Secular Institutes

Today, 25 November 2015, is the 480th anniversary of the foundation of the first Secular Institute - The Company of St Ursula by St Angela Merici. What is a Secular Institute as the Church now understands it?

There are two kinds of Secular Institutes: those whose mission is one of immersion in the world, to transform it from within. The members of these Institutes live a "hidden" life for they use neither title, nor distinctive dress, and in their professional life may exercise an element of reserve with respect to the Consecration that is the foundation of their life. Other Secular Institutes are more overt and may collaborate for a particular work.

As indicated in the previous post, the distinctions envisaged at the time of the New Code of Canon Law in the 1980s is no longer as clear cut. What we might see now are polarities that draw different Institutes - Religious and Secular - and it is this balancing of polarities that reveals the distinctive charism of each Institute. The following diagram is a preliminary simplistic way to begin to ponder these polarities (and the solid lines are no longer solid but very "fluid").

Institutes of Consecrated Life hold in tension the polarities of being drawn into a greater engagement with the temporal or secular world or being drawn apart from it; some are drawn more towards a contemplative life and others are drawn more towards a life of apostolic service. A further dimension is that of mission whereby for some institutes the engagement in mission is more characterised by dialogue at a pre-evangelization stage and proclamation by way of Gospel living. For other institutes mission is very much much about proclamation in multiple ways.

In our diagram above, those Institutes that have an overtly apostolic character, and so occupy the top part of our diagram, still need to balance the pull of withdrawal from the world and immersion in it. For some, their ministry is a mode of engagement with the world. The world is an "other" in the relationship. There is a sense therefore, that while engaged with the world, they are "apart" or "other". For some of these Institutes, the temporal sphere is a distraction to that which is core in their life. To varying degrees therefore, they will develop structures that protect a certain "apartness" in order to nurture and nourish the core relationship a the centre of their life. In the past such structures have included, but are not limited to, dress, insignia, title, common residence, common order of the day, These Insitutes possibly find themselves in the top right hand corner of the diagram above.

Institutes in the top left hand corner may see themselves as not quite so separate to the world, but rather as part of the world. They seek God in the temporal domain, rather than finding it a distraction and something from which they need to stand apart from. This does not mean that prayer is not an important and necessary part of their life. However, they find themselves more "a-part-of" rather than "apart-from" the world. They are freer in the work they undertake, but find identity/communion/cohesion in the work in which they collaborate specifically for the Gospel. With Secular Instiutes, this work may or may not define the whole of their lives. It may be additional to their ordinary employment.

In the lower right hand corner we might readily recognise those contemplative monastic institutes for whom monastic enclosure is intrinsic to their way of life, with their ministry being that of prayer, not merely nurturing their own relationship to Christ but praying with the Church with and for the world and its needs.

Finally, in the lower left hand corner of this diagram we find perhaps Secular Institutes of immersion. Members of these Institutes have no identifying title, insignia, place of residence, work in which they collaborate. The work they do may not even be specifically "church related" in a public sense. Drawn into the temporal or secular domain as the entire locus of their life, they live in constant discernment of the traces of God in our world, ever seeking to nurture that which is of the Spirit and challenge that which is not of the spirit. They constantly endeavour to live the Gospel in every facet of what they do and say. They are perpetually on mission. But this is not possible unless they also are deeply contemplative and committed to their own life of prayer. They try to live as yeast, to be salt and light for the world.

Consecrated Life - Forms other than "Religious"

The 1980's

Following Vatican II, the Code of Canon Law was revised to incorporate and reflect the teaching of Vatican II, and other changes that occurred over time. The New Revised Code of Canon Law was published in 1983. Significantly, to reflect the teaching of Vatican II, it situated the section on those living consecrated life within the broader chapter on the People of God - Part III of Book II. The title of this section is "Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life." The following table simplistically captures the known forms of Consecrated Life at that time as reflected in this section.

