[As taught by Fr Iker]
Remember we have three human psychological levels in us:
- Physio-psychological level (such as the need to eat and drink)
- Psycho-sociological level (needs that can wait; such as eating with this person instead of another; more important to sacrifice a little; such as loving your parents and yet leaving for the love of answering God’s call)
- Rational or spiritual level (the highest level)
We have the Spirit of Christ in order to follow Christ. It is not having ice-cream everyday. It is not a laughing matter, not ‘hoo-hoo-ha-ha’, everyday.
It is a difficult matter.
We need to renounce, to give up certain things and yet feel satisfied and fulfilled.
A call comes from above, from God.
A call takes place in the life of the people. We are mindful of it.
A call is always towards the future where one is called to become, to take the vows and so it is on-going.
A call is also only the beginning. There is a tension always between the present and the future. The rich young man in the gospel could not bear to give it up.
Realising that it is a response, we know that there is a choice to make. You choose to renounce. You cannot eat and chew and swallow at the same time, so you cannot have everything. You need to select. You reduce what you really need; not everything can be taken.
There are both positive and negative aspects to the vows. Where chastity is concerned, you are free to move here, there and everywhere but you do not have a spouse. Well, Christ did not choose to be on the cross; he chose to do his Father’s will. His Father’s will is the cross and so he ends up there.
There is value and to renounce is seen as a positive aspect. Why? Consecration does not come from what you do but from what you are. I am a Christian by Baptism. I become a Christian. It is introduced in the sphere of the sacred, the sphere of God. It is like being taken by God. I am brought. This is done by God to God for the church, for mankind. It is never self-centred. It is never done for your own holiness. It is for the church.
A vow is a binding of oneself to something which is better for me than the opposite. I make a vow of chastity. I choose to be celibate. It is better for me than to be married. I see God’s invitation and I say ‘yes’. So we try to be subjectively free in making the vows. The vows are a free response to an invitation.
You spend two years in the novitiate to get you free to respond with the vows. It is consciously free. Why do I take the vows? I know the reasons. There is no pressure. It is free. The vows are apostolic. Even if I may take my vows in the Society of Jesus, and I am put in an office, surrounded by books, that still becomes apostolic, even if I do not have any apostolic actions. It is the same for someone getting into a coma for 15 years.
Vows are taken for the sake of the community, never as an end in themselves. They are means to an end. Besides, a vocation has different stages of development.
Here is an example given in a talk. 2008.
Fr Timothy Radcliff O.P. speaks of the loss of identity.
“Our crisis of identity has to be placed in the context of our own society, in which everyone is suffering from a crisis of identity. In our society, people seek identity through all sorts of things that may be good and fine, which are ultimately inadequate for the children of God: status, wealth, a career, and so on. What is unique about our identity is that our vows push us beyond such identities. We have no fixed identity except as those who are on the way to the Kingdom of God. What is special about our identity is that we leave behind the usual signs of identity. We are a naked sign of the human identity, which will only be disclosed in the Kingdom.
This has always been fundamental to religious life. The way of life of the monk and the contemplative nun speaks. Because they do not do anything, but just are there for God, then their existence is a provocative sign. The meaning of their life lies in pointing to God. If God does not exist then their life has no meaning. It is a powerful witness because of what it says of the hidden God. But the power of all religious life lies in how it speaks. Early this year I was at the General Chapter of the Franciscans, and so St Francis has been much on my mind. Francis was a man who spoke of God, through dramatic gestures.
As religious our visibility is first of all the powerful witness of lives that speak But we are entering a new world, that of the World Wide Web. In this new world, what principally circulate are signs and symbols, above all that symbol of everything and nothing which is money. The world of the industrial revolution is, perhaps, passing away. The main export of the USA today is so-called culture; films, icons, logos, signs. We live in what has been called ‘the symbol saturated society’. [5] Advertisers know that what we consume nowadays is not products so much as cultural signs. [6] This new world will move at the service of our sort of meaning, symbolic and sacramental meaning. Just as the Franciscans grabbed Giotto to transmit the meaning of Francis’ life, and the Dominicans had our homegrown Fra Angelico, so today the WWW offers a new way in which to be visible. We have largely lost the old visibility of before the Council, of big institutions with the names of our congregations splashed in ten foot high letters. We entered the anonymity of the post-Council year. Now a new visibility is possible in the www, which is that of meaning, of sign and sacrament. If we can find the right signs, then the world will hear the gospel.”
