On Use of the Term "Vocation"

[vee]

i dont know if there is a controversy over the words monastery and convent as I was just trying to think of an example, however, there is probably some distinction that when used incorrectly could ruffle some feathers. 

[Spem in alium]

2 hours ago, Sr Mary Catharine OP said:

Spem, I think the "issue" of religious life and consecrated life is because it is new and there are a lot of ambiguities. They are not the same thing. There needs to be a lot more work done in this area as well. Again, it can sometimes seems that "everyone" is consecrated!

I agree, Sister. It is very new. Recently I attended a talk given by Cardinal Aviz, who was visiting from Rome, and the event was advertised as a "gathering for consecrated persons". The distinction there, I felt, was very important, and I could tell that people who attended who were not priests or living in religious life, but had still consecrated themselves in some way, deeply appreciated that.

[Sr Mary Catharine OP]

34 minutes ago, Spem in alium said:

I agree, Sister. It is very new. Recently I attended a talk given by Cardinal Aviz, who was visiting from Rome, and the event was advertised as a "gathering for consecrated persons". The distinction there, I felt, was very important, and I could tell that people who attended who were not priests or living in religious life, but had still consecrated themselves in some way, deeply appreciated that.

Which is the correct terminology today following the Church. I've been to something similar and I kept looking around and thinking, "Hmm, now why is HE here or why is SHE here?" It was sort of like a game of Clue! Then they got up and gave a talk on what sort of consecrated person they are and why.

 

[Spem in alium]

25 minutes ago, Sr Mary Catharine OP said:

Which is the correct terminology today following the Church. I've been to something similar and I kept looking around and thinking, "Hmm, now why is HE here or why is SHE here?" It was sort of like a game of Clue! Then they got up and gave a talk on what sort of consecrated person they are and why.

 

Yes, it was quite fascinating! There was one consecrated virgin, a secular institute (I believe), and a society of apostolic life there. Very interesting stuff. 

[Gabriela]

6 hours ago, vee said:

Ooooh this is like vocation station debate table, what should we discuss next?  The terms monastery versus convent versus..?

I have a lot of topics I've refrained from posting about because I thought they'd heat things up too much in the VS. I don't think they're terribly controversial, but because of the tendency that Spem mentioned—to put religious and priests on a pedestal—I haven't brought them up.

 

6 hours ago, IgnatiusofLoyola said:

I keep expecting someone to correct me when I say I live across the street from a convent. Except, it really is a convent, not a monastery. (The monastery is about a block away.) 

Let's not get into heated debates here--VS is my sanctuary. For the past few weeks I've managed to almost completely avoid Open Mic and that has been a positive thing. (I learned to avoid the Debate Table years ago.) If I want debate and criticism, all I need to do is call my family who manage to find fault with pretty much everything I do, from what I eat, to the sheets on my bed. WHATEVER I do, my sister finds a way to tell me how I could do it better (in her eyes, at least).

I'm not saying we shouldn't have discussions on VS--"heated," "criticism," and "passing judgement" are the things I am avoiding. 

Relax, Iggy. There's a "no debate" rule in the VS, and so far, I think we've all respected that. We're just hashing out what "vocation" and "calling" properly mean.  

7 hours ago, Sr Mary Catharine OP said:

Clarifying the term vocation vis a vis religious life or consecrated life to make it to be everyone has a vocation isn't exactly helpful because it doesn't respect the nature of this "thing" we call a religious or priestly vocation. Changing it to the "everyone has a vocation" is then confusing the religious or consecrated state with the call of holiness. EVERYONE by virtue of their baptism is called (has a vocation) to be a saint, called to be holy. EVERYONE. That's not Vatican II, that is the teaching of the Church from the beginning.