	“In” the world	“Apart” from the world
Alone	Consecrated Virgins	Hermits
Group	Secular Institutes	Religious Institutes
And Societies of Apostolic Life

Since the 1980's these distinctions are no longer as clear cut. Now there are simply "Institutes of Consecrated Life", for example Verbum Dei, with no designation of religious or secular. And there are also consecrated members of some ecclesial movements. Some Religious Institutes have evolved to appear more like a Secular Institute and some Secular Institutes appear as quasi-Religious. However, in 1983, in the Code as we have it from then, common to all the above forms is:
(a) Consecration to Christ that engages the totality of one's being, i.e. celibacy for the sake of the kingdom;
(b) This expressed by a sacred bond - vow, promise or firm intention;
(c) Such bond is officially recognised by the Church via the Bishop or Institute who receive the sacred bond in the name of the Church;
(d) And this bond establishes a relationship of authority and mutual responsibility between the person professing it and the one (Bishop or Institute) receiving it.
(e) A conscious endeavour to live ever more fully the evangelical counsels.

Such "Consecrated Life" is public or official. Without this public character and authoritative relationship, one's commitment to follow Christ celibately for the sake of the kingdom, may be just as whole hearted and real, but is deemed "private".

Perhaps here also lies an element in the rightful place of Ecclesial Movements in the Code of Canon Law. These movements have developed significantly since the 1980's and many find that the current Revised Code of Canon Law of 1983 does not adequately represent them. However, this is a further discussion beyond my competence, because as I see it, it also pertains in part to the structuring principle within Canon Law - is it charism or consecrated celibacy? Developments since the 1980's suggest a need for some consideration of Ecclesial Movements, and in particular of their consecrated members. 

What the simplistic outline of the 1980's categorisation does highlight is the complexity of discernment as one finds oneself being drawn more and more towards the exclusivity of one's love being consumed wholly by Christ and the service of the Gospel, i.e his kingdom. For there are associated questions of immersion or withdrawal from secular life, of travelling alone or with others in an institutional framework. 

The Year of Consecrated Life - "Wake up the world"

Pope Francis has declared 2015 as the Year of Consecrated Life, commencing on the first Sunday of Advent in 2014 and concluding February 2016. The theme for the year is "Wake up the world". How is this to be understood? No doubt many are unaware of this year or its theme. For while consecrated men and women may themselves have used the year as an occasion for renewal and may have personally participated in particular events to mark the year, "wake up the world" may not seem to have noticeably translated into more intense activity, heightened public profile or more public prophetic comment on and advocacy in issues of justice. It may appear to have been largely celebrated amongst themselves for "Wake up" is often suggestive of some loud or heightened activity. Also implied is that the world is asleep. However, there are other images that "wake up" and "sleep" can suggest if we turn to Scripture.

Jesus says of Lazarus "Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him" (Jn.11:11), of Jairus's daughter "Do not weep; for she is not dead but sleeping" (Lik8:52) and of course we read the quotation in Eph.5:14 "Sleeper, awake! Rise from the dead, and Christ will shine in you." In these instances, Jesus recognized life in what others saw as death, life that needed to be stirred into wakefulness by a gentle taking of the hand or a calling forth and then being assisted by others to feed, nourish, unbind, and a return to one's primary community of belonging - family. This is the hope of the Kingdom and our world is in need of hope.

In this vein then, we may ask: Where does our world appear to be dead? Where does it sleep in hopelessness? Where has belonging and communion been broken? What is the gentle hand needed to stir it from its sleep and to restore hope? How is it to be called forth and unbound? To "Wake up the world" is also an invitation to reflect on our world, where it sleeps, or where it appears to have died, and to discern how to gently stir it, call it forth and renew its hope. It may well appear an unobserved work. It is an invitation to embrace the world ever more deeply with the love of Christ. It has a profound depth.

Consecrated Life

SO WHAT IS CONSECRATED LIFE?

           It is “Firstly, the total donation of your life as the response to a personal and vital encounter with the love of God. You have discovered God is everything for you; you have decided to give everything to God.”[1] Or Sandra Schneiders, speaking of Religious Life, but equally applicable to all forms of Consecrated Life, puts it this way:

For some people their experience of the universal Christian vocation to the love of Christ has the unusual character of seeming to call them to an exclusivity in that relationship which makes other primary life commitments (e.g., to spouse or family or life work) not viable for them. The call to consecrated celibacy, that is, to giving themselves to Jesus in an exclusive and permanent union that expresses itself in nonmarriage to anyone else is at the heart of Religious Life.[2]

If one truly understands this fundamental ground of Consecrated Life, one will never ask “why such consecrated people can’t be married”. Non-marriage is not an imposed rule but rather a primary response of love that is determinative of this vocation.

