Suchergebnisse

Issue 60.6 of the Review for Religious, 2001. ; ° R-eview for Re!igio~s b~lps people re~pon~ and befaithful to.God's, universal ~ail to holiness' ' " by making; available tO them the sl~irituai legades - " tb~t flow-~om the, charisms of Catbolicconsecrated life~ Review for Religious (ISSN 0034-639X) is published bimonthly at Saint Louis University by the Jesuits of the Missouri Province. Editorial Office: 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, Missouri 63108-3393 Telephone: 314-977-7363 ° Fax: 314-977-7362 E-Mail: review@slu.edu ° Web site: www.reviewforreligious.org Manuscripts, books for review, and correspondence with the editor: Review for Religious ¯ 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, MO 63108-3393 Correspondence about the Canonical Counsel department: Elizabeth McDonough OP Mount St. Mary's Seminary; Emmitsburg, Maryland 21727 POSTMASTER Send address chafiges to Review for Religious ¯ P.O. Box 6070 ¯ Duluth, MN 55806. Periodical postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri, and additional mailing offices. See inside back cover for information on subscription rates. ©2001 Review for Religious Permission is herewith granted to copy any material (articles, poems, reviews) contained in this issue of Review for Religious for personal or internal use, or for the pers6nal or internal use of specific library clients within the limits outlined in Sections 107 and/or 108 of the United States Copyright Law. All copies made under this permission must bear notice of the source, date, and copyright owner on the first page. This permission is NOT extended to copying for commercial distribu-tion, advertising, institutional promotion, or for the creation of new collective works or anthologies. Such permission will only be considered on written application to the Editor, Review for Religious. vi,ew for religious LIVING OUR CATHOLIC LEGACIES Editor Associate Editors Canonical Counsel Editor Editorial Staff Advisory Board David L. Fleming SJ Clare Boehmer ASC Philip C. Fischer SJ Elizabeth McDonough OP Mary Ann Foppe TracT Gramm Judy Sharp James and Joan Felling Adrian Gaudin SC Sr. Raymond Marie Gerard FSP Eugene Hensell OSB Bishop Carlos A. Sevilla SJ Ernest E. Larkin OCarm Miriam D. Ukeritis CSJ NOVEMBER DECEMBER 2001 VOLUME 60 NUMBER 6 contents 566 a wider mission The Interreligious World: A Nun's Experience There Mary C. Boys SNJM probes aspects of religious life in light of the Catholic-Jewish relationship and provides a testimony that emboldens her continued commitment to this lifeform. 581 'Unsuspected Mission A. Paul Dominic SJ identifies the mission of spiritual conversation as the basic apostolic work of Jesus and of all who are his followers. 594 spiritual directions On the Seventh Day God Rested Marie Beha OSC suggests ways of understanding and making more creative use of Sabbaths in our life. 602 Where Your Heart Is Donald Macdonald SMM sees in Jesus' journey to Jerusalem (in Luke) an ardor and constancy that our bonding with him through Sc~ipture's strong and burning words can accomplish also in us. Review for Religious evaluations 614 628 Criteria for Change: Women's Ministering to the Body of Christ Marie Brinkman SCL looks at the lives lived by sisters in the past as the foundation that must validate today's discernment criteria for the needed changes. Missionary or Mercenary Patrick Sean Moffett CFC offers a perspective on changes in membership, changes in collaboration, and changes in corporate commitment in order to stimulate discussion on community apostolates. 640 647 divine initiatives What Only God Can Make Ann Marie Paul SCC imaginatively ponders religious community pictured as a tree, with the trunk representing chastity, the branches poverty, and the leaves obedience. God's Will: Where Desires Commingle Denis Donoghue SJ ruminates on the seeking out of God's will and illustrates some principles of discernment in a personal'example. departments . 564 Prisms 655 Canonical Counsel: Readmission to a Religious Institute 661 Book Reviews 667 Indexes to Volume 60 November-Dece~nber 2001 prisms All of us have to be born and have to die. These "have to's" sound like some activity we must do, when both are rather something that happens to us. "Being born" and "being dying" are the leveling events that bookend all human life. What fills the space in between seems to spell out nothing but all the hills and valleys, rolling vineyards and desert wastelands, that represent the inequalities of human living. Some people are born into wealth, and they will never know want. Others are only fortunate enough at birth to have a mother healthy enough to give them mother's milk, but they will go through life malnour-ished and disease-prone. Some are born highly gifted and fail ever to develop their talents. Others struggle through life with a minimum of human endowments, but successfully act with a perennial zest. Some will spend their life in steel and glass skyscrapers, and others will know only the simplest of grass or plywood huts. Some will travel the world; others will know only their village. Except for "being born" and "being dying," we human beings seem to spend lifetimes of greatly unequal value. There seems to be no level playing field for all people to encounter each other on. God engages the inequalities of human life in the incarnation and birth of his Son. In the familiar hymn quoted in St. Paul's letter to the Philippians, our atti-tude must be "that of Christ: Though he was in the form of God, he did not deem equality with God something to be grasped at. Rather, he emptied himself and took the form of a slave, being born in the likeness of men. He was known to be of human estate, and it was thus that he humbled himself, obediendy accepting even death, death on a cross" (Ph 2: 5-9). Paul reflects that God takes on a true inequality. In becoming human, Christ goes from the fullness of divin- Review for Religious i'ty to the emptiness of humanity. Theologically, humanity is empty because everything that each of us has is gift, as Jesus reminds us in saying that all his words and his works are not his, but come from the Father. So in faith we know an inequality that is real between God and the human. But, then, in God's becoming human in Jesus, we come to know God's definitive action in breaking down all the appearances of inequality that divide us humans. Jesus entered into the leveling experience of all humans by "being born" and by "being dying." Through all the in-between time, he lived his life as an example and .taught by word and para-ble that the leveling process permeated the whole of human living. While friendly with rich and poor alike, with learned and unlearned, Jesus seems to violate our sense of leveling by his iden-tifying with the poor, with servants and slaves, with the marginal-ized. He reaches out to them in his care; he tells stories about them for our instruction. Jesus asks us to be like him--one who serves. In the Last Supper washing of the feet, Jesus stresses that he has given us an example. Jesus transfigures the language and meaning of slavery, ser-vice, and ministry. All these words now describe valued human interaction from a divine perspective. We all are meant to be helpers--in Scripture, sometimes called slaves, sometimes servants, sometimes minis-ters-- to one another in life. Helpers and those being helped are on the same level. One is not superior as a human being in either being the helper or minister or being the one being helped or ministered to. Jesus gave us an unforgettable image by answering "Who is my neighbor?" with the parable of the Good Samaritan. Th~ second half of the one commandment stresses that we love our neighbor as ourselves. Our love goes out to whomever, persons always on a level no different from ourselves. We neither reach down in helping nor reach up; we only reach across. By entering into our human level, God broke through all the specious levels that seem to divide humankind. By our entering into the divine experience of Jesus, we see and act as sons and daughters of a heav-enly Father. Every Christmas, we challenge ourselves anew about the Christian leveling of human life. By our faith we live life on the same level--the level has been forever divinely clarified because of the birth of Jesus. David L. Fleming SJ November-December 2001 a wider mission MARY C. BOYS The Interreligious World: A Nun's Experience There A great value of ecumenical and interreligious exchange is that it sheds light on one's own tradition. Seeing oneself through the eyes of others expands one's reflections, provokes absorbing questions, and clarifies values and modes of thought. While my roots in the religiously variegated Pacific Northwest mean I have long been in Protestant company, and my interest in Judaism dates back to my college years, it was only upon moving to New York City seven years ago that I staked my tent on ecumenical and inte~religious terrain. Teaching at the historically Protestant Union Theological Seminary and working in Christian-Jewish dialogue beyond Union's quadrangle afford new understandings not only of the religiously "other," but of Catholicism as well. And, by providing a flesh viewpoint on religious life, my situation exercises a profound personal effect) SandraSchneiders has observed that women religious seem able to work beyond the boundaries of Christianity while remaining deeply affiliated with it; we Mary C. Boys SNJM is the Skinner and McAlpin Professor of Practical Theology at Union Theological Seminary in New York City and the author of Has God Only One Blessing? Judaism as a Source of Christian Self-Understanding. Her address is Union Theological Seminary; 3041 Broadway; New York, N.Y. 10027. Review for Religious "are at once very deeply involved in institutional Catholicism and often widely and deeply involved in the experiences of spirituality beyond its denominational boundaries.''2 Yet, in exploring the topic of religious life and interreligious dialogue, she turns her gaze more to the East, to dialogue among monastics. By exploring the implications of interaction with Jews and Judaism, I hope to highlight a distinctive interreligious conversation that Schneiders touches on only tangentially, and thereby to add another layer to, and engage in occasional argument with, her outstanding scholarly study. Probing religious life, a topic on which I have never published, in light of the Catholic-Jewish relationship, on which I have published, challenges me to hold together two vital parts of my life. This essay, then, revolving around four "scenes," is deeply per-sonal, but I hope not solipsistic, for I intend it as a stimulus for conversation. I. London, June 2000, a Catholic-Jewish conference on "The Theology of Partnership." This conference involved participants principally from the United Kingdom and the United States, along with a few European and Israeli scholars and a Vatican delegation. Although the large number of participants hindered the flow of discussion, our exchange was for the most part candid and stimulating. In the latter part of the conference, one of the Catholics, a priest, launched into a romanticized mini-sermon about Mary as virgin and mother. Its traditionalist theology and tangential relation to the point under discussion elicited considerable skepticism, if one might judge by the body language of rolled eyes and heads held in hands. Many sought recognition by the chair to respond (including all the Catholic women), but I have less recollection of the rejoinders than I do of the comment by the woman next to me. A Reform rabbi from the United Kingdom, she wrote furiously on her notepad: "Mary. Virgin. Why don't they talk about real women?" Liminal. Marginal. Such terms, used by Schneiders (among others) to describe religious life strike a chord. Insofar as this lifeform has a prophetic character rather than a hierarchical status, religious life is indeed lived on the "thresholds where realities meet, dash, and merge.''3 Nonetheless, such terms are sometimes far too academic to describe moments of feeling just how odd and anomalous we religious are. While on one level I suspect I November-December 2001 Boy~ * The lnterreli¢ous Worm To be with Jews as a member of a religious congregation is to experience our liminality, our oddness, on a regular basis. understand what my table companion was objecting to, the starkness of her opposition of "virgin" and "real women" hit hard. In reflecting later, I realize I never use terminology about virginity to describe celibacy; not only does it connote a naive innocence, but it speaks only to the dimension of abstention from genital sexual intimacy. Without question, this self-chosen abstention---or, better, an abstention that is part of our being called to a distinctive way of life--has its ascetic aspects. Nevertheless, the term virginity seems to suggest that we have repressed our sexuality, thereby ceasing to be "real" women. Whether or not the Jungian-grounded theory of the "virgin archetype" or a similar perspective can overcome the cultural stereotypes of virginity is a real question, but this dimension of Finding the Treasure offers a compelling description of the inner autonomy celibacy can offer. In the halls of Union, being a nun (in the imprecise use of the term) is sometimes seen as a "weird" way of life. Yet consecrated celibacy is not unknown in Protestantism. Students of Hinduism and Buddhism, moreover, know about celibacy in those traditions. It, is, however, completely uncharacteristic of rabbinic Judaism, which places intense emphasis on family life and home-based ritual.4 So to be with Jews as a member of a religious congregation is to experience our liminality, our oddness, on a regular basis. While this experience can be jarring, as it was at that conference June 2000, in general it has increased my sensitivity to the peculiarities of religious life, a sensitivity that can be dulled by remaining in the more homogeneous company of one's religious congregation.5 At the same time, it makes the God question more prominent. Jews typically are more reticent in speaking about God, a healthy corrective to the overfamiliarity with which many Christians ~peak about the Holy One.6 The presence, however, of persons for whom the "God quest" is the principal explanation for their liminal way of life raises questions, at least implicitly, about the divine-human relationship. Perhaps, to balance the incident with which I began this section, I should report that recently, at the conclusion of a Review for Religious weekend spent as a scholar-in-residence at a synagogue, an elderly man came up to thank me. His eyes welling with tears, he said, "You answered God's call many years ago, and now you are able to be among us." II. November 2000, a gathering of Holocaust survivors in the New York metropolitan area. While giving a series of lectures in a Catholic parish on New York's East Side the previous September, I met Lewis Weinstein, a businessman who had just published a novel on the Spanish Inquisition, The Heretic. A few weeks later he phoned to ask if I would share the podium with him at an event sponsored by the New York area Holocaust survivors. They had invited him to speak about his book, and he in turn thought it would be good if I would speak about developments in the Catholic Church's relations with Jews. His historical novel portrays a grim time. The Inquisition bears witness to the ways in which the legacy of anti-Judaism became a justification for greed and intolerance and persecution. His selections mirrored the bleakness. For example, one of the principal characters, Friar Ricardo Perez, copies texts from the New Testament and early church writers such as Chrysostom in order to justify his hatred of Jews. Lew's final excerpt was from John Chrysostom, whose vitriol toward Jews is well known: "These Jews are gathering choruses of effeminates and a great rubbish heap of harlots. Their synagogues are brothels and theaters, dens of robbers and lodgings for wild beasts. Jews know but one thing: to fill their bellies and be drunk. Their condition is no better than that of pigs and goats. Refusing to accept Christ, they have made themselves fit for s!aughter. The synagogue is a dwelling of demons, and the Jews who pray there themselves are demons. If the Jews are acting against God, must they not be serving demons? For they did sacrifice their sons and daughters to demons. Jewish mother~ ate their own children, and the hands of Jewish women boiled their own children. Their synagogues are fortresses of the devil, and the pit of all perdition. The devil is a murderer, and the Jew demons who serve him are murderers, tOO.''7 The air hung heavy in the room. Then the chair introduced me in her heavily accented English. "Mr. Weinstein wanted this Sister Mary to come. I'm not sure why. I did not have such a good experience of nuns in Poland. Anyway, here's Sister Mary Boys." " "Oy ray," I thought on the way to the podium. "How did I get myself into this one--and what now?" November-December 2001 Boys ¯ The Interreligious Worm There was enormous anger in that room, much of it directed at the Catholic Church, which I represented to them. Their anger was not simply the church's failure to live the gospel during the Shoah (Holocaust), but also their experience as children. These were men and women who had been taunted, even beaten, as "Christ-killers," who feared--with good reason--walking by a church, who were terrified to go out in the streets on "Good" Friday. I had with me the 1997 "Declaration of Repentance" by the French bishops. Its words came to life before my eyes: In the judgment of historians, it is a well-proven fact that for centuries, up until Vatican Council II, an anti-Jewish traditibn stamped its mark in differing ways on Christian doctrine and teaching, in theology, apologetics, preaching, and in the liturgy. It was on such ground that the venomous plant of hatred for the Jews was able to flourish. Hence the heavy inheritance we still bear in our century, with all its consequences which are so difficult to wipe out. Hence our still open wounds? To work as a Catholic with Jews is to witness many "open wounds," wounds from the "heavy inheritance" of our own tradition. For this reason, the Catholic-Jewish encounter is sui generis in the interreligious sphere, a point Schneiders overlooks in saying that the interreligious encounter differs "in virtually every way from the ecumenical one. It involves an encounter not between separated siblings, but between virtually total strangers.''9 We Catholics and Jews are indeed separated siblings, and that separation has been bitter, violent, and tragic. We are not strangers; we have been enemies--and to work for reconciliation is an obligation of justice. It is difficult enough for us as Catholic women to deal with church structures that mute our voices. It is even more disillusioning to study the long history of Christian contempt for Jews, the tradition of adversus Judaeos: how rivalry hardened into contempt, and contempt fostered disputation, and disputation developed into demonization, and demonization fertilized this "venomous plant of h~tred for the Jews." Like all of history's stories, the church's relationship with Jews and Judaism is a complicated tale--with significant contextual factors in every age, occasions of amity and respect and of prophets with a different vision. Nonetheless, it is largely a story of moral blindness, imperialism, and violence. While I am not personally complicit, it is Revie~v for Religious a story of which I am deeply ashamed--and one that demands I examine my complicity in other betrayals of the gospel. I am grateful for the privilege, difficult though it is, of facing those whom our history has hurt. Meeting survivors and knowing children of survivors (and, for that matter, knowing any Jews at all, for who among them has not been touched in some way by the Shoah?) means not only reading this history with deepened sensitivity, but also being emboldened to act differendy so that "the spoiled seeds of anti-Semitism should never again take root in the human heart."1° Nevertheless, confronting this history causes anguish and compounds my problems as a feminist with the institutional church. The "open wound" of which the French bishops spoke festers even as I struggle with my Catholic identity in a church that treats women as second-class citizens. I live, too, with the irony that the official church seems more committed to dialogue with Jews than with their own women. The confrontation with history, moreover, triggers another crisis, a dark night of the soul. If "the most acutely painful point of intersection between the postmodern sensibility and religious faith is the God-image,'' 11 then the Shoah is the starkest event in this intersection. It brings one face-to-face with the "abusing God," requiring us to ponder unbearable questions about the One to whom we pray22 As grateful as I am for all I have learned (and continue to learn) about prayer from my sisters, we seem reluctant to address these searing questions in our common prayer. Indeed, I cannot recall any occasion in which the Shoah and its challenges to our understanding of God have been raised to the conscious level in the communal prayer of my own congregation, the Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary. This leads me to wonder whether any congregation, with the exception of the Sisters of Sion, confronts "God issues" that swirl around the Shoah23 The way that many Jews, especially in this post-Holocaust period, address God in a challenging manner has much to teach us. Elie Wiesel says that those who stand within the covenant have the To work as a Catholic with Jews is to witness many "open wounds," wounds from the "heavy inheritance" of our own tradition. Nbvember-December 2001 Boys * The Interreh~ious Worm right to say anything to God--even blasphemy.~4 In the concluding section of his profound meditation on God and abuse (including the Shoah, but also sexual abuse), David Blumenthal composes darifig prayers for use in Jewish liturgical services. He cautions that prayers of this type require preparation: One must have a deep commitment to God, a deep desire to want to be with God, to want to have a relationship with God. It must be important, indeed a matter of spiritual life and death, to be able to address God. One must have, too, deep and abiding faith in the covenant, in our ability to address God no matter what the circumstances and no matter how severe our prayer may be; and in God's desire to hear us and to help us address God. One must also have a sense of proportion about our relationship to God. We are creatures, not Creator. We are innocent, as victims of abuse; but we are sinners, in many other matters. We are accusers, yet we are children. This creates a tension in our images of ourselves, of God, and of the proper relationship between us; yet we must live, think, and pray within this tension.~s Facing the history of our relationship with Jews and learning Jewish ways of addressing God have provided depth and texture to my own prayer. I~I. Friday nights: a guest at the dinner table for Sbabbat. Passover: a guest at the Seder. I feel deeply privileged to join jewish friends for Shabbat or for the Seder. I have learned more than I can say from the lively conversations and observing the ways in which they su'ive to lead lives of integrity in fidelity to Torah. Without idealizing the tradition, I find much cause for "holy envy": its depth of prayer mirrored in the Siddur and in the cycle of festivals, the intellectual vitality (especially the value placed on study), the prizing of family, and home-based religious practices. My relationships leave me no doubt that Judaism fosters a holy way of life and that the ways of Torah are salvific for those committed to walking in its ways. The privilege accorded me in coming to know the power of another religious tradition finds little reflection in the recent Vatican declaration Dominus Iesus (D1).16 My experience provides a different vantage point from which to view other religious traditions. Even as DI recognizes that the dialogue between Christianity and other religions raises new questions that should be "addressed through pursuing new paths of research, advancing proposals, and Review for Religious suggesting ways of acting that call for attentive discernment" (§3), it reiterates traditional formulations of faith in arguing against pluralism. It condemns the mentality of indifferentism "characterized by a religious relativism which leads to the belief that 'one religion is as good as another'" (§22). The declaration refutes those who regard the Catholic Church as merely "one way of salvation alongside those constituted by the other religions" (§21). Rather, "Jesus Christ is the mediator and universal redeemer" (§11). Further, "one can and must say that Jesus Christ has a significance and a value for the human race and its history which are unique and singular, proper to him alone, exclusive, universal, and absolute. Jesus is, in fact, the Word of God made man for the salvation of all" (§15). According to the Congre-gation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), one may still speak of equality in interreligious dialogue, but only in reference to the "equal personal dignity of the parties in dialogue, not to doctrinal content nor even less to the position of Jesus Christ . Thus, the certainty of the universal salvific will of God does not diminish but rather increases the duty and urgency of the proclamation of salvation and of conversion to the Lord Jesus Christ" (§22). Without entering into detailed theological analysis of Dominus Iesus, I simply want to call attention here to one of its primary deficiencies. The declaration has no sense of the relational, no feel for human interchange. Other religions are an abstraction, a category, an it. DI pays no attention to these religions as they exist in the lives of real people; it shows no sensitivity to the "thick" texture of other traditions. The writers, rather, claim objectivity: "Objectively speaking, they [other religions] are in a gravely deficient situation." Such a judgment ignores theologies of pluralism that allow one to privilege his or her own convictions while taking account of the reasonability of others' beliefs.~7 In judging dialogue from a position of omniscience, the declaration bears no indication of what we might learn from the religious other. Facing the history of our relationship with Jews and learning Jewish ways of addressing God have provided depth and texture to my own prayer. Noventber-December 2001 Boys ¯ The Into'religious Worm On the explicit level, DI says little about the church's relationship with Judaism.~ DI refers to Jews just once (§13): "The first Christians encountered the Jewish people, showing them the fulfillment of salvation that went beyond the Law," thus implicitly porraying Judaism as legalistic. DI then falls silent about Judaism. Nonetheless, its judgment~ seem to encompass Judaism, because DI notes no exceptions. It works only with three categories: Roman Catholicism, other Christian churches (distinguishing between those with apostolic succession and a valid Eucharist and "ecclesiastical communities which have not preserved the valid episcopate and the genuine and integral substance of the eucharistic mystery [and therefore] are not churches in the proper sense" §17), and non-Christian religions. In view of such a sweeping scope, readers may reasonably infer that the CDF includes Judaism within the rubric of non-Christian religions. Jews, therefore, seem also to be subject to the claim that, because "Jesus Christ is the . . . universal mediator" (§11), "one can and must say" that his significance and value for "the human race and its history., are unique and singular, proper to him alone, exclusive, universal, and absolute., for the salvation of all" (§ 15). For Catholics this means being "committed to proclaiming tq all people the truth definitively revealed by the Lord and to announcing the necessity of conversion to Jesus Christ and of adherence to the church through baptism and the other sacraments in order to participate fully in communion with God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit" (§22). Such a view stands in tension with my own experience.~9 As one privileged to be a frequent guest in Jewish homes, to learn from Jewish scholars, to experience something of the profundity of Jewish liturgy and prayer, and, above all, to have close Jewish friends, I have an abiding respect, even awe, for the depth of Judaism. The way of Torah certainly seems to me salvific for those who walk in it. I cannot.in conscience seek the conversion of a Jew. This is not a matter of indifferentism, but rather a glimpse of the incomprehensible God whose ways transcend our under-standing. IV. Three items: Item: "Jesus' relations with women seem to have been remarkably free, given the reserve that Jewish custom in his day required."2° Item: "At the historical moment when Jesus was born Review for Religious into the world, the stares of Jewish women had never been lower . By the time of Jesus' birth, many decades of rabbinic commentary and custom had surrounded Old Testament literature. And these rabbinic traditions considerably lowered the status of women.'m Item: "Palestinian Hebrew women were among the poorest in the world in Jesus' day. This was probably because they had no inheritance rights and could be divorced for the flimsiest of reasons. Hebrew men could divorce their wives for anything from burning the dinner (Hillel) to adultery (Shammat). Yet Hebrew women were not allowed to divorce their husbands .A. Hebrew woman had minimal to no property rights A. .child was held to be Jewish only if the mother was Jewish. Most Jewish girls were betrothed by their fathers at a young age. Jewish women were held to be unclean while menstruating. If she inadvertently touched a man while having her menses, he was obliged to undergo a week-long purification ritual before worshiping at the Temple . In early Judaism women did proclaim and prophesy, but in Jesus' day they weren't permitted to proclaim Torah at synagogue because of their periodic 'uncleanness.' As a rule, only the rabbis' wives were so educated. Women were not accepted as witnesses in Jewish law, nor could they teach the law. Women had no official religious or leadership roles in first-century Judaism. Jesus' behavior toward women, even viewed through the androcentric lens of the gospel texts, is remarkable.''2z I could multiply such examples; they seem ubiquitous in feminist writing, both scholarly (less now, though more common among feminist authors from the third world and the East) and pastoral. These perspectives are communicated widely among women's communities and beyond them. My encounter with Judaism helps me look at such claims critically, especially those related to the Second Temple period and the early church. I am sympathetic to the desire to understand Jesus as one who liberated his followers--including (perhaps especially) women--from the oppressive structures of religious authorities. (Yes, many of us consider some religious authorities oppressive in our time.) Nonetheless, I have come to agree with Mary Rose D'Angelo that portraying Jesus as the one "who saves women from Judaism" bothoversimplifies and distorts the situation of Jewish women in lst-century Palestine23 It does indeed seem that, in many feminist and liberationist circles, "no plot is complete witho.uLt a-575- November-December 2001 Boys ¯ The Interreligious Worm reference to the 'Jewish patriarchal system,' although very rare are comments on the similarly patriarchal pagan cultures of antiquity.''24 Sadly, I have come to see that many who do theology under the rubric of feminism have drunk all too deeply from the wells of anti-Judaism. Despite the rich literature on the Pharisees, most notably that of Anthony Saldarini,25 in many liberal and feminist circles they function as the symbol of precisely what is wrong with religious authorities. (For example: "[The Pharisees and their colleagues the scribes] tried to keep control over people's access to God through control of the Law. Jesus denounced this pretension and returned to the people the true means of access to God: love and com-passion." 26) In many feminist writings, moreover, the laws of ritual purity, which the Pharisees are portrayed as championing, serve as the source of the clearest contrast between oppressive Judaism and the liberating Jesus. We are instructed about the "dehumanizing situation in which the women of the time were enslaved." We learn how menstruating women were "discriminated against, degraded, and dehumanized,m7 In short, some feminist writers contrast Jewish women of the Second Temple period with New Testament narratives to support their claims that, "at its inception, pristine Christianity and Jesus himself were free of any misogyny or gender bias." Thereby they implicitly buttress the argument of Christian superiority over Judaism.28 Thus I differ with Sandra Schneiders's portrayal of Jesus vis-a-vis his Jewish contemporaries. While I appreciate--and agree wholeheartedly with--her larger argument about the way in which the prophetic character of religious life places communities in tension with ecclesiastical authorities, I disagree with claims such as "Jesus was rejected by official Judaism" and the more subtle assertion that, "like Jesus, who taught both respect for ecclesiastical leaders insofar as they legitimately hold office and resistance to ecclesiastical oppression, religious must stand with and for the disempowered in the church (cf. Mt 23:2-5 [the scathing denunciation of the scribes and Pharisees]).''z9 The Pharisees, despite their depiction in the Gospels, cannot historically be regarded as representatives of "official" Judaism (there was no such official body), and we should not use them as symbols of clericalism, however useful that might be to feminist causes. They were not the equivalent of ecclesiastical leaders. We would do well to listen to Jewish feminists--such as Paula Review for Religious Fredriksen's observations about the purity laws,3° Ross Kraemer's critique of rabbinic prooftexting,3~ and Rabbi Elyse Goldstein's wrestling with the meaning of the purity rules for her own life.32 To recognize that "Jewish hopes of a new and transformed world made the movement begun by Jesus and his companions and early Christian communities forums for participation and leadership for women" necessitates refining our argument, but in no way diminishes it.33 To acknowledge the complexity of patriarchy in antiquity as well as in early Christianity entails facing the arrogance of our own limited perspectives. In sum, my encounter with Jews and Judaism has brought deepened appreciation for the distinctiveness of religious life in the Catholic tradition. It has challenged me to face the long shadow of our history and to grapple with many questions about God in light of the Shoah. It shapes my theological vantage point on Dominus Iesus as well as various feminist writings. Above all, my encounter inspires hope. For all that lies unresolved within our church in regard to relations with Jews, what has happened between Christians and Jews in our time testifies to the power of the Spirit to bring healing and new life--a testimony that emboldens my own commitment to religious life. Notes ~ This is an edited version of a paper presented at the conference on "The Nun in the Postmodern World," sponsored by the Suenens Foundation in Leuven, Belgium, 31 May--4 June 2001. My thanks to Dr. Doris Donnelly, director of the Suenens Foundation and to Mariana Murphy SNJM, to whom I dedicated it on the occasion of her 70th anniversary of religious profession. 2 Sandra M. Schneiders, Finding the Treasure: Locating Catholic Religious Life in a New Ecclesial and Cultural Context, Vol. 1 of Religious Life in a New Millennium (Mahwah: Paulist Press, 2000), p. 348. 3 Schneiders, Finding, p. 330. 4 Celibacy seems to have been characteristic only of the Therapeutae, a lst-centuryJewish ascetic group near Alexandria, Egypt. Scholars debate whether the covenanters at Qumran were celibate and, if so, whether that was a permanent or temporary state. See Lawrence Schiffman, Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls (New York: Doubleday, 1994), pp. 127-143, and Joseph Fitzmyer, Responses to 101 Questions on the Dead Sea Scrolls (New York: Paulist Press, 1992), p. 66. s Schneiders speaks of religious life as "nonnatural" insofar as it involves bypassing the most fundamental natural mediations of the God- November-December 2001 Boys ¯ The Interreligious World human engagement. She distinguishes "nonnatural" from unnatural or antinatural "because nothing is mote fundamental to our humanity than the quest for God." She also notes that this path is fraught with danger, including "ascetical extremism, rigidity, misanthropy, false mysticism, gnosticism and esotericism, elitism" (Finding, pp. 131-132). 6 For an analysis of this reticence, including its problematical character, see Steven M. Cohen and Arnold M. Eisen, The Jew 14/Tthin: Self, Family, and Community in America (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2000), esp. chap. 6, "God and the Synagogue," pp. 155-180. 7 Lewis Weinstein, The Heretic (New York: goodnewfiction.com, 2000), p. 158. Later Weinstein has Perez use Chrysostom in a sermon at the cathedral (see pp. 242-244). s Quoted in Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, Catholics Remember the Holocaust (Washington, D.C.: United States Catholic Conference, 1998), p. 32. 9 Finding, p. 336. 10 This is the conclusion of the 1998 Vatican document We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoab; see Catholics Remember the Holocaust. The United States Conference of Catholi~ Bishops (USCCB) has now published a companion volume, Catholic Teaching on the Shoah: Implementing the Holy See's "We Remember" (2001). II Schneiders, Finding, p. 195. 12 I take the phrase "abusing God" from the work of David R. Blumenthal, Facing the Abusing God: A Theology of Protest (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox, 1993). 13 On the Sisters of Sion, see my Has God Only One Blessing?Judaimt as a Source of Christian Self-Understanding (Mahwah: Paulist Press, 2000), pp. 17-22. 14 "The questions man poses to God may be the same God poses to man. Nevertheless, it is man who must live--and formulate--it. In so doing, he challenges God, which is perm. issible, indeed required. He who says no to God is not necessarily a renegade. Everything depends on the way he says it, and why. One can say anything as long as it is for man, not against him, as long as one remains inside the covenant; only if you repudiate and judge your people from the outside will you become a renegade." Elie Wiesel, One Generation AJ~er (New York: Avon, 1972), p. 216. ,s Blumenthal, Facing the Abusing God, pp. 284-285. 16 "'Dominus Iesus': On the Unicity and. Salvific Universality of Jesus Christ and the Church," Origins 30, no. 14 (14 September 2000). It is dated 6 August 2000 and was issued on 5 September 2001--ironically, the same week as Jewish scholars released Dabru Emet, an eight-point statement responding to Christian attempts to come to terms with anti- Judaism. (For Dabru Emet, see www.jcrelations.net or www.icjs.org; also Tikva Frymer-Kensky, David Novak, Peter Ochs, David Fox Sandmel, ReviewforReligious and Michael Signer, Christianity in Jewish Terms (Boulder: Westview Press, 2000). ,7 See, e.g., Michael Barnes, Christian Identity and Religious Pluralism: Religions in Conversation (Nashville: Abingdon, 1989), and S. Mark Heim, Salvations: Truth and Difference in Religion (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1995). ~8 See my "Dominus Iesus and Judaism," forthcoming in Richard Sparks, ed., Proceedings of the Fi~h-sixth Annual Convention of the Catholic Theological Society of America. 19 For an account of something of what I have learned from Jews, see my Jewish Christian Dialogue: One Woman's Experience (Mahwah: Paulist Press, 1997). 20 Monique Alexandre, "Early Christian Women," in/t History of Women in the West, Vol. 1, From Ancient Goddesses to Christian Saints, ed. Pauline Schmitt Pantel (Cambridge: Belknap Press, 1992), pp. 407-444 (citation, p. 420). 21 Cited in Judith Plaskow, "Feminist Anti-Judaism and the Christian God," Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 7, no. 2 (Fall 1991): 104-107; in Helen P. Fry, Christian-Jewish Dialogue: A Reader (Exeter, U.K.: University of Exeter Press, 1996), p. 233. 22 Christine Schenk CSJ, "Celebrating the Inclusive Jesus," Celebration: An Ecumenical Worship Resource (February 2000): 80-84 (citation, 81-82). 23 Mary Rose D'Angelo, "Gender in the Origins of Christianity: Jewish Hopes and Imperial Exigencies," in Joseph Martos and Pierre Hegy, eds., Equal at the Creation: Sexism, Society, and Christian Thought (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1998), pp. 25-48 (citation, p. 25). 24 Amy-Jill Levine, "Lilies of the Field and Wandering Jews: Biblical Scholarship, Women's Roles, and Social Location," in Ingrid Rosa Kitzberger, ed., Transformative Encounters: Jesus and Women Re-Viewed (Leiden: Brill, 1999): pp. 330-352 (citation, p. 332). 2s See Anthony J. Saldarini, Pharisees, Scribes, and Sadducees in Palestinian Society (Wilmington: Michael Glazier, 1988); also his "Pharisees," in David Noel Freedman et al., eds., The Anchor Bible Dictionary, Vol. 5 (New York: Doubleday, 1992), pp. 289-303. 26 Tereza Cavalcanti, "Jesus, the Penitent Woman, and the Pharisee," Journal of Hispanic/Latino Theology 2, no. 1 (1994): 28-40 (citation, 40). 27 H. Kinukawa, Women and Jesus in Mark: A Japanese Feminist Perspective (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1994), pp. 12, 27. 28 See Ross S. Kraemer, "Jewish Women and Christian Women: Some Caveats," in Kraemer and Mary Rose D'Angelo, eds., Women and Christian Origins (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 35-49 (citation, p. 36). 29 Schneiders, Finding, pp. 334 and 255, respectively. I am also uncomfortable with her section on Jesus as a prophetic model in her otherwise superb 2000 Madeleva Lecture, With Oil in Their Lamps: Faith, Feminism, and the Future (Mahwah: Paulist Press, 2000), pp. 97-108. In my November-December 2001 Boys ¯ Tbe lnterreligious Worm judgment, greater sensitivity to the heterogeneity of lst-century Judaism (arguments about Sabbath observance and the Temple [see pp. 100-101] were part of this heterogeneity), recognition that the Roman prefect controlled appointment of the high priest ("Nevertheless Jesus was executed by the Romans on the charge brought against him by the official of Judaism," p. 100), and contextualizing of phrases such as the "narrowness that had marred religion from long before his birth in the exclusivity of the Jews" would provide a more nuanced context for her claims. 30 Paula Fredriksen, Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews: A Jewish Life and the Emergence of Christianity (New York: Alfred Knopf, 1999), esp. pp. 197-207. 3, Kraemer, "Jewish Women and Chrisfan Origins, pp. 37-39. 32 Elyse Goldstein, ReVisions: Seeing Torah through a Feminist Lens (Woodstock, Vermont: Jewish Lights Publishing, 1998), esp. pp. 94-114. 33 D'Angelo, "Gender Hopes," p. 25. Mary at the Window Tawdry as any plastic trinket outshopped To some Asian source, and mass-produced In garish glass-like gold and blue To catch the sun, Mary Most Holy is reduced To a window ornament, turning to face out, Turning on filaments again for facing in On household disorder, dissension, kitchenwork, Children at play on the floor, where a thin Shaft of shining blue light circles one Dazzled child looking up: Mary catches a son. Nancy G. Westerfield R~vie~v for Religious A. PAUL DOMINIC Unsuspected Mission MeisSion, which is much more talked about than put into xecution by talkers, is at bottom a very simple human experience of sharing with others our living faith in God. As such it is accessible to all of us anywhere, if only we are interested in it. It can begin whenever we meet others and spontaneously converse with them. It seems that not enough has been said or even thought about these ordinary human encounters, without which no mission can be started or sustained, whereas perhaps too much has been said about progressive modes of mission. Genesis of a New Mission With the founding of the Society of Jesus, St. Ignatius Loyola surely initiated a whole new saga of mission in the world of his time. The saga, however, may not be or even seem new any more. In fact, since Vatican Council II, there has been quite a legitimate revision of his ideas about promoting and defending the faith. But one exercise of that old mission has still not lost its newness; it is relevant today, but without making a splash. That exercise is simply, to quote St. Ignatius's own words, "to be profitable to individuals by spiritual conversation.''~ Accordingly, unlike the monasteries in mountain solitudes from the time of St. Benedict in the 6th century or the hermitages erected in earlier times in the desert far away from the evil world, the Jesuit residences came to be situated near the centers of towns and cities, where people would gather and A. Paul Dominic sJ writes again from Satyodayam; 12-5-33 S. Lallaguda; Secunderabad 500 017; India. November-December 2001 Dominic ¯ Unsuspected Mission Different from preaching, the mission of spiritual conversation is best characterized and distinguished as pure and simple conversation. intermingle. Only then would the Jesuits be able to meet the people naturally enough, have normal dealings with them, and, as occasions arose, converse with them spiritually. That was an unassuming exercise of mission with an enduring validity, for there can be no time when personal mission, that is, reaching out to specific individuals wherever we are and keeping them company, will be out of tune with the times. The movement of new mission, which in God's providence the Society of Jesus came to be and even stand for, was itself a product of person-to-person missions that Ignatius himself exercised. Having sensed the working of God in himself, he could not keep the experience to himself, but felt an urge to share it with others. He would have certainly loved the angel Raphael's words: "It is good to conceal the secret of a king, but to acknowledge and reveal the works of God, and with fitting honor to acknowledge him" (Tb 12:7, NRSV unless otherwise indicated), Sharing with others his treasured experience of God gradually became a mode of life for him. He came to see it as a matter of course for him: to glorify God and at the same time be of help to others within his reach. Whereas his first contacts were the women whom he chanced upon at his usual haunts of the chapel or hospital, his fame)us beneficiaries were Pierre Favre (now a blessed) and Francis Xavier (now a saint) and a few others at the University in Paris, who with him came to form the Society of Jesus. It is no wonder that people who experienced the charm of his spiritual conversation tried to. be like him. It seems that the early Jesuits' fecundity in mission was in no small way owing to their exercise of spiritual conversation. Xavier, who blazed the trail of mission for the nascent Jesuit order and for the church of his day, was known for his extraordinary expertise in spiritual conversation. Not only companions of his like Peter Canisius (now a saint) witnessed to itfl but also the people of Bologna, who could say twenty years after his short stay with them: "He spoke little, but with great persuasivene.ss. He talked of divine things with great Review for Religious ¯ devotion, and his words penetrated into the hearts of his hearers and held them fast.''3 Itis a pity that those who have criticized Xavier's mission outreach with their post-Vatican II historical hindsight have failed woefully the postmodern mission by their ignorance of the practical skill in which Xavier excelled, namely, conversational mission--which, to be sure, will be out of date when humans cease speaking and being sociable. The Makeup of Conversational Mission Though the expression "conversational mission" used just now, and the equivalent expressions used earlier, are self-explanatory enough, there is nothing like getting full information straight from the horse's mouth. What did Ignatius himself say when he spoke to his little band of friends regarding their kind of preaching. We get some idea from his answer to a Dominican authority's peremptory question "Whatever do you preach?" Ignatius answered: "We do not preach but do speak familiarly of spiritual things with people, as one does after dinner, with those who invite us." In this brief and frank response--which, however, his interlocutor considered equivocal--one may discern and recognize three elements of the conversational mission: (1) conversation itself, (2) a veering to spiritual matters, and (3) a pleasant, familiar tone of voice. Notice that this Ignatian anecdote itself demonstrates spiritual conversation. A contrasting example may clarify the matter. Gregory of Nyssa had observed Christians in the marketplace of Constantinople. He reported: Constantinople is full of mechanics and slaves, who are all of them profound theologians, preaching in the shops and the streets. If you want a man to change a piece of silver, he informs you wherein the Son differs from the Father; if you ask the price of a loaf, you are told by way of reply that the Son is inferior to the Father; and, if you inquire whether the bath is ready, the answer is that the Son is made out of nothing,s This is certainly not true spiritual conversation, having only a specious similarity to it. Different from preaching, the mission of spiritual conversation is best characterized and distinguished as pure and simple conversation. It is that first and foremost, with no agenda except being present to others and getting acquainted.6 One talks with a November-December 2001 Dominic * Unsuspected Mission single individual or a small cluster, not a crowd. Such a conversation happens when we adopt towards people a welcoming attitude, perhaps forgoing for the time being our own business or preoccupation. It unfolds when we are truly ourselves, without putting on airs or having an ax to grind. It is engaging by its very nature, as we respond sensitively to the personal and situational stimuli around, now by word, now by silence, and all through by our bearing. Such a conversation does not follow any pattern except that of people letting one another's personalities freely rise to the occasion according to the twists and turns of the talk and the topics. If there is any way of programming it from beginning to end, it is by eager and attentive listening. Such conversing is like the breath of wind whose coming and going is beyond our reckoning, but which refreshes us and gives us pleasure. It is as natural and spirited as that. Engaging in it, we take others' measure and strive to bring out the best in them, thereby improving and testing ourselves (Si 9:14; 27:5). When people open the homes of their hearts in this hospitable way, Abha-God cannot be far away (1 Jn 4:12). If the art of dealing and conversing with people is, obviously enough, a natural human talent or acquirement, it is also, according to the mind of Ignatius, a grace.7 Perhaps such an understanding may be read between the lines of Paul's "Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone" (Col 4:6, NIV). Surely any conversation done ¯ in the reverent awareness of the Lord Jesus (Col 3:17; 1 P 3:15) will enable us to be at our best, natural or supernatural. Thinking along this line, perhaps, Kahlil Gibran could counsel: "When you meet your friend on the roadside or in the marketplace, let the spirit in you move your lips and direct your tongue.''8 Those who make sense of this and make spa~e for the Spirit will come to know how the~ are led, even in the face of the unfriendly, to talk without anxious forethought and yet reveal a truth that they themselves are not directly aware of (Mr 10:17-20). Besides such inspired moments, however, there are bound to be routine occasions or chance meetings when they will have to exercise their grace of conversation on a more deliberate, reflective level. At the appropriate time they will speak on spiritual affairs, as Sirach counseled long ago: "Let your conversation be with intelligent people, and let all your discussion be about the law of the Most High. Let the. righteous be your dinner companions, and let your glory be in the fear of the Lord" (Si 9:15-16). And the more Review for Religious they speak from the abundance of their heart, the better (Mt 12:34), following Paul's declaration "we believe, and so we speak" (2 Co 4:13). They will not resort to spiritual generalities, but will offer a specifically personal spiritual word of witness arising from whatever God has produced in the recesses of their heart and the externals of their life, as St. Paul does often (2 Co 1:4). In general, such conversational talk of God will be directed to what the partners in conversation require (Col 4:6). Far from anything bordering on evil, it will be "only what is useful for building up, as there is need, so that [our] words may give grace to those who hear" (Ep 4:29), furthering their interior progress and stimulating their power for good in a society that hungers for more than small mercies: namely, justice, freedom, good faith, neighborliness, equality, and, not least, economic sufficiency, the proof of all the above? This conversational mission is to be carried on, for all its spiritual vision, in pleasant, discreet, and wholesome familiarity, the kind that may be witnessed (as Ignatius remarks) between the glad host and the happy guest who take time after a good meal to share what is in their hearts. Familiarity is the climate in which the conversational seeds of the spirit are best sown and harvested. Familiarity, however, is of different levels. The greater the familiarity, the better the opportunity for spiritual conversation. And so it is worthwhile to work discreedy towards deepening the familiarity. Familiarity or intimacy being the opposite of imposition, no conversational mission can be attempted if people make us aware that they would rather be left alone. Avoiding the least intrusion into their privacy, then, we must gendy gain their favor by our genuine respect for them, our interest in them as individuals with unique endowments, and our concern for any particular needs they may have. It is a matter of sincere accommodation, becoming all things to all people (I Co 9:22), all the while being sensitive to their ideals, their finer spiritual instincts. This is neighborliness towards them, without which no mission for their spiritual welfare can ever be thought of. So, even if they are not well disposed towards us, we deal with them pro-actively and seek to win them over, as God does. It is our familiarity with God that should overflow in our relation with others and make them feel at home with us. If we ever succeeded in this way of living, we would perhaps never meet anyone, however far gone in error, without effecting a change for the better. Blessed Pierre Favre was known precisely for such surprisingly wonderful encounters as November-December 2001 Dominic ¯ Unsus~ected Mission he spoke about God without boring or annoying anyone, and so was lauded by Ignatius himself as one who could draw the water of grace from hardened souls. For those who would learn from him, here is a little precious lesson that he confided in a letter to a friend: In the first place., anyone who desires to be serviceable to heretics of the present age should hold them in great affection, . . . putting out of his heart all thoughts and feelings that tend to their discredit. The next thing he must do is win their goodwill and love by friendly dealings and converse on matters about which there is no difference between us, taking care to avoid all controversial subjects that lead to bickering and mutual recriminations. The things that unite us ought to be the first ground of our approach, not the things that keep us apart?~ Scriptural Suggestiveness Speaking about his spiritual discipleship, Ignatius confided that he was taught by God as a child by his master. In sharing his spiritual knowledge with others, however, he used theological and scriptural ideas and language, as in evident in his Spiritual Exercises. The question arises, then, whether there are scriptural indications behind his idea of conversational mission? Rescued by Jesus for Abba-God, Ignatius bums with desire to follow suit: looking for ways to edify and help his neighbors, he discovers that spiritual conversation significantly serves that purpose. Advocating this practice expressly and officially in the Jesuit Constitutions, he advances this reason: "The Lord has given care of his neighbor to everyone."~2 There seems to be reference to Sirach 17:12 or 17:14b and Luke 10:25-37, and certain other passages have a bearing on his divinely favored understanding of the mission of conversation. One is: "Proclaim the message; be persistent when the time is favorable or unfavorable; convince, rebuke, and encourage, with the utmost patience in teaching" (2 Tm 4:2). Is there much in common between proclaiming and conversing? Proclaiming is the activity which is described by the Greek verb kerussein here in 2 Timothy. Elsewhere in the New Testament, the " leprous man and the demoniac who were healed by Jesus, and the friends who witnessed Jesus' healing of the deaf and dumb man, are later "proclaiming" the blessing they received. Obviously, their proclaiming cannot be anything other than simply and Review for Religious enthusiastically telling people everywhere about their good fortune (Mk 1:45; 5:20; 7:36). This would have been conversation, involving relatively few people here and there--particularly impressive ahd contagious conversation, to be sure, but conversation nonetheless. Does the same sense hold when kerussein is used to denote the proclaiming activity of Jesus?13 Does kerussein have the same connotation of conversation here too? It does, for the following reason. Jesus himself presents his characteristic way of mission in terms of eating and drinking, while contrasting himself with his predecessor (Mt 11:19). In so doing he does not simply distinguish his way as the path of enjoyment or pleasure as opposed to the other's ascetical approach; but rather reveals himself in his mission as one who welcomes and enjoys and also extends fellowship with people, not of a class, but of all classes, brushing aside all prevalent social and religious taboos. So as he honors meal invitations--whether from Pharisees like Simon, tax collectors like Levi, friends like Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, or the hosts of wedding celebrations as at Cana, he in ~rn welcomes and plays host not only to his disciples but also--something that escapes people's attention--to public sinners and to social outcasts like the poor, the crippled, and the blind. If table companionship, being a guest or a kind of host, is characteristic of his ministry, it is not, as the Pharisees judge, by way of being a glutton and a drunkard, but of doing what goes with moderate eating and drinking, that is, having a conversation. C.S. Lewis remark, "The table is from time immemorial the place for talk." 14 This was particularly the case at feasts or parties that Jesus went to, with people reclining at table and engaging in prolonged conversation, valuing it more than food and drink.Is And, if a rabbi like Jesus is the chief guest, he has an excellent opportunity to cast his pearls26 Jesus makes use of such occasions to meet and converse with people at leisure and at length about what they miss and long for in life.17 When Jesus sends his disciples on their mission, he wants them to do no more than what they have seen him doing (Mk 3:14; 6:12). He bids them stay in the houses where they are welcome, in accordance with the sacred duty of hospitality in the East; there, during mealtime and at other times, they are sure to find Is there much in common between proclaiming and conversing? November-December 2001 Dominic ¯ Unsuspected Mission opportunities for spiritual conversation. No matter how variously mission was carried on in the early church, kerussein in the sense explained above was surely part of the picture. It is interesting and revealing that, like his Master, Peter was accused of eating with those outside his Jewish fold. He was doing what he had seen Jesus doing, namely, conversing with those at table, sharing with them the word of God, and bringing them graces of the kingdom of Abba-God. And Paul too, despite the popular impression of him as addressing small and large crowds, no doubt employed the conversational mode of mission, especially towards the end during his two years of semicaptivity at Rome, as Luke's use of the word kerussein at the conclusion of Acts seems to suggest. The Practice of Unobtrusive Missioners The conversational mission, as traced above, is not something apart from life, but is very much part of it. One may find this confirmed in St. Paul's general exhortation: "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; teach and admonish one another in all wisdom" (Col 3:16). Though Ignatius specialized in the art of the conversational word and trained his Jesuit companions in it, one should not consider it something only for initiates.~s There can be no doubt that ordinary Christians in all times and climes have, like Ignatius in the first flush of his conversion, taken spontaneously to the conversational mission, and with tangible results. Their names have not come down to us, but they are in the company of the little Hebrew servant girl whose brief remark led Naaman the Syrian to find the true, unseen God (2 K 5:1-19). Describing the (Protestant Christian) mission that flourished in the mid 19th century among the Telugus in Andhra, South India, Rajaiah D. Paul can say: "From the very beginning of the movement., the work of evangelization was carried on by the infant native church itself, commencing with one individual and then extending, by natural and inevitable growth, like that of a living tree . The people followed much their own impulses . The quiet conversation when visiting friends and relations, the zealous defense of the truth when Christianity was assailed by others, the simple enunciation of belief when a reason for the hope that is in them was demanded; these, accompanied by a life consistent with the demands of the new religion, were what Review for Religious produced fruit in fresh accessions to Christianity." ~9 Reflecting on such experience of mission, which is perhaps more common than many suspect, one may discern an interplay of Christian fecundity and mission. The word fecundity, incidentally, may not be in common parlance now; but, as Henri Nouwen said, "it is a word worth reclaiming, for it can put us in touch with our deepest human potential to bring forth life"2° even in the ordinary circumstances of life. He tells a story of a bereaved South American mother. After celebrating Mass in memory of her young son killed in a tragic accident, he tried to condole with her. Caught up, however, with his own sorrow for her, he was not looking at her and not listening to her invitation to come home and have a meal with the family. Sensing this, the woman went closer to him and spoke to him gently, looking into his eyes: "Don't be so depressed, Father. Don't you know that God loves our Antonio, that God gave him to us for a few years and now wants to bring him to heaven? We are grateful that he was with us and we are grateful too that he can now be with God forever. We are grateful to you also. God loves us all and cares for us all.''21 One of the most dramatic and recent exponents of spiritual conversation is the North American woman named Peace Pilgrim. The Wise Choice of Celebrated Missioners Besides these anonymous but locally fecund missioners, there are celebrities in the international scene, like Frank Buchman (1879-1961), who made the most of spiritual conversation. For instance, along with swaying groups and governments by his moral authority as founder of the then quite active movement called Moral Re-Armament, Buchman also converted and gave life to all sorts of religious or secular-minded people by his individual conversations and dealings with them, and he inspired them to do likewise. A story is told of his stay at a hotel in Milan a few months before he died: "There were three barmen at the hotel. Frank Buchman did not buy drink from them. He went into their bar and gave them the bread of life. They and their families all found November-December 2001 Dominic ¯ Unsuspected Mission something new from their friendship with him. One of then said of him, 'Dr. Buchman is different from most of the people I see. We have cleaned things up here since he came. Most of the leaders of Italy come to this bar sooner or later. The Foreign Minister was here the other day. He was so interested in what we told him about Buchman that he almost forgot his drink.'''22 One of the most dramatic and recent exponents of spiritual conversation is the North American woman named Peace Pilgrim (1908-1981). Not a Christian, she described herself as a religions woman with a vision of peace for the world. Keeping to her self-chosen double-barreled name, she committed herself to walking prayerfully as a pilgrim among people, eager to meet them and talk to them about the chances for peace. For this purpose she sported a short tunic with "Peace Pilgrim" in front and "25,000 Miles on Foot for Peace" on the back; she succeeded in drawing people into engaging conversations on the possibilities of peace in the modern world. To her pleasant surprise, she found the general response positive, with either a lively curiosity or a genuine interest in peace efforts. Her humble mission, basically human and Christian, touched people's hearts and even became a media phenomenon. This is how she recalls its beginning: "The birthplace of the pilgrimage was at the Tournament of Roses parade in Pasadena, California. I walked ahead along the line of the march, talking to people and handing out peace messages, and noticing that the holiday spirit did not lessen the genuine interest in peace. When I had gone about halfway, a policeman put his hand on my shoulder and I thought he was going to tell me to get off the line of the march. Instead he said, 'What we need is thousands like you.'''23 Her personal encounters soon became media events spreading her message of peace. What began fruitfully on 1 January 1953 continued with greater and greater effectiveness till her death in 1981 during her seventh talking pilgrimage. The Like Choice in India Ignatius, too, began his mission as an obscure pilgrim on the move. Thinking, as an Indian, of the pilgrim Ignatius and others before and after him in the Christian world, I cannot but admire the sureness of their spiritual instinct, which many Indians have as well. India, too, is an ancient land of pilgrims going on regular Review for Religious pilgrimages, besides, of course, the lifelong pilgrims who keep moving across the length and breadth of the country or stay put in a monastery (math) or in a forest area. It is pleasant to recall that, as Peace Pilgrim was exercising her newfound permanent mission in the American world, two (Catholic) Christians--Joseph Thambi in Andhra Pradesh and Peter Reddy (a convert from Hinduism through Lutheranism) ir~ Tamil Nadu--were living in India a life much like that of the sannyasis, going about and sharing their spiritual pleasure and treasure with others who came their way. Even before them Sadhu Sunder Singh of Punjab, a Sikh-turned-(Anglican) Christian, had blazed a sannyasi kind of mission trail as early as 1908.24 Part of "Vie Voyag~re" However unusual and surprising their vocation may have been, the personalities mentioned above knew how to exercise their mission in ways not only unusual but most ordinary. They used the ordinary human capacity of conversation to excite and evoke spiritual awareness in people. Such spiritual talk, being part of normal sofiial intercourse, can and ought to thrive among Christians anywhere; all they need is a good measure of the Christian spirit of people on pilgrimage (Heb 3:12-4:11; 11:8-16). This was the sure but unforeseen way by which even the risen Jesus, making his return pilgrimage to his Abba-Father, reached out to his lost or fallen disciples and sent them on their new mission. Who has not enjoyed the narratives of his accosting them, drawing them to speak to him from their heart, and then with inspiriting w~rds arousing their drooping spirits for mission? It is up to us, partners in a holy heavenly calling, to keep our eyes on Jesus and, thus encouraged, to encourage one another day after day on our mission journey, a journey at once inward and heavenward (Heb 3:1, 13). Such was characteristically the vie voyagkre or missionary life of Mary, too, whom Marguerite Bourgeoys (1620-1700), the foundress of the Congregation de Notre-Dame de Montreal, contemplated as the model of conversation with others. After composing my own article, I learned this from Mary Anne Foley's recent article.25 Because of the reported affinity of her spirituality with the lgnatian variety, I suspect that the Sisters of Notre-Dame may well have more to say about Marguerite's conversational mission, adding to what I, have said about Ignatius's. November-December 2001 Dominic ¯ Unsuspected Mission Notes t St. Ignatius of Loyola, The Constitutions of the Society of Jesns, trans. George E. Ganss SJ (St. Louis: Institute of Jesuit Sources, 1970), p. 283, no. [648]. 2 See Thomas H. Clancy SJ, The Conversational Word of God (Anand, India: Gujarat Sahitya Prakash, 1978), pp. 59, 63. 3 So Schurhammer, Francis Xavier, Vol. 1, as in Clancy, The Conversational Word of God, p. 11. ~ See Clancy, Conversational Word, p. 9. 5 William Barclay, The Letters to Timothy, Titus, and Philemon (Bangalore: Theological Publications in India, 1990), p. 127. 6 In an exhortation Jer6nimo Nadal shares what he has learned about this from Ignatius. See Clancy, Conversational Word,~pp. 53-54. 7 St. Ignatius, Constitutions, pp. 277, 332-333, nos. [624d] and [814]. s Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (New Delhi: Allied Publishers, 1976), p. 72. 9 See St. Ignatius, Constitutions, pp. 113,283, nos. [115] and [650]. l0 See Clancy, Conversational Word, pp. 53, 65. I I See Clancy, Conversational Word, pp. 20-21. 12 St. Ignatius, Constitutions, p. 113, no. [115]. ~3 See Lucien Legrand, Mission in the Bible (Pune, India: Ishvani Publication, 1992), p. 60. ~4 C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves (Glasgow: Collins Fount Paperbacks, 1977), p. 91. t5 See Albert Nolan, Jesus before Christianity (London: Darton, LongTnan, and Todd, 1977), p. 38. t6 See William Barclay, The Gospel of Luke (Bangalore, India: Theological Publications in India, 1975), p. 94. ~7 The objection that Jesus' table talk does not qualify to be kerussein since it lacks the usual fanfare of publicity of the kerux or royal herald can be met by remarking that Jesus, being the herald of the compassionate God, does not carry himself like the heralds of proud earthly rulers. 's See William Barclay, The Letters to Pbilippians. Colossians, and Thessalonians (Bangalore: Theological Publications in India, 1975), p. 126. ~9 Cecil Hargreaves, Asian Christian Thinking (Delhi: ISPCK, 1979), p. 97. 20 Henri J.M. Nouwen, In the House of the Lord (London: Darton, Longrnan, and Todd, 1986), p. 33. 2~ Nouwen, House, p. 49. 22 Peter Howard, Frank Buchman's Secret (Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1962), p. 2. Review for Religious 23 Peace Pilgrim, compiled by some of her friends (Santa Fe, New Mexico: Ocean Tree Books, 1994), p. 27. 24 See P.A. Augustine, "On a Pilgrimage to Rampur," Vidyajyoti Journal, March 2001, pp. 205-213. ~s See Mary Anne Foley CND, "Spirituality for Mission: Marguerite Bourgeoys and the Ignatian Tradition," Review for Religious 60, no. 1 (lanuary-February 2001): 53-57. Straggler Because he was youngest, his gift ranked least among the others, last of the lambing. But somewhere between the start of his journey and its final stretch he'd lost the creature, himself lost as well. Then he followed the star, as told, so stumbled upon the stable by accident, or design, call it what you will. Afraid, empty-handed, embarrassed, yet drawn to the manger, he knelt, close as a whisper. "I lost my gift." The Babe's mother, softly, "No, child, yours is best of all." Leonard Cochran OP November-December 2001 MARIE BEHA On the Seventh Day God Rested spiritual directions Maybe God rested (Gn 2:3), but we cannot. God could afford to rest; after all, creation was finished and "it was very good," but we rarely experience the luxury of seeing our work completed or of feeling satisfied with it. So we find Sabbath observance hard, whether it is the day of rest at the end of our work week or those mini- Sabbaths that occur naturally in our lives. Our tendency to fill all these times makes them anything but restful, even though it seems that resting should be at the heart of Sabbath observance, our own as well as God's. Sabbath Fillers Mmost any "thing" will do to fill up Sabbath time and minimize rest: work left over from the previous week, or getting ahead on the week to come. Fun and games can keep us busy. "Good works," everything from returning phone calls (or catching up with email, as though that were possible) to a frantic round of visiting sick relatives or neighbors, fill in the hours. Even an overload of required worship can make Sabbath more a burden than a rest. Marie Beha OSC writes from the Monastery of St. Clare; 1916 North Pleasantburg Drive; Greenville, South Carolina 29609. Revie'w for Religious So, you ask, what is a person to do? The problem with all of the above is not with the what but with the why and bow of our doing. The need for accomplishment that motivates us is revealed in the satisfied but weary sigh that accompanies our Sunday evening summation: "I really got a lot done this weekend" or the equally tired but dissatisfied confession "My to-do list is as long as ever." Why are we so driven to do? Too often we fill our days, including our Sundays, to fill ourselves. No wonder there are never enough hours in the week. "Resting" risks having to face the reveal-ing silence, the emptiness inside. So we hurry on, stuffing every day, including the Sabbath, with self-satisfying work. Even our worship can be performance oriented. What does "We had such a good liturgy this morning!" really mean? Are our criteria the spirited music, the well-delivered homily, and the smooth flow of the service--or being moved to heartfelt prayer and challenged to genuine interior conversion? Hopefully, the music and the homily prepare the way for "worship in spirit and truth" On 4:24), but they may simply leave us entertained and content. Worship can become crowded as though more equals better. When that is the case, we can hardly expect to "rest secure" (Ps 16:9). Nor can we if haste to have it finished clocks our obser-vance. Shortening periods of silence in order to get through our quota of prayers is anything but worshipful. The pace of our performance, in liturgy or elsewhere, may also keep us "worried and distracted by many things" (Lk 10:41). We are still meeting deadlines, even when being together is itself the goal. Family time has to be scheduled with the precision of airport takeoffs and land-ings, surface activity substituting for person.al relationships. Though we are together, we do not allow ourselves opportunity to really enjoy each other, much less become intimate. Scheduling every moment, hurrying through one activity to begin the next before the first is really completed, all adds up to workday pressure. Though we are weary, it seems we cannot stop or slow down. Our attempts at relaxation only add more stress. Even our sleeping late is restless. So we come to the end of our Sabbath lacking any sense of re-creation. The motivation for such crowding and overscheduling of even leisure time has a lot to do with our self-image, Which stems from our deeply felt need to see ourselves as creative achievers. God has no such need and so can rest, and asks us to begin to do the same. November-December 2001 Beha ¯ On the Seventh Day God Rested Becoming a Sabbath People But you say, "I know all this, know it too well. What I don't understand is howto keep the Sabbath holy" (Dr 5:12). Rather than insisting on utterly severe limitations of activity on the Sabbath, as some Pharisees in the Gospels seem to have done, our recent Catechism (§2185) says nothing about "servile work"; it simply says we should "refrain from . . . work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord's Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relax-ation of mind and body." Especially for the many of us who do almost no manual (or "servile") work on weekdays, spading in the garden may be a wonderful thing to do on Sundays. Churchgoing is not supposed to be the only activity that makes the seventh day special, though some neglect even this. For those who do partic-ipate in Sunday worship, however, it may become just one more item packed into a hectic weekend schedule. After it, we may feel permitted to spend the remainder of the day on ourselves--and then squander it on hecticness that neither praises God nor refreshes us. And that is precisely the problem with much of our Sabbath observance. This is God's day. Like God, we are to work most days at cre-ating this world, making a garden of it, if you will. But also, like God, we are to rest from our labor one day and so gain something of the divine perspective. Work is meant to predominate since this is the way our world takes form and shape--and we ourselves are likewise formed by that very shaping. Through work we become what we are meant to be: responsible cocreators of this beautiful world of ours. Made from this earth, we are called to care for it, to be nourished by it, and in the end to return to it. But there is more to our human vocation than this. Though made from the earth, of the earth, we are ultimately from and for God. Sabbath observance rhythmically registers this reality of human existence in our lives. Between this week's labor and the next, we stop and look up. Like God, we rest. Although our Sabbath observance is brief and limited, it is there to prevent our being worn down by the activity needed to work out our salvation. Sabbath prepares us for an eternal rest when our work will be complete and our being-with-God just begun. The original commandment, "Keep holy the Sabbath," is the third commandment, after those forbidding worship of false gods and taking God's name in vain, All three put us in the context of Review for Religious God's original covenant with his chosen people. Observing these commandments is our covenantal response. More than moral law, the Sabbath describes a relationship. Since we are God's people, we need to be holy as God is holy, working and resting as God does. Observing the Sabbath forms us into the divine image, helping us realize our identity as individuals and as a people. Why did God rest on the seventh day? To enjoy the goodness of that wondrous creation. We do the same. Enjoyment, part of our human capacity for contemplation, moves us beyond the every-day criteria of use and usefulness. All too often, when we experience something new, our question "What's this?" is followed at once by "What's it good for?" Sabbath offers us a respite from such a utilitarian viewpoint; it gives us an opportunity to affirm reality as good in itself. We receive it as a divine gift, even before we discover whether if fits into our schema of things. We appreciate its beauty, even if it is not to our taste. We accept its truth without need to compre-hend, much less control, its mystery. Besides deepening our capacity for appreciation, Sabbath leisure forms us into a free people. Originally a way for the Jewish people to celebrate their liberation from Egypt's oppres-sion, it can open us to similar possibilities. We are not meant to be slave laborers, nor to enslave others to relentless productivity. Stepping back from what we do six days a week enables us to see where we are oppressed, where we may be oppressors. In the leisure that this seventh day provides, we are free to ask ourselves what we would like to do if we had the time. What would re-create us? No matter if our answers would require more demanding activity than our everyday work; perhaps that is what we would find renewing. After being tied all week to a desk, we may really enjoy discovering and using our bodies at least one day a week. Professionals may relax in an activity that allows them the leisure to be rank amateurs, while people whose everyday is dull or dreary discover their potential as "professional" chefs or musicians. Seeing each other in more creative ways keeps us open to the surprises that lie untapped in the hearts of us all. Someone who lacks both time and talent for learning to play music well can still More than moral law, the Sabbath describes a relationship. November-December 2001 Beha ¯ On the Seventh Day God Re, ted enjoy the creativity of a less-than-professional performance. Attempting portrait painting may not produce a recognizable like-ness, much less something that can be sold, yet it can fill someone's need for self-expression. Sabbath Free Time The Sabbath also provides us with "free time," allowing us to "waste" some of it. For productive Americans the mere phrase "wasting time" sounds vaguely immoral, even though time is a giJ~. We cannot earn even a single additional day of life, nor are we billed for the ones we have received. Sabbath observance opens us to the possibility of"doing nothing." Even a brief period given over to deliberate inactivity can, if nothing else, show us how enslaved we have become to filling time. When not doing some-thing useful, we feel threatened by nonexistence: what are we good for? Doing nothing translates readily into being nothing; that is why it is painful, at least at first. But, with patient practice and a willingness to go below surface unease, we can discover a deepening quiet underneath all our activity. As with a swiftly moving river, there is a silence inside that is full of life and awaits the exploration of our doing nothing. Enjoying what is, being free to do something nonproductive that in fact re-creates us, can be forms of Sabbath worship for us creatures as we learn who we are and why we were made. Personal relationships require a certain spaciousness, and this is true of our friendship with God. On the Sabbath we and God spend time together. Sometimes we talk or argue, sometimes we are simply together in comfortable or uncomfortable silence, but we are together. That is what matters. That is the heart of any obser-vance of the Sabbath. And those observances are multiple. Seventh-day observance is paradigmatic but not exhaustive. We can expand one day to a week of R and R: rest, recuperation, or retreat. Or, and this is more common, we can compress Sabbath-like observances to take advantage of moments of free time that open up in any day or that we build into it. The former include snippets of time we often vainly fret away: when the elevator takes forever to arrive, when the answering machine advises us to "hold" until the "next available operator" responds, or when the receptionist explains that "the doctor is running l~te today." Also, we can choose to sit quietly Review for Religious on the side of our bed when we first awaken, we can stretch quietly during a long morning at the computer, we can take a breath of morning air as we walk to the car. All of these can be pieces of Sabbath rest. They can break into our everydayness, much as seventh days interrupt the steady pace of work weeks. They can refresh us. Or they can be uneasy gaps we hasten to fill with nervous activity. How else explain doodling on telephone pads, tapping our feet, consulting our watch at fifteen-second intervals, or rushing our moments of transition. Using Sabbath Leisure Well Taking advantage of all the Sabbath times in our lives requires creative discipline. One suggestion: that we follow the traffic direc-tive "Be prepared to stop." Be ready to allow the seventh day--and the small intervals that force themselves into our best-planned days-- to evoke in us a willingness to surrender to something, to Someone, beyond our own self-interest. Willingness to set our own interests aside opens us to the more of mystery. The capacity for such transcendence demands life-long discipline, a way of living that includes. Sabbath observance. Preparation for Sunday's resting in the Lord begins when Saturday makes some change in our everyday routine. Though the day itself may well be packed full, it can hold its own refreshment, the peace and joy of taking care of things we had to put off earlier in the week. The danger is that "things to do" can take on a life of their own and invade our Sabbath time. Setting some time limits and then prioritizing what most needs to be done is one way of extending Sabbath observance to the vigil. Another is to include in this day of preparation something we like to do, something we look forward to doing: perhaps a special supper menu, a phone visit with a friend, a more leisurely bath, some quiet time before going to bed. The endless possibilities need only be tailored to our own preference. Fruitful observance of the Sabbath itself, like the great com-mandments of loving God, neighbor, and self, revolves around worship, reaching out to others, and re-creative leisure. As we Wil,tingness to set our own interests aside opens us to the more of mystery. November-December 2001 Beba * On the Seventh Da~ God Rested know only too well, these will not happen unless we are prepared to make them happen. Time for worship is probably the easiest of these to schedule, but we still need careful planning lest we end up in such a rush that we spend most of the service becoming quiet enough to worship. Of course, if some truly unforeseen great need comes into our life, we worship by responding to that need. But on most weekends we can prepare for worship at least as carefully as we would for any other important appointment. If a scheduled meeting with an employer requires some attention to appearance and promptness and some thought preparation, worship of our God surely merits the same. Once the time for communal worship has been determined, the rest of the day can revolve around it. How begin our Sabbath day in such a way as to open our heart more fully to God? A slower start, a long shower, a more leisurely breakfast, not only make this day special but also quiet our restlessness, enabling us to be more present in worship. Getting outside for some early morning exercise can do the same, while some silent reflection may help others to change pace and be ready for prayer. Getting to church in ample time seems a necessity if weekday patterns are to be converted into Sabbath stillness. Letting the drivenness, competition, and workday worry fall away prepares our heads as well as our hearts to "hear the word of the Lord" (Is 1:10). Even an unsuccessful effort to attain inner peace and quiet is a form of worship. We are trying to give God's time back to God. Coming into God's presence along with others reminds us that all our worship is communal. We join with others, not only those with whom we immediately share sacred space this week, but all the people of God gathered for worship, observing their Sabbaths on Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Sons and daughters of God, we are all children of Abraham as well, our core unity greater than our all too apparent diversity. Gathering in a common worship space lets us take these theological realities and translate them into practical charity. What begins with the community of worship can flow out to a much wider world or can be focused on care of a family member or a needy neighbor next door. Because we do this together, our charity becomes expansive and yet not abstract. We are reminded of needs that we ourselves may never have experienced or been exposed to, and we are challenged not to forget the small service Review for Religious that has no glamour and wins no notice. In both cases we are stretched beyond ourselves, an attitude basic to any true worship. A third element in our Sabbath observance is leisure, some rest, an opportunity to be made new in re-creation. Unless given some thought, all our Sabbath time can disappear in the more evi-dent good works of prayer and care for others. But a leisure that renews us is basic to true love of God and of others. Something we really enjoy needs to be included in our Sabbath observance if we are to be faithful to a Creator God who first saw that everything was good and then rested in that joy. So Sabbath observance includes time to just be, to play in the world, to enjoy the good-ness that God has made. Our rest is worshipful because it is filled with the truth that this is God's world wrapped in God's care. Sabbath beyond the Sabbath Other Sabbaths beyond seventh-day observance are three-day weekends, full weeks of retreat, and full sabbaticals every seventh year. Smaller Sabbaths can occur at intervals on ordinary days. All of these can contribute to forming us into people of the Sabbath, people who are free and not slaves to what we do. We are wor-shipers in what we do for God, for others, and even for ourselves. Our day can begin with a personal offering of our day to God along with our getting out of bed. It can end with a night prayer that is part of our stretching out in bed and getting comfortable for sleep. What is important is a habit of praying that, over time, becomes worshipful living. Willingness to expose ourselves to worldwide concerns is part of our everyday Sabbath observance. Ordinary caring for others on ordinary days opens our hearts, making more room for God in our life as we do on our Sundays. Sabbath observance is not a narrowing of our lives. It is a grand and glorious expansion that is an image of eternity. -50! November-December 2001 DONALD MACDONALD Where Your Heart Is Adrug pusher in prison said that he well understood the evil effects of drugs, but if he left prison tomorrow the temptation to go back to drugs would be irresistible. He knew of no other way where so much money could be made so easily. He had neith'er the skills nor the connections to obtain a similar lifestyle any other way. A young merchant seaman on shore leave in his home port said that, each rime he d6cked and met his friends, he noticed that their lifestyles had progressed to levels.he could never hope to reach, no matter how hard he worked. They too dealt in drugs. For these and others, the attraction of a lifestyle for self and family funded by illicit drugs almost overwhelmed the power of reason, community feeling, or the gospel to offer something better. Famine of God's Word Many people growing up in our postmodern climate assume that there is no such thing as objective truth; that, even if there is, it is beyond our reach. There was a time when people assumed that reason ruled, or at least could provide us with a guide to life for the benefit of all. Two world wars later, the cruelty of various civil wars and the unavoidable evidence of global human suffering have shown that confidence in reason alone is misplaced. Even the rocketing progress of technology, with its potential for Donald Macdonald SMM writes again from Montfort House; Darnley Road; Barrhead, Glasgow; G78 1TA Scotland, U.K. Review for Religious good, has a number of self-destruct buttons, one or other of which someone is sure to press. The many forms of the media offer access to much that is good, but may also expose us to what is bad or sadly deficient. Western Christians, for example, are aware that a good many writers and producers of television seem to hold that any reverent mention of God is nonsense, and that it is open season for attack-ing the Catholic Church. There are many occasions for people, especially young people, to be misled or bewildered. If this assess-ment is accurate, that does not mean that people cannot avoid being hypnotized or depressed by it all. There is a blunt alterna-tive in the invitation to accept the challenge to "repent and to believe in the gospel" (Mk 1:15). It is crucial that those blessed with the gift of faith understand this as a viable alternative or, better, that, with the confidence of the early church, they give themselves to it as "The Way." ¯ Otherwise, time and energy will be wasted in a possibly dispirited response to what are judged to be the ills of society. To react forever and not initiate risks clouding Ourselves in perpetual negativity. The seemingly omnipotent secular battalions set the agenda, and Christians hurry to set some defenses up, almost breathless in a sadly polluted atmosphere. "Repent".has a 19th-century ring to it and, on that assump-tion, may be dismissed by those who thoroughly accept contem-porary culture. It is, in fact, a call to change our minds, to turn from being self-centered, to open ourselves to the will and guidance of God. It is a dynamic challenge, not a static ruefulness, and it offers a new perspective on life. It may so take hold of us that we become "a living sacrifice," giving ourselves completely to God in response to the wonder of God giving himself to us in Christ (see Rm 12:1-2). Whether it be "us" or "them," Christian tradition recognizes the seed of sin in everyone. It is not the whole picture, but it has its effect on human behavior. Cardinal Newman found "the being of God [to be] as certain to me as the certainty of my own existence." Regarding the society of his day, he said, "There I see a sight which fills me with unspeakable distress., the defeat of good, the success of evil, physical pain, mental anguish, the preva-lence and intensity of sin, the pervading idolatries, the corrup-tions, the dreary hopeless irreligion . [All of this] inflicts upon the mind the sense of a profound mystery, which is absolutely November-December 2001 Macdonald ¯ Where Your Heart Is beyond human solution . Either there is no Creator, or this living society., is in a true sense discarded from his presence." 1 Each category he mentions can be documented today--and perhaps the personal distress, too. Newman famously concluded that, "if there be a God, since there is a God, the human race is implicated in some terrible aboriginal calamity. It is out of joint with the purposes of its Creator.''2 The call to "repent and to believe" is the way out of this morass. "Bad religion" will not do it, and numbers of people have been hurt by it. But before so much hurt and "the dreary hopeless irreligion," with its miasmic presence stunting so much growth, the authentic way of Jesus Christ can guide us. This is the path religious walk on the jour-ney to God. The challenge is as insistent today as it was for the 1st or the 19th century; our century, like earlier ones, needs to hear the Good News. Pope John Paul said recently: "Even in countries evan-gelized many centuries ago, the reality of a 'Christian society' which . . . measured itself explicitly on gospel values is now gone. Today we must courageously face a situation which is becoming increasingly diversified and demanding" (§40).3 The church und.erstandably tries to come to terms with chang-ing structures in the contemporary world. Religious are often sad-dled with plant and too few personnel. Time and energy go into dismantling the structures, with pain to people and religious who have grown up seeing them as part of themselves. For many, this appears a sunset with nothing but darkness ahead to bury a once lively hope. But what if it indicates sunrise and the possibility of a graced opportunity to walk in newness of life, alive to God in Christ Jesus? Approach the Word To be open to thatl "we must rekindle in ourselves the impetus of the beginnings and allow ourselves to be filled with the ardor of the apostolic preaching" (§40). The zeal forming the church in the beginning came from the experienced presence of the Spirit of our risen Loi-d. To view the contemporary from within that perspective is to find ourselves with Someone who faced all that life could do to him, including crucifixion in his mother's presence, and who is alive with us today. Faced by contemporary relativism in a consequently fragmented society, Christians and Review for Religious especially religious would have so much more to offer, and so much more for themselves to believe in, if they realized that "holiness, a message that convinces without need for words, is the living reflection of the face of Christ" (§7). Familiarity with the authen-tic Jesus allows us to reflect him almost intuitively, as our faith is rekindled by who we see in the Gospel. It may then be impossible not to want to share what we have seen and heard. A glance at the Lukan Jerusalem journey (Lk 9:51-19:28) may help us glimpse something of the world of the early church, where the odds against Christians con-tin- uing to exist and influence society were immeasurably greater than anything we face. St. Luke's account begins with a thrice-repeated warning to consider where accompa-nying Jesus may lead, since "[Jesus] set his face to go to Jerusalem" and Samaritan villagers refused him hospitality "because his face was set toward Jerusalem" (9:51, 53). This is serious, not a day trip to the beach. The ostensibly encouraging "I will follow you wherever you go" (9:57) was not met with open arms by Jesus, but by a sharp warning to the individual to examine every syllable and consider what he meant. Does he really intend to volunteer for the same insecurity as his Leader, "the Son of Man [with] nowhere to lay his head" (9:58)? To come with Jesus may mean finding himself left like a leaf in a gutter--does he really want that? Another was bluntly told that commitment to Jesus comes before all family obligations: "Let the dead bury their own dead. ¯ . . You go and proclaim the kingdom of God" (9:60). Another would-be follower said he Would come, "but let me first say farewell to those at my home" (9:61). Jesus would leave by the time he came back, he was told; come now or not at all. The call is for mature persons who, once they have put hand to the 'plow, never look back. The humane pastoral concern of the Lukan Gospel is evident here in view of what happened at journey's end. No doubt this pattern was repeated time and again in the early years of the church. St. Luke's experience led him to believe that, while attrac-tion to Jesus is wonderful, it must include a realistic appraisal of what this means. We need to face ourselves as we face Christ; we Fami!iarity with the authentic Jesus allows us to reflect him almost intuitively. November-December 2001 Macdonald ¯ Where Your Heart Is must engage in true discernment. If Jesus himself "set his face," steeling himself to stay at one with his Father's will, would-be fol- ¯ lowers can do no less on the journey, unless they come as specta-tors and not companions. Fidelity to God's will as the guide to life is a daily and life-long challenge: "I must go on my way today and tomorrow and the day following, for it cannot be that a prophet should perish outside Jerusalem" (13:33). Jesus had to face his greatest challenge, one that would cost him his life. He did so after thoughtful reflec-tion, not as a witless victim. In the light of experience, he honestly asks no less of us. Later on the journey, at a time when "large crowds were traveling with him" (14:25), the message is reinforced as Jesus asks them why they are there: "Whoever comes to me and does not hate father arid mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple" (14:25-26). Even while noting that Hebrew has no word for prefer, we get the point. Every natural and rational tie must take second place to the gift of myself to Christ. This is not meant to put people off. It asks us to consider seriously what we undertake if we accompany Jesus. We will always have Jesus, but perhaps at the cost of losing much else and, as it may appear, Jesus as we would want him to be. How much are we prepared to pay for that? We are asked to really consider this as we look to give ourselves to the gospel challenge. Our attraction to Jesus has to be constant and compelling if we are to genuinely repent and believe in him. Realistic Lukan pastoral care has Jesus ask yet again for mature thought about what it means to accompany him through life: "Which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise . . . not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him" (14:28-29). A second parable suggests pondering the consequences of going to war with ten thousand against an oppo-nent who has twenty thousand (14:3 i). This reflects the almost unbearable concern of Jesus and the evangelist, who have journeyed together and know the implica-tions of accepting the invitation to come with them. The verses . immediately before and after these challenging parables tell us why: "whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple . . . so, therefore, none of you can be my Review for Religious disciple if you do not give up all your possessions" (14:27, 33). The rest is surely silence, with mature prayer, reflection, and advice to help us see where we go from here.4 The Power of the Word Bearing one's cross is both a superb challenge and practical advice in view of the implications of accompanying Jesus. Even at first reading, we pick up the implied heroism, the need for great courage and strength. Yet, on gospel evidence, Jesus' closest disciples display a humanity that we can recognize in ourselves. There is, then, something attainable here. We should not put the challenge on the shelf as an impossible ideal. There is never a suggestion that it is a mistake to accompany Jesus. There must be something superlatively attractive in the per-son of Jesus that enables his disciples to hear such a challenge and actually take it up. The desire to understand how that enablement works is reason for opening our-selves to God's Word in Scripture. This is what was done at the beginning of monastic and reli-gious life. The desert fathers and mothers wanted to know from experience what it meant to leave all for Jesus, to accept the Sermon on the Mount's challenge to live without cares in the freedom promised by the gospel. Scripture helped them make the attempt and persevere. They and their contemporaries saw how Scripture's power could form them into people who have nothing as the world would understand it, yet were themselves rich in the currency of the gospel and able to make others similarly rich. They were truly influential people. The gospel, finding lodging in individual hearts, made for intimacy with God and love for others. As subsequent centuries learned, time given to Scripture, and to the Spirit of our risen Lord found therein, can make abounding love for others available to us too. Disciplined daily reading--allowing the words to register with us, and gently persuading us that we are hearing them for the first time--can transfigure us too. We need such transfiguring to approach a Lukan conclusion: "So, therefore, whoever of you does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple" (14:33). Jesus" closest disciples display a humanity that we can recognize in ourselves. November-December 2001 Macdonald ¯ [~here Your Heart Is Nearer our time, that challenge was taken up by Charles de Foucauld, and his life is yet another proof of the transforming power of the word. He took the challenge of the Jerusalem jour-ney to heart. A religious, photocopying his "self-offering," offered me copies to send to friends. The gothic lettering was beautiful, but as I read it I wondered whether I had the courage to keep a copy beside me, much less send one to others. It reads in part: "Father, I abandon myself into your hands. Do with me what-you will. Whatever you may do, I thank you. I am ready for all. I accept all. Let only your will be done in me and in all your creatures. I wish no more than this, O Lord. to surrender myself into your hands without reserve, and with confidence beyond all question-ing, because you are my Father." Here are the terms of acceptance for accompanying Jesus on the journey through life. To invoke the prayer and patronage of such a man in Christ and, if I dare, to keep his self-dedication where I can see it--these things can help me join others on the Jerusalem journey. They can lead me to the sources that fed him. They are necessary in a world where so much competes for my self. Jesus on the Jerusalem journey points out that the heart may not be left empty. Even when all that is evil is forced from the heart, evil may return with immense power and bring "seven other spirits more evil than itself.and the last state of that person is worse thanthe first" (11:26). The evangelists, ~e fathers, Charles de Foucauld, and others can only encourage us to open our hearts to the power that made them mirrors of the gospel. With this shared enthusiasm for God in Christ continually fed by what we see in them, we in turn become faithful members of the company of Jesus. This is not for everyone, but it may be for us. Among the obstacles to accompanying Jesus as sketched in the Jerusalem journey is the risk of having a divided heart. Pressure to back away, to be close but not too close to Jesus, is always .there in one form or another. While it helps to steep ourselves in the gospel and invite the influence of those who clearly live for God alone in Christ, we must also try to live simply and so nourish detachment from everything but God's will. The less clutter around us, the freer are we to give ourselves to what w~ are asked. Often, tO want something is to get it. We get into a car, pick up a phone, write a check, press a key, or ask for it--and presently we have it. This is not true for vast tracts of the world, but it is true for much of it; and, given the chance, most people on every con- Review for Religious tinent seem to want to live like that. Religious professedly "poor in fact and spirit" share that same humanity. Because of this human tendency to acquire, they need constant vigilance, personal disci-pline, and continually renewed motivation in order to accompany Jesus on his gospel journey. Our circumstances need to reflect the authentic gospel challenge. Otherwise, despite our intent the cri-teria offered by the Lukan Jerusalem journey will seem an impos-sible ideal--the sort of ideal someone had in mind when saying archly that, with the Ten Commandments, "as in any examina-tion, only five need be attempted." Without the insight of faith, our postmodern environmental circumstances are likely to keep sug-gesting a "more reasonable" way of life, and we are likely to accept it unthinkingly. The chapel of a religious community, open on Sunday for Mass to a hundred or so people, presented a stark picture during Lent. The crucifix and statues were covered. A large swathe of purple material across the front of the altar ended in a symbolically overturned chalice. The lecterns from where Scripture was read and the gospel preached were engulfed in purple. The branches of a leafless tree reached up and out from its purpled-wrapped trunk. To the visitor it said that for this community Lent really meant something. Something has happened here. For the people wor-shiping here on Sunday, if the words spoken were at one with the setting, they could scarcely be less than disturbing. If, however, the religious community's life were at one with those words and those symbols, people attending would receive sufficient support and encouragement. The chapel inside the house, however, where the community prayed and worshiped with a few people during the week, was rather differe.nt. There was no suggestion of purple, aridity, or stark challenge in the folksy, chatty chapel. It was, in a word, domestic. There was no provision, no place, for a moment of pri-vacy in which individuals might face themselves before God; the chairs around the orange carpet formed a square with the altar, and people spoke and laughed easily across the space. A visitor asked how the community could issue so sharp a statement to people coming on Sunday from the pressures of their postmodern environment, and yet offer so little challenge in the chapel where they themselves were at home. They may have spent the night in prayer, dined on bread and water, and been selfless in serving the poor, but the climate they chose for themselves for November-December 2001 Macdonald * Where Your Heart Is addressed and told to consider whether we can leave everything, even life itself, to accompany Jesus. worship and prayer did not suggest that. The Sunday chapel may have been a liturgical or catechetical visual-aid for others; but, if they were to accompany their Lord to Jerusalem's summit, much more than a public gesture was necessary. It might be a good idea to have a framed copy of Charles de Foucauld's "dedication" in both chapels, but, for us and others to glimpse the simplicity of what he saw, we need to recognize that environment and appro-priate symbols matter, that we must make special efforts to free ourselves from many assumptions of contemporary society. Unless we do this, an easy acceptance of what we see around us in matters of lifestyle, furnishings, and aspirations will inevitably lead us into a certain secularity. Earlier history and the evidence of the last thirty years surely make that point incontrovertible. There can be no objective and globally acceptable standard here, but, for people who think of accepting the blunt challenge of the Jerusalem journey, surroundings do matter. One by one we are addressed and told to consider whether we can leave every-thing, even life itself, to accompany OFle by oFle we are Jesus. As ever, the situation is made plain in the Lukan approach: "Go on your way. I am sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves. Carry no. purse, no bag, no sandals, and greet no one on the road. What-ever house you enter, first say, 'Peace to this house'" (10:3-5). Our sole security lies in being with Jesus, but, for such security to be ours, we must leave much else on which people around us reasonably rely. To behave differently we must see other than they do. In our dedication to the gospel, we scarcely have time for normal civilities, and yet we frequently offer the gift of peace and expect our words to have effect. We must accompany our risen Lord closely to function like that. Even if we sometimes see bringing some peace as a short-term mission, the effort may still be a weighty burden, and one that is clearly related to the rest of the Jerusalem journey. If our following of Jesus occurs in "the real world" (where being a lamb among wolves argues no future and scarcely any pre-sent), temptations to go through a gap in the hedge for a respite from the effort of keeping close to Jesus will inevitably occur. Lukan pastoral care admits as much: "Whoever denies me before others will be denied before the angels of God" (12:8-9). On arriv-ing in Jerusalem, the disciples collapsed under the pressure and did deny Jesus. In a postmodern world, we too are frail human beings, and the pressure to distance ourselves from him, not least by a more "reasonable" lifestyle, will always be there. To prevent this, we need to know where our real wealth is. "Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also" (12:34). Jesus' answer to the rich young man's question, "What shall I do to inherit eternal life?" left him sad, "for he had great possessions" (18:18, 22) and his heart was not as close to Jesus as he had sup-posed. "Jesus looking at him said, 'How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God. For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle" (18:24-25). Money and the power it brings opens most doors here on earth, but Jesus makes it unmistakably plain that it cannot buy anyone's way into his company. But for the grace of God, it would perhaps be an insuperable obstacle. Delight in the Word Inviting and challenging, Jesus looks at us too. He wants our company so much that he has risen from a grave to enable us to enter into his kingdom. There is a personal.relationship here. Intimacy with God and living at one with God's will, these are what living life to the full means. Here is human purpose, and our purpose. "Jesus rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, 'I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent and have revealed them to infants . All things have been handed over to me by my .Father" (10:21-22). These words are spoken after the disciples' excited return from venturing out among the people supported only by trust in Jesus' word. Now they know from experience something of the possibilities and power of his message. Many others who seem better placed than they to understand do not know what the disciples know. Jesus is ecstatic. "Thrilled with joy in the Holy Spirit," he looks in wonder at these "infants" who were coming to know him and his Father. On our journey you and I ake in the company of our risen Lord; we. are not isolated strangers at a bus stop waiting for something to turn up. We should be full of wonder at who we are November-December 2001 Macdonald ¯ Where Your Heart Is and what we have in Christ, and never take our identity primarily from people lacking the insight of faith. In Christ, who has "given you authority., over all the power of the enemy, and nothing will hurt you" (10:19), Satanic power can be successfully challenged. "Then, turning to the disciples, Jesus said to them privately, 'Blessed are the eyes that see what you see! . . . many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it'" (10:2,3-24). Like John the Baptist, these people, for all their insight, could only prepare for or point to what the disciples were enjoying from within the company of Jesus. To those outside that company, his parables and teaching might be helpful stories to take or leave; but, for the "infants" around Jesus; these words reached both mind and heart and helped form their consciences as guides to life. There is much more for us to see if we "infants" develop genuine receptivity to and then realization of the gift of God in the risen Christ. Insofar as the wonder of that gift is ours, we will have the "stick-to-itive-ness," courage, and conviction to share .it with others on the jour-ney. We know that We are treasured by our risen Lord, and so we come to treasure him. He is where our heart is! For perhaps significant numbers of religious and would-be religious, it is asking too much to make more that a notional con-nection between words then and work now. The biblical word is respected, but even in generally literate societies words do not always communicate in depth, often because there are just too many of them to hold our attention. Yet, to this day in the his-tory of the church and consecrated life, Scripture has had an intrin-sic power which people have felt and which has energized for God some of the greatest evangelical witnesses. A contemporary vade mecum of consecrated life--P~'ta conse-crata-- points to Scripture as "the first source of all Christian spir-ituality." There is undoubtedly a wider awareness of this in recent .decades, but we may have some way to go before all of us have the view that "the primacy of holiness and prayer is inconceivable without a renewed listening to the word of God, . . . a life-giving encounter., which draws from the biblical text the living word which questions, directs, and shapes our lives" (§39). Only some-one like the Holy Father, speaking from experience of that back-ground and also very aware of the contemporary challenge to the gospel, could be convinced that, while "we do not know what the new millennium has in store for us,., we are certain that it is safe Revie't.v for Religious in the hands of Christ." (§35). The Lukan Jerusalem journey, approached from within that mindset, would produce a like conviction. Pope John Paul saw the pilgrims in Rome for Jubilee 2000 as representative of so many others, each individual reflecting "the story of someone whom Christ had met, and who in dialogue with him was setting out again on a journey of hope" (§8). As an older brother, perhaps, on the journey, he has learned from experience that, "if Christ is presented to young people as he really is, they experience him as an answer that is convincing and they can accept his message, even when it is demanding and bears the mark of the cross" (§9). This is why he does not hesitate to challenge and call on them "to make a radical choice of faith and life., a stupen-dous task; to become 'morning watchmen' (Is 21:11-12) at the dawn of the new millennium" (§9). Consecrated people, glimpsing Christ "as he really is" from the Gospel pages, might feel called to respond to that same challenge as they journey together, eager to share their delight in their risen Lord. "Remaining firmly anchored in Scripture, we open ourselves to the action of the Spirit" (§17), and who can say where that may lead us? Notes t John Henry Newman, Apologia pro Vita Sua (Longmans Green, 1890), p. 241. 2 Newman, Apologia, p. 242. 3 John Paul II, Apostolic Letter, Novo Millennio Ineunte, Rome, 6 January 2001. Numbers here and subsequently refer to paragraphs. 4 Walter J. Ciszek sJ, He Leadeth Me, repays rereading for an appre-ciation of faith today. through/be ~do~n! ~nd Cbri~tmo~ t~ b/~6~ing~ of ~oat'~ ~nt~dng into $ia creation in November-December 2001 church and MARIE BRINKMAN Criteria for Change: Women's Ministering to the Body of Christ ministry To search in the past for signs of a viable future for reli-gious women's communities is to reverse the usual order of things, but that is what I intend. I offer a rationale for searching there. I seek, however, not criteria for esti-mating outcomes of change, but rather the foundation made up of sisters' lives which itself takes the measure of other criteria and thus provides the framework for wise discernment. The dawn of a new millennium suggests radical change, much of it underway, yet brings from some quarters hints of probable demise. We know that, for the authors of the many articles and books on the present situation of religious men and women, the good of God's people is the primary concern. And we well know that, if religious communities are to survive, they will do so in response to that people's need and in fidelity to the gospel, particularly its radical counsels. These are any century's religious foundations and the basis for all reform and renewal. But, in the life of religious communities of women, what in particular urges their Marie Brinkman SCL presented this paper at the History of Women Religious Conference at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in June 2001. She is a professor at Saint Mary College; 4100 South Fourth Street; Leavenworth, Kansas 6604-8. Review for Religious continuance? What characteristics should serve as norms for appropriate change, in the face of diminishing numbers, advancing median ages, and increasing opportunities for minis-tering to God's people in lay and secular life? In her hopeful assessment of a third-millennial future for women religious, Jo Ann Kay McNamara observes that sisters from the "young" African and Asian churches "are already in the process of changing their worlds as their foremothers in the West did for so many centuries." And she foresees "a larger global sisterhood" in which religious women of the West will revise their institutions and women of all cultures will devise new forms of rule, commu-nity, and ministry (pp. 643-644). Ways of envisioning and shaping such inevitabilities are what we must seek. In this regard Joel Giallanza csc asserts that "the quality and integrity of religious life as a sign of unity in the church for the future is direcdy related to the quality and integrity which religious life embodies today" (pp. 468-469). That quality and integrity must inform any criteria for discerning constructive change in community and ministry. When communities, particularly apostolic ones, revisit their charism (as Vatican documents on religious life have urged) and when they engage laypersons as associates (communal or profes-sional) in the realization of that charism, even in these charted waters they run risks described by Francis W. Danella OSFS. While believing that "efforts to recapture the spirit of the foundation have been the singularly most hopeful development in religious life since the council" (p. 266), Danella cites a major risk, that of failure to integrate individual needs and community priorities, personal growth and the common good. We might well add that it is a risk rooted in human nature that has become greater in the last three decades. It takes subtle forms that only habitual and rigorous spiritual discernment at every level of decision making and leadership can recognize. Mary Anne Foley CND, in her careful critique of two widely read works of the past decade, Ann Carey's Sisters in Crisis and Quifionez and Turner's Transformation of ,4merican Catholic Sisters, asks for continuing dialogue between the polarized constituencies studied by these authors (pp. 342-357). She acknowledges serious inadequacies attending the documentation of their views, but is convinced that nonetheless the Spirit speaks to us through one another, within our diverse limitations. Her most significant obser- November-December 2001 Brinkman ¯ Criteria for Chan~e The fundamental question before us, I think, is whether personal relationship to God, in its rhythm of continuing call and free response, has taken directions in the lives of religious women so concrete as to be guidelines for the future. vation, I think, follows a statement that Christian men and women have for centuries linked their lives to God by means of vows. She adds: "They have done this not., primarily as a witness to oth-ers, but because God has somehow reached into their lives, and so, in being true to themselves, they structure their lives around their rela-tionship to God" (my emphasis; pp. 351,356). She credits Edward Vacek sJ for the latter concept. Here we draw close to the source of continuity over two thousand years of religious commu-nity life, regardless of what reforms or renewals have attended it. The same source or cause will guarantee its contin-uance throughout another millennium. Michael Himes would call the source a radical poverty, an ultimate dependency that he says is "the key value in the vows" (p. 21). Joan Chittister would call it the ultimate commitment and radical atten-tiveness to the presence of God in every aspect of a vowed life. It is my contention, hardly'unique, that this centrality of God, this fact of personal relationship to God, realized and grasped as the origin and end of all resolve and purpose, and of all consequent rela-tionship and mission, is the efficacious cause of continuing life in religious com-munity. All change and adaptation, all forms of communal living and ministry that may develop, will be tested and must be evaluated by this criterion. But spiritual reality must take sensible form if it is to become a human measure of worth. As adaptations and innovations multiply, so do reports and projections. More significant are potentially prophetic voices that try to discern the Spirit in radical change and the reactions it pro-vokes. Few--scholars and prophets included--would presume to forecast the future with confidence. Some contemplate the end of our life as we have known it, or its evolution into confederations, syneisactic (Greek syneisdgein, to. bring in together) communities of mixed genders and terms of commitment, new monastic/apos- Review for Religious tolic arrangements, or vowed ministry within a church defined in nonhierarchical terms. The fundamental question before us, I think, is whether per-sonal relationship to God, in its rhythm of continuing call and free response, has taken directions in the lives of religious women so concrete as to be guidelines for the future--directions, in fact, so clear as to suggest qualities essential to the continuance and integrity of these women's communities. The limitation of aca-d