Witnessing Christ in Secular Life
“How, then, should we face this terrible conflict which divides the heart and soul of contemporary humanity? It becomes a challenge for the Christian: the challenge to bring about a new synthesis of the greatest possible allegiance to God and His will, and the greatest possible sharing in the joys and hopes, worries and sorrows of the world to direct them towards the plan of integral salvation which God the Father has shown us in Christ and continually makes available to us through the gift of the Holy Spirit.”
February 1, 1997 Joannes Paulus II
The following is also adapted from Blessed John Paul II’s message given on the 50th anniversary of Provida Mater Ecclesia‘
There is a false concept of secularity in which God has nothing to do with the building of humanity’s future. The relationship with Him is made out to be a private decision and a subjective question which at most can be tolerated as long as it does not claim to have any influence on culture or society.
How, then, should we face this terrible conflict which divides the heart and soul of contemporary humanity? It becomes a challenge for the Christian: the challenge to bring about a new synthesis of the greatest possible allegiance to God and His will, and the greatest possible sharing in the joys and hopes, worries and sorrows of the world to direct them towards the plan of integral salvation which God the Father has shown us in Christ and continually makes available to us through the gift of the Holy Spirit.
The members of secular institutes are committed precisely to this and express their full fidelity to the profession of the evangelical counsels in a form of secular life full of risks and often unforeseeable demands, but rich in a specific and original potential.
The humble yet daring bearers of the transforming power of God’s kingdom and the courageous, consistent witnesses to the task and mission of the evangelization of cultures and peoples, the members of secular institutes, in history, are the sign of a Church which is the friend of men and can offer them comfort in every kind of affliction, ready to support all true progress in human life but at the same time intransigent towards every choice of death, violence, deceit and injustice. For Christians they are also a sign, a reminder of their duty, on God’s behalf, to care for a creation which remains the object of its Creator’s love and satisfaction, although marked by the contradictions of rebellion and sin and in need of being freed from corruption and death.
Is it surprising that the environment with which they have to contend is often little inclined to understand and accept their witness?
The Church today looks to men and women who are capable of a renewed witness to the Gospel and its radical demands, amid the living conditions of the majority of human beings. Even the world, often without realizing it, wishes to meet the truth of the Gospel for humanity’s true and integral progress, according to God’s plan.
In such a condition, great determination and clear fidelity to the charism proper to their consecration is demanded of the members of secular institutes: that of bringing about the synthesis of faith and life, of the Gospel and human history, of total dedication to the glory of God and of unconditional willingness to serve the fullness of life of their brothers and sisters in this world.
Members of secular institutes are, by their vocation and mission, at the crossroads between God’s initiative and the longing creation: God’s initiative, which they bring the world through love and intimate union with Christ; the longing of creation, which they share in the everyday, secular condition of their fellow men and women, bearing the contradictions and hopes of every human being, especially the weakest and the suffering.
Secular institutes in any case are entrusted with responsibility of reminding everyone of this mission, witnessing to it by a special consecration in the radicalness of the evangelical counsels, so that the whole Christian community may carry out with ever greater commitment the task that God, in Christ, has entrusted to it with the gift of His Spirit.
The contemporary world appears particularly sensitive to the witness of those who can courageously assume the risk and responsibility of discerning the times and of the plan for building a new and more just humanity. Our time is one of great cultural and social upheaval.
February 1, 1997
Joannes Paulus II
Every vocation is a response to divine love. This is a message confirmed by our Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI.
“We are loved by God even ‘before’ we come into existence . . . Moved solely by his unconditional love, he created us ‘not … out of existing things,’ to bring us into full communion with Him.
“The profound truth of our existence is thus contained in this surprising mystery: every creature, and in particular every human person, is the fruit of God’s thought and an act of his love, a love that is boundless, faithful and everlasting. The discovery of this reality is what truly and profoundly changes our lives.”