This underpinning irresistible drawing to Christ and all that Christ loves is the ground of consecrated celibacy and distinguishes it from that celibacy that may be taken up as mandated by some authority, an imposed condition or undertaken for motives other than “religious motivation”.[3]  It is not simply part of the package of consecrated life. It is an invitation to a way of loving that is other than, different to, the way of loving to which the majority of baptized Christians are called to embrace. It is not a better, higher, nor more perfect way. It is expressed in non-marriage for the overarching alterity experienced is a total inclusivity of all that God loves, and it is thereby determinative of the entire configuration of one’s life. To be attracted to love in this way is real, possible and still experienced. It is a path to full maturity in Christ for those so called, exemplified first and foremost by Mary, “the sublime example of perfect consecration.”[4]

The call to a total gift of oneself, a gift accepted and responded to in the formal liturgical act of “profession”, a call and total gift of one self as a response of and in love to the person of Christ and “for the sake of the Kingdom”, the attraction of which can only be expressed and lived in the configuration of one’s life to a celibate life for the sake of the Kingdom in communion with others likewise called, such a call is not that of all the baptized.  The formal liturgical act of professing such a call and acceptance, together with the Church’s blessing and invoking of the Holy Spirit,[5] is deemed a “further consecration”, for the call and response in this vocation are gifts of the Holy Spirit. A shift in language from “profession of vows” to “consecration” acknowledges that the vocation of “a total gift of oneself” that configures one’s decisions and life choices differently to the majority, is not much the choice and action of the person, but rather the call and gift of the Holy Spirit.

But let us not confuse a “total gift of oneself” with a whole-hearted response, for it does not necessarily imply that the consecrated person will be more “whole hearted” nor more committed to Christ. For if we are to acknowledge the universal call to holiness of all the baptized and that every vocation is a path to perfect love in Christ, then married and single people are called to give no less of their life to God. They also make a “total gift of their life to God” through their particular vocation. So what is intended by this phrasing in relation to consecrated life is that the “total gift of oneself to God” engages the “totality of one’s being” through the embracing of celibacy for the sake of the Kingdom. And so, like any vocation there may be moments when one is less than whole-hearted in how they are living their Christian baptism, but every aspect of one’s being is engaged in one’s response, even if sometimes in moments of human weakness it is found lacking a degree of whole-heartedness.

As a response to a vital all-consuming encounter with the love of God in Christ, consecrated life as a response of love is therefore at its core relational. It is about who one is and how one is called to grow in love. It is a way of loving through which one grows to full maturity in Christ, can be seen as an affirmative rather than a renunciative reality. Choice by its very nature is both affirmative and renunciative. Where one good is chosen rather than another the norm is to speak in terms of that which is chosen, that which is affirmed, rather than that which is not selected. Marriage is not spoken of in terms of renunciation of those one chooses not to marry. Rather, marriage is portrayed affirmatively as commitment in love to one person. Likewise, celibacy for the sake of the kingdom is not so much a renunciation of marriage and family but rather a positive acceptance of an invitation to a particular way of growing in love, a commitment to Christ “in an exclusive and permanent union”, just as marriage is a commitment to one’s spouse “in an exclusive and permanent union”.  Just as monogamy symbolizes faithful commitment to one’s spouse, so religiously motivated non-marriage is a symbol of one’s total self-gift to God in response to an invitation of Love to grow in love in this particular way. As in all relationships of love, one grows to love all that the other loves. Thus the Consecrated person is called to embrace all humanity and creation with the love of Christ.

In such giving of their heart and entire being to God, the Consecrated person signifies with their life the ultimate call to union of all humanity with God and the union of Christ with his followers who believe in Him. This personal vocation is not unique to such consecrated people, for it is the vocation of all the baptized, but it is that aspect of our common consecration that comes to the foreground in Consecrated life. For Balthasar, such celibacy was not just a eschatological sign but the eschatological sign, for while the Old Covenant valued sexuality as a sign of theological hope for the Messiah, the New Covenant “transvalues” this.[6] It is an invitation into Trinitarian union for it is a call to enter that union that exists within God, allowing the future fullness of that union to enter into the present, to live in the present the eschatological reality to which all humanity is invited. It is also an invitation to live now humanity’s response of a return of that fullness of love first given by God.

WHAT ABOUT SERVICE, MINISTRY, COMMUNITY? DON’T THESE DEFINE CONSECRATED LIFE?