Issue 53.5 of the Review for Religious, September/October 1994. ; Review for Religious (ISSN 0034-639X) is published bi-monthly at Saint Louis University by the Jesuits of the Missouri Province. Editorial Office: 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, Missouri 63108-3393. Telephone: 314-535-3048 ¯ Fax: 314-535-0601 Manuscripts, books for review, and correspondence with the editor: Review for Religious ¯ 3601 Lindell Boulevard ° St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. Correspondence about the Canonical Counsel department: Elizabeth McDonough OP ¯ P.O. Box 29260 ¯ V~rashington, DC 20017. POSTMASTER Send address changes to Review for Religious ° P.O. Box 6070 ° Duluth, MN 55806. Second-class postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri, and additional mailing offices. See inside back cover for information on subscription rates. ©1994 Review for Religious Permission is herewith granted to copy any material (articles, poems, reviews) contained in this issue of Review for Religious for personal or internal use, or for the personal or internal use of specific library, clients within the limits outlined in Sections 107 and/or 108 of the United States Copyright Law. MI copies made under this permission must bear notice of the source, date, and copyright owner on the first page. This permission is NOT extended to copying for commercial distribu-tion, advertising, institutional promotion, or for the creation of new collective works or anthologies. Such permission will only be considered on written application to the Editor, Review for Religious. for religious Editor Associate Editors Canonical Counsel Editor Assistant Editors Advisory Board David L. Fleming SJ Philip C. Fischer SJ Regina Siegfried ASC Elizabeth McDonough OP Jean Read Mary Ann Foppe Joann Wolski Conn PhD Mary Margaret Johanning SSND Iris Ann Ledden SSND Edmundo Rodriguez SJ David Werthmann CSSR Suzanne Zuercher OSB Christian Heritages and Contemporary Living SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 1994 ¯ VOLUME53 ¯ NUMBER5 contents living gospel values 646 Inculturation 658 Timothy Radcliffe OP faces us with the challenge of inculturating the gospel not only in countries aod cultures not our own hut also in our local home situation. Second-Stage Inculturation: Six Principles of the American Mind J.J. Mueller SJ presents the tensions caused for Americans formed by principles embedded in their culture and the ways of thinking and acting which are a part of the Vatican culture. leadership and authority 675 The Challenge of Priestly Leadership J. Peter Sartain reflects on the ministry of leadership entrusted to priests which is at the heart of their call to holiness. 694 Election: A Call to Service Catherine M. Harmer MMS considers the ele'ments involved in an election process in religious congregations for selecting leadership. 703 Authority: An Imitative Charisln A. Paul Dominic SJ examines the authority exercised by Jesus in order to understand the kind of authority we in the church should imitate. continuing formation 711 A Tale of Two Synods: Laity and Clergy Formation Robert L Kinast examines the formation of laity and clergy proposed in recent synods and suggests ways of furthering the relational process between them. 724 Religious Formation and Ecumenical Formation Ernest R. Falardeau SSS reports on the National Ecumenical Consultation for men and women religious which met in April 1994 at Narragansett, Rhode Island. 642 Review for Religious 728 744 751 prayer and growth Contemplative Prayer among Apostolic Religious Women Jeanne Knoerle SP assesses the contemplative attitude in the tradition of apostolic religious women. Shame, Mystical Writers, and a Spirituality of Self James J. Magee DSW clarifies the restorative influence that the Christian mystical tradition can provide for shame-bound religious. The Ought of the Ignatian Quest John P. Mossi SJ examines.the life experience of Ignatius Loyola as a paradigm for searching out God's will for our individual lives. 761 768 774 faith experience Reflection on the Solitary Life Theresa Mancuso explores the richness of the solitary life as living in the hollow of God's hand. My Faith Journey M. Gemma Victorino PI)DM recalls a most important moment of a parent's death for the deepening of a vocational commitment. A Rock to Build On Vincent Hovley SJ challenges us to enter more dynamically into a Eucharistic way of living. departments 644 Prisms 781 Canonical Counsel: The Contemplative Dimension of Religious Life 787 Book Reviews Septentber-October 1994 643 prisms One of my favorite sayings is that the church is as healthy as religious life is healthy. I believe that is true. Of course, we may also say that the church is as healthy as the laity are healthy, or as healthy as the bish-ops, priests, and deacons are healthy. St. Paul was the first to reflect about the church in terms of a healthy body. "The eye cannot say to the hand, 'I do not need you,' any more than the head can say to the feet, 'I do not need you'" (1 Cor 12:21). He says directly, "If one member suf-fers, all the members suffer with it; if one member is hon-ored, all the members share its joy" (1 Cor 12:26). Although Vatican Council II took a major step for-ward in our theological understanding of ourselves as church in its Dogmatic Constitution on the Church (Lumen gentium), it seems that we now stand poised for further theological development. Perhaps the synod on consecrated life will provide an occasion to explore more adequately the interrelationships of the hierarchical and charismatic elements integral to the church. The synod may at least be a stimulus for raising questions about the centrality of holiness and the role of a significant group of members, identified by a form of Christian life called con-secrated, in the healthy life of the church. Such church members, commonly grouped under the term religious life, are identified as keepers of the spiritual heritages of the Body of Christ. Holiness is God's gift to all members of Christ's Body, but in God's providence it is meant to shine through the Body more brightly because of God's action in calling forth religious life. Religious life is not created or manufactured by human ingenuity; it is not modeled on a guru tradition of pre-Christian reli- 644 Review for Religious gions. It is not legislated into existence by a bishop's decree. Just as God in Jesus and in the Spirit bestows upon the church various hierarchic and charismatic gifts, so the same Lord gifts the church with certain members, both women and men, called and con-firmed in their following of Jesus through evangelical counsels. As with any gift, the church can only receive gratefully--and then care for and make use of--God's graciousness. The synod serves as an example of members of the hierarchy exercising their proper care and reverence for God's gift present in other members. For its part, then, religious life does bear a heightened respon-sibility for the healthiness of the church--not in terms of mis-sionary activity, not in terms of educational or social services, not in terms of leadership, but primarily and expressly in terms of spirituality, a life of holiness. Although "I want to be holy" sounds too simple to explain the myriad forms of the religious follow-ing of Christ through the ages, it is the grounding of the response to the gospel imperative "go, sell, come, follow." Evangelical counsels can too quickly come to be defined by a threefold identity of poverty, chastity, and obedience. The monas-tic beginnings of religious life clearly indicate that the imitation of Christ by evangelical counsels is far broader and deeper. The Spirit continues to raise up religious groups marked by the total dedication of evangelical counsels. But such a consecration takes shape, as it did in the first monastic groups, through various expressions consonant with a specific gospel inspiration, but dif-ferent from the venerable though limited way of the three vows of medieval spirituality. Healthy holiness in our day may find the church recognizing many forms of religious life not by the three traditional vows, but still by ~h.e norm of evangelical counsels in imitation of Jesus. Religious life has often been described as a troublesome or meddlesome element in the church. Yes, the head or hand of the Body might wonder whether life would be easier without this member. But one cannot dictate the kind of gift one receives; one cannot control the Giver. If the holiness of God in Christ today seeks to shine thoughout the Body in ever new prismatic ways through the gift of women .and men religious, people should respond not by complaint, but by asking in gratitude for more of such a gift. For we as a church strive to be healthy by becoming ever more God's holy people. David L. Fleming SJ September-October 1994 645 TIMOTHY RADCLIFFE Inculturation living gospel values It is a great pleasure for me to have been here these last few days, listening to this debate on Inculturation in Religious Life and Formation. I want to share a few very si~nple reflections on the throne but with great hesitation, since I am becoming one of the least inculturated people I know. I move so rapidly from one country to another that I have to look out of the window when I get up to remember where I am: "There are coconut trees, and so it cannot be London." In fact when I was in Chicago, one person thought from my accent that I was Irish and another that I was Australian. Here one of my own broth-ers has the idea that I am American. I am starting to get worried! Secondly, I have no expertise in this area. At the General Chapter of Mexico we talked much about incul-turation and acculturation and deculturation and inter-culturation. At the end I swore to myself that I would never again say anything about such matters. But the first lesson I have learned as Master of the Order is that of obedience, and so here goes. The last time that I was in England I had lunch with an aunt, and she asked me what I thought of Hans Kfing. Timothy Radcliffe OP serves as Master General of the Order of Preachers. He delivered this address to the Second Joint Conference of Dominican major superiors and formators at Nagpur, India, on 21 October 1993. It was published in Dominican Ashram 12, no. 4 (December 1993): 149-159. Father Radcliffe may be addressed at Convento Santa Sabina; Piazza Pietro d'Illiria, Aventino; 00153 Rome, Italy. 646 Review for Religious So I started to explain what I thought were his strengths and weaknesses. After five minutes she stopped me and said: "My dear, all I want to know is this: Is he good or is he ba'd?" And let's face it, in most theological debate that is what people wish to know! And if my aunt were here today, I would say to her: Yes, incul-turation is a good thing. In fact, there can be no good theology which is not inculturated. One problem in the church is that peo-ple often think that whereas one might find inculturated theology in India or Africa, where they live, whether it is Rome or Munich, no such contextualization is necessary. But I would like to add three points: 1. The Gospel should both embrace and transform any cul-ture in which it is planted. 2. No culture is pure and static. Every culture is in a con-stant process of evolution, creating new meaning; other-wise it is dead. The Gospel should meet a culture where it is most creative and fresh, like a bee seeking out the nectar of the flower. 3. Inculturation is always painful, like any process of com-ing to birth. And we can only engage in it if we are pre-pared to experiment and sometimes fail. This requires great mutual trust. There are many other things that I would like to add, such as the need for prayer and for study if inculturation is to have depth, but those comments will have to wait for another time. The Gospel Both Embraces and Criticizes Any Culture It Encounters As Father Thomas Aykara CMI said, the fundamental event of inculturation is the Incarnation. God, the source of all, becomes a squealing, crying, Jewish baby who needed to have his nappies changed and who had to learn to walk and speak like any other child. Often people fear that inculturation might fragment the universal church and divide us from each other, and yet the one in whom we are united, the one who overthrows the boundaries of division, is this first-century Jewish man. You cannot get more inculturated than that. At the same time one must say that Jesus was one who threatened Jewish identity, who challenged the Law and who welcomed the Samaritan'. He was utterly Jewish, and yet he was perceived as a threat to Sep~mber-O~ober1994 647 Radcliffe ¯ Inculturation A culture is not only defined by whom it excludes, but by what it shuts out, by its perceptions of reality, its underlying philosophy. Jewish identity. And this must surely always be so in .every moment of incuituration. Every culture builds a home in which the Gospel may be welcomed. But every home excludes a stranger who must be welcomed and whose presence is perceived as threatening. Every culture has its Harijans [outcasts]. A culture is not only defined by whom it excludes, but by what it shuts out, by its perceptions of reality, its underlying phi-losophy. These too are challenged by the Gospel. We can see the same process at work when Christianity embraces the Roman world. We adopt the language of the Romans and speak Latin; we still build our church on the basis of their halls, even here at Nagpur; the priest wears a distant descendant of Roman clothes; we accepted much of the vision of Roman law. And yet Christianity reached out beyond the boundaries of the Empire to e~nbrace the stranger, for example, the Irish! The foreigner is made at home. Every culture is both wel-comed and transformed. The Spirit is dike yeast which transforms what it meets. In France grapes become wine; in England hops become the loveliest beer; in Scotland grain becomes whiskey; in Japan rice beco~nes saki. And this reflects that founding act of Christ who performed that utterly Jewish act of celebrating the Passover, the feast of the home, and yet used it to found a com-munity in which everyone had a place: the betrayer like Judas, the denier like Peter, and all the disciples who would run away and leave their savior alone. It is the home in which anyone can belong. During my travels around the Order this first year I have seen how in every continent, inculturation poses this same question: Who is the stranger whom we must welcome? In Africa, for exam-ple, where tribal identity is strong, and where the Order is per-ceived as a tribe, the challenge is to make at home the members of another tribe, to be a tribe beyond tribalism. I went to Rwanda which has been deeply divided by conflicts between two tribes. 648 Review for Religious Here our Vicariate of Rwanda and Burundi is a sign of the Gospel, for members of both tribes live together as brothers. This is an incarnation of the Gospel, in which our identity as human beings is prized, open, stretched and transformed. When I went to Zaire in February it was in a state of near civil war between tribal groups. You could see how the church was trying to enter the extraordinary richness of that culture and be truly Zairean. The liturgy was wonderfully African, alive and beautiful. But we also had to challenge the tribal identities and invite people to find themselves in Christ. In Guatemala, the strangers are perhaps above all the indige-nous people living in the mountains. Here we have a wonderful experiment of inculturation in which the Dominican sisters and the brothers are cooperating. At Coban in the mountains of Alta Vera Paz, the sisters are accepting many indigenous vocations and seeking to evolve a way of being a Dominican that respects their customs, their lovely songs, their ways of dressing and being human. The brethren have built a study center nearby, which is in contact with the brethren working in the indigenous villages, collecting information about their rituals and customs, so that we can find a way of evolving an indigenous way of being Dominican for both the men and the women. The stranger is made welcome. But what is the challenge that we must put to them? A priest who worked with the Masai in Kenya wished to have a truly inculturated Eucharist, and so he tried to make it as African as possible. When he turned up to preside he found that gath-ered around the table were only the men. The women were not to be seen. So he asked: "Where are the women?" And the men replied: "It is not our custom to eat with the women." Is that inculturation or a betrayal of the Gospel? No prizes for the cor-rect answer! In the discussion group in which I have participated at this conference we found similar questions posed in the context of Asia. On the one hand, we saw that there was' much to learn from the Indian understanding of the gztrlt, the master. We were reminded that becoming a master demanded real asceticism, real renunciation, a real poverty and simplicity of life. [I was not, I might say, taking all of this personally.] Do we, who are regarded as gurus, really make that deep apprenticeship of silence and asceti-cism? Do the religious of Hinduism and Buddhism put us to shame? VVhere might one find Dominic in India if he walked the Septe~ttber-O~ober 1994 649 Radcliffe * Inculturation roads today? Would we meet him walking the roads with a beg-ging bowl, like a Jain holy man? Does not this culture challenge us to rediscover our own ascetic and mendicant tradition? Yet at the same time we foun'd that we wished to challenge some aspects of the Asian understanding of the guru. We do not expect the dis-ciple to submit to the master in blind obedience. As the provin-cial of the Philippines said: "The master must teach the disciple to learn to learn, to learn creativity, originality. If he stands on the master's shoulders it is to see farther." I think that Western culture poses particular problems with regard to.inculturation. You do not find theologians demanding that we be inculturated and adopt the norms of our society; yet that is often what is happening. I think that this is partially because it has become not just one culture among the cultures of the world. Since the fall of communism, it has become the one global culture which threatens to suck in and absorb all others in its vast stomach. Western consumerist capitalism is the culture which simultaneously embraces nearly everyone and excludes the vast majority. It touches most of humanity and shuts it out from its promised land. It sells everyone a TV so that they may see par-adise and then forbids them to enter. For me a symbol of this was a visit to Soweto a couple of years ago. I wandered about this sad and exuberant place, this great township of some two million African people, which was not until recently even marked on South African maps. I came across a school and ambled in. The children ran to me shouting what I thought was some obscure African word, "ninja." It turned out to refer to some strange turtles that are the heroes of the then latest TV series in the United States. They had cups and T shirts and even shoes covered with pictures of these ninja turtles. These children were offered the culture of American TV and told they could never belong. I think also of the endless queues of people waiting in Moscow to buy a McDonald's hamburger, a week's wages for this "holy wafer" of Western culture. Do'we Dominicans wish to be radically inculturated into this culture? Will this add new riches to our religious life? This is a culture of wealth, not just of wealthy people but of the glory of money. Perhaps more radically than in any other society, the poor cannot properly belong, since they are by definition those who have failed. Their fate is invisibility. Of course, I do not for one moment deny the wonderful things that this culture has produced 650 Review for Religious and its real inventiveness, its tolerance for human difference, its love of human rights, and so on. But I would still suggest that we religious must resist inculturation here and be with those who do not belong. But do we? This is a question I put to the superiors of the Dominican Leadership Conference in the United States last week. Even the language we use suggests we are sucked into an alien view of the world. The Prior Provincial becomes part of "the Administration," a sort of chief executive; the brethren become personnel, and instead of a love of poverty we have end-less discussions of budgets. Maybe the vows of our religious life are in such radical contradiction with the values of the consumerist West that we can thrive as religious only if we opt out, become out-culturated! Chastity seems puerile, poverty absurd, and obe-dience infantile. I also think that it is interesting that this matter of poverty illustrates the ambiguity of the relationship of the Gospel and culture. In India there is precisely a religiou~ tradition which respects poverty and which invites us to embrace it; in the West there is a culture of wealth which we are invited to refuse. Inculturation is then both an embrace and a challenge. And it must be so for the identity to which we are called as Christians is beyond our naming. Who we are is a mystery hidden in God. For, as St. John says: "My children, we know that we are God's children now, but we do not know what we are to be. We know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him" (1 Jn 3:2). Inculturation and Creativity I was fascinated by the argument between professors Pawar and Mataji the first evening. As a good Dominican, I love an argu-ment. It was wonderful to hear someone challenge our assumption that inculturation was a good thing. We seemed to be faced with a dilemma: to inculturate and risk assimilation or to stick to our own traditions and culture and go on being foreigners. Do you do what the Buddhists do or follow the Roman rubrics? What a sticky spot to be in! It is my own view that this is a false dilemma, for it only faces us if we make the mistake of thinking of culture as something frozen, stuck, immobile, like a pure white ice cream in a cultural deep freeze. Here you have some set and eternal thing which is Indian culture, whose practices you either adopt or remain a foreigner. Septentber-October 1994 651 Radcliffe ¯ Inculturation Perhaps the magic of Indian culture for me is precisely its complexity and fluidity, forever old and new. This is symbolized by what I have heard from the window of my room. In the evening I heard the sound of the music of some Hindu festivals; maybe it was for the festival of the goddess. Mixed with the beat of the drums was the rhythm of one of those endless trains on that net-work of railway lines holding the subcontinent together. In the early hours I have heard another train, whose hooter strangely resonated with the early morning call to prayer of the mosque, perhaps played on a tape recorder. Every culture is alive in a con-stant state of transformation, of meeting other cultures and absorbing or rejecting them, of remembering old ways and invent-ing new ones. Any culture which is worthy of the name is complex and fertile. Think of Jewish culture. The whole history of that culture is one of interaction, of the absorption and rejection and transfor-mation of ideas from Egypt, Canaan, Babylon, Assyria, Persia, Greece, and Rome. There never was a pure Jewish culture which you could pop into the deep freeze, any more than there is a pure English or Indian or Japanese culture. If there were, they would be brain dead. They bubble away like Irish stews, constantly evolving. How does the incarnation, that epitome of inculturation, take place? It is through the most acutely creative moment of human life, in the conception of a child. God pitches his tent among us by meeting us in our most deeply creative moment. God becomes one of us at the moment that we make something new, present in the fertility of a woman. And it is always so in any true moment of inculturation, for a culture is most alive, most itself, where it is most creative, just as a tree is most alive at the tips of its branches. The challenge of inculturation is to be there, sharing in its inventiveness, sharing its exploration. The choice is not to adopt a given Buddhist or Hindu ceremony or carry on with a Roman one: "Do we say the rosary or sing a mantra?" We enter it as it makes things new, for then something may be born which is utterly Indian and utterly Christian. The most wonderful example of that was given to us in the Indian dance of the life of Jesus that we saw the other night. I think that this was more than a synthesis of the Indian and the Christian. It was mating which brought to birth a child which was completely of both its parents. What it meant to be Indian was extended and deepened in that dance, and what it meant to be 652 Review for Relig4ous Christian was expanded. Such moments make us more Catholic. When I saw those wonderful finger movements I understand what it might mean to celebrate that the "finger of God is upon us." Never have l seen the mystery of the resurrection so beautifully evoked. Afterwards I asked myself why. Why was I so touched? I think that it is because for us the resurrection is the resur-rection of the body, and so it is most radiantly evoked in the dance of the bodies, expressed in the stretching of our bodiliness. The dancers said that their dance is prayer. One might say that our bodiliness is made prayerful. V~rhat better way to evoke the Resurrection in which the Body of Christ is utterly transformed into per-fect praise? Let me give you another example. Everywhere I went in Central America earlier this year I was struck by the thriving popular culture. Our Dominican students wrote poems, painted, composed music. When I asked the pre-novices in E1 Salvador to tell me about their society, they spontaneously composed five little plays, including one about the visitation of a contemplative monastery of Dominican nuns by the Mother General, Mother Timotea. Here one could imagine an incultur-ation of the Gospel, because here there was the fertility of doing something new. The example 1 loved most was that of a Haitian cross, painted by a peasant in our parish in the central moun-tains. It made the cross into a via crucis, along which walked a peasant, walking the way that all Haitian peasants must go, a path of suffering. But at the center of this cross was a flowering palm tree; the dead wood bore fruit. And behind the hills one could see the glimmerings of a new dawn. Here was a symbol so old and so new, the glorious and beautiful cross, pointing one back to the flowering crosses of the Middle Ages and earlier, and yet so Think of Jewish culture. The whole history of that culture is one of interaction, of the absorption and rejection and transformation of ideas from Egypt, Canaan, Babylon, Assyria, Persia, Greece, and Rome. September-October 1994 653 Radcliffe ¯ In~dturation new and so of just-this-moment-and-culture. Yesterday we saw the flowering cross in the philosophy house of the Carmelites of Mary Immaculate. In theology one could think of Thomas Aquinas grasping and transforming Aristotle and giving us a the-ology which is utterly Aristotelian and utterly Christian. Surely it belongs to our Dominican way to love what is simul-taneously so traditional and so fresh, this beauty "so ancient and so new--the ever fertile tradition. As Matagi said, quoting a Chinese proverb: "Find your roots and then fly." The Enlightenment, because it rejected tradition, drove a wedge between our feet and our wings. So the challenge of inculturation is surely to be there where the action is, there where there is intellectual and artistic cre-ativity, so that we may make something which is both utterly our own and which belongs to the culture. In any culture we must seek out the thinkers, the artists, the explorers and sit at their feet so that they can help us to make something new. It does not even matter whether they are believers are not. And this involves courage and trust. We must let people exper-iment, try things out and sometimes fail. We have the liberty to make mistakes. ~re must not fear failure. One famous theologian, I forget whom, said that one cannot contribute a single theolog-ical insight unless you make a hundred mistakes. There can be no creativity if you are afraid to play a bit--homo h~dens, playful humanity. And you cfinnot play around if you are afraid of falling on your face. You cannot dance if you are always afraid of stand-ing on another's feet. An interesting question to ask is this: Do we dare to accept young men and women who might wish to venture a bit into the unknown? What do we look for in vocations? Do we wish them to be nice and safe, people who will not rock the boat? Do we dare accept the rather difficult ones, who will certainly be a prob-lem but who might, just might, be saints? It is good to imagine how we might have reacted if some of our great predecessors had applied to join our province. What would we have written about them after their novitiates. St. Thomas Aquinas: "Eats and thinks too much. ~Refuses to join in communal sport and play basket-ball." Jordan of Saxony: "Always writing to a Sister Diana; he will have problems with chastity." Catherine of Siena: "Too fond of the brethren and thinks she hears voices. Bad start." Fr~ Angelico: "We cannot afford the paint." Savonarola: "We cannot afford the 654 Review for Religious books; he keeps burning them." Las Casas: "He stirs things up too much." Martin de Porres: "His obsession with people at the door upsets community life. No sense of obedience and said that it was less important than charity. Troublemaker." And what would we have said of Dominic? Would we have let him in? Would we? You might think that we Dominicans who so care for the truth should above all fear error. On the contrary, it is because we believe that the Holy Spirit is poured upon the people of God that we can dare to risk getting it wrong, for the church will tell us when we do. History suggests that sometimes it may say that we are wrong when we are not. That is the pain of bringing about the new. The point is that we can play with confidence. I can play with ideas and search and experiment because it does not all depend upon me. It seems to me that the adventure of inculturation is inseparable from that strong sense of our wider belonging in the Order and the church. It is because we belong that we dare to be free. If we are neurotic about making mistakes, as religious often are, then it suggests we do not believe in Pentecost. Look at St. Peter, our rock. He hardly ever got it right, and the church did not collapse. The challenge of inculturation is surely to be there where the action is, there where there is intellectual and artistic creativity, so that we may make something which is both utterly our own and which belongs to the culture. Let Us Talk to One Another The sort of process that I am envisaging, of being creative and imaginative, of experiment and taking risks, will, of course, be painful and disturbing. It will create moments of conflict and uncertainty. One person's inculturation is another person's betrayal. Just think of sexual ethics. Do the official sexual ethics of the church represent a refusal to enter the modern world, as Septonber-October 1994 655 Radcliffe ¯ Inculturation most of my young friends seem to think, or a prophetic stance against a degradation of the body? Should we inculturate and have lots more sex and make many of the young feel more at home or be a counter-culture which might exclude the young for whom this is incomprehensible, but be a witness to the Gospel? Another example: when I was a Dominican student in Paris twenty years ago, the brave and prophetic thing to do seemed to be to give up the habit, live in an ordinary, fiat and get a job. Today it looks rather boringly conformist. Any experimentation, any creativity, will involve painful dis-agreements, dissension, mutual puzzlement. "This is not the Order I joined, some may say. And so it has always been, ever since the beginning, ever since Peter confronted Jesus when he began to walk on the way to Jerusalem; ever since Paul confronted Peter at Antioch for refusing to eat with the Gentiles. There is nothing new in such conflicts. ~,~hat matters is whether they are fertile, fruitful. Do they lead us to truth? I. believe that we should never embark on such a course of experimentation, of incultura-tion, if we do not dare to talk to one another. And do we, do we dare to talk and listen? One of things that has most struck me during this last year of wandering about the world is just how much our church is marked by silence. It is not the meditative rich silence that Matagi can teach us. It is not the silence of our contemplative nuns but the silence that comes of fear. I believe that what most afflicts us is a fear of debate. It is not that people do not make statements; there are statements about dissident theologians and statements by dis-sident theologians. The papers are full of denunciations and counter accusations, but this does not add up to much of a con-versation. Surely we should be among those who, as at a dreadful tea party, try to get the dialogue going! We are one of the largest and most diverse religious families in the church. Where else could one find such a diversity of peo-ple, brethren and sisters and nuns and laity, contemplatives and actives, academics and pastoral people, progressives and conser-vatives? If we cannot take the risk of talking, then who will? And yet sometimes at the heart even of our own communities, where three or four are gathered together in Dominic's name, there may be silence in the midst of them. As I endlessly repeat as I wander around the world: we do have a tradition of dialogue, of disputa-tion. And, as you can see in St. Thomas, this is not founded on 656 Review for Religious ham~nering your opponent into the ground, but arguing with hi~n so as to learn frmn him or her. Central to our tradition is the belief that you might argue with someone precisely because you dare to hope that he or she may teach you something. Who was that holy man who grabbed his opponent and said: "I will not let you go until you teach me something"? We should wrestle with the other as Jacob wrestled with the angel, so that we may demand a blessing. We must dare to raise the question of truth. It is our motto. In much of modern Western culture, this is a word which one may hardly breathe. To question the truth of another's utterance, is to put them into question, is to question their value, their right to be. If someone tells you that he/she is really a Martian who has come from outer space, then you must merely reply: "Honey, if you are comfortable with that idea, then it's fine by me." But we Dominicans ought to dare to raise the question of truth not because we know it all, but because we hope that together we may discover it, and so we respect the other enough to say some-times: "I believe you to be wrong." It is not worth saying to any-one: "I think that you are wrong," unless you believe that it matters what they think. It is too easy to say in ecumenical discussions that we all believe the same thing deep down. There would be no point in dialogue if it were so obviously true. The first stage of friendship is discovering how ~nuch you are alike. The second is daring to see how much you differ. The third may be the revelation that in the hidden heart of the unspeakable God, we are indeed one. And so, to conclude, I would suggest, indeed I would argue, that if inculturation is not just selecting items off some cultural supermarket shelf--"1 will have a Hindi bhaja,1, one item of Buddhist meditation and a Christian Eucharist, please"--if it is a thoroughly creative business, then it asks of us a twofold courage: the. courage to experiment, to play, to risk failure and mistakes. But there is also the equally deep courage of talking to one another, in the pursuit of truth that transcends us all. Do we dare? September-October 1994 657 J.J. MUELLER Second-Stage Inculturation: Six Principles of the American Mind Anew day has dawned in the understanding of the rela-tionship between the gospel message and culture. Vatican II officially used the word culture for the first time as a theolog-ical category in the process of evangelization.' Soon after the council, the word mculturation became widely accepted to describe bringing the gospel into a culture. Simply said, culture described the human fashioning, working, and making of an environment wherein and whereby people survived, lived, and developed val-ues and meaning in their lives. Languages, symbols, institutions, and rituals were integral components of every, culture. The church recognized that people could hear the Good News only in the light of their own cultural ambient. As a result, culture tended to be dealt with as the world out there, synonymous with an observable society, and could be examined empirically. This was the first stage of our thinking about inculturation. A new day has dawned and shines its light upon a second stage. Two features characterize this second stage. First, we are now moving from a world "out there" to a world "in here," that is, we understand culture to impact the nonobservable world where our thoughts, feelings, presuppositions, and assumptions about life take shape. Secondly, we are not talking about the gospel J.J. Mueller SJ, associate professor of theology, at Saint Louis University., is the author of Practical Discipleship: A United States Christology (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1992). His address is Department of Theological Studies; Saint Louis University; 3634 Lindell Blvd; St. Louis, Missouri 63108. 658 Review for Religious coming to a pagan land, but about believers talking to believers across cultures. Regarding the world "in here," the first great missionary Paul expressed it well when he said that the gospel penetrates like "a two-edged sword that cuts between bone and marrow." ~re can add to Paul's words that the gospel cuts between our spirit and the culture through which we must express ourselves. Not only can no human being enter this world without simultaneously being born into a culture, but also the mind of every person can understand, judge, and decide only through a culture. The formative culture of the mind, then, is a domain where the gospel must enter. The new stage of inculturation is not talking about the gospel encoun-tering a non-Christian culture, but about Christian believers speaking to each other out of their respective cultures. One unasked-for consequence can be misunderstanding, with tension as its sign. Because we use the same words, communication is not necessarily clear, and different meanings are given and received. As an African proverb says, "We see with the same eyes but not with the same mind." While it is apparent that cultures differ, we seem to have operated as if minds were the same. They are not. The principles, assumptions, and expectations set up by the incul-turated mind differ from culture to culture, and it is here that the source of many tensions exist in theo Catholic church today. This article will present the culture of the mind I know best: the American mind. By using American I am referring to a person of the United States, knowing full well that it also refers to peo-ple of two continents. I am doing so simply because no other ade-quate adjective of United States people exists. Although the American mind is my example, I hope to make clear that the method used in this article is not limited to only one culture but is applicable to any other culture. The American mind, as with any mind, is principally formed by the society in which it lives. The word society is often used interchangeably with culture because a society is the largest and clearest designation of the common particularities that bind peo-ple together in a common identity. We do not say we are "Western" culture but "American" culture. Within the American culture exist dynamics of binding and formative influence. The principles of democracy as lived in the United States form the basic social culture of the American mind. This type of democracy is not identical to democracy anywhere else in the world, because September-October 1994 659 The word democracy has had a stormy ecclesial history due to differing contexts about what it means. it has a particular history and experience unlike any other. Nevertheless the principles that undergird this democracy are clear and found in the Constitution oft& United States and the first ten amendments to the constitution, the Bill of Rights. Six prin-ciples clearly operate in the American mind which, although not exhaustive, present adequately the tensions of intellectual incul-turation with which the American church is faced. I will present each one in turn by providing an explanation of what the prin-ciple means and then follow it by the events which have given rise to the spe-cific tensions within the American church, thereby forming a kind of profile of the American mind by the end of this study. Each of the six sections will proceed in two parts. The first part is an explana-tion of the principles, expectations, and assumptions that operate in the American mind. The second part begins with a ten-sion between the Catholic American mind and with decisions made by the Vatican. The tension with the Vatican mind is obvi-ously an important relationship to examine because it brings to the surface a series of misunderstandings that are deeper than a lack of knowledge, whose source lies at the cultural difference forming and filtering each mindset. It therefore focuses the dis-cussion so that people of other cultures can understand what is happening. In addition, the examples are international in char-acter and clearly represent cross-cultural exchanges that offer the clearest test cases for examining the workings of the American mind. The process, however, could be done also through exam-pies from other cultures, for example, American and Asian minds, or from dioceses and parishes located on East Coast and West Coast, or women and men's religious orders, in the case of an international group like Jesuits and how they actually interpret their religious life in different cultures. Most probably, the reader will see other applications. This article is not about championing American culture. That would be to impose one culture on another. My concern is much deeper, because if we are to find out how to be authentic and 660 Review for Religious responsible disciples of Jesus Christ we must come to grips with those unconscious yet dynamically present principles by which we filter all information, even religious. Therefore, in order to become more modest about our cultural limits--not to foist them upon others and to avoid any reverse American "cultural imperi-alism"-- we must shine the spotlight upon the culture of the American mind. Democracy The principle of democracy is central to the American mind and gathers the other principles together to make a distinctive unity. The American people express their principles of demo-cratic governance in the Constitution of the United States; today we are the longest-lasting and oldest democratic country still run by its original constitution. This longevity points to perduring cur-rents that are continually renewing themselves and that run deep in the American mentality. So too is it with Catholics, who came mostly as Europeans, thinking as Europeans; they gradually yielded this identity to a new American one. So goes the process of culture. The demo-cratic way of governance thereby became commonly accepted to the point of being taken for granted and, even more, growingly appreciated for its way of ordering the commonweal. As early as 1784, the first bishop of the United States, John Carroll, saw this process happening and made the prophetic statement that the religious revolution in America was "more extraordinary" than the political.2 Bishop Carroll argued with Rome for the indepen-dence of the fledgling church, but he was unsuccessful; the American church had only "mission" status under the Roman congregation Propaganda Fide until 1908. Democracy was not won or shaped easily in its two-hundred-year history. The cost was often war and bloodshed, with Catholics fighting and dying for democracy 'in every war. Mistakes were made, but Americans really do not disagree about the freedoms that democracy offers. Hence, the emotions of American people run deep on this subject. It is a form of governance and a princi-ple in which the Christian message can flourish. Tension: The word democracy has had a stormy ecclesial his-tory due to differing contexts about what it means. The main rea-son is that the European (and one must includ~ the Vatican) mind Septentber-October 1994 661 has interpreted democracy through the tragic and chaotic events surrounding the French Revolution, beginning in 1789 where the church suffered grievously; even the pope was imprisoned by Napoleon. The French Revolution became an example of the bankruptcy of the principles undergirding the "Modern World." In 1794 at the Synod of Pistoia Pius VI condemned this rage for "furious democracy" (Auctorem fidei). A century later, the Vatican warned against the so-called "Americanist heresy," again finding democracy an unacceptable way of operating. The twist this time was that the Vatican thought that democracy was inappropriate for ecclesial governance. The filter for the Vatican was again European democracy, especially as it was being proposed in France. It must be remembered that even such an extraordinary person as Pius IX, who dominated and determined the papacy in the 19th century, never left the papal states in his lifetime! In fact, the "Americanist heresy" was started in France, not in the United States, with the French mis-interpretation of Isaac Hecker. The bishops in America were con-fused by the 1899 papal letter Testem benevolentiae, and some objected that such a "description" did not find its place in the United States. Of far greater consequence, however, is the present turn to democracy by many countries in the world. The forms of democ-racy are not necessarily in the American vein, but are their own specialized types that belong to the same trunk of the tree. Nevertheless, the 19th-century lesson needs to be laid to rest. With the end ,of the Cold War, while a wave of "democracy" is going around the world, the Vatican continues to warn people in an antiquated way that "the church is not a democracy," a fre-quent but confusing ecclesial response given to Americans and others who raise concerns about undecided and open-ended issues, especially as they particularize themselves in each culture. This can hardly be called a "cultural imperialism" but a holding to Vatican II's clarion call to evangelize each culture. What, Americans ask, is the alternative procedure? A monarchical form of government, historically embedded in the European tradition? The question is not one of winners and losers, but one of where is God and the kingdom of God in all this. While Americans understand and even agree with the Vatican's underlying objection that religious truth is not up for a vote, nev-ertheless Americans are confused because many of the roles of 662 Review for Religious governance could be participatory. After all, is it not true that the Catholic Church has found fertile ground here, unlike anywhere else in the modern world, through the protection of democracy? "Why," the American asks, "would people want to keep and con-tinue with ways of governance that created problems like reli-gious wars, intolerance, and harsh judgments that lead to oppressing one religious group at the expense of another?" Americans founded a type of governance where these European traits were left behind. Something new and in contrast to Europe was established on these shores. Our experience of democracy raises serious questions that the uni-versal church has to address; it is not simply an American phenomenon nor an American triumphalism, but a search to value difference in what might be a non-Eurocentric model. The marvelous success story of the American church and its vitality, is related to democracy where rights, freedoms, and opportunities offer peo-ple the chance to participate in their own destiny as believers. Hence, fianericans have a graced expe-rience that says the principles of democracy are not antithetical to ecclesial governance. The outstanding German theologian Karl Rahner wrote years ago that, granted the church was not a democ-racy, nevertheless ecclesial decisions and ways of proceeding could be done democratically. It is a legitimate way of proceeding within the church. Most important for our consideration, one must remember that there is no other way for Americans to think than the way they have learned through their culture. What is the case in America is also the case elsewhere; a tension results when cul-turally foreign and intellectually alien forms of governance are imposed upon a people. The answer is complex and not one that I wish to address here, but it comes down to this: To remain truly Catholic is to be "universal" and thereby to grant to others the legitimate and welcomed influence of culture upon my/our faith. My point, however, is to examine the unexamined starting point Americans have a graced experience that says the principles of democracy are not antithetical to ecclesial governance. September-October 1994 663 of our mental culture: If the gospel is to be truly inculturated, the question of democracy as the beginning point of under-standing the gospel message must be taken on clearly and with respect. 664 Due Process If everyone is to be treated as an equal who has rights before law and society, then Americans expect that the manner of pro-ceeding is honest and fair to all concerned. This means attention must be given to the various forms of due process. The Asnerican Revolution of 1776 was ignited because of British abuse of power which taxed the colonists without representation. In response to a painful lesson learned from. being oppressed, the U.S. Constitution included principles in determined opposition to any authoritarian and totalitarian governance and in so doing accepted the principle of due process. Hence fairness for everyone was guaranteed by law, including the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty, to be tried by a' jury of one's peers, to know one's accuser, and to be represented by counsel in a court of law. Above all, fairness included the right to information, freedom of speech, and the power both to elect judicious officials who would uphold these rights and to remove any official who violated them. Whether a president or a pauper, every citizen is equal before the law. These protections are human acts of a culture that seeks to guarantee as far as possible that truth prevails. Above all, it is fair to everyone, and no one can claim a hidden truth or secret agenda of a special process. Because the process is common and follows the same rules, the innocent and powerless are protected while the powerful and privileged are not allowed unfair advantage or tyran-nical sway over citizens. Tension: Because Americans operated on the non-European principle that peopl~ are innocent until proved guilty, Americans regard ecclesiastical censuring as a serious judgment that requires due process to be observed. If due process is violated, then the act is considered authoritarian in the most arbitrary sense of the word. Americans recognize that people of goodwill have differences of judgment and actions, but, if the truth will prevail, every person has the right to explain and defend his or her actions. All per-sons deserve this basic dignity, and so does the community from Reviezv for Religion,s which they spring. It is too easy to bash Banerica for individual-ism and not see the heroic, countercultural struggle of kanerican Catholics to form communities. And certainly, when it comes to something as important as faith, Americans assume that any eccle-siastical censure would be at least as respectful of persons as their culture is. Americans, painfully and confusedly, have found decisions from Rome violating due process. A few examples that have angered Americans are these: the censuring of Archbishop Hunthausen of Seattle; the silencing of creation-centered the-ologian Matthew Fox; the removal of Charles Curran from his teaching position even though the allegations date over a twenty-five year period (the formal investigation began in July 1979) and he had not taught in the area of sexual ethics for fifteen years; and the requiring of a "mandate" for teachers of theology, which puts the entire Catholic university in jeopardy. (Ironically an act the enemies of Catholicism could not do for over two centuries might become a reality through the imposition of European Vatican principles on the American context.) In these cases, accusers remained anonymous, secret letter campaigns to the Vatican held disproportional power, actions and judgments fol-lowed in secret, and unilateral silencing for a year was imposed on theologians as a test and act of obedience; and quite beyond the demands of faith an additional test of loyalty such as an oath was required of theologians as if the sacrament of baptism were not enough for faith. An~ericans find such actions heavy-handed, clash-ing with the deepest rights to which peoples are entitled. "Fairness" is multifaceted and certainly indicative of the gospel message. American Catholics feel their own integrity is violated when a basic human right and clearly a gospel requirement, a spiritual and human boundary deep in the inculturated psyche, has been disregarded. Certainly a gospel-oriented church is not looking to squelch such rights, yet the outrage is there. Attention to the culture of the mind is the place where any movement for-ward can be made. In front of the American public and on front pages of news-papers, the church unfortunately seems to be cast in a role where it is more guilty of human-rights abuses than secular society. American Catholics feel compromised in their witness to the gospel because of such action. My purpose is not to put blame anywhere or defend one side or the other but to point out the September-October 1994 665 tension and the culture of the mind that has to be dealt with if we are to enter into a deeper encounter with Christ. A new dawn requires the examination of how the gospel is received, judged, and preached in a culture. Equal Rights ~qlile everyone is not created equal in talents and opportu-nity., everyone shares in equality, of personal rights before the law. For example, that people are born into a social class (lower, mid-dle, upper class) should neither reward nor condemn them. Persons can seek their own pursuits of life, liberty, and happi-ness. As a result, Americans ensure opportunities such as manda-tory education to level the mountain of privilege and fill in the pit of poverty, to create a playing field of possibility based on merit. Hence, openness to the future, new possibilities, and change are characteristically strong Mnerican attributes. American children are raised with encouraging dreams such as "X~rork hard and you will be a success; . Make something of yourself; . Be all that you can be;" "You too can grow up to be president of the United States." Still, we are not naive about these dreams. We have learned that within our country upward possibilities have down-side problems, even unsurmountable for some, and that in our foreign policies we have failed to grasp the different cultural struc-tures of meanings and values. The principle, nevertheless, remains that people are equal and that the future can be shaped by our human decisions. The question remains: Who will decide? Aanericans do not want it done by the tyrannical few. Americans have faithfully championed this position and insisted on it for two centuries. American Catholics helped shape this ideal. A long-standing and troubling conflict about equality has been the gender issue. I do not think it is possible to understand the gender issue in the United States without understanding some-thing of the racial issues which are part of the same cloth. With respect to the race issue, the bloody and soul-searing Civil War (1861-1865) resolved the legal question of slavery in favor of emancipation. The painful legal struggles afterward led the Supreme Court in 1896 to the divisive "separate but equal" clause that allowed over a half century of civil racism. It was finally reversed by the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Americans "know this history and are being 666 Review for Religious increasingly sensitized to the racism at work deep in the fabric of society. The gender issue has become a connected issue where the lack of equality has been a reality that cannot be ignored. The equality of women is a world revolution that, in America, predates the founding of the United States. In the 17th century, New England's Anne Hutchinson explained religious experience through a woman's experience and was forced to flee. Two cen-turies of women's advocacy has culminated in recognition of women's equal rights. Today, equal-rights legislation dominates business, education, government, and every facet of personal rela-tionships, including new laws against sexual harassment in the workplace. Notwithstanding the many personal sexual prefer-ences that the law must deal with, the legal principle in the gen-der issue is clear: Gender is not to be a barrier in freedoms and the opportunities to exercise one's talents. Now even little girls can be all that they can be and dream of becoming president. Tension: In the search for basic equality, Americans find priv-ilege based on race or gender an inequitable, unjust principle upon which to make distinctions. Catholic life, unfortunately, not only reflected but supporte'd many of these unjust positions. The list includes the discouragement of indigenous vocations to priest-hood and religious life, and "separate but equal" racial policies where congregations were racially segregated, even by pews. These historical realities are not just a bligh't on the history of the American mentality; they make us more sensitive to our sin-ful past. The feminist movement is another case in point. Why women could not be altar servers, and crossbearers, have their fe(t washed at Holy Thursday liturgy, preach, or enter into ordained min-istries of diaconate and priesthood, bishop or pope, simply because of their gender, is not clear to Americans who want to under-stand. American Catholics, while perhaps agreeing with the con-clusion, find arguments based on gender not only unconvincing but sexist, and not gospel. This point of tension is awkward and difficult for everyone, as we all know. For the American mind, it is not, therefore, a way of proceeding to declare topics' on women "nondiscussable." Truth demands, Americans think, that such top-ics should be discussable to proceed forward and arrive at an understanding of the truth. Equality implies that women's expe-rience, like racial experience, be listened to as they encounter the living, loving God, even if it is awkward and uncomfortable for Septentber-October 1994 667 women or men. Otherwise, Americans cannot help but see the ecclesial policies as acts of unilateral power and authority, to con-trol others, not principles of service and truth to free people to encounter the risen Lord. In the church we cannot trivialize the difficulties of equal rights, whether racial or gender, or unas-sumingly accept any solution where there are racial or gender winners and losers. Then everyone loses and the gospel is lost. We have to find another way out while holding on to equality of the rights of believers in the community of believers. The Right to Choose Americans value the right to choose as an important exercise of their maturity and responsibility. The right of self-determina-tion is not necessarily individualistic or selfish; one can commit one's self to community, the common good, relationships, and religion. It even respects the right to .make decisions and be wrong. The first experience of American Catholics was their choice of religion. Catholics fought for their right to belong to their religion, form organizations, and associate with whomever . they wished. The right to choose is a most powerful belief in the goodness and willingness of a citizen to contribute to the common good. Tension: Here is one of the truly difficult tensions for con-temporary American Catholics. Take the example of birth con-trol. On the one hand, the Vatican that told people that they were spiritually mature enough to form and follow their consciences has, on the other hand, seemingly reversed itself by telling peo-ple what their conclusion and decision should be. I am not speak-ing about the arguments about birth control, or making any judgment about it; my aim is to shed light on why there is a ten-sion for Americans. People cannot be given the right to choose and then told they have no right to choose. Their reaction, pre-dictably, is confusion over the double messages being given. Americans are no strangers to disagreement, but they expect open discussion of the problems and the marshaling of all the data (his-torical, anthropological, theological, and so forth). When differ-ent choices are possible, people have the freedom to make them to the best of thei.r consciences. One other example which is not in the ethical sphere is the selection of bishops for dioceses and priests for parishes. Without 668 Review for Religious local participation by the people, the choices often seem capri-cious, whimsical, punitive, or mysteriously rewarding. Giving rea-sons for the selection, even asking for consultation in the process where it concerns a parish or diocese, seems proper. If people are not consulted in their own affairs, then their conclusion is that someone has something to hide or that such decisions are simply autocratic and arbitrary, something to be disregarded as irrelevant because the decisions speak for only few decision makers. This is not a request for democracy, say American Catholics. If, as the Catholic Church teaches, the Holy Spirit resides in all believers, then why act as if it belonged only to a few? The challenge is how to give voice to people open to the Holy Spirit. Americans desire to con-tribute their.understanding of the Spirit to the entire church and to listen to other cultures' under-standing and contribution. At the same time Americans recognize legitimate authority in the pope and bishops to make decisions with necessary knowledge and perspec-tive. It would seem some cooperation of the two ways of pro-ceeding might be a way to go forward with mutual dignity and trust. It would be, moreover, a beacon of trustworthy light to our dialogue with other' Christian and non-Christian ecumenical groups. In the church we cannot trivialize the difficulties of equal rights, whether racial or gender, or unassumingly accept any solution where there are racial or gender winners and losers. Voluntary Participation Americans reject forced participation and prefer the freedom to participate in the types and varieties of work that they choose. Voluntary participation by i;avitation has always been part of the American Catholic church and is one of its most distinctive but unheralded trademarks. In his first pastoral letter (1792) Bishop John Carroll wrote that voluntary support had to be asked of the faithful because there was no tradition of civil support, an unusual Sept~nber-Octobcr 1994 669 circumstance but a reality continuing to this day. The reasons for a voluntary church are easy to understand. Nations like France, Spain, and Portugal were responsible for the support and evan-gelization of their new mission territories. Rome had little say, and policies were actually up to the nations to enforce. The result was financial support that made evangelization dependent upon the secular nations. No such relation ~xisted in the "Protestant" colonies in America controlled by the Church of England. The Catholic church was not allowed to operate openly, and people had to take oaths to uphold the monarch as the sovereign head of the church. It was an easy way to keep pesty Catholics out of the colonies, especially "papist" priests. As a result, finances were held in the name of lay people who paid for the support of both the church and clergy. This situation, incidentally, spawned the first great crisis in the American church, the problem of lay trusteeism where laity held the property and appointed pastors. The bishops broke this system in the 1830s, and the trend to centralized power in the episcopacy began) The virtue ofvoluntarism, nevertheless, gave rise to unparalleled accomplishments with hospitals, orphanages, soup kitchens, educational institutions, and charitable organiza-tions of every kind. Most often, religious orders provided the people to start and maintain these institutions. Initially most of these religious came from Europe, with American-born religious gradually taking their place. This story is one of the greatest con-tributions to American Catholicism. Tension: American Catholics know from their cultural condi-tioning that money is power, given in support of those appeals, needs, and cases that one deems desirable. Americans feel, how-ever, that the church operates with a double standard, namely that it is only too ready to accept their money but not their expe-rience. A growing tension occurs, then, if people feel their finan-cial support is either mismanaged or used against them. For example, the recent international financial scandals Of the Vatican by Bishop Marcinkus hit Americans doubly hard. First, Americans saw that this trusted Vatican official seemed to use church money more like a Wall Street broker than a churchman. How could this be allowed? Some call the lure of holding the purse strings the curse of the "Judas touch." Secondly, Mnericans were out.raged ¯ that it was an American bishop who was in charge. Whereas Americans have trusted the papacy, bishops, and pastors with the 670 Review for Religious disposal of money, such scandals only reinforce the idea that the clergy, as financial overseers, are naive, even irresponsible, about money. Unfortunately, too many examples abound to support their judgment. Because Americans consider their voluntary finan-cial support as an important act that demands fiscal responsibil-ity, they demand fiscal expertise, management, disclosure, accountability, and even consultation about its use. That means sharing power. Is the Vatican ready to do this with the laity? How are we to configure such cooperation? At the same time, if Americans feel the money is used against them, then they will refuse to give. For example, women have a seldom-mentioned illustrious and even heroic history of voluntary generosity in this country. If women feel sexist policies against them, they will likely refuse to give not only their time but also their money to support such a situation. Americans, unlike a state that supports a church, give voluntarily and expect to be treated with respect in every phase of their lives, not just in the financial area. If there is only a financial regard, as many American lay people in the parish have concluded, then Americans bristle because it is only their money that church governance wants. To an American this message would be one of utter disrespect and manipulation, totally against the gospel, whose message the peo-ple asking for money are supposed to be upholding. Thus, in the voluntary American system, the littlest person giving and not the bulging pocketbook has to be respected. If the dignity of the vol-untary gift and the person giving are to be upheld across cultures, then the two cultures of the mind, kanerican and Vatican, need to address the implications and meanings involved from both sides. Tolerance and Plurality United States Americans live in a pluralistic culture that accepts the principle of tolerance, not as an end in itself but as a precondition for moving forward and presenting the truth. Catholics of Maryland and New York were instrumental in shap-ing the original type of toleration that was later adopted in the U.S. Constitution. It meant a separation of church and state, but it accentuated the belief that people could converse with one another and at the same time live their lives according to their own beliefs without fear. This principle of toleration, while born and bred in/Mnerica, achieved universal church recognition only September-October 1994 671 after one hundred years of continual restatement, when it was finally accepted in the Vatican II document "Declaration on Religious Liberty." But even here John Courtney Murray, the architect of the document, cautioned believers that the document applied to people outside the church, not inside it (emphasis mine). This article argues for the beginnings of the discussion inside the church, especially from the view of the particular American cul-ture from which this society works. This principle of toleration recognizes that there is a cultural diversity within th~ United States which still remains the most ambitious experiment in diversity by any nation in the world. If it works, itis because the principle of toleration and the gover-nance by democracy has allowed it to work. Tension: Americans know that, despite the best of intentions, relationships fall apart. The question is whether to look back-wards to the past and try to assign blame, or to look to the future in building the kingdom for the future. The factors are compli-cated and complex, and judgments that punish people for trying to find solutions are not acceptable. For people trying their best, tolerance of their decisions before God may be the most Christian response possible. Americans clearly want lifelong commitments, not shallow, expedient ones; but if they do not work out, then people are encouraged to pick up the pieces and do their best. Roman canon law, which is certainly not kanerican law, holds to principles of the unbreakable relationship in marriage and priest-hood. This is good and one side of the human hope. But rela-tionships change and do not always last forever. In annulment cases many Americans find it a violation of their integrity to have to adnfit that a first marriage did not exist. It did exist and they did their best; it did not work, despite their desires that it would be forever. People can live in the past or the present. Americans fol-low Christ by picking up our lives and by trying to be the best lov-ing people we can be, now and in the future. Too often many Americans decide not even to go through an annulment pro-ceeding; others simply stop practicing because they feel judged and condemned in trying to uphold Catholic principles, kanericans ask the question: Could there not be other ways of dealing with these good ends from both sides? With regard to priesthood, a priest who asks to be laicized and who has faithfially served the people of God for twenty-five years must admit that he really did not have a vocation. For many 672 Review for Religious priests who have left, even to sign such a statement is at the cost of personal integrity. It is not true that they did not have a voca-tion to serve as a priest those many years. IA~hen married men become deacons, they do not renounce their married vocation. Cannot, Americans say, vocations be not eternal but changeable calls from God to be and go in other directions? If not, where would Abraham be? Francis of Assisi? Ignatius of Loyola? Mother Teresa? In a related issue of confusion, Americans ask why mar-ried Anglican priests who are trained and lived years in another tradition can become married Roman Catholic priests, while faith-ful Roman Catholic priests who live and love the Catholic tradi-tion want to marry but cannot? Is it necessary because of law to pursue and establish blame such that one person is a "winner" at the expense of another as a "loser"? Americans recognize that vocations can be forever, and people desire this; but life and rela-tionships change. When they do, the conflict for the Vatican becomes maintaining a principle of life commitment, while the conflict for Americans is to recognize change that they might not understand and yet not judge but encourage the person to find God in these changed circumstances. When faithful people's integrity is violated, there might be other ways to understand and deal with these issues. To understand where God is may require learning the culture of the mind. Conclusion These six principles are not meant to exhaust the profile of the American mind. They are, however, six principles that operate within the culture and are formative in how Americans think, live the gospel message, and act in the public domain. A new day has dawned as the second stage of inculturation is taking shape. It is a stage that focuses upon the inner world of culture which forms and filters our understanding. There is no other way for Americans to live. To be in a culture is to be fundamentally influ-enced by it, and Americans are trying to be faithful to the total demands of the gospel message. The way people think, therefore, is not the end point but a starting point. It is only by examining our mental culture that we can truly understand the gospel mes-sage and neither impose one culture upon another nor assume that we are all the same. We will be able to hear the voice of Jesus calling in its many inculturated expressions. Septonber-October 1994 673 Mueller . Se~ Nevertheless, tensions will continue. In this second stage of inculturation, two areas of concern will figure prominently, and I will use the American mind as the example. First, American cul-ture has an identity separate from Europe, just as other coun-tries, even with democracies, differ from America. Thus principles, assumptions, and presuppositions are bound to be different. If this is the case with cultures united in the larger Western main-stream, then how much more challenging will it be for cultures in Africa, India, Asia, and China? Secondly, and this follows from the 'first, the church may find itself in a double bind: The Vatican governs by one set of principles and the culture by another; this often results in strong tension or even opposition. The one goal for everyone is to be the best disciple that one can be. The church is now in a second stage of inculturation, begun at Vatican II, where it must listen to the Holy Spirit through inculturated believers and find ways to bring forth God's work in new cultural wineskins. While we do not have a crystal ball to see into the future, we do see that the future depends upon a cross-cultural contribution that respects the differences in the culturally conditioned mind. We must struggle to be sure that, in Africa, India, ~s'ia, Europe, and America, though we do not look the same exteriorly or express ourselves in identical terms interiorly, we share the same discipleship in the Holy Spirit. In order to find this necessary unity of the church, then, we must make the turn to the interior culture: the inculturated mind. Notes ~ Certainly, it raises questions about the inculturation going on within the Vatican mind. See the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World (Gaudium et spes), The Documents of Vatican H, ed. Walter Abbott SJ (New York: America Press, 1966), chapter 2, paragraphs 53- 62, pp. 259-270. 2 James Hennesey SJ, ~'Catholicism in an American Environment: The Early Years," Theological Studies 50 (1989): 664. 3 James Hennesey SJ, "American Catholics (New York: Oxford University Press, 1981), pp. 93-100. 674. Review for Religious J. PETER SARTAIN The Challenge of Priestly Leadership I went through the seminary when it was not yet con-sidered necessary to teach administration and manage-ment skills to future priests. It was not that such skills were considered unimportant, for in fact some of the sem-inary faculty were excellent mentors in administration. There was simply no formal course in the administrative aspects of priestly ministry; I suppose it was assumed that we would eventually learn what we needed to know by observation and imitation--perhaps by osmosis! Even now, while I am a strong proponent of formal training in administrative skills for seminarians, I do not expect that such training will completely prepare them for the task; facility in management will come only with experience in managing. Moreover, I have come to realize that the fun-damental issue to be addressed in seminary formation is not administration or management, but leadership. When I was first assigned to a primarily administrative position some years ago, I was often frightened and bewil-dered with certain sensitive tasks. I am diplomatic by nature, but that was not enough. In a directed retreat one year I sensed God calling me to develop my own style of leadership, one that was both consistent with my person-ality and integral to my priestly vocation. The retreat experience confirmed my belief that there should be some-thing unique about the way a priest goes about being a leader. J. Peter Sartain is pastor of Saint Louis parish in Memphis and serves as vicar general of the diocese. His address is Saint Louis Church; 203 S. V~rhite Station Road; Memphis, Tennessee 38117. leadership and authority September-October 1994 675 Sartain ¯ The Challenge of Priestly Leadership During the years I ministered primarily in administrative positions I was often asked, "Do you think you will ever get back into pastoral work?" This article is a reflection on the ministry of leadership entrusted to priests, since their leadership role is at the heart of their call to holiness. Excellent resources are available to improve administrative skills--just treatment of church employees, man-agement principles, techniques for conflict resolution, and the like. I know the value and importance of such resources, and I assume that insofar as a priest is called to administrative leader-ship he will make proper use of them. Some insights into priestly leadership I have gained through the years have challenged me to grow in holiness. I will add a few practical exhortations gleaned from experience. Seminarians would benefit best-from the study of parish administration were it considered in the broader context of leader-ship. Whatever the particular ministry a priest is called to exer-cise, he is a leader. At times his leadership will occur in a parish setting, with its concomitant administrative responsibilities; at other times he might be appointed to a primarily administrative position. No matter what the job, the priest's leadership should always be rooted in prayer and sacramental ministry, especially the Eucharist. The question always struck me as misguided. Perhaps the questioner intended to ask, "Do you think you will ever get back into parish work?" But even then the unspoken implication was that only parish work is truly "pastoral" or, more fundamentally, "priestly." As pastor I have discovered a clear continuity with my years as a church administrator; there are not two priesthoods, two leaderships, but one. First I am a priest. I am a man called to accept the grace of holiness, to pray and preach and celebrate the sacraments with devotion and a clean heart. I am also called to be a manager of people and departments, a strategic planner, a creator of budgetsi' and a convener of meetings. This type of work has provided a 676 Review for Religious unique setting for nay growth as a priest, my ongoing conversion of life, and my love for the vocation I have accepted. That is not to downplay the tedium and frustration that are part of every vocation; but I see clearly that the task before me each day is to approach my work with a priestly heart. Although I will make frequent mention of challenges and problems, I do not wish to give the impression that they are the constant lot of the church leader. Most colleagues work as part of a team, striving to put their faith into practice. Most are sup-portive, enthusiastic, and competent. At the same time, problem areas exist, and they bear the potential of trying the morale of the priest whose responsibility it is to address them. Challenges to the Aspiring Leader Church leadership today presents a number of unique chal-lenges, one of which is the rampant confusion between power/ authority and leadership. Christian leadership is not defined in terms of power, yet many people view it only that way. The con-fusion is most evident in some discussions about the nature of ordained ministry, but it is also present in the daily business of the church. I was caught off guard when a brother priest once asked me, "Do you realize how much power you have?" He was refer-ring to the decisions placed in my hands. What caught my atten-tion was not his suggestion that what I did affected other people's lives, but his implication that perhaps I had not yet come to that realization myself. Insofar as what I do affects the lives of oth-ers, one could say that I have "power"; in that case I pray it is the power of wisdom, prudence, and compassion. If I have "authority," I hope it is like the authority of Jesus, in whom there was no contradiction betw.een word and deed. I am profoundly aware that what I do affects peoples' lives; as a consequence I must rely first and foremost on the grace of God to guide ~ne in exercising the church leadership with which he has invested me. It is more difficult to exercise genuine leadership than to wield power; but it is, liberating for the priest to realize that the grace of ordination involves the promise of God's continued guidance. Thus the priest will not lead unless he prays, unless he is steeped in the Word of God, unless he is one with the Eucharistic Christ, unless he is striving for ongoing conversion of life. He will not lead until his heart is centered on serving God's people in the September-October 1994 677 Sartain ¯ The Challenge of Priestly Leadership person of Christ. The priest does not lead by giving directions, by pointing this way or that; he can point only in the direction he himself is going. He leads by following Christ, and he follows Christ by leading God's people. Priestly ministry is often defined in terms of "function" (what do you do all day?); the priest then becomes the coordinator of other functions in the church, analogous to the conductor of an orchestra. Such an analogy is flawed from the outset, for the priest is someone grounded interiorly, finding his vocation and his peace not in power or in function, but in a Person, the Lord Jesus, in whose priesthood he has been invited to share. In an egalitarian society which highly values equality, some people become suspicious of peers who accept positions of lead-ership. They are assumed to have sold out to power and status and to have forgotten the daily lot of the common person. Several years ago I scheduled a luncheon meeting with a psychologist who had been working with one of our priests; as Vicar for Clergy it is my responsibility to act as liaison with the bishop in such cases. Although we had spoken by telephone several times, the psychologist and I had not met until the luncheon. Toward the end of our time together he told me that he had "checked me out" with some Catholic friends. They reported that I was friendly and caring, a nice guy; several added that for that very reason they were puzzled about why I had my job! I was amused both by his need to check me out and by the comments he received. I learned once again that some people simply do not expect "nice guys" to be in positions of authority, even in the church. Moreover, some are hesitant to accept church leadership posi-tions or to support leaders precisely because of misconceptions about authority figures. My own hesitation early in the priest-hood continues to remind me that as a priest I am to be a com-passionate, just, and humble leader. At times, others will conveniently appeal to our authority in search of the legitimation of a decision they have made. When coworkers lack confidence in their own leadership or authority, they appeal to mine. When they are uncomfortable accepting responsibility for a decision, they will add, "and Fr. Sartain agrees with it." Such posturing once annoyed me; now it reminds me that when I delegate a decision I promise to claim it as my own. Most challenging are the controversies that permeate the atmosphere for many who choose to minister in the church: the- 678 Rbview for Religious ological conflict, feelings of oppression, disenchantment, burnout, and anger. The causes of these sore spots are legion, and those who would reduce them to a single cause miss the mark in under-standing human nature. It is a dangerous temptation to believe that they exist only in the church; they are present in every orga-nization and workplace. They are particularly challenging when pow-erfully present but unspoken or unconscious. Unconscious anger is frequently directed toward the nearest leader, identified as the "authority figure." The leader must learn to deal with both the angry person and the issue at hand. The person demands more energy than the issue, and the temp-tation to frustratedly dismiss both person and issue is great. It is eas-ier to deal with someone who is angry with me, rather than with someone who is just "angry." Once when I made a decision unpopular with a religious sister, she subse-quently felt the need to arrange a meeting to tell me she was angry, "but not with you--with the church." The truth was that she was indeed angry with me, but her anger had its roots in dealings with other priests and prior situ-ations unrelated to me; nonetheless it affected our working rela-tionship. I had to be aware of that fact, whether or not she was. Am I prepared to deal with the unresolved anger that seems to grip many in the church, today? Am I willing to accept the fact that the anger will often be directed toward me as an ordained minister of the church? Will I make the effort to address issues even when the attendant anger is unreflective and misdirected? In a five-part work entitled On Consideration, a major portion of which is devoted to advice on sound administration, St. Bernard of Clairvaux writes to Pope Eugene III, a fellow monk who had been elected pope. At one point, while referring to the type of circumstances I have ou.tlined, he writes, "it is not the face of the scorpion that you should fear, he stings with his tail!" (On Consideration, 4.4.9.). The priest does not lead by giving directions, by pointing this way or that; he can point only in the direction he himself is going. Septentber-October 1994 679 Sartain ¯ The Challenge of Priestly Leadership The church leader must make fair decisions based on facts. However, our sensitivity to people makes us keenly aware that the network of staff members has its own version of whatever issue is currently on the table. They may be influenced by the behind-the-scenes subterfuge of colleagues, including fellow priests or religious. Because of the nature of the discussion we may not be free to offer a public rebuttal. When we discover such duplicity, will we let anger sour our disposition and provoke us to biased decisions? Will we be able to face the possibility that oth-ers have made judgments about us and our motivations? Will we begin to pin labels on certain segments of'the church? Will we ask to be removed prematurely from a job simply because it is not worth today's hassle? Will we lead? A final word about today's pervasive anger. As a healthy step toward growth many people have trained in techniques for assertiveness. That can be a good thing. However, :all too many settle for being assertive; rather than entering forthright conver-sation and working toward resolution of a conflict, they merely assert themselves, leaving in their wake the debris of their hostility. Unless assertiveness is marked by openness, desire for reconcili-ation and a willingness to forgive, it is just another way of push-ing people around. We are called to go beyond assertiveness to achieve understanding and forgiveness. When. I uncover assertive-ness within myself, I must pose this question: do I consciously or unconsciously abuse or manipulate people? The era of political correctness has witnessed the creation of a unique body of church jargon; it appears in mission statements, correspondence, minutes of meetings, and hallway conversation. There is nothing bad about that in itself; every profession devel, ops its own jargon. I find, however, that some church profes-sionals use "correct" words they do not fully understand. Collaboration and justice stand out in particular. Nothing is more healthful, respectful of persons, and theo-logically valid than striving for collaboration. It builds morale, insures ownership of a common mission, and promotes vitality in the. church. The gifts of the Spirit are for the common good, and the Spirit intends that we work together. However, there are kinds and times of confidential decision making which require a unilateral decision on the part of the leader or leadership group. Even in a system characterized as collaborative in usual circum-stances, some decisions must be made by leaders alone. In the 680 Review for Religious face of allegations of "lack of collaboration," the leader must nonetheless continue to lead. That a certain decision was of neces-sity made behind closed doors does not indicate that it was not made for the common good. Another popular charge is injustice. True injustice in church settings is deplorable, and leaders have a responsibility, to act justly. In the best of circumstances the exercise of justice is a formidable task. However, I have often heard the word unjust applied to sit-uations when it would have been more honest for the protester to have said, "I didn't agree with so-and-so's decision." The priest leader will recognize that at times he cannot win; sometimes the leader stands alone. He must have the resolute-ness not to rescind a good decision when faced with charges of lack of collaboration, poor communication, bad judgment, and stubbornness. He must also have the humility to be flexible when he realizes he has made a mistake. The Challenge to Generosity To be a leader in the church today is a daunting challenge, due in part to the characterizations I have listed above. Each dio-cese, parish, institution, or school is stamped with its own per-sonality and its own distinctive staff and clientele. It is an exciting time to be a leader in the church, with singular opportunities for growth in holiness. I begin this section with a series of questions every seminarian and priest could pose to himself. 1. Will I kiss the altar every day? Each day every priest bows to the altar at which he is to offer Mass, as an act of reverence for Christ, who is symbolized by the altar. The altar is a sacred symbol, whetheroit be made of stone or wood, or whether it stands in a magnificent cathedral or on a bloody battlefield. Its sacred meaning is so powerful that none of us should ever pass an altar without bowing to Christ present there. But the priest also kisses the altar. This is a very public gesture, made in the presence of those gathered for the Eucharist; it is at the same time an intensely private gesture, an act of affection, an act of submission, an act of love and trust. Even more to the point, the priest's kiss of the altar is an act of identification. He is pro-claiming to Christ, to himself, and to those assembled that it is Christ the Priest who makes him who he is. He kisses the altar which symbolizes the Lord himself, the sacrifice of Calvary, and September-October 1994 681 Sartain ¯ The Challenge of Priestly Leadership the table of the Last Supper. Everything he does flows from the altar and back to it. The kiss symbolizes his daily embrace of the sacrifice of Christ as his way of life, for on the day of his ordina-tion he was totally and irrevocably joined in character to Christ. Some days it is quite easy to kiss the altar. At his first Mass, the new priest knows the sheer joy of experiencing the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at the hands of the bishop, the wonder at God's goodness in calling him to the priesthood. Who would not joy-fully kiss the sacred altar in gratitude for such undeserved blessing? Again and again the priest kisses the altar in celebration of the Sunday parish Mass, of weddings and anniversaries, of others' ordinations and gatherings of the church. He stands behind the altar, not because he i~ better than others but because he bears the identity of Christ, the only true Priest, who came not to be served but to serve. In reality, standing behind the altar is an act of humil-ity, a stance of service. There are also sad occasions at which the priest kisses the altar, when he leads God's people in prayer with Christ the con-soler, the one who knows our pain and the grief of death, the one who announced "Peace!" when he found his apostles gathered in fear after his resurrection from the dead. Av those times the priest stands with Christ, the giver of hope, who in times of difficulty trusted wholeheartedly in the providence of his Father. Sometimes when the priest kisses the altar only he himself knows the nature of the cross he bears. Perhaps he is keenly pained by the weight of his sinfulness, so his kiss symbolizes his need for Christ's mercy. Perhaps at other times his kiss is an act of the will and a prayer that Christ will help him understand the challenges he faces as a priest. Perhaps it is at times a simple act of love: "I love you, Christ, my Lord." At any time, and in any circumstance, the priest kisses the altar as a dramatic reminder of who he is and who he is called to imitate. Will I kiss the altar every day? 2. Am I willing to be led? The first and primary commitment of the priest is to pray. Whether we consider ourselves seasoned pray-ers is not the point. Help is available in the form of good reading material and spiri-tual direction, and it is never too late to begin. Any priest who dares to take on a responsibility in the name of God and the church without a simultaneous commitment to daily prayer will soon find that he is an empty well. If I am a steward, how can I 682 Review for Religious give what I do not take the tittle to receive? If I am a preacher of the word of God, how can I speak of what I do not take the time to hear? If I want to lead in the ways of God, how can I do so without assuring I am first being led? Concern for a particular style of prayer likewise sidesteps the point; God works with me as I am. But I must begin (again?), and if I have not yet begun, I should begin today. Karl Rahner once told seminarians at the University of Innsbruck that if we wait until we feel like praying, we will rarely pray. As Bernard writes to Eugene about his duties as pope, he is very aware of the hazards of his friend's busy office. Eugene has been taken from his monastic milieu and placed at the head of the church's administration. His temptation is to give himself so completely to his new duties that he has no time for himself and no time for God. He is new enough at the job to still feel uncomfortable with the hectic pace of his life; Bernard's fear is that Eugene will settle into his heavy schedule and become so calloused and habituated to an unreflective life that he will no longer realize that his acceptance of relentless busyness is not a sign of inner peace, but of hardness of heart. "It is not the virtue of patience to permit yourself to be enslaved when you can be free . Are you less a slave because you serve not one but all. ? [1.4.5.] I praise your devotion to humanity, but only if it be complete. Now, how can it be complete when you have excluded yourself?. You too are human . You also should drink from the waters of your well . If you are a stranger to yourself, to whom are you not?" [On Consideration, 1.5.6]~ In prayer we discover who we are. In prayer God nourishes us with food of real substance and changes us in ways hidden even to ourselves. In prayer we return over and again to the source of our vocation and gradually begin to take on the likeness of Christ who is our true self. We will ask for guidance in specific circum-stances; but true discernment takes place not when I demand of God, "Tell me what to do!" but when in openness of heart and generosity of spirit I simply allow myself to be led by the Holy Spirit, with no expectation or goal other than to become his instrument in all things. 