Embracing the evangelical counsels by vow is not the same as holiness. It is a means of holiness. It is BOTH a radical living of our baptismal vows and a new and deeper following of Christ. It is a "state of perfection" because it is a following of Christ committed to by vow and recognized by the Church. It's a PUBLIC witnessing but it is also a personal way of holiness. It is not an extraordinary calling but it is a supernatural calling. Living poor, chaste and obedient isn't possible without the particular grace to do so.

Spem, I think the "issue" of religious life and consecrated life is because it is new and there are a lot of ambiguities. They are not the same thing. There needs to be a lot more work done in this area as well. Again, it can sometimes seems that "everyone" is consecrated!

The funny thing is that in the middle ages if you followed a rule of life you were considered "a religious". Such as 3rd Orders, etc.

People use sister and nun interchangeably. Most of the time it doesn't really matter and nuns and sisters don't get offended! There are times when it DOES matter as for example, talking about Dominican women. Dominican Nuns and Sisters are distinct institutes of religious. There aren't Sisters of the Order of Preachers because the Sisters are Dominicans Sisters of Such and Such but the Nuns are the Nuns of the Order of Preachers with an entirely different way of relating and belonging. So, in that case Nun and Sister does matter.

This stuff is really good conversation and it would be great if somebody had a sort of symposium or something with papers being given and time for hot and heavy discussion afterwards.

When I think back I think it was just simply, "I want to be a nun. If I keep wanting to become a nun than that means I have a vocation to be a nun." I really mean it. It was that simple. WHAT KIND OF NUN was a whole other thing, though!

 

I agree. A conference or something on this topic would be really good. Would you agree that VII made us more sensitive to the vocations of the laity (i.e., including non-religious)?

[Sponsa-Christi]

5 hours ago, Sr Mary Catharine OP said:

Which is the correct terminology today following the Church. I've been to something similar and I kept looking around and thinking, "Hmm, now why is HE here or why is SHE here?" It was sort of like a game of Clue! Then they got up and gave a talk on what sort of consecrated person they are and why.

 

Just wondering...was I at this event also?

[Sponsa-Christi]

Some more food for thought (and building on what Sr. Mary Catharine mentioned earlier)...there is a very old standing theological and canonical debate on whether religious life properly so-called is a special vocation (as in, something to which God calls some people but not others), or a general means of holiness equally open to all of the baptized. 

There are actually good arguments on both sides of this debate, and I don't have a strong opinion either way right now. Still, I do have a sort of pet theory that the call to relate to Christ in a spousal way---whether as a consecrated virgin, or as a "call within a call" for religious, or even as a purely private commitment---is a special vocation that not all women are called to. 

[Sr Mary Catharine OP]

7 hours ago, Sponsa-Christi said:

Just wondering...was I at this event also?

Yep!

 

[AveMariaPurissima]

13 hours ago, Sponsa-Christi said:

There are actually good arguments on both sides of this debate, and I don't have a strong opinion either way right now. Still, I do have a sort of pet theory that the call to relate to Christ in a spousal way---whether as a consecrated virgin, or as a "call within a call" for religious, or even as a purely private commitment---is a special vocation that not all women are called to. 

Interesting...are you saying that even among women who are called to religious life, not all of them are called to relate to Christ in a spousal way? (since you call it a "call within a call" for them?) Or am I misunderstanding what you wrote? Could you please elaborate a little bit?  

[Sponsa-Christi]

16 minutes ago, AveMariaPurissima said:

Interesting...are you saying that even among women who are called to religious life, not all of them are called to relate to Christ in a spousal way? (since you call it a "call within a call" for them?) Or am I misunderstanding what you wrote? Could you please elaborate a little bit?  

Yes, I don't think all women religious as a general category are automatically called to relate to Christ in a spousal way. There is nothing about religious life per se that demands this, and it seems that there are some faithful women religious who have a hard time relating to bridal imagery. I think it's perfectly legitimate for a woman to be drawn to religious life in terms of following Christ as a friend or disciple rather than specifically as a bride.