Consecrated life finds expression through service or ministry be that a personal, collaborative or institutional work/service or an evangelising dialogue and proclamation of the Gospel in other activities or professional engagement. Those called to Consecrated life, are not necessarily called to “community”, for example, hermits and consecrated virgins. Even community has many configurations and lived reality ranging from monastic communities sharing a common residence and order of the day, to secular institutes whose members reside alone but gather for periodic meetings and are bound together by their common calling, by that which grounds and gives meaning to their life. There are many and varied forms in which Consecrated life may be expressed and lived.

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[1] Benedict XVI “Secularity speaks to Consecration” addressed to Ms Ewa Kusz, president of the Executive Council, sent through the Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Cardinale Bertone 18 July 2012. http://www.cmis-int.org/en/documents-2/magisterium-of-the-church/benedict-xvi/ Accessed 18 October 2015.

[2] Sandra M. Schneiders, I.H.M., Religious Life in a New Millenium. Volume Two. Selling All (New Yor/Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, 2001), 10.

[3] Schneiders, Religious Life in a New Millenium. Volume Two. Selling All, 117.

[4] John Paul II, Apostolic Exhortation. Vita Consecrata 28.

[5] John Paul II, Apostolic Exhortation. Vita Consecrata 19, 30.

[6] Balthasar, Hans Urs von, Explorations in Theology IV: Spirit and Institution translated by Edward T. Oakes, S.J. (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1995), 392. Original Pneuma und Theologie IV (Einsiedeln: Johannes Verlag, 1974).

All Vocations

All Vocations in Service of One Another

The best vocation is that which is the "right fit" for you.  No one vocation is better than another. Consecrated Life can no longer be seen as a better or higher vocation, as doing or being "more" or "better" for God. The fullness of God's love can never be totally encapsulated or imaged in any one particular vocation. The variety of vocations gives witness to the differentiating unity of the Holy Spirit.

A universal call to holiness was strongly asserted by Vatican II  and taken up keenly since Vatican II. The uniqueness of Consecrated Life is not therefore a "more perfect" life. Vatican II affirmed the universal call to perfect holiness of all Christians, whatever their state or condition (Lumen Gentium 11), with following of Christ, whose life was poor, chaste and obedient, being the foundation of perfect love (Perfectae Caritatis 1). Indeed,  Rincón-Pérez notes that “the Council, as emerged from the development of chapters V and VI of Lumen gentium, deliberately suppressed the term “state of perfection” to avoid making any suggestion that Christian perfection is a monopoly reserved to a canonical state.”(1) All Christians are called to live a life that is chaste, obedient to God and the Church, and reasonably detached from material possessions appropriate to their state.(2) In so doing, all Christians are called to the perfection of love in accordance with the fit of their proper vocation(3) for diversity of gifts is the work of the Holy Spirit. 

Each state in the Church, while having a specificity of its own, also includes the others. Each state is in its self-giving to God (the “Non-Other”: Non-Aliud) and to the other in the Church and in the world. Thanks to this self-giving, the one, Catholic Church lives in the wonder of divine Love.(4)

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(1) Tomás Rincón-Pérez, “Introduction to PARS III De institutis vitae consecratae et de societatibus vitae apostolicae” in E. Caparros et al., Exegetical Commentary on the Code of Canon Law: Book Ii: The People of God (Canons 460 - 746). Vol. 2,2 (Midwest Theological Forum, 2004). 1455.

(2) John Paul II, Apostolic Exhortation. Vita Consecrata 30.

(3) John Paul II, Apostolic Exhortation. Vita Consecrata 31.

(4)  Juan M. Sara, “Secular Institutes According to Hans Urs von Balthasar,” Communio: International Catholic Review 29, Summer (2002), 311.

ABOUT THIS BLOG SITE

Vocations - everyone has one. All of us are drawn towards some career, occupation or role that is a "good fit" for us. But for Christians, our baptism in Christ also "calls" us to grow in Christian love, to grow in Christ. So there is a further vocational discernment other that what we "do" in life. That further vocational discernment concerns who we "are", and, how and what life pattern of relationships will lead us to grow and be in Christ. What is the "right fit" in this respect? Single life? Consecrated life? Married life? Ordained ministry?

This site has a particular interest in Consecrated Life and especially those forms of Consecrated Life other than Religious Life.