3. Am I willing to be a leader? This question is more complex than it first sounds, for it goes beyond one's willingness to take on a job, to be in charge, or one's capacity to accept or claim responsibility. More fundamentally, September-October 1994 683 Sartain * The Challenge of Priestly Leadership it means "am I willing to give of myself to this endeavor, this parish, this school--knowing that I am also accepting a great bur-den-- because I believe in its mission, value its growth, and love its people? .Am I willing to be a leader when it is fun and when it is painful? .Am I willing to take time and effort to communi-cate, to care, to consult, to weigh tough choices, and to decide?" "Am I willing to take a firm stand when necessary, knowing that the opposition may be fierce? . Am I willing to abide the mistrust and misunderstanding of authority prevalent in our society, and in the church? . Am I willing to admit my mistakes? . Am I willing to admit that as a leader I am a public person and thus a frequent topic of discussion?" When a newly ordained priest begins to realize that he is regarded as a leader, he notices that people relate to him in a new way, particularly if he is the final word on a decision. He is star-tled that some people, are suspicious of him, even coworkers and friends with whom he has previously worked. His protestations to the contrary, some will insist that he has changed simply because he has been ordained to the priesthood. Often p~ople project upon leaders whatever unpleasant experiences they have had with authority figures. The leader becomes the embodiment of all that made them angry or distrustful in the past; I become the cranky pastor, the mean nun from grade school, the unfair principal from high school, or the uncaring coach. Such projection is blatantly unfair and unmerited, and in reaction we strive to alleviate the suspicion of authority by our efforts at good Christian leader-ship. Unfortunately, we must accept the fact that such efforts will not always work. %then we assume a position of leadership, some will relate to us in a strained, unsettling way. Are we willing to live with such change, or will we constantly frustrate ourselves by try-ing to change others' attitudes,~over which ultimately we have no control? Experience tells me that most people are supportive day-to-day. However, some tend to forget that leaders are people, too. We have feelings, anxieties, needs, just like everyone else; but angry parents or anonymous letter writers ignore our feelings and are unconcerned about our preoccupations. They have something to say, and they want us to listen, period. The father of a sixth grader can enter my office, deposit his anger and complaints at my feet, and leave. If the meeting has not resolved all of his con-cerns, he has the satisfaction of knowing that he has lobbed the 684 Review for Religious bomb in the appropriate direction! But what about me? After I close the rectory door, I am left to myself in the midst of his rub-ble. Such experiences give me pause to consider my motivation for accepting the leadership role: Was it the prestige of the job? Was it to be well thought of?. Was it to be congratulated on hav-ing attained an exalted position? If so, the first onslaught of criticism will be devastating. Did I assume this position only because my bishop appointed me to it? At some point I must claim it as mine or I am doomed to misery and resentment. Priests are public property. We are delighted when parishioners remem-ber our birthdays and anniversaries, but we are chagrined to learn that they also know the license plate number of our cars, the name of the restaurant where we dined two weeks ago (as well as the names of our companions), and the gist of the disagreement we are rumored to have had with the sacristan last month. Our whereabouts on Friday evenings and during vaca-tions are the topics of conversation at coffee klatches; most of the time the conversations are harmless, but sometimes they are malicious. Thus one of the major adjustments facing the newly ordained priest is the experience of our fishbowl lifestyle. Priestly leadership is not anonymous but public, and we cannot expect to disappear into the woodwork once ordained. The challenge is to create the balance of privacy which rejuvenates us for the public nature of our ministry. It should not surprise us that people talk about us, nor should it surprise us when we occasionally discover those who are preoccupied with us. 4. Am I willing to see this work as constitutive of my call to holiness? Am I willing to view my particular ministry not just as what God wants me to do (the assignment God has given me!), but as the very means he will use to make me holy? When I begin to see my work as the very context in which Godwill make me holy, whatever challenges and frustrations I experience along the way take on a new meaning. They are no longer obstacles to happiness "Am I willing to admit that as a leader I am a public person and thus a frequent topic of discussion ?" September-October 1994 685 Sartain ¯ The Challenge of Priestly Leadership but means to growth; they are no longer occasions for exposure of my dark side but God's hopeful call to conversion. There is a flip side to this series of questions: For whom am I doing this work? For myself? For others? Or for God? My answer to that question will in large measure determine my suc-cess and sense of well-being in carrying out the work. If I am doing it for any reason other than the love of God and his peo-ple, I will never know joy in the work, and the work will never be a means of growth in holiness for me. Until I embrace the truth that God has called me to this leadership role, I will not enjoy the fullness of his grace and the love that he shows me through the work. Our motives are rarely pure; we are a mix of motivations and hidden agenda. We need not be surprised at our duplicity, for from the midst of our mixed motives God calls us to contin-ually refocus our attention on his love and his people. St. Augustine begins his Sermon on Pastors with the follow-ing words: I must distinguish "carefully between two aspects of the role the Lord has given me, a role that demands a rigorous accountability, a role based on the Lord's greatness rather than on my own merit. The first aspect is that I am a Christian; the second, that I am a leader. I am a Christian for my own sake, whereas I am a leader for your sake; the fact that I am a Christian is to nay own advantage, but I am a leader for your advantage. Many persons come to God as Christians but not as leaders. Perhaps they travel by an easier road and are less hindered since they bear a lighter burden. In addition to the fact that I am a Christian and must give God an account of my life, I as a leader must give him an account of my stewardship as well (Sermon 46, 1-2). ". I am a leader for your sake." God uses priests as his instrument in dealing with others in particular circumstances. That is a cause for humility, not pride, for the role is based on the Lord's greatness rather than on our merit. Priestly leadership is a function of stewardship, the stewardship of a disciple, a servant. I have something to give--but what I have to contribute is itself God's gift to 'me. As Paul wrote, "Name something you have that you did not receive" (1 Cor 4,7). Moreover, as Rabbi Abraham Heschel observed, "What we own, we owe."" I am a steward. Vocations are often viewed in terms of "giving up." One "gives up" this or that in light of a higher good. There is a danger in dwelling on that perspective, for if I focus on what I am giving up, 686 Review for Religious I will eventually succumb to anger and resentment. If I were preparing to be married and announced to my fiancee, "I'm giv-ing up a lot for you, but you're worth it," she would be justified in saying, "then. keep it!" If a priest says the same to God, God would be justified to reply, "Come back when you've forgotten about giving up and are ready to give." My response to God's call is my willingness to give completely of myself, in response to his goodness to me. Is that not what Jesus did? Did he not recognize that he too was a steward of the Father's gifts, of the Father's will? Every Christian vocation is a reflection of the gratuitous self-giving of God; only a commit-ment that is consciously made, sure and focused, can be a limpid mirror, an image of the Invisible. It is precisely here that the church Fathers saw the true mean-ing of martyrdom and sacrifice. A sacrifice is some treasure which I remove irrevocably from my use and offer to God as a sign of my inner gift of self. In burning the first fruits or the choicest animals, I give them away with no strings attached. This is conscious and voluntary giving and not giving up; the sacrifice of Jesus was his conscious and voluntary gift of himself to the Father for our sake. It is difficult to give without expecting anything in return, but it is that giving to which we are called. Another gauge of my vocation is the following question: 7b vabom am I giving myself completely? Until I have a firm grasp on the answer to that question, I will remain a bag of mixed motives, and I will measure my successes by the wrong yardstick. I will add a postscript to this section. While we must be care-ful not to focus on what we have given up in accepting our cur-rent role in the church, we should be cognizant of any giving up that our lay coworkers have done in accepting the tasks of min-istry; we recognize their sacrifice and thank both them and God for it. God is grateful for our gifts, and we are stewards of his gratitude as well. 5. ~lm I ~villing to work through my inevitable disenchantment? Our vocation is lived in the real world, where Christian val-ues and the gospel itself are often compromised, or at least imper-fectly incarnated in people like [~s. Life is not perfect, and I must come to terms with imperfection--that of the church, of my supe-riors and co-workers, and my own. Most of us who work with the church go through experiences of disenchantment. We have high ideals and lofty goals; we love our September-October 1994 687 Sartain ¯ The Challenge of Priestly Leadership work. We are enchanted by the mystery and beauty of the mission we have accepted. What happens when I see the clay feet of the church, when I confront the difficulty of living out God's call? Disenchantment can occasion some unsettlingoquestions. Why should I try at all? No one else seems to be trying. V~as my ide-alism childish illusion? Those who are asking me to do a job are making it difficult for me to accomplish the task! I may be dis-tressed by the behavior of my superiors or coworkers or by my own behavior. At such times I am called to recommit myself to the ideals of the gospel and to practice mercy, one of the more diffi-cult virtues. Anger is often justified, and disillusionment under-standable, but of what value are they if not used for go~d? Disenchantment can be transformed into renewed commit-ment, a deepened self-giving. It is a tangible way to enter into the sacrifice God made in taking on human form, for in our own disenchantment we touch the embarrassing humility~of God, who was willing to embody his perfect love in our imperfect nature, The "self-emptying" of the Son of God of which Paul wrote to the Philippians, is the voluntary "disenchantment of God," who took on our nature conscious of what fragile and misshapen vessels we are., In our disenchantment we are reminded of the profound humility of God and our absolute dependence on his grace. There but for God's grace go we--for we may be the cause of another's disenchantment. Are our hearts big enough, to embrace the humility of God? Some Practical Exl~ortations i. Always rentain consciously and practically rooted in the founda-tions of the priesthood: the Word of God and the Eucharist. Recent years have witnessed the evolution of specializations in almost every field of endeavor. On the one hand, such a phenomenon is the positive by-product of explosive developments in science and medicine; on the other hand, when seen in the priesthood it can become a tempting trap. The priest who is preoccupied with seek-ing his "niche" in the church--his specialization--may very well forget who he is. The priest is ontologically and irrevocably linked to Christ and the church; thus he is the one who prays, serves, sacrifices, cel-ebrates the Eucharist, absolves, heals--lives!--in the person of Christ. That is "who he is." His ministry may take a very partic- 688 Review for Religious ular direction--one that may last a lifetime or one that may change frequently; but any job he undertakes, any niche he dis-covers, is secondary to who he is in Christ. A pastor may wish to develop new and innovative programs for his parish, programs that fill in the gaps and address newly-discovered needs. But if he does not at the same time consciously identify himself with the Eucharistic Christ, he loses the depth and richness of his min-istry; and his people are deprived of the church's fundamental gifts. The priest is consecrated for his specialty, his niche, at ordi-nation; his speciality is his Christ-identity. 2. Remember that sloppy management and procrastination hurt people. Every morning more mail arrives to be piled on the stack already on my desk; there is yet another form to fill out, another phone call to return, statistical research to undertake for the chancery (the sins of nay past have returned to haunt me!). For many priests, such tasks are repulsive because they seem to bear no relation to ministry. They are unrelated to the real-life situa-tions of flesh-and-blood parishioners. At times I have been careless in responding to these tasks, only to discover that ultimately my laxity hurt someone. Perhaps the form I was remiss in completing was a job reference; or the phone call I procrastinated in returning was related to a com-plaint unfairly registere'd about a coworker, and my tardiness meant that his or her reputation needlessly suffered. Perhaps the research requested of me was crucial to a grant proposal for a new ministry in the diocese. At some point I began to attach human faces to the tedium, which reminded me that such tasks would ultimately help persons (in most cases, at least!). Now my motivation is stronger to com-plete tasks at the proper time. 3. Don't give someone a difficult job but make it difficult to com-plete. I have purposely posed a positive principle in a negative fash-ion in order to emphasize a point. When I delegate a difficult task---for example, I ask the principal to develop a balanced school budget--I do not release myself of the responsibility to make it work. I have observed church administrators establish an adver-sarial relationship with those to whom they had delegated a diffi-cult job. When I delegate I am not abdicating responsibility; on the contrary, I am pledging cooperation and understanding, and I may be acknowledging that I do not possess the skills required to com-plete the task. We demoralize parishioners and coworkers when we ~eptember-October 1994 689 Sartain ¯ The Challenge of Priestly Leadership make requests of them and then place unreasonable restrictions on their performance. We also demoralize others when we assign them a task that is simply impossible to complete. 4. Don't give someone a job you know the person will shirk; then you get angry when the job isn't done. Chuang Tzu, a Taoist philoso-pher of the 3rd century B.C., understood this truth. One of the most famous of all Chuang Tzu's "principles" is that called "three in the morning," from the story of the monkeys whose keeper planned to give them three mea-sures of chestnuts in the morning and four in the evening but, when they complained, changed his plan and gave them four in the morning and three in the evening. What does the story mean? Simply that the monkeys were foolish and that the keeper cynically outsmarted them? Quite the contrary. The point is rather that the keeper had enough sense to recognize that the monkeys had irrational reasons of their own for wanting four measures of chesmuts in the morning, and did not stubbornly insist on his original arrangement. He was not totally indifferent, and yet he saw that an acci-dental difference did not affect the substance of his arrange-ment. Nor did he waste time demanding that the monkeys try to be "more reasonable" about it when monkeys are not expected to be reasonable in the first place. It is when we insist most firmly on everyone else being "reasonable" that we become, ourselves, unreasonable? It is unfair to ask someone to undertake a task for which the per-son is unsuited. A good leader matches task to talent. 5. Say "yes" when you mean "yes" and "no" when you mean "no." There is no substitute for clarity in communication with cowork-ers and parishioners. If I speak in circles out of reluctance to deal with conflict or my fear of taking a stand, it will o~nly serve to confuse others. Eventually they will be angry with me, and their anger is justified. I will have led them nowhere. 6. Don't harbor unrealistic expectations of superiors. Leaders have superiors, and priests deal with senior priests, pastors, deans, vicars, and bishops; we owe them the accommodation and open-mindedness we expect fi'om others. 7. Don't take it personally. Some things will inevitably go awry, but seldom are mishaps directed intentionally at us. Life simply does not always work out the way we wish it would. When we meet failure it is important to remember that there is no clan-destine plot to make us miserable. Moreover, we may frequently deal with people at their worst, 690 Review for Religious and from time to time may find ourselves walking into a mael-strom of anger. Anger directed at us is often displaced anxiety about what is happening at home, a sense of powerlessness over a difficult child, a troubled marriage, or a lost job. Don't take it personally! We may be the object of the anger, but we are prob-ably not its root cause. Such experiences can be channeled as a means of growth in compassion; a discerning ear and heart can help heal at the root. 8. Nurture in your heart a deliberate commitment to human respect. After God, people come first. Are you willing to learn to love? The highest value to a leader is the human person: the neighbor, the brother, the sister. Spend time with the people with whom you work. Take time to console a grieving friend. Slow down to listen to the one who needs to talk. Be big enough to forgive, let go of grudges. Be first to extend a hand in friendship and last to judge. Be attentive to the little things in others' lives. Be mindful of birth-days and anniversaries, family tragedy, illness and hardship. Learn compassion and foster reconciliation. When reading the newspaper, notice first the names of people, then the statistics. Joyfully embrace sacrifice, faith, family, friends, and the one in need. 9. Temper all things. Priests are called both to challenge oth-ers to a better way of life and to reflect God's mercy when they fail. If we make the challenge needlessly harsh, it will discour-age; if we confuse mercy with permissiveness, it will encourage stagnation. The Rule of St. Benedict offers wise counsel to abbots in this regard: Therefore, drawing on . . . examples of discretion, the mother of all virtues, he must so temper all things that the strong may have something to strive for, and the weak noth-ing to dismay them (RB 64,19). 10. Recognize that as a priest you are also a leader within the pres-byterate. No priest is a free agent; by virtue of ordination we form phrt of a presbyterate and share in the pastoral role of our bishop. This article has been primarily concerned with the priest's leadership role in day-to=day ministry; what has not yet been said Priests are called both to challenge others to a better way of life and to reflect God's mercy when they fail. September-October 1994 691 Sartain ¯ The Challenge of Priestly Leadership is that we undertake the tasks of ministry in union with the pres-byterate. That is not simply a theological truth;' it is also a practi-cal challenge to strive for unity with our bishop and brother priests. It is more important for me to live in union with the pres-byterium than to be alone and absorbed in my work.4 But there is something more to add to this reflection. It has been my assumption that every priest is a leader; it is equally important to remember that every priest is a leader within the presbyterate. Dioceses and religious communities have devised structures to address the pastoral ministry and care of priests; there are pres-byteral councils, personnel boards, vicars for clergy, mentors, and the like. However, it is a great mistake to assume that only those who hold elected or appointed positions are leaders within the presbyterate. The most important leadership within the pres-byterate is that which springs spontaneously from fraternal love, the care of priest for priest. Some Final Considerations St. Bernard's second book On Consideration was written for Pope Eugene after the failure of the second crusade, for which Bernard himself had preached at the pope's behest. Bernard is aware that people will blame them for this dis-aster. He says he did what he thought was right., and he is willing to take the blame rather than have people murmur against God (2.1-1-4). He says this from the standpoint of one who does not need to be successful at every turn. A career is not the end all and be all of life: Virtues are more important than honors or results (2.7.14)'. "Plant, water, be concerned, and you have done your part" (4.2.2)~s Our daily tasks are the invisible path to holiness; but in the end, they are all God's work. When I was named Chancellor/Moderator of the Curia of my diocese, a fellow priest presented me with an essay entitled "The Penalty of Leadership," which first appeared in the Saturday Evening Post 2 January 1915, as an advertisement for Cadillac Motor Car Company. It begins: 692 Review for Religious In eve~ field of human endeavor, he that is first must per-petually live in the white light of publicity. Whether the leadership be vested in a man or in a manufactured product, emulation and envy. are ever at work. In art, in literature, in music, in industry, the reward and the punishment are always the same. The reward is widespread recognition; the punishment, fierce denial and detraction. Its author, Theodore MacManus, explains that the leader coura-geously upholds an enduring standard against the outcry of those who cannot comprehend lasting value. That is part of the penalty of leadership. Every priest finds that he is faced with similar chal-lenges; but for him leadership is worth its penalty., for he sees his position as a vocation, and he knows how profoundly he relies on the grace of God. Genuine leadership is determined neither by market share, nor by publicity, nor by power, nor by Gallup poll, but by the quality. of the heart. It is understood only by those willing to learn the meaning of the word sacrifice. Jesus did not tell his disciples not to aspire to leadership; rather, he said, "if you aspire to be leaders, then learn to serve." Learn great skills, make great plans, strive to improve. Butat the same time, learn to serve, to sacrifice for some-thing greater than yourself, for someone other than yourself. In the final analysis there is no penalty in leadership for the one who loves God and neighbor. The one who loves knows that loving is its own reward. And the one who struggles to love as Jesus loved will find unimagined fulfillment. And the church will gather courage and hope and grace from that kind of priestly leadership. Notes ~ Hugh Feiss OSB, "The Spirituality. of St. Bernard for Managers," Cistercian Studies XXV, no. 4, 1990: 271. 2 Abraham Joshua Heschel, Who is Man? (Stanford University Press, 1965), p. 112. 3 Thomas Merton, The Way of Chuang Tzu (New York: Ne~v Directions, 1969), p. 32. 4 Gisbert Greshake, The Meaning of Christian Priesthood (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 1988), p. 167 [quotatiou from "Instead of an epilogue: Ten principles for a priest's life pattern," proposed by Prof. Dr. ~,~. Breuning and Bishop Dr. KI. Hemmerle]. s Feiss, p. 273. September-October 1994 693 CATHERINE M. HARMER Election: A Call to Service One of the elements of apostolic religious life which has :hanged since the renewal period following Vatican Council II is the selection of leadership. Prior to the council most positions of leadership were appointed, the exceptions being supe-riors general, their councillors, and chapter delegates. Even when provincial chapters elected provincial superiors it was, in many cases, more accurately a nomination to be confirmed by the gen-eral council. Regional superiors and local superiors were appointed, with little if any input from the membership. Today many leadership positions are filled through election by the members, even when a confirmation is needed at another level. This movement toward greater participation of the members in the choice of their leadership has had both positive and nega-tive aspects associated with it. Most of the dire predictions about the decline in quality of the leaders chosen have not come to pass. There are, however, some unpredicted difficulties which continue to cause problems. In this article I will look at some of the back-ground of those problems and suggest a helpful discernment model. Even a cursory analysis of constitutions and directories of congregations shows that many more positions of leadership are now elected, often directly by the members. Thus, local, area or regional leaders, provincials and their councillors, and in a few cases generals and their councillors are directly elected by the Catherine M. Harmer MMS has worked as a consultant and facilitator for various religious congregations' chapters. Her address is Medical Mission Sisters; 300 W. Wellens Street; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19120. 694 Review for Religious members. Where direct election is not the case, there are strong nominating processes which are considered seriously by chapters or other electoral bodies. What is more interesting than the number of positions open to direct election is the increased openness about elections. In the past many of those who were the formal electors in fact held discussions among themselves and with the members about the potential leaders. This was informal, and when done responsibly, a way for the electors to broaden their own knowledge of the potential candidates. When done with less responsibility it had some of the characteristics of the "smoke-filled rooms" of the old American political system. Now, it is generally the practice to have the members involved in the selection process by means of suggestion or nominating lists. In some cases these suggestions are connected to predetermined criteria or to rationales given for a nomination. While there are definite values in this openness, a fear of "campaigning" has arisen. Some members are reluctant to be named in a process that might require them to submit to ques-tioning or to present a personal position regarding the office. Another growing concern is the reality that many elections are held with the majority of those who were nominated removing their names from the list prior to the election. I would like to address several of these problem areas in more detail, then look in a new way at the nature of election in religious congregations, and finally make some suggestions concerning the whole nature and the processes involved in election by members. Areas of Concern One current problem also existed in the time of limited involvement of the members. It is the connection in the minds of some religious between being chosen or not chosen and their own self-image. Even today at the time of election of chapter del-egates there are those who suffer a sense of not being appreci-ated because they are not chosen. In the business world one often measures one's self worth by salary and position within the com-pany. To be passed over is often a sign that it is t

Issue 20.3 of the Review for Religious, 1961. ; CONGREGATION OF SEMINARIES Ecclesiasti .al Formation Prot. ,N., 2121:60 LETTER TO THE EPISCOPATE IN THE THIRD CENTI~NARY YEAR OF THE'DEATH OF ST. VIN, CENT DE PAUL ON CERTAIN PROBLEMS OF EC-CLESIASTICAL FORMATION. Your 'Excellency, On June 5th of last y.ear, the Sacred Congregation of Studies, prompted by the wonderful example of the priestly life as typified in the holy Curd of Ars, addressed a letter to the episcopate. [For the text of this letter, see REview Fort R~I.~ctous, 18 (1959), 321-27.] The,.purpose of this letter was to recall to mind some fundamental princi-ples 'of ecclesiastical formation, the lack of which might irrevocably affect the sound preparation of the candidate foi" the priesthood and thus his success in the sacred minis-try. The radiant figure of St. Vincent de Paul, whose name in the third centenary 6f his death has resounded in every corner of the world, induces us to continue and complete our thoughts on this matter. The occasion presents to us anew the life of a saint who/it can be said, was a perfect pattern of Jesus Christ, the Eternal Priest. It offers an ex-ample which merits the earnest consideration of all those who are engaged in preparing students for the priesthood, preparing those who have answered the call to fashion themselves according to the model of the Master. Do not think that w~ are presenting an anachronism; if the spir-itual conditions of the clergy and of ecclesiastical training are happily" very different from, those under which the saint carried out his ~igorous reform, nevertheless the guiding principles which were the leaven of his multiple activity ever remain valid. His activity was impir(d by the eternal value of the Gospel message. The heroic charity which permeated his whole life ca~ not be explained or understood in its full significance un-less we realize that it had its origin in his great concept of the priest and the duties of a priest. ÷ ÷ ÷ Ecclesiastical Formation VOLUME 20, 1961 I6! ÷ ÷ $ac~ed Congregation o] Seminaries REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS In a time of dire calamity which he felt deeply in his heart, he knew how to confront miseries with comfort and to help all those in need. Through his w~ork of refor.m he had already enkindled in the clergy that zeal which fosters in the faithful the.well-springs of charity. It car/be safely affirmed that there are few ~who l~ave felt to the same extent as St. Vincent de Paul the shpernatural value of the priesthood and its essential importance the Church as the source of Christian life. He had in com-mon with his great contemporaries of the French school a most tender devotion to the mystery of the Incarnation and to the Priesthood of Christ; nevertheless, inspired by his own pastoral experience, he gradually develgp.ed spirituality of his own which was directed immediately towards the practical pastorate and was sustained by an ever.more earnest zeal for,the salvation of souls. His out-look ~ras determined by concrete cases and showed itself in various ways, but it was always based on this funda-mental principle that the priest is the man whom God has selected and called to participate in the Priesthood of Jesus Christ. His task is to continue the work of redemp-tion and, animated with the spirit of Christ, carry still fur-ther .the work which Christ has done and in the way He has done it. For St. Vincent de Paul, our Divine Lord is above all the Savior of mankind and the priest must be another savior who continues His mission of salvation. Therefore he clearly saw. tha_t, the firs5. qualit~ies a prie~st should possess are an ardent charity and apostolic zeal and that if the love of God be the soul of priestly activity, the object of that love must lie in the salvation o~ rfien. See how the saint emphasizes effective love of God: Let us love God, my brethren, but at the cost of our toil and the sweat of our brow. For it often happens that' the various affective acts of the love of God and the interior motions of tender heart, even if they are good and. desirable, are none the less suspect if ,t.hey do not result in effective love. Our Lord Himself says: 'In this is my Father glo~ifidd: that you bring forth very much fruit" (Jn 15:8). w~ must be on our guard be-cause there are many who think that when their exterior de-portment is correct and they are: filled with great sentiments tqwards God that they have fulfilled their duty; but.when they are confronted with the practical work of the apostolate their inadequacy is made manifest. They flatter tti~mselves with their lively imagination; they'are content to converse sweetly with God in pra~er; they even talk the language Of the~ angels; but outside of this when it is a. case of working for God, when.is a case of suffering, of mortification, of instructing the poor, of going in ~earch of lost sheep, of being content'under l~ri~,tions, of a~cepting illness and bther misfortunes, alasl they are not to be counted on, their codrage~fails. Nol Nol We must not deceive ourselves: our whole jqb consists in working.1 a St. Vincent de Paul, Correspondance, entretiens, documents, 162 edited by P. Cost~ (Paris: 1919--25), 11, 40-1. .We c~n say, then, that St. Vincent de Paul sees the priest in- the light of his ministry for souls, souls who are buried in.ignorance of the truths of the faith, souls who are in a state of sin. Or better still, he sees the priest in the light of his service of Christ Himself~' th~it Christ whom the saint kriew how to perceive clearly in the suffering members of the Mystical Body, .even though immersed in the most ab-ject spiritual and bodily misery.- His intense activity consisted in the continual oblation of himself for love of the.God whom he saw and loved in his brethren. Was this activity separated from prayer and from union with God? Such a thought would be the great-est affront to the saint bf charity, since the fire he en-kindled. in others, he had first drawn from the heart of God Himself. We can not do better than to continue the above quotation where We see how graciously the saint treats of the point in'question: ~ There is nothing more conformable to the Gospel than for us to accumu_lafe light and strength for our own souls in prayer, spiritual reading, and solitude, and then to bestow on men this spiritual food. In doing so, we are following the example of our Lord andHis Apostles; we are uniting the task of Martha to that of Mary; we are imitating the dove which itself takes a part of the food.it has gathered for its own nourishment and gives the.rest to feed its young. This is what we must do. This is how we must prove to Gbd that wd love HirfiNthrough the mh.dium"of~ our good works? The aspect'under which he loved to think of the Savior is that foretold, by the Prophet and used by Christ at the beginning of His public lifein reference to Himself: "The spirit~of the Lord is upon me. Wherefore he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor, he hath sent me to heal the contrite of heart, to preach deliverance to the cap-tives, and sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord and the day of reward" (Lk 4:18-19). The poor, those in tribula-tion and distress, were indeed the special care of Vincent de Paul even if he did not exclude any social class from his apostolic work, seeing it to be his duty as a priest to work for the salvation of all. But to the poor and humble he cer-tainly showed his preference. For them his love was bound-less; it was a love which has given us the most glorious pages, in the annals of Christian charity. They were his principal concern in his reform of the priesthood. "Make good priests" a favorite expression of his meaning "Make holy priests"--signified for him a bringing back of the clergy particularly to their mission of preaching by which th, ey would rescue the people from their ignorance of the truths of the faith and lead them away from sin. By means of this he established an indissoluble link between the See the preceding note. ÷ ÷ ÷ Ecclcslasticai Formatio~ VOLUME 2~ 1961 163 ÷ Sacred Congregation ot Seminaries REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 164 priesthood' and the laity: good priests mean a good laity; ignorant or sinful priests are their ruin. From this unify: ing principle, "As the priest, so the people," were derived all St. Vincent's projects for the formation and sanctifica-tion of the clergy: the Congregation of the Mission, for ordinands, the Tuesday conferences, clergy re-treats, and especially the establishment of seminaries. his innovations bore the stamp of God's approval, for hav-ing first given himself up to humble and unceasing prayer he then went forward with his plans slowly and carefully so as not to jeopardize, as he used often say, the work of God. That was in fact characteristic of the man: to ensure that in every undertaking, big or small, he followed will of God, avoiding all forms of impatience which is detrimental but especially so in the carrying out the designs of God. This accounts for the qualities of en-durance which characterized his work. He sought God's will in all things, straining with the single-mindedness a saint towards the perfection which was his ideal for priests. Selection and Evaluation of Candidat.es The reply of St. Vincent to those who were proposing one of his own nephews for sacred orders out of motives not altogether praiseworthy is well known. He s~tid: "F~my part had I known at the time when I haft the rashness to enter the ecclesiastical state what I subsequently learned, I would have preferred to work in the fields than to go forward to such an awe-inspiring state." If we can see here evidence of the saint's constant and profound hu-mility, we can also see an indication of his very great reverence for the priestly vocation. In those unfortunate days when men entered the priest-' hood for motives, other than the wish to serve God and save souls,. St. Vincent's only preoccupation was to prevent from such an unworthy course those "who make the just weep tears of blood." Clearly the reason for his care was that "God gives the graces needful for this hgly state only to those whom, in His goodness, He calls,''3 "Those who enter there without His call would seem to be lost.''4 In these and similar quotations there is obviously evidence of Jansenistic pessimism; we know well St, Vin'-' cent's undying hatred for the harm caused by this teaching and the part he played in its condemnation. Of course, th~ fact is that he saw the priestly vocation through the eyes a saint--in other words, in its true supernatural light. Each priest is individually chosen by God who gives St. Vincent de Paul, op. cir., 6, 155-56. St. Vincent de Paul, op. cit., 5, 569. qualities necessary for his state and the graces to live up to its obligations. It was, therefore, with the express inten-tion of testing the genuineness of vocations and making them effective for leading souls in the path of justice and salvation, that the saint applied 'himself with:unflagging zeal to the establishment of seminaries formed on the Zri-dentine decrees. His first difficulties and reverses in no way daunted him. ., The seminary is of necessity a place of selection and for-mation where~the Church lays on superiors the onus of picking out those really chosen by God in, order that these may be'brought to the height of perfection demanded of them fbr the profitable exercise of their ministry in the world. Selection and formation, therefore, are two essen-tial factors of a seminary which can not be changed. The Church d~mands that this be recognized at all times and under all circumstances. She is guided by Divine Wisdom in the adoption of new methods and their adaptation, de-ciding with loving care how to meet changing conditions. She can never afford to compromise, her fundamental at-titude when dealing with seminaries; according to their state, she flourishes or declines. 'The priesthood is such a high calling, it demands so fine a character, it confers such great powers that it must be the result of a special choice, a special vocation from God. This special vocation is essential to those who are to receive the dignity and exercise the prerogatives of the priesthood. It follows that both the student and the Church should make it their business to find out what the will of God is in each individual case: the student that he may not lightly intrude himself into a state of life so exalted and to which he can lay no claim, the Church that she may not take the risk Of conferring orders on one who has not the necessary requirements. The Church has the strict obligation to seek the signs of a true vocation in all who feel themselves called to the sanctuary. She must make sure, at the same time, that they have the quali-ties which will enable them worthily and efficiently to ful-fill their office. We know that whenever God lays on men such exalted duties and responsibilities, He gives to those so chosen sufficient graces to enable them to carry them out worthily. The candidate puts himself, forward for the judgment of. superiors. It is for the superiors to judge and act accordingly. This scrutiny begins from the time a student first enters the seminary. It ends either with his ordination or with his dismissal as soon as it becomes apparent that he is un-suitable. Each superior in a seminary has his own particu, lar sphere but each, by reason of his sacred trust, has a twofold office. He is to be an educator in the daily task of making a new man out of each of those entrusted to his ÷ + + Ecclesiastical Formation VOLUME 20~ 1961 165 + 4. 4. Sacred Congrega6on oy Seminaries REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS charge; and he is to be a judge as to whether they are corresponding to the graces they have received, as to their progress or otherwise, as to the evidence of further physi-cal and spiritual develolSment, and. as to their resistance to or inability to profit by the work of formation, it task which can not be shirked. The superiors, in their ac-tions, must be guided by the light of God to whom hearts are open and whom all hearts obey. To evaluate a vocation properly, it is indispensable know the student's whole personality. Taking qualities and abilities singly, considering weak points and defects in isolation, it is possible to be seriously mistaken. These elements must be considered under the aspect of a per-son's whole character-only thus can~ they be viewed their proper light. If we are to reach a-correct judgment on the vocation of candidates for the priesthood, we must not base that jtidgment on first impressions of a particular facet of their character. Rather, we must strive to see the whole person and thus we can reach a balanced estimate of the particular elements which form the,total character. There is a fundamental element in every person from which all the facets of his character spring.It follows, therefore, that the. superior's energy must be directed a profound study of each individual student, maximum importance to,the resourceful energy of the mind which is called will power. For example, some brilliant personalities at first make ¯ very favorable but often they are inconsistent characters who lack the necessary stability and will be unable to face tomorrow's temptations and the great trials of life ahead. They will fall victims to fatal weaknesses altogether much for their defective will power. At other times a. close scrutiny can reveal as' unjustified'the esteem held up then for .the piety or at least the devotional piety of youth who~ otherwise showed no great strength of:'charac-ter. We speak of that apparent piety which is the uncon: scious refuge of the intellectual and spiritual pauper who, once his environment is changed, will stand revealed in his weaknegs, We would insist that superiors watch closely over un-stable natures to see whether this weakness springs only from the youth of the students concerned. This will especially apparent in adolescents. On the other hand, may be a permanent defect of character, as in a youth who will apply himself to a hundred tasks without seeing through to its completion. He may be a pefson of nervous temperament, always vacillating and undecided, who puts one in mind of the: basic neurosis underlying these symptoms. Such characters as ~these, the products of, a world in ferment almost to the point of frenzy, can be blamed for their condition, but they are certainly the most suitable candidates for the ranks of the priest-hood. This requires a strong and even temperament, one ready to endure any sufferings and to take any risks for the advancement of God's kingdom. Therefore, both the who!e.personality and the. many individual traits must be thoroughly.examined, with par-ticular attention being paid to psychological and emo-tional stability. The superior is dealing with the realms of the spirit where the meeting.~of God with man is the inti-mate personal; responsibility of each individual; he must tread warily, making constant use of humble prayer, ap-proaching God with reverence, waiting and listening and sensitive to the-manifestations of His will. Supernatural means must always take the first place, but the aid which the sciences of the educationalist and the psychologist af-ford should not be forgotten. When one's own experience does not suffice, a specialist should be called in. This, of course, must involve no compromise of the faith and nothing which is contrary to Catholic morality must be countenanced. We can never be too careful in such deli-cate matters; this is especially~true because, as competent psychologists tell us, the mental maturity of modern youth frequently lags behind his physical growth---a trap for the unwary who would content themselves by judging from appearances. . In this matter, the Code of Canon Law, c. 973, §3, clearly lays down that there must be "a moral certainty based on positive arguments" . of the candidate's suitability. That is the judgment to be formed before a superior can with a safe conscience advance his candidates to holy orders. If it is impossible :to arrive at this moral certainty, the other rule must be applied, the r_ule stated by Pope Plus XI with equal clarity in his encycIical,letter .4d Catholici sacer-dotii of December 90, 1935: ", . in this [the Pope is speak-ing of dismissal from seminaries] they should keep to the most secure opinion, which in this case is the one most in favor of the penitent, for it saves him from a step which could be for him eternally fatal.''~ The. reason for this clefir~and uncompromising attitude must be evident to all who have at heart the good of the Church whose well-being depends on the qualities of her ministers. In her age-long wisdom, the Church has satis-fied herseIf of the real worth of these qualities, all the more so in view of the heavy burdens she places upon her ministers. Daily, every priest has an enormous weight of pastoral responsibility to bear. The various urgent prob-lems which clamor for his attention create tension and fatigue. He is beset with dangers at every step he takes in a world which is losing its Christian values and submitting ~Acta Apostolicae Sedis, 28 (1936). 41. ÷ + ÷ Ecclesiastical Formation VOLUME 20, 1961 ÷ ÷ ÷ Sacred Congregation ~o! Seminaries REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 168 to a paganizing influence. In view of this, it is no wonder that the Church exercises the greatest caution in the choice of those who are to be her priests. For the sake of her good name in the world and for the common good of the faith-ful, she can not afford to advance to orders even a single one whom she deems less suitable, such is the damage she might suffer at his hands. The unsuitable student of today is the unworthy priest of tomorrow. The Church must train up young men of sound moral fiber, ready to re-spond to the highest ideals, men of deep-root.ed convic-tions, prepared for sacrifice arid self-oblation. Only then does she feel confident in presenting them to her divine Spouse for the seal of ordination. Canon law carries a warning for those who have not a true understanding of the "tutiorism" clearly set forth in both general and par-ticular terms in many papal documents. They can not escape the penalty for defaulters with regard to the canon mentioned above. In fact, they are running a grave risk of "sharing in the sins of others:" All laxism must avoided and no other method or moral system may be countenanced which departs.from the line laid down, es~ pecially when it is a matter of making a final decision on student's ability to observe clerical celibacy. Undoubtedly, some otherwise sound moralists hold opinions which can hardly be reconciled with the "tutiorism" of papal pro-nouncements and repeated above. Unfortunately, there is no escaping the fact that 'in spite of the strict instructions of the Sacred Congregation of the Sacraments (Quara ingens of December 27, 19~0, and Magna equidem of December 27, 1955) not a few candi-dates without a true vocation have been admitted to holy orders. It is not a question of mistakes due to human falli-bility, since on examination of the hist6ry of many ship-wrecks, one becomes perfectly aware that clear indications of a lack of vocation to the priesthood could have easily been noticed during the period of training in the semi-nary. Besides, the Sacred Congregation itself has been able, through periodic apostolic visitations ordered in the vari-ous countries under its jurisdiction, to verify the.fact that not infrequently the fault lies in an inadequate sifting of candidates and the retaining in seminaries of students of little promise either from the human or from the supernatural point of view. It would seem that the policy of many superiors is guided by ~the sad state of dioceses which are hampered by a serious lack of priests. How can one act differently, one hears it asked, when we have not the necessary organization for pastoral work---even for the bare. administration of the sacraments? Is it'not per-haps better to have priests, even if they are not the best type of priests, as long as they provide ior the basic spiritual needs of the faithful? Such a utilitarian concept of the priesthood constitutes a denial of the very essence of the priestly vocation and the priestly ministry. Even if it is true that the efficacyof the sacraments does not de-rive from the goodness of the~minister, yet it is no less a fact that the building up of Christian life is closely bound up with the holiness of God's priests. Their mission, as seen from the Gospels, consists precisely in enlightening their flock and protecting them from corruption, not only iby means of grace, but also by the personal example of 'their lives (see Mt 5:13-14). We must not reduce the priest to the level of a mere bureaucrat of the things of God by ignoring his personal qualities and depriving him of the glory of his intimate union with Christ, a union which consists not only in sharing in His powers but also in copy-ing His virtues. This would be to deny in practice the in-escapable demands of the Catholic priesthood and its transcendent dignity. Preoccupation with numbers regardless of quality is clearly seen to be a mistaken policy. The admission to the sacred ministry of men who are only mediocre is a corrupting influence not only on the zeal of their fellow priests whose apostolic effort is thereby lessened but above all on thd intensity of the religious life of the laity. This last, of course, is a necessary condition for the birth of good and numerous vocations. It is' well to remember that in the ordinary course of events the appearance and develop-ment of priestly vocations d~rive from the personal action and example of the priest as from their instrumental cause. It is an undeniable fact that vocations flourish where there are real men of God~' SuCh men who believe in and love the sublime things they handle show forth in all its pure beauty the ideal which they preach. Acting as poles of attraction, they enkindle the spark of the divine call in generous souls who respond to living example rather than to mere words. Let it therefore be quite clear that preoccupation with numbers, whenever it tends to compromise quality, is self-destructive, slowly but surely drying up the sources of vo-cations and paralyzing the work of divine grace. It shows a weak faith, as we see from the vigorous words of Pope Plus XI, quoting St. Thomas Aquinas: Bishops and religious superiors should not be deterred from this needful severity by fear of diminishing the number of priests for the diocese or institute. The Angelic Doctor, St. Thomas, long.ago proposed this difficulty and answered it with his usual lucidity and wisdom: "God never abandons His Church; and so the number of priests will be always sufficient for the needs of the faithful, provided the worthy are advanced and the un-worthy sent away." . We reaffirm that one well-trained priest is worth more than many trained badly or scarcely at all. For ÷ ÷ Ecclesiastical Formation VOLUME 20, 1961 169 4, 4, Sacred Congregation o~ Seminaries REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 170 such would not be merely unreliable but a likely souxce of sor-row to the Church,° This Sacred Congregation, therefore, demands with all the force that accrues from its high mandate of watchful-ness, that the most exact and scrupulous care be taken in the choice of candidates. We exhort all those responsible for the task of selection not to minimize in the slightest degree, the wise rules laid down in this matter by Holy Church. Are we to allow ourselves to be overtaken in this respect also by'the children of darkness? We are well aware of the great care these latter exercise in the selection and training of those of their disciples who show the greatest natural gifts and display an ability to influence others; their intention is to use such men to permeate the masses and gain them for their own ends. It is a principle both human and divine that the fate of institutions depends on quality and not on numbers. "Gidedn, with an im-mense host at his command, a host seemingly ready to face any danger or difficulty, hears it said to him by the Lord that in great enterprises, one must count on few, not on many. Selection is the rule of existence, of progress, and of perfection.''7 Let us, therefore, rest our hopes on those alone who are chosen by the Lord. Filled with the spirit of Christ, these men will be the vigorous band who by the integrity of their lives and their burning zeal for souls, will,lead the people of God back to the pure.sources of Christian life, thus ensuring the growth of a vigorous generation of priests. The Training of .Seminarians "To devote oneself to making good priests and~ to co-operate to this end as the secondary, efficient, and instru-mental cause, is to fulfill the very task of Jesus Christ. Our Divine Lord during His life on earth seems to have taken it as His very special work to train twelve good priests, His Apostles; with this end in view, He deigned to stay with them some years to instruct and train them for this sacred ministry." Teachers in seminaries must, then, be intimately united to Christ and must give themselves com-pletely to Him, for their work is the priestly work par excellence, "the most difficult, the most sublime, the most important for the salvation of souls and the progress of Christianity.''s "To make'more perfect priestsl Who can understand' the sublimity of this work?"9 "To make good priests is the greatest achievement in the world; it is ira-e Ad Catholici sacerdotii, Acta Apostolicae Sedis, 28 (1936), 44. ~ John XXIII, "Discourse ~to the Students of the Roman Colleges," January 28, 1960, in Acta Apostolicae Sedis, 52 (1960),272. sSt. Vincent de Paul, op. cir., 11, 7-8. * St. Vincent de Paul, op. cir., 11, 9. possible to conceive anything greater or more impor-tant." 10 For St. Vincent de Paul, therefore, those who have the task of educating candidates for the sanctuary can only be described as the perpetuation of Christ in th.eo~ighest realms of the priesthood. Such m~n carry on the teaching work of our Savior, instilling into the youths called to fol-low Him, those principles which He Himself taught to His Apostles before He sent them out tO procla.,im the message of salvation before men. It follows from this that in the mind of the saint, the seminary must be nothing other than a school in which the students, by means of a fitting preparation, learn those things both human and divine which they will need later if they are to bring forth the fruits of salvation. But they must learn these lessons from their superiors who, for them, stand in the place of Christ and who must be capable of instilling in them the spirit of Christ. The saint's spirituality is vigorous, Some have even con-sidered it hard, but such people have stopped at the mere letter of his vehement teaching without considering the thought behind it. It is true that he never tires of preach-ing reunciation, sacrifice, and detachment from family and from worldly goods; he demands the unconditional surrender of the will; he condemns in no uncertain terms indolence and laziness; he. brands pride as the chief ob-stacle to the triumph of grace in the soul of the priest. He insists on penance as the undoubted means of bearing fruit in the sacred ministry; he exalts the value of suffer-ing, renunciation, sacrifice, and detachment fromrfamily, the complete submission of one's own spirit in order to possess the spirit of Christ. Here we have the pure teach-ing of the Gospel, untainted by compromise or human considerations. It is from the Gospel that the Vincentian method of seminary training gains its strength and vigor. If the saint demands renunciation and sacrifice, he shows them in the light of the love of Christ and of souls. He preaches death too but only as the gateway to a richer life; he too takes the shears to the vine to prune it, to cut away all that is disordered and superfluous, but it is in order that the plant may have a more vigorous growth; he too preaches immolation in union with Christ, but it is as a way of coming to the triumph of the Resurrection at Easter and to the fullness of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. Because he was intolerant of any form of self-love, including that kind which is more subtle and capable of cloaking itself ambiguously under the most plausible pretexts, he had a heart as vast as the ocean, a heart which was most t~nder, always ready to sympathize with every form of misery, ~°St. Vincent de Paul, up. cir., 12, 14. + + + Ecclesiastical Formation Sacred Congregation of Seminaries REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 172 and to beat with a zeal which in him was a devouring flame. Worthy friend of St. 'Francis de Sales, he possessed the delicate virtues of meekness and forbearance; he could rise on the wings of the supernatural over the limitations of human nature and yet stoop with understanding to its weaknesses. He was the Good Samaritan who saw in hu-man nature the humanity of Christ. For this reason he looked upon it with serenity and kindness, seeing it as the necessary foundation on which the dignity of redeemed mankind had to be built. But being conscious of its weak-nesses, he would allow it no more than the role of a means, never that of an end: "For he that will save his life, shall lose it; and he that shall lose his life for my sake, shall find it" (Mt 16:24-25). It is often repeated, and not without truth, that prior to making priests, the teachers in our seminaries should make it their first care to train upright men. The purpose of this assertion is to emphasize the importance of human qualities in the full priestly personality. This is the sincere mind of the Church. She demands precisely the presence of notable natural gifts in formulating a positive judg-ment on the worthiness of candidates, and these are the foundation, the starting point, of the ecclesiastical forma-tion. A vocation does not involve the rejection of the hu-man qualities of man. On the contrary, it places the high-est value on what he is by nature and by grace. The God who gives the divine call is the same God who has be-stowed the gifts and who waits for the day when these talents show their increase (see Lk 19:22 ft.). Grace does not destroy nature; but, according to a Thomistic princi-ple so very fertile in the field of theology, it restores, puri-fies, elevates, and transforms nature. Moreover, it can even be said that, in the ordinary course of events, nature con-ditions grace inasmuch as the action of grace is facilitated where human qualities abound, whereas it is stultified where human qualities are lacking. Consequently, any-thing which is contrary to nature has no part in Christian and priestly virtues; and any educational system which dis-dains natural virtues, even though it be presented under worthy pretexts, would be unreasonable and confusing and fraught with dire consequences. It could become the rock on which the frail barks of many vocations, guided by inexpert helmsmen, would founder. Much more en-couraging is the exhortation of the Apostle: "For the rest, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever modest, whatsoever just, whatsoever holy, whatsoever lovely, what-soever of good fame, if there be any virtue, if any praise of discipline: think on these things" (Ph 4:8). A wise teacher, then~ conscious of his responsibilities with regard to his students and in the eyes of the Church, will consider with religious care the individuality of each one and will know how to accept, stimulate, and develop the precious per-sonal gifts of each character. However; there has arisen today even in ecclesiastical circles an excessive tendency to ghrink from these duties as educators and to submit ~' ~l~e iiadividualism df oi]r mod-ern youth who seem intolerant of all discipline. There is much talk of how the child must be prepared for future responsibility by reducing restrictions in the field of edu-cation. In the community as a whole, self-government, the vital spirit of democracy, and group decisions are widely praised. This involves an ever decreasing guidance or so-called "interference" from superiors. They accept, that is, if not in theory, at least in practice, the conclusions of certain authorities whose theories, though much in vogue, are nonetheless reprehensible: We may rightly include under this category, those modern theories which, though presented under different names, agree in regarding it as fundamental in all forms of education that children should be allowed to mold their characters entirely at their own will and discretion, Advice from teachers, or elders is rejected and no account is taken of any law of assistance, human or divine. '. Unhappy illusionl Claiming.to emancipate the Child, they enslave'him; they make him a slave to arrogant pride and irregular desire, to a pride and passion which, if their system is true, are to be approved as the needs of an autonomous human nature?a Such theories owe their origin to an over-optimistic con-cept of human nature. They do not appreciate the frailty and inadequacy of man, nor, in his fallen state, his need to be ruled if he is to achieve self-control. This is above all the case with adolescents and young people who are natu-rally immature and often lured by merely transient en-thusiasms and torn by conflicting emotions. "The same thing is not possible for one who has a virtue and for one who does not have it; so too the same thing is not possible for a boy and for a perfect man".''~s If they lack singleness of purpose and perseverance, our students will never be able to control their impulses. In all kindness they must be made to accept subjection to rule and to realize the force of law. In this way, they will acquire deep-rooted habits which will neither stifle thei~ conscience nor restrict their liberty, but which are, on the contrary, the source of freedom and a guarantee of its ex-ercise. There is no doubt that the authority of the su-perior should control the liberty of the student but always in an atmosphere of mutual confidence, active collabora-tion, and charitable understanding. Thus[ the student's development will not stop short at mere p~assive submis-sion, bu.___~t will go to the very roots of his personality. n Pius XI, Divini illius Magistri in Acta Apos,tolicae Sedis, 22 (1950), 69-70. = St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 1-2, 9.6, 2. + + + Ecclesiastical Formation VOLUME 20, 1961 173 Sacred Congregation of Seminaries REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS Therefore, we can not approve of the attitude adopted in some institutions where there is not the necessary in-sistence on the fundamental value of the rule in the for-mation of young men for the Church: Discipline is the rule .of life and the way of virtue. If a rule life is necessary for men in general, how much more necessary is it for those called to the priesthood. Therefore, the discipline of the seminary and the observance of rule, even on minor points, should be close to the heart of every student. Superiors are necessary just as Supervision is necessary, but clerics should behave and fulfill their duties without the need of a superior to watch over them.= ~'o ask young students still in the process of formation to carry out their many duties without the help of a full and'detailed rule, to refuse them the benefits of a well ordered discipline, is to leave them a prey to uncertainty and to deprive them 6f an atmosphere which would be most helpful to their own personal efforts. The daily "bearing and forebearing" of a rule observed in detail will bring much fruit. It will develop reserves of will power; will prepare characters of strength and perseverance; and it will foster balanced and methodical minds, minds which will be able to remain master of themselves and control the situations which inevitably arise from the clash with the difficulties of life. We repeat therefore: It is one thing take care that our students, while being obliged to carry out their duty even to the smallest detail, are imbued with right principles both human and divine such as will en-able them to assume responsibili'ty in the future; it is an-other to exclude or compromise the actual value of the obligation. If discipline is to be fully effective, individual teachers must not operate in isolation. On the contrary, one must work together with his colleagues, taking c~re, however, not to intrude unduly in the province of any other. With this collaboration and guided by like con-victions, all can work for the progress of the seminary as a whole. We do not intend to evolve these ideas fully here. But, unfortunately, we must take notice of the fact that natu-ralism seems to have penetrated even into some institu-tions for ecclesiastical training. This has been partly due to those who universally condemn the past as unsuited to the task of forming new generations of young priests and who eagerly search for "up-to-date" methods. Yet an-other cause is the rather fatalistic passivity of those who indeed regret in their heart of hearts this dangerous in-novation in the field of education but still accept it as the inevitable consequence of living in our times. In these instances, there is evidence of a gradual decline which ~ St. Plus X, "Discourse to the Seminaries of Milan," October 14, 174 1908, in Enchiridion Clericorum, n. 827. seems to be affecting every aspect of ecclesiastical educa-tion. The common factor in the whole process seems to be an apprecxable lessemng of the supernatural element. The true foundauons of genmne oecclestast.lca! education prayer, intimate union with Gbd, a spirit of mbrtifica-tion, humility, obedience, withdrawal, and. s.eparauon from the world are retreating ever more into the background to be.replaced by externahsm under the g~ ~se of chanty. The intention is to '~'understand" our' era and the new generation. In reality, it only means givi~ng way to its Shortcomings. One has the impressi6n that teachers, far from exercising restraint, have encouraged and even be-come. obsessed with what is novel and untried. They are concerned rather to grant what would most ~tplease the stu-dent than to insist.on what wouldbe most beneficial, and they have not the courage xo ask.for self-dehial and sacri-rice. ! ¯ But Christ asks for both ~self-~en~al and s crifice. "Deny yourself'.' (Mr 16:24) is at the root of all Hislteaching, and ~t contains the,key to the secret of Christiari vocation and above, all the priestly, calling. The priest is the man of sacrifice, chosen to fill up by his own suffering, sacrifices, and his daily self-immolation that which ~s wanting m the sufferings of Christ (see Col 1:1 2 ) . H . eI ~Socalled to,bear fruits of grace; but without the Cross therelcan be no re-demption (see Heb 9:22). He is called to be alshining'light, but this can only be if he is aflame,with the spirit of self-sacrifice. We need hardly say that this liker~ess to C~hrist, Priest and Victim, must begin in the semirlary.We well realize how long the road is and how strong the resistance of human nature, for many "follow Jesus to the breaking of bread, but few to the drinking of the chalice~of His Passion.TM It is essential, therefore, that ou} students be-gin their self-denial and sacrifices from the loutset. Thus they may come to understand the truth and joy contained in these, words: I But blessed is that man who fir thee, O Lord; abandons all things created; who offers violenc~ to nature and through fervor of spirit crucifies the concupiscence of. the flesl~, so that with serene conscience he.may offer to thee pure prayer and become worthy to be admitted among the choir of angels, having ex-cluded himself both exteriorly and interiorly[ from all the things of earth.~ ., Above all, we must insist on the conflict which Christ Himself emphasized, between His ~spirit andI the'spirit of the world, the world for which Christ did[not wish to pray since it was already permeated wit[i the[spirit of evil and hardened against grace. Therefore His o~n must not :: ~.hKOemma~S,~.'~e:sP.i~, Zmitation o, Christ, ~, 1,, 1. " " P'o , o ¯ I 4. + Ecclesiastical Formation . VOLUME 20, 1961 ÷ ÷ ÷ Sacred Congregation oy Seminaries REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS be of this world, just as He Himself was not of it (see Jn 17:9 and 14-16; 1 Jn 5:19). They must appreciate that they are consecrated ~o the things of heaven and that al-though taken from the world, they are no longer of it. Only as they detach themselves from the attractions of the world, from its principles, from its methods and from its facile compromises, will they become the salt of the earth and the light of the world. They must be made to realize that a priest does not cut himself off from his own times simply because he refuses to accept their fallacies. In a word, "the man dedicated to the Church, walks indeed this earth, but his mind and heart must look to heaven.''le Likewise in the delicate question of the students' as-cetical training, it is necessary to move slowly and with discretion and to maintaina gentle but firm hand: "ford-ter in re, suaviter in modo" or, to quote our saint, "firm-ness and constancy regarding the end, sweetness and hu-mility regarding the meansY This simply means that we must go back to the' life and teaching of our Savior which, if well presented, exert an irresistible attraction on the minds of the young. Nothing can equal these pure founts. Our students must be led to a spirit of intimacy with Christ, they must live according to that spirit which brings truth and freedom. They must believe in Christ with that strong faith urged by St. John (14:1), that faith which im-plies an unquestioning acceptance of His word, complete. confidence in His help, and a loyalty and correspondence with grace, even to forgetfulness of self. Through 'their daily contact with their Divine Master, they will be im-pelled to be more like Him (see 2 Cor $: 18), to assume His spirit, and thus gradually to achieve "unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the age of the fulness of Christ" (Eph 4:13). This seems to us to be'the royal way, in fact, the only way, in which our students can be made into the apostles of the future, "perfect men, furnished to every good work" (2 Tim 3:17), who will contribute successfully towards "the edifying of the body of Christ" (Eph 4:12). In fact, zeal for souls has always been nourished by a deep spiritual life and by a mortification which is wholly directed to- Wards personal holiness. But there is always a danger of destroying in a short space of time what has taken much labor to prepare. We are referring especially to the impatience, so common these d~ys, whereby our young students are submitted too easily and without the necessary precautions to trials which are beyond their strength. The aim of this, it is said, is that they may become aware of the surroundings 1e John XXlII, "Discourse to. Roman Colleges," in ,4cta Apos- 176 tolicae Sedis, 52 (1960), 262-70. advocate this method deceive themselves inl thinking that I in this way they are securing students against the dangers they are bound to meet with and that at ~he same time they are arousing in them at an early stage, [ m action and by action," the spirit that must animate their future apostolate. Yet they flatter themseh, es th~,t the diocese will thus be supplied with better priests; priests who from the beglnmng of their pastoral work will b'~e able to pro-duce more results and better results; priests who are .in the public eye, leaders of men, who are inla position to bear faithful witness to the Gospel. This policy of haste is not only based on a!mistaken ner-spectlve, ~n so far as it gxves first place to what must neces- I sarily take second place both in importance and in se-quence; but m addmon ~t presupposes somethang whxch does not exist at all, namely, a sp~rxtual, ~nt~ellectual, and moral maturity that is essential if this exper~.ence of which we speak is to be of profit. What is more, it distorts the nature and aim of the seminary as conceived by the Church's legislation. The seminary is not a~ad never can be a place for testing theories and still le~ss a training ground for dangerous and compromising actxwues. It can be nothing other than a home for deep ~piritual and intellectual formation. O1: course, the futureI apostolate is and, must be a source of inspiration, but anyI practical ex-perience must come by degrees and only when the student has reached the requisite standard. Such is th~ mind of the Popes. They are so concerned with keeping the true aim of the seminary intact that they visualize a particular in-stitution with the specific task of initiating the young priests into the various fields of the apostolat6. In this way the transition from the quiet of the seminary is brought about naturally and, with a more adequateI preparation in theory and practice, the danger of eventual spiritual unbalance is precluded,x7 | TO destroy the whole balance of the life~of our semi-naries and their proved worth on the plea of a~n imaginary "apostolate of action" must of necessity do ~mmense harm~' Indeed, it is to be feared that, if priests of t~e future are trained by such a method based on activity, they will not be able to perform really fruitful apostolic ~lwork. They will not be able to surmount difficulties andl discourage-ment and will fall an easy prey to the moral ihstability of ttle restless and treacherous world in which ~ve live. Ex-perience teaches that the bridling of the passions is an interior achievement that must be accomplished in the secret depths of the soul. It takes place slowly ~nd only by a~ See Menti Nostrae (Acta Apostolicae Sedis, 42 [1950] 691-92) and the motu proprio Quandoquidem (Acta Apostolicae S~,dis, 41 [1949], 1.65-67). 4. Ecclesiastical Formation VOLUME 20, 1961 ÷ ÷ ÷ Sacred Congregation oJ Seminaries REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS means of reflection and recollection. If we allow our stu-dents to throw themselves into external activity, if we leave them free to indulge in that kind of enthusiasm which could easily lead them away from their strict but necessary life of piety and study--even if it is to gain experience of the apostolate---does it not mean, perhaps, that we are drawing them away from their day to day formation which is nourished on prayer, study, and sacri-fice? And at length when their training in the seminary is at an end and they have to face the serious reality of life without sufficient preparation, is it not to be feared that passions suppressed but'not truly subjugated will return? The results of such an education can be observed while still in the seminary. A weakening of piety, a lack of in-clination for all forms of study and especially for specu-lative thought, a discipline that is undermined at its very foundations, and, above all, the appalling superficiality that is found in various branches of education--surely these things are incapable of producing true apostles for the Church. Here we can appropriately quote a saying of St. Vincent de Paul. It can serve as a general rule of- be-havior but it has a special value :when applied to educa~ tion. "Good works fail because people act in too great haste, because they act on their own impulses. This haste has the effect of obscuring the mind and reason and pre-sents the object as possible and opportune. It is not so, and subsequent failure makes it evident.''is Accordingly, rather than use doubtful methods to train a priest just for the present, we must make every effort to form one who will be a priest forever. Conclusion I Your Excellency, before concluding this present letter' in which we have sought to express our concern on cer-, tain matters, we can not but address a last word to the teachers in our seminaries. Whatever position they hold, they are well aware of the seriousness of their duties and of the great responsibility "they bear before God for their students, whom they are seeking to train for the high office that awaits them. In this .unremitting yet hidden toil, which often brings little human satisfaction though it earns much merit, they must never forget their great aim. We are all fully convinced of the importance of en-vironment. Therefore the good will of the students must be encouraged and they must be helped at every stage, of their path towards priestly perfection with all the a.ssist: ance they require. Above all, we would wish that the golden words of Pope Leo XIII be engraved in the hearts of all: 178 nSt. Vincent de Paul, op. cit., 4, 122. n their own field, a personal example of a full, priestly life. l'he example of those in authority, especially for the young, is he most eloquent and persuasive way of convificing them of heir own duties and of fostering a love of wrtue. It is good then that teachers in our semin~aries should se outstanding for their natural gifts, w.hich can win for hem the esteem and trust of their pUpils.°But~ at the same ime, they must realize that natural qualities hnd achieve-nents are of httle use ff they are not ammated by a deep plr~tual hfe. Only th~s can ensure that their work will be ,f real value and bear fruit. The Dlwne Maste.r who dwells n our hearts and speaks to us there "Christ is our ! eacher and He is within us"=0--will be ev, er ready to ,less, increase, .and perfect their work which, by the "rovidence of God, is destined to spread thd mystery of ~Iis Love. We are certain that Your Excellency will ~.ee that this etter be brought to the attention of the superiors of your emmary for their careful cons~deranon. At the same ume, -¢e gladly take this opportunity of express~,ng tO Your ;xcellency our feelings of highest esteem. Rome, Sep-ember 27, 1960.] Yours devotedly in our Lord, JOSEPH Cardinal PIZZARDO, Suburbican Bishop of Albano, Prefect. DINO STAFFA, Titular Archbishop of Caesarea in Palestine, Secretary. Leo XIII, Fin dal principio in Acta Leonis XIII, 22, 254-55. St. Augustine, In lo, 5, 19 (PL 35, 1557). ÷ ÷ ÷ Ecclesiastical Formation VOLUME 20, 1961 179, JAMES I. O'CONNOR, S.J. Some Aspects Religious Authori9 ÷ ÷ ÷ James I. O'Connor, S.J. is professor of canon law at West Baden College, West Baden Springs, Indiana. REVIEW FOR'RELIGIOUS In the Church there are different kinds of authority, One form of authority is called jurisdiction and is the pub lic power of ruling or governing others. It is called publit because it is a power belonging to a perfect society for tht direction of its subjects to the end for which the saic society was constituted. Thus defined, it is a power which belongs both to the State and to the Church. If we narro~ our consideration to jurisdiction in the Church, we can de fine it more fully as the public power of a legitimate su perior, granted by Christ or by His Church through ~ canonical mission, of governing baptized persons to tht achievement of their eternal salvation. This power, native to the Church by reason of its con stitution as set up by Christ, can be and is shared by tht immediate or constitutive parts of the Church by reasor of a canonical mission for the attainment of the purpose o~ the Church. Immediate parts of the Church are diocese: and the clerical exempt religious institutes, As a result! local ordinaries and superiors in clerical exempt religiou: institutes possess true jurisdiction, although the bases art different in each case: in the first case, it is territorial; ir the second, personal. Other moral persons in the Church do not possess juris diction because they are not immediate divisions of tht Church; that is, they are subject to the authority of ar immediate section; "examples of such are parishes, none exempt religious institutes, and so forth. Consequently~ such divisions are sometimes called mediate sections of tht Church. If such a division has jurisdiction, it is by specia~ grant, not by reason of its nature. Within the perfect society which is the Church, w~ find also other societies which are imperfect in the sens, that they are not self-sufficient and are not independen'li although they have a purpose of their own which, how. ever, is a means to obtain the purposes of the Church. Ex amples of such societies are religious institutes. Therefore, ander different aspects, clerical exempt re'ligious insti-tutes are both immediate and mediate sections of the Church whereas all other religious institutes, are mediate ~ections only. Just as the Church in itself and in its cons,ututive divi- ,ions has authority to govern its subjects (and such power I s called jurisdiction), so also the mediate secuons must have and do possess authority for their proper govern-ment. Since this latter authority ~s not jur~s~hct~on, It ~s :alled dominative power. Both types of powerlor authority are set down in canon 501, §1 of the Code of Canon La¯ w: 'The superiors and chapters, conformably to the consu-tutions and to the umversal law, have dominative or .z°vernin~'o~-r~°wer over their sublects,o and .in eve~ ~ exem p t :lerical institute, they have ecclesiastical jurisaiction in both the internal and external fora." ~i UP to the present century, by way of to juris-cfion as a 'public power to govern, dominhtive power as often called a private power. It was calledI dominative power because it was understood as the power or force .~xercised not only on the matter or content ~of the com-mand- theth "ing to be done or not to be done--but also ~n the will of the subject so that the will oflthe subject igree with that of the superior. Perfect s.u~bjection or ibedience brings the intellect of the subject xn,to harmony qith that of the superior insofar as such subjection may )e possible ~ in view o~ the evidence presented to the in-ellec~. By way o[ further distinction, a third kind 6f authority vas recognized by some writers. They called ~it domestic ~ower or authority. This is the power, for exar~ple, ~vhich ~ religious superior exercises over lay peopleI who work or the community; it is also the power of a ~resident of ~ commercial firm, or the supervisor of a hospital floor or . he head o[ a department has over the employees, It is the ~ower or force over the matter or content of the command ,nly--the thing to be done or not done; there ~ no power ,ver the will, much less over the intellect of th~ employee. While these were the usual distinctions of r~ligious au-hority, they did not cover all the authority of a religious uperior, even in a non-exempt institute. A r~,ligious su- ,erior has authority over many things which ,do not fall .nder dominative and domestic power as described above. 7h ose powers all deal w"~th phy"sical persons~, iwith in" d~- iduals. Some illustrations of a religious superior's au-orxty not exercised over lnd~v~duals as such, at least dl-ectly, are the following: admission to the no,~t~ate and ~ religious profession; limited power to dispense from n.pediments to such admission; administration, of the re- .g~ous community as such; administration of the tern- Religious Authority VOLUME 20, 1961 + 4. 4. James I. O'Connor, S.J. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 182 poralities of the entity over which one has authority, example, to contract loans, negotiate sales, lease property and so forth. What kind of authority is this in the case a superior in a non-exempt religious institute? For centuries it was very disputed among canonist., whether such authority was part of the dominative powel of religious superiors.1 Spearheaded by Father (now dinal) Larraona,~ the opinion that such authority was anc is part of the dominative power of a religious superiol gained ground in the present century. As a result, the olt description of dominative power as a purely private powel had begun to fall by the wayside and certainly seems belong there in view of a rather recent reply from tht Holy See. The power in a society has to correspond to it nature. That nature is public since religious institutes art set up by pontifical authority .as a public state of life More%ver, the Church through lawful representatives r ceives-the vows of such religious and these vows are publi both in themselves and in their effects (Canons 488, 1° 1308, §1). Canon 501, §1 acknowledges only two kinds o authority in religious life: jurisdiction and dominativt power. Since in a non-exempt institute the authority is no jurisdiction and since the power over such things as tern poral administration is not a private power, dominativt power must now be classified in two forms: public ant private. Relative to jurisdiction, many questions can arise; fo~ example, kinds of jurisdiction, delegation and subdelega tion of jurisdiction, conferral of jurisdiction in cases whert a doubt is had as to whether a person possesses or cat possess jurisdiction, conferral of jurisdiction on a persor who objectively does not have it but is commonly believec to have it. All these, as well as some other aspects of juri diction, are nicely provided for in canons 196 to 209. N such provision was made in canon law for correspondin' questions pertinent to dominative power. Nevertheless the same questions.and problems can and do arise fo non-exempt religious superiors. All the discussions which proposed solutions to suc] vexing questions were finally brought to an end by al affirmative reply of the Pontifical Commission for th Authentic Interpretation of the Canons of the Code c Canon Law. An affirmative answer was given on March 2~ 1952, to the question: "Whether the prescriptions c 1Those interested in this dispute and the development of th notion of dominative power are referred to a study by the preser writer, "Dominative Power of Religious Superiors," which was pul fished in The Jurist, 21 (1961), 1-26. ~ "De potestate dominativa publica in iure canonico," in Congressus luridici Internationalis, v. 4 (Rome: Pontificium Insl tutum Utriusque Iuris, 1937), 145-80. canons 197, 199, 206-09, concerning the power of jurisdic-tion, are to be applied, unless the nature of the text or context of the law prevent it, to the dominative power which superiors and chapters have in rehg~ous institutes and in societies of men and womenliving in 'common with-out public vows?''a Many religious superiors seem never to'.have heard of this reply, much less of the canons cited, their wording, and their interpretation. Therefore, we shall :first give an Enghsh translauon of those canons, substa, tuung dorm-native power for jurisdiction so that it will be easier to read, understand, and, later, comment upon them. Canon 197, § 1. Ordinary dominative powei: is that which the law itself attaches to an office; delegated]power is that which is committed to a person, §2. Ord:'.nary power can be neither proper or vicari-ous. Canon 199, §1. One who has ordinary dom,inative power can delegate it to another totally or partial,ly, unless the law expressly provides otherwise. §2, Moreover, dominative power which ,has been dele-gated by the Apostolic~ See can be subde~egated for a single act or habitually, unless the delegate was chosen be-cause of his personal qual,ficauons or subdele.gatmn is for, bidden. §3. Power delegated for a whole class of. cases by one who has ordinary power but is subordinate t0 the Roman Pontiff can be subdelegated in individual cases. §4. In other cases, delegated dominative power can be subdelegated only if subdelegation is expressly permitted. §5. No subdelegated power can ~n turn be subdele-gated unless the power to do so has been expressly granted. Canon 206. If several persons have been d~legated suc-cessively, that one must execute the busines~ whose com-mission was given first and has not been expressly re-voked by a later rescript. Canon 207, §1. Delegated power ceases to exist: by fulfillment of the commission; by lapse of time or by exhaustion of the nut Lber of cases for which it was granted; by cessation of the reason for the delegation; by revocation by the delegator together with lirect notice to the party delegated; or by renunciation on the part o[ the one d, elegated to-gether with direct notice to and acceptance ~by the dele-gator. However, delegated power does not cease with the expiration of the authority of the delegator ekcept in the tw~ cases mentioned in canon 61 . 8Acta Apostolicae Sedis, 44 (1952), 497; T. Lincoln Bouscaren, S.J., Canon Law Digest, v. 3 (Milwaukee: Bruce, 1953), 73. + 4. 4. Religious Authority VOLUME 20, 1961 183 4. 4. ]ames I. O'Connor, $.]. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 184 §3. When several persons have been delegated cor-porately, if one of them loses his power, the delegation of all the others also expires, unless the contrary appears from the tenor of the delegation. Canon 208. In accordance with the norm of canon 183, §2, oidinary power does not expire with the expiration of the authority of the person who conceded the office to which the power is attached. However, it does cease with the loss of the office and is suspended by appeal made ac-cording to law, unless the appeal happens to be made with-out suspensive effect, saving the provisions of canons 2264 and 2284. Canon 209. In common error or in positive and proba-ble doubt of law or of fact, the Church supplies dominative power for the external forum. We shall now give some commentary on each of these canons as well as illustrations of their application and non-application. Canon 197 The word ordinary here is a technical term and is not to be confused with our everyday usage of the word as meaning usual, regular, habitual, and so forth. For power to be ordinary two things must be verified: 1) the power must be given by the law itself, whether that law be the Code of Canon Law or the constitutions, which are the particular law of the religious institute; 2) the power con-ferred by this general or particular law must be attached to an office in the institute. An office, as canon 145, §1 tells us, is a function permanently established by divine or ecclesiastical ordinance, conferred conformably to the sa-cred canons, and carrying with it some participation in ecclesiastical power of orders or jurisdiction, or (now in virtue of the 1952 reply) dominative power. Thus, the power of a superior to govern the house or the province or the whole institute is ordinary dominative power be-cause the power is conferred in canon 501, §I of the code and is attached to the office of superior, no matter who may be the incumbent .in the office. The details of that power are partly spelled out in later canons of the code and partly in the constitutions. Some examples of ordinary power from the code are: government of the community over which one is superior; administration of the temporalities of the entity in which one holds office; admission to novitiate and to religious profession; limited prolongation of postulancy, novitiate, and temporal profession; anticipation of renewal of tem-porary profession; change of cession and disposition of one's property; admission of outsiders into cloister in certain instances; egress of religious from cloister under certain conditions; exclusion from renewal of temporary vows or admission to perpetual vows; in all communities, the conduct of the preparatory process fo~/ dismissal of perpetually professed members and, in diocesan law in-stitutes, also that for dismisSal of temporaiily professed members. Not every superior ~has all these powers: some be-long only to the superior general; others ark had also by provincials; still others are possessed by the 16cal superior. Just which superior, alone or conjointly with! another, has these powers must be learned: from reading ~he code and the constitutions. ~i. Some common examples of ordinary power from par-cular law, that is, the constitutions, are: reception of isitors; going out to visit; making trips; dispensation from disciplinary articles of the constitutions; and ]o forth. The details determining the exercise of such po.wers will, in each case, have to be gleaned from the constitutions. Delegated power is defined in the canon. It is any power ~or ta bueth iomriatyg iwnehdic, hw iist hnoout to crdoinnsairdye.r Dinegl etghaet ep~lr psoonw eorf cthane ~lelegate whereas ordinary power can be conceived even though nobody holds the office to which the law attaches ~1 e authority. Ordinary power ~s inherent ,to the office; ~elegated power must always be invested in aI person. r Delegation is conferred by word of mouth or in writing wh l"ch may be the written law itself or some other form of ocument or rescript. A rescript ~s s~mply a written reply to a question or petition. Delegated authority must always be given expressly. Express conferral may be explicit or implicit. Explicit :lelegation is had when the superior in so many words nforms another that he is hereby given suct~-and-such a ~ower or faculty or authority. Implicit delegauon is ~ower of authority or a faculty which ~s not conferred in o many words but which is contained witl~in another ~ower or faculty explicitly conferred which, m turn, can ~ot be exercised either at all or, at least, not ade-quately unless the other power or facul'ty is also ~ossessed. In such a case that other power or faculty s implicitly conferred. Thus, for example, a supe- "ior delegates a subject to investigate a t~oublesome ~tuauon and take care of it. This is explicit delega-ion. When the investigation is made, the delegate finds hat the effective way to correct it is to revoke ~ delegated aculty of the party concerned or to impose a penance. qowever, the superior did not tell the delegate he had he power to revoke in one instance or to punish in the ~ther. Nevertheless, since the superior delegated the per-on to take care of the situation, implicitly ~e thereby lso delegated to him all the power necessary to effect that vhich was explicitly delegated. Delegated authority is not to be confused with pre-÷ ÷ ÷ Religious Authority VOLUME 20, 1961 185 + lames I. O'Connor, S.]. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 186 sumed authority. In the case of presumed authority, the person making the presumption can not contact the party having the authority. Further, after weighing all the cir-cumstances and what is sincerely believed the superior or official would do if asked, he draws the conclusion that the authority would be granted if the superior or official could be contacted. Such action is very different from the express grant of authority made by the superior or official to a definite 'person or group of persons. What power can be delegated will be taken up under canon 199. Ordinary power is said to be proper when it is possessed and exercised in one's own name. Hence, the authority given by the code or constitutions to the superior general, the provincial, and the local superior is both ordinary and proper. Vicarious power is ordinary because the law, especially the constitutions, provides for the office of vicar and the authority of the vicar is determined and conferred by the law itself. However, vicarious power differs from proper power in that the former is not exercised in one's own name but in the name and according to the mind of the superior whose vicar this party is. As a result, when the superior can not discharge his office, for example, because absent from the community or because confined to his room by sickness, and so forth, the vicar becomes acting su-perior and has most, if not all, of the authority of the su-perior. But this authority must be exercised as the supe-rior himself would exercise it. Consequently, the vicar may not take advantage of his position to change the policies established by the superior, even though the change may be desirable. Likewise, he can not grant a re quest which has been already refused by the superior. Moreover, as soon as the superior is again able to discharge his office himself, the power of the vicar ceases because the function of the office of vicar ceases. Vicarious power and delegated power are alike in that in both cases the power is not proper and so is exercised in the name of another. These powers are unlike in tha! vicarious authority is annexed by and spelled out in the law whereas delegated authority depends totally on the will of the delegator as to what authority is possessed. Th~ two forms of power also have different norms as to when and how they are terminated as will be seen by comparin~ canons 207 and 208 as well as what was said above abou~ the cessation of vicarious power. In the light of these distinctions between delegated, Vi carious, and proper power, it seems worth while notin~ that in orders and congregations having a hierarchica form of government, the local superior in regard to hi own community is not a vicar or a delegate of the pro vincial or general superior. This point is explicitly se down in article 312 of the Normae drawn u~ by th Sacred Congregation for Religious. Some . superiors seem not to be aware of the position legally held by the local,superior. This Is especially, true when, the major su-perior drops in~ on the local community either merely for a stopove;,or for a canonical v, isitation. ThE local superior is and remains the true superior of the lo~al community and still possesses and has the right of exercise of all the authority cgnferred on a local superior byI the code and by the constitutibns; The Norma~ in article 265 e~plicitly state thav a provincial or general superior ,can not at the same time be a 19cal superior. A very immediate~and logi-cal ~onclusion follows from tha~t premise: Itherefore, the major suoerior can not take over the functions of a local superi~r.'O'ne,can not.lawfully discharge tl~e function of an office one'does not and ~n h~t ha~. , The only ~xception to this ge~aeral rule islthat in which the local c~mmunity is composed only of m~mbers of the provincial or general curia. Even ~n such cases, ff the com-mumty ~s large, as it ~s in some orders and congregauons, a special religious ~s appointed to be the local superior of the house since such work would notably interfere with the prlnc~paJ wo.rk 9f the major sqpenor m the admxms-tration of the province or institute. A word of caution o~ught to be injected here. There are some "active'-' communities which seem n_ot ~to be obhged by, the~above norms because their local superiors have on!y thg authority th,e top sup.eripr grants the~m. However, such communities do not have the government olan of the ordinary order or congregation. Theirs is [1~ monastic form of government inowhich there is only lone superior who is the equivalent of the abbot or abbess in a ~trictly monastic con~munity. What look like local-~ommunities are not such, canonically; they are not separate moral or jund~c.al~persons. As a result, the superiors" of such houses, are not true superiors in their own right but are vica~rs qr delegates of the one and only true superior. Their authori~ty, then, is only what th,,e one superiorl gives them. Canon !~9 . This canon sets down the rules governing tlie' delegation of authority. In the first place we are told that everybody who has ordinary dominative power can delegate any part of it or the whole of it to another person unless the law, namely the code or the constitutions, expressly declares otherwise. In the absence of a contrary reqmre, ment ~n the law, the delegator may delegate any person competent [or th e assi"gnment, whether the delegated party be a mem-ber of t e ~nst~tute or not. Hence, a qualified s~uperior can delegate the priest who comes to say the community Mass to receive the vows of one of.the commumty. ,Whale the canon does not put a time limit on the duration of the Religious Authority VOLUME 20~, 19bl 187 James 1. O'Connor, $.J. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS delegation, even when all the authority of a sup6rior or official is delegated to another, it is usually p~inted out'by moralists and canonists that such unlimited delegation of all authority is an abdication of one's own resppnsibility. Therefore, delegation of total authority should be granted for a fiXed time only and, ordinarily, for a comparatively short time. ' ~ Delegated power can be used in any legitimate way un-less the manner of use was also defined at the time of dele-gation. When delegation is made, the terms of delegation should be clear to both delegator and delegate so that all doubts and misunderstandings can be avoided. In this first paragraph of canon 199 the solution is of-fered to many problems of superiors. So very often supe-riors, and especially local superiors, complain that the), have no time to be a real superior, to be a mother or father, ~s the case may be, to the members of the community be-cause their time is largely taken up with granting routine permissions, distributing articles, for example, writing supplies, dentifrices, ~ind so forth, so that there is very lit-tle or no time left to help subjects with doubts, questions, and problems. One way of getting that necessary time is to delegate some one or more persons in the community to grant those routine permissions, to distribute articles to the members of the comm~unity, to handle the mail, and so forth. Heretofore some superiors doubted whether they could use such a means as delegation) Whatever grounds for doubt" existed earlier, there is certainly no basis' for such doubts since the 1952 reply of the Code Commission. In as much as the right to delegate is granted by law to all having ordinary power, this power to delegate is itself part of that ordinary power and the superior needs no approval of a higher superior if he chooses to delegate his authority. It may be that a superior in one institute can not delegate to the same extent as a superior in another in-stitute because of a limitation contained in the constitu, tions which is not found in the second set of constitu(ions. Such a limitation, however, has to be found in the law; otherwise there is no restriction except, as previously noted, in the case of delegation of total authority for an indefinite period of time. Occasionally a superior is afraid to delegate authority because he fears the delegated party may use poor judg-ment, abuse authority, and so forth. This simply means that the superior should be as careful as possible in" the selection of the person to be delegated. Sometimes this is the only real way to find out what a given person will do with authority. Secondly, if such faults occur and the dele-~ gate does not amend after advice and correction, since the authority belongs to the superior, just as that authority Could be delegated, so also it can be revoked at any time the delegator judges it should¯ Conseq.u1e tnht dyl, e e e-gator never has to feel that once authority is delegated, it is gone forever from his control. The second situation in which delegation is allowed by general law is that in which~:tileHdly See d~leg'a~t~s an in-fervor, who, ~n turn, may pass on delegation to a third party. Such delegation of delegated power is called sub-delegation. Subdelegation can be granted either for a soli-tary case or for all such cases unless the Holy See's con-ferral of delegauon exphcltly states that the delegate has been chosen because of his personal quahficat~ons or un-less the Holy See exphcltly forbids subdelegauon. To date, there is no general grant of delegation of dom~na-ttve power by the Holy See to all'religious superiors. An examrfle of such a general grant of delegatei:l ]urtsd~ctton ~s the brochure of qumquenmal faculties to local ordi-naries, some of which can not be subdelegatedA Another occasion in which subdelegationlcan be made is found in canon 199, §3. Here the original delegate re-ceives his authority from a person who posse.sses ordinary power 'but who is a. subordinate, of the Holy See. More-over, the delegate must have authority over a whole class of cases or business. In this situation, the del~egate has the authority from the code to subdelegate t~artt or all of his authority to a given individual for all cases! or only one case, or he can subdelegate many persons forI one case. There are or can be a number of instances in which this law can be applied. Perhaps the best exampl~ is that of a hospital administrator or a college or university president, The ultimate responsibility for the hospital br school be-longs to the superior. However, because ofI the load of work involved in functioning as a religious superior,' espe, clally of a large commumty, and also funcuomng as the I administrator of the hospital or the president of the col-lege or university, the work-load is split andlthat part of the superior's authority which pert~ains to thee operation of the hospital or school is delegated to another who serves as admtmstrator or president.5 Th~s ~s delegauon by a person hawng ordinary power but subject to the Roman Pontiff. It is conferred for a whole class of cases or busi-ness, namely, operating the hospital or schooi. If need or usefulness should dictate, the administrator ~r president | t T. Lincoln Bouscaren, S.J. and James I. O'Conn!r, S.J., Canon Law Digest, v. 4 (Milwaukee: Bruce, 1958), 69-82. I . ~ Such split authority can give rise to many problems. A suggested method for dividing the authority in the case of hospitals can be found in an article by the present author, "The Hosp.~tal ~n Canon Law;" in Hospital Progress, 41 (February, 1960), 361-87. Most of the suggested division of authority can be applied to col!ege and uni-versity presidents by simply substituting "president" for "adminis-trator ¯" I Religious Authority VOLUME 20, 1961 189 ]ames L O'~,o~nor, S.]. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 190 has the authority from the code to subdelegate part or all of his authority in~ an individual case. Another example, in a different line, is that in which the local superior is delegated by the superior general or, if competent, by the provincial, to receive the vows of all~ who make profession, temporary or perpetual, in the hduse of that superior: This, again, is delegation for a whole class of cases, namely, the reception of vows. Such a local superior, if impeded from receiving the vows him-self, could subdelegate another, for example, one of the community or the priest celebrating the vow Mass, to re-ceive the vows on this particular occasion. Apart from the two cases provided for in §§2-3 of canon 199, §4 prohibits subdelegation of delegated authority un-less Such delegation is expressly permitted by the original delegator. Subdelegated authority can never be again sub-delegated unless an express grant to that effect was .made when the first subdelegation was given (canon 199, §5). Canon 206 Canon 206 supposes a' situation where, for example, three sisters receive delegation for the same task: Sister Felicitas on January 2; Sister Mary on January 3; and Sis-ter Josephine on. January 5. While all three have delega-tion, which one has the right and obligation to exercise her delegation? Canon 206 replies that the person whose commission was first given has the right and duty; in: our case, that is Sister Felicitas, An exception to this rule is made if a later commission contains a revocation of the earlier grant; for example, if in Sister Josephine's appoint-ment there is also found an explicit revocation of the dele-gation previously extended to Sisters Felicitas and Mary~ Canon 207 ~ Canon 207 lists the ways in which delegated power ceases to exist. Only §1 and §3 are quoted above because §2 can not apply to purely dominative power. Only a brief commentary seems useful here. I) Fulfillment of commission: the delegated authority ceases as soon as the job for which it was given~has been completed. 2) Lapse of time: authority was delegated to December 31, 1960 inclusive. With the end of 1960 the delegated authority also ended. 3) Exhaustion of number of cases: delegation, was ex~ tended to receive vows on five occasions. After the fifth occasion the delegation is lost. 4) Cessation of the reason for delegation: Sister Felicitas is delegated to govern the convent of St. Helen, December 26-31 because the local superior is to be away to attend a series of special conferences. On December 24th word is ~ceived that the director o the con erence has taken eriously sick and the conferences have been ~alled :of[. As result, the superior does not go away Dece.mber 26-31. ince the reason for Sister Felicitas' delegation .has now eased, her delegation also ceaseS. .5) Revocation by the delegator roger er wxth direct no-ice to the delegate; of great imp ortance in~ this stpi ula-ion is the word direct. An example: Brother Hilary has ¯ een delegated by his provincial to negouate the, sale of a ,fece of community property. Before he has time to com- ,lete the transacuon, he hears from a fellow rehg~ous who appened to pass through the prownclal's re.s~dence 'that he provincial said he was writinga letter to Brother Hil-ry revoking his delegauon. The same day l~e hears this ews, Brother Hflary happens to have an appointment to lose the property deal. Does he still have~delegauon to do :~? He does, because he himself has not received dire~t otice from his provincial of the revocation ofldelegation; e merely heard of it from an unofficial sourc.e. If the fel- :~w religious was commissioned by the provincial to in, ~rm Brother Hflary of the revocauon, then Brother s elegat~on would cease as soon as he was informed by h~s eligious confrere. ~6) Rentinciation on the part of the delegate ~together ,ith direct notice to and acceptance by the:del~gator: Two ~ings are to be noticed in this instance: dire~t notice to nd acceptance by the delegator. Direct ha~ the same -~eaning as above regarding revocation. In addition to the irect notice, for instance, Brother Hllary reforms his pro-incial by letter or phone that he is renouncing the dele-auon g~ven him, there must be acceptance by lthe delega- ~r. Brother Hilary does not lose his delegation unless his rovincial accepts.,the renunciation. | . After listing all the ways a given individual@ay lose his elegation, the canon goes on to add a situation in which elegation is not lost, even though, at first glance, it might -em delegation is lost: An illustration will l~elp: Sister enigna, a local superior, has been delegated by her ,other general to receive all vows pronounced in her con-znt. Mother general went out of office Januu~ry 5th be-muse she died that evening. On the morning.+f January ,~h, Sister Benigna received the vows of some s~sters in her ~mmunity. Later that day she learns of mother" general!s eath. Now Sister Benigna wonders if she had ~lelegation ~ recexve the vows that morning. Sxnce no hm~tat~on was ut on her delegation, her authority continued on Janu-y 6th and still continues after that date unless the new ,other general revokes the delegation. The law on this point makes an exception in the two ~ses mentioned in canon 61 which reads: umess ~t should opear otherwise from appended clauses, or unless the re~ I ÷ ÷ ÷ P~ligious Authority ¯ VOLUME 20~ 1961 19l ÷ ÷ ÷ ]ames I. O'Connor, S.J. REVIEW FOR,RELIGIOUS script confers on some person the power to grant a favo to particular persons named in it and the matter is stil intact." Examples of "appended clauses" are: "As long as I a. superior general"; "As long as I wish." With her remova from the office of superior general, both appended clause cause a cessation of the delegated authority. The "As lon as I wish" can be had only if she is competent to grant th delegation. With removal from office she is no longer co petent to have such a wish effectively; therefore, the del gation ceases. The second exception supposes delegation, for exampl to permit Sisters Gervase and Protase to take a trip t Europe. For one or other reason, the delegate has not ye done anything about granting the permission to :the tw sisters named. Unexpectedly, the delegating superior die Since the matter of the delegation is still intact, that i has not been touched, has not had even a beginning o execution, the delegation ceases. Hence the erstwhile del gate is no longer competent to grant the favor and Sister Gervase and Protase are out of a European trip. Canon 207, §3 considers the case where two or more pe sons have been delegated as a single body to carry ou some commission. Brothers John, James, and Joseph hav all been delegated as a unit to transact some business fo the community. Brother Joseph renounces his delegatio by direct word to the delegator who, in turn, accepts th renunciation, Unless the contrary appears from the orig nal delegation, the delegation of Brothers John and Jame automatically ceases. Canon 208 In canon 208 the code turns to the question of cessatio~ of ordinary power. It repeats the norm already mentionec in canon 183, §2; namely, an ecclesiastical office is not los by the loss of authority in the party who conferred th~ office, Therefore, canon 208 draws the logical conclusio~ that authority attached to an office by the law, that i~ ordinary power, is not lost when the party who conferre, the office loses his own authority. This norm is similar t. that for delegated authority at the end of canon 207, ~§1. In the present instance, the case supposed is that, fc example, of a local superior who was appointed to offic by a competent higher superior. The term o~ the highe superior ends before that of the local superior appointe~ The local superior's power, derived from law through hi office, continues even though the party who put him int the office has now lost his authority. Ordinary power ceases when one loses the office t which such authority was attached. The power is su pended, that is, it is possessed but can not be used, if i! possessor lawfully appeals a decision to a higher superior, unless the nature of the appeal is such that it does not prevent immediate execution of ~the original deCision. Ap-peals in judicial processes usually produce suspension of the decision; otherwise, for example, in purely°fid~ainis, trative decisions, appeal or, more exactly, recourse does not suspend the decision (canon 1889). The norm set down above does not derogate from the provisions of canons 2264 and 2284. The first of these canons stipulates that an act of dominative power is il-licit if placed by an excommunicated person. Further, if the excommunication has been pronounced in either a condemnatory or a declaratory sentence of a judge, the act is also invalid. An exception to that law is contained in canon 2261, §2; but both it as well as canon 2284 can ap-ply only to priests, not to sisters and brothers. Canon 209 The last of the jurisdictional canons made applicable to dominative power is of .extreme importance, even though it is not usually of frequent'application. It solves situations which earlier caused very serious problems. Canon 209 supposes a situation where, in the objective order, a superior certainly lacks dominative power or has it only in a doubtful way, In the latter case, the doubt must be positive and probable, that is, there must be good arguments in favor of possession of the authority but there must also be good arguments against its possession. The source of the doubt may arise from a lack of clarity in the law itself or from the lack of certainty that a given fact or facts exist. An illustration of a doubt of law is found in canon 105, 1° concerning the necessity of having a consultive vote of councilors in order that the superior may act validly. As it stands, the canon says: "It is sufficient for valid action if the superior hears the councilors." It is disputed among canonists whether such a hearing is required for valid action because, contrary to its usual language, the canon does not say required. As a result, since the law itself is doubtful, even if the superior did not consult the council where consultation was prescribed in the general law or in the constitutions, the superior's exercise of dominative power is certainly valid since', in virtue of canon 209, de-fect of authority is supplied by the Church in such an in-stance. A doubt of fact means that with regard toa given event there are arguments for and against its existence. If the fact is required as a condition for possessing dominative power, the Church again supplies the authority needed. To illustrate: On May 15, 1960, Brother Joachim was ap-pointed provincial by competent authority. Some time + + + Religious Authority VOLUME 20, 1961 ~93 + ÷ ÷ James 1. O'Connor, $.]. