Taking a run is running; wearing a veil is veiling. It just means it in a different sense than "real veiling." It's also not a fashionable choice.

 

Wearing a covering on one's head when it is not required means one has engaged in a fashion choice.  Of course, it can be considered unfashionable too.  :)