“Every specific vocation is in fact born of the initiative of God . . . It is a gift of the Love of God! He is the One who takes the ‘first step,’ and not because he has found something good in us, but because of the presence of his own love ‘poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.’
“This divine love is the hidden impulse, the motivation which never fails, even in the most difficult circumstances.”
Awareness of her own personality and human individuality
- Capacity of being an autonomous woman, capable of maternity and of loving as a bride in relationships
- A love of the environment where one lives
- Capacity of keeping a dialogue and of listening, also with persons of the other sex
- Capacity of an objective, balanced and stable judgement
- Capacity of assuming responsibility
- Capacity of how to live affective solitude
- A conscience of one’s Christian identity
- A deepening of the value and the exigencies of Baptism
- A willing of the total gift to God in celibacy for the Kingdom, lived as a lay person
- Capacity of living the missionary aspect as a gift of life for the Church and the world
- An intuition of the marvellous dignity of the active and contemplative life
- Awareness that our life becomes a witness when it assumes the form of faith, hope and charity
- Awareness and acceptance of the significance of being Company
- Availability to let oneself accept to be helped by the responsible person and by the Company, maturing the sense of belonging
- Capacity of living the relationship with the sisters of the Company
- To edify and to keep the spirit of unity
- Commitment to live co-responsibility in the life of the Company
Means for formation:
- The writings of Saint Angela, the Constitutions, the literature of the Company
- Church documents for Secular Institutes
- Meetings at all levels: human, Christian, and vocational
- Dialogue and checking with the formation guide
- Elements of discernment for the period of initial formation
- Is there in her a sufficient balance of human and spiritual?
- Is she capable of controlling herself, of being mistress of herself and of objective judgement?
- Is she capable to guarantee for herself an existence in an autonomous way?
- Is she capable of running her proper goods with the availability of being checked?
- Is she available to change and to question herself?
- Is she available to nourish herself with the Word of God and Church documents?
- Has she begun a walk of personal prayer and does she participate in the Sacramental life?
- Is she capable of freedom and joy in the choice of living for the Lord in the interior of the Company?
- Is she available of living and sharing the charism, spirituality and mission proper of the Company?
- Has she begun to assume the writings and the Constitutions as a norm of life?
- Is she available?
- When you desire to give yourself to the Lord, be prepared for formation. A lifetime will not be enough to make one ready. We are daily being guided by the Holy Spirit.
- For a start, let us ask if we can attend to the following:• Availability to acquire a human-maturity • Knowledge, acceptance and self esteem • Acceptance of her own sexuality, orientated towards a plan of a gift • Awareness of her own proper feminine identity • Desire to know and to heal her own wounds, overcoming the difficulty of her own history • Capability to live autonomously to various levels and to manage well, solitude, avoiding isolation • Possessing the attitudes of assuming responsibility • Knowing how to live cordial relationships with others and “thinking positively” • Being available in the path of being accompanied and knowing how to question oneself in a sort of discussion • Knowing how to live the temporal reality intensely • Availability to acquire a Christian maturity • Enough Biblical and Doctrinal formation to accept the plan of life and to live it profoundly for Christ • A desire to live the Christian experience in the world (= missionary) • A conscience of living the radicality of the Gospel in the Church and for the Church • Availability of walking the road of faith with the Company and in a practical relationship with the person responsible • Availability to acquire a vocational maturity • Availability of letting oneself be accompanied by the person responsibly and by the Company • Awareness that the Company is a choice of a stable life which implies priority of commitment • A desire to offer a real contribution to the life of the Company • A commitment to search in the writings of Saint Angela and in the Constitutions the spirit of the vocation • A commitment to live the baptismal radicality in celibacy for the sake of the Kingdom • Capability in living as consecrated “lay” in every situation.N.B. Formation is a walk which requires long and gradual times. From the candidate, it is required enough availability for change.
The conditions and the result of the consecration… For the old ritual, one could ask to be incorporated that candidate who had been found devoted (totally given), humble, obedient, polite, of good example, persevering in prayers and observant of all that the Rule of the Company commands.