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS later it comes out that at the time of his appointment Brother Joachim seems not to have completed his thirtieth year of age. If that is true, then, without a papal dis-pensation he is not a validly appointed provincial and, furthermore, lacks the dominative power of a provincial. An investigation of the matter shows some documents as well as testimony of relatives and friends indicating he was born August 16, 1929. However, other reliable sources give the year as 1930. Further investigation does nothing to solve the doubt regarding Brother's-birth date. If he was born in 1930, he did not possess one quality required by canon 504 to qualify'as a valid provincial. The doubt in this problem has nothi~g to do with the meaning of the law; it centers on whether or not a given fact occurred in one year or another. Hence, it is a doubt of fact, Since the doubt is both positive and probable, that is, capable of proof both ways, the Church supplies the dominative power brother needed for all his actions. As a result, they are all valid and licit. As for the future, brother should, of course, be reappointed by competent authority since it is not certain that the original appointment was valid. The third instance in which the Church supplies domi-native power is that in which there is no doubt either of law or of fact but because of some externally perceptible circumstance a person is commonly believed to be a valid superior when the real truth is that this person is not, Such a condition of affairs is called common error. From the evidence available and in accord with limited knowledge, the community forms the judgment that Sis-ter Lioba was duly elected superior general on February 11, 1958. She proceeds to exercise all the powers granted such a superior in the code and in the constitutions. One day in the summer of 1960 Sister Sophia, one of the gen-eral councilors, is attending a canon law lecture at the end of which she is very disturbed and consults-the lecturer. The consultation reveals the following facts as certain be-yond all doubt. Sister Lioba pronounced her temporary vows on August 17, 1937; she made her perpetual profes-sion on August 15, 1940. During the annual retreat of 1956 something the retreat master said raised the question whether Sister Lioba had valid perpetual vows. The above sets of dates of her professions, in virtue of canon 572, §2 in conjunctibn with canons 574, §1 and 34, §5 which re-quire a full three yea.rs of temporary vows, from date to date, in order to have a valid perpetual profession, clearly prove she was not validly professed of perpetual vows on August 15, 1940. Consequently, on August 15, 1956, with the full reali~zation of the invalidity of the 1940 profession, she pronounced her perpetual vows. At the general chap-ter on February 11, 1958, she was elected superior general. Because sister certainly had perpetual vows then; because it had been almost twenty-one years since sister pro-nounced her first vows; because the casting and counting 3f the ballots had been canonically performed; and be-cause the presiding local ordinary declared the elections met all the requirements of ciin6n law, all the sister's 6f the zommunity concluded that Sister Lioba was their new su-perior general. Sister Sophia's disturbance of mind was caused by a ;tatement of the lecturer that, among other qualifications, a :religious, in order to be a valid superior general, must have been validly professed a minimum of ten years, in-cluding the time of temporary vows (canon 504). Mother Lioba, although in the community since 1935, as of Feb-ruary 11, 1958 had valid vows for only just under four and a half years (August 17, 1937-August 17, 1940; August 15, 1956-February 11, 1958). Therefore, Mother Lioba is not really the superior general. Ignorance of the law on this point, even though it excused from all sin because nobody knew any better, does not prevent the canonical effect of the non-observance of the law, for the reason that canon 504 does not provide for ignorance as excusing from the effects of canon law (canon 16, §1). That is all bad enough. However, since a validly chosen superior is required for valid admission of candidates to the novitiate, to tempo-rary and per.petual' professions, to negotiate contracts of sale or loan, to appoint provincials and local superiors, and so forth, what about the validity of all those admis-fions, contracts, appointments, as well as all other actions whose validity depended on a validly chosen superior? Prior to the 1952 reply, cases like this with their chain reaction of multiple invalidities were something of a night-mare to canonists who in various ways sought to find a legal remedy to prevent' such awful consequences. The ;urest way to take care of such cases was to request from the Holy See what is called a radical sanation (sanatio in radice). Now in virtue of the 1952 reply, in such circum-stances, namely, where common error is had, the Church mpplies the dominative power necessary for the acts ~laced by such a "superior." Consequently, as regards the ictions of Mother Lioba, all those requiring dominative 3ower in order that they be valid, are all valid by supplied iuthority. As in the case of Brother Joachim, so also in :hat of Mother Lioba the status as superior should be vali- ]ated if possible. In the present instance the easiest way ~zould be to petition the Holy See for a radical sanation. These considerations should make for a better under- .tanding and appreciation of religious authority or dotal: ~ative power and especially of the application of certain urisdictional canons to that authority. + 4- + Religious Authority VOLUME 20~ 1961 195 FRANCIS N. KORTH, S.J. Total Dedicatio in the Worl ÷ ÷ ÷ Francis N. Korth, S.J., is professor o[ canon law at St. Mary's Col-lege, St. Marys, Kansas. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS ]96 The apostolic constitution, Provida Mater Ecclesia, o February 2, 1947, focused attention upon a new, otficiall~ approved type of totally dedicated life in the world namely, the life in secular institutes. Members of these institutes bind themselves to the practice of evangelica poverty, chastity, and obedience according to their con stitutions for the purposes of personal sanctification and of apostolic work. Secular institutes are the third corn ponent of the juridical state of perfection-to-be-acquired as that state exists at present in the Church; the othei two components are the various kinds of religious insti tutes and of societies of common life. Outside the juridical state of perfection-to-be-acquired, there exist other groups many of them in a stage of development or growth, whose members dedicate themselves totally to an apostolic life and personal sanctification. Religious institutes and societies of common life (ex amples of these latter are the Paulist Fathers, the Mary knoll Missionary Fathers, the Vincentian Fathers) are well established and known in this country. Not so seculaI institutes, since they are a more recent development. Secular Institutes in the United States In an effort to help the growth of this new form ol specially.dedicated life in this country, as well as to make these groups and other similar groups better known and understood, a small number of interestedpersons:met in the summer of 1949 to talk things over. A year later in July, 1950, the first general meeting of such groups with some seventy participants, was held in Washington D.G. From this developed an unofficial national cente, (operating with the knowledge.and approval of ecclesiasti. cal superiors) for the purpose of coordinating activity and~ of collecting and disseminating information. Until 1957 this center was located and serviced at Notre Dame Uni cersity under the able and generous leadership of Father Ioseph Haley, C.S.C. Two other persons who have played mportant roles from the beginning are Father Patrick ~lancy, O.P. and Father Stephen Hartdegen, O.F.M. In lanuary, 1952, a restricted' gathering (seventy-five 'per- .ons attended, however) met at Notre Dame University. Fhe proceedings of both the 1950 Washington meeting ~nd this 1952 meeting at Notre Dame were compiled. In August of that same year, 1952, the first National ,~ongress of Religious in the United States' was held at Notre Dame University; during this Congress two papers were given on secular institutes. About the same time ~ome published materials about secular institutes ap-peared, and some talks were given to various groups about the same subject. In February, 1954, a meeting 3f twenty-six interested priests took place in Chicago. Meanwhile, an informational bulletin was being issued from time to time by the national coordinating center. The interests of the coordinating center had now been extended to include, besides secular institutes, other groups devoted to a life of total dedication in the world. The bulletin received the expanded title of Bulletin on the Dedicated Life in the World and Secular Institutes. In 1955 a workshop for dedicated persons in the world was conducted at Chicago. That same year regional meet-ings were held in San Francisco and New Orleans, fol-lowed by one in Chicago the next year and one in Boston in 1957. The national center's bulletin was now appear-ing under the name of Bulletin of the Life of Total Dedication in the World. In 1957 there was published a ;ymposium, Apostolic Sanctity in the World, edited by Father Haley, C.S.C.; in August of the Same year a ,aational meeting of representatives of the four regional areas was held at Notre Dame University. The Sacred Congregation for Religious had been ac-quainted with these different activities and meetings. ~'or purposes of unifying the activity and of guiding the zfforts of all concerned along proper lines and in con- ~ormity with the Holy See's directives in this matter, the 3acred Congregation urged that all these related activities ,~e now placed under the direction and guidance of the .~onference of Major Superiors of Men's Institutes in :he United States. Father Joseph Haley, c.s.c, had been in charge of zoordinating efforts until 1957, at which date the national ,nformation and coordinating center was shifted to Wash- .ngton, D.C. with Father Stempen Hartdegen, O.F.M. of Holy Name College in that city as the national director tnd president of the newly proposed (but not yet fully tpproved) Conference of the Life of Total Dedication n the World. The plan for this Conference had to be 4- 4. Total Dedication VOLUME 20, 1961 19'/ Francis N. Korth, S.~. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 198 submitted to the Conference of Major Superiors for approval. This approval was obtained (September 29 1959) and 'preparations were then begun for the firs triennial general meeting of the new Conference (here after referred to as the C.L.T.D.W.), Though ~his meeting was projected .for St. Louis in November, 1960, an un foreseen delay caused it to .be held in Washington, D.in January of the following year. The Washington Meeting This first triennial general meeting represented an edu cational effort to make the life of total dedication in world, especially in secular institutes, better known and understood by clergy and laity alike. The program was signed to appeal both to those whose interest in this wa) of life was just beginning and to those whose interest wa~, of long standing. The opening session of the meeting, convened in auditorium of McMahon Hall at The Catholic University on Saturday, January 28, 1961. Chairman of this session was the president of the C.L.T.D.W., Father Hartdegen. O.F.M. More than one hundred and fifty persons (laymen and laywomen, a number of priests, and several brothers and sisters) had registered for the meeting; a fairly large number of visitors, including some clerical students, individual sessions. The first formal paper of the meeting was a review the activities' during the past eleven years in the United States leading up to and culminating in the formation and. official approval of the C.L.T.D.W. This talk, .en-titled "The Conference of the Life of Total Dedication in the World--A Decade of Growth, 1950-1960/' has fur-nished the facts given in the opening part of the present article. Next on the program was a paper with the title, "An Active Lay Apostolate: Condition of Growth of Secular Institutes in the United States." The paper emphasized that an active apostolate and a deep interior life are the conditions for the growth of secular institutes in this coun-try. Secular institutes, the paper continued, are peculiarly suited to the needs of the times; because they are different in their extrinsic elements, they can fulfill the contem-porary apostolate's need of easier access to atheists and sinners; the institutes, accordingly, answer the universal need for an organized secular apostolate and for a deepl interior life. The paper then went on to give a historical and statistical survey of secular institutes, the main point~! of which are summarized below. In 1938.representatives of twenty-five societies or group~" of total dedication in the world came from various part,~ o[ the world to a meeting in Switzerland. Events such these gradually led up to the official, juridical recognition of secular institutes by the Church in 1947. In the United States at the present time there are repre-sentatives of twenty-five known groups of persons spe-cially dedicated to the apostdlat~ in the world;~ fli~se are either secular institutes or other groups which might de-velop into secular institutes. (No figures are available for Canada.) Of these twenty-five groups, twelve are secular institutes (eight are pontifical and four diocesan), seven are canonically approved pious associations, and six are not yet canonically established, but are existing with the approval of the bishop. The eight pontifical secular institutes are divided into six with final approval (Company of .St, Paul, Daughters of the Most Holy and Immaculate Heart of Mary, Mis-sionaries of the Kingship of Christ [women's branch], Opus Dei, Society of the Heart of Jesus, and Teresian In-stitute) and two not yet fully approved but having the de-cree of praise (Caritas Christi Union and the Society of Our Lady of the Way). The four diocesan secular insti-tutes are: Missionary Priests of the Kingship of Christ, Regnum Christi, Schoenstatt Sisters of Mary of the Catho-lic Apostolate, and the Secular Institute of St. Plus X. The seven canonically approved pious associations are.' Caritas; Domus Dominae and Domus Domini (Madonna House); Jesus-Caritas, Fraternity of Fr. de Foucauld; Ob-late Missionaries of the Immaculate; Oblates of St. Joseph; Pax Christi; and Rural Parish Workers of Christ the King. The six groups not yet canonically established are: Daughters of Our Lady of Fatima, Ecclesian Institute of Christian Life, Institute of Blessed Martin de Porres Work-ers, Institute of the Mystical Ghrist, Institute of the Word, and Pro Deo Workers. Not falling into the above categories of specially dedi-cated persons in secular institutes or in groups that might develop into such, but still worthy of mention here under a special listing because of total dedication or noteworthy apostolic work being done by their members are the fol-lowing four groups: International Catholic Auxiliaries; La Paix (Lafayette Associated Professional Apostolate of Individual Christians ); Lay Workers of the Sacred Heart; and the Society of the Daughters of St. Francis de Sales. [Some information about the above-mentioned secular institutes and other groups is available in a pamphlet en-titled Chan:~els, published by the national information center whose address is: C.L.T.D.W., Brookland P.O. Box 4522, Washington 17, D.C. The price of the pamphlet is twenty-five cents.] The above groups exist in. nearly thirty of the states, though the overall representation is small. While it is true that the secular institute movement has developed Total Dedfi:atlon VOLUME 2°0, 1961 199 4. Francis N. Korth, $.]. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 200 fairly rapidly, still ther~ is reason for concern about the slowness of growth in the United States. The principal cause of this is perhaps the lack of realization on the part of many of what the modern apostolate means and re-quires; namely, the Christianization of modern society. Life in Secular Institutes Following the two main talks of the morning, the audi-ence was then divided into fourteen smaller work groups. Each group had a leader and a secretary; items presented in the preceding talks were discussed more fully by each group; and prepared questions to aid discussion were dis-tributed. Any conclusions were noted by the secretaries; summaries of these conclusions were presented at the final general session on the last day. The first afternoon speaker treated the topic of "Secular-ity in the States of Perfection of Secular Institutes." He made the point that the secularity of these new institutes does not imply secularism but rather a stable way of totally dedicated life in the world. The member of a secular in-stitute has the obligation of the three evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience and is always subject to the will of God expressed by the constituti6ns and by superiors. Some difficulties encountered are loneliness, being misunderstood, and a lack of some of the things of the world while living and moving in it. The lack of com-munity life and of a common garb is hard for outsiders to understand. In addition, the member of a secular in-stitute is on his own to do the required thing: perhaps to give up a movie or a television program in order to be faithful to spiritual exercises, to do without new clothing because of the poverty professed, to stay away from an office party. There are no bells to direct one's day, no assistance from the example of others, as is had in com-munity life. Mentality, personality, and strength above average are needed to lead this life. A person must be an active, militant apostle, for part of a vocation to a life in secular institutes is to be the leaven in the masses. The second part of this first afternoon was devoted to a panel on "The Evangelical Counsels," the panelists being two priests and three lay persons. The first panelist pre-sented the canonical aspects of this topic, commenting on the nature of the vows or promises and their resultant ob-ligation or bond and on the fact that one binds himself according to his paiticular constitutions, that a member of a secular institute is not a religious, and that such a call-' ing is a special vocation which at times may require rather high intellectual qualifications. Prudence and good judgment are essential in any prospective candidate and, of course, a good moral life. Some inner impulse or desire is found, but not necessarily a liking; in other words, there should be some general appeal and an investigation of that appeal, The second panelist considered the moral aspects of a life of poverty, chastity, and obedience. His remarks may be summed up in the followifi~ ~iy. Poverty~ tile ~dical ownership remains, while the useful ownership is re-stricted according to the constitutions. A very strict ac-count of income and expenditures is required, the account being rendered to the superior usually at the time of the annual retreat.Combined with generosity to the poor, frugality is practiced. Ckastily: all sins against' chastity must be avoided and, moreover, ~easonable means must be taken to preserve the full beauty of this virtue. Members in the strict sense of secular institutes are forbidden to marry. Obedience: superiors are to be obeyed within the limits of the rule and constitutions. A formal command would be given in writing or before two witnesses and with the use of a special formula; this power is not to be used beyond what is found in the rule or statutes or constitu-tions. ',The practical "aspects of living poverty, chastity, and obedience in a secular institute were briefly treated by the three remaining panelists, each of whom considered one of the three evangelical counsels. The first speaker discussed the practical living of poverty, At times, he noted, it is difficult to determine the detailed application of poverty, particularly in the case of persons engaged in individual work or careers~ One should live in the spirit of poverty and pray to understand what: living in that spirit means. In everyday living two methods of practicing poverty are followed: 1) the individual keeps his own budget and sup-plies his own needs, getting the necessary permissions from his superiors; 2) income obtained from work is pooled and the needs of individuals are supplied by Superio[s. from the common fund. At times there might also be some com-bination of both these methods. Practical ~tuestions, de-termined or settled by the Constitutions or the rule of life of each institute, inclUde the following: whether or not to keep a budget, how much may be spent without special permission, how much to give to charity on one's own ini-tiative, how much.to give to the institute. A definite record of revenues and expenses must be~ kept and reported to superiors at stated times, Permission is required to spend any amount; a general permission might cover expendi-tures for medicine, toilet articleS, and so forth; for cloth-ing, by way of example, specific or special permission might be required. The alignment of permissions varies with the occupations of the members. In emergencies one may act and later report the matter. A booby trap in 'prac-ticing poverty could be the accepting of gifts from relatives or friends (though in some groups it is permissible tO ao ÷ ÷ ÷ Total Dedication VOLUME 20, 1961 ÷ ÷ ÷ Francis N. Korth, $.1. REVtEW FOR R~t.tGIOUS 202 cept gifts even of money) or working extra hours to earn more money when the time should be given to the apos-tolate. A monthly financial report might be required. The rule of life of a particular group will flesh out its constitu-tions on these and similar points. It is important to note that the practical living or regulation of poverty varies considerably with different institutes. Though there is a great variety concerning poverty in the const.itutions, some restriction is essential for all. The speaker on the practical living of obedience noted that obedience presupposes a mature mentality which sees that it is from Calvary that. the meaning of obedience be-comes clear. Obedience gives one an assurance of fulfilling God's will and it frees from pride. Just as other things connected with secular institutes have secular character-istics, so too does this obedience. The member of a secular institute is neither alone nor completely dependent: There are no .schedules or other helps as in religious institutes. Secular institute obedience must be active; often the su-perior gives only general directives. For example, the hour of rising in the morning and the hour of retiring at night are indicated; but if some friend or guest is in the house, the member could probably bypass that directive for the sake of charity. The last of ~he five panelists discussed the practical living of chastity. This means no marriage and no sin against chastity; for God, marriage is renounced and per-fect chastity is undertaken. In regard to dances and shows, the me .mber of a secular institute does not make a habit of these diversions but "attendance is permissible if charity or the apostolate requires it, One must be selective in tele~ vision programs; similarly, books and movies, if there is time for them, must be chosen wisely. Women members should wear clothing that is modest and suitable for their apostblate. Jewelry should not be expensive; it should be used as part6f the costume and not for show. As a motive for faithfulness in preserving chastity, a deep love of Christ should be cultivated. A strong devotion to the Blessed Mother will also help, as.also will fidelity to the rule, which was given precisely to be of assistance in this matter. Formation of M'embers of Secular Institutes The evening session feat ~ured another panel whose topic was "Formation for the Life. of Total Dedication in the World." This time, there w~ere four panelists, two priests and two lay persons. The first panelist spoke about spirit~ ual instruction and remarked that the purpose of a pro-gram of spiritual instruction is to give glory to God, to further the work of the Church, and to form apostolic secu-lar ambassadors of God.: For this latter purpose, apostolic virtues, especially as detailed in the particular constitu- tions, are necessary. In general there is need of zeal for souls, prudence, fortitude, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. In any consideration of method in spiritual instruction, it is important to remember that the spiritual life must be allowed to grow by degrees. 'It ~as,suggested by the~speaker that in the period of formation fundamentals be stressed; a knowledge of secular institutes in general and of the con-stitutions of a particular group must be imparted along with the spirit of that particular group. In the period of temporary incorporatibn, the above areas should be devel-oped more fully, the .person should be acquainted with the apostolate of the institute, and forbearance of the faults of others should be inculcated.In the period of final or definitive incorporation there is need for continued spiritual instruction, for growing simplicity in one's spirit-ual life with no overemphasis on either the active or prayer aspect of secular institute life. Spiritual guidance was discussed by the next speaker. The spiritual director of a secular institute, he said, must realize that he is working with specially dedicated souls. He must teach them the principles of the spiritual, life with emphasis on prayer and mortification. He must also teach them to think with the Church, to have zeal, tO lead a life of self-denial in order to live with Christ. For purposes of guidance, the panelist suggested the following three "p's" as useful: 1) a philosophy of life (= the faith); 2) a pro-gram (for which consult the constitutions, customs, and heritage of the particular group); and 3) "passion" (= en-thusiasm for living total dedication). The means at a di-rector's disposal are conferences, lectures, discussions, di-rected spiritual reading, and especially a mirroring of all he teaches. The two lay participants on this panel discussed "Teach-ing and Living the Rule and Constitutions in Secular Life." For teaching the rule and constitutions, the third panelist stressed the need of starting with humility, since one is to serve when one governs or teaches. Compassion, zeal, pity, and patience are necessary to teach or train young people. The teacher must teach by living and must himself be immersed in prayer. In actually teaching, the person to be instructed must be studied and the amount of training or instruction to be given here and now must be duly measured. If the person should at present be con-fused or somewhat emotionally disturbed, teaching of mental hygiene is indicated. The vocabulary of instruc-tion should be adapted to the capacity of the hearer. The questions that will be asked of a teacher of the way of life in a totally dedicated group will always tend to be the same; hence the teacher must learn to be patient with the questioners. The final speaker of the panel gave some thoughts on ÷ ÷ ÷ Total Dedication VOLUME 20, 1961 203 ÷ ÷ ÷ Francis N. Korth, S.$. REVIEW I:OR RELIGIOUS 204 living the rule and constitutions. To this end the personal touch and a greater initiative in the following of Christ are needed, especially for groups that do not have training of members in common. Perfection is to be sought from the rule which must be taught gradually without any great upheaval or change in the candidate's life. It must be stressed, however, that the life the candidate is contem-plating is a life of total dedication. He should be taught that in day-by-day living decisions must be made by the individual, but later he should check his decision with the superior's judgment. In the realm of poverty, one should have as if he had not; hence there should be a spirit of being ready to turn.over all one's money to the in-stitute. In order to live the rule and constitutions there must be a constant, conscientious, mature completeness in giving. On Sunday, January 29, the second day of the meeting, a low Mass was celebrated in the crypt chapel of the Na-tional Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. The sermon at the Mass was entitled "The Catholic University and Secular Institutes." The hope was expressed that at some later date a planned series of general courses might be given at The Catholic University on basic knowledge about secular institutes and on training and spiritual in-struction fundamental for life in any groups devoted to total dedication. The Apostolate The general sessions were again held in the auditorium of McMahon Hall. The opening morning session pre-sented a panel of lay participants on the overall subject of "The Apostolate." Five speakers successively discussed lay missions (two speakers), social work, nursing, and teaching. The first speaker on lay missions gave some background information on the general idea of missionary work in the Church. The particular role of the lay apostle in mission areas, he said, is to develop an atmosphere of Christianity through the practice of Christian principles. To achieve this purpose, the natives must be educated in Christian principles, perhaps initially through the ministrations of those in some profession such as nursing. To prepare mod-ern young people for such lay missionary work on a life-time basis, spiritual preparation must first of all be stressed. Next, the prospective missionaries are to under. stand that there must be no forcing of American attitudes about government and life on the natives. The basic atti-tude of the missionary should be humility; he must be sympathetic to the customs and culture of the people among whom he is working. To this end a study should be made of the culture, philosophy, and literature of the par-ticular missionary country. The second speaker on lay missionary work pointed out that opportunities for laymen to spend their lives as per-manent missionaries are found in ~ay mission societies. A lay missionary should be imbued with the missiona~ry mys-tique: to give. He is "going~oht'' to help other p0~ential members of the Mystical Body. Emotional balance is neces-sary for a lay missionary. He should be able to accommo-date himself to the culture of. the country in which he works. "Missionary poverty" means giving up one's former way of living and even of thinking. Joy will be found in a sense of fulfillment, in the hope enkindled in men's eyes, in the happiness of the children one meets, and in the friendship of the natives. Hardships will include discour-agement, lack of assimilation by the natives, rigors of cli-mate, and the like. Teams of missionaries, as opposed to free lances, supply mental uplift, coordination of activity, spiritual assistance, and so forth. The third panelist spoke on the apostolate of social work, an apostolate that implies service and sacrifice. So-cial work implies climbing into the stream of human events and adversities to serve a fellow human being who is suffering. This demands a spirit of self-sacrifice and the conviction that no human being is trifling or insignificant. The fourth panelist discussed nursing as an apostolate. Nursing, it was said, is an art and science that deals with the patient in his entire environment. The nurse must be a mature person with a ministry of mercy based on the love of God. The nurse is to see Christ in the patients, for there is a need of "a restoration of nursing in Christ" to counter-act a secularistic and materialistic attitude. The average nurse today seems self-centered instead of Christ-centered. The nurse should try to help patients spiritually and should teach the Gospel message by action; thus, for ex-ample, the nurse should be ready "to go the other mile" whenever the opportunity arises. A nurse truly dedicated to Christ shares His sufferings and also His joys. The fifth panelist on the apostolate considered the area of teaching, pointing out that educational statistics in the United States show that many Catholic students on all levels of training are not in Catholic schools. Some sug-gestions have appeared in various publications to meet the situation; for example, to close the first four or five grades in parochial schools, to have fewer but more excellent Catholic schools, or to sacrifice tremendously to retain the entire system. Whatever be the solution to the prob-lem, it will always remain true that Catholic teachers must endeavor to be at least as professionally competent as non-Catholic teachers. The speaker suggested that a specialized apostolic group of lay teachers is needed in this country. Moreover, the influence and activity of the Cath-÷ ÷ ÷ Total Dedication VOLUME 201 I961 £05 Francis N. Eor~h, $.J. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 206 olic teacher could well be extended into the area of adult education. After the close of the Sunday morning session, a formal group luncheon was held, at which the Very Reverend Celsus Wheeler, O.F.M. of the Conference of Major Su: periors of Men's Institutes in the United States gave a word of encouragement to the work done at the meeting. He told those in attendance that secular institutes and other groups requiring a life of total dedication in the world are in a splendid position to establiSh contact with people for apostolic purposes in places and circumstances where priests and religious often could not make contact. The second speaker at the luncheon was a physician, a member of a professional men's sodality, who spoke on the topic,. "Dedication to t~he Lay Apostolate through the Professions." In his speech he stressed that though the lay apostolate can achieve a vfist amount of good, still consid-ering the number of Catholics in the United States, there is not the'desired impact or influence which might be ex-pected. Many young people today have no concept of how their future work as professional men might be utilized for the apostolate. One must learn to think with the Church and to carry that thinking into one's professional life. A deep interior life must be developed so that this can spill over into apostolic work. As an example of what one group of professional men is doing for the apostolate, a detailed description was given by the speaker of the sodality to which he helorigs, of its course of training, and of some of its apostolic activities; his presentation was both impressive and inspiring, A business meeeting was held in the auditoriu

Issue 12.6 of the Review for Religious, 1953. ; A. M. D. G. Review for Religious NOVEMBER 15, 1953 Pracfice Of ÷he H01y See, I I . Joseph F. Gallen Psychological Testing . William C. Bier The Eucharistic Fast . : . Hi~ary'R. Wer~s MOfU Proprio Jubilee . c.J. McNaspy Communications Questions and Answers News a'nd Views Book Reviews Index for 1953. VOLUME XII NUMBER 6 RI::VII::W FOR Ri::LIGIOUS VOLUME XII NOVEMBER, 1953 NUMBER CONTENTS NEWS AND VIEWS . 281 PRACTICE OF THE HOLY SEE, II--Joseph F. ~Gallen, S.'J .2.8.5 BOOK NOTICES . 290, 316, 329 LETTER ON OBEDIENCI~ . . . 290 PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTING OF CANDIDATES AND THE THE-OLOGY OF VOCATION---Willlam C. Bier, S.J2.91 OUR CONTRIBUTORS . 304 THE EUCHARISTIC FAST---Hilary R, Werts, S.J . 305 MOTU PROPRIO JUBILEE--C. d. McNaspy, S.J . 317 COMMUNICATIONS . 321 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS-- 29. Correction of Subject by Immediate or Mediate Superior 322 30. Guidance of Subjects by Superiors . 322 31. Local Superior at Council Meeting . 323 32. Local Superior at General Chapter . 324 33. General Council and Suggestions to General Chapter . 324 34. Postulancy and Readmission . ." . 325 BOOK REVIEWS-- Religious Men and Women in the Code; Fundamental Psychiatry; Most Reverend Anthony 'j. Schuler, S.J., D.D.; I Want to See God 326 BOOK ANNOUNCEMENTS . 330 INDEX FOR VOLUME XII, 1953", . 333 REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, November, 1953. Vol. XlI, No. 6. Published bi-monthly: January, March, May,,July, September, and November at the College Press, 606 Harrison Street, Topeka, Kansas,, by St. Mary's College, St. Marys, Kansas, with ecclesiastical approbation. Entered as second class matter 3anuary 15, 1942 at the Post Oflke, Topeka, Kansas, under the act of March 3, 1879. Editorial Board: Jerome Breunig, S.J., Augustine G. Ellard, S.J. Adam C. Ellis, S.J., Gerald Kelly, S.J., Francis N. Korth, S.J. Copyright, 1953, by Adam C. Ellis, S.J. Permission is hereby granted for quota-tions of reasonable length, provided due credit be given this review and the author. Subscription price: 3 dollars a year; 50 cents a copy. Printed in U. S. A. Before wrlfing to us, please consult notice on Inside back cover. News and Views Psychological Testing When we last published an article on the psychological testing of candidates, a religious superior wrote an indignant letter cancelling his subscription and asserting that such testing interferes with the work of the Holy Ghost. Thatthis is a misconception should be evi-dent to all who read Father Bier's article in the present number and a s~cond article to be phblished in January. Whatever may be said 'for or against the value of psychological tests--and we do not claim to have all the answers--it seems clear enough that their use is no more an attempt to "naturMize" religious vocation than is the use of previous medical examinations. Educating Sisters We have just received a very yaluable brochure entitled Directorg of Catholic Women's Colleges with Facilities for the Education oF Sisters. This brochure gives tabulated i'nformation on colleges and motherhouses accredited to offer degree programs, detailing the par-ticular courses provided, the number of Sisters who could be cared for, and the conditions, financial and otherwise, under which they would be received. The information was gathered by the Commit-tee on the Survey Section on Teacher Education of the N.C.E.A. The reason for gathering the information was the fact that many of the smaller religious congregations of women do not have facilities for educating their own members and find the standard costs of "sending Sisters away" prohibitive. These congregations can obtain help from the larger congregations; and this Directorg will show at a glance where and how the help can be obtained. For further information, or for copies of the Directo~g, piease address: Sister Mary Gerard, O.S.F., Chairman, Directory Project, Alverno College, 3401 South 39th Street, Milwaukee 15, Wisconsin. Poor Clares The Poor Clares of New Orleans have prepared a file of at least one hundred 2-inch slides in .black 'and white for use in a still pro-jector. The photos were taken within the cloister, and every" part of the monastery is included. Also prepared is a brief description of every picture. The nuns will send'this file to any desiring to show 281 NEWS AND VIEWS Reoiew for Religious the slides tO interested groups, particularly, young ladies among whom there might be the possibility of a contemplative vocation. They will also send ~lratis literature for distribution, a set of seven large posters, and 6-inch dolls'd~es~ed as" Poor Clar~s. The remailing of, the small slide file is the only expense they would expect the user to assume. Those interested in this vocational project shQ~Id write to: Monastery of Saint Clare, 720 Henry Clay Avenue, N~w Orleans 18, Louisiana. New Indulgence For the purpose of 'increasing devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary ever more and more, Ou~ Holy Father, Pope Plus XII, in. an audience given to the Cardinal Major Penitentiary on March 30, 1953, granted in perpetuum an indulgence of fifty days, to be gained once a day, to those who, keeping on their person a duly blessed rosary of Our Lady, have kissed it devoutly.and at the same time have recited with a pious mind the words of the Angelic Salutation: "H~iil Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women, arid blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus." (Acta Apostolicae. Sedis, XXXXV [ 19 5 3 ], 31 1.) , Valuable Booklets The Grail Press, St. Meinrad, Indiana, has sent us two booklets of immense value for clerics. Both of them are re-editions. One is Rome and the Study of Scri_pture, which contains a collection of papal enactments on the study of Holy Scripture, together with deci-sions of the Biblica.1 Commission. The price is one dollar. The other booklet is The Popes and the Priesthood, which contains English translations of importgnt statements of the Holy See on the.priest-hoo. d. The price of this booklet is only fifty cents. Rural Parish I, Vorke;'s In our last number (see. p. 242) we promised a more complete account of the Rural Parish Workers of Christ the King. This apostolate was begun by Miss Alice Widmer, a graduate of.Webster College, Webster Groves, Missouri, and Miss LaDonna I-fermann, a graduate of Maryville College of the Sacred Heart, St. Louis. In the summer of 1941 they decided to devote ~heir lives to lay action for the salvation of souls and the extension of Christ's Kingdom by the igractice bf the spiritual and corporal works of mercy. That fall they heard Monsignor (later Bishop) Leo J. Steck speak of the'lick 282 Not~ember, 1953 NEWS AND VIEWS. of priests'in rural.areas, and th'ey: asked him whether they might help in one of these areas. With his assis'tance and that of Father William d. Pe~.old, they began work in the latter's parish of Cottleville, St. Charles Count'/, Mi'ssouri. During that same summer they learned to use the short breviary. The remainder of their story i~ told by tlSemselveL as follows: "Activities ir~ St. Ct~arles County, where we lived in two twelve: by-twelve-foot rooms in a portable schoolbuilding on thechurch grounds, included home visiting, care of the sick, helping the poor, Vacation schools, Sianday school for non-Catholic and pre-s~hool .Catholic children, craft classes for,, dhildren and adults, discussion Clubs in' the homes, w~rk with teen-agers, in'structions of converts'. distribution of Catholic literature and sacramentals, religious and social Welfare work. "Originally we had no thought of a continuing organizatio.n. As'we saw the needs and what could be done we went to see Car-dinal John d. Glennon of beloved memory', who had been a benefac-tor from the first. He encouraged us in our plans to £tevelop a per-manent organization and gave permission to solicit funds for~ p, er-manent home not to be located on parish grounds. Shortly there-after he died. "Sev, enteen months, later we discussed our future with Arch-bishop. Joseph E. Ritter. Three months afterwards he asked us;.to work'among.the miners and farmers of the tiff.aiea in Wash, ington County, the mbst e~ploited region in the St. Louis archdiocese. Through ,his generous assistance and that of Auxiliary Bishop: Charles tt.'Helmsing and Rev. Edward A. Bruemmer of Old Mines, we moved in September, 1949, to Fertile iri the Old Mines parish,of St. Joachim. We entered into parish, activity by beginning the in-struction of ninety-one public-school children and visitation in their homes and began extensive remodeling of an old brick residence eight miles from church. "The Rural Parish Worker program is adjusted to the,.needs of the area and is always pointed to the development of Christian homes and the strength.ening of parish life. In Washington County the following activities take precedence: ~eligiotis and social welfare work: distribution of food and ,clothing; transportation, to church, h.ospitals,_a.nd clinics; Sunday instruction classes; preparation of con-verts: home visiting, and instruction; interpretation of rights and 283. NEWS AND VIEWS duties as citizens; assistance in obtaining State and Federal benefits, doctors' care, hospitalization. "Some assistance is given to a few in adjoining parishes. HOw-ever, since.our home parish of St. ,loachim is one hundred and fifty square miles in size with poor and sometimes no roads,, it occupies most of our time. Attendance at civic meetings and participation in civic affairs are also on the agenda, as are outside works, such as land-scaping, building of small buildings, care of goats, and gardening when we can get to it. "Yearly summer sessions ~nd a year-of-service program are offered to young women thinking of the lay apostolate as a way of life or who wish to give at least part of their lives in. concentrated work for the restoration of Christ in society. "Last fall Rev. Bede Scholz, O.S.B., of Plus X Monastery in Labadie, Mo., was appointed by the Most Rev. Archbishop as our spiritual director. Father Bede, then at Conception Abbey, Concep-tion, Mo., had helped form us in the early days. (We would go for a week of spiritual refreshment to Conception.) Father Bede, Rt. Rev. Monsignor Martin B. Hellriegel, and Rev. Charles P. Schmitt were our spiritual advisers for several years when we lived in St. Charles County. "At the beginning we had literally nothing except a few dollars we had saved when working, a typewriter, phonograph and records ¯ bought for the work, our clothes and personal little belongings. Yet we have neve'r been in want and God has sent everything as it was needed for our neighbors and for us. Today many are assisting by prayer, donations of money and materials. The bills are always with us but we know that Almighty God is also, and we have no fears for the future. We know He will do with us as He wishes and that is all we want. It is with humble hearts that we look back over twelve years of labor in His vineyard and it is with confidence that we invite others--young women from all over the United States--to come to Fertile, to the Center of the Rural Parish Workers of Christ the King, and lend their talents and their labors in this rural aposto-late of service based on the spiritual arid corporal works of mercy for the glory of God and the development of Christian homes; to come to Fertile and help in the world-wide work "of the Church today-- the restoration of Christ to society." The address of the Rural Parish 'Workers of Christ the King is: Route 1, Box 194, Cadet, Missouri. 284 ¯ Pract:iceot: :he l-loly See, II Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. [The first part of this article was published in the September REVIEW, pp. 252- 72.] XII INDULTS OF SECULARIZATION New practice of the Holy See. Secularizati-on is the voluntary de-parture from religion, authorized by an indult of competent ecclesi-astical authority, in virtue of which the subject is separated com-pletely and perpetually from membership in the institute and is freed absolute.ly from all obligations contracted by. religious profession. Since secularization dispenses from all religious vows, even if solemn, it is co~nmonly also called a dispensation from the vows of religion. The Holy See alone may grant secularization in pontifical institutes; in diocesan congregations the Ordinary of the place where the, reli-gious is staying is also competent.34 .Indults of secularization granted by the Holy. See for those who are not priests now contain the following sentence: "This decree ceases to have any validity if not accepted by the petitioner within ten days after being informed of the executorial decree.'qs" It has long been a clea~ principle of canon law .that an indult of seculariza-tion, even ~hou.gh freely petitioned,, may be refused and has no effect until accepted by the religious in question,z6 If within the ten days: (a) the indult is expressly accepted, it becomes effective immediately;37 (b) the induli is neither accepted nor refused, it ceases to have any validity at the end of this period; (~') the indult is definitively refused, all validity of the indult cer-tainly ceases at the end of ten days and. at least more probably immediately upon the definitive refusal.3s In practice a new indult is to be petitioned if the religious repents of his refusal and wishes again 34Can. 638; Bouscaren. II, 173. 3s"Post decem dies a recepta comrnunicatione Decreti exsecutorialis, ex porte Oratoris (ricis), prasens Decretum, si non fuerit acceptatum, nullii~s roboris esto.'" Cf. Gu-ti& rez, CpR, XXIV (1953), 186-197. 36Bouscaren, I; 326. 37Cf. Creusen. ft. 332: Jombart, RCR, II (1926), 151; Piontek, 262 ft.: Ver-meersch, Periodica, XI (1923), 151. a8Cf. Guti~rrez. CpR, XXIV (1953),194-195: Goyeneche, CpR, XVIII (1937). 239-240:.Muzzarelli, p. 172; and Jombart, RCR, II 1926), 150-151, who ap-pears to hold the contrary. 285 ¯ JOSEPH 1:::. GALLEN for Religious to leave during the ten-davy period. ," The practice of the Holy See is not to grant the indult directly to the religious but to give to an intermediary person, for example, the local Ordinary, the f~iculty of granting the indult of secularization to the religious. The actual granting of the indult by this intermedia'ry person is called the executorial decree. The ten days begin to run -from the time the religious is officially notified of the granting of this executorial decree, not from the date of notification of the deciee of the Holy See. The day of notification is not computed. If the no-tification is given on August 1, the ten days expire at midnight of August 1 1-12. This time does not run for any period in which the religious was ignorant of or unable to exercise his right of acceptance and refusal. XII. GENERAL CHAPTER 1. Constitutions rec.ently appro~)ed by the Holy See. One congrega-tion of sisters had difficulty in persuading the S. C. of Religious to approve in a general revision of its constitutions the designation of the Secretary and Bursar General by appointment rather than by election. Appointment was approved about the same time in another general revision without any difficulty and had been permitted in some constitutions approved by the Holy See in the past. The num-ber in the grouping of the smaller houses for the election of delegates. is now rather constantly stated to be at least twelve and not more than twenty-three professed. The S. C. of Religious is consistently including in constitutions an article stating that the duties of the pre-siding local Ordinary or his delegate terminate at the proclamation of the election of the mother general.39 Some recent constitutions con-tain the prescription of the Normae of 1901: "If the Ordinary. is ac-companied by one or more priests, these may in no way take part in the election.''40 The present practice of the Holy See permits not only the secretary general but also the bursar general to be elected a general councillor but neither may be elected as the first councillor. The same practice now rather consistently gives the general chapter the right of declaring matters to be of greater importance and subject to the deliberative vote of the general council. Some recent constitu-tions. also give to the general chapter and council the'right to deter- 39Cf. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, XI (1952), 16-18. 4ONormae of 1901, n. 224. Cf. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, ibid., 17-18. 286 Nooember, 1953 PRACTICE OF THE HOLY SEE. min~ matters as subject to the deliberative vote of-the local council. The S. Congregation corrected one set of constitutions to read~ " . . .the newly elected M6.thfir General shall appoint one or seoeral. committees.to examine and arrange the'proposals to the Gerieral Cfiapter and to furnish a report concerning them." Even if not so' stated in the constitutions, several committees may be appointed be~ cause of the amount of work or for greater efficiency and lack of time, since several committees are not forbidden by the constitutions. 2. Indult's. One congregation of si'sters secured an indult from the Holy Se~ permitting th~ anticipation of its next general chapter by' six months. The principal reason given in the petition was the ex-~ p~nse and extensive travel that would be required foi the' capitulars' to return to the motherhouse two months after all had been present there for the annual retreat. ~ Another congregation of sisters requested a change, in its constitu- ' tions by which the novice mistress would be a member of thegeneral chapter in virtue of her offce. The S. C. of Religious replied: "It is not expedient.'" Canonical authors had stated that such a provision was not in accord with the practice of the S. Congregation,4x but a.~ similar article had been approved in a very small number of constitu-. tions in the past. A congregation of sisters was to hold in the United States an ex-traordinary general chapter,, which the delegates of the provinces be-yond the "iron curtain" would not be able to attend. The S. C. of Religious gave to a local Ordinary the faculty of permitting their votes to be sent by letter or for these provinces to choose delegates here who would cast their votes. 3. Roman meeting. The subjects touched upon at this meeting of superioresses general appear to have been the following: (a) The Holy See is opposed to the immediate re-election, or rather postula-tion., of a mother general beyond the limits prescribed in the consti-tutions. Similarly the Holy See only for serious reasons grants a dispensation permitting a local superior to be given a third successive three-year term in the same house. (b) Two excesses are verified in ~lections, an indifference that results in ignorance of the eligible and' suitable and electibneering. (c) Young religious should not be ex-. cluded from higher offices' if they have the necessary natural and spit-. itual qualifications. ., 41Basticn, n. 246, 2; Battandier, n. 352. 287. JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review/:or Religious These subjects present nothing new,4z but the. light thrown on the abuse of electioneering is very Opportune. Electioneering is the deliberate seeking of votes, directly or indirectly, to elect a particular person, or one person rather than another, or to exclude anyone from being elected. The simple seeking of information concerning the abilities or defects of those eligible and the communication of such information to. others, without any attempt at persjaasion, is not for-bidden, and is very frequently necessary and laudable. It is.:remarkable.how often the matter of elections can blind the moral sense of even very good religious. This reason alone has per-suaded the present writer to hold rigidly to the conviction, that in any general revision of the constitutions elections should, be restricted to those absolutely necessary. Only the offices of the superior gen-eral and of his or her councillors demand election. Every religious should have the permanent resolution of nevei uttering a word about future elections in his institute until after he has meditated daily for at least a week on the will of God. XIII. MONASTERIES OF NUNS I. Federations and Con/¥derations. The only federation or con-fdderation affecting American monasteries of nuns that has been made public is that of the Visitandines. The pohtifical constitution Spon~a Christi and the accompanying Instruction should be carefully studied by all nuns. Unwise and exaggerated changes are to be avoided in any state of life, "but no religious institute can reasonably exclude progress and prudent adaptation to .the times; Federations and con-federations are highly recommended by Plus XII in Sponsa, Christi. 2. Restoration o[ solemn ~ows. In 195 1-52 eighteen monasteries of nuns-in the United States secured permission from the Holy See for the taking of solemn vows.43 The restoration of solemn vows is at least strongly urged on all monasteries of nuns in Sponsa Christi. If serious reasons exist against this restoration in any monastery, such reasons are to be submitted to the S. C. of Religi6us for examina-tion. 44. The form of the decree granting solemn vows is uniform. The provisions are: (a) Papal cloister must be observed as' described in 42Cf. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, X (1951), 187-200. 43Guti~rrez. CpR, XXXIV (1953), 102-115. Cf. the list of monasteries of solemn vows in the United States, as of January, 1950. in REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, IX (19~50), 58, note 2. 44Larraona, quoted by Guti~rrez, ibid., 1"07. " '288 November, 1953 PRACTICE O~: THE HOLY SEE canon law, Sponsa Christi and the accompanying Instruction (Inter praeclara), and also the Instruction of the S. C. of Religious of Feb-ruary 6, 1924.4s (b) Nuns at present in simple perpe.tual vows and thbse who have compieted the prescribed time of temporary vows make solemn profession. The local Ordinary or his delegate receives the profession of the superioress, who then receives all the other pro-fessions. (c) Any nun in simp!e perpetual vows who does not wish to make the solemn profession may remain in simple vows but she is obliged by all the prescriptions of papal cloister.46 (d) Future per-petual professions Will be solemn except, of course, those of the ex-tern sisters, who may be admitted only to simple perpetual profession at the expiration of the prescribed peridd of temporary vows. 3. Dowr~ . Modifications in the general constitutions were granted to several monasteries of one order of nuns in the United Sta~es by the S. C. of Religious in 1950. A canonically interesting article of these modifications is: "No dowry is required for the admission of postulants." 4. Induhs concerning papa! clbister. A monastery of nuns in. the United States obtained the follov~ing permissions from the S. C. of Religious: (a) for five years--to admit into the enclosure at the funerals of nuns the clergy, acolytes, and pall bearers required to carry the body to the crypt; (b) fbr three years--to allow those taking out naturalization papers to go out to government offices as often as necessary; (c) for three years--t6 allow a nun to leave the enclosure as companion for a nun obliged to go out for bospltal treatment. Iri the case of another monastery, the local Ordinary whs given the faculty for twenty cases of permitting a nun to leave the enclosure with a companion for the reason of ill health. The rescript contained the clause, that any unbecoming circumstance was to b~ avoided. 5. Concession of Masses. A proper ordo or calendar, and thus dis-tinct from the diocesan ordo, is had by all orders of regulars, and this is to be observed also by the nuns and sisters of these orders. A proper ordo is also had in.religious congregations and societies living in common without public vows, whether of men or women, that have been approved by the Holy See,.[re constituted under one gen-eral superior, and are obliged to the divine office, even if only by 45Bouscaren, I, 314-320; .46Escudero, CpR, XXXIII (1952), 35, nota 39. 289 JOSEPH F. GALLEN reason of major orders.47 Nuns that constitute a second order, such as the Carmelites, will follow the proper ordo of the first order of men. Obviously, there-fore, they may not celebrate in the divine office and Mass feasts granted to dioceses or t6 other institutes. For this reason at least one monastery of nuns in the United States secured from the Holy See an indult permitting the celebration of the feasts of the North American Martyrs on September 26 and that of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini on December 22.48 47,SCR, 4312, ad'l-2; 4403, ad 1. 48The autlqors, documents, and abbreviations not clear from their mere citation are." Acta Apostolicae Sedis (AAS) ; Bastien, Directoire Canonique; Battandier, Guide Canonique; Bouscaren, Canon Law Digest; Cervia, De ProFessione Religiosa; Com-mentarium Pro Rell.qiosis (CpR) ; Creusen, Religious Men and Women in the Code; Decreta Authentica Congregationis Sacrorum Rituum (SCR) ; Muzzarelli, De Con-gregationibus luris Diocesani; Piontek, De Indulto Exclaustrationis necnon Saecular-izationis; Revue des Communautis Religieuses (RCR) ; Schaefer, De Religiosis. BOOK NOTICE AUX SOURCES DE LA TRADITION DU CARMEL, by Jean le Soli-taire, is a work that will be of special.interest and value, not only to Carmelites, but also to all who are concerned with understanding well the essentials and the accidentals of the contemplative life and~ with the problem of adapting it fittingly to the changes that mark modern culture and the present situation of the Church. The book is not primarily historical; rather it is conceived from the ,spiritual point of view, and would like to contribute to the best possible re-vitalization and perfection of the contemplative life in the concrete existe.ntial conditions of today and tomorrow." (Paris: Beauchesne et ses Fils, 1953. Pp. 274.) LETTER ON OBEDIENCE Father William J. Young. S.J., has made a new and very readable translation of St. Ignatius' Letter on Obedience. This translation is published in pamphlet form by the America Press. Single copies are twenty cents; special discounts are allowed on quantity orders. Write to: The America Press, 70 East 45th St., New York 17, N.Y. 290 Psychological Test:ing ot: Candida!:es and t:he Theology oF Vocal:ion William C. Bier, S.,I. [EDITORS' NOTE: This article is an adaptation of 'a paper presented at the Fordham "Institute on Religious and Sacerdotal Vocations, July, 1953. Father Bier's interest in the use of psychological tests as helps in evaluating the suitability of candidates for the priesthood and religious life goes back to graduate work in psychology at The Catholic University under Father Thomas Verner Moore, who encouraged him to plan a doctoral research on some.preliminary phases of this problem. After the completion of his doctoral work in 1948 Father Bier went to Fordham and has been teaching in the psychology department of the graduate school since that time. He developed a program of psychological tests for candidates in the New York Province of the Society of 3esus, which has been in operation for five years. This work is now spreading to other Provinces of the Society and to other religious groups. He thinks that the greatest need at the present time is the development of specific, norms on these tests, not only for religious as distinct from lay persons, but probably also for different religious groups. The development of such norms is of necessity a cooperative undertaking, and Father Bier has been serving as a clearing house for gathering the needed information from the various groups working in conjunction with him. At the present time this work is still in its initial stages, and it will have to be in operation some time longer before publishable results are ¯ available, ] THE present article is the first in a series of two dealing with the use of psychological tests in the selection of candidates for the priesthood and for the religious life. This matter receives clari-fication bydistinguishing and giving separate treatment to the two questions involved. The first concerns the role of psychological tests in the selection of candidates and raises the question of the relation-shiio between testing of this kind and the theology- of vocation. It is evident that this first question is largely theoretical, but testing must first be justified on these grounds before it is feasible to discuss the second question, namely, the practical requirements of such a testing program. The current article, therefore, will consider the theoretical basis for the psychological testing of candidates, and a second article will take up the problems involved in the development of such a pro-gram in practice. Religious Vocation Although in full accord, on theological and psychological grounds, with the modern tendency to extend the term vocation to embrace all states of Christian life, the current consideration is never-theless restricted to vocations to the religious life.and to the priest- 291 WILLIAM C. BIER Reoiew for Religi'ous hood. More specifically still, the explicit treatment is confined mostly to the religious life, leaving the priesthood as matter for reasonably evident inference. A vocation, as the nominal definition of the wor~l implies, ex-presses the action of summoning someone to move toward a definite goal; in a word, it is a call. ~n the case of a divine vocation, it is God who calls the person, and in the matte~ of religious vocation, it is a call to the voluntary practice of the evangelical counsels in an institute.approved by the Church. The question that arises in the case of every vocation is: how can we know in a given case that'God calls? How can it be determined that the vocation is real and not illusory, genuine and not deceptive? This is the question ~vhich must be answered by the candidate himself, by his director, and by the superior who accepts him. In his recent book, The Theolog~I of Religious Vocation, Father Edward Farrell, O.P.,1 indicates that St. Thomas Aquinas distin-guished between internal vocation, or desire on the part of the candi-date for the religious life, and external vocation, or acceptance by a legitimate superior. It will be helpful for our present purpose to consider vocation under both of these aspects, and in so doing we shall 9ttempt to place the psychological testing of candidates in its proper perspective and to indicate what is its legitimate function with respect to the discernment of vocation. Internal Vocation By internal vocation St. Thomas means the intention on the part of the candidate to embrace the religious life. This intention is formed by. a man under the influence of the Holy Spirit. -Such an intention is the result of grace, or rather a series of grace~ consisting of interior'andexterior helps, in virtue of which the individual is led to take the resolution to enter.religious.life. This resolution to enter religion may result from an extraordinary illumination of the mind and incitement of the will toward the reli-gious state. Some of the saints have been favored with such an un-mistakable divine call, but Pope Plus X in his decision on the book of Canon Lahitton on Sacerdotal Vocation made it clear that no such special attraction is necessary for a priestly or religious vocation. Gen-erally, the intention to enter religion is formed under the influence of what theologians would refer to as ordinary grace, i.e., a grace which " 1St. Louis: Herder, 1951. 292 o November, 1953 PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTING works through the reasoning processes. Theologians generally would take this to mean that the decision is the result of deliberation where-by the individual perceives, in the light of the Gospel ~ind from other considerations that, everything being taken into account, the way of the counsels is preferable for him. Consequently be experiences a corresponding rational inclination of the will toward such a life. It is Worth n'oting, however, that the proposal to enter r.eligion must be sufficiently firm considering the difficulties involved in this state of life. It is only a firm resolution which, in the opinion of theologians, is the subjective manifestation of vocation. On philo-sophical grounds it may be shown that a state of mind can be logically firm only when reasonable doubt is.excluded. We may .say, therefore, that what God's grace does in the case of vocation is to make it possible for the individual to see with a clarity which ex-cludes the reasonable fear of error that the way of ~he counsels is the preferable way of life for him. It would seem, therefore, that the applicant, whose state of mind prior to entrance is uncertain, who is not ~ure whether he has a vocation or not, but who applies "in order to give the life a try," does not hav~ a vocation, since he lacks this firm proposal which is the subjective sign of vocation. It is possible that such an applicant would become certain bf his vocation during postulancy or noviceship, but it seems more prudent, when such a doubt is known, .to postpone his acceptance until it is solved, and meantime to encour.age him to'pray and consider the matter more maturely. It is evident that such a firm decision to enter the religious state is the result of grace. "You have not chosen me, but I have chosen you" (Jo. 15:16). This is the essence of religious vocation, and it is clearly its supernatural aspect. Directly, therefore, psychology, which can touch only the natural, has nothing to do with this aspect. of vocation. Yet,. indirectly, even here, it may have something to contribute. Canon 538 indicates that the candidate for the religious life must be inspired by a "right intention." This requirement expresses in another way what has already been discussed. If the intention to enter religion has been formed under th~ influence of grace, it will be a right intention. Therefore, no purely natural motive will suffice, such.as disappointment or disillusionment with the world, or per-sonal happiness, or security; or the desire to escape an unhappy home situation. On the other hand, theologians allow that ar~y super- 293 WILLIAM C. BIER Ret~iew for Religious natural motive will suffice, for instance, the desire, to save one's soul, or to work for the salvation of others, or to serve God more per-fectly, or to render salvation more secure. It is at thi~ point, it would seem, that psychology can enter to make a contribution. Human motivasion, we know now, is a much more complex affair than was previously suspected. Our motives are seldom simple, and seldom single. Conscious motives can sometimes serve as a cloak for hidden and undetected tendencies. In the case of the motives inducing a person to apply for admission to the religious life, it will seldom happen that they are pur~ly supernatural. Natural motives invariably enter as well. What seems to be important, how-ever, is that the dominant motives should be supernatural. Granted that in the.concrete the total motive force will bepartly natural and partly supernatural, the more dominant the role of supernatural motives, the more assurance there would be that the call was truly from God. Let us illustrate the point mad~ here by an example. " Suppose a spiritual director, on inquiring why a girl wants to consecrate her virginity to God, were to discover that it is because she finds things of the flesh repugnant. Marriage would be abhorrent to her, and if ¯ the attraction to the religious lifewere in fact nomore than an adjust-ment to such a psychic inhibition, it would scarcely be genuine. Prob-ably, such a girl would have combined this fundamental motive force with some supernatural intention, but the question is how dominant, and hence how genuine, would a supernatural motive be in such a case? Would it be any more'than a case of self-deception? I can conceive of a director telling sucha young girl to thank God that she feels that way, because she is thus freed from many temptations against chastity. Yet such advice, I think, would be highly questionable. It is true, of course, that such a person would have little or no difficulty with the material observance of chastity, but absence of sin or conflict.is not a proof of virtue. In such a case the brake applied to prevent sin is not the regulating influence of rea-son, which would be the basis for virtue, but is an inhibition of the psychic order. It is God's plan that sex should be attractive, not repugnant, and it is clear from the words of Christ (Math. 19:12) and of St. Paul (I Cor. 7:6-9) that the invitation to the counsels implies.a sacrifice. The girl who finds sex repugnant has no sacrifice to make in dedicating her virginity to God. The suitable candidate for the religious life is not one who is incapable of marriage, but one 294 November, 1953 PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTING who freely surrenders this good for a greater. There is a further consideration in a case of this kind which should not be overlooked. The repugnance felt toward sex expression is, as we have presented it, a psychicinhibition. It is due to some psycho-logical twist or other. Suppose, "perhaps after some years of religious life, that this twist is suddenly straightened out--a not inconceivable happening. Once the psychological brake is removed, the person may, for w.ant of virtue, be defenseless against a passion whose existence she never suspected. Could it not be that something similar to this is the explanation of some of those particularl~- puzzling defections after years in religion? The masters of the spiritual life have always recognized the pos-sibility of self-deception in the service of God, and modern psychol-ogy tends to re-enforce their warnings by supplying instances of the subtle ways in which uncon'scious and undetected influences may in-sinuate themselves into human motivation. When such happens in the case of vocation, the good will of the applicant is not in ques-tion, but the genuineness of his vocation.is. He is, in this supposi-tion, deceived himself, and be may quite easily deceive others. The manifestation of virtue is sometimes ambiguous, and what externally passes for virtue may actually be no more than a cover-up for a psychological problem. Natural submissiveness and deep-seated inferiority can ~asily pass for humility, overly-conscientious strivihgs for perfection can, as a matter of fact, be no more than psy-chological defenses against fear of criticism and inability to tolerate failure, while genuine apostolic zeal is not always ea~sy to distinguish from a paranoid discontent. The discernment of spirits is sometimes difficult, and we have the scriptural warning: "Dearly beloved, be-lieve not every spirit, but try the spirits if they be of God" (I John 4:1). This admonition seems to be particularly pertinent in the matter of the discernment of vocation and especially with respect to. the motives prompting the applicant to apply for admission to reli-gion. It would surely be excessive always to question o~ur conscious motives and to see in them nothing but disguises for hidden tenden-cies, but it must be acknowledged that conscious motives are some-times deceptive, and that the dominant motives for our actions are not always the ones which consciously move us. Unconscious fear of contact with the world, for example, may be concealed by perfectly orthodox motives such as contempt for the world and desire of per-fection. For a long time the individual's actions may seem to be in- 295 WILLIAM C, BIER for Refigious spired by these traditional motives, but it may eventually appear that ~hey were in fact but the effects of neurotic tendencies. Where uhcon-scious factors are at work common sense is hardly sufficient for the discernment of vocation, and the eye of the expert, is needed to detect a latent neurosis artfully Concealed behind normal behavior. External Vocation ~ ~ Let us pass now from internal vocation where psychology has but a limit.ed and indirect contribution to make, to external vocation where its contribution is more direct and more extensive. By external ¯ vocation, as previously mentioned, St. Thomas meant the acceptance of ,'i candidate by a legitimate superior. Thus external vocation com-pletes and perfects the internal call essentially determining it to this particular institute. It is evident that before an applicant can be accepted a judgement must be made on his suitabil!ty for the religious life. Some one must 'pass on such firness, and ultimately this decision is the responsibility of the religious superior. The internal call is always subject to the possibility of self-deception, and finds a certain confirmation, there-fore, in the judgement of suitability passed by a competent superior. The junction of the two gives vocation to the religious life in the concrete. Suitability for the religious life might be treated from various-points of vie~v, but for the purposes of the present discussion it will be considered under qualities of body and mind, which in the words of Canon 538 render the individual "fit to bear the burdens of the religious state." A certain level of physical well'being is required for the exercise of religious life, and it is co~nmon practice, to require of applicafits a doctor's certificate of good health. Pertinent to the present discussion, however, is the fact that mental health is no less necessary for religious life. The idea of "mens sana in corpore san&' (a sound mind in a sound body)' seems to be a p~oper estimate of fitness f?r life in religion. The Contribution of Psychological Tests There would be no real disagreement, I think, on the fact that certain psychological qualities are required in a candidate for the reli-gious life. What these qualities are might be diff,erently expre.ssed as maturity, balance, stability, control, adjustment, but there is at least agreement that some over-all psychological integrity is needed. It might even be clearer and there would, perhaps, be even greater agree- 296 Nouernber, 1953 PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTING ment if the propositi6n were put negatively: certain psychologic.al conditions render an applicant unsuitable for the religious life. Con- .sequently no .superior can accept a candidate for religion without making some judgement of psychological fitness. The trouble is that such a judgement, necessary as it is, is frequently superficial and hap-hazard, because the basis for a more adequate judgement is not avail-able. Here the psychological examination of candidates can enter to make its contribution. Such an examination can offer a more ade-quate foundation for the estimate of psychological suitability which must be made. It may be valuable to point out thus early in the pre~ent discussion that the psychological testing of candidates is new only in its methods; not in its p.urpose. Its function is traditional and inescapable: namely, ~a judgement on the psychological fitness of the applicant. The psychological' examination has a function to perfwor~mth " " respect to all candidates. With the greater n~amber of them its func-tion will be negative hnd w. ill consist simply in affirming the fact that th'ey are psychologically suitable, i.e., that no psychological fac-tors are in evidence which would antecedently make it impossible for them to bear the burden of religious life. Even though the contribu' tion here is negative, it is not to be despised for it is precisely what is needed, namely, a clean bill of mental health. It should be noted that such immunity at the time of application is no necessary guar-antee that psychological difficulty ~might not subsequently ,,develop, any more than the assurance of physical health at the time of entrance is a gua.rantee against subsequent ill health, bht at the time it repre-sents what is needed and is sufficient. With ~espect to the remaining candidates the psychological exam-ination, we assume, will show positive results. Sometimes these re-sults will be extreme, for serious mental disorder cannot be a priori excluded in candidates for the religious life. .In this connection, the work of Father Thomas Verner .Moore on the. rate of insanity in priests and religious2 is pertinent. This ~tudy appeared in The Ec-clesiastical Review for 1936, and still remains the only published work on th,e subject. In connection with the investigation, Father Moore contacted all the Catholic and non-Catholic state and .private sanatoria and asyla for the insane in. the United States. On a basis '-'Thomas Verner Moore. "Insanity in Priests and Religious. Part I[ The Rate of Insanity in Priests and Religioi~s." The Ecclesia t;'ca! Reoic~', 95 (1936). 485- 498. : 297 WILLIAM C. BIER Review for Religious of his returns, Father Moo~e reports the following figures for the year 1935. The ratio per 100,000 population was as follows: for priests 446; for sisters 485; for brothers 418: for the ge,neral popu7 lation 595. He found a notable difference between active sisters with a ratio of 428 and cloistered sisters with a ratio of 1034. On a basis of these findings, therefore, the rate of insanity among priests and religious is less than it is among the general population, but the rate for cloistered sisters is more than twice what it is among the popula-tion at large. One additional point is worth noting. Although it is true that the rate of insanity among priests and religious is less than for the general population, this result is due to the fact that syphilitic types of insanity are almost completely absent among priests and re-ligious. If the latter were eliminated from the figures for the general population, the rate of insanity for priests and religious xvould rise above that for the population at large. One might be tempted at first sight to interpret these figures as meaning that religious life makes reore demands on psychological stability than life in the world, with psychological breakdown conse-quently more frequent. Although there is truth in this interpreta-tion, Father Moore is of the opinion that a more important factor in producing these results is the attraction exerted by the religious life upon certain pre'-psychotic personalities. Schizophrenia, for example, is by far the most frequent psychiatric disorder among institutional-ized priests and religious; and there can be no doubt that a consider-able number of pre-schizophrenic personalities are attracted by the retirement and seclusion of religious life, and of the contemplative life more than the active. Their schizophrenic tendencies blossom out into a full psychosis in religion, but they would undoubtedly have done so just as xvell had these persons remained in the world. Outright psychosis among applicants for the religious life is hardly to be expected, but pre-psychosis and incipient psychosis is ~ problem, as Father Moore's findings and fundamental interpretation indicate. Now, the essential point in term} of the present discussion is that pre-psychosis is not likely to be discovered in an applicant for the religious life, apart from some special testing procedur~ designed to reveal it. Sufficient proof of this statement is found in the number of such persons who secure admission to religious life. As indicated above, cases of severe mental disorder among appli-ca, nts for the religious life are relatively rare, nor do they offer too great a difficulty in evaluation. In such cases the picture is unequivo- 298 Not~erober, 1953 PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTING 6al, and upon examination the applicant is found to exhibit such a wealth of psychopathology as to be clearly unsuitable. There is, however, a larger number of cases in which the degree of psychologi-cal difficulty is considerably less. The evaluation of such cases is more difficult for two fundamental reasons: (1) because the degree of disorder being less it is more difficult to detect; and (2) because it is more difficult to predict the extent to which the disorder is likely to render the applicant incapable bf bearing the burdens of the religious life. It is evident that the reference here is to neurosis in 'general and to the milder forms of mental difficulty which wduld not even qualify as neurosis. Neurosis, referring in general to the non-psychotic forms of mental difficulty, is a broad term, and I am inclined to think that most responsible and informed persons would be reluctant to say that the presence of neurosis, ipso Facto, would render an applicant un-suitable for the religious life. The presence of neurosis would un-questionably create a presumption of unsuitability, but the latter might yield to the contrary fact in a given case. What then is to be taken as the norm? I would, suggest that we might distinguish 'on the basis of the kind of neurosis. It is beyond question that there are certain types of neurotic difficulty which would almost surely be accentuated by the demands of religious life, and it would be my suggestion that the presence of a neurosis of this type would render the applicant unsuitable. At the present time I would prefer to leave open the question as to whether there actually are any neuroses of the second type, i.e., which would not be aggravated by the requirements of life in religion. As an example of a neurosis the presence of which would likely preclude acceptance into' religion, I would mention hypochondriasis, an abnormal pre-occupation with bodily health. This tendency, as is well known, can grow into an exclusive pre-occupation leaving the individual with little thought or energy for religious observance. In its milder forms it s.imply interferes with ~ommunity life and regular. observance; in more advanced stages, it renders the individual com-pletely incapable of foIlowing religious routine. Experience quite well attests that the introspection of the religious life develops a cer-tain number of hypochondriacs as it is, so that the expectation seems justified that this life would aggravate such tendencies if they were already present at the time of admission. An even clearer example, to my mind, of the kind of neurosis the presence of which would 299 WILLIAM C. BIEP~ Re'view [or Religious render an indi~cidual unsuitable 'for the religious life, would be an obsessive-compulsive neur6sis, which manifests itself .in the moral sphere as scrupulosity. I have referenc~ not to an isolated instance of scrupulosity in the life of an applicant, but to scrupulosity of suffi-cient duration to have become habitual. Such a state is aggravated 'by the additional duties of religious life, by the continual self-exam-ination which is an iodispensable condition for progress t~ward reli-gious perfection, andparticularly by the obligation of the vows. In its milder forms, scrupulosity impairs efficiency, in prayer no less than in apostolic work. In its severer manifestations, it makes prayer and religious observance a torture, and any substantial measure of pro-ductive work an impossibility. Attitude to be Assumed in Doubtful Cases In connection with the matter just .discussed, a question arises which must be faced directly, and it is this: do we not go too far in excluding applicants with neurotic tendencies? Would it not be more in accord with the spirit of Christ. and the Church to accept them and to leave something to the healing effect of God's grace? In answer to this sort of a question, I would like first of all to. point out that psychological testing is finished, its work complete; its contribution made, when it has ascertained the facts, in as far as it is possible to ascertain them in the case of the applicant, and has put these at the disposal of the superior. It then becomes the superior's responsibility to act upon the facts as seems best, and, in view of them and all other available sources of information, to accept or to reject the candidate. A prudent superior will not come to a decision', of course, without taking the matter to prayer. Indeed everyone con-nected with the discernment of a vocation must pray; the applicant himself must pray, his director must pray, and the superior who acts on his application must pray. The Gospels tell us that Our Lord spent the .night in prayer before choosing the Apostles. The example. of saints teaches us that we should pray in such an important deci-sion, but also work. It was it. Ignatius' advice, for instance., that we should .work as if the entire l)utcome depended on us, buy pray as though the entire outcome depended on prayer alone. Such advice seems particularly apposite in the selection of candidates. In this case, the importance of the matter requires that the most adequate possible investigation be made, but ultimately such s~lection depends upon a judgement of the superior. This judgement should be founded in fact--as far as it is humanly possib, le to discover the truth--and 300 Noaeraber, 1953 PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTING should be illumined b'y grace, in as far as it is possible to invoke the divine assist~ince through prayer. Even when we have proceeded in: the manner indicated abo,~e,.the decision still remains difficult, for we are attempting in such cases just ¯ about the most difficult task in the .world, namely, to predict the interplay of divin'e grace and human freedom. "If the human mind,'r says a distinguished French contemporary, "cannot probe this mys-terious interplay +yen after the event (for when someone leaves a re-ligious institute it is often impossible to tell.whether it was through infidelity to a. real vocation or simply due to the late discovery that there was no vocation at all) still less can it see it~beforehand.'''~ We are compelled .humbly to admit that there are and will continue to be a certain number of cases which cannot be avoided, but there are others which, with a gr.eater expenditure of human effort and l~ru-dence, could be avoided. Such" is our task. When there, is, doubt about the psychological s~itability of can-didates for the religiou~ life, I would offer it as a general principle that we should be severe rather than lenient in admitting. My fun-damental reason for this recommendation is that the religious life demands more than ordinary psychological stability for. its practice. In the vows, which constitute the essence of religious life, man makes of himself a holocaust to God. owe speak also of the martyrdom of the vows. It is true that "holocaust" and "martyrdom" are meta-phorical expressions in this context, but they serve to emphasize the demands made of human nature in the practice of the religious life, " demands which are to a considerable extent psychological. Certainly the number of psychological satisfactions available to religious are considerably reduced over those possible to people in the world, while the occasion~ for frustration are greater, due to the surrender of deep human wants through the vows of religion, and by reason of the demands of day-by-day community lif~. Hence there is required more than the usual amount of psychological stability and maturity in a religious, and it would seem, therefore, to be imprudent to accet3t in religion applicants with distinctly less than the normal amount of psychological integrity. A further point seems worth) of note in this connection. The attitude is sometimes assumed that doubtful candidates should be ac-cepted in religion because religious life wotild benefit them more than 8A. Pit, O.P., "Unconscious Attraction to the Religious Life." Religious Life: H Vocation. Westminster, Maryland, Newman, 1952, p. 110. 301 WILLIAM (~. BIER Reoiew fo'r Religious it would some better individuals who are less in need of helps reli-gion would prgvide. A ~lightly different way of putting this same objection would be to say that if there is a doubt, we should give the ,applicant the benefit of the doubt. We assume that the doubt is a positive one, i.e., one in which there are positive .reasons for ques-tioning the suitability of the candidate. ¯ In such cases, I do not think that the general principle that the applicant should be given the bene-fit of the doubt is the correct one. It must not be forgotten that the religiouscommunity has rights as well, and it .seems a more funda-mental principle that the good of the community should prevail over the good of an individual, particularly when the latter is not yet a member of the community, as would be the case of an applicant. The doubtfully suitable applicant--if indeed the doubt is well founded--is likely to prove to be a problem from the very day of his arrival in the novitiate. If such is the case, he will require a dispro-portionately large amount of the novice master's time, to the detri-ment of the other novices who would profit more from his counsel and direction. Furthermore, psychologically unstable and neurotic individuals are difficult to live with, and it seems really inequitable that such persons should be permitted to enter and to. disrupt the peace and harmony of community life. One such person can be a thorn in the side of an entire community,, as experience very well at-tests. In God's Providence we shall always have enough 'difficult members of the community to make religious~life a source of virtue and sanctification, but it seems quite another thing knowingly to ¯ contribute to the difficulties of religious life by admitting psycho-logically unsuitable persons. Finally, there is always the distinct possibility, if not probability, that the defiaands of religious life will increase the difficulties of psychologically unstable persons to the point where they will ultimately be compelled to leave religion (and the institute may consider itself fortunate if the p}oblm can be solved in this way), or else they will have to be removed from the commun-ity and institutionalized. The latter can be.a tremendous financia'l burden to a c~mmunity, an, d it would seem an unjust one when the likelihood of such an eventuality could have been foreseen at the time of admission. It might be felt by" some that when there is doubt about the psy-chological suitability of a candidate, he should be admitted with the expectation that his inability to adjust to religious life would soon become evident to him through the actual attempt in a way which he 302 Noaernber, 1953 PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTING would never have been able to accept beforehand, and that he xvill in consequence voluntarily leave. The expectation of k, oluntary with-drawal in a case of this kited is not well founded. Even for the psy-chologically well-integrated and mature personality, readjustment to life in the world is difficult and the courage required to face the un-asked questions of family and friends is considerable. Ability to measure up to such demands is not realistically to be expected of one whose difficulty is weakness precisely in this area. Furthermore, it is assumed that the individual is suffering from personality or emo-tional disorders, and one of the main characteristics of such difficulties is a lack of insight on the part of the individual into his condition.' Hence, if the disorder" increases to a point where the individual should leave, insight is likely to decline as well, so that it is not to be ex-pected that the individual will leave voluntarily. I return, therefore, to my earlier proposition that it is a mistaken charity to accept doubt2 fully mature and questionably stable individuals into religion. In concluding the'present article I should like to refer to two quotations which seem to me to re-enforce the viewpoint presented. The first arises out of*the symposium on religious vocation held in France during the summer of 1949, and consists of the following expression of experience on the part of a religious superior: "Experi-ence has taught us one thing, and that is that when there is a doubt about any.one in the novitiate it is n~arly always confirmed later: the situation does not improve. There may be exceptions but they are few and far between.TM I would simply suggest that, under adequate investigation, we can move the process back one step further, and speak about the doubtful applicant, but that the principle remains the same. The second quotation is from our late Holy Father, Pope Pius XI, xvho expressed himself on the severity to be exercised in admitting candidates to the religious life. The occasion was an audience granted to the Capuchin general chapter after the election of Very Reverend Donatus de Welle as Minister General in June I938, at which time the Pope spoke in part as follows: "This recommendation, for which we take full responsibility, ought to be regarded as a father's instruction to his children, based simply on a desire foi the well being of all religious families. And the instruction is this: Be severe. These may be hard words but they~ 4"An Enquiry about Vocation" in Religious Life: II Vocation, Westminster]Mary-land, Newman, 1952, p. 83. 303 WILLIAM C. BIER are p~ompte~t by love, for true love, love worthy of our L.o~d's' friends, can be satisfied with nothing short of the truth . We are not alluding merely to severity of discipline, in general, but first and foremost to the seyerity v,;hich ought to be shown in accepting postu-lants. If ariyone tells you that there is too much sev.erity even now, we authorize you to reply that the Pope wants it to be that .way, be-cause he clearly sees the, need of it, in virtue of his position and.re-sponsibilities, the more so as Providence has granted him a pontifi-cate of some length and thus allowed him to acquire wide .experience in this field. Indeed, if the religious life is to be kept in all its splen-dour there must be severity, particularly with regard, to vocations, because although divine grace helps nature it does not destroy iF; the necessity fordoing battle remains, and in the religious life the stakes. are higher . "It is no exaggeration to say that whenever people unite to form a group, even in small numbers, deterioration occurs. We learn.this from experience. This does not mean that a religious family ought therefore to reduce the number of its members; quite the contrary-- the tendency should always be to increase. But it should see that its members are carefully chosen, like picked soldiers. This is a difficult task, but essential.~ When a number of men join together in some enterprise, their good qualities, and particularly the highest ones, do not become common property; each man keeps his own. Their weak-ness and. bad qualities,I on the other hand, add up and merge to-gether . " These words, coming from so high an authority, speak for them-selves. The purpose of the present article has been to demonstrate the ~)roposition that psycl~ological testing has a function to perform in theselection of candidates for the religious life, and that such,a pro- . gram is in keeping with the spirit of religious vocation as understood in the Church. The theoretical desirability.of such a program is one thing, its practicality is another, arid the latter question will be con-sidered in a second article. OUR CONTRIBUTORS JOSEPH F. GALLEN is professor of canon law at WoodstockCollege, Wood-stock, Md. HILARY R. WERTS is superior and a professo.r of moral theology at Alma College, Los Gatos, Calif. C. J. McNASPY, an authority on ~cclesiastical music, is on the faculty of St.'Charles College, Grand Coteau, La. Information on WILLIAM C. BIER is given in the prenote to his article. ' 304 \ The F:ucharis :ic Fast: Hilary R. Werts, S.3. THE. new and mitigated law of the Eucharistic fast contained in the Apostolic Constitution, Christus Dorninus; and the accom-panying Instructibn of the Holy Office, whose translations were published in this REVIEV~, last March, is a generous concession of our H01y Father the Pope who wishes to make more humanly possible the frequent and even daily reception of Holy Communion so.much recommbnded by Blessed Pope Pius X and his successors in the chair of Peter. In pro.mulgating the new law His Holiness urge~ bishops and priests to take advantage of its concessions to exhort the faithful to more frequent reception of'the Blessed Sacrament. Religious who have much contact with the faithful in schools and hospitals will find many' opportunities for their zeal to promote frequent Com~ munion by expla.ining this law'and leading people to use its condes-sions. For this purpose it is necessary that they have a clear under-standing of the conditions for the.application of these concessions. It is hoped that this article will help to this understanding. The former law for the Eucharistic fast is retained except for the particular conces~ion~ "granted in the new law. The first concession is that water does not break the fast, Water may now b.e taken at any time by anyone, right up to Communion time. The Eucharistic" fast is no longer concerned with water, and abstinence from it can no long, er properly be called fasting, though it may be an act of mortifi-cation ¯ Water here means plain water, that is, water without the admix-ture of'any other substance whatever. Water as it is found in natural conditions is plain water, even.though it be mineral water from a mineral spring, Qr ocean water with its content of salt. But minerals or salt may not be added artificially to the water that is permitted before Communion. How,ever, the chemical additions to our city water su'pplies are not to be considered, f6r otherwise we would have no water available to drink and the change in the law would be meaningless. Aside from the permitted water, the Pope confirms the former law and says that it must be observed by those who are able to do so. But this does not mean that those who c.ome under the conditions of the new concessions must worr, y as to whethe, r or not they should use .305 HILARY R. WERTS . Revieu~ for Religious them. Norm I of the Constitution says: "The law of the Eucharistic fast, to be observed from midnight, continues in force for all those who do not come under the special conditions, which We shall set forth in this Apostolic Constitution" (italics supplied). Hence there is no requirement that those who come under the concessions should rather fast from midnight if possible. Norm II of the Constitution makes concessions for the infirm. They may, without any time restriction, take something by way of drink or medicine. They may take non-alcoholic liquids and they may take medicine in either liquid or solid form at any time before the celebration of Mass or the reception of Communion. The ini~rm who enjoy this concession are either those who are sick, or thos.e who are infirm because of age. For the sick, no kind or length or degree of gravity of sickness is specified, but it is required that the infirmity be such that it is difficult to observe .the fast from midnight. The difficulty need not be extraordinary; a moderate diffi-culty will suffice. If an infirm person who desires to communicate would omit Communion because of th~ fast from mid.night, then surely he finds this fast too difficult. For example, influenza, stom-ach ulcers, diabetes, asthma, the ills of pregnancy, may be presumed to make fasting from midnight difficult. Any sickness in which the doctor recommends nourishment before Communion, or in which re-covery would be delayed by fasting, or any infirmity which causes the feeling of weakness unless nourishment is taken will suffice to permit liquid nourishment before Communion. Insomnia, severe headache, high or low blood pressure, distressing ~ough, rheumatism, arthritis, a bad cold, hay fever, may frequently make fasting rather difficult, ahd permit liquids. Some kinds of infirmity may last for a long time and permit .liquids daily before Communion; others may be tran.sitory and cause difficulty only for a day or a few days and these latter equally suffice for the use of the concession whenever ~hey occur. Since a moderately serious difficulty in fasting is required for the use of this concession, there are cases of infirmity in which the con-cession may not be used because the fast is no more difficult in these cases than it is for ordinary healthy persons; e.g., a person who has weak eyes or is blind, one who has lost an arm or leg, will have no fasting difficulty arising from his infirmity Unless other circumstances enter into the case. The difficulty in fasting required in order to permit the infirm to 306 November, 1953 THE EUCHARISTIC FAST take liquids before Communion is, according to some commentators, also required in order to permit them to take medicine. However it seems to me that a close reading of the Instruction (n. 1) reveals a distinction between liquid nourishment and medicine. There are two clauses, one concerning liquids, which are permitted fi~nder the con-dition that fasting is difficult; the other cgncerning medicine, which is permitted under the sole condition that it is real medicine. Thus [ conclude that a person with a headache, even though it is not severe enough to make fasting difficult, would still be permitted an aspirin before Communion because he is sick and aspirin is real medicine. ¯ It may happen that someone feels well on rising, but knows from exi~erience that if he fasts until he receives Communion, he will be-come ill. In this case be may take medicine or liquid under the con-cession for the infirm, in order to avoid the sickness. Sometimes a person's sickness is due to his own fault, as when one is ill the morning aft, er an evenir~g of overindulgence in food or d~ink. Nevertheless, he .may use the'concession for the sick, sup-posing that he has the .proper dispositions of body and soul for the reception of.the Blessed Sacrament. We may now examine more .in detail what is meant by liquids and medicines. The liquid permitted to the sick before Communion is anything that can be pour,ed and drunk, except alcoholic bever-ages. Thus milk, tea, coffee, broth, fruit juices, soft drinks, and. heavier liquids like egg hog, milk shake, creamed soup and raw or lightly boiled eggs. The liquid may have some° undissolved solids as lo.ng as it remains a potable liquid; e.g., broth with some bread or cracker crumbs, cereals such as cream of wheat or corn meal when diluted with suffici,ent milk to make them drinkable. But all alco-holic beverages, even with low alcoholic content, are excluded after the midnight preceding Communion. Medicine, either liquid or solid, is permitted so long as it is real medicine, and not merely something nourishing or agreeable. True medicine is somethi,ng curative, palliative, or preventive. Any medi-cine prescribed by a doctor is a true medicine, but there are also many substances that are known to be medicine and used without a pre-scription, such as aspirin, sleeping pills, cold remedie~, etc. Commen-tators dispute whether medicine containing alcohol is permitted. It may safely be said that alcoholic beverages may not be used medici-nally before Communion, but a real medicine, even if it contains alcohol, may be used. This accords with the wording of the law, 307 HILARY R. WERTS ° Review for Relioious and the law hardly requires that a sick person know the chemical con-tent of his medicine, or° be prevented from Communiofi because he must take medicine containing some alcohol. We may also note that some things which are ordinarily considered food and not medicine may in certain diseases be real medicine with curative or preventive value. Thus sugar is prescribed for diabetics who have an insulin reactidn. This concession of the use of liquids and medicines for the infirm is granted to priests or rion-priests, and to p~iests for the reception of Communion or th,e celebration of Mass, and applies whether the ¯ Mass or Communion is in the morning or in the evening. The liquids or medicine may be taken once .or several time~ after midnight, and in any quantity. The use of this concession is not directly open to all the infirm, but those who are not priests are required to first consult a confessor, that he may judge whether they may use the concessio~a. This con- ¯ sultation is required in every case, but need be made only once ,for a given cause of infirmity, and the advice of the cQnfessor maY be fol-lowed as long as the infirmity continues, even if it be life-long. When the infirmity diminishes, as during convalescence, the c6ncession may still be used until it is clear that the infirmity no longer makes fasting difficult. . The time'fo[ this consultation is any time before Comm~ion. The confessor's advice is not required to take liquids or medicines. The advice is required for Communion after having taken these things, and so .it may be asked after taking them ~but before receiving Communion. The gravity of the obligation to consult a confessor is discussed by commentators, and some hold that to use the concession without consultation would be to viOlate the law of the Eucharistic fast and commit a grave sin. Others say that a person who is sure that his case comes under the conditions of the concession would sin'venially by disobedience if he were to omit the consultation and rceive Com-munion; and that in an extra.ordinary case, when it is impossible to. consult a confessor, he could use the concession without consultation. This opinion may be followed unless the Holy See ~olves the question otherwise. Of course, if a person were not qualified to judge the matter, he would sin at least, venially b,y acting imPrudently. There is"also some discussion about the confessor who is t6 be consulted. The strictest o.pinion is that he must be a priest who 308 November, 1953 THE EUCHARISTIC FAST could h~re and now hear the confession of the one consulting, and this would be required if the advice were sbught in confession. But the law does not require that the advice be sought in confession. It may be asked in private consultation outside the confe~si6nal and, according to atenable opinion, from a priest who can hear confes-sions somewhere, even though he .has no faculties to hear confessions in the place of the consultation or of the person consulting. Certainly no one but a priest may give the required advice, though teachers and others may explain the requirements to their charges. Since the advice of the confessor may be asked out of confession, it follows'that it may be asked in personal interview, by phone or by letter, or by an int.ermediary,such as a parent or other relative, a Sister or nurse in a hospital, a teacher, etc. The advice is personal and in-dividual and could not be given to a large group together, such as Ill the people attending Mass; but.if there is a group in which the con- "fessor knows that all those present have the same reason for the use of the concession, he could advise the group together, as when all the nurses present are on night duty, or all the people present must make a long trip to Mass, and thus come under the concessions to be seen later. As seen above, a person who is not a priest must consult a con- . fessor before using the concession for the sick (and also the conces-sions to be seen below). Must the sick priest also consult a confessor before using this concession to receive Communion or to celebrate Mass? "A~ first sight the law seems to requlke this, and some com-mentators thus interpret the law., But many, i~ncluding some who are connected with the Holy Office in Rome, say that the sick priest need not consult a confessor. This seems reasonable, for if the priest can decide for others, he should be able t9 decide ~or himself. With-out entering into all the arguments, it might be well to consider one point, The Instruction of the'Holy Office concerning the sick (n. 3) says: "Priests who are ill., may likewise take advantage of the dispensation." The word likewise is a translation of the.word pariter, meaning "likewise," "in the same way." Many'commenta-tors r~fer this word to what has gone before, and understand the law to gay that priests may use the dispensation in the same way as the faithful, that is, .after consulting a confessor. It seems to be as well or even better to refer the word to what follows, and understand the sentence to mean that priests are given permission to .use the dispen-sation as well for celebrating Mass as for receiving Communion, 309 HILARY R. WERTS Review for Reliqious which is a new and very noteworthy concession, emphasized by the word pariter. The next concession is for priests in circumstances other than sickness which make fasting difficult. Three specific causes of diffi-culty are set down and the concession is grant.ed to piiests in these circumstances, without the need of consulting a confessor, and even incases where the pri, est couId fast without difficulty. The three causes are exclusive, and the concession is not to be extended to other circumstano~s, but actually the three given causes cover most of the difficult cases. The first cause is the late hour of celebrating Mass. The hour is defined as nine o'clock in the morning. If a priest celebrat,~s Mass after this hour he may take non-alcoholic !iquids as explained above, up to one hour before the beginning of Mass, and may take them as often as he wishes. The time in this case must be measured mathe-matically. There must be a full hour of fasting before the beginning of Mass. And the Mass must start after nine o'clock. If the priest leaves the sacristy promptly for a scheduled nine o'clock Mass, it will be after nine when he begin? the Mass at the foot of the altar with the sign of the cross, and he is a proper subject for this concession. When a priest is celebrating more than one Mass, and one of them is after nine o'clock, he fulfills the cbndition and may us~ the dispensation by taking liquids any time after .midnight, and therefore before his. earlier Mass, but he must observe the prescription of fasting from the liquids for one hour before each Mass. Thus if he celebrates at eight and nine o'clock, he could take liquids before seven o'clock; if he celebrates at six and nine o'clock, he could take liquids before five and again after the first Mass but before eight o'clock. The second cause which allows priests the use Of liquids up to one hour before the beginning of Mass is heavy work of the ministry done before Mass. No exact definition of this work is given, but in view of the definition of a late hour given above, and of a long jour-ney given in the next cause, it would seem safe to say that one hour or more of concentrated work, such as hearing confessions, taking~ Communion to the sick, preparing a sermon, participating in solemn ceremonies, and the like, would allow the concession, but not an hour of puttering at odds and ends while waiting for Mass time. The third cause permitting liquids to the priest up to one hour before the beginning of Mass is a long journey, before Mass. A long journey is defined by the Holy Office as a distanoe of a mile and a 310 November, 1953 THE EUCHARISTIC FAST quarter on foot, which is a walk of about 20 or 25 minutes. If transportation is used, the distance must be greater in proportion to the kind of conveyance, the d!fficulty of the road, and the condition of the traveler. The inconvenience of the trip by conveyance should be equivalent to the inconvenience of a walk of a mile and a quarter. For a healthy person and a good road, it would seem that about forty minutes by car, or thirty minutes by bus, or twenty minutes by bicycle, would be a long journey in the sense of this law. Where the road or the weather is bad, or the person old or unwell, this distance may be shortened proportionately. Since water no longer breaks the fast, it is noted that a priest celebrating more than one Mass may take the ablutions in each Mass, but using only water except at the last Mass. However, the Holy Office makes an exception to this in the case of Christmas and All Souls Day, if the priest celebrates three Masses on these feasts without interruption. In this case he should observe the rubrics of the missal which require the omission of the ablutions in the first two Masses. If on these two days the priest should take the ablutions with water, he would not be breaking his fast but he would be violating the rubrics. The Holy Office says that if the binating or trinating priest in-advertently takes wine at the ablutions of a Mass before his last one, he may still celebrate the subsequent Mass or Masses. Some commen-tators hold that this permission is granted only if the priest has some special need to celebrate the subsequent Mass, e.g. because it is a sched-uled Sunday Mass. But others say that the law does not necessarily mean any particular need for the Mass, and that the priest may pro-ceed with his Masses for no greater reason than his own devotion. It would seem that if the priest inadvertently took the wine ablu-tion into the chalice in his earlier Mass, and noticed it before con-suming the wine, he would not be obliged to dispose of it some other ~vay, but could consume it. However, if he deliberately took the wine ablution at Mass, not intending to binate, and later the need for another Mass arose, he could not celebrate again .unless there were sufficient need to allow him to celebrate after breaking his fast. But in view of the present mitigation of the law, one might be less severe than formerly in weighing this need. Having seen the concessions for priests who will celebrate Mass, we come to the concession for communicants. This concession, simi-lar to but somewhat different from the preceding, is the one which 311 HILARY Rz WERTS Re, view/or Reli~lious rules the reception of Holy Communion for all non-priests, even though they be religious or clerics in the major orders of subdeacon or deacon, and it also applies to priests who are to communicate rather than celebrate, as for example, priests who do not c~lebrate Mass on Holy Saturday. The concession is given for three exclusive causes of grave diffi-culty, namel~, fatiguing work ¯before Communion, late hour of. Communion, or a long journey before Commianion. The concession requires consultation of a confessor, as seen ~above for the infirm. When the" concession is allowed, the communicant may take .liquids as often as he wisheL from midnight until one hour b~fore Com-munion, and of course water at any time. No solid food,or alcoholic drink is allowed after midnight. Note that the hour is measured be-fore Communion, while for the celebrant we saw that it is measured before the beginning of Mass. The period of fasting must be a full hour and if in doubt about the exact time of Communion one must leave some margin Of time; or risk arriving at Communion before the full hbur is completed and thus be deprived of Communion, for there m'ust be no diminution of the hour. There are various opinions as to the application of the three causes of grave difficulty. One opinion requires not only the exist-ence of one of these three causes, but also the existence of at I~east a moderately grave difficulty in fasting from midnight for this particu-lar communica.nt, A second opinion holds that if one. of the three, causes exists, we may presume that it is actually difficult for any par-ticular person to observe the fast" from midnight, and so he should be allowed to use the concession unl.ess it is clear that fasting causes him no difficulty. A third opinion holds that the only difficulty required is the actual existence of one of the three given causes. For example, if one must make a long journey to church, he may be allowed to use the concession without inquiry as to the inconvenience he would suf-fer by fasting from midnight. TJae practical application of these¯ different opinions will be the same except in border-line cases in which the third opinion will cre-ate less anxiety in the confessor and the comrrluriicant than will the other two opinions. This third opinion has the fewest supporters,. ¯ but I adopt it'as the easiest to. apply and as defensible according to the meaning of the law. Although the tenor of the law is that it in-tends to relieve those who experience grave difficulty in fasting from midnight, it also states that there is grave difficulty in certain cases 312 November, 1953 ¯ THE EUCHARISTIC FAST given as examples. The C0n~titution also insinuates that some cir-stances which do not ~eem to be serious in a single case may have a serious cumulative effect over an extended period. Thus 'the Consti-tution says that the burden of a priest's Sunday ministry unques-tionably undermines his health; the conditions of work in the mod-ern economy and the conditions of modern living especially after re-cent wars have caused a general decline of health. The Constitution, norm V, grants the concession "because of grave incon.venience-- that is, because Of fatiguing work, or the lateness of the hour . or the long distance." (italics supplied), signif~ring that these three conditions are actually grave difficulties. The introduction to the ¯ Instruction says the concessions may be used by those who find them-selves in the particular conditions specified in the Constitution, which in this.concession are the three given causes. The Instruction states 'the concession to the sick conditionally,."if because of their illness~ they are unable without grave inconvenience, to observe a complete fast," signifying that illness may or may not be a cause of grave in-convenience. But in the concession to communicants who are not ill, it states directly that the three enumerated circumstances are (not rna~] be) causes of grave inconvenience. Furthermore, the spirit of these, documents is very lenient, considering a mile and a quarter as a gravely inconvenient walk and nine o'clock as a gravely inconvenient late horn:, if these are considered as.generally grave, there seems to be little room for a reasonable decision that in some.exceptional cases they are not grave. To draw a line betw,een grave and not grave in this matter seems to be practically impossible and the attempt to do so would lead to anxiety and scruples. So it seems to be in accord' with the meaning and spirit of this law to allow the concession to all communicants who are in one of thd three given circumstances, without trying to measure the gravity of the difficulty of fasting for each communicant. ¯ The first cause given, fatiguing work, is illustrated in the law by the cases of night workers in factories, ships or other transportation, ~hose who spend the night in the'service of the sick or as watchmen, and mothers who must perform domestic duty before going to Com~ reunion. The work may be an all-night occupatign, or it may be work done in the morning for a period long enough to make it fa-tiguing, or it may be work done during some part of the night with some sleep afterwards, as when a nurse is called at night for some emergency. An hour's heavy work in the morning would seem to jus- 313 HILARY R. WERTS Reuieto /:or Religious tify the use of the concession. Work done late in the evening does not seem to be ordinarily included in this cause, but .such work and even work done earlier might sometimes be so fatiguing that it would permit use of the concession. The law also mentions pregnant women,rand probably considers them subjects for the concession in-dependently of any work they must do before Communion, merely by reason of the pregnancy. The second cause is the late hour at which alone the communicant can receive. The late hour is not defined, but since nine o'clock has been defined as a late hour for the celebrant, it must also be a late hour for the communicant. Perhaps it was not defined because it maC/ happen that a time before nine o'clock will be a late hour for those who must rise very early. The Instruction gives the example of Communion in a place where a priest is not able to say Mass early because he must come from some distance, as happens when on.e priest has charge of two or more churches. Although the Constitution says: "The ,lateness of the hour at which alone they can receive," this must not be understood to mean that it is absolutely impossible to receive earlier, but rather that it is difficult to receive earlier, or there is some necessity for waiting until a late hour. The concession could be allowed to these: the parent who must care for the children while the other parent goes to an early Mass and then himself goes to a .later Mass; one who is awake until a very late hour at night and so needs to sleep late in the morn-ing; one who needs a late sleep on Sunday or a holiday to rest from his week's work; one who must choose a late Mass to keep peace in the family; the altar boy who is assigned to serve a late Mass, even if he could go to another earlier Mass; a worker who could.conveni-ently go to noon Mass down town but would find it inconvenient to rise early enough for Mass before work; some special reason for a late Mass, as when the bride and groom wish to receive at a late nup-tial Mass, or the family wishes to receive at a late Requiem Mass; and in general, whenever in view of the person's accustomed rising hour, the time of the first conveniently available Mass is relatively late. But one may not without some necessity freely choose the later of two Masses in order to be able to take liquids before Com-munion. A special case of a late hour, mentioned in the documents, is that of children who would have to go to church, communicate, and then return home for breakfast before school. In order to obviate this 314 Nooernber, 1953 THE EUCHARISTIC FAST difficulty, these children may take liquid nourishment up to an hour before Communion. It must be admitted that this concession is not without its own problems. Although a child could have a sufficiently nourishing breakfast made up entirely of liquids, still it might not be a satisfying breakfast for those accustomed to a more substantial meal, and the liquid breakfast might require that the child and hi~ family rise earlier than usual in order to finish it an hour before Com-munion time. From this case of the school child we may conclude that some-times the hour may be considered late because the available time be-tween Holy Communion and other duties does not permit the com-municant to obtain breakfast, readily after Communion. This may be the case not only for school children, but also for college students, and for people who work away from home and do not have conveni-ent time after Mass to return home for breakfast. The third cause which allows this concession is a long distance to travel to church. The distance in this concession is to be measured in the way explained above for priests, i.e., a mile and a quarter walk, or the equivalently inconvenient ride. Here again there must be some need for the travel. One could not choose a more distant church when there is a nearer one unless there was some fairly serious reason for doing so. Sufficient reason might be some special solemnity at the distant church, e.