I personally would tend to see the special vocation to be a bride of Christ for women as being somewhat complementary or parallel to a vocation to priesthood for men. That is, just as a male religious may or may not be called to priesthood, a women religious may or may not have the spiritual gift of relating to Christ as her Spouse. 

I did write a fairly long post about this topic on my blog earlier this year: http://sponsa-christi.blogspot.com/2015/03/who-can-be-called-bride-of-christ.html

But again, these are my own personal theological musings, just shared here for the sake of having an interesting discussion!

[Sr Mary Catharine OP]

45 minutes ago, Sponsa-Christi said:

Yes, I don't think all women religious as a general category are automatically called to relate to Christ in a spousal way. There is nothing about religious life per se that demands this, and it seems that there are some faithful women religious who have a hard time relating to bridal imagery. I think it's perfectly legitimate for a woman to be drawn to religious life in terms of following Christ as a friend or disciple rather than specifically as a bride.

I personally would tend to see the special vocation to be a bride of Christ for women as being somewhat complementary or parallel to a vocation to priesthood for men. That is, just as a male religious may or may not be called to priesthood, a women religious may or may not have the spiritual gift of relating to Christ as her Spouse. 

I did write a fairly long post about this topic on my blog earlier this year: http://sponsa-christi.blogspot.com/2015/03/who-can-be-called-bride-of-christ.html

But again, these are my own personal theological musings, just shared here for the sake of having an interesting discussion!

But theologically you'd have to do a lot of work to explain this since the CHURCH is the Bride of Christ and that is everyone. From St Paul and from the earliest of the fathers of the Church they speak of the 3 fold relationship of Israel as Bride, the Church as Bride, individual souls relating as bride, etc. I think there is a difference between bridal IMAGERY and spousal relationship. St. JPII's theology of the body places strong emphases on sponsality.

I know you believe strongly in what you are saying so you really should do some serious theological work on this since you do. It may be more a matter of emphasis.

[bardegaulois]

On 12/5/2015, 4:13:56, Sr Mary Catharine OP said:

Spem, I think the "issue" of religious life and consecrated life is because it is new and there are a lot of ambiguities. They are not the same thing. There needs to be a lot more work done in this area as well. Again, it can sometimes seems that "everyone" is consecrated!

The funny thing is that in the middle ages if you followed a rule of life you were considered "a religious". Such as 3rd Orders, etc.

 

Sister, this really intimates to me a huge unresolved issue that casts a large shadow on all aspects of "vocations culture." We need to ask what it means to be consecrated, and who should be consecrated. Canon law has since simplified the bewildering variety of consecrated persons, regulars, persons taking particular vows, etc., that we saw in the Middle Ages, but I sometimes wonder if that simplification and legal categorization hasn't squelched a lot of the individual initiative that many seemed to have had in the age of faith.

It seems to me often that there's a group of people nowadays who aren't recognized as consecrated but at the same time aren't quite typically lay in attitude or worldview. Researching canonical definitions and taking part in discernment culture has just seemed to muddy the waters for such persons. So many seem to go their way, usually from a sense of frustration into a pious detachment in which they live often according to a rule of their own devising and without concern for the pat answers of vocations directors or canon law. I've known many such persons and can attest that they have among the richest interior lives I've encountered in my life.

What of such persons? They're largely invisible and also largely indefinable according to standard vocational definitions. I don't think they really mind that much, but should they be?

[Sponsa-Christi]

1 hour ago, Sr Mary Catharine OP said:

But theologically you'd have to do a lot of work to explain this since the CHURCH is the Bride of Christ and that is everyone. From St Paul and from the earliest of the fathers of the Church they speak of the 3 fold relationship of Israel as Bride, the Church as Bride, individual souls relating as bride, etc. I think there is a difference between bridal IMAGERY and spousal relationship. St. JPII's theology of the body places strong emphases on sponsality.