-g., the first Mass of a member of the family; a group Communion of a family or of the Holy Name Society or the Knights of Columbus; .an alumni or father-son Communion-group at a school; a baccalaureate Mass; the close of a M'ission or novena one has attended; but hardly the mere devotional desire to communi-cate in the distant church rather than in a near one. The final concession concerns evening Masses. These Masses are not directly permitted, but the local Ordinary may permit them on the days specified in the law, and he may permit them in all .the churches of the diocese, or in certain designated churches. He may also permit them in the oratories of religious. There must b~ some need for the evening Mass, for workers who cannot go to morning Mass, or for a gathering for a religious or social festivity such as a Eucharistic Congress, a Sodality Convention, a business, labor or scout convention, etc. The evening Mass may begin at four o'clock or later. Some have thought that an eoenin9 Mass differs from a night Mass, and have tried to assign the latest hour at which this Mass may begin as some hour earlier than midnight, but the law does 315 HILARY R. WERTS not ~eem to set a final hour at any time before midnight, and the hour may be defined by the local. Ordinary according to the need. When evening Masses are permitted, all are free t6 go to the Masses and to receive Communion, but no one may communicate twice on the same day, nor may the priest celebrate morning and evening of the same day unless he may legitimately binate on that day. Neither priest.nor faithful need consult a konfessor under this concession. The Eucharistic fast required for evening Communion is a fast "of three hours from solid food and one hour from liquids, and the time.is measured before Communion for the communicant but before the beginning of Mass for the celebrant. No hard liquor is allow~d ¯ after the preceding midnight.Light alcoholic beverages such as beer and wine are allowed in moderation, but only during a meal. Some commentators hold that these beverages may be taken at only one meal, even if the person ~ats two meals before a Mass late in the evening, But it may I~e admitted with other commentators that the law does not intend to exclude the use of these beverage's from any meal taken before evening Mass or Communion. This new law of the Eucharistic fast is a generous help for the increase of frequent Communion. Priests and other teachers of the faithful can use it effectively, as the Holy Father wishes, to encourage the frequent reception of the Blessed Sacrament, and the faithful should take full advantage of these concessions to increase their re-ception of the'Bread of Life in proportion to the greatlyincreased convenience of its reception. " BOOK NOTICI: Over twenty years ago Father Bernard Hausmann, S.J., first translated from the German a notable book on-the devotion to the Sacred Heart written by Father Christian Pesch, S.J., under the title of OUR BEST FRIEND. World War II and other causes kept the book out of print for some years. Now the publisher has reset the book entirely in very legible type. Its thirty chapters, each acom-plete unit in itself, offer ideal reading matter for daily spiritual reading during the month of June; or for the Fridays of the year. The central thought of this work, that Jesus is t, ruly our best Friend, contains the strongest possible motive for fervent practice of devotion to the Sacred Heart. (Milwaukee: Bruce Publishing Cc~mpany, 1953. Pp. 228. $3.00.) 316 Motu Proprio ,Jubilee C.J. McNaspy, S.J. ~IGH MASS ~nd possibly an added toothsome tidbit, at least for the choir, mark St. Cecilia's feast in many religious com-munities. This year is likely to see a fuller fe.stivity on No-vember 22, the golden jubilee of Blessed Pius X's Motu~Proprio on ¯ sacred music. 'Everything about'this famed document is rwell known to music teachers and chant directors, who often have had to flourish it in defense of their innovations or renovations. But this fiftieth anniversary may be a fit .occasion for all religious, however unmusical, .to recall what the Church has to say about her own music. If the Motu Proprio were a dead letter no one would take the trouble to commemorate it. Blessed Pius himself saw to it that this would not easily happen by enshrining his prescriptions in tt~e pre-paratory draft of canon 1264. His immediate, successor, Benedict XV, not long after stated: "We do not wish that the lapse of time should weaken the force of these wise rules.; indeed, we desire them to have their full force." On the silver anniversary, 1928, Pius XI indeed bolstered them with a new papal document, Diuini Cultus, in which he expr~essed surprise "that some have declared that these laws, though so solemnly promulgated, were not binding on their obedience." .Finally, our present Holy Father devotes several pa.ragraphs to sacred music, alway~ stressing the sameprinciples, in his masterly Mediator Dei. No one, unless wi~h a peculiar axe to grind, can say that the Motu Proprio is out of date. Another unfounded notion one sometimes hears is th~t the Motu Proprio is a bit extreme and not practical enough for us to do anything about it. The full reply to this objection would be simply to read it through. By no means does it. state or imply' that one should use only Gregorian chant in sacred worship. Quite explicitly the Holy Father states that "modern music is also admitted in church, as it also offers compositions of such goodness, seriousness, and grav-ity that they are not at all unworthy of liturgical functions." And if this were not enough, the Holy Father explains that "the Church: has always recognized and favored the progress of the arts, admitting to the service of worship everything good and beautiful that genius has been able to discover throughout the centuries." No, only one 317 C. J. McNAsPY Review for Religious type of music is condemned in the Motu Proprio, and that by indi-. rection: the music that does not possess "the qualities proper to the liturgy, namely holiness, and goodness of form, from which spon-taneously there springs its other mark, uniuersaIit~t.:" It is hard to see how anyone could find this either radical or extreme. So much has been done, especially during recent years, to carry out the requirements of the Motu Proprio that another possible qualm may occur: isn't it all so obvious that we needn't discuss it any more? Mu~n personal contact with religious, younger ones particu-larly, is so encouraging that one is tempted to let down, feeling that the battle has been won. The ever-.widening conquests of the Gre-gorian Institute, Piu; X School, and other liturgical or musical or-ganizations must surely bring added joy to the Blessed Pontiff who so recently launched the whole movement. But when one leaves religious house and seminary to venture forth into parish, or even, in some cases, cathedral, the situation is dismal indeed. True, the more offensive, bumptious Masses usual in the last century will h~rdly now be heard. But in too many instances, what replaced them is little better. In fact, there are parishes, even deaneries, Where .the Motu Proprio would seem never to have been promulgated. Sad indeed would be the Blessed Pastor were he not already in heaven. It was with real poignancy that he had written, fifty years ago, while intro-ducing his great statement, of the "many prejudices so stubbornly held even~among responsible and pious persons"; not all of the stub-bornness is gone .today. Need we recall once again that all.discussion of the role of sacred music in divine worship must be situated in the total context of the very m. eaning of liturgy.? The question cannot be simply decided on a purely musical basis. It cannot be just a matter of aesthetic value, abstractly considered, if that were possible. Much less can it be just a question of "I don't know anything about music but I know what I like." ¯ Music that would ~ank high on some ecclesiastical Hit Pa-rade or even music performed in Carnegie Hall will not necessarily be suitable as worship music. Too often, even now, dubious standards are implicitly set up. A meditative reading of the Motu Proprto could remedy that. "Sacred music as an integral part of the solemn liturgy shares in its general, purpose, which is the glory of God and the sanctification and edification of the faithful." Thus far no cavilling possible. "Its principal function is to adorn with suitable melody the liturgical text 318 November, 1953 MOTU PROPRIO JUBILEE proposed to the understanding of the faithful." Here it becomes clearer that music's place must be secondary, that of a handmaid, as Pius XI would make explicit. If tb? sacred text becomes a plaything, or in any way obscured instead of pointed and intensified, then some-thing has gone askew; this may be good concert music; it is no longer liturgical music. Then the Pontiff enumerates the three qualities of sacred music which we gave above. By "holiness" he means ~hat all profanity must be excluded, "not only in itself but also in the manner in which it is presented by the perfgrmers." Farther on he explains that nothing may be admitted ~hat contains anything "reminiscent of theatrical motifs," or "fashioned even in external pattern on the movement of profane pieces." Music of a romantic or sentimental flavor (aptly called "googaudery") in which the."pleasure directly produced by music is not always kept within bounds," is evi-dently excluded under this heading. Next, music "must be true art, for otherwise it is not possible for. it to have that effect on listeners which the Church intends to achieve in admitting the art of music into bet liturgy." This precept is commonly violated in two ways: either by singing music of low artistic worth, music that would never make its mark in "the world ~vere it not put forth under the aegis of the liturgy; or by singing worth~(music in an unworthy way. The second fault, while often less grievous because prompted by good. intentions, can sometimes do more harm than good. People have frequently grown to dislike Gregorian chant or the Church's great polyphony because they were performed with more good will than skill. For this reason Plus XI insisted that at least seminaries teach "the higher and 'aesthetic' study of plainchant and sacred music, of polyphony and organ, which the clergy should by all means thoroughly know." As the seminaries turn out pastors competent in this field, it is likely that choirs will reflect their understanding of sacred music, artistically and liturgically. The third mark of liturgical music, "universality," means that "though every nation is allowed to admit into its ecclesiastical com-positions those particular forms that constitute, so to speak, the spe-cific character of its own music, still these must be subordinated in such a way to the general character of sacred music that no one of another nation may receive a bad impression-on hearing them." This delicate catholicity, a tension between unity and diversity, is perhaps 319 C. J. MCNASPY the hardest principle to apply. However,. ,the Pontiff goes, ,on. ex-plicitly- to condemn the operatic style of his own country. We wonder~ what he would think of certain rather eccentric efforts to produce Negroid or "western" sacred music for use.in our country. But popes are ever practical, and to prevent us from being too abstract in our approach, the Holy Father immediately gives concrete examples of what the Church does want. "These qualities are found, in the highest degree in Gregorian chant,~'' which "has always been considered the supreme model 'of sacred music." Then he sets down, in italics and as unambiguously as possible, the fol-lowing'rule: "The more closely a composition for church approaches the Gregorian melody in movement, inspiration, and flavor, the more sacred and liturgical it is; and the more it departs from that supreme model, the less worthy it is of the temple." It would" take real in-genuity to misunderstand that. Blessed Pius next forestalls a possible escape. Granted, one might object, that.the chant is so sacred and worthy; but isn't other music really more solemn? No, says the Pope, "it must be held by all as certain that an ecclesiastical function loses none of its solemnity when accompanied by no other music than Gregorian chant alone.'.' How-ever, he adds, "the qualities mentioned above are also possessed in an eminent degree by classical polyphony, especially by the Roman school, which in the sixteenth century reached its highest perfection in the work 6f Pierluigi da Palestrina. . Classical polyphony is quite close to the supreme model of all sacred music, namely Gre-gbrian chant, and for that reason deserved to be received together with Gregorian chant in the most solemn functions of the Church." A fir~al scruple: is this not reactionary,, or at least over-conserva-tive? As an interesting corroboration of the Holy Father's stand I believe we could give quotations from almost every leading con-temporary music historian or theorist. To cite only the most recent,, and surely, one of the most eminent, Harvard's Professor. A. T. Davison, a no/~-Catholic. " His new book, Church Music: Illusion and Reality, could almost be called a commentary on the Motu Pro-prio. After calling our chan~ "the unchallenged example o~t:, worship become music" and speaking of Palestrina and other polyphonic corn- .posers in terms of the highest pr~iise, Dr.Davison states in reference to both: "It may appear to the reader that this music of the Roman Cath-olic Church has been rather aggressively held up as a model.If this 320 November, 1953 COMMUNICATIONS is so, it is only because of a conscientious attempt to deal objectively with the matter; for that particular music, it would seem, fulfills two all-important requisites of true church music: first, in vying with the greatest music in any field, sacred, secular, or instrumental; and second, in creating an atmosphere of worship wherein not man but God appears as the important figure in the transaction." . Surely no fine~ tribute to the sainted Pope and his liturgical work for Christ could be offered. Communications Reverend Fathers: The September issue of the REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS reached me t£day and I should like" to cl~arify a reference made by WilliamGrem-ley, in his article entitled "Intergroup Relatiohs," pages 231-241. The quotation given by Mr. Gremley from This Is Our Town appeared in the old edition of the book. I have since revised all the Faith and Freedom" Readers and the particular story referred to by Mr. Gremley is no longer in the new edition. Mr. Gremley gives 1952 as the date of copyright which is also in-correct. The story referred t0 in This Is Our, Town appeared in the 1942 edition. The re~;ised book was published last spring and has a 1953 copyright. There is no 1952'edition of this particular volume. --SISTER M. MARGUERITE, S.N.D: Reverend Fathers : His Excellency, Bishop Gonzaga, of the Palo (Leyte) diocese in the Philippines; has asked me, during my brief visit to the United States, to try to interest some American Sisterhoods to undert~ike educational work in his diocese. Will you allow me to publicize his request through your e~teeme'd columns? The Holy See has entrusted to this zealous and schokirly Filipino prelate the spiritual welfare of over 1,000,000 Catholics on the large island of Leyte. During my twenty years in the Philippines, I have had the privilege of. long acquaintance with him, and know well his situation. With only about sixty-five priests (some of whom are old and sickly) and only three schools conducted by Sisters, he is in desperat9 need of spiritual reinforcements and most anxious to obtain American Sisters, and also priests, for his diocese. 321 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS Reoiew/or Religious Anyone acquainted with our own country realizes that we have many regions at l~ome which need additional laborers in the vineyard of the Lord. It is this situation, no doubt, which is preventing many of our high-minded ecclesiastical, and religious superiors from allow-ing their .American subjects to go to foreign fields. On the other hand, Catholic history from the time of the Apostles is replet~ with examples of how the Church has always been prodigal in sending missionaries to foreign fields, even though their home lands were not yet fully manned nor completely evangelized. And they have been richly rewarded by the Holy Spirit, \Vho has multiplied vocations to their ranks as a blessing for their sacrifices. Those interested in further details will please write .to the under-signed. REV. G. J. WILLMANN, S.J. P. O. Box.510, Manila, Philippine Islands --29~ There are members o~ a commun;ty ~;v;ng ~ogefber who bare not spo-ken to one another over a period of four or five-years. Is the local superior obliged to try to correct this situatlbn or should a higher superior who !~nows of the maffer take a hand? As a general norm local situations as far as possible would be handled by the local superior. For a good reason in a particular case it might be deemed advisable that some other than the local superior take care of the matter; t.he case could then be referred to higher supe-riots. Such a good reasbn could be discrepancy in age between the superior and the subject'.who needs correction, possible lack of ex-perience in a younger superior, a question of tactfulness, a clash of personalities, and the like. In our instance the higher superior is al-ready acquainted with the situation; hence the lotal and higher supe-riors might confer together regarding the more prudent and more efficacious way of handling the case. Is it the mind of the Church tha÷ S~sters who de~re and even ask for correction and guidance from their superiors be left wlthouf it on ÷he ex 322 November, 1953 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS pressed opinion that the Sisters are grown women and know what they are supposed fo do? Canon 530 strictly forbids all religio~s superiors in any way to indfice their subjects to make a manifestation of conscience to them. It does not, however, forbid subjects to open their minds freely, and of their own accord to their superiors; in fact, it encourages filial trust in superiors and, if the superior is a priest, it also recommends sub-jects to reveal doubts and anxieties of conscience to such a superior. Consequently subjects are free to go to superiors, even those who are not priests,~ with their problems, especially if the problem does not in~rolve a question of sin. Superiors on their part will usually lend a sympathetic ear. But the case might arise in which the superior did not feel competent tO handle a certain problem; or one could, en-visage a particular case in which the superior judged that it would be better for the individual to resolve some simpler difficulty for himself and thereby buiid up self-confidence. In these matters a great deal of tact and Christian charity is required on the part of superiors; but subjects also should practice charity in moderating ~he demands they make upon superiors. Some problems could easily be solved on the individual's initiative after prayer and reflection. A decade ago the REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS invited discussion on the topic of spiritual direction. In the concluding survey (II [ 1943 ], 187-201) the twofold prong of spiritual direction was indicated, namely instruction and encouragement. On pages 19 I-192 the con-clusion is voiced that need of instruction should certainly decrease with the i~assage of years to such a point that normally the intellec-tual help required of one's spiritual director would be mainly friendly criticism. "In other words, these religious plan their own lives, submit their plans to a director for approval or disapproval,. and then occasionally make a report on the success or failure of the plan." In regard to encouragement, the need is more individual ~nd is usually not lessened with the years. "At various periods in our lives, most of us need sympathetic help or paternal correction lest we lose heart or descend to low ideals." Both superiors and subjects might profit by keeping those considerations in mind. --31-- If a councillor is absent and the local superior, who is not a councillor, is called to a council meeting, does the local superior give her vote ~n ÷l~e order the absent councillor would have or after all the councillors? 323 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS Review for Religious ¯ Canon 106, n. 5 says in part.that among the members of any college (collegium) the right of precedence shall be determined by the legitim.ate constitutions of the college; otherwise by .lawful custom; in default of that, by the norms of the common law. Hence, the con-stitutions of the institute should be consulted. If they make no pro-vision, then follow whatever has been the legitimate custom (which here means the customary way of acting), in this situation. If neither the constitutions nor custom provide a solution, canon 106, n. 1 states that one who represents another enjoys the precedence'that person has; but anyone who is in a council or similar meeting .as a proxy yields precedence to those of the same rank who are personally present. Accordingly, then, a local superior wl~o is not a councillor but who has been summohed to take the place organ absent councillor would vote after the councillors who are present in person. m32m Acjeneral chapter is held in a branch house. When the time comes for voting, does the local superior who is not a councillor .cjeneral vote before or after the ~ouncillors cjeneral? (It is customary for Junior Sisters 1.o vote first, followed by Senior Sistei-s.I The first answer is, consult your constitutions. If they say. nothing, the.n follow whatever has been customarily done in this matter. If no solution is forthcoming from either of those sources in the order enumerated, it would seem that the local superior in this case would yield precedence to the councillors general since the latter in this instance seem to be acting in their "general" capacity, so to speak. (Possibly some institutes follow a simpler method of having all capitulars vote according to strict seniority, upwards or down-wards, without regard to offices h~ld.) ~33~ Propositions to be presented to our cjenera! chapter are very often sent throucjh some member of our cjeneral council or fhroucjh the cjenera/ council. 'Has the cjeneral, councll the right to discard a proposition that pertains dlrec~ly or indirectly to the cjeneral council itself, since the cjen-eral chapter, wh[le in session, is the highest aufhorlfy ~n the concjrecjatlon? Perhaps your constitutions or legitimate custom indicate that proEositions intended for the genekal chapter are to be forwarded ,dlrough the counciI16rs general, and that these latter have the power to judge the feasibility of presenting any such proposition to the gen- 324 0, November, 1953 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS eral chapter. Otherwise, an answer (in part) appearing in the RE-VIEW ~:OR RELIGIOUS, XI (1952), 309-310 in response to a similar question .says: "Usually they [requests" or complaints intended for thegeneral chapter] are given to one of the delegates to'the general chapter who, in turn, at the proper time, turns them in to the special committee appointed for the purpose of screening such requests .and complaints. Those that are considered worthy of the attention of the general chapter are proposed to it in due time during the chapter of affairs. At the end of the. chapter, before a vote to adjourn is taken, .any delegate may ask tha~ a request or complaint which has been turned in but has not been submitted to the general chapter 'should now be read, and the chapter will then vote first on whether the request or complaint is to be considered or not. If"it is "rejected, that is the end of the matter. If the majority is for considering it, it will then be 'considered in the same way as .the other requests or com-plaints which Were already submitted to the general chapter." m34.- ~ One of our novices left religious llfe aboufa year ago because of ill health. Now she has fully recovered and would like ÷o re-enter our com-munity. We know she has ÷o make a new novitiate, but does she have to make a new postulancy? Unless your own constitutions require a new postulancy, the ap-plicant does not have to rbpeat the postulancy. There is no special provision in the°Code of Canon Law for this case, but the conclusion is reached by analogy with two other provisions in the Code. Accgrding to canon 640, § 2, if a religious who after making profession obtained an indult of secularization is readmitted later on to a religious institute by virtue of an apostolic indult, he must make a new novitiate and a new profession, but nothing is said about making a new postulancy also. Hence a new postulancy need not be made in that case. ~ Likewise in an institute which has two canonical classes of mem-bers, if a novice or professed passes from one ciass to the other, a new novitiate must be made, but no new postulancy is required (~ee canon 558). Hence by analogy with the above two provisions of the Code, no new postulancy is required in the case proposed in our question. (See also REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, I [1942], 357.) 325 Book Reviews RELIGIOUS MEN AND WOMEN IN THE CODE. By Joseph Creusen,'S.J. Fifth Engfish edition, revised and edited to conform wi÷h the sixth Frefich edition by Adam C. Ellis, S.J. Pp. xlv -f- 322. Bruce Publish° ing Company, Milwaukee, 19S~}. $S.S0. Religious superiors and subjects will welcome this latest edition of Father Creusen's vhluable work. In editing the fifth English edi-tion, Father Ellis has painstakingly made the various changes, addi-tions, and omissions found in the latest French edition. These emen-dations, due partly to a constant effort to keep the work up-to-date with recent pronouncements of the Holy See, serve to enhance the undoubted worth of this book. It should be kept handy alike for r~ference shelf and classroom study of the Church's law for religious. Something about the annual report and the new questionnaires for the quinquennial report is included. Appendix III gives an English translation of the questionnaire for the quinquennial report of dioce-san congregations and societies. As the author remarks in his preface: "We have not deemed it necessary to add a chapter on Secular Insti-tutes, since by no title' are they a form of the religious life nor are their members religious." There is a revised bibliography. A larger type has been used for the table of contents.--F. N. KORTH, S.J. FUNDAMENTAL PSYCHIATRY. By John R. Cavanagh, B.S., M.D., ¯ C.P., K.S.G., end James B. McGoldrlck, S.J., S.T.D., Ph.D. Pp. x Jr- 582. Bruce Publishing Company, Milwaukee, 19S3. $S.50. For fifty years psychiatry has drawn man's psychic portrait across the medical horizgn without a spiritual intellect or will, with-out a spiritual soul. For decades the brilliant analytic theories and therapeutic techniques, often investigated with scientific precision, have been built upon a false psychic substructure of practical mate-rialism and ihstinctive determinism. The emerging portrait tends to be a distorted caricature of human nature and psychic life as a mere mixture of matter and determined instinct. As a net result, psychia-trists are now left without adequate goals in life to point out to their patients. To interpret, to correct, to refashion psychiatry on the same old base has long been unsatisfactory. The present authors challenge the jaded materialistic framework at every turn ,and discard it com'- pletely. They have produced a first-rate psychiatry textbook that 326 BOOK REVIEWS turns a new medical page and builds the young ~cience of psychiatry entirely upon the time-tested framework of traditional scholastic psychology. This book is important for its psychological structure and its emphases. Perhaps more than any other psychiatry book today it emphasizes, with scientific precision, the spiritual intellect, will and soul; volitional freedom at the root of mental disorder; character formation based upon intellectual, and moral habits; and .the need of an adequate philosophy of life for true mental balance taken from both reason and revelation. Pervading the book with regard to etiology is the author's insistence upon the psychogenic or nonmaterial origin of mental disorders caused by a misuse of man's spiritual faculties. The high caliber and clear structure of Fundamental Ps~chiatr~ reminds one of Dr. Strecker's excellen~ book Fundamentals ot: Psgt-chiatr~ l. It has seven major sections, thirty-one chapters critically written and well-documented, sixty-five thorough case histories, and rich bibliographical material. Publishers and authors have designed a clear and highly readable book. It opens with intr6ductory con- ¯ cepts, the extent of mental disorders, and a picture of normal per-sonality. Five major sections treat of etiology, the clinical approach to psychiatry, psychoneuroses, psychoses, and borderlands of psy-chiatry. The conclusion is devoted to psychiatry, philosophy, and religion. The growing importance of psychiatry makes thi~ an important and valuable book for Catholic hospitals, doctors, nurses, and coun-selors, and for those engaged .in educational and sociological 'work involving modern psychiatric pkinciples.--CHARLES NASH, S.J. MOST REVEREND ANTHONY 3. SC~HULER, S.J.,D.D.,FIRST BISHOP OF I:L PASO, AND SOME CIATHOLIC~ ACTIVITIES IN THE DIOC~ESE BETWEEN 1915-1942. By Sls~'er M. Lilliana Owens, S.L., Ph.D. Pp. xxiv -J- 584. Revls÷a Clatolica Press, El Paso, 1953. $3.50. This labor of love but also a heavily documented work intro-duces us into the career of another "first l~ishop" in the United States coming from the Society of Jesus. When the diocese of El Paso was erected in 1915, the second choice for this new See was the pastor of ¯ a church in Denver, Colorado. He had seen the southwest in earlier days and knew something of the complicated and almost insoluble problems that would have to be faced. But obedience imposed the task; with confidence in God's help the new bishop put his shoulder BOOK REVIEWS Review for Reliytotts to the task. For more than a quarter of a century he carried on, then handed over a well-established organization to his successor. Less than two years later death carried his soul before his Maker. The volume is prgfusely illustrated and well printed. Six ap-pendixes add materials to those cited in the course of the narrative. Thirty pages.of bibliography give a riotion of the industry that went into the preparation of this work. There is a carefullY-madE index. In the treatment the author in the main f~llows the topical meth-od, giving for each theme the background and carrying it through the whole period of the episcopate. ]3ecause of this we do not get a very clear picture of the growth of the diocese as a whole. In giving the background more is at times given than is needed for the purpose intended. Fo~ the most part the ]3ishop appears before us, not so much initiating projects of his own, but as discreetly promoting and supporting movements set afoot by others and at times making them his own and thus leading'them to a happy solution. In his administration Bishop Schuler faced unique problems with which he had to deal prudently. Such were the bilingual popula-tion in the diocese, its location in t~ro states, the onrush of exiles due to the persecution in Mexico, the dire poverty of a large portion of the faithful, the shortage of priests and of priestly vocations. Some of these themes are treated with some completeness while others are merely touched upon--the title gives warning that the work. is not meant to be exhaustive.--AUGUSTIN C. WAND, S.J. I WANT TO SEE GOD. A Pra~:fical Synthesis of C:armellfe Splritualify. By P. Marle-Eug~ne, O.C~.D. Translated by Sister M. Verda C~lare, C:.S.C:. Pp. xxli -I- $49. F~des Publishers Association, .C:hicag~ .10, 19S3. $S.7S. This is the first of a two-volume work. The. second is to be en-titled, 1"Am a Daughter of the Church. ¯ Their grew out of a series of .conferences on the Carmelite theory and practice of prayer. St. Teresa of Avila, rather than St. John of the Cross, was chosen as the proxi-mate "guide." Of St. Teresa's writings The lnterior Castle, with its seven "mansioias," was taken as basic and typical and it provides .the plan for this exposition. St. John's doctrine is introduced here and there as a confirmation or completion of St. Teresa's, not as something that. is continuous a'nd unified in itself. Very often fu'r-ther confirmation or illustration is sought from St. Th~r~se of Li-sieux. The work as a whole has five principal parts, three of them being 328 November, 1953 BOOK NOTICES in this volume. The first part is called "Perspectives" and serves as a general introduction. "The First Stages" deals with the matter treated in St. Teresa's first three mansions. Therefore it is ascetical. Next follows "Mystica~ Li~e and Contemplation." In this section-- nearly half of volume .one--there is much that one would hardly ¯ think of in simpl~¢ reading the works of St. Teresa or St. John; for example, ch~apter two on the "The Gifts of the Holy Spirit." The two principal parts reserved for the second volun~e are "To Union of Will" and "Holiness for the Church." On the value of this study as a satisfactory synthesis of Carmelite spiritual teaching we' had better let the Carmelites themselves pro-nounce. Besides it would be premature to judge it before the second and much the more important volume appears. --AUGUSTINE G. ELLARD, S.J. BOOK NOTICES Highly recommended is THE NEW EUCHARIS:FIC LEGISLATION, by John C. Ford, S.J. This book contains the original Latin texts of the Christus Dominus and the Instruction of the Holy Office, an English translation of these texts, a stimulating and enlightening commentary on the documents, and some brief summaries that should be very useful for confessors, religion teachers, catechism teachers, and parish priests. (New York: P. J. Kenedy U Sons, 1953. Pp. vii -t- 130. $1.50.) Little less than fascinatir~g is .the story of Louis Brisson as told by Katherine Burton in So MUCH So SOON. Carthusiafi-minded himself, this man founded schools for boys and clubs for girls, and the Oblate Fathers and Sisters of St. Francis de Sales to conduct them. Of rare scientific genius, he planned his own buildings and invented various things to keep his foundations operating efficiently. With profound trust in Providence, he quietly saw most of his great works swept a

Issue 48.4 of the Review for Religious, July/August 1989. ; R~,vw:w voR R~:I,~cIous (ISSN 0034-639X) is published hi-monthly at St. Louis University by the Mis-souri Province Eduealional Inslilule of the Society of Jesus; Editorial Office; 3601 Lindell Blvd., Rm. 428; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. Second-class postage paid al St. Louis MO. Single copies $3.00. Subscriptions: $12.00 per year; $22.00 for two years. Other countries: for surface mail, add U.S. $5.00 per year; for airmail, add U.S. $20.00 per year. For subscription orders or change of address, write: Ri~v~i~w t:oR R~:,ucous; P.O. Box 6070; Dululh, MN 55806. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to R~:v~:w voR R~:,.~(aot;s; P.O. Box 6070; Dululh, MN 55806. David L. Fleming, S.J. Iris Ann Ledden, S.S.N.D. Richard .A. Hill, S.J. Jean Read Mary Ann Foppe Editor Associate Editor Contributing Editor Assistant Editors JulylAugust 1989 Volume 48 Number 4 Manuscripts, books for review and correspondence with the editor should be sent to Rv:v~:w voa R~:u{:lot~s; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. Correspondence about the department "Canonical Counsel" should be addressed to Rich-ard A. Hill, S.J.; J.S.T.B.; 1735 LeRoy Ave.; Berkeley, CA 94709-1193. Back issues and reprints should be ordered from R~:v,v:w vo~ R~:uctous; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. "Out of print" issues are available from University Microfilms International; 300 N. Zeeb Rd.; Ann Arbor, M! 48106. A major portion of each issue is also available on cassette recordings as a service fl~r the visually impaired. Write to the Xavier Society fl~r the Blind; 154 East 23rd Street; New York, NY 10010. PRISMS . Religious life in no way merits the descriptive word dull. Currently conferences, workshops, and books deal with the theme of "refounding religious life." Another approach looks more towards a "creating of re-ligious life," often with the addition of "for the 21st century." Along with the recent publication of Pope John Paul II's letter to the United States bishops responding to the findings of the 1983 papal commission study of religious life in this country, we find ourselves confronted with various challenges which indicate that religious life remains a valuable concern not only for those who are dedicated to this special form of Chris-tian living, but also for those who support it and are the collaborators and recipients of its service. Religious life takes on its many different forms as a response by those people to God's call to point the way in bridging anew the gap be-tween the lived values of Gospel and culture. Any particular grouping of religious challenge the rest of the Church peoples (including other re-ligious) to a continuing conversion call in one or other aspect of their Christian living. Religious frequently make uncomfortable the govern-ing and teaching authority as well as their own benefactors and friends by their witness and service in those very areas where the Church may b~ slipping into more secular values and ways of acting than gospel val-ues and gospel acting. It is not surprising that religious have been in the forefront of the liberation theology and base-community movement in Latin America. The charism or grac~ which identifies the special call to a particular religious grouping often attracts some kind of participation by both di-ocesan priests and laity. The Third Orders of some of the older religious institutes and the sodalities of some of the more modern apostolic oiders are examples of a long-standing tradition of affiliation. Today there are many more questions about various ways of belonging within the relig-ious grouping--often referred to as "memberships" in the religious fam-ily. Sister Maryanne Stevens, R.S.M., raises some of these issues in her article, "The Shifting Order of Religious Life in Our Church." We are still in the early stages of this new focusing of collaboration in life and in ministry, and there are difficulties and obscurities still to be resolved. We will continue to find it necessary to clarify the identity and responsi-bilities for members dedicated in a specially graced form of life from 481 41~2 / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 other parties with different vocations and yet somehow drawn by grace to a similar model of discipleship. As part of the special spiritual legacy which monastic life, particu-larly in its more contemplative form, has been to the Church, this spe-cial form of religious life may have its own contribution to offer in terms of ecumenical efforts. Fr. Basil Pennington, O.C.S.O., opens up some possible ways of considering this question in his article, "Monasticism: A Place of Deeper Unity~" The AIDS crisis predictably draws forth a religious life response since it presents a special need calling for a gospel ministry. Robert Sirico, C.S.P., calls us to reflect upon our own reactions of fear and stigma concerning those with AIDS .within our own religio.us groupings as well as those AIDS patients whom we intend to serve. The issue of confidentiality is a particularly sensitive point both in our religious com-munity life and in our ministry. His article, "An Improbable Fiction?: Religious Life Confronts the AIDS Crisis," was originally printed in the October 1988 In-formation, the bulletin of the Religious Formation Con-ference. Re!igious life, with all its graced attempts to respon~l to gaps between the Gospel and culture, today finds itself, along with the wider Church and with the contemporary world, caught in the gap itself. As a result, the questions and issues will necessarily have only tentative and at-tempted responses while the Church and our world remain in this in-between time. Reflecting this kind of ongoing response, in FORUM we publish two recent letters from Father Stephen Tutas, S.Mo, president of the Conference of Major Superiors of Men, to its members. All of us continue to need prisms through which we might more quickly catch the movements and fleeting images of God's grace alive in our everyday religious life world. Each time we come to see a new aspect or see in new ways, we face the personal challenge of reinte-grating the truth of our lives, our relationships, and our work. May some of our writers in the articles in this issue be those prisms for us. David L. Fleming, S.J. Reproducing the Pattern of His Death John McKinnon, S.T.D. Father John McKinnon is a priest of the Diocese of Ballarat in Victoria, Australia where he is currently the Vicar for Religious. He works extensively with the various Ministry to Priests Programs and has played a pioneering role in the development of lay spirituality in Australia. His address is the Center for Human Development; 24 Custance St.; Farrer, A.C.T. 2607; Australia. ]n speaking about spirituality, I think that we Often tend to focus immedi-ately on the various ways by which we may seek to foster it--prayer, reflective ministry, and so forth--rather than on what it is we are seek-ing. Spirituality to me speaks of the way we look at life and respond to it. It is the assessment and response that we draw from the level of our own spirit, from that inner point of our self, that is closest to God. It is made up of the values, beliefs, convictions, insights, and so forth, ab-sorbed and developed over the years, which enable us to give meaning and pattern to the myriad experiences of life, and on which we base our deliberate choices. Basic Attitudes for Christian Spirituality For us as Christians these values, beliefs, convictions, and so forth are powerfully affected by our faith in tl~e person of Jesus and our'con-tact with him. This faith in Jesus and contact with him need to be per-sonalized and deepened through time spent intimately with him in prayer. The truth of any person is leai'nt most deeply only by opening to that per-son in love. Friendship is built on time spent together; it is expressed and nourished in devoted action. And it seems to me that both are equally indispensable. In his Epistle to the Philippians, in a very intimate and personally revealing passage, Paul writes about himself: 483 tlS~l / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 All I want is to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and to share his sufferings by reproducing the pattern of his death. In this way I can hope to take my place in the resurrection of the dead (Ph 3:10- ~). In writing this he was merely outlining his own response to the invi-tation of Jesus, recorded in Mark's gospel: "If anyone wants to be a fol-lower of mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross and fol-low me" (Mk 8:34). Paul wanted to follow Jesus into the triumph of his resurrection, but he clearly realized that following Jesus meant firstly shar-ing his sufferings by reproducing the pattern of his death. The motivation for Paul's choice to follow Jesus was based on his knowledge of Jesus. Knowledge. in the Hebrew mind was not an aca-demic "knowledge about," but an enfleshed knowledge made possible only by love. I would think that only in this "love-knowledge" rela-tionship could any of us find the inspiration to face life as Jesus faced death, and to run the risk of "losing our life in order to find it," sus-tained only by trust in Jesus and the subtle intuition that in that way we might in fact find our life and live it to the full. Paul's comment in Philippians 3:10-11 seems to sum up for me the essential features of any disciple's looking at life and responding to it. It sums up the authentic Christian spirituality. Indeed, the pattern of Je-sus' death reveals the deepest dimensions of Jesus' own spirituality. I presume that Paul was not a masochist, and that Jesus was not in-viting his disciples to suicide. Jesus loved life. There is a sense in which we can say that in his moments of dying Jesus was never more truly alive and, indeed, living life to the full, at a depth and with an intensity that he had never had to muster before. The conclusion drawn by the centu-rion in Mark's gospel, who had known Jesus only in his dying moments, is also very revealing. Mark writes: The centurion, who was standing in front of him, had seen how he had died, and he said, 'In truth this man was a son of God'(Mk 15:39). In wanting to reproduce the pattern of Jesus' death, Paul was paradoxi-cally expressing his own desire to live life to the full. The Source of Salvation The Epistle to the Hebrews (5:9) says that Jesus "became for all who obey him the source of eternal salvation." We open ourselves to salvation as we in turn obey Jesus, as we attune our hearts to his, and through his to the Father's. It becomes ours, therefore, as we plumb the Reproducing the Pattern of His Death truth, as we accept the dignity and worth of every other human person, and as we commit ourselves to that dignity totally. That is why St. Paul dan write in his Epistle to the Philippians that he wants "to reproduce the pattern of Jesus' death." He sees that sim-ply as the way to become fully alive, and eventually "to take his place (with Jesus) in the resurrection from the dead." To obey Jesus and to find salvation mean to reproduce the pattern of his death, or, as the gos-pels put it, to take up our cross and to'follow him. What does this involve, then, for us? It means that we commit ourselves, too, to the vision and the priori-ties of Jesus; that, like Jesus, we let life touch us; that we respond to these temptations in the same way that Jesus responded to his. Our spiri-tuality is to be modeled on the spirituality of Jesus, on his values, be-liefs, and resources. Sharing His Sufferings No one can,be protected from the vicissitudes .of life. We do, how-ever, have some control over the nature of the inner suffering consequent upon these vicissitudes. In the face of the evil of the world we can choose our response. W.e can choose the inner suffering of absurdity and despair, of the sterile meaninglessness of a world without God, of the superficial and unsatisfying logic of the short-term, of the poisoning and paralyzing choice of bitterness and the refusal to forgive. We can face life with no hope and look on everyone as beyond redemption and on the world as condemned to an unchanging sameness. The other alternative is to taste the suffering involved in living the consequences of our own integrity with its seeming powerlessness; the feelings of irrelevance and nonserise involved in trusting a God who, we believe, makes sense of the meaningless sometimes only in the long-term; the dying-to-self ,involved in forgiving and the price of the perse-verance involved in pouring oneself out for others, trusting against hope that they may one day change and be converted. When St. Paul prayed to share the sufferings of Jesus, he was pray-ing that his sufferings would be those involved in the second alternative. Those were the sufferings of the dying Jesus. Those sufferings were the way to life. Context of Commitment It is the context of our life that gives flesh to the living out of our spirituality. I would like briefly to allude to a few consequences of this 4~16 / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 spirituality of Christ as it touches the lives of all involved in active min-istry, priests, religious and laity. To some extent we can shield ourselves from the difficulties of life by choosing not to love. That, however, would be to betray our call to discipleship. The source of Jesus' experience of failure was his commit-ment to love. Luke makes this point quite clearly in his final prelude to the public life of Jesus, the meeting at Nazareth of Jesus and his fellow townspeople. There Jesus declared his manifesto in the words of Isaiah: The spirit of the Lord has been giv~en to me, for he has anointed me. He has sent me to bring the good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives, and to the blind new sight, to set the downtrodden free, to proclaim the Lord's year of favor (Lk 4:18); and it was there that he was violently rejected by the former companions of his childhood. The starting point of our imitation of Christ is a~commitment to depth in ourselves and to share with others the wonderful good news of God's love for all, and consequently to allow our own liberation to grow, to share in the liberation of others, and to work together for justice and free-dom for them. The Call 1. Being Authentic The choice to be authentic means firstly that, like Jesus, we accept and respect both the wonderful dignity of our human nature and at the same time its limitations. It means that we accept the' fact that to be human is to grow. To re-fuse to grqw is to be untrue to the thirst for life and fullness imprinted on our nature by our creating Father. But growth is painful. It is some-times easier to refuse to grow and to change, to opt instead for the fa-miliar and the unchallenging, even to obstruct and to attack change both in ourselves and in the institutions that we make up. Integrity means that we make peace with gradualness and that we re-spect the laws of sequential growth in ourselves and in others. It means that we accept the need for performance and ambition in the establish-ing of our own sense of identity, and it equally means that we be pre-pared to relinquish in time our reliance on performance in order to sur- Reproducing the Pattern of His Death / 487 render to the risk of intimacy, of forgiveness, and of grace. Eventually it means that we move to the even broader task of universal love and of generativity. Each of these transitions can be painful, and the tempta-tions to stay as we are, to secure our own comfort and peace, are strong. We do so, however, at the price of our integrity and the call of our cre-ating and redeeming God who sent. Jesus that we might live life to the full. Being authentically human means that we need to make peace even with our weakness. We have some strengths, but we do not have them all. What we admire in others is often beyond our own reach, and vice versa. We cannot do everything. None of us is "superman." We live, for example, in a day that has only twenty-four hours and not twenty-eight. We are not called to do whatever is good, but to discern what God is asking of us, to do no more than that, and to surrender the rest. Jesus had to choose between consolidating where he was, or going "to the neighboring country towns, so that I can preach there, too" (Mk 1:38)-- he could not do both. With time the very process of aging brings us in touch With new weakness and limitation. Eventually we have to make peace even with our sin. At the price of our sense of self-reliance we have to surrender to the need for forgive-ness and of mercy. In doing so we find our true dignity, and learn to re-spect ourselves because we are loved by God. A further consequence of the choice for discipleship is that we com-mit ourselves to follow our own duly informed and educated conscience. Jesus allowed himself to be led by the Spirit. It is so easy to avoid fac-ing truth and its .consequences and to persuade ourselves that what we are really doing from fear of the opinion of others or from a concern for our own comfort is being done for the sake of pastoral flexibility or main-taining peace or some other equally inadequate.excuse. And yet, at the same time, we also have to recognize that often we are not sure what our conscience is asking of us, and we have to live in uncertainty. Basically the commitment we make to ministry is a commitment to love. We know that love is the only kind of power that can ultimately give life and bring freedom. The commitment to love immediately rules out the possibility of using other kinds of power, all other kinds of power, even ostensibly for the good of people. It applies across'the board, within the Church as well as in the broader world outside. It pre-cludes manipulation, coercion, persuasion. It is notoriously ineffective. It raises whole issues of the interrelationship of institution and individ-ual person, because institutions made up of imperfectly converted and 41~1~ / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 motivated people necessarily require some kind ofsanctions. It requires clear perceptions of priorities; and the constant readiness to change and to repent, because our ongoing experience and reflection reveal that we do not consistently discernpriorities clearly and choose appropriately. The commitment to love also involves a commitment to non-violence (which is not the same as non-resistance to evil). It is the un-willingness to counter violence with violence; it is the choice to over-whelm evil with love, rather, than to double it by retaliating. Non-violent resistance sometimes calls for total self-sacrifice; more often it means apparent ineffectiveness. There are plenty of champions of jus-tice who are prepared to seek it~with violence. That was not Jesus' way. His non-violence made him unpopular, no. doubt, to the Zealots, the "ur-ban guerillas" of his day; it makes his followers equally unpopular in our day. It is~also ineffective. It ensured the inevitability of Jesus' arrest when he was apprehended in Gethsemane, but also elicited his strict cen-sure there of the violent response of one of his followers (Mt 26:52-54). It makes sense only in a world where God is the basis of meaning. It means that we may have to leave free, to go their own way, even to walk into disaster, those whom we love or for whom we have respon-sibility. That was the experience of Jesus. He had to let his ow.n special friends, hi's own diSciples, walk unheedingly into unfaith. He could not, and would not ev.en if he could, live their lives for them. He could not, would not, make their decisions for them. He had to let them_, grow up. Handing them over into the loving hands of his Father did not help all that much. He had learnt the requirements of love precisely from that same Father. As far as the Gospels are concerned, Judas did not come back. On the other hand, the Peter whom he had to leave to walk into utter perplexity and loss of faith did grow up and was a wiser and greater man. We follow the same paths as Jesus. The choice to love makes us notoriously vulnerable. Where our way of life is one that involves our working closely with others, an option for love may mean at times all the pain and frustration of working for consensus. The democratic vote can sometimes simply mean the coercive imposition on the minority of the will of the major-ity. At times it may be appropriate. Often it is not. An honest commit-ment to consensus will mean for many the readiness to devote the time and effort needed to develop the necessary skills of listening, assertion, and negotiation. We need to face the temptation to ineffectiveness, at times even to irrelevance, the jibes of naivete and so forth, and, like Jesus, explore the Reproducing the Pattern of His Death depth of our own authenticity, listen to his heart and to the heart of our creating Father. We need to listen to our own hearts, and somehow trust that integrity, truth, and love make sense, the only sense, and that our God is a God of the long-term, and not of efficient and immediate re-sults. 2. Forgiving We are familiar with the temptations to bitterness and to unforgi-veness. Not only is our world polarized; in some ways, too, our Church is also. Forgiveness is a decision. It is a decision that has consequences. When we decide to forgive, we surrender our right to use the memory of the wrongs again, either for our own self-pity or to store up and accu-mulate them in order to attack again whoever has hurt us. In a situation of ongoing disagreement or.difference, forgiveness in-volves a commitment to seek whatever common ground there is and to work for reconciliation and even at times for consensus. It involves the need to move beyond the words or the positions we may have adopted to listen to our own hearts and to the hearts of those with whom we dis-agree. It is a consequence of choosing the spirituality of Jesus. It leads to life and to peace, but it has its price. ~Forgiveness can seem like the surrender of our own dignity and self-respect, or of our loyalty to our friends and respect for them. 3. Committed . Perhaps our greatest temptation is to lose hope in people. We get hurt through life. We lose o~ur enthusiasm, even our courage. We try some things and our efforts are rejected. We know the temptation to cut our losses: we do our job; we do what is expected of us. But we lose our com-mitment, and we do little or no more than seems necessary. It is difficult to keep pouring out our lives, to keep working enthusi-astically or to try to introduce innovations only to be met with little or no response. It is easier to settle down, to look after ourselves, to make life comfortable to lose hope. But to lose hope is tochoose against life. Jesus faced blankness, in-difference, rejection, mockery, and blasphemy. In the face of that he chose to pour out his life "for the many." He knew the temptation, but he also listened to his own depths and to the heart of his Father. He died still hoping against hope in people. And for many his hope and his com-mitment bore fruit. There is in the depths of every human person an open-ing towards truth and a connaturality with love. Jesus believed that. He saw it in himself. He wanted to set it free in everyone. He would never 490/Review for Religious, July-August 1989 give up hope in people's changing and being converted; he would go to death for the sake of that hope. A truly Christ-based spirituality calls for a commitment in 'hope to people. The Outcome Our active ministry and lifestyle, therefore, whether we be priests, religious or laity, present us with infinitely nuanced temptations tO,work other than in love--to compi:omise and to find our way around our con-sciences, to choose :power in one or other of its many forms, to lose pa-tience with the apparent ineffectiveness of non-violence and love, to avoid the risk of intimacy and to settle instead for subst.itutes. We lose confidence in our God who gives meaning, sometimes too late and only beyond the grave, to our striving, for integrity and authenticity, and we prefer more tangible results and accountable successes, even at the price of what we know we are really called to be. We know we can give lip- ~service to forgiveness but not have the energy.to follow up its conse-quences. We feel the enticing attraction to settle down, to make life com-fortable, to. be "realistic." It is by facing these temptations, recognizing them and naming them, and then by choosing instead to be authentic, to trust, to forgive, and to hope that we work out our salvation and come to savor that life in abun-dance that Jesus wishes to share with us. As we respond to life as Jesus did, we know his peace and his joy, and we get in touch with the "blessedness" he spoke about in the be-atitudes. There is ai~ irrepressible quality to these experiences. We do not have to force 6urseives to find them. They come of themselves. They do not depend on circumstances beyond our control, and require no "fly-ing- carpet" ride through life. Like Jesus who could thank his Father even on the night he was betrayed, like Paul who could write: ". as the sufferings of Christ overflow to us, so, through Christ, does our conso-lation overflow" (2 Co 1:5), we, too, find the unexpected presence and power of peace and joy within us. Even in the very moments of our "re-producing the pattern of his death," we "know Christ and the power of his resurrection" (Ph 3: 10). It might seem to be paradox, but our ex-perience knows it to be truth. The victory that Jesus has won over evil, and in Which we share, is not a victory in which everything has been done already for us. The vic-tory won for us by Jesus means that we now have within us the resources to face whatever comes and to. triumph in love. It is a victory in which we actively participate, and through-which, precisely by our own par- Reproducing the Pattern of His Death / 491 ticipation, we ourselves become more fully alive and more authentically human. No one can do that for us, not even Jesus. But he does do it with us as we allow his Spirit scope to breathe within us. Mission to the World A~ccording tO John's gospel, on the night of his resurrection Jesus ap-peared,~ to his disciples and commissioned them to do what he had done: As the Father sent me, so I am sending you (Jn 20:21). Jesus had been sent to engage with evil and to overwhelm it with truth ~r~ love. He showed the way to us. The Epistle to the Hebrews writes: As it was his purpose to bring a great many of his sons into glory, it was appropriate that God . . . should make perfect, through suffering, the leader who would take them to their salvation (Heb 2: 10). The same Epistle consequently recommends: Let us not lose sight of Jesus, who leads us in our faith and brings it t6 perf6ction (Heb 12:2i. We follow the path that Jesus has trodden. He has commissioned us to show the same way, to others. That is our mission: we show the way, and we show it by living it ourselves. We cannot live the lives of others for them, any more than Jesus could live ours. But we can show them and, by our love, we can empower them, as Jesus has done with us. Though we might all feel embarrassed to say so, really our mission to others must be summed up in the words of St. Paul, "My brothers, be united in following my rule of life" (Ph 3:i7), or, more succinctly, "Take me for your model, as I take Christ" (1 Co I1:1). Like Peter we would all like to follow in the footsteps of a popularly acclaimed and universally accepted Christ. But there is no such Christ. Like the two sons of Zebedee, we would like to share in a victory where struggle is not necessary. But there is no such victory. Jesus has won the victory, but it was won on the wood of the cross. We share in his vic-tory, but we do it as we drink his cup and are baptized with his baptism (see Mk 10:35-40). As with the mission of Jesus, so, too, then, with our own: the suc-cess of our ministry will be counted not by the numbers of those who may listen to us or cooperated in our projects but in the ones who are encouraged by our example and empowered by our love to engage with the evil in their own breasts and meet it in love. It will be found in those 492 / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 who allow the failures of their lives and of their relationships and the .fail-ure of their projects to touch them, and who feel the consequences of those failures, but choose, whether wearily or resolutely, to continue to reach out lovingly in trust, in forgiveness, and in hope. Jesus' message really is one of love, of peace, ofjgy, and of happi-ness- but not as the world understands and gives them. His message is one of victory, but of victory through the Cross, even for his followers. They have to engage with life and they have to let life touch them. It will hurt, not because God wants it that way, but because of the sin of the world and the mutual destructiveness in which it takes shape. This sin of the world can be overwhelmed. Jesus has made it possible. But where it touches people, there people have to engage with it. Conclusion A truly Christian spirituality is one that responds to life as Jesus did. That is the only Christian spirituality. "All I want is to know Christ, and the power of his resurrection, and to share his suffering by repro-ducing the pattern of his death. In this way I can hope to take my place in the resurrection of the dead." As we treasure our experience and pon-der it in our hearts, as Mary did, I believe that our pondering can fruit-fully be done only by relating it to the pattern of his death. Other values and~insights will modify many forms of this basic Chris-tian spirituality; various lifestyles will determine the concrete shapes that it takes; and wisdom and experience will dictatehow best to ponder and to get in touch with those spiritual depths of Jesus. But all must be based firmly on him or they will fall short of salvation. And he wants so much that we share hig experience of life and taste that life "to the full!" Work and Leisure: Our Judeo- Christian Foundations Melannie. Svoboda, S.N.D. Sister Melannie Svoboda, S.N.D., is currently dividing her time between teaching and writing. She recently completed six years as novice director. Her address is Notre Dame Academy; Route one, Box 197; Middleburg, Virginia 22117. Recently I was asked to give a workshop on leisure and spirituality. As part of my research, I looked in the Reader's Guide to Catholic Periodi-cals to see what already had been written on the topic within the past few years. When I looked up the word leisure I was surprised to find very few articles listed under it, but I noticed, there were many articles under Lent. I looked up the word play and found even fewer articles under play, but there were many under Plato, and planned parenthood. Next I tried the word celebration. I found several articles under celebration but many more under celibacy, cemeteries, and censorship. Finally, I looked up the word fun. I found no :articles under fun, but plenty under fund raising, fundamentalism,, and funerals. This experience made me realize how little has been written on the topic of leisure and other related topics which, I feel, are fundamental to our Christian faith. This article will discuss the Judeo-Christian un-derstanding of leisure. It will begin with an exploration of the biblical understanding of the nature of work. Then it will look at the tradition of the Sabbath, the great 'leisure day,' and show how a balancing of work and leisure is essential to a healthy Christian spirituality. Let us turn first to the book of Genesis. What does Genesis tell us about work? It tells us many things. First, it says something extremely significant: God works. This concept of, a working God was something of an oddity among the peoples of that time period. Many other civiliza- 493 494 / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 tions envisioned their gods as beings who did not work. Their gods lei-surely romped around on mountain tops or lay around sleeping all day. But the Hebrews, based on their unique experience of God, saw their God differently. At the beginning of Genesis they posted a large orange sign with big black letters on it: Go~)AT WORK. But Genesis tells us something even more revelatory than the fact that God works. It tells us why God works. He works not because he has to work; he works because he wants to work. His work, creation, is not for his sake; his work is for others' sake, for humankind's sake, for our sake. In Genesis, God chooses to work because he chooses to share some-thing of himself with someone else. So already in the opening pages of Scripture, work is seen as being intimately associated with the act of self-giving-- a self-giving for the benefit of others. A third thing we notice in the creation narrative is how God works. He seems to enjoy it! God is not portrayed as someone who hates his job or finds it mere drudgery. We do not see God complaining, for exam-ple, at the beginning of the fourth day, "Darn it! Today l've got to make those stupid birds! I'll never get them to fly--I just know it!" On the con-trary, God takes delight in the work process, pronouncing creation, the product of his labors, as "good" at the end of each day. In Genesis, we also notice that leisure or rest is an integral part of the work process. God rests not merely on the last day; he rests, he takes "time off," between each day of creation. The ending of each day brings closure to that particular day's activity. The seventh day, the Sab-bath, is just a longer rest period--an entire day of complete rest. But throughout his work, God has been taking other rests--"mini-Sab-baths"-- all along, Rest or leisure is part and parcel of the work proc-ess. Leisure, like work, must be good if God himself does it. In the creation account, Adam, like God, works. "The Lord then took the man and settled him in the garden of Eden, to cultivate and care for it" (Gn 2:15). Work is not a punishment for Adam's sin. It is one of the ways Adam is made in the image of God, A working God means a working Adam. Adam's work is a sharing in the creative activity of God. Adam's work, like God's work, consists primarily in cultivation and care. But something happens to work after the Fal!: Adam sweats and Eve had labor pains. Genesis 'seems to be saying that after their act of dis-obedience, Adam and Eve suffered some serious consequences. All work--whether bringing forth new I.ife through farming or giving birth-- would now necessarily involve fatigue, frustration, and pain. Work and Leisure / 495 In summary, then, Genesis presents some fundamental attitudes to-ward work. Work is .good--even God works. Work is an act of self-giving directed toward the good of others. It consists primarily in culti-vation and care, in the bringing forth of new life. Work should basically be a joyful activity even though it often entails fatigue and pain. Rest or leisure is good, too. It is somehow integral to the work process. Altfiough Genesis beautifully describes work and leisure, it is in Exo-dus and Deuteronomy that we learn more precisely where leisure comes from and, more importantly, what leisure is for. For the Israelites, the concept of leisure is identified with the tradi-tion of the Sabbath. This tradition is expressed explicitly in the fourth commandment: "Remember to keep holy the Sabbath Day" (Ex 20:8). The key phrase in that commandment is "keep hol~,." What exactly does "keep holy" mean? The remainder of that commandment explains what it means: "Six days you may labor and do all your work,, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord, your God" (Ex 20:9-10). The implication is that to "keep holy" means "not t.o work." But wl~y were the Israelites directed not to work on the Sabbath? The reason is found in Deuteronomy's version of the fourth command-ment. This version adds the following: Remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and out-stretched arm; because of this, the Lord God has commanded you to keep the Sabbath (Dt 5:15). The reason for not working is found in the words "because of this." What does the "this" refer to? It refers to the exodus--the great work of Yahweh. In other words, the Israelites were directed not to work on the Sabbath in order to take time to remember their deliverance from bond-age in Egypt by a powerful yet loving God. In his book, Confessions of a Workaholic, Wayne Oates says that the chief motive for keeping the Sabbath was gratitude to God. It is not fear of God, nor the need to hew the line of ritualistic practice. Rather it is the motive of gratitude for deliverance from slavery, grati-tude for the gift ~f freedom. ~ But the Israelites were to do more than to set aside a day on which to thank God for their freedom--as important as that is. They were to express their gratitude to God by the way they used their precious gift of freedom during all the days of the week. Just as God had used his free-dom to free the Israelites from slavery, so, too, were they to use their 496 / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 freedom to free others from slavery--the slavery of ignorance, poverty, hunger, ill health, fear, old age or whatever form that slavery took. In his book, Flowers in the Desert, Demetrius Dumm, O.S.B., has written a beautiful section on the Ten Commandments. His treatment of the fourth commandment is especially relevant here. He sees the fourth commandment as a "transitional commandment"--one that comes af-ter the three commandments that are concerned with the Israelites' rela-tionship with God and one that comes before those six which govern the Israelites' relationship~with each other. The first three commandments called the Israelites to affirm the mystery of God, writes Dumm. They called the Israelites to trust in God's basic goodness, to see him not only .as powerful but as loving. The last six commandments direct the Israel-ites to affirm that same divine mystery present in every human being by the fact that he or she is created by God. Durum writes: Every creature deserves, therefore, to be respected because of its share of divine mystery. One of the most powerful tendencies of man is to eliminate mystery in his life because it cannot be controlled and thus seems threatening to him. The most natural way for man to control the mystery in :creation is through his labor. The Sabbath commandment or-ders the Israelite to interrupt his labor every seventh day as a reminder that that labor is intended by God to release the mystery in life and not crush it.2 What does all of this have to do with me personally and with my Christian faith? Maybe we can answer that question by taking a few "lei-sure moments" to reflect on these questions. What is my. attitude toward my work? Do I see it as a way of self-giving for the benefit of others, or do I view it as a drudgery or, worse yet, asia punishment? Is my work a way of earning God's love, or is it an expression of gratitude for God who loves me already? Is my work a way of serving others, or has it become my sole means of earning the esteem and respect of others? How is my work helping to free others from slavery--no matter what form that slavery might be? In my work, do I respect the divine mystery in creation and people, or is my work an attempt to control or manipulate creation and people? Have I become a slave to my work, or am I free to let go of it at times? Can I, for example, freely walk away from my work when lei-sure calls me to praye~, to relaxation, or to sleep? Have I learned the art of bringing each day.to a close, entrusting the fruits of my labor to the Lord? Do I set aside regular.time for leisure--for "mini-Sabbaths" and for longer ones? Do I use this "wasted time" to remember God's deliv- Work and Leisure / 497 erance.of me from sin, to reflect on his goodness to me, and to thank and praise him for his power and love? Can I just be with God or must I always be doing for him? Do I find the Lord both in my work and in my leisure? Do I take time to be with others, to enjoy their company, to play with them, to appreci-ate the divine mystery present in them? Or is the only time I am with others when I am working with them or for them? In conclusion, then, we have seen how a healthy balancing of work and leisure is essential for our Christian faith. In his article, "The Spiri-tual Value of Leisure," Leonard Doohan explains how work and leisure manifest our faith in God. Unlike those who profess some religions, we claim to believe that God is near to us, in us, in others, in the wonders of the world. Only in lei-sure dowe prove this belief by giving time to developing attitudes nec-essary to meet him. We also believe we can experience God personally and in community, but does our faith show this to others in the life we live? Are we "working" tourists who look at everything and see noth-ing, or do we pause, appreciate, wonder, and praise God who, we be-lieve, reveals himself in creation? It is not by work that we earn salva-tion, but in leisure that we appreciate that it is gift. Leisure is the cor-rective that puts work in perspective and shows forth our faith.3 NOTES ~ Wayne E. Oates, .Confessions of a Workaholic: The Facts about Work Addiction (Nashville: Abingdon, 1971), p. 35. 2 Demetrius Dumm, O.S.B., Flowers in the Desert: A Spirituality of the Bible (New York: Paulist, 1987), pp. 14-15. 3 Leonard Do6han, "The Spiritual Value of Leisure," Spirituality Today, 31 (June 1979), p. 164, Positive Wellness: Horizon for Religious Experience Jerome A. Cusumano, S.J. Father Jerry Cusumano, S.J., is a member of the Japanese Province of the Society of Jesus. He is currently engaged in studies at Arizona State University. His address is B:'ophy College Prep; 4701 N. Central: Phoenix, Arizona 85012. In this article I show how the integrated approach to health as exemplified in the holistic health movement can serve as a vehicle for opening a per-son's consciousness to the religious dimension of life. Since the goal of holistic health is "positive wellness," it is meant for those in good health who wish to achieve even better health, those who, in other words, are no longer focused on the negative problems of health such as giving up smoking, controlling drinking, losing weight, and so on. Holistic health encompasses at least the following four dimeffsions: nu-trition, exercise, awareness, and lifestyle. Since numerous self-help books as well as much scholarly research have more than adequately ex-plicated what is essential to each particular dimension, I do not intend to repeat here what has been better said elsewhere. However, I will briefly summarize what seems to be generally accepted in each area in order to establish a basis for the reflections which follow. 1 will treat the four basic factors in ascending order of importance. Nutrition Quantitatively, one should systematically "under-eat" in such a way as to maintain his body weight at the level it was when physical growth was completed, usually about the age of twenty. Qualitatively, one's diet should be based primarily on whole grains, raw vegetables, and fresh fruit. The diet should be, in yogic terms, sattvic, that is, nei- 498 Positive Wellness / 499 ther making the body sluggish nor stimulating it, but rather leaving it en-ergized and calm at the same time. Since one needs energy for exercise and calmness for awareness, a sattvic diet disposes the body properly for the next two dimensions of holistic health. Exercise Good food will not be adequately assimilated if the blood and oxy-gen circulation of the body are poor; conversely, a body kept in good condition will be healthy even on a poorer diet. Thus exercise is more important than nutrition for positive wellness. One needs to do some form of stretching exercises every day in order to maintain flexibility and alignment in the musculo-skeletal frame. What is gained during exercise times should be maintained at other times by sitting and standing in pos-tures which keep the shoulders and pelvis in line and the back straight. One also needs some form of daily aerobic exercise done for at least twenty minutes a session in order to revitalize and refresh the cardiovas-cular and respiratory systems by increasing the oxygen supply in the blood. The amount of time one devotes to exercise serves as a good gauge of one's desire for positive wellness. Nevertheless, even exercise is of less importance for positive wellness than the next dimension, aware-heSS. Awareness A period of at least twenty minutes a day should be devoted to some method of systematic awareness in the form of relaxation or meditation. The possibilities range over the spectrum from Feldenkrais's body aware-ness exercises or Jacobson's progressive relaxation method done in the prone, position, through the measured movements of Tai Chi done stand, ing and walking, to the one-pointed focusing of zazen or yoga done in the more demanding postures such as the full lotus. ~ Turning one's con-scious powers in on oneself while in slow m6vement and/or remaining still for a good length of time not only revitalizes the conscious mind and relaxes the body, but also provides a place where unconscious material, such as negative emotions, can .surface and be disposed of through aware-ness. While aerobic exercise refreshes one through an expenditure of en-ergy, in awareness one gathers his energy, concentrates it, and so re-charges himself. Furthermore, while it is possible to both eat well and exercise enough, and yet still lead a harried life, this is not possible for one who wishes to practice awareness regularly. The daily period set aside for purposefully quieting both body and mind through awareness presupposes a lifestyle conducive to such an activity. Thus awareness is 500 I Review for Religious, July-August 1989 both the support of and the fruit of an ordered lifestyle which is the fourth and most important dimension for positive wellness. Lifestyle In proportion as a stressful lifestyle has deleterious effects on the physical and psychical organism, so also a relaxed lifestyle is the single most important factor in promoting positive wellness. Such a lifestyle in-cludes a job ohe feels satisfied with and sees as worthwhile, as well as a personal life that has sufficient rest, satisfying human relationships, and some absorbing interests. Requisite to such a lifestyle, however, is a I . clear conception of the purpose of one's life, which serves as an implicit criterion by which one can judge which activities are to be undertaken and which relationsh.ips fostered. With a relaxed lifestyle and a clear pur-pose in life a man may reach a state of positive wellness even though he does not scrupulously follow all the directives with regard to nutri-tion, exercise, and awareness. Actually, a clear grasp of the purpose of one's life gives a meaning to striving for positive wellness. "Maintain-ing good physical and mental health is like preserving two fine instru-ments which can be used to carry out the purpose of life . Thus it is clear that the basis of holistic health lies in one's understanding the purpose of his life and learning how to achieve that purpose."2 Religious Experience The state of positive wellness, achieved and maintained by the inte-grated approach of the holistic health movement as summarized above, can dispose one to be more receptive to the transcendental and religious dimension of life. One becomes accustomed to an habitual state of vigor, energy, and wellness which hecan no longer do without. To use Glas-ser's term, one has developed a positive addiction to health itself. This addiction to positive wellness has its source in the good feelings gener-ated through the "spiritualization" of one's body by the increased vi-tality attained through conscious effort and the "physicalization" of one's mind by the greater calmness achieved through attention to bodily processes. At peak moments this dual action issues into a harmony which Glasser call the PA (positive addiction) state. "In the PA state the mind flows with the body. The two cease completely to be antagonistic to each other and blend into one. The state of positive addiction to health is experienced as a drive from within oneself, but not an instinctual drive such as that for sex, nor as a drive stemming from the force of one's will. One feels that he has tapped into another force which is now pulling him to higher levels of Positive Wellness health. Yoga terminology calls this force the Self as opposed to the self. However, it might just as well be conceived in terms of health itself. The healthier one becomes, the more he makes contact with the body's own innate drive to good health and experiences the power of that drive. He gradually opens his consciousness to the life force within him and allows it to work of itself. The healthier one becomes, the more he can tap into this life force. Paradoxically, this means that one becomes a "spiritual" person not by ignoring the body in the pursuit of higher interest, but rather by infusing the body with spirit, that is, by directing one's consciousness to the health of the body in such a way as to energize it as fully as possible. As a result one becomes a more suitable vehicle to channel the energy of life within himself and to others. "As you continue to develop your channels of energy, you will notice differences in your entire being, and these will likewise be observed by those around you, who also benefit from the increase in energy flow."4 Energizing the body through sustained, systematic daily care of one's health puts one into contact with a Life greater than one's own. It is this Life, more than individual will power, which makes possible the main-tenance of a sane lifestyle and consistent attention to nutrition, exercise, and awareness demanded for positive wellness. For some this may be the first step to recognition of transcendent being. For others it may be a preparation through a new experience of satisfaction from taking respon-sibility for one's life. As Bloomfield says, "There is joy in taking full responsibility for your health and happiness.''5 Children at play, fully alive and vibrant, exemplify the joy he speaks of. Theirs is a joy spring-ing from the flexibility and agility of their bodies as well as from the care-free state of mind in which they live. Paradoxically, Ardell notes, it is only as one grows older that he can fully enjoy youth.6 Conclusion If pursued within the holistic health framework the current quest of many for youthfulness and positive wellness can become the occasion for opening oneself to transcendent and religious experience. For positive wellness makes one aware of the source of Life itself. NOTES ~ M. Feldenkrais, Awareness Through Movement, (New York: Harper and Row, 1972), E. Jacobson, You Must Relax, (London: Unwin Paperbacks, 1980). 2 S. Rama, A Practical Guide to Holistic Health, (Honesdale, Pennsylvania: The 50~. / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 Himalayan Publishers, 1980), p. 13. 3 W. Glasser, Positive Addiction, (New York: Harper and Row, 1976), p. 56. '~ R. Shames, The Gift of Health, (New York: Bantam Books, 1982), p. 140. 5 H. Bloomfield, The Holistic Way to Health and Happiness, (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1978), p. 274. 6 D. Ardell, High Level Wellness, (New York: Bantam Books, 1981), p. 67. Full Circle Morning did come! Rise with the full-day Sun! Work begun. Thy Will be done! Day half-spent, Rest in the noonday Sun! Renewed, refre~shed--run! Day-work, toil done. Daystar, noon, setting Sun. Rest! Be still! Tomorrows come . . . maybe? Glory be! Walter Bunofsky, S.V.D. 1446 E. Warne Avenue St. Louis, Missouri 63107 Striving for Spiritual Maturity: Ideals as Obstacles Wilkie Au, S.J. Father Wilkie Au, S.J., has been working in psychological counseling and spiritual direction. He served for six years as novice director for the Jesuit California Prov-ince. He may be addressed at Loyola Marymount College; Jesuit Community; P.O. Box 45041; Los Angeles, California 90045-0041. The metaphor of a journey captures well what most adults come sooner or later to realize about spiritual and psychological growth: it is a never-ending series of changes and struggles. In a word, it is a hard road to travel. It is tied to the ways we respond to the crises of human life. These crises are both predictable and unpredictable. The predictable ones have been outlined in the literature of deve!opmental psychology, which de-picts the pattern of adult growth, not as an undisturbed straight line, but as a zigzag process often full of setbacks and frustrations. The unpre-dictable crises are easily recognized: sudden illnesses, career disappoint-ments, interpersonal misunderstandings, the loneliness of ruptured rela-tionships, the separation of death or divorce. When faced with the strug-gles that are the inescapable conditions of growth, people frequently ask themselves: "Why go on? Why keep trying, if there is no chance of suc-cess? What difference does it make any way?" The frustrations of seem-ingly endless change--new jobs, new residences, new relationships-- force many to question whether it is worth all the effort. These are nei-ther theoretical nor abstract questions. They emerge from the concrete experience of striving to grow in holiness and wholeness. These quan-daries frame the struggle to love as Jesus commanded. An effective spirituality today must strengthen the individual's com-mitment to the ongoing process of sanctification and maturation. It must 503 ~i04/Review for Religious, July-August 1989 do this by reminding us that God is always close by with divine love and power to help us in our struggles. As followers of the risen Christ, we are called to believe that "the power.by which life is sustained and in-vited toward wholeness is no human creation and abides and remains steadfast even in a world where death does have dominion over every individual." ~ As in other human journeys, we reach the destination of our spiri-tual pilgrimage only gradually. However, there is a paradoxical nature to the spiritual sojourn. While alive, we will never fully reach our goal of union with God and others. Yet, being on the spiritual path is already a way of attaining that end. God is to be enjoyed not only at the end of the search, .but all along the way. The Christmas story of the magi illus-trates this truth. God was present to them not only when they joyfully arrived at the cave in Bethlehem, but also in the original stirrings that sent them off in search of the promised Messiah. God's presence was also experienced in a guiding star that directed them through dark nights and in a dream that warned them of Herod's threat. They experienced God's support, too, in the encouragement they gave each other through-out an uncharted search that took them miles from home. God is more present to us than we think. Our search for union with God is life-long, often a strenuous trek punctuated by dark passages. If we are to persevere, we must take cour-age in God's abiding presence all along the way. Even as we are travel-ing towards God as destiny, Emmanuel is already with us in manifold ways. The disciples of Jesus were once given a dramatic lesson about how Christ is ever-present. One day they were crossing the Lake of Gali-lee when a fierce storm enveloped their little boat. Frightened by vio-lent winds, the apostles were stricken with panic. Suddenly, Jesus ap-peared to them walking on the water. He told them, "It is I. Do not be afraid" (Jn 6:21). Jesus then calmed the storm, and the boat quickly came to shore. The significance of Jesus' words is clear when we look at the original text. The Greek has Jesus saying "ego eimi" which liter-ally means "I am." In the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the phrase "ego eimi" is used as a surrogate for the divine name (Ex 3:14). It is Yahweh's response to Moses' question, "Who shall I say sent me?" In placing these words in Jesus' mouth, John ex-p~' esses the early Church's belief in the divinity of Christ. The good news affirmed in this Johannine passage is identical to that contained in Mat-thew's story of the magi: God is always with us in our journeys through life. This truth must permeate our consciousness, especially when our Striving for Spiritual Maturity / 505 fragile boat is rocked by waves of worry and troublesome torrents. In our fear and confusion, we need to recognize the presence of the risen Jesus drawing near to us to still the storm. Calm will descend on us when we hear Jesus say, "Do not be afraid. It is I." Letting Go of Flawless Images ~The journey metaphor most accurately reflects reality when it is seen as a zigzag pattern i'ather than as an uninterrupted straight line. Human growth is not a process that moves relentlessly ahead in a single direc-tion. It, rather, is a mixture of progressions and regressions. At times, we experience forward movements; on other occasions, slips indicate re-gress; and sometimes, no matter how much effort we expend, we find ourselves at a standstill, seemingly stuck at a developmental plateau. Is this wrong? To the contrary. Accepting the jerky aspect of growth and relinquishing the illusion of a forever smooth-flowing journey is not only necessary but will bring serenity to our striving for maturity. Failures should not produce despair; temporary plateaus need not trigger paraly-sis. The expectation of a flawless journey is counterproductive because it misrepresents the process of developmenta~l growth. It also distorts the truth of what it means to be a human being. A view of the human person which does not acknowledge that sinfulness casts a shadow on every person is unrealistic. Such a notion can also have harmful effects. Our sinful condition renders us radically weak. In an iron'ic way, not to admit to our weakened capacity leads us to a sense of perversity and guilt rather than worthiness and self-acceptance. The refusal "to recognize the persistent ambiguity and the final impotence of our lives tantalizes us with an optimistic promise of self-evolved be-coming," concli~des theologian LeRoy Aden. It also "stands in danger of giving us a sense of failure and despair to the extent that we do not achieve it. ,.,2 Thus, failure to acknowledge the shadow aspect of human personality, diminishes, not enhances, self-esteem. Aden elaborates on the harmful effects of a naively optimistic view of human development in the context of a critique of Carl Rogers, the father of client-centered therapy and a major influence in the field of pas-toral counseling. Aden objects to a basic hypothesis of client-centered therapy: the belief that persons have within themselves the ongoing ca-pacity to reorganize their lives in the direction of maturity and fulfill-ment if the proper psychological climate is present. Concretely,. this hy-pothesis presupposes that if the counselor communicates empathy, warmth, acceptance, and genuineness, a client wil~ naturally begin to manifest behavior that enhances the true self. According to Aden, "Ro- 506 / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 gers' faith in the individual's ability to choose the good is absolute. He entertains no qualifications. He allows no doubts.In fact, therapists who begin to question the hypothesis and who shift to another mode of inter-action only confuse the client and defeat their own purpose."3 Roger~ clung tenaciously to his belief in the individual's absolute ca-pacity for constructive and enhancing behavior. Aden recounts an inci-dent in Rogers' life in which he nearly destroyed his own psychic health by maintaining at all cost this article of faith. Rogers once dealt with a very disturbed woman who continually demanded more of him--more time, more warmth, more realness. Although he began to doubt his own adequacy and to lose the boundaries between himself and the client, Ro-gers was very reluctant to let go. Finally, when he realized that he was on the edge of a personal breakdown,he swiftly referred the client to a psychiatric colleague and left town for an extended period. He eventu-ally sought therapy to overcome feelings of complete inadequacy as a therapist and deep worthlessness as a person. According to Aden, this "event shows that Rogers would doubt him-self as a therapist and as a person before he would question his basic faith in the individual.''4 Rogers had provided his disturbed client ~,ith un-derstanding and acceptance over an extended period of time. Neverthe-less, she got progressively more dependent and sicker, bordering on psy-chosis. Her behavior explicitly challenged the very foundation of his the-ory. Thus, it was easier for him to doubt his own worth as a clinician than to reexamine the linchpin of his therapeutic creed. Belief in the in-dividual's indomitable capacity for ongoing growth and actualization had to be maintained at all cost. Forgiveness: The End Point of Life Carl Rogers has made many contributions to pastoral counseling, but his trust in the absolute ability of individuals to grow continually toward fulfillment is a harmful assumption for Christians. It contradicts Christi-anity's deepest insight into the human person as radically good, yet bur-dened by sinfulness. This sinful condition impedes our struggle for growth in holiness and maturity~ It often leads to imperfect fulfillment. Unlike the contemporary tendency to absolutize fulfillment as the basic truth and the final goal of human existence, Christian faith reiterates the good news proclaimed by Christ: forgiveness is the endpoint of human life. Thus faulty fulfillment and incomplete development need not worry those who trust in the forgiving love of God. In thelend, we will fully enjoy the unconditional acceptance of God, not because we are flawless, Striving for Spiritual Maturity / 507 but in spite of our imperfections. Our merciful God's gift of forgiveness means that we "cannot and need not measure up to any conditions of worth."5 When forgiveness, and not fulfillment, is seen as the endpoint of our lives, we can live with greater acceptance of our weaknesses and with greater hope in God's power to complete what grace has started. No longer will the ambiguity of our fulfillment judge us, nor the impo-tence of our efforts condemn us. With St. Paul, we are "quite certain that the One who began this good work" in us "will see that it is fin-ished when the Day of Christ Jesus comes" (Ph 1:6). As Aden states beau-tifully., the promise of ultimate forgiveness "allows us to be incomplete and yet complete, estranged and yet related, distorted and yet fulfilled." When our journey reaches its termination, we will be wrapped in God's merciful arms, like the prodigal son. Because "you are forgiven" will be the final words we will hear, we are freed from the compulsive need to actualize perfectly our human potential and are released from the guilt that accompanies falling short of that goal. "Success and failure are accidental," writes one spiritual writer. "The'joy of the Christian is never based on . . . success but on the knowledge that (one's) Redeemer lives."6 Thus, the author encour-ages us to learn to li~,e peacefully to the end of our life with a certain imperfecti6n: The Lord will never ask how successful we were in overcoming a par-ticular vice, sin, or imperfection. He will ask us, "Did you humbly and patiently accept this mystery of iniquity in your life? How did you deal with it? Did you learn from it to be patient and humble? Did it teach you to trust not your own ability but my love? Did it enable you to under-stand better the mystery of iniquity in the lives of others?' ,7 Our lack of perfection will never separate us from God because the Lord's forgiveness is always perfect and total. What to Do Until the Messiah Comes Until that day of Christ Jesus, when we will receive "the perfec-tion that comes through faith in Christ and is from God," we are called to strive for the goal without ceasing (Ph 3: 9-10). We are to imitate St. Paul in his deep yearning "to have Christ and be given a place in him" (Ph 3:9). We have not yet won, but are still running, trying to capture the prize for which Jesus captured us. We too must forget the past and strain ahead for what is still to come. We must, in Paul's words, race "for the finish, for the prize to which God calls us upward to receive in Christ Jesus" (Ph 3: 14). Review for Religious, July-August 1989 Paul's expression of the Christian goal is beautifully poetic. We must look to a contemporary spirituality, however, to translate it into real-life terms. As a guide to Christian living, a spirituality' must spell out the prac-tical dimensions of that vision. It should keep the Gospel ideals eve~r be-fore the Christian sojourner. These ideals are meant to help Christians finish the spiritu~.l race and to receive a place in Christ. They can be use-ful in our spiritual odyssey. Like the stars, they may never be reached; but they are useful to steer our lives by. Ideals can hinder us, however, and discourage us from trying when the fear of performing poorly para-lyzes us. The French saying, "The best is the enemy of the good," il-lustrates this attitude of fearfulness. Ideals impede our spiritual progress when we use them as an excuse for mediocrity, thinking to ourselves: "Christian holiness is something for saintly people, not ordinary folks like us. ". Furthermore, ideals are injurious when they lure us into think-ing that we can earn God's approval by doing everything perfectJy. Paul refers to this as seeking a perfection that comes from the Law rather than from faithin Jesus (Ph 3:9). When striving for holine~ ss deceives us int6 thinking that we can stand in pharisaical judgment over others, we have been seduced by pride. Finally, ideals are harmful when they lead to cyni-cism and disillusionment. That no one fully lives up to espoused values should not undermine the importance of having high aspirations. The fail-ure of sincere efforts should not disillusion us, but the apathy of not try-ing should appall us. Dreaming is not the same as doing. Ideals should inspire us to act, not merely to dream. Thoughts of what could be tomorrow should lead us to do what we can today. When lofty aspirations lead to romantic pre-occupation rather than realistic pursuits, they retard our spiritual devel-opment. In a letter to a friend, C. S. Lewis makes this point nicely: We read of spiritual efforts, and our imagination makes us believe that, because we enjoy the idea of doing them, we have done them. I am ap-palled to see how much of the change which I thought I had undergone lately was on!y imaginary. The real workseems still to be done. It is so fatally easy to confuse an aesthetic appreciation of the spiritual life with the life itself--to dream that you have waked, washed, and dressed and then to find yourself still in bed.8 No matter how grand our ideals, they can only be achieved through small but steady steps. As the Chinese sage Lao Tze stated centuries ago, "The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step." We must bear this wise saying in mind as we let the star of idealism lead us, as with the magi, incompanionship to the Messiah. Striving for Spiritual Maturity / 509 Activity and Passivity in Spiritual Striving Striving for spiritual maturity is paradoxical. It requires us to be si-multaneously active and passive. We are called to exert our efforts and use our God-given talents to develop ourselves. And, at the same time, we must remember that our efforts alone can never bring us to holiness and wholeness; only God's grace can effect our transformation into Christ. While we ultimately cannot save ourselves, we must neverthe-less cooperate with divine grace. We must dispose ourselves to be re-ceptive to the sanctifying action of God's touch. In our spiritual journey we have to negotiate a delicate passage between the Scylla of presump-tion and the Charybdis of despair. Presumption, according.to St. Tho-mas Aquinas, is "an unwarranted dependence upofi God."9 It is the at-titude that God will do it all and that our efforts are not important. Fos-tering irresponsible inaction, it keeps us from doing our part. Despair, on the other hand, is losing hope in God's saving power. It stems from an exclusive reliance on our efforts, without any trust in God's power to make up for Qur human limitations. It results from thinking that eve-rything depends on us alone. Only ongoing discernment can help us main-tain the right balance in our spirituality between personal effort and trust-ing reliance on God. Both dynamics are encouraged by Scripture. Many New. Testament passages attest to the need to rely on God's power in order to bear spiritual fruit in our lives. A beautiful expression of this is the Johannine image of God as the vinedresser. Jesus is the vine and we are the branches. The Father prunes us so that we might bear fruit (Jn 15: I-2). Spiritual growth is passive in the sense that purification and progress are the direct results of God's action upon us. The evangelist Mark reinforces the centrality of God's action in his parable about the seed growing by itself. This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man throws seed on the land. Night and day, while he sleeps, when he is awake, the seed is sprouting and growing; how, he does not know. Of its own accord the land pro-duces first the shoot, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. And when the crop is ready, he loses no time; he starts to reap because the harvest has come (Mk 4:26-29). Notice that the farmer's work is described with a minimum of words. The emphasis falls on the mysterious process of growth. Just as the earth produces fruit spontaneously, so God's reign comes by divine power alone. Once the seed is planted, the result is as sure, as dependable, and as silent as the forces of nature. Stage by stage--first the green shoot, then the spike of corn, and then the full grain in the ear--the seed of S10 /Review for Religious, July-August 1989 God's reign grows to harvest in a way that the farmer does not under-stand. This parable reminds us that nature (God's creation) contains a power which humans do not make or~direct. Similarly, God's grace will bring about conversion and growth in us in ways we may not understand. In human lives, the Spirit of Jesus is the divine power that brings God's kingdom from seed to harvest. When we remember that God's 'work-ing in us,.can do more than we can ask or imagine' (Ep 3:20), we will be protected from the pride and anxiety that stem from the myth of total self-sufficiency. But Scripture also stresses the importance of human effort. Luke's gospel strongly urges followers of Christ to translate words into action. "Why do you call me Lord, Lord," asks Jesus, "and not do what I say?" (Lk 6:46). Everyone who comes to me and listens to my words and acts on them ¯ . . is like the man who when he built his house dug, and dug deep, and laid the foundations on rock; when the river was in flood it bore down on that house but could not shake it, it was so well built. But the one who listens and does nothing is like the man who built his house on soil, with no foundations: as soon as the river bore down on it, it col-lapsed; and what a ruin that house became! (Lk 6:47-49). Jesus not only challenges us to practice his teachings, but also warns that our very hearing of his word must be done with care. In the parable of the sower and the seed, he describes the fragility ofthe seed of God's word. If it is not received by the right soil, it will not take root and grow. Grains that fall on the edge of the path represent people who have heard the word of God, but have it stolen from their hearts by the forces of evil. Seeds that fall on rock are like people who receive the word in a superfi-cial way, and give up in time of trial. Those that fall in the midst of thorns are Christians who let worries, riches, and pleasures of life choke their growth, preventing it from reaching maturity. Grains that fall in the rich soil signify those of generous hearts who have let the word take deep roots in themselves and have yielded a harvest through their persever-anc. e (Lk 8:11-15). Emphasizing the importance of human effort in dis-posing the soil of the inner self for receiving the word, Jesus concludes with a warning: "So take care how you hear" (Lk 8: 18). While Mark's parable of the seed growing by itself stresses the power of God actively bringing about growth, Luke's parable emphasizes the necessity of en-ergetic human cooperation. Another Lukan parable about a fruitless fig tree highlights the im-portance of personal effort. When its owner realized that his tree had Striving for Spiritual Maturity been barren for three years, he ordered his gardener to remove it. In-stead, the caretaker pleaded, "Sir, leave it one more year and give me time to dig round it and manure it: it may bear fruit next year; if not, then you can cut it down" (Lk 13:8-9). We too are called to actively tend the seed of God's word so that it can take deep roots in our souls and can bear fruit for the world. A classical biblical text used to illustrate the need for docility to God's formative action in our lives is Jeremiah's visit to the potter. Watch-ing the artisan working at his wheel, the prophet noticed that he contin-ued to shape and reshape the clay until he created what he was envision-ing. Then the word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah as follows: "House of Israel, can I not do to you what this potter does?. Yes, like clay in the potter's hand, so you are in mine, House of Israel" (Jr 18:1-6). While the image of the human person as clay being shaped by the divine Potter testifies beautifully to God's active involvement in our spiritual development, it should not be used to justify excessive passivity or in-fantile irresponsibility. While trying to be malleable to the fashioning in-fluence of God, Christians are called to take adult responsibility for their growth. This means taking active means to deepen one's love for God and neighbor. Activity and passivity must coexist in dynamic tension, if we are to remain.spir!tually healthy. In describing her Jeremiah-like visit to a pot-ter at work in Provincetown, situated at the tip of Cape Cod, a recent writer shed light on the active-passive dimension of spiritual formation. The observer discovered that the artist,, a woman-of more than seventy years, was a wise person as well as a potter. After conveying her belief in the direct relationship between the pliability of the clay and its strength, the artisan added, almost as an aside, "If you can't bend a lit-tle and give some, life will eventually break you. It's just the way it is, you know." ~0 The visitor noticed that the potter worked with both hands: one placed inside, applying pressure on the clay; the other on the out-side of the gradually forming pot,. Too much pressure from the outside would cause the pot to collapse, while too much pressure from the in-side would make the pot bulge outward. The old potter spoke wisely about life: Life, like the pot I am turning, is shaped by two sets of opposing forces ¯ . . Sadness and death and misfortune and the love of friends and all the things that happened to m~ that I didn't even choose. All of that in-fluenced my life. But there are things I believe in about myself, my faith in God, and the love of some friends that worked on the insides of me. ~ 512 / Review for Religious,. July-August 1989 Like Jeremiah, this modern day potter sheds light on the Lord's ways of dealing with us. The Lord who calls us to be holy is also the One who forms us into the image of Jesus, the living icon, of God. This divine Art-ist works on us with two hands: one shaping us from the inside and an-other molding us from the outside. Like the clay pot, we need to be mal- . leable. And, paradoxically, our pliability will give us strength to per-severe ac~tively in the process. Knowing how to bend a little will keep us from breaking. Experience as Manure in the Spiritual Field In the spiritual project of transformation into Christ, effort is what counts, not unremitting success. Acclaiming the value of practice in spiri-tual growth, the Eastern guru Chogyam Trungpa speaks of the "manure of experience and the field of bohdi." ~-~ Bohdi represents the search for enlightenment. If we are skilled and p~tient enough to sift through our experiences and study them thoroughly, we can use them to aid our en-lightenment. Our experiences, 'our mistakes, and even our failures func-tion like fertilizer. According to Trungpa, to deny or cover up our errors is a waste of experience. When we do not scrutinize our failures for the lessons they contain, we miss an opportunity. What appears to be use-less trash contains potential .nutrients for life. But, to convert our defi-ciencies into positive value, we need to pile them on a compost heap, not sweep them behind a bush. Hiding failure is to store it like rubbish. "And if you store it like that," the guru remarks, "you would not have enough manure to raise a crop from the wonderful field of bodhi.''~3 In a parallel way, experience can be said to be manure in the field of Christian development. Like manure, past experiences must be plowed into the ground to enrich the inner soil of the self, making it more re-ceptive to. the see.d of God's word. Then, we will reap an abundant har-vest base~l on our perseverance. Mistakes need not ruin our spiritual jour-ney, if we learn from them. Even saints like Augustine of Hippo and Ig-natius of Loyola learned how not to make mistakes by making many. The Lord who desires our holiness can bring good out of everything, can work in any and all of our experiences to transform us. In our fragmen-tation, we rejoice in the power of God to bring wholeness. If we bring our weakness before the Lord, humbly asking for the help of enabling grace, we can then trust that the Lord will produce an abundant harvest. Spiritual Growth Through Trial and Error The ideals of Christian spirituality cannot be achieved without im-mersing ourselves in the messiness of nitty-gritty experience. Learning Striving for Spiritual Maturity how to love God and others in an integrated way comes only through daily practice. The way of trial and error, not book learning alone, will teach us how to fashion a dynamic and balanced life in which there is room for solitude and community, ministry and leisure, autonomy and intimacy, personal transformation and social reform, prayer and play. Striking the right balance is a highly personal matter. No one can attain it for us; we must discover it ourselves through personal experience. As theologian John Dunne states, "Only one who has tried the extremes can find this personal mean., on the other hand, trying the extremes will not necessarily lead to finding the mean. Only the [person] who perceives the shortcomings of.the extremes will find it. 14 Blessings for the Journey Achieving wholeness and holiness requires traversing the difficult ter-rain of real life with all its challenges and crises. Even at the end of a lifetime of effort, we will still need to be completed by the finishin~g touch of the divine Artist. God will .then bring to completion in us the eternal design of persons destined to love wholeheartedly. While await-ing that unifying touch of divine grace, we pilgrims are called to follow the way of Jesus. And the Lord who walks with us assures that we will always be blessed. The blessings sent our way may not always be enjoy-able, but they will always nudge us forward in our efforts to love as God i'ntended. °~ A rabbi was once asked, "What is a blessing?" He prefaced his an-swer with a riddle involving the creation account in chapter one of Gene-sis. The riddle went this way: After finishing his work on each of the first five days, the Bible states, "God saw that it was good." But God is not reported to have commented on the goodness of what was created on the sixth day when the human person was fashioned. "What conclu-sion can you draw from tha~?" asked the rabbi. Someone volunteered, "We can conclude that the human person ~s not good." "Possibly," the rabbi nodded, "but that's not a likely explanation." He then went on to explain that the Hebrew word translated as "good" in Genesis is the word "tov," which is better translated as "complete." That is why, the rabbi contended, God did not declare the human person to be "toy." Human beings are created incomplete. It is our life's vocation to collabo-rate with our Creator in fulfilling the Christ-potential in each of us. As the medieval mystic Meister Eckhart suggested, Christ longs to be born and developed into fullness in each of us.~5 A blessing is anything that enters into the center of our lives and expands our capacity to be filled with Christ's love. Therefore, a blessing may not always be painless, but Review for Religious, July-August 1989 it will always bring spiritual growth. Being blessed does not mean being perfect, but being completed. To be blessed is not to get out of life what we think we want. Rather, itis the assurance that God's purifying grace is active in us, so that our "hidden self (may) grow strong" and "Christ may live in (our) hearts through faith." In this way, we will with all the saints be "filled with the utter fullness of God" (Ep 3:16-19). NOTES I Sam Keen, "Manifesto for a Dionysian Theology," in New Theology No. 7, eds. Martin E. M~irty and Dean G. Peerman (New York: Macmillan, 1970), p. 97. 2 LeRoy Aden, "On Carl Rogers" Becoming,"Theology Today XXXVI:4 (Jan. 1980), p. 558. 3 lbid, p. 557. 4 Ibid. 5 lbid, p. 558. 6 Adrian van Kaam, Religion and Personality (Denville, New Jersey: Dimension Books, 1980), p. 15. 7 lbid, p. 15. 8 C.S. Lewis, The3, Stand Together: The Letters of C.S. Lewis to Arthur Greeves (1914-1963), ed. Walter Hooper (New York: The Macmillan Co., Inc. 1979), p. 361. 9 Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, Latin Text and English Translation, Introductions, Notes, Appendices, and GIossaries,~Vol. 33 (Blackfriars, with New York: McGraw-Hill and London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1966), II-II, Q 21, a I, ad 1. ~0 Paula Ripple, Growing Strong at Broken Places (Notre Dame, Indiana: Ave Ma-ria Press, 1986), p. 68. ~ Ibid, p. 69. ~z Chogyam Trungpa, Meditation in Action (Boston: Shambhala, 1985), p. 26. ~3 Ibid. ~4 John Dunne, The Way of All the Earth (New York: MacMillan Company, 1972), pp. 37-38. ~5 Meister Eckhart once said: "What good is it to me if Mary gave birth to the son of God fourteen hund'r~ed years ago and I do not also give birth to the son of God in my time and in my culture?" As quoted in Matthew Fox, Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality (Santa Fe, New Mexico: Bear & Company, 1983), p. 221. The Shifting Order of Religious Life in our Church Maryanne Stevens, R.S.M. Sister Maryanne Stevens, R.S.M., is currently Assistant Professor of Theology at Creighton University. She had served as formation director for the Sisters of Mercy, Province of Omaha from 1977-1982. Her address is Department of Theology; Creighton University; California at 24th Street; Omaha, Nebraska 68178. The difficulty of thinking thorough questions about religious life today should not be underestimated. Such reflection is often complicated by the fact that those straining to see and articulate what the shifts in relig-ious orders mean for their future in our Church are often themselves mem-bers Of religious congregations. Thus, the efforts to make sense of vowed living can be blindedoby both self-interests and past~ ways of understand-ing. Th6 blindness feels to me like the fuzzy sight of Mark's blind man who could see people "but they look like trees, walking" (Mk 8:24). It was only after the man "looked intently" that he was able to see ev-erything clearly. This ~article is more an attempt to describe the "tree walking" than to asser(any.de~finitive conclusions. Two circumstances in particular have sparked my own reflections on the changing order of religious life. First, we continue to have members "leaving." They do not leave in the dark of night as they did in the 1950s; rather many stand before us in assembly or community saying that their integrity prevents them from +ontinuing to live the vowed life, but they wish always to remain ""sister" or "brother" to us. Many are not immediately interested in a different lifestructure, for example, marriage, personal wealth, and so forth; rather, they are no longer able to connect celibacy, poverty, and obedience to any understanding of their life. Secondly, those within religious communities primarily vested with 515 516 / Review for Religious~ July-August 1989 the role of discerning vocations and incorporating new members are no longer called the "formation-vocation" team. They are now referred to as the "membership team." Some of these new membership teams are made up of non-vowed associates of the community~ as well as vowed members. The job description of these teams is unclear even though it includes the discernment of vocation and the incorporation of new mem-bers because vocation and membership have taken on new meanings. Vo-cation is not necessary to the "vowed" life and membership does not necessitate professing the vows. The new terminology and the alteration in the constitution of the teams are profound symbols of a "changing order." These two realities--members continuing to remain attached to con-gregations even though they "leave" and the development of "mem-bership teams"--can allow for i~ew insight into how, with decreasing numbers,,religious orders will continue the legacy of their foun~lresses or founders, women and men whose gifts have been confirmed as a vivi-fying influence in the Church and the world.2 These gifts or charisms are the animating characteristics for the style of life, witness, and apostolic action within the congregations. Membership within a congregation has meant at its most basic level that a person'believes he or she is called to re-offer the charis~m of the founder to the contemporary world. This offering is buttressed by the belief that the gifts of the founder or foun-dress are not time-bound and will continueto contribute to a further ap-proximation of the reign of God in history. Thus the Sisters of Merc~y (the "order" to which I belong) present the foundation for their exis-tence as the desire to continue the story of a nineteenth-century Irish woman, Catherine McAuley, in theChurch and in the world. This par-ticular goal is expressed by tfieir fourtti vow of gervice and through the wording of their present Constituiions which point to the ideals of their congregation as well as the way they presently understand their congre-gation and words the way they presently understand th6ir mission as a community within the Church. By the vow of service we commit ourselves to exercise the spiritual and corporal works of mercy revealed to us through~ t~,h.e life of Jesus. En-riched by his love, healed by his mercy and0taught by his word we serve the poor, sick, and ignorant. To celebrate our corporate word in a discordant society requires the courage of a deep'faith and interior joy. We believe that God is faithful and that our struggle to follow Christ will extend God's reign of love over human hearts. We rejoice in the continued invitation to seek jus- The Shifting Order of Religious Life tice, to be compassionate, and to reflect mercy to the world.3 The thesis of this article is simply that the clues for how to continue the legacy of a particular founder or foundress will be found by looking intently at how the tradition of the founder or foundress continues to be lived, seeking to confirm all those ~'ho focus their discipleship of Christ through the prism of his or her life and legacy. In order to amplify this thesis, I will discuss eight understandings that result from an attempt to "look intently," and then present several ideas intended to help the "re-ordering" of religious communities. But, first, one caveat is necessary. No matter how blind men and women religious feel as they grope toward an understanding of their .lives, they must trust that they faithfully embody the tradition of the par-ticular foundress.or founder. When I was in formation work in the 1970s, I was fond of telling the newer .members that the Sisters of Mercy were made up of the names in the current directory and the names on the tomb-stones in our cemeteries. This was the most concrete way of describing what they were getting into~companionship with persons who were char-acterized by a variety of shapes, sizes, quirks, personalities, sickness, gifts, skills, weaknesses, ideas, and so forth--but with one thing in com-mon: they all believed they were called to focus their discipleship through the story of Catherine McAuley. It seemed essential that each member act toward the other with the belief that each sister was a part of this tradition and that all were searching for what was necessitated by the call to appropriately renew the story (or tradition) in the light of the sources of Christian life, the original inspiration behind the community and the changed condition of the times.'* At that time I was pointing the novices toward the vowed members of the group, the Sisters. Now the names in our directory include asso-ciate, that is non-vowed, members who have made a contract with us in which we promise our support for their attempts to live the tradition of Catherine McAuley and they promise specific ways in which they will contribute to the offering of Catherine's gifts to the Body of Christ. There-fore, wl~ether we be Sister JaneSmith, R.S.M. or Jane Smith, Associ-ate of the Sisters of Mercy, we must believe in and support one another as we seek to embody the tradition of our foundress. Each of us brings only a part of the story, thus each person who focuses his or her disci-pleship through the same tradition helps focus the present and the future "order" of one's specific congregation. Part I The following are my understandings of religious life today: I ) Men and women in religious orders are disciples of Jesus. We be- 511~ / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 long to a pilgrim people searching for the reign of God. We are blinded by sin and limitation as we seek to discover the ways of our God as re-vealed through Jesus. We learn how to follow Jesus in our times and in our circumstances. The primary mode of ou'r learning is experiential. It is complex and it calls us to struggle with our daily realities to see anew w,hat patterns in 6ur lives need conversion. The greatest threat to our dis-cipleship is to think that we have learned enough or to reduce the reign of God to the glimpses of glory which we see in our own time. Liberation theology is probably the clearest indication to today's Church that it is still on pilgrimage. Begun with Moses' vision of a God who had heard the crying out of the Israelite slaves, reiterated in Han-nah's canticle that praises God as one who will raise up the lowly, and reborn in the 1970s through the efforts of those struggling to see God and understand God's ways from the experience of twentieth-century op-pression, this theology reminds us as a Church that we are still learning not only how, but where to find Jesus.5 2) Members of religious orders are those who are disciples of a par-ticular charismatic leader recognized by our Church. Recognizing that our stories do not belong to the time and culture of the founder or foun-dress, the charisms of these characters and their companions are a way of expressing discipleship in Christ. To be members ofa religious con-gregation~ is to take one way of interpreting discipleship of Jesus, namely the life of a founder or foundress, as a way to focus discipleship. Again, congregational members are disciples of this way of focusing, that is, there is no profession, ministry, office, or role, no direct service or in-stitutionalized ,ministry, that exempts members frorri continually learn-ing what it means to pattern their lives or focus their discipleship of Je-sus through the prism of this great man or woman. All of our lives are mystery, not in the sense that they defy explana-tion, but in Gabriel Marcel's sense that the more we are involved in them, the more inseparable we become from their depth.6 Our Church has confirmed the legacy of some men and women as mysterious, that is, there is within these persons a depth of discipleship that calls and be-comes involving for others. Nano Nagle, Francis of Assisi, Ignatius of Loyola, Elizabeth Seton, Angela Merici, and Catherine McAuley are some of these people. Their gift to the Church is mysterious to us, and that is why they can properly have disciples. The more their lives, their stories are considered, the more insight we gain into what it might mean to be a disciple of Christ in our time. Thus, many religious congregations acknowledged with Vatican II The Shifting Order of Religious Life that reflection on what it meant to follow Christ and to plead the radical nature of the Gospel through the focus on their particular founder or foun-dress meant that they must be learners of new ways. The call for renewal necessitated a refounding and a reordering of these congregations that con-tinues into the present.7 This challenge reminds many in a very profound way that they are indeed learners. 3) We are co-dikciples. There can be no doubt about this. Baptism incorporates us into a community of disciples. As members of religious communities, we are co-disciples, learners with the other clergy and la-ity. Appropriating Gospel values and finding patterns of life that typify holiness are calls received by all within the Christian community, whether they be married, single, or vowed. The sixth-century understand-ing of Pseudo-Dionysius who envisioned the grace of God as descend-ing through three hierarchical angelic choirs into two earthly hierarchies of clergy and laity respectively was normative until Lumen Gentium's statement that "in the Church, everyone . . . is called to holi-ness . ,,8 No longer do lay folk stand below those ~who profess the evangelical counsels nor do the latter stand below those who are ordained to the priesthood in the Church. Paul VI reiterated the Vatican Council's hierarchy-shattering words when he said that the whole Church received the mission of Jesus--"the community of believers, the community of hope lived and communicated, the community of love. ,,9 The consideration of volunteers, partners, and associates who claim the life and charism of a founder or foundress of a religious order in our Church as their way of focusing discipleship reminds us that we are co-disciples. These new relationships can intimidate as well as inspire and so we must continually remind ourselves of John Paul ll's challenge to the whole Church to embrace mercy. In Dives in Misericordia, he de-fined Christian mercy as "the most perfect incarnation of "equality" between people., love and mercy bring it about that people meet one another in that value which is the human person., thus mercy becomes an indispensable element for shaping mutual relationships between peo-ple, in a spirit of deepest respect for what is human . ,,~0 4) As members of apostolic congregations, ministry is our reason for existence. A common life and the vows have constituted the order of re-ligious life, but the purpose of this order for apostolic communities has always been service. Many founders and foundresses wrote words simi-lar to those of Catherine McAuley, the foundress of the Sisters of Mercy, when describing the qualifications for an aspirant to apostolic groups. Catherine stre'ssed "an ardent desire to be united to God and to serve 520 / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 the poor" and a "particular interest" in helping the sick and dying. ~ The rereading of the history of apostolic orders, which was occasioned by the cali of Vatican II to renew, led many congregational members to realize that "order" or common patterns in the style and structure of the lives of men and women who focused their discipleship through the charism of a particular founder, is negotiable, but the reason for the or-der is not. This should help women and men religious to open themselves and their ownership of the legacy of their founder or foundress to those who do not "order" their lives in the same way. If the purpose of the order is service,or ministry, then should those who do not profess the evangelical counsels be excluded? This can be a very challenging ques-tion, because throughout history the only way to claim concretely many of these charisms or legacies was to order one's life through the evan-gelical counsels of poverty, celibacy, and obedience. But, as Dorothy noted in the Wizard of Oz, "Toto, we're not in Kansas anymore." Men and wom'en who do not profess these vows are desiring both to minister after the fashion of these great men and women and to receive the sup-port of congregations dedicated to these legacies without maintaining a common living style or divesting themselves of marriage possibilities or ownership of property. 5) It is not order, but mission that describes our lives. John O'Mal-ley, S.J. claims that the history of apostolic religious orders might more properly belong to the history of ministry than to the history of institu-tionalized asceti~cism. ~2 Groups that banded together for the sake of serv-ice presented a whole new trajectory within our Church, as they were a break from the ascetical tradition. However, the Church in its concern to regulate these groups modeled their "order" on the flight of Anthony into the desert in 275 A.D. Many of the great women foundresses, in par-ticular, found their desire to gather others for the sake of service to a par-ticular need frustrated by an order of enclosure, profession of vows, and obedience to an ecclesiastical superior. ~3 For example, the Sisters of Mercy often reflect on the history of Cath-erine McAuley whose companionship with other women grew around their mutual attention to the poor in early nineteenth-century Dublin. In-dependently wealthy, she commissioned the building of a "House of Mercy'r in which women could gather to devote themselves to the relief of suffering and the instruction of the ignorant. She resisted and ex-pressed discomfort about the "order" of the lives of those in congrega-tions of nuns, to the point of abhorring the thought of spending time in the Presentation novitiate to learn the ways of an established canonical The Shifting Order of Religious Life / 591 institute into the Church. However she submitted to the "ordering" be-cause without it her mission would have failed. ~4 The time in which she lived demanded that women engaged in companionship for the salve of service be organized as vowed religious women. Among many active congregations of religious in the United States, especially congregati.ons of women, the question of whether or not to re5 main canonical has arisen. This question is motivated primarily by the difficulty involved in gaining the Congregation for Religious and Secu-lar Institute's (CRIS) approbation for Constitutions and the reordering of "religious" life so that it more properly aids in fulfilling the particular mission of the group. ~5 The question, however, is not whether religious congregations will choose to remain canonical, that is, of some standard within our Church; the question is how their "order" will be specified within the Church,-that is, how will they organize themselves as women arid men embodying the charisms of great founders or foundresses within the Church. Ignoring for a moment the enormous difficulties of dealing with a bureaucratic power structure that often seems less than open to anything irregular, let us look at the question before us. Can we, as disciples of the great founders and foundresses in our Church, make a distinction be-tween vocation to a particular lifestyle or life structure (that is, marriage vows/the choice of single life/vows of poverty, celibacy, obedience) and the vocation to a particular charism and mission within the Church (a deep identity with the spirit and gifts of a particular person who focuses our discipleship of Jesus)? I think that the movements of associate membership, volunteers, part-nership (all of which imply non-vowed varying degrees of membership in religious "orders"), mighi be a tremendously important break within the history of what have come to be called "active orders" in our Church, but these movements will further our ability as a Church to do ministry as baptized disciples of Jesus. 6) One of the most pressing questions for: religious congregations is what life structure or "order of life"facilitates discipleship of Jesus focused through the mission of their founder or foundress. The current documentation abou( the life structure of those called to follow a foun-der or foundress organizes it around the three vows of poverty, celibacy, and obedience. Both the Vatican II document on religious life and the 1983 Essentials of Religious Life promulgated by the Vatican Congrega-tion for Religious and for Secular Institutes present the evangelical coun-sels as not only "essential," but also as the basis for the organization 522/Review for Religious, July-August 1989 of life for those in religious congregations. However, both Sandra Sch-neiders and John Lozano, show effectively in their recent and widely read treatments of religious life that the vows cannot be taken as impor-tant in themselves. 16 The vows, if taken at all, need to be placed in the context'of a statement of desire to,pursue the mission of the community, how we promise to accept the responsibilities of this mission in our lives, and how others dedicated to this mission accept us within their group. Furthermore there is more and more recognition (fueled by the relatively new science of psychology) t.hat intimate, committed relationships to per-sons, ownership, and autonomy do not make one less holy. Along with this, New Testament scholars have shown that these counsels do not flow from the gospels as such, but were constructs of our Church at a later time. And, even without Vatican ll's assertion of.the universal call to holiness, experience tells most of those who are presently members of religious congregations that they are no more holy than thos6 who choose to marry and have children, own property, and center their autonomy dif-ferently. Indeed, if men and women are going to structure their lives by pro-fessing the evangelical coufisels, (thus sacrificing the gifts of sex, own-ership, and autonomy), then these must only be given up for the sake of mission. Johannes Metz is perhaps the most clear and the most chal-lenging on this point. In his Followers o.fChrist: Perspectives on Relig-ious Life, he argues that the vows are both mystical and political. Thus, poverty demands not only a protest against the tyranny of having, pos-sessing, and pure self-assertion; it also impels those practicing it into a practical and situational solidarity with those poor whose poverty is their condition of life and the situation exacted of them by society, rather than a matter of virtue. Celibacy, as a state of being radically seized by a long-ing for the reign of God, impels one toward those unmarried people whose not having anyone is not a virtue but their social destiny, and to-wards those who are shut up in lack of expectation and in resignation. And finally, obedience is the radical and uncalculated surrender to God and it impels one to situate oneself .among those for whom obedience is nota matter of virtue but the sign of oppression and placement in tute-lage.~ 7 It is only in this way that these counsels can ever be real signs of eschatological witness. Metz has called vowed communities "shock therapy instituted by the Holy Spirit for the Church as a whole.''~8 Us-ing Metz's ideas, if I read him right, many more of us might call our-selves "associate members" of religious congregations than already do out of integrity. There may be many who want to focus their discipleship The Shifting Order of Religious Life / 593 of Jesus through the legacy of a great founder or foundress, but their ac-commodations to the culture would indicate not that they are lesser dis-c! ples, but rather that the functions they perform and the gifts they bring to the reign of God are not th6se that necessitate or call them to the vowed life. That is, "association" may be more appropriate for those who draw support from the tradition or story of a great founder or foundress and find the mission of that congregation an animating principle for their dis-cipleship. Whereas formal vowed commitment to one another, relinquish-ing of goods and full authoring over one's choice of service might be re-served for those whose discipleship leads them to more radical under-takings. The question here concerns the life-structure (or "order") that has traditionally been associated with claiming followership of a specific mission in our Church. Are there ways to embody the tradition of minis-try defined, by a great founder or foundress in our Church as one group in which some are vowed to poverty, celibacy, and obedience and oth-ers are not? Those who are vowed in the traditional way choose a life-structure which more clearly binds them to the ~reedom to move around and respond to unmet needs among the poor, alone, and oppressed. 19 Those who do not profess the vows but do center their discipleship on the founding charism might be called to a,life-structure which points to-ward a certain stability within a local Church community. One could as-sert that there must be ways to accommodate this diversity because even using the traditional ordering of religious life, which included the vows of poverty, celibacy, and obedience as part of the package, I would sub-mit that there are some within religious congregations who have the free-dom to live the vows as Metz proscribes and others whose lives point toward and demand a different modi~ of discipleship. That is, the vows may not be absolutely constitutive of focusing one's discipleship through the charism of a great founder or foundress.2° 7) There is a need for enabling ministers who are not constrained by local church boundaries. According to O'Malley, one of the most re-markable characteristics of the development of active orders is that it in effect created a "church order (or several church orders) within the great church order and itdid this for the reality to which ~:hurch order primar-ily looks--ministry."z~ That is, pontifically erected religious orders en-joy a warrant and exemption from the bishop of Rome to act publicly on behalf of the Christian community wherever the needs to which their charism responds arise. This has, throughout history, caused some ju-ridical as well as cultural complications. However, despite difficulties, 524 / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 needs have been' attended to that would never have been served if it was necessary to rely only on the personnel within local boundaries. As the order of religious life shifts, this is a very important compo-nent of our history that should not be lost. This "pontifical warrant" for the sake of ministry has allowed for tremendous creativity in meet-ing the needs of the people of God. Glimpses of the reign of God are seen in the histqry Of religious orders who have brought literacy, heal-ing, and economic stability to the uneducated, sick, ahd poor around the world. 8) Finally, men and women in religious orders need to realize the gifts they can sh~are with the Church. The emergence of the laity is very new to our Church, and the long history that religious orders have of do-in~ ministry leaves many' within them unskilled at enabling and serving with others. But vowed men and women need to recognize that one of the gifts they may have is 6ffering those who have taken to heart the mes-sagegf the gospel and the spirit of Vatican II both some encouragement and some means for realizing their call. Many who~desire a more intense following of Christ may find that the sp, iritual, intellectual, and apostolic life in their parishes does not encourage these needs and aspirations. Thus, they only feel frustration in their call to maturity and co-responsibility in the Church. Religious orders ha~,e a wealth of experi-ence in thinking through methods for spiritual development and encour-aging other adults in gro~vth. Many find in religious life rich resources of the heritage of the Church not avail~.ble in local parishes. They find a focus and discipline for spiritual growth, a unifiedvision of the pur-pose of discipleship, .and a structured identity with a family in a living tradition of the Church. The challenge is to share these gifts, without thinking people have to become "mini-religious'"l~o acquire them. An extension of our charisms beyond those in the vowed ranks might mean that many more can become effective ministers in the parish and the Church at large. Part II We should not be surprised that a "new ordering" is difficult for us to think about and may even create controversy, dissention, and fear when we attempt to talk about it with one another. Anything new always brings a death to something within the present. Many of us love our way of ordering our .lives. We have lived the vows and known ourselves and our companions to grow through the experiences they have presented to us. We want to share our-lives, extend them, and see the "ordering" that has facilitated our growth be embraced by others. Yet this "order" The Shifting Order of Religious Life / 525 may have to die so that discipleship focused on the great charismatic lead-ers in our Church might continue. We are challenged to refound our con-gregations. This challenge implies the freedom to consider reordering our lives for the sake of mission. From the above understanding flow the following ideas that may help religious congregations to reorder their membership and to reorder the perception of religious life in the Church. I) We, as those who vowed ourselves to the legacy of great founders and foundresses within the order specified by the Church, must continue to think about what that means. Imitating her tongue-in-cheek, I quote the twentieth-century Jewish philosopher, Hannah Arendt, "what I pro-pose, therefore, is very simple: it is nothing more than to think what we are doing." The thinking, although allegedly simple, is.indeed quite com-plex and we of.ten try to escape it, precisely because we did it once be-fore during the 60s and the 70s. Even though new life was born in our midst, many of us remember the struggle and some among us have not quite recovered. Thifiking usually means that we risk conversation of sub-stance. And conversation of substance usually implies the same kind of controversy as that depicted in the Gospel account of Jesus asking Peter a question of substance. "Who do people say .that I am?" is the query of the man who had just multiplied loaves and then cured a blind one. Peter knew who Jesus was. "You are the Christ." But Peter did not like the implications of the insight. "Get behind me, Satan" is the rebuke heard when Peter tried to squirm out of the new order specified not only for Jesus but also for his own discipleship. Insights gleaned from thinking and from conversation of substance can be threatening. But we must remember that even more threatening is the possibility that some valuable offerings to the further approxima-tion of the reign of God will be lost if we are unwilling to gain and ex-press the insights of our experiences. If our experience is that the vows do not make meaning in our lives, but the charism of our founder does, then perhaps we must search for other ways to order our lives so as to offer more fully the charism of our. community to the Church. And, if our experience is that others who are not vowed can claim the legacy of our founders, (and more importantly if their experience confirms this), then they must be allowed to do so in an equal fashion. 2) We must effect reconciliation and a spirit of interdependence within our Church, especially with persons and groups claiming the same charism. As stated earlier, a tradition specifying that God's grace flowed toward the non-vowed and non-ordained last was reinforced in 596 / Review foUr Religious, July-August 1989 popular piety until the Second Vatican Council. This distanced many re-ligious from other laity and created a perception ihat vows or ordination meant that one was more graced and clos+r to God'. Men and women in religious; congregations must actively pursue reconciliation with other la-ity because, intentionally or non-intentionally, some disunity has been effected within .our Church. We can take a cue from Paul, ambassador of reconciliation, who was .furious with his community at Galatia when they entertained the idea ofclassifying and categorizing the early Chris-tians. In Christ, there is neithe~ Jew nor Greek, slave nor free person, male nor female, women religious nor lay women, Dominican from Mercy, associate member from more traditionally ordered mem-bers . Often former members of religious orders continue to claim the charism of the order as a way of focusing their discipleship. We must reach out to these people and ask them if,. even though they found the "order" of our lives restrictive, they still find themselves drawn to the charism asa focus. We need to confirm the existence and continuance of the charism in these people, and perhaps just as importantly, let them confirm the continuance of the charism in us. A more concrete way of symbolizing our reconciliation and interdependence on one another is a very simple, yet awkward thing. We need to re-form our vocabulary so that "sisters" and "brothers" does not refer to a closed group of vowed women or men. Just as many have committed themselves to the use of gender inclusive language, we need to change the language specific to our communities, so that "sisters and brothers" becomes a way to refer to all, vowed and non-vowed, who find themselves bound to the same charism. 3) Within our working places, we must announce what inspires us. We must claim our founder or foundress as inspirations, as stories that aid our belief in and discipleship of the Christ. Many people look for a way to focus and sustain their belief, and there appear to be few heroes of a depth able to sustain followers in our contemporary life. Since many of us have been inspired by and nurtured in the founding spirit of a great man or woman disciple of Christ, we must share the gift. We must let others know what moves us, inspires us, and keeps us going as disciples in a world where the odds against the fullness of God's reign dawning seem to be mounting. Perhaps we need ways to be again inspired and again encouraged in our own focus before we will feel enthusiastic enough to inspire others. In many cases, our associates are formally rethinking and reaffirming The Shifting Order of Religious Life / 527 their commitments each year. They renew their covenant with the leg-acy of the community, and they reconsider and recommit themselves to their association with others who share the same focus. Might we not learn from them something about animating our own commitments by using this model? Let us not merely resurrect the passivity of receiving an appointment card with our job and the provincial's name on it, even though there was important symbolism there. Let us every year rework and represent our covenant with the legacy of our founder or foundress. Let us reconsider and recommit ourselves to the implications of disci-pleship and association with others who share the same mission. These understandings and recommendation are initial forays into a very difficult, yet timely, topic. They are intended to spark further thought and discussion. Although I doubt there is danger of them being considered a "last word," let me close with a few lines from T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets. They reflect, 1 think, what it means to see trees walking, to be fuzzy in our sight, and what it means to face this period of time as religious men and women in our Church. These are only hints and guesses Hints, followed by guesses, and the rest Is prayer, observance, discipline, thought, and action. The hint half guessed, the gift half understood is Incarnation. Here the impossible union of spheres of existence is actual, Here the past and future Are conquered, and reconciled . -~-~ NOTES ~ An associate member is defined for the purposes of this article as one who wants to share in the life and apostolate of a religious institute and to become a member to a certain extent. "They are members associated and not incorporated by profes-sion. For a discussion of the variety of such groups and their notation in the new code of Canon Law, see Elio Gambari, Religious Life According to Vatican II and the New Code of Canon Law, (Boston: Daughters of St. Paul, 1986), pp. 625-635. Also, David F. O'Connor, "Lay Associate Programs: Some Canonical and Practi-cal Considerations," REview For~ REt.~;~ous 44, 2(March-April, 1985), pp. 256-267. 2 How to continue the legacy of the founder or foundress or how to continue the mis-sion of the congregation is understood to be the underlying concern of those who e.xpress dismay of the declining numbers in religious congregations. 3 Sisters of Mercy of the Union, Constitutions (Silver Spring, Maryland, 1986), nos. 29-30. Most active congregations use wording similar to this to describe their mis-sion. 521~ / Review for Religious, July-August 1989 4 This describes the call to religious men and women from the Second Vatican Coun-cil, See Perfectae Caritatis, the "Decree on the Appropriate Renewal of the Relig-ious Life," no. 2 in Walter Abbott (ed.), The Documents~ of Vatican !I (The Amer-ica Press, 1966)." " 5 For a concise description of liberation theology by two of its most challenging pro-ponents, see Leonardo and Clodovis Boff, Introducing Liberation Theology (Ma-ryknoll: Orbis Press, 1987). 6 See his Being and Having, (New York: Harper Torchbook edition, 1965), p. I 17, 145. 7 For some initial strategies presented to and used widely in the early 1980s by men and wom,en religious struggling with the call to '~refound," see Lawrence Cada et al, Shaping the Coming Age of Religious Life, (New York: Seabury Press, 1979). s "The Dogmatic Constitution on the Church," in Abbott, no. 39. 9 Evangelii Nuntiandi, "On Evangelization in the Modern World (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Catholic Conference, 1976). no. 15. ~0 "Rich in Mercy," (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Catholic Conference,. 1981), no. 14. ~ 1836 letter to a parish priest in Nass, Ireland, Quoted in Kathleen O'Brien's Jour-neys: A Preamalgamation History of the Sisters of Mercy, Omaha, Province (Omaha, Nebraska: Sisters of Mercy,1987), 6. ~20'Malley conceives of "active orders" as a '~critically important phenomenon in the history of ministry claiming "apostolic" inspiration," rather than as the insti-tutional embodiment of an ascetical tradition traced back to Pachomius. See -Priest-hood, Ministry, and Religious Life: Some Historical and Historiographical Consid-erations," in Theological Studies, 49 (1988), p. 227. ~3 The sweeping 1298 decree of Boniface VIII (repeated by Pius V in 1566) com-manded that "all nuns, collectively and individually, present and to come, of what-soever order of religion, in whatever part of the world they may be, shall henceforth remain in their monasteries in perpetual enclosure." Insight into the unfortunate ef-fect of this decree throughout the centuries following on women's attempts to or-gaoize associations for ministry can be gleaned from reading histories of women foun-dresses, such as Angela Merici, Nano Nagle, Mary Ward, and Louise de Marillac. ~'~ For more information about Catherine McAuley, see Sr. M. lgnatia Neumann, R.S.M., ed., Letters of Catherine McAuley (Baltimore: Helicon Press Inc., 1969) and M. Joanna Regan, R.S.M., Tender Courage: A Reflection on the Life and Spirit of Catherine M~Auley, First Sister of Mert3, (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1988). ~5 Note the history of the Glenmary Sisters of Cincinnati or the Los Angeles I.H.M.'s in addition to the more recent stories of Agnes Mary Monsour, Arlene Violet, and Elizabeth Morancy, all Sisters of Mercy unable to continue their ministries as vowed women ifi religious congregations. Consider also the present renewal attempts of the Association of Contemplative Sisters. For brief surveys of these cases, see "Inside- Outsiders" chapter three of Mary Jo Weaver's New Catholic Women: A Contempo-rary Challenge to Traditional Religious Authority (New York: Harper and Row, 1988) . ~6 See Sandra M. Schneiders, New Wineskins: Re-imaging Religious Lift, Today (New York: Paulist, 1986) and John M. Lozano, Discipleship: Towards An Understand-ing of Religious Life (Chicago: Claret Center tk)r Spiritual Resources, 1980). Also see O'Malley, "Priesthood," p. 249 tbr the same point from a different perspec- The Shifting Order of Religious Life / 599 tive. ~7 J.B. Metz, Followers of Christ: Perspectives on the Religious Life (New York: Paulist Press, 1978), chapter 3. ~8 lbid, p. 12. 19 Being "bound to freedom" appears at first sight to be an oxymoron, however the phrase is an attempt to reflect the demands made by the vows. ~0 Of interest in this regard is that even though various documentation from our church and the recent writings on religious life avert to the vows as important, if not essential, the Fifth Interamerican Conference on Religious Life, inclusive of leader-ship from men and women religious of North and South America, did not name the vows as essential. In a preparatory paper, the Leadership Conference of Women Re-ligious named mission, community, freedom, ministry, participative government, pub-lic witness, apostolic spirituality, spirituality of the founder, and ecclesial character as characteristics of religious life. None of the descriptions of the above included the vows. See The Role of Apostolic Religious Life in the Context of the Contempo-rary Chu'rch and World: Fifth Interamerican Conference on Religious Life (Ottawa: Canadian Religious Conference, 1986). 2~ O'Malley, p. 236. 22 T.S. Eliot, The Four Quartets (London: Faber and Faber, 1960), lines 212-219. Monasticism: A Place of Deeper Unity M. Basil Pennington, O.C.S.O. Father Basil Pennington, O.C.S.O., well-known for his many publications on prayer and the contemplative life, may be addressed at Assumption Abbey; Route 5; Ava, Missouri 65608. In 1976 for six months I had the privilege of living among the Orthodox monks on Mount Athos, the semi-autonomous monastic republic in north-ern Greece. There the Gospels are the law of the land and day-to-day liv-ing is governed by the writings of the great spiritual fathers of the past, most notably those of Saint Basil, Archbishop of Caesarea, named the Great. I noted the remarkable affinity between the life lived on the Moun-tain and that lived by the monks of Saint Joseph's Abbey in the United States, from whence I came. The one great difference that struck me was the way lay visitors were incorporated into the life and worship of the monks. It was evident that there was no gulf between the life and wor-ship of the monks and that of the ordinary devout member of the Ortho-dox church. Orthodox monasticism is at the heart of the Church and all the rest of Church life is deeply influenced by it. In Western Christianity, monasticism is further removed from the life of the ordinary church member. Yet the historical influence of the monas-tics can not be denied, even among those Christian Churches which have largely disowned monasticism. Catholics generally revere monasticism, especially the more contemplative variety, and hold it in reverence as something vital to the life of the Church. The Second Vatican Council affirmed this strongly. Quite generally Catholics frequent monastic guest houses and retreats and find there something that speaks deeply to them. Protestant Christians from such contacts are beginning to reclaim this part of the common Christian heritage. The Anglican or Episcopal church 530 Monasticism and Unity/531 has been in the forefront in this. But the most notable Protestant monas-tery is one within the reform tradition--the monastery of Taize which is found in a part of France filled with monastic resonances: Citeaux, Cluny, Molesme. Most re~:ently the General Conference of the United Methodist Church has authorized the exploration of the possibility of es-tablishing an ecumenical monastic community in the United States. ,Monasticism is, then, a widespread phenomenon within the Chris-tian community and is becoming ever more present. It would be difficult to exaggerate the role of monasticism within some of the other world religions. Tibet, before the recent Communist take over, could have been called, like Mount Athos, a monastic coun-try, more a theocracy than a republic. In many Buddhist countries it has been the expected thing that every male would spend sometime within a,.monastery as part of his preparation for life. Although secularization is having an increasing effect within the Buddhist world, the monastic influenc

Issue 44.1 of the Review for Religious, January/February 1985. ; REVIEW FOR R ELIGIOUS(ISSN 0034-639X), published every two months, is edited in collaboration with the faculty members of the Department of Theological Studies of St. Louis University. The editorial offices are located at Room 428:3601 Lindell Blvd., St. Louis,-MO 63108-3393. REVIEW FOR R ELIGIOOS is owned by the Missouri Province Educational Institute of the Society of Jesus, St. Louis, MO. © 1985 by REVIEW FOR R El.IGlOOS. Composed, printed and manufactured in U.S.A. Second class postage paid at St. Louis, MO. Single copies: $2.50. Subscription U.S.A. $10.00 a year: $19.00 for two years. Other countries: add $2.00 per year (postage). For subscdpllon orders or change of address, write REVIEW FOR RELIGIOOS: P.O. Box 6070; Duluth, MN 55806. Daniel F. X. Meenan, S.J. Dolores Greeley, R.S.M. Iris Ann Ledden, S.S.N.D. Richard A. Hill, S.J. Jean Read Editor Associate Editor Review Editor Contributing Editor Assistant Editor Jan. / Feb., 1985 Volume 44 Number 1 Manuscripts, books for review and correspondence with the editor should be sent to REVIEW FOR RELtGIOOS; Room 428; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. Correspondence about the department "Canonical Counsel" should be addressed to Richard A. Hill, S.J.; J.S.T.B.; 1735 LeRoy Ave.; Berkeley, CA 94709. Back issues and reprints should be ordered from REvlEw FOR RELIGIOUS; Room 428; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. "Out of print" issues and articles not published as reprints are available from University Microfilms International; 300 N. Zeeb Rd.; Ann Arbor, MI 48106. Review for Religious ~,'olume 44, i985 Editorial Offices 3601 Lindell Boulevard, Room 428 Saint Louis, Missouri 63108-3393 . Daniel F. X. Meenan, S.J. Dolores Greeley, R.S.M. Iris Ann Ledden, S.~.N.D. Richard A. Hill, S.J. Jean Read Editor Associate Editor Review Editor Contributing Editor Assistant Editor REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS is published in January, March, May, July, September, and November on the twentieth of the month. It is indexed in the Catholic Periodical and Literature Index and in Book Review Index. A microfilm edition of REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS isavailable from~University Microfilms International; Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106. Copyright © 1985 by REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS. A major portion of each issue of REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS is also regularly available on cassette recordings as a service for the visually impaired. Write to the Xavier Society for the Blind; 154 East 23rd Street; New York, NY 10010. Religious Life as Unchanging in a World of Change John E Whealon Archbishop Whealon of Hartford addressed the Fall Meeting of the Consortium Perfectae Caritatis in October, 19.84. He may be addressed at his office: Archdiocese of Hartford; 134 Farmingtoh ~v~nue; Hartford, CT 06105. he theme of your meeting, my dear sisters and brothers, is "Religious Life as Unchanging in a World of Change."Th~ medieval~scholastics taught us that distinctions are necessary for ~good thinking, for good logic. So I make a necessary distinction here between the essentials and the accidentals of the religious life. As a Father of the Second Vatican Council (andotherE are precious few of us left :as active bishops these days), I point,out with sortie authority that the council did call'upon religious to change--or at least to consider.changing --the accidentals ofiheir religious life. The operative text is Paragraph 2 of the council's decree Pe~fectae Caritatis, which lays in effect: "The: appropriate renewal of religious life involves two simultaneous processes: (1)'a continuous return to the sources of all Christian life and to the original inspiration behind a given community;, and (2) an adjustment of the community to the .changed conditions of the times." ~ " So the council expected every religious community to fix one eye on the Gospel and on its founder, and the other eye on the modern world, and to update those accidentals which no longer made sense in the modern world. I do think that all communities, nineteen years after that council decree, have done what they were asked to do. The real question is whether some communities have lost some of the essentials as well in their efforts to update. Returning, then, to that basic distinction, I am thinking now of religious life as "Unchanging in E~sentials in a World of Change." 3 4 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 I wish to do twothings this afternoon: first, to speak about these essentials; second, to read to you some quasi-private correspondence. What are the essentials for us in our living out of the Christian life? Forgive me, not a religious, for listing her~ some of the items that are essential in my life--I suspect, though, that they are quite essential in your lives as well. At the end of the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew gives us the Lord's teaching about the person whose house is built on rock. It is a useful metaphor to describe the person who has certain fundamental convictions which carry through the years. Let the tides and eddies and swirls and winds come, the rock-foundation of these convictions is there, unshaken, unmoved, unaffected by what goes on around. So you and I should be solidly based on the rock of our certain convictions, on the essentials of our lives, so that we are not really shaken by what other people say or do, by the spirit of the age, by the shallow currents of our shallow times. I will now list for you five unchanging elements in this world of change. They have carried me through some years which have been very difficult for any bishop. Perhaps the listing of them will find an echo in your own lives as well. The first essential is God. As the years go on, I "become even more convinced that the incredible design in nature, the intricate and intertwined design of the human body and psyche, and the very continuation in being of this world and of us humanbeings in this world and in.life must be explained by God. How a person can go through, life and not accept a Designer, God, who alone explains life, the world, and the universe, I fail to fathom. The second essential is JeJus Christ, the climax of Revelation. By Revelation I mean that truth from God which we know frrm Scripture and the Spirit-guided Tradition of the Church. From Revelation there are many things God had not ~old us and which we can only wonder about and theorize about in theology. We know so little about heaven and ~hell and purgatory, about what Jesus Christ knew,~ about what the Blessed Mother knew, about how she came to the end of her life, about the Apostles, But we know all that we"need to know to save our souls and to lead a good and fruitfully human life --and whatwe know is summed up in one word, because it is the Word-- Jesus, our Lord. Our life isto be the imitation of that Perfect.Life: Our life is to be our acceptance of the One who is the Way, the Truth, the Life. So, as St. Paul said, life is Christ and death is Christ. In thefirst reading, from Galatians, of today's Mass we have the same lesson: we are baptized into Christ, we live totally in Christ. St. Ignatius of Antioch over eighteen centuriesago described Christ as "our inseparable life." This is what it means to have Jesus as our Lord. For us the ~iimax of God's Revelation is Jesus Christ: in what Jesus was and is, and in, what Jesus has taught us and teaches us. So this is a.second solid essential on which to base a life: Jesus Christ, after God. The third essential for living is prayer, mainly personal prayer, but also Religiou~ Life as Unchanging public or liturgical prayer. One of the standard definitions for prayer is -conversation with God. In my life prayer has not been a. conversation at all with God. My prayer is a poor, one-sided effort to speak to the Almighty and to praise the Almighty. I trust and I believe that God is listening. Prayer is a necessary dimension of living,. I believe, so that a day spent without an attempt at mental prayer, a little move towards contemplation, minutes spent in praise and thanksgiving, would be a ,day somehow lost spiritually. I know that prayer does more good for me than I will ever know, and so prayer is the third foundation for living that I list. A fourth essential is community with others. I am not a religious, but I would have a' very difficult time living alone as an anchorite or a hermit. I need to be with others who think and pray and live as I do, and that is why I live with a community of priests. It seems to me that for much the same reasons the religious life is an element in the Catholic Church that will be present until the Lord comes again. So long as the faith is strong, some will want to live out their Christian lives in a community form of life. Some will be called by God to put themselves under vbw in order to live their lives in Christ more fully, in order to do more for Christ and for his Church. So in .a world of change--and I suspect that the prominence of the electronic, media in our society will make inevitable an atmosphere of continuous change in the: years ahead--religious life will be a constant, an ever-available way of life for those with a vocation. A fifth essential element for any Catholic is the Church itself--the Catholic Church possessed, of a teaching authority or rnagisterium that is a part of the Christ's Church. We are the Church, we People of God. But we are also a Church which has a teaching authority. The Lord Jesus gave a universal shepherd and other shepherds to guide his flock. The Lord Jesus, who taught with authority, told his apostles to use his authority and to teach and baptize all nation's, even to the ends of the earth. One of the dominant characteristics of the Catholic Church is its magisterii~m. We have in the Church an authority to tell us what is right and " wrong, what is true and false, what is to be done and what is not to be done. The test of theomagisterium, and of Our acceptance of it, occurs precisely when we are told to believe something or to do something that we personally would prefer not to believe or not to do. The "obedience of faith," then, calls for some humility. And in a proud and indulgent age, neither the concepts nor the words "obedience" and "magisterium~ are very popular. So, specifically by reason of the magisterium in the Church, the Catholic today should know and hold clearly that racial discrimination is wrong, abortion is wrong, contraception is.morally wrong, liberation theology is in some forms dangerous, and ~o forth. I do not see how a person can live the Catholic life fully without following the magisterium. In saying that, I fully realize that there are distinctions which have to be made about the voice 6 '/ Review for Religious, Jan.-~eb., 1985 expressing: magisterial teachings, the clarity and loudness (so to speak) of that voice;, the.topic taught, and so forth. But my point is that the gentiine ~Catholic is to follow the teaching of pope and bishop, and not turn Somersaults so as to avoid accepting magisterial teaching. It is in the context of this acceptance, of magisterial teaching that I see the various reactions (really only two) to the Holy'Father's letter of April 3; 1983, addressed to the diocesan bishops of the United States. The Holy Father asked the bishops to: give special pastoral.service to religious in their dioceses, with a view to express gratitude for all that religious mean for the Church and also to convey concern over the future of this charism in the Church because of the decline in vocations. The papal letter mad~ reference to the Ten Essential Elements .of Religious Life and to their further explanation in an accompanying document drawn up by the Sacred Congregation for .Religious and Secular Institutes. ,, There.,has been much voiced opposition by some U.S: religious to that document and to the Ten Essential Elements. 1 have heard presentations, that go. into a lengthy exegesis of the document, that anal~,ze the mind,set, the limited world-outlook and limited theology o~ its authors, that criticize the ten points for this or that reason. I can only say to such criticisms that it seems to me to,be improper to attempt to separate the document or the Ten Essential Elements from the Holy Father. In September of last year, in company with~a hundred U.S. bishops, I made the obligatory ad limina visit to Rome and presented a quinquennial report~ on the archdiocese. In talking to me, and to,each of the.other U.S. bishops, the Holy Father asked with concern and worry about.the religioias in our dioceses and about their reaction to :his letter. On the basis of my experience, then, it seems tome that the way to read and interpret this letter is to see that the Lord's Universal Shepherd is'worried about a most.important part of the universal flock, the ireligious in the U,S.A., and wants to tell them what religious life should be: in the past, and now, and in the future. A hypercritical or narrowly analytical reading of that letter will offer, I believe, a wrong interpretation and, in view of the magistegium, not a fully Catholic reaction to it. This question of magisterium is of critical importance today for Catholics seeking to understand more fully the dimensions of their faith. During the past twenty years the underlying question in many news stories relating to Catholics has really been about magisterium. And magisterium is the real question un~derlying the recent discussion regarding two Catholic legislators and their pro-choice stance concerning abortion. I conclude this presentation by summarizing the :several points which we need to hold to as basic for living, as Christians and Catholicsand religious, in an ever-changing world: '1) God; 2) Jesus Christ as Lord; 3) prayer,or our aRempts at prayer; 4) religious community; 5) the magisterium' of~the Catholic Church Religious Life as Unehanging / 7 Come what may in future years, may we hold to these essentials and find strength as. we base our lives, build our house, on them; My second purpose this afternoon is to read to you, for whatever wisdom it holds, my answer to the Holy Father's request for special pastoral service to the Leligious of the archdiocese. A copy of this letter has been. sent to Arch-bishop John Quinn for~reference to the Pontifical Commission which he heads and the committee which he appointed. ~ , My answer was dated August 14, 1984, and reads as ~follows: Most Holy Father: This letter is in response to the request of Your Holiness to the U.S.A. diocesan bishops, asking each to give special pastoral service to the religious in the dioceses. After receiving the letter of Your Holiness, I met with either the provincial or council or community of each of the ten communities of religious with provincial houses in the Archdiocese of Hartford. With each group I discussed the esteem of Your Holiness for these religious, your concern for their future, and religious vocations, and their experience of renewal after the Second Vatican Council as seen in the light of the ten "Essential Elements." ~ I learned that of the ten communities, seven [and here I list,,their names] see the ten essentials as expressing their religious life. Most of these have already had their constitutions approved. Of the ten communities three have experienced renewal in. a different way. In general they have experienced a reduction of centralized and local authority In favor of a more collegial approach, an openness to difference and individual apostolates, a willingness to permit smaller groups to live apart from the larger community, and.a replacement of religious garb with a simple secular dress. In these three.communities, however, a minority of the community has kept the religious garb and traditional customs. These are mainly older members of the community. From these interviews, and from meetings with religious outside the Archdiocese, I conclude: 1. We have today in the U.S.A. two sharply different approaches to religious life. The one approach follows the Ten Essentials. The other approach follows some of the Ten Essentials, but has adopted a noticeably more democratic approach to authority, work, living arrangements and religious garb. 2. These two approaches' are irreconcilable. There is a painful division between the two groups, and a more painful division within a community in which the leadership and most younger members have followed a progressive approach to renewal, while most of the older members have remained conservative.* 3. Some; not all, consei'vative communities are growing. The more progressive communities, our largest communities of women, are Review .for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 showing no growth. 4. Because of these two different approaches to religious life, there is widespread confusion about the identity of religious life. 5. The progressive group,, includes many of our best, brightest, most dedicated religious. Their lifestyle and works of religion are to the credit of their community and Chui'ch. And that they are not growing in numbers is cause for lamentation. 6. The progressive group is concerned that its approach to renewal will be judged as not valid, and they will lose their status as religious in the Church. One answer to this is that they have .already effectively ~ converted the community to the status of a secular institute. The picture is extraordinarily complex. My best thinking is that the Holy See could respond in two possible ways: 1. Following the Gamaliel~principle, do nothing. In fifteen years, a brief time in the life .of the Church, the picture will be much more clear. At the end of the century a decision can be made. 2. Designate the religious following the Ten Essentials, including individuals in progressive communities, as "religious. of strict ob-servance," and designate the others by a different terminology. The conservative in progressive communities should be given special consideration.~ ' ~ My conclusion is that there is in the long run little difference between these two approaches. But, for the purpose of identifying the religious in the. Church' and for encouraging religious vocations, the second approach is probably preferable. With respect and fraternal affection in the Lord. That is the end of my letter tothe Holy Father, and end of my presentation to you. And I am grateful~ for your attention. *In response'to a listener, Archbishop Whealon offered the following clarification: By the terms .progre~ssive and conservative 1 intend nothing other than the more or less conventional way used to describe different extremes in the body p~61itic. I am consciously irying pot to use loaded terms in any way, and so am open to any more successful way of expressing these differences. Future Directions in Ministry Barbara Kraemer, 0 S. E Sister Barbara Kraemer is Vice-President of the School Sisters of St. Francis. This article is based on a presen~tation delivered to the, Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the course of their.Assembly (August 6, 1984). Sister may be addressed at her generalate: 1501 S. Layton Blvd.; Milwaukee, Wl 53215-0006. Our future directions in" ministry are rooted in our history and in our current context. We are members of apostolic communities in the United States. Our spirituality is rooted in our western culture. The experience of growth and renewal these past years has been basically positive for Changes have not been made lightly, nor have they been made without mistakes and difficulties. Renewal is an ongoing process. My community was founded at a time when ~Catholic schools were being established to teach religion and to giv~ people the skills they needed in an irfimigra~society. Over the years, the needs have changed and also our responses ~m ministry. Todaywe must ask: "What is our unique contribution in education?" Today the descendants of~the German immigrants are members of the middle and upper classes. Do we continue to have a mission to them? What is its new focus? Do we have a mission to new immigrants from Southeast Asia, from Latin America and the Caribbean? There are several areas of blatant need in the U.S. today that help to direct out: efforts in ministry. They are the real needs of real people and they must be part of our consideration as we shape our present and future responses. First, Poverty. Not the t:oncept, but thepeople who are poor. How can we keep in touch with the devastating reality of the poor people around us?.How can we keep our hearts open to them? What can we do so that the distribution of wealth and opportunity will be more equal? "~ ,. Second, .Violence. There is a lack of respect for life in our country, and I'm not speaking only of abortion or capital punishment, but also about child and 9 10 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 spouse abuse, prison conditions, war-making. Are we aware of the violence within us? What steps can we take so that in the future our country and our people stand for a nonviolent world? Third, Inequality of Women. Women in our country receive contradictory messages. Are we convinced that further changes need to be made? What is my or your personal commitment to equality for women? Fourth, Economic Exploitation, There is the philosophy that says we should have more because it's available, that we should sacrifice nothing and enjoy our abundance. And there is the undeniable fact that someone can make a living by exploitation, later beginning a respectable enterprise, made more respectable by donations. People are happy to accept the money because they need it. Playboy Enterprises now has a charitable foundation. Do we scrutinize the source of donations we accept? The response we make to these and other needs is important not only in terms of the what but also the how. The value of our future contributions in ministry depends as much on how we live out our beliefs and values, as it does on the work itself. Therefore, I would like to emphasize three characteristics of ministry that are extremely important for the future: insertion into the lives of people; public witness; and effective use of resources. Insertion Insertion simply means that .we must be part of the people we :serve, part of the society we live in, identifying ourselves as much as possible with the people. Sometimes that seems easy, especially when we come from the same class and a similar background. It is harder when a person with ~a middle-class background goes to teach in a wealthy suburb or to work~at an inner-city shelter for the homeless. It takes careful looking and searching to see the people around us and to recognize what they have to contribute to our lives. Not many, if any, of us rea!ly know what it is to stand in a line at a government office waiting'for an unemployment check,.to personally face the question of abortion or divorce. But iLwe let people teach us, our ministry will not be superficial and it will not be judgmental. Recently,someone. questioned the priorities of a small group of our sisters living in a village in Guatemala. "They spend so much time buying food and " preparing the meal," she said. Their work is basically with the .women of that village and the surrounding area. What better way to understand the life of those women than to identify with how they spend their day! And whose time priorities do we use to measure the value of our presence with these people? Henri Nouwen has spoken about how difficult it is for us to receive from people; we 'always want to give. He pointed out: a servant doesnt decide how h~/she is going to serve. He/she comes to work for people and observes and graduall3i learns how to serve them.~ It.seems that this is something we learn slowly in life. New teachers believe that everything depends on them. They prepare and prepare, presenting a day's work in the first half hour of class and Future Directions in Ministry then wonder what they will do the rest of the day. With time they learn that they don't even know what to prepare or what to give until they learn from the students what they need. Teachers must receive from their students in order to be of service to them. There are some consequences to the approach to ministry: We can't as easily deceive ourselves, believing we are in control. Not to be in charge can be very frustrating! Neither should we be an elite group in the Church anymore, on a pedestal, separated from the rest of the faithful. There is no work religious do that laity cannot do. And maybe the laity can do some things better. We may learn that lay leadership can be far more effective than our own in a parish or a school. We may need to stay for years in an area before we are really accepted by the people. This is often true in places like Appalachia where people are suspicious 6f"here-today, ,gone-tomorrow" outsiders with projects. The people we work with who are poor, who have little, help us examine our own lifestyles. We see what we actually need and what we have accumulated because consu-merism has crept in. One sister, speaking about the poor she encounters in the cour~ system, said; "They keep me honest." In our society and in our wo~:ld, the values that are a.ccepted and carry weight are: competition, power, domination, control--what we would characterize as "masculine" values. What our world needs is an alternative vision: not domination, but in,terdependence; not control, but freedom; not individualism, but collaboration. Within the Church, as religious persons, we already bring many gifts. We have the potential to do more. Sometimes lay women see sisters as rivals .for positions or recognition, rather than seeing them as sisters working with them to make the Church receptive to the contribution of women. Collaboration requires us to leave our ghettos, wherever they are, however comfortable. We need to stretch ourselves, to be with those who are different from ourselves and who can complement the gifts we have to bring. For such collaboration, coalitions can be formed so the power of action for good can be strengthened, i have belonged to the Central America Solidarity Coalition in Milwaukee since I returned from Nicaragua in 1980. ~.There are Catholics, atheists, Lutherans, students, union workers, socialists, democrats, medical personnel and many others in that coalition. It takes us time to come to agreement on directioqs or actions. But there, is respect for the differences, which is cbnstantly an example to me. I ~m convinced that it is worth the effort to make the coalition work because we can reach out to more people. We are not only talking to ourselves, to those convinced of the need to stand with the peoples of Central America. We also talk to the Catholics who are indifferent, to the union workers who want to see the relation of Central America to their jobs, and to many others. Our mission as a coalition is served by our diversity, even though this same diversity can be an obstacle, because people tend to categorize others by their associations. That may be what we are afraid of in taking such a step. 12 / Review for Religious, Jan,-Feb., 1985 To summarize, insertion into people's lives calls for a ministry with them, a -ministry which is reciprocal. It calls us to collaboration with other religious, with laity, with people who have the same goals as we, no matter what their background. There is one other point to be considered, and it is a sensitive one. Why would a musician take a practical nursing course and work in a nursing home? Some would say she is wasting her talents. Why would a Ph.D. go to work in a refugee camp or in a Catholic Worker house when~ she could be teaching? Most often these changes occur because the ministers have inserted themselves into the lives "of the people around them, and are listening to the needs of these pepple. Most often these.people are poor. We continue to hear the phrase, "the preferential option for the poor," and it has a foreign ring to it. The expression comes from Latin America, not from the United States. What does it mean? This preferential option for the poor basically is not about the type of people w~e work with, or where, or what type of work we do. It has to do with our hearts and with the values that inform all we do. It has to do with our priority concern in ministry. The term "preferential option for the poor", does. come from Latin America. The Latin American Conference of Religious-(CLAR) has explained its meaning, declaring a priority for certain poor, those who have these three characteristics: (l). they have nothing, no opportu, nities, no resources (2) they can do nothing, i.e. they have no power, and (3) they struggle in faith and love for justice and for a better world.2 The Church in Latin America has made a preferential option to accompany this group of people. And these are the poor 'who evangelize, who convert us. The question is: can We p~rsonally, can our religiou~s-institutes, make such an option in ministry? Can we support those who make this option? Public ~Mi~ "nistry For'some missionaries the preferential option for the poor has led to their persecution, torture, even death, the same consequences that the poor face in their daily lives. By thifir choice these missionaries give public testimony to Gospel values and to their following of Christ. This'is a second characteristic of ministry, public witness. In the United States our bishops have exercised a public ministry through their positions on racism, the threat of nuclear war, abortion, capital punishment and Central America. They' have not been persecuted, but they have been criticized and wooed. They have generated opposition and reaction. J. Bryan Hehir in the commencement address at Catholic University this past year coffcisdy presented.the meaning of public witness for us in the U.S. Church: In the.end a public church is a community which stands for something--indeed, which Future Directions in Ministry v stands f9r many things. It is the product of people who shape their personal lives in such a way that they make a public d~ifference. In concrete terms, that is the challenge of a public church: to live with a vision which makes a difference for the world.3 In this country we have a unique opportunity to 19e a public church. We are guaranteed freedom of expression and freedom from religious persecution. But many times Catholics do not understand this role for themselves or for the Church. Our tradition of separation of Church and state, designed to guarantee freedom of religion and prevent the establishment of any one religion, has been interpreted to mean that religious concerns are private, and that the Church should stay out of public life. The spirit of the Second Vatican Council is just the opposite. Gaudium et Spes calls the Church tO be a permeating rather than a parallel presence in the world. The mandates of Vati.can II must be carried out in the market place, in political cgnventions, in schooi~, in nursing.homes, in international meetings. To move in this direction is a risk. Bishops, Church people, may lose support and privileges. Religious institutes might lose their tax-exempt status, especially if the message they.speak is a threat to the status quo. Yet how ¯ important it is to hear Church representatives and organizations say no, as Bishop Hunthausen and others .have, to weapons production; ~ say no, as Archbishop Weakland has, to the deportation., of Central American refugees. More and more the Church must be known for upholding the vision of a better world and thus announcing the Reign of God on earth. It is unfortunate that at times we hear more from .our bishops than from our parish priests. There is such a need to awaken a consciousness of injustice. Who is doing it? Are we? Just as we say an institution has a mission or a sponsored program has a mission, so the total religious community or institute has a mission and can make a corporate response to the needs of the world. The community can take a public stance on certain issues, not because they are fads or the latest cause, but because of the values that we believe in as religious persons, as Catholics, as Christians. Furthermore, the leaders of a religious community, by their writing and other.actions, can call attention to injustices and to needs in society and in the Church. For years, the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth, Kentucky, have been using a corporate reflection process in their community. They reflect in small groups and then in larger groups on a certain need or concern, for example, racism. Most of their sisters are located in the south. Publicly they are known as a community tha~ stands against racism. What are our communities known for publicly? How can the Gospel affect the world through our 9ommunities? Another dimension is the public witness of individual members of the community through writing, public appearances, participation in demon-strations, lobbying for reforms, holding prayer vigils, even civil disobedience. Our beliefs and values as a religious community, stated in our documents, are a guide to us as members examining the need for public witness. Increasingly, 14 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 this area of action l~as become more controversial within the Church. as we face the question of public office. It may not always be appropriate for individuals to speak publicly or take political stands. One of.our sisters in'Honduras, Maria Rose Leggol, directs a program for orphaned and abandoned children. The success of her efforts depends on support from all sectors of society and from the Government. Another ' sister in Central America works in a refugee camp. If she wants to continue to work there, she cannot criticize or even complain about anything that happens. This is especially difficult for her because of her background in union organizing in the south, but she makes this choice in order to continue her ministry. What is important is that some of us are present in the public arena--as legislative aides, as members of UN commissions, as writers for national publications and as artists who call to mind the beautiful in this world. Through some of our members we can be present where decisions are made, where values can be influenced. One caution in all of this: we must avoid dichotomies. Rather, we must see the connections. There is not only one way to look at anything. So, we are not all ptiblic figures or writers or artists. But some of us are. And weare all called to be leaders and prophets in our own ministry. The choice is not between direct service and structural change, between education and social justice, between the individual and the corporate. The choice is between cooperation and competition. The challenge is for us to see the connections among all of these types of ministries, and to be a public witness in the spirit of 1 Co 12:4-5: There is a variety of gifts but always the same spirit; there are all sorts of services to be done, but always to the same Lord . Effective Use of Resources As members of religious institutes Wer share in their personal, financial, institutional resources. We do have some money at our disposal and perhaps, as religious communities, more money than many individuals in our society, because the money is held in common. At the same time we also have needs within our-communities, including retirement needs. Therefore, there has to be a balance between the use of inonies to meet those community needs and to respond to ministry needs. A question to ask, as a community, is: What are the ministries that we believe in so much that we are willing to make sure that they continue? We can make sure that they continue in different 'ways. One is~by giving personnel, maybe even sacrificing someone we would like to see in internal community work so that ministry needs can be met. Another by allowing our members to work by contributing services, that is, working for a stipend or lower salary. A third is giving real money, on a one-time or an ongoing basis. Maybe those earning more can contribute or be assessed a certain amount annually to support those who do not earn enough. Future Directions in Ministry ] 15 An example of how to insure an ongoing program, in this case one that meets the immediate food needs of the poor, is the St. Benedict Meal Program in Milwaukee. This program has been organized citywide with many parishes and organizations providing the meal one day a month for the people who are poor and homeless. It is a program that does not drain resources, because different parishes and groups sponsor one day a month. They can afford to do that. It is a program that is systematized so that people are fed every day of the month. Therefore, it is a program that is ensured a long life and is a real service to people. St. Benedict the Mror Parish also had the idea for,the project now known as the Benedict Center for Justice, which helps women in jail through a program of v!siting, of education, and of job counseling. This program is dependent on outside financial resources to be able to continue. There are limits to financial commitments, and the parish may not be able to do much, but they have established a brainstorming group to consider the long-term. Over the years, our religious institutes have made some institutional, Commitments. We must evaluate these to determine whether they continue to respond to the fieeds of people, and whether we have the resources, personal and financial, to maintain them. Institutions can give a service that individuals cannot. Because of the size of an institution and its very existence, it has a certain amount of clout, or power. An institution can have an effect on a political issue, for example. We have been looking at this questirn in relationship to our health care institutions in the United States. We have one rehabilitation hospital, one nursing home, one psychiatric hospital and one general hospital. We have been asking whether we should maintain the one general hospital, and until now the answer has been "yes" because having a general hospital allows us to speak in a forum that would otherwise be closed to us. . An alternative tO owning and operating an institution is to sponsor an institution or a program. For example, our community sponsors the LaFarge Lifelong Learning Institute, a separately incorporated organization, serving the needs of over one-thousand elderly people each semester by providing classes, a place to visit, h.chapel, and a hot meal at noon. The community has no financial obligation to this institute, but some of our sisters, active and retired, work within it. Another example is a project our community sponsored some years ago in the Walker Point area of Milwaukee. It is still bearing fruit, even though the project as such has ceased to exist. A small group of sisters researched the needs of the Walker Point neighborhood community. Three of them began to live and work there. One worked with a handicraft cooperative, another helped to establish a neighborhood newspaper. They all served within a local parish. At the present time, only one of those sisters remains, but now there is a tri-college outreach project, with our college, Alverno, participating, to help women in that area of the city who have not had the opportunity to continue in school, to complete their basic education. So needs change, responses change. If there 16 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 is some ~commitment to an area, sponsorship ofa new program, even though that program h~is a time limit, m~y be one way to serve people, Many of us are familiar with discussions about the meaning of "corporate th.rust~ or ',corporate commitment." Institutions and sponsored programs and parish schools are clearly ',corpora, te" commitments. But there are other ways of serving ,that amplify :our undei'standing of the corporate dimension. For example, the Capuchin priests ~nd brothers have some intentional communities, In one the priests are in different w.brk but they are all committed t~ being part of the inner-city neighborhood the~ live in; and they share the same values and concerns about justice. Another w,ay of looking at the corporate dimension is to see it present in each member,of the community. One member may say about another, "Oh, she is just going off to do her own thing." What that person may not know is that this itnd~vldual may have internalized v~ery well the vision of her foundress and theigoals of her community. Se.eing a need, she might, respond as an individual but very much as part of the community Bishop Kenneth Untener of Saginaw, MI, said to the religious of his diocese that the measure of the val,ue of religious life is the impact of our lives upon others. He says, ~ ' Today your witness is more individuali Today we notice how each of you prays. Today we notice how each of you finds ways to :live out the vow of poverty. We notice how celibate commitment is expressed through your own person. We notice your attempts to be obedient to the Lord's call, to the work of your community, to the needs of the Church. Your respo~nse unfolds in ma~ny different ways . You are aware, I'm sure, that this p~laces different demands upon ~ou. It is One thing to be a member of a community whose Collective life makes an impact. It is quite another thing to make an impact through your own individual life. The Church needs both . 4 If this trend is true, and we know from our experience that it is, then it continues to be exceedingly important that each one of us develop ourselves, our own resources through study, reflection, education and through other ways :of ~keeping ourselves open, to learn more an~l to become more. Experiences of people very different from ourselves can be broadening if we are open to them. One of our sisters, participating in our mission exchange program, went to Peru to develop her Spanish and her understanding of Hispanic people. She works with learning-disabled children in Aurora, Illinois, many of whom.are Hispanic. This year she is back in Aurora, her h~art opened to the pastoral needs of the Churc~h in another part of the. world. We are all aging and though x~e might be happy with .the work we are doing, we have less choice about, what else we might do. The Sisters of Perpetual Adoration in LaCrosse .~ponsored a hostel last summer for their sisters age fifty'five ~nd older. It ~;as a program of theological reflection, in which participants looked at their own futures and possibilities for new directions in their lives, recognizingithat with aging come physical Limitations. The contribution of new members also needs to be drawn out and appreciated. When we think about~lspecific ~vorks, we need to recognize that new members are not necessarily in education or health-care fields in which Future Directions in Ministry many of us have worked. What do they bring? What kind of ministry directions do they point us toward? We had a meeting of all our formation directors from different countries during December, 1983. One of the points mentioned at that meeting was that the new members help to form the community. If we really believe that, we have to find ways of putting it into practice. Sometimes they are so new that they do not take much initiative, or they are drowned out by the initiative of other members. We need to look for ways to hear their voices so that they can really shape the community, which is theirs, in the future. Each one of us must: Consider the treasure that w~ arer the gifts and skills and abilities we possess. We must recognize our own freedom or lack of freedom to make changes, to start on a new path, to "let go." We must take into account our limitations, our personal needs. The deeper our awareness of our own selves, the more we can be in ministry. We, in the United States, in the Catholic Church, have a unique opportunity to be prophetic. We belong to a Roman-based Church that, at the present moment, emphasizes hierarc~iy at the exPense of the prophetic dimension, and the Church needs both. We know that at times our contribution is not recognized. Thdt does not mean that it is not valuable. The Church needs the dimension we bring just as the body needs both arms, each finger and toe. To be prophetic in ministry may mean nothing more (or less) than that each of us and all of us pursfiE our goal as members of our communities, which at root is the goal of the Church and' ultimately of the Gospel, to transform the earth and promote the Reign of God. ' We express our fidelity to that goal through our ongoing willingness to reexamine our ministry priorities. As :we crntinue that reexamination, we must keep before us the people we serve. We must ask ourselves about our awareness of reciprocity and our efforts to collaborate. About the quality and the fearlessness of our public witness; individually and corporately. About the creative and effective use of our many-faceted resources. Then we will be prophets in the Chui'ch of today ¯ and tomorrow, true in our following of Jesus and fa'ithful to the heritage of our communities. NOTES t Henri Nouwen, "The Spirituality of Struggle," a presentation at the annual meeting of the U.S. Catholic Mission Association, May 6, 1984. , 2Cited by Anthony Bellagamba, I.M.C., "The Preferential Option for the Poor," Alba House Cassettes, Canfield, Ohio 4440~6, to be released in Spring, 1985. 3j, Bryan Hehir, "A Public Church," Origins, May 31, 1984, p. 43. 4Kenneth Untener, "The Rich Abundance Within an Earthen Vessel," Origins, June 7, 1984, p. 61. Focused Freedom: To, Someone in Formation Desmond O'Donnell, O M.1. ; Father o'Donnell, is a General Councillo~r of his congregation, and may be addressed at the generalate:~ Oblati; C.P. 9061; 00i00R o m~a-Aureh"o; Italy. His last article in our pages, "The Problem Member in Community;~ appeared In the issue of March/April, 1981. Agood friend confides in you that he or she is considering adopting a way of life which will guarantee reasonable security but no significant material rewards, in which Considerable mobility of residence may be foreseen, in which work-preference will not always be,given, in which marriage and family life ar~ forgone and for which a seven or eight year training period, will be necessary. What would you sa); to your friend? What sort of questions do you think he or she should consider? Is there~ one big question which your friend should face deeply? Before you read further, in this letter, it could be useful to jot down the sort of questions you think you~r friend should think about before he or she gets into this unusual way of life. t No deep reflection is necessary to discover that your friend is thinking ~bout giving up a great deal nor to see that the demands of this way of life are unusual. Can you do it? Is it worthldo~ng? Has anyone the right to ask all this of you? Why are you doing it anyway? What do you hope to get out of it? These are some of the spontaneoqs questions which might come to mind in responding to you~ friend. It is clear that at base there is question not merely of material prosperity, marriage or m~obility but of your friend's very self, of his or her core freedom. Your friend h~s to face the issue of exercising or of losing his or ~her freedom in a very radical way. You are aware~that I am talkin~ about your own respofise to priesthood or to the vowed life. Looking at either from this human point of view that of using.or losing one's freedom---can~,be a good starting point. The questions are 18 Focused Freedom / "19 important for you at this time and they cannot be answered theoretically nor by another person for you. Your own very personal freedom is at stake, The exercise of freedom at any level is personally demanding but at the level of priesthood or the vowed life, one's entire personhood is involved. 31,000 priests asked to be dispensed from their way of life between 1963 and 1978; 60,000 sisters have changed their way of life during approximately the same period. Did these sincere people have freedom? Did they lose their freedom? Did they give it away? 'Did they have it taken from them? Or did they find it only in later life? What does the fact of their presumably painful experience of staying, then leaving and readjusting to a new way of life, say to people life yourself? The failure to deal with this sort of question could mean that you become an additional statistic. Keeping Your Options Open There is a very obvious, and attractive temptation today to avoid the risk and exercise of freedom at any depth. It is to avoid completely all deep and permanent choices like marriage, priesthood or the vowed life. It is to sidestep all unconditional decisions. Besides being aimless, this if-perhaps-maybe-for-a- while exercise of freedom is purposeless, as we are~ reminded by Dag HammarskjiSld -- "The man who is unwilling to accept the axiom that he who chooses one path is denied the others must try to persuade himself, I suppose, that the logical thing to do .is to remain at the cross roads."1 We can understand and admirea married couple very fruii-fully renewing their choice of each other, at regular intervals, but constantly revising or reassessing their choice would hardly make for a deepening relationship any more than regularly uprooting a flower and replanting it would help it~ growth. As Karl Rahner reminded us, freedom is not exercised in the constant revision of choice but in the, ability to make one choice and follow it. Experiencing Freedom . 4, To be free is to be untrapped, free from han/~-ups which could hinder a chosen directioning of one's life. It presumes the ability to shake off anything which might limit the power to say yes in the direction of a deeply-chosen goal. More positively it is the power to surrender one's whole self, to lose oneself even one's life--for a chosen cause: It is the ability to bring oneself together, to collect one's frequently scattered parts, to point them and trigger them all in one important direction. Freedom at its best enables the momentous launching of one's life in a morally irreversible .direction. "Man is free when he is able to make up his mind in conformity with the highest values and the ultimate aims" (John Paul II to the Faculty of Frib~urg University, June I3; 1984, quoted in L'Osservatore Romano 2/7./84 p.3). Maximilian Kolbe was most frbe when he walked out of his cell in 20 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 Auschwitz to take the place of another prisoner about' to be killed:" .Dag Hammarskj~ild tells us about his '.freest moment--"To be free, to be able to stand up and leave every, thing bfhind--without looking back. To say yes" (p,88). ~ Jesus .summa~:izes his life thusT--"I~ lay down my life., no one takes it from me. I lay it down freely" (Jn 10: 17, 18). While this deepest exercise of freedom can sometimes be socially supported and encouraged by less than totally selfless motives, it can come ultimately only from someone who i~ rich indeed--a real adult. No wonder (Jordon Allport reminded us that only adults can commit themselves and that commitment and adulthood arrive simultaneously. Appreciating Freedom It seems to me that one blessing of this age of totalitarian regimes and mind-manipulating techniques is ttlat it is leading to an increased appreciation of freedom. In the past the conscious awareness of freedom was lower because it was less necessary, or less encouraged but now there is a growing sense of human rights and freedom everywhere. Some would see a need to recall St. Paul's words today even in the Church: "Some who do not belong tO the brotherhood have furtively crept i,n to spy on the liberty we enjoy in Christ Jesus and to reduce us all to slavery again" (Ga 2.4): To which he opposes the fact that "When Christ freed us, lie meant us to remain~free" (Ga 5.1). Paul surely appreciated hisfreedom agai.hst those who would limit it even within the Church. ', It is only in freedom that we c.an become our best selves by transcending ourselves in an act of kenosis and thus reflect the justice-fidelity of God by the power of his Spirit---"Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom" (2 Co 3:17). When we use our freedom toldo what w6 know is right or what we know we are called by God to do, we arellike God whose dabar was his word-event, his word-acted-upon in freedom. Our freely acted-upon word no~t only expresses us but it makes us what we are,. as Karo.l Wojiyla, later Pope John Paul II, emphasized in his Acting Person. Thus it is that freedom involves your deepest you. Your free acts express you, and they also make you---especially those rare acts of dedication which influence your life'~ direction deeply. While you can be forcibly limited by others whenexpressing it externhlly, this core freedom can be touched only, and used only, by you. The full and, fruitful exercise of this freedom calls for an ever-deepening appreciation of it. Conscious Awareness Since thefinal choice of priesth~aod or/and of the vowed life is. going to be an expression of your deepest freedom, it is important that you get the feel of this freedom now. You cannot lose yourself unless you have found yourself. It will only be when you have exp'ressed and felt the satisfaction of lesser Focused Freedom / 21 :freedoms that you can gradually appreciate the deeper ones. and finally the deepest one of being "ready at any moment to gather all into one Simple sacrifice"2 as Hammarskji51d put it. -~, Have you recognized yet that every choice is a little death; that every choice makes you in a way that can never quite be unmade? Or have you ex;er thought and reflected upon how prominent people in the Chuich, in your own congregation or in history have exercised their freedom? Why not organize a seminar or write a paper on one of these people and then line it up with the oarticioants' own experience of freedom? And to flex your~own freedom muscles in the exercise of everyday actions such as eating, drinking, fasti~g, going to bed, getting up, keeping to study or prayer exercise/schedules can be a revealing and helpful exercise. This recognition of' the primacy of the practical--just doing it--will add authenticity to the reading and reflection you do on the subject. Your failures to be free can teach you as mu(has your hard won victories. From these you can discover and list--it is good to write them down--the areas of your freedoms and unfreedoms and what it is that contributes to'each. Your freedom to finally choose the vowed life or. to accept priesthood will be on sand or on solid ground depending on the type of soil you have prepared over these early years. The fact that. you fail or succeed in exercising your smaller freedoms could be less important than ~,our discovery of what motivated the success or failure. That iswhy the habit of monitoring your.freedom in a daily examen of consciousness is important. Heightened physical and mental aware-ness has great benefits for richer living: Try to grow in a similar awareness of your freedom by learning to look at it reflectively. Discerning Freedom , ~ To help you in monitoring your freedom-efforts as you grow into~your vocation, may I offer you a guideline or norm? As you find yourself growing in peacefulness, ease, harmony or even enjoyment of your way of life, you can know that you are moving into real freedom in your vocation, This, of course, allows for rough spots and moments of doubt but not for a constant series of such. You will grow into thefeeling that paradoxically you are beco .ming less free to choose outside that way of life as a happily married couple becomes less free to part, with the years. In a way, your growing vocational choice can be compared to an onion with its many layers~ If the core is sound, then each layer originatingfrom the core fits around it and strengthens' it~ As time passes, the healthy core becomes safer with its close-fitting layers protectingly around it~ And a time comes when the core cannot be touched unless the layers are gradually and destructively removed and the entire organism destroyed. That is why. it is difficult to lose a genuine vocation and impossible to lose it suddenly or without gradual and long infidelity. If a person's vocational choice has been sound in the beginning and 22 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 succeeding choices emerge from it and fit it, then what is called loss of vocation has tb be more a partial disintegration of the personality than a departure from something which was part of it. If, !on the other hand, the core has been poorly motivated, the later layers are more like wrapping paper which can easily be removed b~cause ~they do not really belong; they, were put on rather than having emerged from the core. Thee vocation was not lost; it was never there. So it is vital in these early years to beaware of your core freedom, to reflect on it and to relish it.