I know you believe strongly in what you are saying so you really should do some serious theological work on this since you do. It may be more a matter of emphasis.

I did get into that in my blog post, actually.

Of course the Church is the bride of Christ in the fullest and truest sense, but since Apostolic times there have always been some women who have embodied this mystery in a more direct and literal way.

E.g., we can recall St. Agnes' story of martyrdom, and how she refused to marry because she was already betrothed to Christ. Since Christians in general aren't required to forsake marriage to a mortal spouse, it would seem that St. Agnes must had some kind of experience of a special (rather than a universal) call to be a bride of Christ in a particularly radical way.

So I think we can indeed still speak of there being such a thing as a special charism to relate to Christ in a primarily spousal way which is given to some women, but not to all the baptized in general. I suppose it would be similar to how we can identify men called to the ministerial priesthood, even while we acknowledge the common priesthood of all the baptized. 

Edited December 6, 2015 by Sponsa-Christi

[Gabriela]

3 hours ago, bardegaulois said:

Sister, this really intimates to me a huge unresolved issue that casts a large shadow on all aspects of "vocations culture." We need to ask what it means to be consecrated, and who should be consecrated. Canon law has since simplified the bewildering variety of consecrated persons, regulars, persons taking particular vows, etc., that we saw in the Middle Ages, but I sometimes wonder if that simplification and legal categorization hasn't squelched a lot of the individual initiative that many seemed to have had in the age of faith.

It seems to me often that there's a group of people nowadays who aren't recognized as consecrated but at the same time aren't quite typically lay in attitude or worldview. Researching canonical definitions and taking part in discernment culture has just seemed to muddy the waters for such persons. So many seem to go their way, usually from a sense of frustration into a pious detachment in which they live often according to a rule of their own devising and without concern for the pat answers of vocations directors or canon law. I've known many such persons and can attest that they have among the richest interior lives I've encountered in my life.

What of such persons? They're largely invisible and also largely indefinable according to standard vocational definitions. I don't think they really mind that much, but should they be?

I agree absolutely, bardegaulois, and this is one of my main reasons for bringing up this issue. If you're a single woman past 30, people are always asking you why you don't marry or become a nun. As if those were the only two vocational options. I'm sure Sponsa must get plenty of that, too. @Sponsa-Christi?

On the other hand, I imagine single men past 30 are constantly asked why they don't get married or become priests. I've never encountered one who told me, "People are always asking me why I don't become a brother." Which is a whole different problem.

[Era Might]

When Dorothy Day was young during WWI she got her first real sense of vocation working in a hospital where there was no time to ponder, just to do your duty and tend to the sick and injured. She would call it the "Sacrament of Duty." I think vocation in many ways can only be discovered in hindsight. Even if you fill a specific office, the vocation is not the office itself, but what the office makes possible for you in your specific circumstances. Francis didn't become poor to be poor, he became poor to find poverty. Juan of the Cross didn't follow the way of Nothing to be nothing, but to find everything. A priest does not serve an abstract flock, he serves Jim and Jane and José. Vocation is made for man, not man for vocation. I think the best icon of vocation is the donkey Christ rode into Jerusalem, who served absoluely no human purpose until the master had need of him. And then, in that single momentary vocation, he became more famous and honored than the high priest.

And it came to pass, when he was come nigh to Bethphage and Bethania, unto the mount called Olivet, he sent two of his disciples, Saying: Go into the town which is over against you, at your entering into which you shall find the colt of an ass tied, on which no man ever hath sitten: loose him, and bring him hither. And if any man shall ask you: Why do you loose him? you shall say thus unto him: Because the Lord hath need of his service. And they that were sent, went their way, and found the colt standing, as he had said unto them. And as they were loosing the colt, the owners thereof said to them: Why loose you the colt? But they said: Because the Lord hath need of him. And they brought him to Jesus. And casting their garments on the colt, they set Jesus thereon.

Luke 19:29-35