~Each day of ygur life over these early years cannot be a review, a revision nor a momentary rejection of your basic choice just as the layers of a healthy onion cannot be !removed even for constant clinical analysis. On the contrary, each~act is a renev~ing and deepening of what you know was a healthy initial choice. It will help you perhaps in ~onltonng your grdwth into freedom to consider Ivan Illich's question about schooling--,'Is it a place where the child . is~,chasing knowledge or where knqwledge ~s chasing the child?" In these early years, do you increasingly get the feeling that this way of life is something you are pursuing more comfortably eac.h year or do you have the feeling that it .is something clumsily pursuing you and with which you are increasingly less than comfortable? Or to put it another Way, can you see and feel yourself enjoying this way of life freely in, say, tweniy years' time? Is this way of life becoming more "good news" to ~ou each year? If you answer these questio.ns in a clear no or with a hesitant yes, you have reasons to doubt the presence of freedom in your present way of life. . I ~ Spiritual directors now exercise their role less as directors than as someone who accompanies--a sort of spiri.tual friend. And who better to help you monitor your growth in freedom? ~With this friend, you can, as it were, take your freedom out to look at it in the only way possible--how you use it from day~to-day, In the presence of such~ friend, you can bring yourself to account gently and even ask him or her to do it for you. Formators, too, have an important role to play in our growth in the external use of freedom. You can 'r.easonably ask, then, that they fulfill their contractual role- that of leading you into a life'form which they themselves are already living. In recent years .,there may have been a sort of suicide of leadership in reaction to an earlier bver-authoritarian model. But laissez-faire leadership is not a Christian model and if your formators use this, they do you an injustice. If you feel theyare faili,hg you in this way, yo.u can reasonably ask them to encourage, challenge and confront you on your external behavior in such matters as presence at commgn prayer, availability to the community, academic results, interpersonal behavior and pastoral work. Both your spiritual guide and your formators are important, in helping you find your response-ability in freedom. ~ ~ Focusing Freedom ,~ .~ It seems very significant that s~]ch a diverse group as a Dutch spiritual Focused Freedom writer, a Jewish psychiatrist, a French philosopher and an American psychol-ogist stress that focusing is an indication of adulthood. Van Kaam says that permanent commitment is entrance intopotential maturity after the indecisiofi and dispersion of adolescence, while Viktor Frankl stresses that the human person actualizes him or herself only insofar as he or she becomes committed to life's meaning. Gabriel Marcel adds to this by reminding us -- "Man can know himself only if he is committed and only the man who knows himself is ready for ~ommitment." Gordon Allpo~t seems to summarize it by saying that it is only when youth begins to plan for life that the sense of self is complete. Like a river which gathers force when it is channeled, freedom is at its best when it is focused. A man is never so free in his relationship with women as when he deeply chooses and marries one. Freedrm is maximized when. it 'is purposefully pointed in one direction. Because all freedom is ultimately situated in a pla,ce, time'and activity, it must be focused to be full and fruitful. You are now looking seriously at one life-form on which you consider it worth centering your freedom. Your diocese with its people, its structures and its leaders or your congregation with its charism, community living and mission, offer you an opportunity to express yrur freedom in and through them. The question before you remains -- "Is this the structured life-form in which and through which I can freely b~come my best self?. Is this where I want to focus and express my deepest freedom unconditionally?" Hume said that reason must always serve passion and Lonergan described emotion as the mass and momentum of human existence. True, to follow feelings or to be driven by emotions is not necessarily to find one's vocaiion, but feelings and emotions experienced over a time can help us find our personal truth." Despite-the partly foreseen sacrifices entailed in your con-sidered way of life, do you feel that this is where you want to express~our personal gifts;' that the mission of this diocese or congregation is increasingly getting hold of you? Do you feel even somewhat driven as St. Paul expressed it in speaking of his own mission: "It is for'this that I struggle wearily on, helped only by his~' power driving me irresistibly" (Col 1:29) or lik~ Jeremiah: "You have seduced me, Lord, and I allowed myself to be seduced"or like Jesus when he said: "I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were blazing already" (Lk 12.49)? Do you feel a conviction that something important will remain undone if you do not do it because,no one else can make your unique and irreplaceable contribution?' While. this experience has come to some people in one momentarily very strong impulse, it comes~to most of us in a calmer and more prolonged way. But come it must and pres~ent it must be, if you are to launch your life freely into the life-form you are now consideiing. Freedom Through Community One good way to determine the quality of your choice now and throughout your life will be your attitude towards and your actions for or 24 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 against the community you join. ~her.e will ever be a healthy tension between your individuality and the community. Dialogue and discernment will have to ¯ be a permanent part of this interdction but from the point of view of the new member like yourself, he or she can reasonably ask: "Will this presbyterium or c~ngregation give me the experience of a community of believers so that the exercise of my freedom in faith arid love will be supported or am I just being invited into a busy bachelors' club or into a same-sex group of social workers where interaction is generally SUl~erficial and mostly for the sake of smooth interpersonal relationships?" On 'the other side of the dynamic, a modern Jewish scholar poses questions t6o: "The proper use of autonomy begins by repudiating the self as a monad! I am individual and unique but likewise inseparably part of all mankind. More, by my finitude I am necessarily more intimately linked to some of its vast number than to others. I am therefore morally obligated to live my life,in community with them and exercise my personal autonomy in terms of them . I understand that to mean that my community .may reasonably demand of me that 1 discipline my will so that the community can function and persevere . It can also legitimately expect me to sacrifice my conscience when its promptings conflict with central affirma-tions of my group . .Our com¯munities and traditions bear a wisdom far more profound and embracing an,d certainly more enduring than anything we could create on our own. In conflict with it we must often bow to what, against our private judgment but in due humi.lity, we accept as.its superior understanding.'3 I have consciously omitted mtich explicit reference to God in this letter so far. I thought it best to isolate the ~,experience of any focused freedom without naming the central motivation which would inspire it in our case, namely faith in God and in his Son, Jesus Christ. To return to your im~ aginary friend of the first paragraph, sure!y the deepestland most inclusive question for him or her will be: "Why are you doing this?'? Because priesthood and the vowed life are meaningless without faith and a real experience of God. the choice of these vocations without faith would beiself-destructive and ~]ltimately harmful for others also. It is not easy to define priesthood or.~ the vowed life with theological precision but one t6ing remains clear, namely that a deep experience of God must be the motivating force. Even positive motives such as preaching good news or changin~ political structures for the sake of God's poor, will not sustain these life-f0rms. While this faith-motivation does not usually come to us as it did to Paul en route to Damascus, it must be there just the same, despite the often-present doubts which are part of any adult faith. "Father, if it be possible." was i .fiamediately followed by nevertheless spoken in faith and freedom by Jesus. Freedom and Uncertainty The .quest for total certainty iis self-defeating whether it is about hang gliding or about God, whether it i~i abou.t someone we love or the significance Focused Freedom of our own lives. Caution cannot be a substitute for action; it can only accompany it. We must beware of theorizing too much about certainty and freedom in a veiled attempt to eliminate the risks of action. Lot's wife was almost persuaded to leave Sodom and Gomorrah; Agrippa was almost persuaded by Paul to become a Christian and the rich young man was almost persuaded to leave his wealth and follow ,lesus. Their search for certainty paralyzed them. Again, Dag HammarskjSld helps us: "Once I answered yes to Someone or Something. And from that hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that, therefore, my life in self-surrender, has a goal.TM He acted in freedom despite the uncertainty expressed in his "Someone" or "Something." It is surely important to be as free as possible before making important life decisions but this is not to say that we must await the chimera of perfect freedom. Carl .lung reminds us: "Life itself flows from springs both clear and muddy. Hence all excessive 'purity' lacks vitality. A constant striving for clarity and differen-tiation means a proportionate loss of vital energy, precisely because the muddy elements are excluded. Every renewal of life needs the muddy as well as the clear. ''~ Muddy freedom will become clearer #s it is exercised just as the str~earia gets clearer on its journey from its muddy source. Conclusion I find that Robert focused' freedom: Frost offers people like us an ideal, as we grow in But yield who will to their separation, My object in living is to unite my avocation and my vocation as my two eyes make one in sight. Only where love and need are one and work is play for mortal stakes, is the deed ever re.ally done for heaven and for future sakes. NOTES ~Dag Hammarskjtild. Markings Ed. W.H. Auden: Faber and Faber Ltd, London 1966. 2Dag Harfimarskji51d. op. cit., 1. 3Eugene Borowitz Theological Studies. March 1984, "The Autonomous Self and the Commanding Community." 4Dag Hammerskji51d. op. cit., 1. 5Carl .lung Psychological Types Bollington Series (Princetown), 1974, p.244. Trusting in the Providence of God Mary Ann Fatu~a, 0. P. Sister Mary Ann is well. known to our readers by reason of her earlier contributions, the most recent of which was "Catherine of Siena on the Communion of Friendship" (March/April, 1984). She may be addressed at her office as Chairperson of the Theology Department of Ohio Dominican College; 1216 Sunbury Roadi'Columbus~ OH 43219. "Cast all of your cares upon the Lord, for he cares for you" (1 P 5:7). A key figure in the political and dcclesial crises of her day, the fourteenth-century Dominican and doctor of the Church, Catherine of Siena, lived a' spirituality which embraced this radical trust in the providence of God. In her Dialogue she expressed with unique insight a central truth experienced by men and women of faith before and after her: far from providing an escape from the reality of human life, it is precisely such a trust which provides the focal point for a key human conversion. It is a conversion to placing one's trust not simply in one's own limited resources and efforts, "but" in the abundant and intimate providence of God. Paradoxically, it is also this conversion which founds a spirituality capable of nourishing an authentic personal autonomy and mature interdependence. Early in Catherine's life the Lord pledged that he would make her his concern if she would make him her concern. Experience of her helplessness in situations which her efforts proved powerless to change faced Catherine daily with the same choice 'which in some way confronts every human being: either to trust or to despair. "Which of you by being anxious can add a cubit to his or her life? If then you are not able to do even this, why are you anxious about the rest?. Yo~.ur Father knows your needs. Seek first his kingdom, and these things shall be yours as well" (Lk 12:25-26, 30-31). Toward the end of her life, Catherine reflected on the Lord's faithfulness to his promise made in her youth. The result is the section in her Dialogue which stands as a hy, mn of praise to the infinite mercy of a provident God. Her close friend and 26 Trusting in the Providence of God / 27 biographer, Raymond of Capua, wrote that this chapter was an explication of the very foundation of her spirituality, the experience of the frailty of what is Created, and the absolute power of the love of God. °The Choice~to Trust In life's most precious experiences there is perhaps the wordless recognition of,.the fruit of trust. It is the paradox of security in the presence of what we cannot ,unequivocally verify. Around us are alluring traces of the kind of trust which makes human life possible at all: in the vulnerability of a child asleep in a parent's a~:ms; in the secret shared between friends; in the vow that is said and then lived, to love faithfully until death. But life leaves also its scars. Those who know what it is not to trust or to be trusted, who know what it is to be betrayed, recognize also the fruit of distrust in the sense of worthlessness which eats away at their identity, in the anxiety and fear which rob them of peace. ~For each of us, in the face.of what life has held out to us, a deeper question and choice inevitably presents itself in the decisions of everyday. Has life ultimately been gracious to us, or has it cheated and betrayed us? To ask this is to ask the meaning of our life experiences taken as a whole, an6 holy vve will choose to live out the future in the light of that meaning. More than most, Catherine knew what it was to live through the bitterness of life. She knew what it was tO have those for whom she had poured out her life energy turn against her. And yet Catherine made her choice. In and through the weak and often twisted ways of the human heart, she found the reality deeper than all others and which she learhed to trust absolutely. For Catherine, the entire universe is ruled not by forces' which rob and deceive us, but by the provident mercy of God. She learned to trust that all of creation is made for humanity, and it is this fragile and precious work of his hands with whom God ~has fallen "insanely" in love. He has given everything with love and care: every facet of creating, every gift and faculty of our unique persons. In every event of history he has unfolded his mercy, until finally, he did not spare even his own Son. What he wantsqs only our good, and having provided for our every need in the past, he will continue to do so to the end.* Catherine realizes that it is only those who see with eyes of faith and hope, who make the radical choice to trust in God'sprovidence, who are able to receive its fullness. The God who infinitely respects the human persons he has authored will not force his love on .their freedom. His providence will never fail those who place their hope and trust!in him (280): But it.is a trust Which cannot exist side by side with a contrary hope. To trust in oneself is to trust in "what is not." To trust in God is to cling to the one alone "who is." The choice to trust is finally the choice to let go, to entrust oneself, to receive the gift Contained in *The Dialogue: 136; in Catherine of Siena: The Dialogue, translation and introduction by Suzanne Nofke, O.P. (New York: Paulist Press, 1980), pp. 180-181. Other references to this work will be cited in the text by page number. 211 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 every moment of life. Yet how can one receive with love and reverence the tragedies which life holds and which evoke in us only :anger and bitterness? Are not '~life's experiences of disappointment and pain empty of the providence of God? ~On the contrary," the Lord tells Catherine. "No matter where they turn those who trust in my providencewill find nothing but mydeep burning charity, and the greatest, gentle, true, perfect providence" (290). It is not that his providence causes tragedies. Rather, even in life's inevitable tragedies, his providence is great enough to bring life from what is material for death. Itis not that we are to deny or repress human feelings of anger in the face of pain. But working through anger and pain is meant to bear fruit finally in the peace and even joy " which recognize the gift of God given in every event. The Wealth ltidden Within Catherine's experience taught her that what human beings find particularly bitter is the discovery that all that is created will eventually~fail us. The temptation then is to cry out against the God whose providence has .abandoned and deprived us of what our plans had fashioned. We "lift up our heads against the goodness of God," writes Catherine, and draw death from what was intended to give life, because we "do not recognize the wealth hidden within" (219). How is the "wealth hidden within" every human experience to be discovered? One dimension of sin is the human resistance to change,-the unwillingness to grow. "How can you lift your head .against my goodness? Because you do not see that all things except my grace are changing and. because you . are constantly changing, I am constantly providing what you need at any given time" (282). The refusal to olet go of a present and yet outgrown security is so. strong a temptation in us that unless it.is removed from us, it can become an obstacle to the deeper security which alone founds human maturity and autonomy. God permits what is created to fail us so that, in the absence of previous supports, we may cling to the one alone "who is," and so be given the means for deeper growth. The "troublesome thorns" of life God permits not out of hatred but love for us (290). In this way we are forced to learn what we would rather not: that what is created can never be God for us. In the collapse of hope in what is created, we are given .the invitation to see and to turn to the one who will not fail us: "I wanted her to learn that although everyone else might fail her, 1 her Creator would never fail her. and that with or without the help of another person, in any situation or at any time whatever. I know how to and can and will satisfy her in wonderful ways" (296). Those who place their trust not in themselves but in God, eventually experience the fruit of this trust. God himself becomes their provider and gives them his "merry," the Holy Spirit, as their mother to nurse them at the breast of God's love (291). Gradually their fear and insecurity starve for want of food. Trusting in the Providence of God / 29 The Spirit, their mother, feeds them with the milk of gratitude and love. The ones so nourislied become with time strong and confident, able to see life with new eyes in a light given by the Spirit. Slowly they learn to hold "all things in reverence, the left hand as well as the right, trouble as well as consolation." Even in painful situations they learn to reverence the gift "hidden within" as the material for deeper growth. Thus, the Lord tells Catherine, in situations 0f great labor, he gives the gift of even greater strength (292). The "Holy Tricks" of Providence In order to make his people "drunk" with his providence, the Lord devises "holy tricks" perfectly suited to meet their needs at any particular moment. To those caught fast in sin he gives his providence by "plucking the rose" from their thorn. One kind of "thorn" is an enslaving sin; the rose, the lack of satisfaction he gives in the experience of that sin. "They set their affection on something,., but they find nothing there" (297). This gift of his providence is meant as an enticement away from the emptiness and pain of sin by means of the sweeter gift of peace and freedom (297): In other circumstances, the Lord employs still other "holy tricks" of his prowidence. He finds ways to humble the pride which bears fruit in judging others, gossiping, and using the tongue to complain and "spit out hurtful words." As healing, the Lord permits emptiness in a person's feelings, darkness in her mind, and temptations which besiege the senses. "Why do I keep her in such pain and distress? To show her my providence so she will trust not in herself but me." The person who is humbled through these struggles will learn the contrast between her own weakness and the provident love of God for her. In these struggles is contained her liberation, for the Lord himself eventually will free her in deeper ways than she could have imagined. Serenity and peace come unforeseen, not through her own effort alone, but through the Lord's "immeasurable charity, which wanted to provide for her in time of need when she could scarcely take any more" (301). The struggles which humble are in fact the gift of God: "The soul comes to perfection by fighting these battles, because there she experiences my divine providence, whereas before this she only believed in it" (302). For those formed in virtue, the Lord provides in still other ways by using a "pleasant trick to keep them humble.," Often, after they have borne the weight of burdens and sufferings with patience and gentleness, he allows them to feel passion or rage at a mere trifle: "In something that really is nothing, that they themselves will later laugh at, their feelings are so aroused that they are stupefied." At other times, his providence leaves his servants a "pricking" as he did with Paul: "I left him., the resistance of his flesh." Is the Lord able to remove the weakness of his servants? Certainly, he tells Catherine, but his providence leaves his loved ones "this or that sort of pricking" so that they will become humble and "compassionate instead of cruel to their neighbors." For those who suffer from their own weakness will have cause to be all the more 30 / Review for. Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 compassipnate toward the weakness of others (305). .- The Chain of Charity According to Catherine, the most tender means which the provident God has designed to care for us is one anothi~r. The God who in his being is trinitarian communion of love has fashioned us in his image. The inescapable truth etched into our own beings is that we are made by love, and we are made for love. We are, in fact, made to need and care for one another. "In this life I have bound you with the chain of charity. 1 in my providence did not give to any one person or to each individually the knowledge for doing everything necessary for human life. No, I gave something to one, something else to another, so that each one's need would be a reason to have recourse to the other" (31 l). Could he have given, everyone as an individual all that he or she needs? Yes, he tells Catherine, "But in my providence I wanted to make each of you dependent on the others,'so that you would be forced to exercise charity" (312). Thus, for example, the poor who place all their trust in him will experience for themselves his providence.Sometimes in their .need they are brought almost to the brink of despair, only so that they may see all the more clearly the miracle of the Eord~s care for them (314). Sometimes the provident God acts directly, as he did with Dominic, causing bread to appear for his brothers who had nothing to eat. Usually, however, he inspires his loved ones to pray for and to come to the assistance of the poor themselves. In many ways he touches his servants' hearts to provide' for those in need. Even those dedicated to solitude cannot escape the chain of charity with which the Lord has bound his people together. Thus, he inspires a hermit to leave his or her solitude in order to giqe help to another hermit (324). He "stretches out" his providence to his poor by inspiring his servants with compassion for the needs of their brothers arid sisters (315). "The whole life of my gentle poor is thus cared for by the concern I give the world's servants for them" (314). In still another way, the Lord cares for our deepest needs through one another. He tells Catherine that he uses a ~holy trick" of his providence to inspire people with a "special love" for another. It is this "special love" which eventually brings to light hidden insecurity, jealousy, possessiveness, manipula-tion, selfishness. The inner struggle uncovered through the pain of these relationships is meant to lead to humble self-knowledge and dependence bn his healing. As a person grows through these struggles into deeper personal autonomy and inner freedom, "a greater and more perfect love for others in general will follow, as well as for the special person my goodness has given her" (303). Thus, his providence has inextricably bound and woven itself into our care for one another. Our 'own~ persons are the lixJing sacrament of God's providence given to us in one another. As his friends grow more and more one with him in prayer, they become identified with him and live out the Trusting in the Providence of God / 31 experience ofPaul: "It is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me" (Gal 2:20). And as with Jesus, those whose love grows will know both deeper joy and deeper sorrow. The pain of the friends of God is not finally that of offenses done to them, but rather the grief they feel for sin against, the Lord and the destructiveness of sin for the sinner. Those who learn to love "know how ineffably I :love my creatures., and so they have fallen in love with my creatures' beauty for love of me." Through the chain of charity with which the Lord binds his people together, he provides in a marvelous way at one and the same time for both sinner and those his love inspires to intercede for them, The sinner's heart is touched through the prayer of his servants, and these latter are in turn all the more united to the Lord through their p~rayer~ Through their love and yearning for others' salvation, "they are another Christ crucified ,. they have taken his task on themselves" (306-307). Catherine compared God's people united in charity by his providence to an orchestra. The Lord is the "maestros" and each person is an indispensable instrument. Without each of the otl~ers, no instrument,alone is sufficient. The more sweetness with which each one plays his or her instrument the gift of each one's own unique life--the more those who hear are allured by this music to the Lord. "Consider the glorious virgin Ursula," writes Catherine of the legend of Ursula and her companions. "She played her instrument'so sweetly she caught eleven thousand from the virgihs alone." The entire orchestra together is meant to grow more lovely in its sound, swelling to make this music worthy to fill heaven and earth with the praise of God. For those who trust in him, everything which happens in their lives is a gift f~rom God as a way of refining their instruments and rendering the music they play more beautiful. It is his infinite providence which cares for each one and all together, teaching each one what and how to play (311). The chain ofcharit~ with ,which the provident God has bound us to one another will not be loosed even in death. The life of heaven will be a rejoicing not only in him but in one another, and this very joy.will be a continual praise of his providence~ "I have so brdered their charity that no one simply enjoys his or her reward in this blessed life that is my gift without its being shared by the others." The joy of all adds to the joy of each, and the joy of each is the joy of .all (312). ~ To live one's life in trust is a gentle ~'0retaste on earth of the life of heaven. The fruit of trust in the proEidence of God is a joy and peace more secure than what human missteps and failures can destroy. The One who trusts learns to rejoice "in what she sees and experiences in herself and others," and finding joy ~in God's goodness to l~er, she learns to rejoice without jealousy in the goodness of God to others. She "is not afraid thaf she will lack the lesser things because by the light of faith she is guaranteed the greater things" (293). Conclusion For Catherine, trusting in the providence of God is not a spec~c kind of 32 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 "spiritual exercise,~ but the entire content of a life lived in 10ve. The more one lives in hope and trust, the more lavishly will God's providence in fact provide. To live in trust is not something mere human willing can attain; it is rather a gift the provident God most deeply wants to give, and for which he wants his people to ask. Catherine learned that what best nourishes trust is a good memory, a heart and mind that have learned to remember and to reflect upon the experiences of one's own life, and to find there the indisputable evidence of the personal and intimate providence of God. In this way, one's own unique life story becomes the inspiration and encouragement to ask for even deeper trust for the future. To trust in this way is not imprudence nor immatu(ity. It is, rather, a depth seeing which increasingly frees one's energies from inner forces inhibiting personal autonomy and mature interdependence. It entails the paradox of a radical inner poverty and inner contentment. To trust, in fact, is to live secure in the care of the one who can be trusted absolutely. It is to have the peace and freedom and courage to dare, to take risks inspired by the Holy Spirit. It is, ultimately, to have the heart to let go. It was not the fourteenth-century Catherine of Siena alone who had the personal call to live a life of trust in the providence of God. Today also, it is the witness of lives lived.in the maturity of trust in the one who alone is Lord over all, which perhaps will be the most radical statement a contemporary world will hear. From Tablet to Heart: Internalizing New Constitutions I and II Address: by Patricia Spillane, M.S.C. Price: $1.25 per copy, plus postage. Review for Religious Rm 428 3601 Lindell Blvd. St. Louis, Missouri 63108 Christian Conversion: Suffering Out of Love John Navone, S.Z Father Navone is well known to our readers. The idea of this article is developed at much greater length in his recent Gospel Love: A Narrative Theology (Wilmington: Michael Glazier, Inc.). Father Navone is professor of biblical theology at the Gregorian's Spirituality Institute, where he may be addressed: Piazza della Pilotta, 3; 00187 Roma, Italy. In the seventeenth century, Samuel Crossman wrote that Christ in his passion has:° Love to the 16veless shown That they might lovely be. The passion story is both the good news of God's unconditional love for us as well as the mirror by which we can judge the authenticity of our own life and loves. It changes us from being °unlovely to being lovely (and loving) by showing us what true loveliness could be. Christ is the author and communicator of authentic communion with God. His claim that all authority belongs to him (Mt. 28:18; .In 17:2) and his communication of that authority to others are based on his power to transcend the limitations imposed by human desires and feelings to suffer freely and gladly out of love, When someone truly loves us, we respond to that love by investing our lover with the authority to initiate elements in our life story. When that love is absolute, as in the love of God for us, the absoluteness of that love claims an absolute authority. The story of Jesus reveals that God is Love, and it summons us to share in God's dynamic state of being-in-Love.I The trinitarian imagery of Scripture presents us with the symbolism of transcendent and unrestricted love where the persons are persons by virtue of their relationship to one another. ,iesus is the human incarnation of that loved and loving reiationship to God and the Spirit. Being-in-Love (Father) with 33 ~!4 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 Jesus Christ (Son) entails our accepting a relationship to the Love that transcends every human Ioye.2 We, however, do not establish that relationship; it is given to us. We do not possess it by nature, so it cannot be taken for granted .3 Our self-deception is the failure to accept the gift of God's love and the call to be transformed into God's children in the Son. We merely pretend that our communion with God is authentic, that we share his being-in-Love, if we are not willing to undergo the suffering that is entailed in meeting the demands and total claims of Love. In meeting the demands of L6ve, suffering demonstrates our authentic acceptance of the gift of God's love. The sovereign transforming power of God's love, as opposed to self-love, is manifested in the sufferings of the just. The Drama of Suffering Love The Synoptic Gospels tell the story of Jesus as a drama in four acts. The first act prepares us for what is to come (Mt 3:1-4, ll= Mk l:l-13 = Lk 3:1-4:13); the second act tells the story.of Christ's ministry in Galilee (Mt. 4:12-18:35 = Mk 1:14-9:50 = Lk 4:14-9:50). In the third act Jesus journeys to Jerusalem (Mt 19:i-20:34 =. Mk 10:1-52 = Lk 9:51-18:43) while the fourth act tells the story of Christ's passion and resurrection. As in every good drama, the story invites the onlooker to join in the dramatic action. We are called to become actors within Christ's dramatic story rather than to remain as onlookers marveling at the drama of what is happening to someone else. The evangelists want their hearers to be trans-formed by authentically sharing Christ's life and his Spirit by dying and rising with him. The life of the Spirit is a sharing in the whole life of Jesus, his dying and rising, his self-emptying and his self-fulfilling glorification in God. We cannot be filled by the Spirit unless the self has been emptied to make room for the Spirit's gifts. The mystery of the Cross and resurr6ction expresses the true nature and power of Jesus' being-in-Love, the power and freedom to .be able to love to the end. The disciples, who share their Lord's de~tiny, are also called upon .to suffer. As his ,followers, we must expect suffering, rejection and persecution (Mk 8:34-35; Mt 10:24-25; Lk 6:22; 14:26-27; .In 12:25,26), for the kingdom of God that comes to us in the myster3) of Jesus Christ's dying and rising is a sign of contradiction. Fidelity to the Master means that the disciples must enter into the same struggle that Jesus entered to fulfill God's plan for creation. Opposition to Jesus is manifested within all his human contexts. Mark structures his Gospel to underscore human resistance to the arrival of the kingdom in the person, work and ministry of Jesus Christ. Society resists Jesus (l: 14-3:6)~ Pharisees and scribes, the leaders of the people, engage him in five controversies (~2:1-3:5) and decide to destroy him (3:6). His family, relatives and townspeople are disturbed by him (3:7-6:6), and they fear for his sanity (3:21). Despised in his own country, among his own relations and in his own Christian Conversion / 35 house, he could work no miracle there (6:4:6). Jesus meets with the incompre-hension of his own disciples (6:6-8:33), and he rebukes them for not understanding the miracle of the loaves (8:17) or the necessity of his passion and death (8:31). Fidelity to the will of God meets with human resistance and incompre-hension. If the kingdom of God was ours by nature, Jesus would not encounter incomprehension, hostility and.rejection. His harmony with the will of God entails his disharmony.with all that is opposed to it. His being-in-Love entails his suffering and death out of love that all persons might be-in-Love. He loves his people, fami]3i, disciples and all others with whom his life, vision and mission are in conflict. He suffers out of love for them with the compassion that leads to his passion and death, in order that all might have the fullness of new life in the kingdom. Especially in Mark's story of Jesus, we see that as God's will for Jesus is being progressively fulfilled, he becomes increasingly unpopular until he dies alone--rejected and abandoned by all. Mark's narrative structure makes the theological point that God alone is the fulfilling origin, ground and destiny of Jesus Christ's living, dying and rising out of Love. The coming of the kingdom in the person of Jesus Christ is the ,revelation that God is in love with all human persons and summons them to become a new creation in God's Love. What is demanded of us is repentance and faith in his love given to us in his Beloved Son (Mk 1:11, 15; 9:7). Such repentance and faith entail the suffering out of Love which the Beloved Son himself experienced i.n his prayer at Gethsemane (~Mk 14:36). Jesus experiences suffering out of Love in every human context, the intra-personal as well as the interpersonal; this is evidence for the community of faith that the integrating center of his life transcends every human context. God's lordship in love is a creative goodness which makes others good. When God begins his reign as Father in Jesus Christ, all things are made new in his love,.all things are possible (Mk 10:27; 11:36; Mt 19:26; Lk 18:27). Conversion: Becoming Persons-in-Love Through the example of Jesus' being-in-Love, ~he Christian community sees that God compassionately demands all persons to find and accept their true fulfillment in the gift of his Love so that all might forever be persons-in- Love. God is not indifferent to what weare and become. To accept his love for all is to learn to suffer with his compassionate and passionate love for all, ¯ overcoming our intrapersonal and interpersonal tendencies to remain impersonal. The new life of the kingdom that is given to us in Jesus and his Spirit entails the suffering out of Love for others that manifests our being-in-Love with others. This new life transforms us by making us willing and glad to suffer for others in the service of the kingdom. In the context of the Last Supper, John's gospel implies that Jesus gladly and voluntarily lays down his life that his friends might know the joy of being able to do likewise. ~16 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 True disciples love as the,Master loves. They share a life that is rooted'in God's community-creating love for all, the only love that constitutes the community of divine and human persons which lasts forever. True disciples have solidarity in that invincible love which, despite suffering and death itself, makes them glad to pour out their lives for others. They do not consider themselves to be martyrs or victims; rather, they suffer for others (divine and human) as true friends in the power of that love which alone grounds the eternal friendship that is life in the kingdom, Central to the notion of Christian conversion as suffering out of love is the fact that God wants all human persons to enjoy his life as their own. The gift of God's love is not so much a giving away as a sharing. In loving, God shares himself and all that he is. Jesus Christ enjoys the life and love of his Father; therefore, he is glad to suffer out of that love so that all human beings might share what he most cherishes. But what is perfect in the Master is imperfect in the disciple. The life that Jesus Christ fully enjoys is the life that his disciples are learning to enjoy. The disciple knows the Master to the extent that he or she enjoys the same life and is glad to suffer out of love to secure that life for others. The. solidarity of Master and disciple in suffering out of love for others consists in their enjoying and cherishing the life that they want others to enjoy. Christian conversion is not only an event but also a process that deepens this solidarity through fidelity to the grace and demand of God for responsible lives. Christian conversion, both as event and as process, is participation in the befriending love that Jesus Christ received and accepted from his Father as the integrating center of his life, mission and death for 6thers. Lived Christian conversion entails suffering out of a befriending love that affects all our conscious activities, directs our attention, pervades our imagination, release~ symbols that penetrate to the depths of our psyches, enriches our under-standing, guides our judgments, reinforces our decisions and motivates 0tii~ actions. To enjoy the transforming, benefit of God's befriending love in Jesus Christ and his Spirit implies a gratitude that actively accepts it and makes a religious and moral commitment to sharing it with others. Gratitude for the gift of God's befriending love reflects a humility that takes nothirig for granted. Such humility'brings an appreciation of others and a commitment to them, even when they are superficially unattractive. If we truly appreciate others, we are glad to suffer out of love for them and to befriend them as disciples of ~the Master who lived and died to make his joy ours and to make our joy complete (see Jn 15:11). Some Principles and Practical Points of Reference 1. Being-in-Love is the motivating power for suffering out of Love. 2. If, as Jesus reveals, God is befriending Love, being in befriending Love is the motivating power foi" suffering out of befriending Love for others. It makes us glad, despite difficulties, to befriend others. Christian Conversion 3. Suffering out of befriending Love for others is the self-transcending activity that frees us from self-absorption, self-pity and self-idolatry (i.e., from being impersonal). It frees us for the fulfillment that is being-in-Love with others (i.e,, for being personal). 4. For human beings to be fully personal is, ultimately, for them to be-in- Love befriending others. Sin is the refusal to be personal, the state of the impersonal subject. 5. In lived Christian conversion, suffering is not sought for its own sake; rather, it is embraced only when it is a condition for commitment to the grace and demand of God's befriending love. 6. If lived Christian conversion entails suffering out of befriending Love for others, suffering is not a univocal sign that something is wrong with a person. It may be, as the teaching of the beatitudes implies, the sign that something is profoundly right with a person. 7. We are not committed to persons or values for whom we are unwilling to suffer. We cannot suffer out of love for others when we have no love for them. 8. Being-in-Love is the efficacious ground of self-transcendence required to live responsibly and to be responsible to the pursuit of the truth, however difficult it may be to discover or to accept. It motivates the will to be responsible and to pay the pric.e of responsibility. 9. The fact that Jesus Christ was willing to suffe~ and die for us grounds the primary dogma that God loves us~ To sense that we are loved is to sense something that is true. It may be that imagination is involved in our sensation, but the truth of the dogma will stand. Being-in-Love and willing to suffer out of love for others should never be identified with the presence or absence of any particular feeling or sensation. Our faith and hope is in God, not in our feelings. 10. Because human beings leave something to be desired that God alone can fulfill, suffering out Of love is the condition for the possibility of friendship. Friendship (marriage, community, society, and more) disintegrates with the refusal to endure limitations arid deficiencies in others. Our incapacity for friendship is related to our unwillingness to be committed to others who do not fully gratify, support or console us. There is no lasting commitment to others apart from the willingness to suffer out of love for them. 11. Having time for others is a form of suffering out of love for them. Religious conversion implies that we are living in God's time, that we have the gift of his time for welcoming and listening to others. Consequently, we do not see others as taking or consuming our time; we are free for them to the extent that we are free from the illusion that the only time we have is our own. Prayer is a form of enjoying God's time and transcending our own. Some seldom find time to pray because they are living in their own time and do not want to lose it for life in God's time. The call to pray always is the call to be-in-Love and to live in God's time forever. Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 12. Sufferingout of love for others is a form of our self-investment in them. Inasmuch as communities are formed and held together by a common faith and hope, there is a community-creating and community-sustaining power and value in suffering out of faith, hope and love for others. 13. Inconveniencing ourselves for others is perhaps the most basic form of suffering out of love for others. Unwillingness to inconvenience ourselves for others is a reft~sal to be personal; it is the failure to befriend others at the most rudimentary level of everyday life. No possibility of a lasting commitment to others exists without our being willing to inconvenience ourselves for them daily. 14. The New Testament demand for human transformation through following Jesus' way of the cross should warn those who are tempted to reduce God to their own measure. The self-abandonment that God's befriending love required of Jesus Christ should correct our tendency to manipulate God. 15. Tothe extent that we are convinced that our importance is in God, as opposed to the illusion of an independent self-importance, we are equally convinced that all others have the same importance and are worthy of self-sacrificing and befriending love. The conviction that we exist because God loves us implies that we-find security and a sense of personal worth in God, rather than in the approval that others may choose to give us. 16. If God's will is done, all human persons will be in his kingdom. Our finite, limited, human love is inadequate to the challenge of loving all persons, apart from the gift of God's all-embracing, all-encompassing, all-sustaining, all-forgiving, all-reconciling and all-fulfilling love. His community-creating love for all is the origin and ground of life in the kingdom. 17. Love takes others seriously. How seriously we take others, according to the Judeo-Christian tradition, reveals how seriously we take God. It is the conviction of Jews and Christians that God takes all human persons seriously. How seriously God takes us is implied in the Christian affirmation that God is Love. We know that God is Love because he sent his only Son to live and die for us: We know that such Love transcends words because it embraces human living, suffering and dying. We know that we are truly loved and taken seriously by those who willingly share our living, suffering and dying. We discover the reality of our love for others in willingly doing likewise. NOTES ~See Bernard Lonergan, Method in Theology. (London: Darton, Longrnan & Todd, 1971), passim, esp. pp. 105-122, 2Although Being-in-Love is the existence of the Father and Son and Spirit, I pareaihesize Father to highlight the filial relationship of Jesus as Son. 3See Charles Hefling's lntrduction to Frederick E. Crowe, The Lonergan Enterprise (Cambridge, MA: Cowley Publications, 1980), p. xvi. A Clump of Lichen and Me Kathleen Gallas, OS.B. Sister Gallas is Food Service Director at the Sacred Heart Convent and Conference Center, where she may be addressed: P.O. Box 488; Cullman, AL 35056-0488. What ig contemplative life? Why the nuclear arms race? Why the environ-mental devastation? In the aftermath of "The Day After" my reflectivd moments pondered these seemingly unrelated questions. A combination of spiritual reading, n~ws magazines and discussions on the American Catholic Bishops' Pastoral On Peace surfaced this assortment of questions. While pon-dering the last two questions there eventually came over me a sense of futility. What can any one p.erson do to change the course of events toward possible destruction of life and environment? It can even be questioned as to what will destroy what firs!! Even if there' is a nuclear disarmament it will only be a matter of time before life is destroyed through our irresponsible use of environ-ment and our exploitation of peoples around the world as though they were so many pins on a chart. The question of contemplative life I pondered as an altogether different kind of issue. Ordinarily when one speaks or hears of contemplative life and of contemplative prayer, it is understood in terms describing activities limited to a select few. Contemplative life involved Contemplative prayer, and anyone experiencing contemplative prayer was undoubtedly living a contemplative life--which usually meant living a vowed religious life. Neither combination is necessarily true, nor the total meaning. My own convictions saw a distinction between contemplative life and contemplative prayer. Mother Mary Clare, S.L.G., in her book, Encountering the Depths, gives a difference. "Contempla-tive prayer can be experienced, if God wills it, in any such circumstance as he sees fit to bestow, while contemplative life is the life so directed in its simplicity, and separated from the normal distraction of the active world, that it provides the best preparation for carrying out the work of contemplative prayer." How- 411 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 ever, as Thomas Merton said, "Not all who are vowed contemplative religious experience contemplative prayer." After a while I found myself considering the word contemplative as separated from the terms life and prayer. By itself I couldn't limit the meaning of contemplative to a few but asked the question if being contemplative wasn't a dimension of being human, and therefore per-taining to everyone. What is it to be contemplative? This assortment of questions unexpectedly came together and found its own kind of answer in an experience 1 had on a January afternoon. Everything I had been meditating within the context of each of the three basic questions surfaced and synthesized an experience with a clump of lichen. I had been pondering these questions separately without any thought of relating them. However, my experience of lichen gave me the insight that in actuality the answer to the question of what is contemplative life was the foundation to answering the other questions--and all other questions concerning peace, justice and harmony in our relationships with each other and our environment. I am standing at my special place on a particular hillside with an Alabama version of mountains before me evoking the line: "I lift my eyes to the moun-tains from where comes my help--the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth." At my feet is a clump of gray-green lichen with red dots. Flowers? To see them eye to eye I have to lie on my stomach. Then do I see. The lichen grew finger-like projections and each finger tip is painted red. There am I on the ground "eyeballing" a lichen's painted finger nails! At first I laugh at myself. Then at us, the~lichen~and me. I talk to it. "Aren't we a crazy pair? Somehow, this is a fun moment, isn't it? We share a secret, you and I. Others might question my sanity if I were to tell them of our secret delight in each other. However, there must be others like us, for Goethe back in the eighteenth century said: 'Tell no man, tell wise men only, for the ~vorld might count it madness'," My deepest intuitions say that I am not mad in having fun seeing and listening ~ith a clump of lichen. After a while the humor of the situation shifts in mood to a sense of wonder, fascination and appreciation of so tiny a bit of color on a January day. In this Garden of Eden setting comes the urge to pick up this clump of lichen and bring it home to the prayer room--a winter flower for the Lord. But no! in my position of lying stomach flat to th~ earth comes the awareness that I am hugging great Mother Earth who in Greek mythology was named Gaia--a name personalizes and effects a deeper relationship. Gaia and I became one in this°moment--a moment of union. She and I are gift to each other from our God, the maker of heaven and earth. There is the vista before me, t_he clump of lichen below me, and myself. We are responsible to each other and for each other. So, I am one human being and this under my eyes is roughly a 3 x 4 inch clump of lichen. Yet this clump of lichen and I represent a microcosm of life on planet earth. On the one hand it could be said what harm done to pull up this clump +sp~cially with the motive of offering? But how thoughtless and insensitive to Gaia who needs this clump of lichen to maintain nature's balance A Clump of "~chen and Me / 41 so that I might live comfortably. To be fruitful and multiplyr fill the earth and stibdue it doesn't mean that I ravage it, pollute it, coerce it for my own selfish needs and even worse, under the guise of something good. Whose good? How often our God voiced that he spurned such offerings. Some would say that I have done no harm to another human being in pulling up this clump. But I have. Even if it is in innocence, the innocence of thoughtlessness; I have harmed another in contr!buting to making earth an unfit place to live. Gaia is upset. Mother Nature reacts and there can eventu-ally come a separation, a divorce. I could be a contributing cause in the erosion of this hillside. In being responsible to Gala and for Gala I am also responsible to all other human beings. Each of us is responsible to the other for maintaining a harmonious relationship with Gaia who will respond accordingly. In this total economy of life no one human being is insignificant. Neitheris this clump of red-dotted lichen by my side. Just now 1 suddenly recall a long-forgotten story, The Little Prince. The fox is explaining to the prince what it means .to be tamed. "It means to establish ties." "To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you, I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world." We were asked to subdue the earth, Wouldn't "to subdue" mean "to tame'~. To establish ties, to create a need for each other? To instill a reverence for the uniqueness of each other? In lying flat on the ground face to face with a clump of lichen, I felt an. interrelatedness. The lichen and I were one. My body pressed to the body of earth were one. As far as the eye could see there was not another clump of lichen to be seen amidst the variety of winter-colored plant life. Yet there was the awareness that while this was so on the immediate level, there was also an awareness on another level that the earth was populated with the likes of me and the likes of this lichen. Each was one in the many and the many in the one. I knew an interrelatedness with all in the universe that was human. The lichen would'feel the same with its kind. However, the sense of harmony, the expe-rience of0neness-and-manyness wasn't limited to recognizing this in our sepa-rateness of plant and human, for at the same time there was the feeling of Oneness with each 6ther. The lichen and I knew a oneness with each other as well as a oneness in the manyness of us. Lichen and me. Plant life and human life. Mother Earth Gaia and me, Gaia and the manyness of me. Each and speaks of union. Each and speaks of a union that is life-creating, life-giving, life-supporting. This life with a small "1" could only be because of the gratu-itous, unfathomable love that is Life with a capital "L." It is from the Life and in this Life that the lichen and I have life. We are gifts to each~ other, responsible to each other from the Gift that is Life--maker of heaven and earth. A dialogue from another story, The Farthest Shore, by Ursula LeGuin Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 speaks of this responsibility. The wise magus explains to his young companion the meaning and responsibility of personal choice. "On every act the balance of the whole depends. The winds and seas, the powers of water and earth and light, all that these do, and all that the beasts and green things do, is well done, and rightly done. All these act within the Equilibrium. From the hurricane and the great whale's sounding to the fall of a dry leaf and the .gnat's flight, all they do is done within the balance of the whole. But we, insofar aswe have power over the world and over one another, we must learn to do what the leaf and the whale and the wind do of their own nature. We must learn to keep the balance. Having intelligence, we must not act in ignorance. Having choice, we must not act without responsibility." When did we become responsible for each other? In the beginning of , creation Life hovered over the darkness of the deep and breathed over the waters of the abyss. God said, "Let there be . " With each word of God, each breath of Life a living being was created. Gaia is a living being. This clump of lichen is a living being. I am a living being. Within each resides the breath of Life uniting us as one. Gaia and this clump of lichen act unconsciously accord-ing to their nature. The breath of Life that brought me into being included the freedom of choice. But "having choice, we must not act without responsibility." However, if I am not awakened in eye and heart to that breath of Life within me then my actions are likely to be irresponsible and contrary to the nature Life intended me as a ruler of myself and of the earth. Only if I am awake to this Life breathing within me will I be able to make responsible choices that will be in harmony with all other beings until All is in all, a union of One, a oneness in the manyness. Frederick Franck in his Book of Angelus Silesitis says: "For the awakened.spirit there is no longer a split between 'I' and 'other'." Meister Eckhart asks, "When is a man in mere understanding?" "When he sees one thing as separated from another." "And when isa manabove mere under-standing? . When a man sees All in all, then a man stands beyond mere understanding." Until one is awakened to the Life within there is no unfolding, no con-sciousness that this clump of lichen and I are responsible to each other, gifts to each other for all others in our oneness. Thoughtlessness, insensitivity, ihgrati-tude to the gift of oneself and the gift of each other have compounded to the magnitude of global disaster at the exp.ense of all that represents the lichen and me. In our insecurities and lack of appreciation of each other's unique gifted-ness-- everything that makes up heaven and earth--we have become envious and greedy. In our drive to be number one in whatever area of life, individually and nationally, we have lost sight of our interconnectedness. We have forgot-ten that the world is round'and not fiat. In our linear vision of life we have forgotten that there is a Center that links us as spokes in a wheel. In our fears and insecurities we can be likened to the schoolyard bullies easily provoked when our power position is threatened. In the global schoolyard we clench nuclear warheads. ° A Clump of Lichen and Me / 43 Or? I was about to pull up the clump of lichen to use as an offering and a decoration but I didn't because ~of an awareness that each of us is connected to a Center and interdependent. But on a global level we have those who thought-lessly, selfishly ravage the earth's peoples and places as so many clumps of lichen and for a variety of reasons--least of all, offering and decoration. On the other hand, when done out of offering and decoration it is far more devastating. It is said that greed brings out the animal in us but that isn't true. Animals act according to their nature as designed when breathed,into life. ,~ dog gnawing on his bone is not envious of the dog next to him chewing on a steak. Each is content. Humans in their greed that becomes exploitation of all living beings act contrary to even animal nature in wanting both, their own and what others have. ~ I feel that my experience with the lichen spoke to the fundamental ques-tion, what is contemplative life--what is it to be contemplative? Am I off the track? I don't think so.-It is for each of us to live life moment by moment deliberately, reflectively, consciously, reverently; awarely, thoughtfully, prayer-fully. The majority claim that this isn't possible. But why not? Walter Burg-hardt in his book Season that Laugh and Weep_:quotes his friend William McNamara in defining contemplative as "a long loving look at the real." Burghardt goes on to explain the "real~" Reality is living, pulsing people; reality'is fire and water;~reality is the sun setting over the Poconos and a gentle doe streaking through the forest; reality is a ruddy glass of Burgundy, Beethoven's Mass in D, a child lapping a chocolate iee-crearn cone; reality is a striding woman with wind-blown hair; r~ality is Christ Jesus. Contemplation~is not an abstraction "where a leaf is no longer green, water no longer ripples, a woman is no longer soft, and God no longer smiles." He goes on to say, "This real I 'look' at. I no longer analyze it or argue it, describe or define it; I am one with it. I do not move around it; I enter into it." When one enters into it one becomes one with it. I am that at which I give a long loving look. Sense of separateness disappears.in the embrace. I am convinced that this capacity is within each of us.As I am writing and ponder-ing this (now a summer morning) I'm aware 0fa buzzing fly. The window has a space between outside glass and .inside screen. The fly flew in by the open middle section. It is now buzzing and frantically dashing itself at the top section of panes. This has been going on for over an hour. If it would just stop long enough to take a long loving look at the reality of its situation, it would come to know that the next set of panes is open. The fly would be free to become one with all that is outside the barrier of closed upper-window panes. To be contemplative is a dimension within each of us that must be responded to in order to live in harmony with one's self, with each other, with Gaia. That dimension is there enabling us to be free, but like the fly we frantically dash our lives on window panes of our own choosing. In all the ceaseless buzzing and frantic dashing about we fail to "see" that the next set of panes is op.en which would free us to be one with all we see but interact with through the glass of 44 / Review for Religious, Jan.-Feb., 1985 fears and insecurities. We are gifts to each other.~As human beings breathed into existence each of us is endowed with gifts we hold in common as well as those unique to each. Gifts can remain latent or be 'used intelligently ~nd responsibly. But this is an unfolding and a growing that starts from a beginning. In the beginning God created the heavens and earth. In the beginning was the Word. In the begin-ning life breathed. The very words "in the beginning" suggest that there is a past, a present and a future. We all have beginnings and are now in process toward endings. But life is a spiral of beginnings and endings gradually open-ing us to greater circumferences. Beginnings proceed to endings only to find that endings become new beginnings. Life is breathing, bringing us to an expanding awareness and fullness. However time past and time future ismean-ingful if I live the now moment attentively, patiently, caringly, lovingly. Other-wise the clump of lichen is just a clump of lichen to be trampled on or pulled up indifferently, carelessly--for there are no established ties. Again, theqittle prince and the fox: "What must I do, to tame you" asked the little prince? "You must be very patient," replied the fox. "First you will sit down at a little distance from me--like that--in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing. Words are the source of misunderstandings. But you will sit a little closer to me, every day." In my experience on that January'day, the lichen and I tamed each other. Ties were established revealing secrets visibly to the heart. As I was walking back home filled with the fullness of Life, pain and sorrow entered. I could identify with St. Francis who cried because Love is not loved. Along the roadside was the trash 6f beverage cans and fast-food restau-rant containers. This marring of the creation of heaven and earth is evidence of a lack of awareness of the meaning of life breathing within all created things. Most of the trash along our highways are food containers betraying the pace and emptiness of our lives. Many people claim they are too busy to eat' reflectively, appreciatively, companionably and as an undivided activity. Too busy to take "long loving looks at the real." Busy-ness reflects an emptiness or a fife lived in qu~intity not quality until it becomes a frantic dashing about. There is not the patience to live the now moment attentively, undividedly. From just considering the kinds of trash I saw along the way, it seems that eating has become something we do while in the process of doing something else, on our way to somewhere else--all activities of another kind that are not entered into fully either. Our attention is fragmented; when the activities of each moment are multiple and experienced indifferently and randomly, as a ¯ necessary activity to get over with, it is a natural consequence to open the window of the car and carelessly toss out the trash on the landscape which goes unnoticed. The fox upon saying goodby to the prihce imparts his secret. "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye." "It is the time you have wasted for another that makes this tamed one so important'. Men have forgotten this truth but you must not forget it. You A Clump of Lichen and Me / 45 become responsible forever, for what you have tamed." What is it to be contemplative? Whether described as "a long loving look at the real" or "time you have wasted for another," it is a time consumption that a pragmatic materialistic society rejects because for them time and life are mea-su~- ed in terms of money--cash and flow. The contemplative dimension that enables us to be truly human is there but lost. From still another source, Tom Brown, a woodsman taught by an Apache Indian, describes in his book, The Search, his conviction of the contemplative dimension. There is a place I know where everything lives in harmony. Nothing is envied, stolen, or killed. Instead, everything is shared. The land is everyone's and no one's. Life is sacred there. A dweller in this place thinks highly of human life because he lives so close to the earth. He understands his part in the scheme of nature and is not lost or searching for himself. Where is this place? Does it really exist? Yes. It is within me and can be within you. It is a state of mind; it is an awareness; it is an appreciation; it is an understanding; it is a commitment to life. It is the realization that everything I described is all about us every day of our lives, but we miss it. We are blind to the beauty of a sunset, deaf to the music of the wind, callous to rough bark and soft grass. We speak of salaries and war instead of singing songs of life. We taste the bitterness of pollution and miss the sweetness of wild honeysuckle. We smell bus fumes but never the apple blossoms or clover flower. Life is manufactured and marketed. It is, for many of us, something to be bought or sold, and the more we pay, the better off we feel we are. Empty, untamed and fragmented lives are not awakened to the Life within. There is no awareness of interconnectedness, of taming and being tamed. There is no awareness that the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth and everything therein, is at the center of his universe and the center of each of us. One indifference leads and escalates into another: trash out the window by individuals, pollution and exploitation of land, sea and sky by industry, oppression of people around the world by political systems. If lives were lived contemplatively to what is essential and visible to the eye of the heart, then it would be realized that no being is insignificant because each o

Issue 34.6 of the Review for Religious, 1975. ; Revtew ]or Rehgtous is edited by faculty members of the School of Diwnlty of St Louis Umverslty, the editorial offices being located at 612 Humboldt Budding, 539 North Grand Boulevard: St. Louis, Missouri 63103. It is owned by the Missouri Province Educational Institute; St. Louis, Missouri. Published bimonthly and copy-right ~) 1975 by Review [or Religious. Composed, printed, and manufactured in U.S.A. Second class postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri. Single copies: $1.75. Subscription U.S.A. and Canada: $6.00 a year; $11.00 for two years; other countries, $7.00 a year, $13.00 for two years (for airmail delivery, add $5.00 per year). Orders should indicate whether they are for new or renewal subscriptions and should be accompanied by check or money order payable to Review ]or Religious in U.S.A. currency only. Pay no money to persons claiming to represent Review Jot Religious. Change of address requests should include former address. Daniel F. X. Meenan, S.J. Everett A. Diederich, S.J. Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. Miss Jean Read Editor Associate Editor Questions and Answers Editor Assistant Editor November 1975 Volume 34 Number 6 Renewals, new subscriptions, and changes of address should be sent to Review for Religious; P.O. Box 6070; Duluth, Minnesota 55802. Correspondence with the editor and the associate editor together with manuscripts and books for review should be sent to Review for Religious; 612 Humboldt Building; 539 North Grand Boulevard; St. Louis, Missouri 63103. Questions for answering should be sent to Joseph F. Gallen. S.J.: St. Joseph's College; City Avenue at 54th Street; Philadelphia, Pennsyl-vania 19131. Unmarriageable for God's Sake Peter G. van Breemen, S.J. Father van Breemen studied nuclear physics in Amsterdam, Holland, and in Rochester, N.Y. He was novice-master in his home province (Netherlands), has a broad experience in Working with priests and religious as spiritual director and lecturer both here and abroad, and is presently in charge of the combined Flemish (Belgian)-Dutch novitiate. His present address is Priorijdreef 21; 1160 Brussels, Belgium. The Old Testament often speaks of virginity, but always the reference is to the virginity of the people as a whole; e.g., Jeremiah says, "I build you once more; ¯ you shall be ri~buiit, virgin of Israel" (3, 1-4), and again, "Come home, virgin of Israel, come home to these towns of yours" (31, 21). In Isaiah we find the same concept: the chosen people as a whole is the virgin bride of Yahweh: Like a young man marrying a virgin so will the one who built you wed you, and as the bridegroom rejoices in his bride, ,so will your God rejoice in you (62, 5). For now your creator will be your husband, his name, Yahweh. Sabaoth; your redeemer will be the Holy One.of Israel, he is called the God of the whole earth (54, 5). We can make the general statement that in the Old Testament virginity is never lived in a personal way. On the contrary, lJersonal virginity is far removed from the mind of an Israelite. Fertiliiy was a blessing, and the com-mandment of Genesis (1, 28) "Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth" was very sacred to the Jews. This article is a chapter from Father van Breemen's forthcoming book, Called by Name, scheduled to be published by Dimension Books, Denville, N.J., in January, 1976. 839 a40 / Review for Religious, ~'olume 34, 1975/6 The natural longing for posterity found in all people, but especially in more primitive people, was deepened to a far greater degree for the Israelite by,the fact that the messiah had been promised as one of his race. To the Jews, therefore, the role of father and mother became sacred in a heightened ~ense. They had many sayings which illustrated their convictions in this matter; e.g., "Who does not marry is like a person who sheds blood," or ". is like a murderer!" A person who did not marry had the power of life within him but did not transmit it. Even as lateas prophetic times Jeremiah's celibacy was a shock. The most striking example of this sacredness of parenthood is found in the Book of Judges (11, 30-40), where we read the story of the daughter of Jephthah, who was to die for a mistaken and unlawful interpretation of a vow made by her father. She accepts her death submissively, but for the young girl, even worse than the death itself to which she is condemned is the fact that she must die without having been fruitful. "Grant me one request," she pleads, "Let me be free for two months. I shall go and wander in the mountains, and with my companions bewail by virginity." The whole longing of the Israelite for children is heard in that plea, as it is also in the words of Rachel: "Give me children or I shall die" (Gen 30, i). It is only in the New Testament that personal celibacy becomes a factor in human life. This is most probably connected with the incarnation and demonstrates that only an incarnate God can enable us to live as celibates, since it is the person of Jesus Christ who is at the heart.of celibacy. Virginity can be realized only because of Christ and with Him since it is only a con-tinuous focusing on Him .which enables us to persevere in purity of heart and flesh without becoming turned in on ourselves. Matthew lists three categories of eunuchs: There are eunuchs'born that way from their mother's womb, there are eunuchs made sot by men and there are eunuchs who have made themselves that way for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let anyone accept this who can (19, 12). Because "eunuch" is such a horrible word, it is a very humbling experience to dwell upon the reality of this mystery. A eunuch is one who is incapable of human marriage. The very starkness of the phrase is in .one way the highlight of all considerations of the mystery of celibacy. "Eunuch" sounds so much like "freak," an incomplete person, one somehow lacking an essential that con-stitutes him human. It intensifies the harshness of the truth which the word "virgin" softens somewhat. On the surface, to "make myself unmarriageable" seems to imply that I should make myself as unattractive as possible so that no one will be interested even in looking at me. But that would be a shallow and exterior approaqh to being unmarriageable. A more valid understanding of the mystery of celibacy would be this: a woman, very much in love with her hus-band, would have eyes for no other man. In this sense, she is no longer marriageable for any other man. She is bound and committed to this one alone--freely, happily. The real mystery of consecrated celibacy lies. in the reason for it, expressed by Christ in the words "for the sake of the kingdom of Unmarriageable for God's Sake / 841 heaven." The kingdom is where God truly reigns,~where the will of God is fulfilled entirely; in other words, where God is fully God. In the history of salvation the kingdom of God so far has been fully realized only in Jesus Christ and in His mother Mary. In the person of Jesus, God's Will was totally accomplished; He is the kingdom of God enfleshed. From His time onward, celibacy for the kingdom of heaven is possible because now it can find inspira-tion and impetus from contemplation .of the kingdom as shaped in Jesus Christ. This is another way saying that Jesus Himself is at the heart of New Testamental celibacy. In its final analysis, celibacy means being captured by Christ. He is our life (Col 3, 4), fascinating us so completely that eventually we become un-marriageable, In its deepest sense, this is what celibacy means. It is not on the basis of pros and cons that one undertakes freely to live one's entire life in celibacy, nor is it just a state of being unmarried; rather, it is existentially be-ing incapable of marriage. When Jesus says there are eunuchs that have made themselves thus for the sake of the kingdom of heaven, He is pointing out that true celibacy is achieved not in a single leap, but by a process of slow growth. The Rule of Taiz6 says, "This work of Christ .in' you demands infinite patience." When a person takes first or even final vows, usually he is not yet unmarriageable. What he expresses in his vow is a two-fold covenant: he professes publicly for everyone to know that he recognizes as an ideal for himself the state of being unmarriageable for the sake of the kingdom of heaven; and he promises that he will put forth every effort to achieve this goal. He will not try to preserve himself marriageable as long as possible; on the contrary, he will try seriously, honestly to make himself unmarriageable. It is a long, .sometimes difficult road to become unmarriageable for the sake of the kingdom, It can take years, even decades, to. progress far on this narrow way of being fascinated by Jesus Christ, but by his vow the religious promises to advance as quickly as he can. He will not procrastinate~ This is his ideal, and he will run to meet it. Only when the point of really being unmarriageable has been reached has celibacy become fully mature. In a book written for priests, La Peur ou la Foi, Maurice Bellet has observed: Suppose one morning a priests reads in his newspaper that the Pope has changed his mind on the En-cyclical Sacerdotalis celibatus; from now on celibacy will be optional for priests. If that priest at this point has to make up his mind what he is going to do--make use of the new opening for marriage or remain celibate--th~ mere fact that he has to deliberate indicates that he is not yet existentially un-marriageable. Thus far, he is only juridically unmarriageable. Genuine celibacy goes so much deeper than a law because it is the interiorization of the goal of that law. The content of celibacy is eminently positive. It involves not just being un-married, but being fascinated by another--Christ--to such a degree that marriage is no longer possible. Celibacy does not mean that on~ has lost something, but rather that the celibate has found Someone. In essence, celibacy is love which can no longer wait; that is what makes it fruitful. There 842 / Review for Religious," Volume 34, 1975/6 is another dimension, at once ecclesial and eschatological, which enhances the value of celibacy and helps to prevent it from becoming myopic or introspec-tive. The celibate stands as an enduring witness that all Christians are pledged to a new order of grace, the fullness of which is that kingdom where no one will be given in marriage. He thus becomes by his celibacy a prophetic voice, recalling to all men that there are ultimate values not wholly attainable in our present life, and that it is only at our journey's end that we shall experience the fullness of God's giving. En route, there is only one thing necessary: God's love as revealed in Christ. Celibacy is a pilgrimage, a tremendous adventure. Along this way we meet magnificent people who have really become unmarriageable because of God. Unhappily, we also meet some who in their celibacy have not come to complete fulfillment, but have become bogged down along the road. Negative Celibacy There is a danger, of course, a risk involved in celibacy because there we lack the incentives provided by marriage and the care of a family. This means that celibacy can lead to a coldness of heart, a lack of affection, possibly even to laziness. The only radical remedy against this danger is to focus all our attention on the heart and inspiration of celibacy, for unless it is based on deep attraction for the person of Christ, celibacy can be irresponsible. In this lies its real challenge. It would be unrealistic to ignore the fact that the celibate life in-volves a genuine deprivation, something which we miss because we are celibates. 'Jesus answered the man who wanted to follow Him wherever He went: "Foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head" (Lk 9, 58). So, no home of His own for the Son of Man, no home of his own for the celibate! One who follows Christ in the celibate why has no conjug~d ties--no husband or wife or children--and he m'isses the warmth these can" provide and the appeal they can make on him. This is the negative element in celibacy. There is also a positive element: viz., the fascination which Christ has for this person, the dedication to the apostolate or to contemplative life, the commitment to the kingdom of God, the being available for the people of God. In every celibate life boththe positive and the negative elements are always present, but in varying degrees, and in this lies the differing quality of celibacy. We call that a negative celibacy when the negative element predominates even though .there is, of course, some minor positiveelement present. The first im-pression this type of celibacy gives is a kind of frustration, .a deprivation; something is missing. We speak about a positive celibacy when--the negative element being present to a certain degree--the over-all impression is that of a wholesome life at once fulfilled and appealing. It is the celibacy in which negative elements prevail which presents the greatest difficulty, yet its problems are not ineradicable. There is always possi-ble a genuine conversion which will transmute the negative, making it genuinely positive. This conversion may require that the religious relinquish some things in or.der to find Christ and to contemplate Him more deeply so Unmarriageable for God's Sake / 043 that he may fill the emptiness. Perhaps there is .some foreign element blocking Christ's way in the life of negative celibacy, and until this is removed, the joy of.positive celibacy remains elusive. It is important that there be a genuine transformation of this negative celibacy into a positive one, a transformation that is truly worth the price it exacts. There is a second way to cope with negative celibacy: to seek dispensation from the vows and then to leave in order to search for happiness elsewhere. Apart from these two radical ways to overcome negative celibacy, there are also two forms of compromise open. In these methods of temporizing the celibate does not break his promise by giving up his vows, nor does he take the radical measure to make his celibacy really positive, but he seeks the in-between solutions of either sublimation or compensation. In sublimation the gap which is there and which is predominant is filled up with important human values. In themselves,~of course, these human values were not the reason why the religious chose celibacy, but having more or less failed in the option he did choose, he tries to make the best of the situation by sublimating it into human values which in themselves are good: work, relations with others, influential positions, broad culture, wide interests. The pain of not being able to'marry, of not being father or mother, is assuaged to some extent by these other values. People attempting this sublimation work very hard; they frequently carryoalmost a double load, and others may marvel at their efficiency and their energy. Outwardly, their life seems anything but a failure. And yet, deep down, :this celibacy is a failure because it was never in-tended for this excessive work-load. Or such a person may seek out many social contacts and relationships, many friends, Or it may be a devotion to study or a drive for power which preempts his attention. In all this, the reac-tion is a sublimation of tlae real core of celibacy. The other type of compromise for coping with negative celibacy without ~ibandoning it completely or transforming it into the positive is compensation, basically the same substitution of a lesser value for the real one, but here the human values used to fill the gap are no longer important ones, but rather of a lower species: insipid literature, curiosity, shallow hobbies. Neither of these ways out of negative celibacy--sublimation or compen-sation- is a sufficiently radical solution to the problem. The only effective way to combat negative celibacy is to grow into positive celibacy, that is to strengthen the positive element by means of a deeper, more intent focusing on the kingdom of heaven incarnate in Jesus. True Celibacy Since the deepest root and inspiration of true celibacy is the person of Christ, the people of God also play an important role in celibacy, and this in two ways: dedication to the kingdom of heaven always means dedication to the body of Christ as formed by the .people; and celibacy needs the support of the people of God and, even more pointedly, the support of the community. Celibacy is not constituted by turning away from the people; rather it is con- 844 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/6 stituted by the fact that through the celibate God turns Himself towards the people. A celibate is not divided, torn between Christ and the people. He lets his affection for the people coincide as completely as pos.~sible with Christ's love for them because he is taken up in this covenant relation between God and His people. Thus, a person who gives himself to Christ gives himself to the Christ who offered Himself for everybody; therefore, genuine dedication to Christ is always dedication to all whom we encounter. In fact, celibacy always implies ,the call to devote oneself to the~ neighbor with Christ's own love. If we really give ourselves to Christ, He will enlarge our hearts so that we can em-brace many and live truly fruitful lives. This dedication to Christ, however, is lived in the darkness of faith and the longing of hope, and often the fruitfulness of our lives is not apparent. We commit ourselvesto Christ, but we have never seen Him. We have to live with a certainty that has no basis in this visible world; there is no hand to hold. The man whodives thus is brave and mature: no one who has seen this or who has tried it hims~elf will deny that. A celibate life is a courageous life, one that has a kind of poverty about it because it offers nothing tangible to which I can cling. I can never grasp God. Sociologically, the poverty of celibacy is often looked upon as something to be pitied. This can be a grace to be.exploitedmone that the celibate would betray if he sought to create an impression of heroism before the people. Instead of trying to elevate celibacy to a pedestal, let him live it as one of the poor of Yahweh: You have seduced me, Yahweh, and 1 have let myself be' seduced: you have overpowered me: you were the stronger. I am a daily laughing-.stock, everybody's butt (Jer 20., 7). In some of our recent theologizing it is possible that we cross the narrow line between giving reasons for the hope that is within us and giving proof for the validity, of our way of life. Underlying this is the sometimes barely acknowledged desire to make ourselves important to .ourselveS. Nor should the celibate claim that his celibacy makes him completely available to the people, because such a claim would be too pretentious, giving him an honor which he does not deserve. Celibacy for the sake of the kingdom of heaven does not need anything outside itself to justify it. In itself it is a ser-vice, provided that it is lived to the full. The ultimate service I render is not that I have more time, that I am more free for people, but that I have pledged as my most constant ideal openness to God and the public testimony of the reality of God in my life. Celibacy is not to be admired by the people. All that is important is that I should.be captured by Christ and spread the news 0f His love. It is enough that religious be a "light to the world~" a beacon to travelers, not so much something for people to admire, as a light for them to see the direction in which they are to go. The very simplicity in which we live our celibacy can in itself be a sign which silently and humbly promotes the reality of God. This is the greatest service we can render to people by our celibacy--to show them that God is so real that He can truly fill a human heart and can Unmarriageable for God's Sake /,,845 bring a human life to fulfillment. Cardinal Suhard says: "To be a witness does not consist in engaging in propaganda nor even in stirring up people, but in be-ing a living mystery. It means to live in such a way that one's life would not make sense if God did not. exist." There is a final way in which other people enter into our celibacy: for a truly celibate life we need the support of others. A cold community which affectively isolates a celibate can do great harm to the growth of positive celibacy in its members. We can never come to God completely by ourselves; we need the inspiration and affection of our fellowmen. It is not that we should claim that support or demand it; that is a most sure way of ruining it. But we should be able to hope for it. And we certainly should be poor and humble enough to be receptive to it when it is freely and purely given. This means that the people in the parish are partly responsible for the celibacy of their priests, and members of a religious community have mutually promised to be respon-sible for one another's celibacy. We are to be living signs of God's love. Celibacy would be a mere caricature of the gospel if it did not make visible God's love in the human community: "See how they love one another!" Commitment in a Changing World Sisters Margaret Farley and Doris Gottemoeller, R.S.M. This article represents the proceedings of a seminar sponsored by the Sisters of Mercy on the topic indicated in the title. The proceedings were edited for publication by Sisters Margaret and Doris. Sister Doris resides at the Generalate of the Sisters of Mercy; I0000 Kentsdale Drive; P.O. Box 34446; West Bethesda, MD 20034. Introduction For many years now religious have been accustomed to hearing that one in three marriages ends in divorce, so that we are no longer startled by that bit of information. More recently, however, we have also observed that the number of dispensations from religious vows now exceeds the number of religious professions, and, in some regions, laicizations outnumber ordinations. Furthermore, in today's professional world several career changes are ex-pected in one professional lifetime. In such a context of flux and imper-manence, can a commitment made for a lifetime have any relevance or viability? It was to explore this question that the Sisters of Mercy undertook a study pr6ject on "permanency in commitment." Religious communities have not been exempt from the currents of change: the reluctance of younger members to commit themselves for life, the waning of vitality in the commit-ment of some older members, and the increased number of dispensations from religious vows all testify to a new interpretation of "permanence" as a value. It can certainly not be concluded that the challenge to permanency in cofia-mitment springs from a lack of generosity. Rather, in many cases it appears to be the result of new insights into the developmental character of the human person, into the dynamism of change in all areas of life, and into the inter-relationship of all aspects of human life, sothat change in one area necessitates an adjustment in another. Nor, on the other hand, can it be concluded that the situation has so changed in the last generation that a case can no longer be 846 Commitment in a Changing World made today for lifetime fidelity to commitments. The lives of untold thousands testify to commitments freely'entered into and fruitfully lived out in ever-unfolding contexts. The purpose of the study reported here, therefore, was to bring together the new insights of contemporary research and reflection and the lived reality of contemporary experience in order to illuminate various practical questions. The immediate context of the study was commitment in religious life, since the project was inaugurated by a religious community, but it was felt that the reflections would have a wider applicability. An investigation such as this must necessarily be multi-disciplinary: the sociologist, the psychologist, the philosopher, and the theologian have all reflected on human experience from a particular vantage point. Many fine ar-ticles have been published in recent years on the phenomenon of change and of non-commitment; but 'all of them necessarily examine the issue from the author's individual perspective. Accordingly, in the fall of 1973, the Sisters of Mercy invited a number of participants to engage in a dialogue which would attempt to bridge the gaps between various disciplines and to widen the con-text of contemporary discussion. The dialogue which ensued was not intended to come up. with "answers" nor to bear fruit in a consensus which would be unanimously endorsed only because it represented the least common denominator of the discussion, but rather to enrich the collective understand-ing of the participants and to furnish a context for future reflection and; perhaps, decision-making. The participants in the study all entered enthusiastically into the dialogue and contributed a rich variety of intellectual viewpoints and life experiences. A brief introduction to the. members of the study group follows: Sidney Callahan: columnist in the National Catholic Reporter; author; lecturer. Thomas Clarke, S.J.: theologian; author; staff person at the Gonzaga Center for Spirituality, Monroe, New York. Norita Cooney; R.S.M.: assistant professor of sociology, College of St. Mary's, Omaha, Nebraska; Director of the Office for Pastoral Development, Archdiocese of Omaha. Margaret, Farley, R.S:M.: associate professor of ethics, Yale Divinity School. Jean Flannelly, S.C.: clinical psychologist; instructor at Cathedral College, Douglaston, New York; active i9 personnel servi6es for the Sisters of Charity. Doris Gottemoeller, R.S.M.: General Councilor of Sisters of Mercy; member of the Planning Committee for this study. John Haughey, S.J.: associate editor of ,,lmerica," adjunct professor of theology, Fordham University; author. ~ Theresa Kan¢, R.S.M.: Provincial Administrator ot: Sisters of Mercy, Province of New York; member of the Planning Committee for this study. Ellen Marie Keane, R.S.H.M.: .professor of philosophy at Marymount College, Tarrytown, New York. Mary Evangeline McSloy, R.S.M.t staff associate at St. Clotilde's parish in Chicago; formerly Executive Secretary of the Sister Formation Conference; member of the Planning Committee for this study. Miriam Sharpe, R.S.M.: Provincial Councilor of Sisters of Mercy, Province of Providence. Richard Westley: chairman of the Graduate Department of Philosophy, Loyola Univer-sity, Chicago. a4a / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/6 In the initial phase of this study project, the participants all undertook to read a selection of articles pertinent to the topic, as a kind of basic orientation to the: discussion. Therefore, the bibliographical references included should be seen as integral to the report, rather than as merely an appendage. In several of these articles can be found more extended statements of some of the par-ticipants~. Furthermore, anyone who reads these references will be led to other sources which will further enlarge the parameters of his or her reflection. In the second phase of the study, which provides the basis for this article, the participants gathered at Mount Mercy, Dobbs Ferry, New York, for a weekend which was described as a "think tank/retreat" experience--an oppor-tunity for free-flowing, uninterrupted dialogue on the topic of "permanency in commitment." The sessions were taped, and this report is an: attempt to distill from the hundreds of pages of transcript a sampling of the opinions expressed: The comments chosen have been rearranged and/or paraphrased .in order to allow~ for, a greater economy of words, but the dialogue format has been preserved in order to convey the liveliness and immediacy of the exchange. The reader,must also be aware that not everyone agreed with every opinion ex, pressed, nor did every comment represent a carefully-reasoned-out position. Rather; some remarks were more in the nature of trial balloons, insights and fragments which were intended to stimulate further responses from the :com-panions in the discussion. Early in the dialogue the participants recognized that there is a degree of artificiality about isolating the element of permanency from commitment. It was,generally felt that.the nature of commitment itself was at issue, ,and that permanency merely designated one quality or aspect of it. Thus it was felt tha~t if the nature of commitment itself was explored, the place of "permanency" in our understanding of it would be clarified. Accordingly, much of what follows is a shared reflection on commitment itself, with the element of temporality as a recurring motif."Commitment," as this was generally understood and used by the group, referred to an interpersonal promise, rather than to a pledge to some ideal or abstract entity. It was used to refer to promises made to God (for example, through baptism orthe profeSsion of Vows in religious, life) or to another person (as in marriage or family or friendship). A strict dichotomy was not intended here: thus, promises made to God have their human expres-sion and commitment to persons has a God-ward dimension. The term "com-mitment," therefore, was used both for the fundamental option and for other interpersonal involvements. When the focus is more specific, the statement is qualified in some way to indicate the proper context in which it should be read_. The following pages, l~hen, are the record of a dialogue, arranged in such a way as to encourage the reader to enter into the flow of ideas and to challenge and qualify and enlarge upon them. As every discussion does, this one" flowed freely and occasionally rambled down some p,retty tangential paths. But in retrospe6t the group's reflections seem to fall under four headings: the challenge to commitment; commitment and human life; commitment and time; and the institutionalization of commitment. Commitment in a Changing World ! !!49 I. "The Challenge to Commitment~ Commitment is challenged today ~'rom many sides and o~ man)~ grounds. The following are a sampling of some ~f the objections which the participants observed. It should be noted that these alleged difficulties spring from both theoretical and existential ~considerat'ions. Some comments in this section deal with the waning of commitments once made, rather than with the reluctance to make them. ~ - E~,en our getting together to talk about commitment might be a sign that the concept is threadbare! ' -What I bear people saying today is that to promise to love someone forever . is to lock,-one's feelings into rigidity or into duty, and thus to destroy them. They are willing to say something like, "I do love you, but it's irrelevant~to think about whether I'll love you tomorrow. In fact, ~I won't be able to love you as well now if you make me think about tomorrow. What moves me to say I love you today may not move me tomorrow." -That's right. Sartre is known as the philosopher of commitment, and his whole point is not that we shouldn't be committed, but that we should be °~uthentic in our commitment. We shouldn't be hypocritical~ that is, we shouldn't say, "I love you and I'll, love you forever," and then when we stop loving, continueoto pretend that we do. The thing to do is to say, "1 love you now, and I'll be faithful to that now and take each day as it comes.:' -It seems to me, though, that there are a lot of perversions in the name of authenticity and honesty! In any kind of relationship you're going to have to go through some very dry, dead times., there can be just total periods of deadness in every living°~relationship. ~ -What I think is interesting, then, is how long do you let something be? .How long can you hope that the deadness is going to revive? That's the key thing. Even though.spring follows winter, if you had a winter that went on for twen-ty years, I'd begin to wonder. The point is, how much suffering and how much deadness can there be in a living relationship? -Or,.what if the deadness turns into something really destructive? We're all familiar, too, with the joylessness of some "committed" peoplewthe teeth-gritted, fist-clenched determination to "stick it out!" -We need creative ways to deal with genuine ~nguish. creative ways to live ~ the winter of~ commitment as well as the summer. It is not necessarily hypocritical to~ sustain a commitment through anguish it may be an authentic experience. -Anguish in commitment is one thing, but what about sheer indifference? The absence of any feeling at all is much harder to interpret than suffering. At .least the latter is a sign of some kind of lifel- -I wonder if some of the situations you describe, of the feeling of deadness or the absence of a relationship that had been vital, may not be experiences of , what the mystics used to call the "dark night.'°' Underneath the present pain . is.the conviction that it's still all right, and that somehow or other I'm being 850 / Review for Religious, I"olume 34, 1975/6 weaned off of one level of relationship, and after I go through this thing, this inertia or deadness, it's going to come out all right, But part of the commit-ment is to kind of "hang in there" when the fruits of the love are no longer tangiblemprecisely out of love--and out of the realization that the relationship is going to be deeper at the end. But 9ne of the cultural obstruc-tions we face is that we want to live in a constant positive feeling, a kind of constant ecstacy, a resurrection experience without the crucifixion. But that is just not a realisti~ expectation, given the human condition. -Another reason that people are constantly disappointed is because of the way that they define love. If they define it in the context of growth, of somehow meeting each Other's needs for happiness, joy, and affection, then that's a very limited context. Because then, if their needs aren't fulfilled, they conclude that love is no longer there. And they go on to redefine the relationship: they say, "I was infatuated with that person," even though they had said previously that they loved him. And then they start hunting for another relationship that will fulfill their needs, so that somehow love is not defined in the context of "forever with one person," but in the context of moving from one to another to another and growing as they .move. -That's an illustration of the concept of "Protean man, popularized by Robert Lifton. In this theory, modern man is like the mythical god Proteus, ,, who constantly changed shapes in order to conceal his identity. In its modern application it means that man constantly changes from one commitment to another without any continuity: every relationship is necessarily short-lived and without effect on what followsl If that is an accurate description of man, the human person, then any discussion of permanency in commitment is irrelevant. The only thing Protean man is permanently committed to is non-commitment! -Such a person is a perpetual wanderer. Kierkegaard uses the symbol of a butterfly moving from one experience to another, never investing itself-~-just kind of tasting and moving on. -The Protean-man image does give a picture, though; of many people who ex-perience themselves as. fragmented, without a sufficiently.clear self-identity to make an enduring and deeply-felt commitment. To talk about commit-ment to people who are devoid of self-confidence or of a firm self-concept is to raise an issue which isn't even a real option for them. -There is a diversity in contemporary experience, though, and I wonder if people don't resist making commitments for very different reasons--but reasons which come together in ways that may be interesting, especially for psychologists. I would identify two challenges to commitment, that from idealism and that from despair. The first is the situation of those who enter-tain a larger hope for humanity than human commitments seem to provide. , They are saying that only commitment i~ holding them back from a grander human adventure; it's reducing their f~eedom. 'But on the other hand, and perhaps even hidden in the first position somehow, is the challenge to com-mitment from contemporary~despair, articulated perhaps in behaviorism. In Commitment in a Changing Worm / 851 this view all talk of commitment is naive: human persons are not really capable of that much. Or our aspirations are necessarily limited because of what we see in society and in the surrounding culture. -To add to what you've said, there is another kind of pseudo-idealism that is promulgated in all sorts of ways. For example, the daily "soap opera" presents a picture of romantic love in which the most important thing seems to be to respond to each new lover that comes along lest one limit one's fulfillment; It would be impossible not to be conditioned by a daily.diet of that sort of thing. It's really akin to the quest for personal fulfillment above all else that is presented in more sophisticated ways by many, forms of the media and popular entertainment. -To change the topic somewhat, the difficulty which some people experience with commitment in midlife may really be due to an over-commitment in youth. In the idealism of adolescehce some people seem to over-extend themselves and then have a kind of"energy crisis" later. But this is endemic to the human condition. When the slowdown occurs, you sort of re-negotiate your priorities and plan how you will use your remaining energies. -Yes, when people are leaving commitments, are they in fact withdrawing from over-commitments? Have they over-subscribed their selfhood in a com-mitment which is too tied-in with a cultural formulation? If they have over-invested their personhood in a fixed notion of what their commitment was supposed to be, according to .what their church taught them or their culture taught them or their parents taught them, then withdrawal from that com-mitment is no great loss. -The situation we~described earlier, of a lack of self-identity or self-worth, may also lead to over-commitment. In other words, if I find it all a shambles inside, I'll put on a religious habit or awedding ring and at least I'll know a little bit of who I am. Then I'll be discernible as Sister or Mrs. or Father. II. Commitment and Human Life Havihg dwelt at length on the difficulty of making commitments and of preserving their vitality, the discussion moved to a description of commitment itself and of the role it plays or can play in human life and development. This portion of the dialogue presupposed some basic assumptions about human nature and human capacities, assumptions which were merely hinted at without being explored. -I wonder if the whole question of whether or not commitment is possible, or wise, isn't a meaningless question.After all, people make commitments, and they want to make them. It may be a problem to know what to do about them when they are made, but in fact people do make them all the time. Even those who refuse in principle to make any commitments make a kind of commitment to non-commitment. -I doubt that it's as simple as that. There are persons who are in some sense non-committed. If I were to try to characterize such a person I think I would Review for Religious, l,'olume 34, 1975/6 say that he or she goes through the same stages that a committed person goes through, only the non-committed person goes through these stages with a series of people. The committed person.goes through these stages with one person. We could, of course, say that the non-committed person goes through a series of commitments, but that nonetheless he or she is not a "committed person." -You mean that in the stages of, say, "highs and lows" or~"light and darkness" the uncommitted person attempts to re-experience the highs with another .person? -Yes, something like that. This is what I would want to say is a picture of a non-committed person. -:But you draw your picture assuming that it is better to be committed than non-committed in this way, Isn't that precisely the question we're asking? What is wrong with moving from one commitment to another? Isn't it possi-ble that we are .even called from one commitment to another? Isn't holding on to only one commitment stifling or narrowing or--especially if the one commitment proves destructive--isn't it a mistake to hold to it simply for the sake of holding to it? -I thi'nk we're going to go a~'ound in circles on that question unless we try to see what there is about our experience of human life that makes us want to make a commitment, that makes us even need to make commitments, and that makes us think that there is something good about living a commitment out to the end. For example, doesn't it have something to do with our ex-perience of being fragmented, of wanting to love with our whole heart and mind and strength and knowing that we are not yet whole? People say today that commitment 'makes love into a duty, and thereby undermines it. I don't think that that is so~ There are loves that awaken in us, that makeus yearn to be fait~hful forever. We have an inkling that it won't just "happen" that we will be'faithful, it won't just "turn out" that we will be faithful without our making some choices about that. That's why we make promises to love. We want to give our word to the one we love. We want to gather up our whole life, our future, and place it all in affirmation 0fwhat we love. It's a question of whether our freedom is powerful enough to stretch into the future. I cer-tainly can't wind it up like a clock and then let it go! I can't just choose to love forever and then it's all settled: "I will love forever." So I commit myself, I give my pledge, my word, my promise. "To commit" means "to send with," to place somewhere, to entrust, to dwell. I give or send my word, and in so doing I entrust myself in a way to the other. Now my word calls to me from within the other. I have given the one I love a kind of claim over my love.,It is no longer a question of my simply being faithful to or consistent with, my own resolution. It is a question of my being faithful to the other in whom I dwell by my word. When my inclinations to love falter, there is the ongoing call to me from the other. -Could I add that this all makes sense because I continue to want to love, even though I. recognize my own weakness? It is not a matter of love now being Commitment in a Changing World / 053 reduced only to duty. I want to love, though the feelings and emotions that made loving easy at one time have receded for now. Kierkegaard says something like, "Duty then comes as an old friend," helping me to do what it is I most deeply want to do though cannot do without the call to faithfulness which is grounded in my having given my word. -I wonder if we could say that commitment is necessary in human lif~ not in spite of the fact that we are weak and fragmented and sinful, but because of that. If we were in paradise, commitment would be unnecessary. I remember in some recent discussions on commitment being struck by the image of ourselves as mountain climbers. Commitment is like the process of getting in your stake up higher so that you can pull yourself up. Ideally perhaps we could just walk up the mountain, but in reality we are not the kind of people who can walk up mountains. -That's an interesting idea, to think of commitment in relation to our sin-fulness. On the one hand, I think the desire to be whole in relation to the one we love--whether God or a human person--is a sign of what is good in human persons, a sign of what is true about our being, Commitment, then, if it helps to hold us in fidelity, in truthful love, serves to make us whole and to continue in relation to another. On the other hand, there is something about our desire to be whole or to be satisfied, or even to be fully alive, that is a sign of the evil, the woundedness, in us. For our desires are insatiable, and they can pull us or press us to fidelity or to fickleness. Because we are never satisfied, we can be drawn offcourse on the mountain. Without the stake, to use your image, we can try this way and that up the slope, but gradually simply lose our grip, neither dwelling happily.~ in .one place nor climbing to another. -We don't~have to talk about that just in terms of sin, although that's clearly part of our experience. Wherever there is any person with a fallible will, with shakeable freedom, it makes sense for that person to give her word. As you said a minute ago, that's yielding to someone a claim, and we do that in situations where we think we might need to be claimed, The whole point of giving one's word is to Strengthen the one who gives it, and to assure the one who receives it, and to have a way of integrating one's self and expressing one's self and one's love. When God gives His word to us, however, it's not because He has a shakeable will, but because we need assurance. It's very important for us to receive His word, to know the incredible truth that He yields to us a claim even on His love. -We know our own love as embattled, in a sense, and there are built into human life counterforces to love. We know our weakness, and we cannot guarantee our fidelity, but we want to try to build in supports against the tendency to infidelity which we recognize in ourselves. We go beyond where we are, perhaps, (like the mountain climber throwing his stake) and express and affirm what we want to be though we know we are not yet. Sometimes the fact that we give our word in the pres~ence of others also increases the chance that we will love against adversity. 864 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/6 -Yes, and the fear of death through commitment (since we may find that it sours or grows cold), is perhaps importantly counterbalanced by a recognition that there is another kind of death which non-commitment can entail. If there is a danger that passion (devotion, power of feeling) will die in the process of commitment, so al~o is there danger that without commitment passion will be wasted, diffused in a superficial search for an intimacy that cannot.always be had in commitment, but can never be had without it. -You make commitment sound so good that I worry about persons' wanting to make a commitment and sort of going around looking for something to commit themselves to. I agree with what you are saying, but it presupposes a kind of prior call to commitment. That is, we can't just decide we'regoing to commit ourselves and then pick something or someone to commit ourselves to. No, I think commitment at the level you are talking about makes sense only if we experience ourselves awakened in love for someone who seems worthy of our commitment, whose loveableness calls to our love and our freedom. -Yes, and as we said earlier, that is part of the problem of commitment now. Persons despair of their finding anything worthy of their commitment. Everything, in a way, depends on the revelation of persons to persons of their beauty and ioveableness. That's why it makes sense to me that everything, in a deeper way, depends on God's revelation of His beauty and loveableness. -And on His revelation that unconditional love and commitment and fidelity are possible because He loves us with a faithful and unconditional love. And perhaps on His revelation, too, that we are somehow enabled by His gift, His grace, to respond to Him and to one another with fidelity in unconditional love. -This is perhaps neither here nor the.re, but it just occurred to me that if we were todo a study of great committed people, we might find that at least one ingredient in their lives was an awareness of something beautiful, of someone beautiful. Maybe we would find that ingredient in tension with a kind of restlessness, too. There may be a combination of feeling very gifted es-pecially through love and of being haunted by a restlessness which has something to do with feeling capable of doing something because of being loved and because of loving. The participants recognized that a great deal more needs to be said about the nature of human persons, human love and commitment. Everyone wanted to underline the importance of some kind of call to commitment, of commit-ment as a response, but of commitment as a process, a way, rather than an achievement or an end. Concern was expressed to clarify commitment as not just a means to one's own wholeness, but as a means to be wholly for another. A need was expressed to address further the difficulties,in making a commit-ment and in keeping a commitment, and to address these in as concrete a way as possible. A caution was introduced because of the failure thus far to dis-tinguish different kinds and degrees of commitment. Distinctions were offered Commitment in a Changing World / 855 in terms of conditional and unconditional, temporary and permanent, relative and absolute, instrumental and core commitments. The task of personal dis-cernment as well as fidelity regarding priority of commitments was noted. At this point, however, the discussion shifted to more explicit questions of com-mitment and time, of commitment lived through a lifetime. III. Commitment and Time A recurring theme throughout the discussions was the experience of time in human commitments. Again and again participants struggled with both con-crete examples of change in commitment and love, and with theoretical inter-pretations of human time and duration. Even a theology of time seemed to become important in considering issues of Christian commitment. -We spoke in the beginning of the problem of time and change within com-mitment. If I change (which I inevitably do), how can I pledge myself to re-main the same in my love for another? How can I even say I will continue to perform the deeds of love? What if new circumstances make that.iml~ossible? Or what if the one I love changes? Am I ever justified in changing my com-mitment, even in breaking it? I for one would like to focus on just these questions for awhile. -Yes, what about the current theory that commitments made by me when I was young are no longer binding when I become mature? I'm not the same person I was, and so I can no longer be held to what an earlier self pledged. -Is our understanding of the personal self at stake here? If so, I hold for some kind of continuity of the self, some kind of continuing self-identity. I think I am the same person I was as a childmeven though I am obviously also profoundly different. I am, therefore, responsible in the present for com-mitments I made in the past. -Always responsible, do you think? Or even if always responsible, always still obligated? -I think we need to be more concrete here. Surely it can be the case that even .though I am in some sense the same person throughout my lifetime, yet I can undergo sufficient change (or the situation can change drastically) so that, for example,~ I am unable to complete my commitment without clear destructiveness to others or to myself to an extent that outweighs whatever is to be gained by completing it. Or surely I can change so that my way of ex-pressing my committed love needs to be modified. It doesn't seem to me the most important question is whether or not a change in commitment is ever justified. It obviously can be justified if, for example, it becomes impossible to keep a commitment, or if a prior commitment conflicts with keeping this commitment, or if this commitment deepens into a commitment which fulfills it but is beyond ~. ,, -I agree with you, but you realize you are on what ethicists might call a slippery slope. While it is true that changes in commitment can be called for, we are also inclined to do a lot of rationalizing in that regard. I'm not 856 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/6 suggesting we should keep all commitments just because of fear of that. I'm only adding a note of caution. -We obviously can't delineate here exact descriptions of justified commitment-changes or unjustified commitment-changes. In fact, that might distort the whole question. It is important for us, though, to affirm that a person can in good faith discern a call to change.commitment. That change can be accounted for in terms of fidelity, not infidelity~ There is a kind of fundamental obligation which each person has to discern in con-science what is the way of fidelity. And that is never an easy task. On the other hand, it is important for us to affirm that every difficulty experienced in commitment (even terrible suffering at times) does not signify either a need for change or a justification of change. -Before we go further into the question of difficulties in keeping com-mitments, could we say something more about the beginnings of com-mitment? When, for example, do we know that we are capable of making profound commitments? Whether commitments remain binding, and whether they prove to be fruitful, depends to a great extent on our capacity for making them wisely and well in the first place. -I' don't think we always kno~ when a commitment actually begins. Its begin-ning doesn't always coincide with an explicit making of a promise or a vow. Sometimes we experience commitment as something that has taken place in us before we become aware of it at a conscious level. I may one day discover, for example (perhaps on a day when I see you in great need of my help), that indeed I have given you my heart in friendship; and I can now choose to ratify the commitment I find I have already made. -We certainly would want to note that commitment does not always begin with its external legal or ceremonial declaration; The latter is surely impor-tant, but we all know of commitments made long before their public celebra-tion and of commitments which are finally made long after their public form has been sealed. -If we look at the kind of maturity needed to make lifelong commitments, it is clear that certain healthy psychological levels of maturity are neededmand perhaps even faith levels of maturity. Yet I can't help resisting some of the present insistence on psychological, health as a basis for all commitment. While affirming it, I want to add that if the role of commitment is as we suggested earlier--namely, to help us to become whole in relation to another--then it cannot have full maturity or wholeness as its prerequisite. If I find commitment necessary for maturation (as does Eric Erikson, for example, in his presentation of the stages of human development), then it is clear that it cannot wait upon full maturity for its making. -That point must be made (with your same caution) in regard to Christian commitment as well. It probably bears pondering that Jesus declared, "I am not called to come to the healthy, but to those who are sick." And then there is Paul's reminder, "Who of you are well-born?" Though again I say this with the usual qualificati0.ns. Commitment in a Changing World / 857 -We might put ~the question this way: What kind of person makes a com-mitment? A strong person or a weak person? A person who is integrated or a person who is aware of fragmentation? I suspect our answer must grasp both alternatives. A person who makes a commitment wisely and well is one who is at home with himself or herself, who experiences' self-worth, etc. But perhaps also such a person experiences some uneasiness, some distress, some fragmentation. This relates to what we said before of the yearning of love to become whole, to deal with fragmentation. ,~ -We keep saying that commitment is a way of becoming whole, a way of growing in love. Clearly something more has to be seen in that regard, because we certainly have not in the past emphasized this aspect of commit-ment. The language of "states" of life, for example, was almost in opposi-tion to it. Now, it seems to me, we are trying to acknowledge that commit-ment (for example, in religious lifeor in marriage) does not mean that a love is once and for all sealed in union with the one loved. -Let me say something.here. I know people who think their first marriage is a 'trial run,' and then they enter a second and a third. Finally it dawns on them that it is marriage that is the problem; it's not the other person that's the problem. When I say marriage is the problem I don't mean here what some would mean--namely, that marriage undermines relationships, and'so forth. No, I mean that marriage is the way to relation, but if it isn't understood that way; it is no wonder that it doesn't work for many. If.t can put it this way, there is in marriage what many of you would understand as a kind of novitiate in selflessness. But that's only the beginning. -Yes, that's something of what I'm trying to say. Commitment is not the end of a story, but in a very real way the beginning (or at least an extremely im-portant point of impetus and direction along the way), We make com-mitments so that we may learn to love, grow in"love,,.There may be nothing more beautiful in all creation than a courageous love, but it is not born whole. The vows which have been characteristic of religious life or marriage, then, are ways of coming to love, means.for expanding one's mind and heart in order to grow into a great and wise love:. -But what assures that commitment will indeed lead that way? We simply must not pass over toolightly the very real problems that We saw earlier and that are being raised with sharpness and great credibility today. What if love finally is always unfaithful? What if the object of love finally always proves disappointing? What if commitment sours at least as often as it liberates? What if we who are created as always changing truly cannot bear the non-changing of commitment? -Wait a minute. Let me just say something about your last question. I think it is a pure and simple myth to say that our need for change can only be answered on a model of changing from one commitment to another (or remaining uncommitted, as I guess we described it before). In fact,.the ex-ample of this that we have had--Lifton's Protean mannis a perfect example of an experience of not changing. Let me explain what I mean. Protean man, 1~58 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/6 ~presumably, finds in each commitment he makes an inevitable ceiling--on his desires, his interest, his belief. Every time he engages himself in some project or in some love he comes to an end in an experience of inertia, dis-illusionment, lack of life. This proves intolerable--for it is indeed an ex-perience of the stopping of process and change in his life. To be free of this, he moves to yet another project or person. But notice that through this mov-ing from one thing to another he finally ends in cynicism, sadness, and a sense of the absurd. That hardly sounds like an overall experience of a living process! The truth is that within himself there is no process. Moving fran-tically from one thing to an6ther looks like life-process, but it never touches him inwardly; within himself he does not change. Nothing really is happen-ing inside. The possibility of something really new coming intoobeing, of real change in the heart of the self, may only occur in the process which commit-ment entails. Does that make any sense? -It may make more sense if you can say something more positive about what this process within commitment is. -Maybe we have to say something about the fabric of time which in a way forms the inner structure of commitment. In a way commitment," as everyone asserts, transcends time. It does have an element of the non-temporal-- or the eternal, if you will, or the non-changing (if that category is important to you).This is especially clear in a permanent commitment. -Isn't that what we mean when we say "forever?" We intend it as a way of transcending time rather than as a time statement~ We're saying, it seems to me, that "I will not let the 'conditions of time or the circumstances at the level of duration erode that which I now say about myself to you," -Yes, but let me quickly add that there is also in commitment, even and perhaps especially in permanent commitment, an element that is wholly tem-poral- that is, a reality that is stretched out and changing in time. Now this is to say that something is on the one hand. eternal about commitment, and something is on the other hand changing. Or better, something about the whole reality of the commitment radically changes. It might help to talk about it in terms of stepping into a relationship with the other. When I make a commitment to another person, I step into a new relationship with him or her. This relati6nship is qualified radically as "forever." I have given my word, and thus myself, in a way that is forever. Yet I, on my sideof the rela-tion, will change, and the one who rec(ives my word, on the other side of the relation, will also change through time. This means that the relation, too, will change: It does not, however, change into non-relation. It is qualified in new ways--for example, by a growth in intimacy. Certain aspects of the relation may emerge and others recede. One might almost draw an analogy between virtue in an individual person and virtue in a relationship. In both realities there is development, and we need a language to describe the growth of thee reality of relation as well as the growth of the reality of an individual person. Perhaps the virtue of a relationship is intimacy. -That makes a lot of sense. Your picture of commitment gets to the on- Commitment in a Changing World / 859 tological. I am now in relation to someone. I could never go back to the self that I was before the commitment except by saying that I now formally step out of the realm of being which has been created by the commitment. Even then I do not go back to that self, for I am forever in some way qualified by having made the commitment. It is my self that really changes, yet remains myself. ~ -Yes. Could I try to say it again? When I make a commitment a new reality begins--the reality of relation to another. Then it is this relation that remains, but moves through time, changing, hopefully growing. It is not a reality separate from myself, nor an appendage to myself. It is myself in relation. As it grows, so do I become new, again and again, yet more fully and wholly what ,I already, am. -Could we add that aspects of growth and change include dimensions of the total personality--imagination, memory, feeling? -Now we are in a position to look at the negatives in commitment. If it in-volves life-process, then the diminishments experienced within it must have the possibility of being taken up into that process. We surely experience, for example, our commitments being choked of their life, or distracted from their life, or overwhelmed in some way. W( know what it means to have barriers grow up in the commitment-relation. In one sense, we must learn a kind of creativity in the liying out of commitment. If it is a way, then we must learn what it means to go along that way. So we must learn creative ways to deal with what chokes us, what irritates us, what renders us helpless. Too little time and attention have been given to learning such things. Perhaps this is because we did not see clearly enough that commitment is a way that must be gone along. -There is something else that arises in the process of commitment, and which is experienced as negative. I've been thinking a long time about this because I've watched so many people go through it. I've experienced it myself in small ways, too, and I think there are clues to be gotten which will tell us how to deal with it. I'm not talking about the exlSerie.nce of being angered or frustrated, and so forth. The only way I can describe it is in terms of being "unhitched" from commitment. It's like driving along in a cart with a horse drawing it, and then the hors~ becomes loose, unhitched, and off it goes on its glorious way, leaving you sitt~ing there. It's like the world going on, or the community going on, and you are left simply sitting there. But in this in-stance it is your life that is somehow sepa.r_ated from you. Perhaps it could also be described as an experience of a.vacuum. Nothing is happening, nothing changes. The lid is on the future, so that it closes in on you. The past is somehow cut off from you and left behind only to.be stared at from a dis-tance. All sense of really living is gone. You become an observer of your life, only able to watch yourself doing what you.do, not able to enter into your own life as a participant. As soon as we back off and only watch ourselves living our lives, it is all over, .unless we discover how to enter into it again. In a sense what must be done is more than "renewing commitment." It is rather 860 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/6 like jumping out of the cart and running after the horse. All 1 can do is use these figures of speech to describe this experience. It is the experience I have '-heard countless persons describe as "something missing." There must be ways to redeem even such time, to make it fruitful in the life-process which is our commitment-relation. Once again, however, we have not yet done much to help one another to find such ways. -Is.all of this to say that it is not possible to truly keep a commitment (if it is a commitment to love) unless we learn the ways of nurturing its life, of freeing our own life and love within and through it? Commitment is a way to love and freedom, but the present task is to chart more clearly the yet shadowed way which it is. I suppose we have said from the beginning in our discussions together that the way is constituted somehow by both light and darkness. It is, as others have said, the darkness which raises the question of fidelity--fidelity which is not just gritting one's teeth and remaining con-stant, but which continues to believe in the light once seen andto watch and to wait and in some sense to serve that light even though we are not at times ourselves able to see it. Some discussion ensued as to how commitment may have the power to un-leash in us the springs of love and action. Attention was given to the role of forgiveness in the life-process of commitment. Finally, however, the .par-ticipants turned to a set of questions which had arisen from time to time throughout the sessions. These questions centered on communal dimensions of commitment, the implications of commitment for society at large, and the ex-istential, concrete framework for commitment. IV. The Institutionalization of Commitment When a commitment is made, it takes life in space and time, a given historical setting and era, within a framework provided by the free decision of the participants, community relationships, society and culture at large. Therefore, when we talk about a commitment to love God or another person, we have to deal with certain structures to which we commit ourselves as well. In this portion of their discussion the participants considered specific, issues regarding membership requirements for religious communities, structural changes and their implications for a community's understanding of its bwn commitment, and so forth. This led to a consideration of underlying questions of priority in commitments, implementation of commitments, and Church regulation of religious life and of marriage. A continuing focus was on the in-carnati0nal dimension of commitment. -A lot of what we,have said so.far applies most clearly to a commitment to love--to love God and to love another person or persons. But there is a whole area which"is just as problematic today as the fundamental commit-ment to love. That's the area of the structures we commit ourselves to--the structures which are, in a w.ay, part and parcel of our commitment to love because they are the concrete forms of living and acting that we commit Commitment in a Changing World ourselves to as an expression of love and as a means to love. Now, for exam-ple, I know many young religious today who have no problem with knowing themselves called to and responding in an unconditional commitment to God. But they have a lot of problems with the structures they find that com-mitment tied to in, for example, a given religious community. I'm just think-ing of some that I have lived with. They understand their permanent com- ~.mitment very differently from the way I understood it (and perhaps the way I understand it now). They see that the only absolute commitment they make is to God, and if they perceive that God calls them beyond their present religious community, then they must leave it (though I'm not saying that they're planning on doing that--only that it remains open as a possibility). -Well, in a sense there can be no denying the validity of that view. It is only God who can call us to absolute love and commitment. All other com-mitments are (or at least in a Christian view should be) relative to a commit-ment to God. The .problem is in discerning what "relative" means here. It means, of course, "related to." It means that the whole raison d'etre for them is their prior commitment to God. But it can also mean that the com-mitment'to God is in some way essentially expressed in these other com-mitments. It surely means, when we are talking about commitment to love other persons, that those commitments (at least to love, if not to live in cer-tain patterns of life expressive of that love) are forever--just as our commit-ment for God is forever. -There are many Sides to this question, and they are all in some sense perplex-ing. We can't on the one hand keep moving through life saying our commit-ment is to God and never really give ourselves to anyone else or never really yield our love for God to .concrete enduring patterns of life which express that love. On the other hand, our commitment to God cannot reify itself in a narroffly defined, immediate context which we refuse to see can and sometimes must be modified in order to be faithful to God. -The question is perplexing in the concrete, but at least what we have said thus far about priority of commitments, the relation of one commitment to another, etc., seems fairly clear to me in theory. -But concretely, we have to take account of the testimony of persons who are anguished now in their discernment of what is fidelity and what is infidelity. We mentioned those who perceive their call from God in a way that makes them necessarily chafe against certain patterns of life and activity which their community may still think are important. But there are also persons who feel that the religious community to Which they committed themselves has changed so much that they can no longer in conscience remain faithful within it. And then there is the problem of the dissonance not only between individual and community but between community and Church. We all know of the tension often felt now by communities within the Church who wish to see their fidelity to God in terms of fidelity to the Church, and yet who find a strange disparity at times between the two. If we didn't take any of these~ seriously--if tlie pattern of our commitments was not seen by us as a62 / Review for Religious, l/olume 34, 1975/6 im, portantly interwoven--we could opt for whatever we wanted at any time. But we obviously, both in marriage and in religious life, are offered the task by the Spirit today of finding the ways of fidelity within a whole pattern of relationships, ~all of which are held in our relation to,God. -I want to say that this kind of tension, even the experience of being "regulated," can work both ways. If everybody got up every morning and defined marriage or religious life in their own way, there would be chaos. Or more importantly, there would be total isolation. We can neither ignore our tradition, our interrelationships, our call, ultimately, to communion with all persons, nor distort it by mindless submission to what was intended as a point of interpersonal discernment and response. -You know, it might help to look at this for a moment as if we were discern-ing for ourselves, within the Church, what God is calling us to. After all, there is a sense in which we can do what we want within the Church. Groups of persons can discern themselves called in many different ways, and as long as these ways are authentic ways of living the Christian life they are free to embrace them, and to embrace them communally. The issue of canonical recognition is not necessarily a central issue--certainly not for everyone in the Church. If I want to live in poverty or chastity or obedience for three years and three years only, I can do it, and the Church doesn't say aye or nay. If I want to live celibacy but not poverty (in the usual sense), I can do it, and again the Church will neither command me nor forbid me. But it is ex-tremely important, it seems to me, to add that that does not rule out the possibility that some persons within the Church (myself included) will still want to gather up their whole future in a permanent commitment, and to make that commitment in terms of a life of poverty and celibacy and obedience within community. It is important that those who are called to that continue to find a way to celebrate it within the Church. Other forms of life may also need to be celebrated within the Church, but to be open to new ways need not (in fact, surely should not) mean to close off present ways. -Yes, I can affirm that and add that, within this context, there still remain practical decisions for each community of persons such as you describe. For example, the ever recurring questions of whether a community should have associate members or temporary members or married members are questions that simply involve practical decisions (based on discernment in prayer, of course) for a community. -You mean that a community, for example, must discern for itself in terms of its understanding of its call from God and the individual ways in which its members are called to participate in that communal call--must discern whether it is to have an associate membership or a third order or some other departure from present practice? -Yes, why not? There is plenty of precedent for that kind of thing, and room for many variations on a theme. Different cultural contexts, different com-munal ministries, and many other factors will all make a difference in a corn, munity's discernment of such things. There is no one law written in heaven Commitment in a Changing Worm / 863 about them to which all must conform. But it is important that a community take seriously a truly communal discernment and decision in this regard. Or even if a community postpones decisions on some of these kinds of questions, it is important for it to know why it postpones them. -If we agree that structures must follow on life experience, perhaps this is the time in history to reflect on the experience we now have of members who would prefer a status other than that conferred by "final vows"; that is, they want to renew their vows every three years or so in an "ongoing com-mitment." If we would re-structure our communities to include a core group and a transient group, we would eliminate some of the necessity for dispen-sations with their negative connotations. Maybe this is the Spirit directing these young people and somehow we as a church have to respond to them. -I think I agree in principle, but somehow I'm wondering wherewe are as a "core group" right now. There is the real question of where we are right now: is there strength at the center, so that the core could truly enliven the whole structure? I mean I can only think of a half dozen people that I really think are the core. By the core group I do not mean people who are going to stay in religious life; I am talking about those who are alive enough to share life in some way. This is not a pessimistic view, it's just saying that right now we are in a phase where it may be necessary to get ourselves together first. On the other hand, maybe extending membership to.associates may be a way of getting ourselves together. -I worry, though, about 'the traditional problems of first and second class citizens. You have to have a tremendous inner peace and sense of who you are and what you are about to avoid those kinds of difficulties. -As a matter of fact, it has been a policy in our religious community since 1971 thatwe would permit women who wished to do so to associate themselves with us in a kind of informal membership. The thought was that if we permitted this to develop spontaneously :for a few years, we would ac-cumulate enough data to enable us to structure something which would be mutually supportive and realistic. However, after more than two years we did a survey and found out that the total number of such applicants was almost zero. So should we go out and recruit them? How do you strike a middle ground between permitting something to emerge and institutionaliz-ing it prematurely? -One way traditionally has b~en to find ways to share the religious com-munity's gifts, to share life with others through retreats, courses in 'spiriiuality, days of prayer, collaboration in ministry, etc. In this way sodalities and third orders have originated, informally at first, and then more formally. The spirit of the religious community and its characteristic spirituality is shared with a larger circle of people who may then desire a kind of membership or more formal association. -You mentioned the characteristic spirituality of a religious community . There is some talk today about the blurring of distinctions between various communities and between celibates and non-celibates, clerics and non- 064 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/6 clerics, so that conceivably institutional distinctions could be wiped out. On the one hand, the elimination or relativization of distinctions emphasizes the basic Unity of Christians; on the other hand, the individual groups emphasize the rich diversity of gifts and graces. I think this is a situation ~where we should proceed somewhat pragmatically, not rushing to reduceall religious communities to one group, but rather asking ourselves what is congruous .with the unity and diversity of the gospel. Religious communities are distinct in this, at least, that their members have freely joined them, rather than be-ing born into them, and this deliberate choice is a kind of witness. -Yes~, we have to ask ourselves, what do we experience ourselves being called to, individually and as a community? What we designate as the "essentials" and the "accidentals" of our commitment should be a reflection of that call. And the fact that religious life was institutionalized in the form of certain es-sentials and accidentals tells us that, at least in the past and apparently to some extent today, people feel themselves called in terms of certain specific graces; for example, they are called to a life of celibacy or to evangelical poverty or to,live in community in Christ's name. -Another aspect of the institutionalization of commitments and their public expression is its value to society itself. We sense that somehow there is some damage to the objective order when a commitment is betrayed. Somehow . the fabric of s~ociety, of the whole body--be it the body politic or the Body of Christ--is strengthened or weakened by our fidelity to, or our betrayal of, commitment. The climate of mutual trust is strengthened or weakened. -Many people find their ability to remain faithful enhanced or threatened by the presence or absence of community support. Ongoing commitment in-volves continuous re-election, re-commitment, re-selection, and all of those . with whom and to whom we have committed ourselves figure in this process. Maybe the parable of the seed falling on good ground and on rocky ground, and so forth, is helpful here. For example, it seems to me not impossible that oa community could be bad ground. It could be the cause of the death of someone's commitment within him; if the community demanded too much from him or distracted him in some way, it could choke the commitment. Or the community COuld be just a dry wasteland. ~On the positive side, the community could be very fertile .soil indeed. If I were to describe the kind of support that I would expect or appreciate on a day-to-day level, I wouldn't look for high points such as the discussion we've been having these days. What~ I would look for in the members of my com-munity would be a kind of resonance, a sense that they were in sympathy with what I was doing, and supported, the .efforts I was ~making. I want to share a, common understanding with the members of my community about such things as who we are as a community, and why we are together, even though it isn't necessary to articulate it very .often. -But besides furnishing one another that basic affirmation, there also has to be an openness to the new, a willingness to challenge one another to reach for greater heights of generosity. I guess religious have to call one another to Commitment in a Changing World faith, as well as calling other members of the Christian community. -Perhaps our concept of ministry has to be re-thought or re-integrated into the Christian synthesis in terms of a call to faith. We have described commit-ment in terms of "radicality" and the committed person in terms of "marginality" vis-a-vis certain cultural norms which are often uncritically accepteduthese terms suggest a kind of presence, a~ very challenging and a personal presence. It isn't so much a question of the apostolate being done, but of understanding and living fully the kind of lives we are called, to and sharing that. Flowing out of that will be specific kinds of service: the healing ministry, teaching, or whatever. -Yes, there is a correlation between the diversity of commitment and diversity in ministry. Sometimes the stance of love is to stand alone, to be in protest; sometimes the stance is to .be a mediator, or to be co-opted in some way. Even while we're allowing for individual insights and calls within Ch°ristian service, there's such a thing as the total stance of the community. Sotit still seems important to me that we have the reference points of some specifications of commitment. Whatever the stance is, whatever it is that we're about, however we try to blend our lives together, it has something to do with being poor, something to do with celibate fLiendship, something to do with abandoning ourselves in union with the obedience of Jesus Christ which .at least implies listening to something beyond ourselves. Further reflections of the participants concerned the relationship of com-mitment and ministry and the necessity of a genuine interiority in apostolic service. Throughout the discussion there was a sense that the multitude of commitments which an individual, makes must be integrated in their inward reality and their outward expression. Toward a Conclusion As with every good discussion, the participants ended with a touch of reluc-tance: there was a sense of incompleteness, a desire to explore further paths only noted in passing, to qualify assertions that were perhaps too confident or too hesitant, and to raise new questions which might expand, the, horizons of understanding. Hence the discussion eludes neat summarization and does not provide ready solutions or conclusions. Some.threads did recur again and again, however, and it may be helpful to recall them here. First of all, promising is a persistent phenomenon. Despite all of the dif-ficulties attendant on making a commitment today and of living it out faithfully in an ever-changing context, people are still making them. Hence, the need to commit oneself to another seems to spring from some deep human need and instinct, something deeper than a merely cultural basis would ex-plain. Moreover, the participants in this discussion shared among themselves a strong "commitment to commitment": while they were not unmindful of the risks and hazards of commitment, they all affirmed its possibility and value in human life. Furthermore, they affirmed that interpersonal commitment must a66 / Review for. Religious, !/olume 34, 1975/6 be understood as the beginning of a relationship, a relationship that can be ex-pected to unfold gradually, in response to new circumstances. Such an evolv-ing relationship may well include periods of darkness and dryness which must be integrated into the whole dynamism of growth. As commitments move through time, there are tensions inherent in their continued existence, tensions between continuity and change, fragmentation and unity, spontaneity and pattern, contract and gift. In the face of our~per-sonai experience of fragmentation and conflict, we experience simultaneously the inability and the need to pledge our word. The framework which society and community furnish for our commitments may be experienced at one time as supportive and at another as restrictive. We may feel drawn by an invitation or bound by a legal agreement. Furthermore, our ability to commit ourselves deeply and without reserve is intimately linked to our own sense of self-identity and self-worth. The context of commitment is also integral to its nature: our promises must be incarnated in space and time. While structures follow life, they can also be supportive of life. That is, commitments should only~be formalized or institutionalized if they are genuine and viable, but then the framework which community ~and society provide must support them. Although structures are relative, the process of changing them should be a thoughtful and prayerful one. There is no virtue in either changing structures or in leaving them un-changed; what is important is their congruity to gospel, to the needs of our day, and to our fallible human resources. Where do we go from here?'The really basic questions~in life have a way of reasserting themselves again and again under new guises, and requiring fresh attention. Perhaps this is because the only entirely satisfactory response to such life-questions is the personal one, made in the context of one,s own relationships of family, community, and society, Each of us must question the possibility and value of a lifetime commitment in his or her own iife~: can I live a fully human and a fully Christiah life without it? BIBLIOGRAPHY Beha, Marie, O.S.C. "Paradoxes of Commitment," Sisters Today, 46 (August-September, 1974), ¯pp. I-9. Burrell, David, C.S.C. "A Fresh Look at 'Perpetual Commitment,' "Sisters Today, 41 (April, 1970), pp. 457-461. ~ Clarke, Thomas E., S.J. "Jesuit Commitment--Fraternal Covenant?" Studies in the Spirituality of Jesuits, II1 (June, 1971),'pp. 70-102. ~. "The Crisis of Permanent Consecration," Sisters Today, 41 (August-September, 1969), pp. 1-15. __. New Pentecost or New Passion? The Direction of Religious Life Today. New York: Paulist Press, 1973. Coville, Walter J. "The Psychological Development of Tentative Commitment to the Priesthood and the Religious'~ Life," Seminary Department Relevant Report. National Catholic Educational Association (June, 1972). Commitment in ,a Changing World / 867 Farley, Margaret A., R.S.M. A Study in the Ethics of Commitment within the Context of Theories of Human Love and Temporality. Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation. Yale Univer-sity, 1973. Haughey, John C., S.J: "Another Perspective on Religious Commitment," Studies in the Spirituality of Jesuits, 111 (June, 1971), pp. 103-119: Keniston, Kenneth. The Uncommitted. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1960. Lifton, Robert Jay. "Protean Man." The Religious Situation 1969. Edited by Donald R. Cutler. Boston: Beacon Press, 1969. Marcel, Gabriel. Creative Fidelity. New York: Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, 1964. __. Being and Having, New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1965. Murphyr David M., ed. Seminary Newsletter, Supplement No. 3. National Catholic Educational Association (November, 1973). Orsy, Ladislas M., S.J. "Religious Vocation: Permanent or Temporary?" Sisters Today, 40 (February, 1969), pp. 347-349. Toffler, Alvin. Future Shock. New York: Random House, 1970. Van Kaam, Adrian, C.S.Sp. "'Life of the Vows: Commitment to a Lasting Life Style." Envoy, V (September, 1968), pp. 125-131. Westley, Richard J. "Fidelity and the Self," Sisters Today, 45 (April, 1973), pp: 482-489. __. "On Permanent Commitment," Ame~'ica (May 24, 1969). __. "The Will to Promise," Humanitas, VIII (February, 1972), p. 9-20. (N.B.: This entire issue of Humanitas is devoted to articles on "Commitment and Human Development.") Space Fora Rose: Spiritual Ecology Sister Mary Seraphim, P.C.P.A. Sister Mary Seraphim is a Poor Clare of Perpetual Adoration and resides in the Sancta Clara Monastery; 4200 Market Ave., N.; Canton, OH 44714. "Time, then, is but the space for a rose to open to fullness." What is this element, time, which surrounds, sustains, measures and secures our existence? We cannot escape it under pain of death but we can never possess it securely. Money does not buy it nor can poverty prevent it. We love it but fume against its restraints. We are meant to transcend it but can only do so by fully integra.ting ourselves into it. Time is our most basic need if we are to be. We are born into time, :grow in its unfolding moments, die When our allotted span has been consumed. It is such a pervasive "given" that we take it for granted. God designed time as the cradle and matrix for His marvelously conceived creature: man. God does not need time to exist but He willed that humankind should need it. For man to exist as God dreamed him to be, he had to have time. There was a moment when he began to be--but he was not com-plete in that first moment. H.appily God does not expect him to be. For man is intended to delight God and His angels by coming to fullness in successive stages. Step by ~tep, we are to grow and develop. We could not do this without time. We could do it without clocks, perhaps, but not without the successive stages of change which time is. Kicking Against the Crib Somehow, somewhere, many of us have begun to harbor a rebellion against time, At least, I have, I began to see time as an uncontrollable tyrant which ruled me, drove me or caged me. I rebelled against it but, of course, quite uselessly. I could neither speed it up nor slow it down. Like a child in 868 Space for a Rose / a69 frustrated rage, I kicked against the very thing which should have been my security and source of hope. I failed to see time for what it really is: the shelter my Father has provided for me until I can~bear exposure to eternity. A sister-psychologist once gave a descriptive definition of time as that which allows things to happen bit by bit, Unless there existed the restraining and apportioning hand of time, everything would happen all at once.t I have enough difficulty trying to cope with troubles one by one. To have to face them all at one time? No thank you! Stop .Kicking and Look Gradually I began to wonder if it would be good to take a long and thoughtful look at this phenomenon known as time. Since it pervades my whole life as necessarily as the air I 'breathe, it seemed to merit some con-sideration. "I'll do it as soon as I have time," I decided. But come to think of it, time, like the poor, we always have with us! It was not that I had no time but that I was unwilling to use the time I had for that purpose. Revelation the first; I always have time. What am I doing with it? When I began to consider time,' I grew to be immensely grateful to my Father for this wondrous girl, Without it, I could not be me for I am a person who is always in the process of becoming. Like a rose~ I~need space to unfold; to happen. Fullness of being is not mine all at once or as asure possession. It is a gift Iam trying to grow into with each new second that is granted to me. Life is being continually re-given. And that, not from a distant heaven but by the Spirit of the Lord hovering, brooding over me. Indeed~ with each new breath I draw, this gift rises up from a wellspring inside me. It is the Spirit who breathes in me, who continues to hold me in being. And I take all this for granted ! What if all my being were given to me at once? Like the angels. Whatever I did I would do with my whole self--but only once. There would be no second doing, no future in which to try again, and, hopefully, do better: There would not be any hope! Instead my Father has allowed that I come to be bit by bit. I grow slow!y to maturity, making mistakes but learning as I go along.All the while I am sheltered, protected by the framework of time which keeps things~from closing in on me. Events happen at a pace and rhythm I am familiar with. Even when things seem to be coming at me too fast, I am called:to meet them only mo- ~ment by moment. It is when I .misuse my ability to mentally transcend time that I get into difficulties, Here and Only Now When I begin to picture future events (usually only possible ones) in the present mo.ment, I begin to get panicky. But if I am honest, I must admit that this not being truly reasonable. My Father may, or may not, have planned this imagined calamity as part of my future. But obviously He has not planned it as part of my present. He has grace for me to.handle the present events and that 870 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/6 is all He is asking of me. When the future becomes the present, it will bring with it all: its attendant graces. If I persist in projecting myself mentally into a non-existent future, I shall indeed have trouble--but not necessarily the kind that sanctifies. More likely, it will bethe type to foster neurosis! The same rule applies if I choose to live over a past that is no more. A child lives in wonder and contentment largely because he lives very much in the present. A small child has very little past to remember and an almost completely unknown future to contemplate. His horizons are limited to today--and, he is for the most part, happy. Do you recall those idyllic days of childhood when days were very long and a week a duration of unimaginable length? To wake in the morning was a thrilling moment (at least it was for me) with the gift of a whole day before me. What would happen that day I could hardly guess but I looked forward to finding out. As the years went by, the luster dimmed and I began to carry accumulated memories and worries into my new day. I began to darken the dawn by projecting storm clouds of anxiety onto the horizon. Joy and wonder went out of my life to a large degree. But Jesus said, "Unless you become as little children." Does that mean He wants us to live each new day as if it were the only one I have--as indeed it is? Yesterday is simply that--yesterday. Tomorrow--that never comes, as the wise man truly said. Here I am with today, just today. It will unfold minute by minute and along with it so shall I. The strong bulwark of time is here to insure that it shall not move faster or slower than I am designed for. There may be grave problems to be met along this unreeling road but they shall not fill every second--unless I allow them. There shall be many tiny islands of pleasure, comfort, joy to be met with too. I can limit the black times to their respective moments by simply letting them go when their time is past. About Pain . I read an account of an incident at Lourdes which has ever since remained an inspiration to me. A pilgrim--a priest, I believe--saw a little boy in one of the invalid stretchers. The child was in such a pitiful condition that the pilgrim was deeply moved and inquired gently how he could stand so much pain. The boy looked up with a bright smile and answered serenely, "It is not hard for I can stand today's pain. I don't have yesterday's anymore and tomorrow's is not here." For all those who have to cope with pain (and who of us does not?) these are words of ageless wisdom. Many have written of the problem of pain or more accurately of the mystery of pain. These theological and psychological studies are very helpful insofar as they provide us with a partial insight into the why and wherefore of suffering in our lives. We all find things easier to bear when they have meaning. But when it comes down to the actual bearing of pain day after day, nothing is more practical than the simple rule of "one day at a time." This may not sound very profound but it is effective wisdom. No matter what kind of pain we have, mental, physical or moral, we can cope with it most effec- Space for a Rose tively when we accept and live with it only moment by moment. For those peo-ple whose pain offers no proximate solution, the temptation to be overwhelmed by it is very real. Especially if it is a combination of physical and mental torments, as it usually is. We can lighten the burden for ourselves and others if we keep our eyes fixed on the God who doles out our life and breath one second at a time. In the same measure He supplies us with His grace, not only to bear but to embrace the pain in our lives. Unpolluted Time We should not pollute the gift of time with a compulsive attitude of rush and of works which absolutely must be done now. Time is the atmosphere of our souls. We must strive to keep it pure. This depends much more on our in-ner attitudes than on the circumstances around us. We don't always have con-trol over outside events but we can exercise control over our attitudes towards them. If you find yourself, as I often discover myself, unconsciously pushing time in order to get to the next event; the next assignment; the next problem, then something needs a bit of adjustment. We are missing the present moment toward which we pressed so eagerly yesterday. And in missing this moment we are missing the God who is waiting for us right now. We think we will find Him next time we are in church, or we will find Him tomorrow, and so we press on, hurry past Him and then wonder why He seems so absent from our lives. He is not absent; we are! Our lives are only a shell of half-lived moments and we are poor; poor and empty. This is not, however, the poverty of spirit which Jesus praised. If we realized how needy we are, we would receive the gift of each moment with grateful wonder and would not dare to abuse it by seeking another time or place. The phrase "spiritual ecology" comes to mind. We can create a beautiful environment for our spirit if we settle down and listen to the message of our beating heart. One beat at a time--not all of them at once (hopefully) and we are living healthily. We breathe in our needed amount of air .this minute and continue to live. Should not this tranquil rhythm permeate our spiritual living also? We have a luxurious amount of time--enough to last our whole lives! But we need to deepen our appreciation of it. Instead of bemoaning the limits it necessarily sets to our activiti,es, even our most spiritual ones, we should joyfully accept the room it makes for all of them. One half-hour is not a very long time for prayer but it can be most rich if each of its thirty complete minutes is cherished in their presence. Our God comes to us only in time. He Loves Time In Jesus' life, we see Him functioning with beautiful tranquillity within the framework of time. He appreciates it; He respects it. He waits patiently for the "hour" which His Father has appointed for Him. Jesus does not try to an-ticipate the time the Father has decreed. He awaits it with composure and uses to their full all the intervening hours and moments in His life. There is an ira- 872 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/6 portant task to be accomplished but Jesus sees that it is meant to be fulfilled by living and loving fully each successive, day. He moves in wide spaces of freedom; so gracious and spacious we think Him touched by eternity. But He found, eternity in the present moment. So can we. God does not do all He wants to do in us as soon as we ask. He has a definite "hour" in mind for us. He comes to meet us at special times in our lives which we cannot anticipate. We may only humbly await them. Sometimes His hour is one of special revelation of HimSelf--or of ourselves. It may be the hour of crushing trial or of joyous unexpected fulfillment. One hour surely awaits all of us, the most decisive one of our lives--our last. We shall scarcely be alive to these extraordinary hours of grace unless we have heard and heeded His word, "My time is at hand," in each ordinary hour of our lives. To develop a healthy spiritual e~ology is not complicated but it requires self-discipline. Our wandering, rushing mind and body must be slowed down, We must deliberately cloister our spirits in the gentle haven of right now. Then we shall walk in wonder and awe before a world most rich and beautiful. Time to See. and B~ If I rush into our enclosed garden determined to get a brisk walk in before 1 do more important things, I shall never see the garden. It shall remain "enclosed" also to me. But if I step out into the sunshine, reveling in the full five minutes my Father has given me, I shall walk with gratitude and wide-open eyes. I shall see the white butterflies with one black spot on each wing dance over the pink zinnias. I shall be able to laugh at the bumblebee who gets snapped at by the snapdragon it was so cautiously opening for nectar. And when these precious five minutes have elapsed I shall be refreshed and alive both physically and spiritually. My Father knows that a rose needs space to unfold, even a wild rose. How good of Him to provide me this room in His mansion of many dimensions, As I write these lines, the cicadas have momentarily stopped singing in the heat. Only the white butterflies are ecstatically circling each other among the blue petunias. It is very quiet., and very good in this moment. The New Law Versus The Gospel Jerome Murphy-O'Connor, O.P. Father Murphy-O'Connor is Professor of'New Testament at the Ecole Biblique de J~rusalem, P.O.B. 178, Jerusalem, Israel. By bringing the prescriptions regarding religious in the New Code of Canon Law to the attention of those who will have to li~e under them Father Kevin O'Rourke has rendered an immensely valuable service.~ Without his ad-mirably objective translations and summaries, the dialogue which should be an integral characteristic of the Christian community would be difficult, if not - impossible. His own evaluation rightly gives credit to the new spirit which animates the revision of this part of the Code, and his censure of the revisors' refusal to accept input from religious is well merited. However, his observation that "A new law can be well designed and constructed, but unless the people think it is 'their' law, it will not be observed as well as if they had some hand in its formulation''2 needs to be taken further. Dissatisfaction can be generated by failure to observe democratic procedures, but a more profound and lasting resentment is awakened when laws do not correspond to the self-understanding of the people they govern. Hence, the need to penetrate behind the statements of the New Code to the theology .of religious life that they embody, It is imperative that the revisors' assumptions regarding the nature of religious life be brought out into the open and subjected to searching debate, because once the New Code is promulgated it will inevitably tend to impose its vision of religious life. Despite the principle of subsidiarity which gives great latitude to particular institutes, it would be ~"The New Law for Religious: Principles, Content, Evaluation," Review for Religious 34 (1975) 23-49. =Art. cit., p. 49. 873 874 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/6 dangerously naive.to assume that the~e will not be pressures to make the con-stitutions of individual congregations conform to the "spirit" of the New Code. Should the revisors' vision of religious life be defective it will frustrate the work of renewal that has begun with so much pain and heart-searching. The advances that have been made will be gradually nullified, and the ground-work will have been laid for a repetition of the crisis that rocked religious con-gregations in the recent years. This danger, in my opinion, is not theoretical but very real. Despite their evident good intentions, the revisors assume an inadequate concept of religious life which has done untold damage in the past. In making this criticism I base myself on the truth that the religious life is but a particular manifestation of the Christian life. In consequence, it must faithfully reflect the pattern of Christian life laid down in the New Testament, and no theology of religious life can be considered adequate unless it successfully integrates 'all the insights of the New Testament. This point has been made explicitly by Vatican II: "Since the fundamental norm of the religious life is a following of Christ as proposed by the gospel, such is to be regarded by all communities as their supreme law" (Perfectae Caritatis, n. 2). When judged against this standard the revisors' understanding of religious life not only fails to reach the ideal proposed by the gospel but on occasion contradicts it. The Definition of Consecrated Life As given by Father O'Rourke, the first canon reads as follows: Life consecrated through the profession of the evangelical counsels is a stable form of life, by which the faithful, following Christ more closely, are dedicated totally to God loved above all, so that by a new and special title they are ordered to the honor of God, to the salvation of the world, and to the building up of the (~hurch, seek the perfection of charity in the service of the kingdom of God, and become clear signs in the Church foretelling heavenly glory. Which form of living in institutes of perfection, constituted under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and canonically erected by the competent authority of the Church the faithful freely accept, who through vows or other sacred bonds, profess to observe according to the particular law of these institutes the evangelical counsels of chastity, poverty and ~ obedience, and who are united to the mystery of the Church in a special way by charity, to which the counsels lead. The elements I have italicized in this definition call for comment. (a) "Following Christ more closely (they) are dedicated totally to God." Since this canon has the form of a definition, these phrases can only mean that by definition religious follow Christ more closely and are, by definition, totally dedicated. They cannot be interpreted as meaning that religious should follow Christ more closely and should be completely dedicated to God. The canon, therefore, states that religious are better Christians than other believers. A view that makes sense only in virtue of the assumption that the form of life chosen by religious is of itself superior to that of other Christians. The revisors, therefore, revert to the concept of religious life as a state of perfec-tion, a concept that was deliberately abandoned by Vatican II. Dedication to The New Law Versus the Gospel / 875 God manifested in the following of Christ is exclusively a question of charity, and has no intrinsic relationship to any particular pattern of life. To imitate Christ means to love as He did, and the degree of perfection reached in such imitation is conditioned only by the quality of love that is actually displayed. (b) "United to the mystery of the Church in a special manner by charity. '° Charity is specifically mentioned here, but the meaning of the phrase is anything but clear, because charity has a unifying effect only between persons. In the strict sense one cannot be united through love to an institution. If the revisors intended to speak of the bond of charity which should obtain between the members of the Church they could have expressed themselves much less ambiguously. It may well be, however, that the vagueness was deliberate, and that the phrase was intended to be suggestive rather than meaningful. In the light of the previous paragraph the purpose can only be to insinuate that religious occupy a special place in the Church. Yet the second canon insists that religious do not pertain to the hierarchical structure of the Church. Hence, while affirming that religious belong to the laity, the revisors make a distinction between two groups of laity and, incredibly, the basis of the distinc-tion is claimed to be charity. By definition, therefore, religious are more perfect in charity than other members of the Church. Since this is manifestly untrue in terms of actual loving, one can only conclude that the revisors operated on the assumption that religious are more perfect in virtue of their state. This, the most natural interpretation, ~is confirmed by the fact that the charity in question is that "to which the counsels lead." (c) "The evangelical counsels of chastity, poverty, and obedience." Because all the other meaningful elements in the definition apply equally to all Christians, it is clear that the revisors' understanding of religious life is based on the concept of the "evangelical counsels" which, according to the third canon, "are founded in the teaching and example of Christ." They suppose that some Christians are called to a higher level of practice than others, and that the acceptance of this option is a matter of free choice. Were this assump-tion correct it would certainly constitute a secure basis for the distinction that the revisors make between two groups of laity, but the fact is that it is in flat contradiction with the teaching of the New Testament. There is a formal consensus among scholars of all confessions that the New Testament does not discriminate between different types of Christians. It makes no provision for an "elite" because the divine demand is addressed equally to all, and the fundamental condition for the reception of baptism is the acceptance of this demand in its totality: All are imperatively summoned to the perfection of charity, and all are guilty to the extent that they fail to manifest the love which animated Christ. The so-called "counsels" are not offered to some. They are binding upon all. More specifically, there is nothing in the teaching of Jesus that can be con-strued as an exhortation to renounce material good or marriage.The poor are blessed, not because they are poor, but because the messianic era has arrived in 876 / Review for Religious, l/olume 34, 1975/6 which their poverty will be relieved. The central thrust of the incident involving the Rich Young Man concerns faith, and the exhortation to sell all that he possessed pertains to his specific psychological state. The same condition for following Jesus is not imposed on the fishermen disciples. The statement con-cerning those who make themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven is' directed towards married persons, and deals with celibacy only to the extent that it concerns the celibacy forced on a sincere married Christian by the obligation to remain open in love to a spouse that has abandoned the marriage? All this is but the current coin of serious exegesis, and it is incredi-ble( given the emphasis on Scripture in Vatican II).that the revisors did not de-mand competent advice before declaring that "the profession of the evangelical, counsels" entailed "the renunciation of certain values which are to be undoubtedly esteemed" .(canon 4), I intend to return to the revisors' understanding of the vows, but enough has been said at this point to show that the revisors are completely mistaken in their comprehehsion of the so-called "evangelical counsels." Since this is the key~element in the definition and the basis of their assumptions concerning the state of perfection, it is evident that the whole definition is erroneous. In itself this is sufficient to compromise all that is said subsequently. Community It will be noted that community plays virtually no role in the above defini-tion. The function of the institute of perfection to which a religious belongs is to specify the precise conditions of the vows of lboverty~ chastity, and obedience. It has nothing to do with growth in love, with the salvation of the world, or with the building up of the Church. These duties all belong to the members taken as individuals, as the plural verbs indicate. The justification for this limitation appearsin Part II of the New Code where it becomes evi-dent that the above definition is intended to apply not only to religioUs com-munities but also to hermits and to secular institutes which are not bound to the common life. There is no doubt that both hermits and members of secular institutes lead consecrated lives, but there is no justification for the watering down of religious life that the revisors' quest for a common denominator necessarily involves. The community dimension of religious life' is pushed into the background with the result that the theology of religious life is completely distorted. By deciding to make the status of the individual the basis of the New Code the revisors have consecrated an individualism which is in radical con-tradiction with the teaching and example of Christ. If the fundamental status of believers is that of members of the Body of Christ how can they be treated as if they were autonomous entities? The revisors, of course, will reply that they consider individuals not in themselves but as belonging to various institutes of perfection. This is simply untrue in the case of the hermit whose only relationship is with a superior. 3For detailed justificfition of these statements, cf. my study What is Religious Life?, Dublin: Dominican Publications, 1973. The New Law Versus the Gospel / 877 Much could be said about this point. The assumption of the revisors is that the hermit can cut him or herself off entirely from the world. It would be ex-tremely difficult, if not impossible, to find any justification for this mod+ of life in the New Testament, and historically no hermit who achieved sanctity was ever totally separated from the world. People came to them with their problems and to learn the secrets of prayer with the result that they were in fact involved with a community. The member of a secular institute belongs officially to an institute of perfection, but the New Code glosses over the ambiguity of the ,word '.'belonging." The members "belong" to the institute in the sense of a legal relationship, but such a relationship can be real or ptlrely formal. A real relationship necessarily involves presence, because it is constituted by the reciprocity in need and response. For sincere Christians the most imperative needs are those about them, because they recognize that the situation in which they find themselves is God-given. Providence, therefore, imposes limits on the universality of charity. Both St. Augustine (De Doct: Christ., I, ch. 28) and St. Thomas Aquinas (II-II, q. 26, a. 6) were conscious of the need to prevent charity evaporating. The precept of charity towards all men"could be taken so literally that no one would be lo~;ed properly. Hence, with the immense com-monsense that is the characteristic of saints, Augustine said, "All men are to be loved equally, but since you cannot be useful to all, it is strongly advised that you concentrate on those who fortuitously are closest to you by reason of time, place, or any other circumstance." It is impossible to love all men, unless charity is understood as a vague theoretical attitude of openness, i.e., when be-ing prepared to love is equated with actual loving. The reality of charity is ac-curately defined by Augustine in terms of utility which implies service. Those to whom service is to be rendered are those whom God has placed in .our path through the providential circumstances of time and place. Jesus commanded "Love your neighbor as yourselt" (Mt 22, 39 and parallels), and all the texts which imply the universality of love are to be interpreted as prohibitions of dis-crimination. Hence, the community to which a Christian really belongs is con-stituted by those who are the actual fabric of his or her daily existence. No legal affiliation can break this fundamental evangelical bond, or be substituted for it. The members of secular institutes working alone belong less to the institute khan to their apostolic environment. Their commitment to intensifying the Christianity of that environment may differ in degree from that of the average layperson, but it is essentially the same. One has only to read the Sermon on the Mount to realize the extent to which every believer is obligated to be the ferment of love, And that love in. order to be real demands the reciprocity of sharing. To the extent that the members of secular institutes depend on their apostolic environment for physical and affective sustenance, and in turn con-tribute on both these levels, the vows of poverty and chastity become real. But this ~haring is only an intensification of the spiritual and corporal works of mercy to which all Christifins are obliged. Therefore, the community to which ~178 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/6 the isolated member of a secular institute really belongs is the local parish or subdivision thereof. In the light of the gospel his or her relationshp to the in-stitute is no different than his or her relationship to the family. Both exercise a formative.influence which served as the foundation for lasting affective bonds, but the reality which manifests the call of God in the present moment is the apostolic environment. To give priority to the institute is to fall back into a merely formal relationship which is equivalent to the sterile legalism that Jesus and Paul condemned so severely. The situation is very different in the case of institutes of common life, because the community in which the members live is distinct from the apostolic environment in which they work. In other words, the community to which they are legally affiliated is the community to which they really belong. That community is the primary context in which the call of God is heard, because according to the order of charity, on which Augustine and Thomas in-sist, those with whom one lives have the first claim on one's love. The needs of those outside the community (i.e, the local community which is the only place that the institute becomes real) must take second place to the needs of the members. The situation is reversed in the case of a member of a secular in-stitute, because those who are legally affiliated to the institute are remote whereas those who constitute the apostolic environment are immediately pres-ent. ~. Legalism can obfuscate this difference, and lawyers may believe that it is not important, but for those who take the gospel seriously it is crucial, because the seed of the Word can take root only in the soil of reality. There is a real distinction between those who consecrate themselves to the service of God as members of a community and those who as individuals consecrate themselves to that same service within the potential community constituted by an apostolic environment. A common denominator can be sought in the idea of "consecration," as the revisors have in fact done, but the value of such a com-mon denominator is precisely what needs to be questioned. There are criteria more important than sterile intellectual neatness or the convenience of lawyers. To ignore reality for the sake of superficial classification is to in-troduce, ambiguities which can have disastrous consequences for the self-understanding of those who have to live under the New Code. This is manifest in the definition of consecrated life adopted by the revisors. It applies much more accurately to hermits and the members of secular institutes than it does to those who belong to institutes of common life. The inevitable consequence is to make community appear as something secondary. It functions as a legal point.,of reference rather than as the basic Christian reality designed to render a unique service both to the Church and to the world.4 4It should also be pointed out that the revisors' understanding of secular institutes depends entirely on the above-criticized concept of "a state of perfection." l f, according to Title I11 of Part il, the members of such institutes "lead their temporal life as the rest of the faithful" all that dis-tinguishes them from the rest of the laity is "the practice of the evangelical counsels." This conclu- The New Law Versus the Gospel / 879 The Difference between Institutes of Perfection The diminution of the importance of community appears even more clearly in Part II of the New Code. The first preliminary canon (n. 91) states, "These institutes follow Christ more closely either~"by prayer, by active works which benefit mankind, or by communicating with people in the world," and Father O'Rourke has correctly observed that the purpose of this canon is to found the distinction between various types of institutes on the type of apostolate carried on by each one? It is perfectly obvious that different institutes in fact do different things, but the way in i,which the revisors deal with this aspect leads to the conclusion that they considered such activities the raison d'~,tre of these institutes. Not only is this assumption in tension with the concept of a state of perfection adopted elsewhere, but it represents a complete misunderstanding of the nature of any Christian community. The revisors neglect the fact that there are two specifically different types of community. For convenience they can be termed the action-community and the being-cornmunity.6 An action-community is one whose raison d'etre is the performance of a series of related actions. It is brought into existence for that purpose. Thus, an army exists in order to execute a plan of defense or attack; a business company exists in order to produce and sell a product. The goal desired in each case is beyond the capacity of an individual, so a number band together to extend the power and scope of their activity. A being-community, on the other hand, is composed of those who come together in order to be or become something as individuals. The purpose of a fitness-club is that the members be fit and healthy. The importance of this distinction is that it permits us to see that the posi-tion of the individual varies considerably according to the type of community to which he. belongs. In the action-community'the individual is for the com-munity, and takes second place to the action which represents the common good of that community. In a business company the individual executive or worker is much less important than the product, and his or her value is judged exclusively in terms of the product. Any sort of damage to the product will result in dismissal. Built into the structure of an action-c6mmunity is the sion is confirmed by the history of the secular institute movement. Th~eir struggle to gain recogni-tion within the Church was based on the assumed relation between the vows and a state of perfec-tion. It was felt that a special value was attached to a lift th(ough profession of the vows, and that the acquisition Of this value conferred a staths that the rest of the laity did not possess. Social recognition of this status was desired as a reinforcement of the members' conviction that what they were doing was worthwhile, in the light ofthe gospel there can be no dispute as~to how this quest for status and recognition should be judged. Love is the only authentically Christian title to status. ~Art. cir., p. 42. ~For a more developed exposition of this distinction, see ch. 2 of the study mentioned in note 3 above. ~180 / Review for Religious, IZolume 34, 1975/6 assumption that a number of ihdividuals will be losers. They can forfeit their lives in an army or be wiped out economically by taxes--and this is rightly taken for granted. In a being-community, however, the community is for the individual, because the raison d'etre of such a community is to provide the individual with stimulus and opportunity. This is perfectly evident in the example of a fitness club. Since its goal is that all the members interiorize the ideal of optimum fitness, it follows that such a club has no common-good distinct from the achievement of the individual. The success or failure of the club. is judged in function of the success or failure of the individual. To which category of community does the Christian community belong? In the light of the New Testament there can be no hesitation. It is a being-community, for its raison d'etre is to make it possible for its members to follow Christ, and thereby to prolong His mission incarnationally by demo.nstrating the double reconciliation (with God and.other human beings, cf. Eph 2, 14-16) that He came to accomplish. In order to be truly Christian, therefore, each community of believers must reflect this basic characteristic. Of its very nature it exists to provide the opportunity of authentic Christian ex-istence for all its members. But such existence is fundamentally a sharing; itis not something that each individual possesses absolutely. This is evident in the Johannine allegory of the vine and the branches (Jn 15, 1-11), but the most,for-mal affirmation comes from St. Paul, "As many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. for you are all one person in Christ Jesus" (Gal 3, 27-28; cf. Col 3, 10-11). Believers are different from non-Christians because they exist in union, whereas the existence of the latter is characterized by divisions. The mission of the Church to transform the world involves breaking down the barriers of hostility and suspicion that divide humanity. In order to ach!eve this it must first show that such divisive tendencies no longer exist within itself. It must show itself to the world as a profoundly reconciled com-munity. Only within the context of such reconciliation are t

Issue 27.2 of the Review for Religious, 1968. ; 193 208 223 243. 281 289 THE DEATH oF°.ATHEISM- . Rene H. Chabot,~ M.S. FUNCTIONAL APPROACH TO SILE_NCE: .°- Sister Joann Ottenstmer.i P ~ V.M "° ~ INDWELLING: TRANSFIGURING CONSUMMATION~" Thoma~ Dubay, S.M. ~. CLOISTER AND TH'E APOSTOLATE OF R~ELIGIOUS. WOMEN James R. Cain. ~ ~ CELEBRATION~OF THE PASCHAL~MYSTERY: THE:EUCHARIST Christopher Kiesling. O~P. ~. DIFFERENCES BETWEEN PONTIFICAL:-AND DIO.CESAN CON: GREGATIONS Joseph F. Gallen; S.J. -~ 308 MORE ON PRAYER Waltero~l. Paulits. F.S.C. 316 OUR LADY, CAUSEWAY Albert J. Hebert. S.M. 317 SURVEY OF ROMAN DOCUMENTS 321 VIEWS, NEWS, PREVIEWS 329 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS. 344 BOOK REVIEWS EDITOR R. F. Smith, S.J. ASSOCIATE EDITORS Everett A. Diederich, S.J. Augustine G. Ellard, S.J. ASSISTANT EDITORS Ralph F. Taylor, S.J. John C. Treloar, S.J. QUESTIONS AND ANSWEKS EDITOR Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. 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Questions for answering should be sent to the address of the Questions and Answers editor. MARCH I968 VOLUME 27 NUMBER 2 RENE H. CHABOT, M.S. The Death- of Atheism THE WOUNDED HERO--MAN It is a diffichlt--perhaps even impossible--task to clearly understand the total human situation of man if one abstracts from God's saving and healing redemp-tion. The reason for this lies in the fact that man--the wounded hero--has never been left to himself, not even for one moment, without God's redeeming love reach-ing him, though at times in a most hidden manner. There was never a single moment in the history of fallen man when he was not in the hands and care of the Healer of all wounds. However, just as a sick person, convalescing from his illness with the help of medicine and doctors, precisely because he is in the process of re-covering and, therefore, not yet in possession of his former health, continues to manifest the nature of his illness thereby making it possible for his doctor to con-jecture what his situation might have been without the medical help he is now receiving, so too, man, because he is not yet fully redeemed and is still in the process of recovering, enables one to discover, or at least surmise, the depth and seriousness of his original illness. Though our fallen hero has never been without the soothing effect of God's healing love, his wounds are clearly visi-ble and one can conjecture what his situation (without any help from the outside)might have been. Such a ~onjecture of man's situation after the fall, abstracting from God's healing grace, will be expounded in the words that follow. An explanation will also be offered why, given such a situation, man finds it diffi-cult to believe in the existence of God, and, at times,' even rejects the possibility. Understanding the situation of our wounded hero will enable one to see better why he rejects, pure love and will also give one a greater comprehension of Christ's mission and, therefore, the mission of the Church--to make God credible to [allen humanity. + Father Rene H. Chabot, M.S., is a member of the La Salette Fathers; La Salette Shrine; At-fleboro,~ Massachu-setts 02703. VOLUME 27, 1968 , REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS The Wound Although possessing an "exalted dignity, since he stands above all things," as was so strongly emphasized in the Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, man has been severely bruised and deeply wounded. Fallen man is indeed a very sick man. This sickness can best be described as a deep-seated self-centeredness. Fallen man is profoundly inclined to selfishness. True love--the love for an other for himself, or, as other-- does not come to him naturally. When he loves, he easily makes himself the object of his love; thus the other is loved for what the one loving can obtain and is, there-fore, not loved but "used." Such easy-coming self-centered-hess is, undoubtedly, the most basic and lasting effect of man's original mistake--a mistake which was de-. cidedly a refusal to turn toward the Other and others as such in preference for a total turning to self. "Man set himself against God and sought to attain his goal apart from God. Although they knew God, they did not glor-ify Him as God, but their senseless minds were darkened and they served the creature rather than the Creator" (The Church in the Modern World, n. 12). The whole of mankind suffered a traumatic experience from this original turning to self. Even with Christ's healing power at work from the very first moment of need, the wound of fallen man is still easily recognizable. True love does not come naturally to man. Few people have learned to love totally and without reserve. Such a love is indeed the rarest and the most difficult of human achievements. Those who have achieved this love are very much aware of the constant and at times crucifying purification which necessarily preceded it. They are also aware that they could not have achieved this love by themselves without the help from someone else. Because of his wound, fallen man finds it natural to turn inward to-wards self and away from the other. Our wounded hero, alongside with his basic greatness and dignity, is "nat-urally" selfish. "Indeed, man finds that by himself he is incapable of battling the assaults of evil successfully, so that everyone feels as though he is bound by chains ¯. Sin has diminished man, blocking his path to fulfill-ment" (The Church in the Modern World, n. 13). Attitudes Which Result from Man's Wound Certain attitudes emerge from this basic and congeni-tal self-centeredness of man which, if left alone and un-controlled, may ultimately lead him to reject the real God and/or create his own. These attitudes are indeed very deeply etched in man's psyche. God's redeeming love has to some extent, and, in some rare cases, al- most totally, corrected them. However, in those instances where they are the rule rather than the exception, these attitudes clearly show how far they could lead man with-out the redeeming love of Christ. These attitudes are intimately linked with and the direct result of man's basic wound of selfishness and self-centeredness. They, in turn, as previously stated, tend to have man reject the one person who could heal him completely, thereby creating a kind of vicious circle. It is of extreme importance that one understand the situa-tion of fallen man in order to grasp why and how these attitudes stem from his own basic selfishness and, as a consequence, tend to have him reject the one true God. Such an understanding will place one in a more favor-able position to recognize the many forms of atheism in the modern world and why it exists in the first place. It will also give one a clearer vision--a deeper insight-~of Christ's mission as the physician of fallen man (see the Constitution on the Liturgy, n. 5). The Council fathers have recognized the seriousness of atheism in the modern world: "Many of our contemporaries have never recog-nized this intimate and vital link with God, or have ex-plicitly rejected it. Thus atheism must be accounted among the most serious problems of this age, and is de-serving of closer examination" (The Church in the Mod-ern World, n. 19). In order to prescribe the proper medi-cine capable of. healing a particular illness one must recognize the symptoms. Why is it that fallen man tends to reject God? How can we who are the prolongation of Christ the physician continue His mission of making God credible to the modern world i£ we do not first understand why and how He is rejected by man? A knowledge of the natural consequences of man's selfish-ness is of primary importance if one is to extend in his own life the healing influence which Christ personally brought to the world and which He now wants to bring to this world through His Church of today. Suspicious of True Love in t.he Other Normally, there are many subjective aspects in our evaluations--the way we think and feel does undoubt-edly condition and influence our decisions and judg-ments. (This, of course, does not mean that one cannot be objective in his judgment. After all, subjective and objective are not to be considered as either-or opposites.) However, personal attitudes and feelings should be, as far as is possible, in accord with the objective truth; otherwise, there will arise a great disparity between sub-jective and objective. If, for example, due to his narrow and biased up-bringing, a Person does not feel attracted to negroes, Death of Atheism VOLUME 27, 1968 19.~ M.~. REV]EW FOR RELIGIOUS ]96 perhaps even harboring antipathy towards them, he will, most likely, disassociate himself with them. His subjective attitude, in this case, will have completely overshadowed the objective truth. Fallen man, observing that others live in somewhat similar situations as he, has a tendency to identify the evaluations and judgments of others with his own. If, for example, he is not at-tracted to the negro, he will, more often than not, be-lieve that other white people in his particular town, city, or country feel the same with reference to the negro. If reality shows him that there are some people who, although they are of the same color and live in the same vicinity as he, are in fact willing to associate with the negro, he will then question the genuineness of this as-sociation. He Will immediately look for ulterior motives, knowing that these motives would be the primary tea- ¯ son for his own association with the negro. Let us apply the above to the .situation of our wounded hero: Due to his deep wound caused by his original Fall, man very easily and "natur.ally" experiences himself as selfish and self-centered. In other words, man experi-ences his own sickness even if, most of the time, he does not consciously consider it as a wound which should not be thei~e. As a result, he projects to others the same kind of basic selfishness which he finds in himself. His thoughts of the other are most likely--"He must be as selfish as I he's out to get what he can from people--I don't trust him, he undoubtedly wants to use me." Fallen man arrives at this conclusion about the other even before meeting him. The other will have been judged as basically selfish and, therefore, not truly capa-ble of loving, for the simple reason that he has been judged according to the experience of the one judging. Add to this man's actual experience of meeting the other. His original projection is substantiated; the other is indeed selfish---he, too, is a wounded hero seeking in all things and in all people his own perfection and self-aggrandizement. Encounter for him is also a meeting of self and not of other~ Such experiences will naturally strengthen man in his conviction that true lovemthe love that seeks only the other for his own sake expecting nothing in return-- cannot possibly exist. This conviction is the result of his own life experiences and not based on any kind of abstract' or speculative 'thinking on his part. Fallen man :does not easily believe in goodness because he has not and does not experience it. It is hard for him to accept as real that. which, he does ,,not personally experience either in himself or in others whom he meets. ~Even with Christ's healing love at work, this unbeliev-ing~ attitude is still ,very" evident. People are so easily suspicious of the kindness of others. Their first reaction to this kindness, interiorly at least, could very well be: "Now what does he want--what's he up to?" If these questions are left unanswered, unbelief continues to sur-vive because they conclude that the ulterior motives prompting the act of kindness are of the type which are not immediately visible. Because he has been seriously wounded and has not yet been fully redeemed, man has difficulty in accepting the reality of true love. Though the doctor has come and has to some extent ar-rested the sickness, man continues to experience the ef-fect of his original wound because he has not completely recovered, Fearful of Being Loved There is yet another consequential attitude which the wounded hero develops from his experience of self-cen-teredness and that is the fear, at times even a deadly fear, of being loved.~To fallen man, self-sufficiency is identified with being, being free. This is but another aspect of his self-centeredness. Consequently, his search for fullness of being is identified with his search for self and total sufficiency. Identifying fullness of being with independence, he automatically rejects that which would call for dependence, that is, pure love. He is so fearful of love that at times even prior to his experiencing it, through a process of rationalization, he will go so far as to deny its possibility, and, therefore, its existence. One can easily refuse to acknowledge that which threatens his very existence. The sorrowful side of this situation is that fallen man, left alone without the healing love of God, cannot change his false identification of being and freedom with self-sufficiency. There is so little true love around him that he cannot experience the healthy kind of dependence which comes from being loved by another. Only the experience of true love is capable of erasing these erroneous attitudes from his mind and replacing them with a healthy outlook towards God and man alike. As his former attitude towards love is a result of a per-sonal experience, so also his new attitude will come only as a result of experienci,hg a new and different love, a love which, while creating [a certain dependence, is ca-pable of and necessary for bringing him to his greatest freedom and fulfillment. Without this new attitude, man rejects love because of his fear of it, fearing it because he identifies it with losing his freedom and being. As mentioned previously, this false identification is rooted in his experience of himself as a self-seeking individual. Even with the presence of God's healing grace, evi-dence of this fear of being loved is constantly present. We are afraid to be loved. If, for example, someone Death of A tlt~sm VOLUME 27, 1968 197 REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 198 loves us and chooses to express his love with a gift, do we not often feel obliged to return this favor by another favor? A sincere "thank you" appears to be too little, but "another favor" would at least reach the level of "equal." To simply say "thank you" is in fact admitting and accepting to be dependent on someone else: it is accepting the dependence of love. By returning the favor we seem to become free again--we are no longer obliged. Such a manner of behaving clearly demon-strates that our sickness is a lingering one and we are still on the rugged road of recovery. The symptoms of the illness are still very visible. Naturally, one should love the one who loves him but should not feel obliged to return his gift with another. If he returns the favor only to relieve the feeling of obligation, he is not truly loving the one who first loved him, but loving himself in that he is actually seeking his own inde-pendence and welfare--seeking it in a way, however, which will not give it to him, but, on the contrary, will make him a slave of his own desires. The Rejection of God From what has already been said, it seems rather evident that our wounded hero's attitudes and feelings toward God have been profoundly conditioned and in-fluenced by the traumatic experience of his original act of selbcenteredness, the effects of which experience live on in each of us. Fallen man normally tends to reject the reality of an all-loving God who seeks nothing for Himself in loving man but loves man for his own sake. This rejection stems from the fact that he does not experience in and around himself the reality of goodness or of true love. His unbelief is further nurtured by the failure of the world in which he lives to make God credible to him in an existential way--notwith-standing, of course, the intellectual and more abstract capacities to prove the existence of God. The existence of such a God is not easily accepted by man because pure love seems to be in direct opposition to his daily personal experiences. He will often accept and believe in a god or in God, but not primarily in a God who is known and accepted first and foremost as a loving God. Man will accept more readily ~i just God, a jealous God, a vengeful God, but not so readily a loving God. Our fallen hero simply cannot naturally accept the reality of such a God. Existentially speaking, then, such a God is not credible to fallen mankind. Due to his innate fear of being loved, the wounded hero shies away from such a God, for to encounter Him and accept to be loved by Him is tantamount to a complete giving up of one's life--remembering al- ways that life to him is synonymous with independence. To accept to be loved by God is to accept also total dependence. Fallen man cannot naturally accept such dependence without at the same time--in his way of feeling and thinking--losing his own freedom and ful-fillment. The true image of God thereby becomes a threat to fallen man. To offset this threat, man will either reject Him completely in militant atheism, simply ignore Him, or diminish the threat by emphasizing the justice of God and so forth, and not His total and absolutely pure love. If man were to accept consciously and without fear the total dependency on God's pure love, he would no longer be a wounded man but a fully recovered patient. However, our thoughts are presently concerned with the wounded man who, as a result of his condition, will readily deny the existence of a pure all-loving God, or, if he does accept the existence of God, will feel obliged to do something in return. He will offer sacrifices to God to "make up" for all that God has done. This can be a very subde form of rejecting dependency on an all-loving God. Love for God should not be motivated by a sort 0f favor-for-favor kind of attitude. Such an attitude transmits one's hidden de-sire to remain free of God, to remain independent of Him. It is an indirect rejection of the reality of an all-loving God. Fallen man--self-centered as a result of his wound-- is perfectly conditioned to reject a priori the reality of a loving God. His wound is so penetrating that it clouds his vision and prevents him from seeing at an existential level the God of love. Yet, if he is to be healed, if he is to regain that health which was his at the beginning, man must believe in such a God and center his whole life on Him. The situation of fallen man does seem to be an impossible one---one from which he must be extracted if he is to ever recover. He must have help to accomplish that which he cannot be alone and that help can only .come from the God whom he so easily denies. Only He who is pure love fully realizes man's predicament and undertakes to make Himself credible to His unbelieving creature--to this man who is seemingly so perfectly conditioned never to believe in Him. Thus we enter into the realm of Christ's salvific mission. THE HUMAN EXPERIENCE OF GOD THROUGH CHRIST Christ is the sacrament of God, or, as St. Augustine wrote: "There is no other mystery of God than Jesus Christ." Here, the word "mystery" is equivalent to'sac-rament or sign. Therefore, Christ's mission is basically .!- + VOLUME 27, 1968 ]99 REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 20O that o[ being a witness. But what is a witness? W~nat are the exigencies proper to being a witness? Two things immediately come to mind: (1) That which is to be witnessed or signified It is not enough simply to be a witness. One could be a witness o[ stupidity or of selfishness--the world is not in need of such wit-nesses. Because Christ isa sacrament, His whole life was meant to be a sign, but a sign of what? True, He was a sign of God, but most particularly under what aspect? One must be aware of what Christ exactly in-tended to witness. (2) For whom is the signification meant?--The very word "witness" implies that someone is present to observe the sign given. One is a witness to someone, therefore, to people who live in very par-ticular situations and circumstances. For one to be a true witness, he must be understood by the people to whom he is a witness. He must know them and so arrange his sign that they are capable of "reading" him. He must do this in such a fashion that, even i£ they do not immediately "read" him, they will at least stop, listen, and ultimately either accept or reject that which he is witnessing. If Christ is the sacrament, it is important that one consider the persons to whom He is a witness. Christ, the Sacrament of Love Christ's mission was to reveal to the world the reality of love. Here, "to reveal" means more than making God's love known by a purely intellectual didactic teach-ing of His love. Christ gave to the whole world, but first and foremost to those around Him, to those with whom He lived, to those who could see Him, touch Him--in a word---to tho~e who could experience Him, a personal encounter with love, an encounter with some-one who loves totally---one who is comple~61y selfless and in no way whatever seeks anything for himself. Christ's role was to make the God of love credible to those people who were able to directly experience Him. We have seen how fallen man was naturally suspicious of the mere possibility of true love and fearful at the same time of being loved. It is only by experiencing pure love, that is, by meeting, on an existential level, true love, that one can rediscover his belief in a God of love. Certain attitudes and fears can only be over-come by personally experiencing the contrary of these attitudes and fears. Christ gave those around Him the opportunity to meet pure and total love. The sacra-ment of love came precisely to make God credible to all who met Him by living a life o[ total and dedicated selfless love. Christ the Sacrament for the Wounded Hero Christ's mission was not only to witness love, but to witness it in such a way that fallen humanity could understand and read Him. The human situation of man, as mentioned before, is quite unique. Our wounded hero is not neutral in reference to the possibility of love--he is not open as far as believing in the existence of love. The scars of his wound have left him piejudiced to the contrary. If one wishes totruly grasp Christ's witnessing of true ,love, it is .necessary that he first understand the situation of fallen humanity. Christ did not witness the love of His Father as in a vacuum, but to people living in a very particular situation--He witnessed to fallen humanity. In another situation~ne where man had not experienced the deadly wound of selfishness--he undoubtedly Would have been more open to the reality of God, and, consequently, would have more easily recognized true love. That which might have been a clear sign of love in another situation was not in fact a clear sign of selflessness to the existential and historical man. Christ's witnessing of His Father's love, therefore, must be understood in the context of the historical [allen man. The sacramental value of Christ's life was for man as he existedmnot for man as he might have existed, as he existed before the fall, or for man as he will exist after the completion of the redemption. Too often we disassociate Christ's sacra-mental life from the existential reality of fallen man-kind. This often happens at the level of the Church and religious life. It is not enough to speak of the Church and of religious life as signs. The sacramental value of both must be related to the reality of the world of the here ~nd now. Is the Church and religious life a sign to this world, a sign that this world can read? What might have been a valid and true sign in the past might no longer be understood today. If such is the case, both the Church and religious must learn more about the world in which they live in order that they may be a more living witness to the world of today. Of what value are they as witness if the world, because of its attitudes, cannot read them? God, in sending His only Son to witness to the world the reality of His love, took into account the existential reality of man. His sacrament (Christ) was commensurate with man as he is, not as he was, will be, or might have been. The Signs of Selfless Love To a world which leans towards attributing ulterior motives to every act of kindness, which experiences selfishness in loving or in being loved, there could be ÷ ÷ ÷ VOLUME 27, 1968 20! ÷ Rene H. Chabo~ M.$. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS no greater testimony of real love than the love which seeks only to give--receiving nothing and expecting nothing in the very act of loving. Such a witnessing of love by Christ necessarily had to take on some very particular modalities due to the special circumstances in which fallen man found himself. Christ, therefore, chose to love and actually receive nothing in return. Such a .love shocks the unbeliever, but he cannot deny the personal experience he has in meeting such a love. As much as he might try, he cannot see any possible ulterior motives in such a love. This explains "why Christ,' in loving the world, chose to receive nothing in return, thereby giving the world the experience of a selfless love. It was the actual self-emptying of Christ in the act of loving which gave the experience of love to those who knew and met Him. A love which had not been expressed by such a self-emptying could not have carried this world to God. A world which was so deeply egocentric could not have been led to a God of pure love without the visible witnessing of a self-emptying love. Christ was that wit-ness. Christ gave to those who experienced Him loving "to the end" a personal encounter with a selfless God, an encounter with the God of love. It is only in the context of a self-emptying love--which love was neces-sitated by the actual situation of fallen man--that one can appreciate those aspects of His life which are given particular emphasis: (1) His extraordinary preoccupa-tion for the poor; (2) His martyrdom; and (3) His virginity. Christ and the Poor "Blessed are the poor." Christ, of course, loved all men, rich and poor alike; He died for all men, the haves and the have-nots. But first and foremost he wanted to be identified with the Poo~. Why did He choose to be so identified? In order that the purity of His love--God's love--might be more visible to fallen man. The poor could not give Him anything in return, they could not visibly recompense Him for His care and solicitude. In other words, through His identifica-tion with the Poor He could more easily witness to the poor and rich alike that He had not come to love only those who could receive Him well, who could discuss intellectual issues and world problems with Him, or who could entertain Him. His mission as witness was to show the world that pure love is a reality--that God is a reality and that He had not come for what the world could give Him. He came only to give---only to love. His identification with the needy, both the physical and spiritual, was indeed a most beautiful emptying o~ self. It is significant to note that such a preoccupation for the poor was a sign to both the rich and the poor. Christ thereby witnessed to the rich that He loved them in themselves, purely, that is, and not for what they could give Him. If Christ had identified Himself first and foremost with the rich, the powerful, the influential, He would not have been able to give the fallen world, with its selfish attitude and suspicion of the mere possibility of true love, a clear testimony of divine love. The existential circumstances of those to whom one desires to witness must always be considei:ed; other-wise, the witness stands alone and that which he is a sign of remains forever hidden. The Death o[ Christ Christ's witnessing of His Father's lov~ was necessarily conditioned by the historical situation of fallen hu-manity. A true sign or witness is the one which can be understood by a particular person living in par-ticular circumstances. Fallen man is basically suspicious of the reality of love; thus, to him, the ultimate proof of love is to visibly see one who not only receives nothing in the act of love, but actually loses what is his by birth--his life. There is no greater expression of love to a man who, because of his deep attitudes and experiences, doubts that love is possible. Christ's death was precisely that unique testimony of love; it was indeed the greatest manifestation of God. Those who personally experienced Christ and His giving of His life for others experienced true love, thereby experienc-ing also the God who is pure love. By making love credible to man, Christ made God credible. This was the total self-emptying of the Son of Man. It is no wonder., that "the Church then considers martyrdom as an exceptional gift and as the fullest proof of love." Christ's death, therefore, was the fullest and strongest rebuttal to fallen man's suspicious attitude about God. It was that which could, more than any other proof offered, counteract his natural (natural, be-cause of his sin) tendency to universalize selfishness to the extent of denying the very existence of God. In His death, Christ became the clearest proof of the existence of God. Christ, the Virgin It is in the same context of witnessing true love to fallen humanity that one can understand and appreciate the meaning of Christ's virginity. As already empha-sized, the greatest proof of tota! and unselfish love is that one be not only willing but does in fact give his life (in the sense of losing it) in the very act of loving 4- 4. .4" Death oy Atheism VOLUME 27, 196S 203 ÷ ÷ ÷ Rene H. Chabot, M.S. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS the other. This is even great~er than receiving nothing in return. After one's own life, the next greatest emptying of self---the next greates.t sign of lovemis to love and not receive the highest good after self--the "other self," namely, a spouse and children. The greatest sign of . love after martyrdom, then, is that of virginity. Christ's virginity was to fallen man an .added proof of God. As in the case of martyrdom, Christ's virginity was a sign of true love only because He valued the goods of marriage very highly. A so-called martyr who does not value his own life is not a true witness of love. So, too, the virgin who does not highly value the goods which he has sacrificed is not a true witness of. God and not a true virgin for the kingdom of heaven. THE EXl'E~ENCE OF GOD IN AND THROUGH THE CHURCH The whole of Christ's life--but especially His martyr-dom, virginity, and poverty--was, to a world steeped in its own self-centeredness, a living proof of the reality of love. Christ's life was to those who knew Him personally--the first Christian communityma reality which they personally experienced. Such an experience counteracted their natural suspicion of the reality of goodness and thereby made the God of pure love credi-ble to them. But what about all the future generations ~those who would come after Christ? Are they to only know of Christ? Are they simply to be told of Christ's great witnessing of love at a given moment in history? Is it sufficient for one who himself is wounded simply to know that someone in the past has truly loved? Is Christ's witnessing of love to be a genuine experience for some and just a memory for others? Is His witnessing limited to the historical Christ? All of mankind has been deeply influenced by the original fall and, as a consequence, all are marked with the scar of unbelief---unbelief especially in a God of love. To remedy this situation, it is not sufficient that one know of goodness, but that one actually experience goodness, that one meet goodness in an existential way. This means that i[ Christ's witnessing of true love was in-tended for the whole world--and it was--it is necessary that somehow the whole world be given the advantage of experiencing Christ in a way which goes beyond knowing of Him. One must experience true love as the first Christians did. In the world of the here and now, the historical Christ cannot a~hieve this. That which the historical Christ did for those who could experience Him, the risen Christ must now continue in time and place that all may have the privilege of per-sonally experiendng true love and come thereby to believe in the reality of a God of love. This is the mission of the Church. The Church Thanks to the renewal of ecclesiology in recent years, and, more specifically, thanks to the great work of Vatican II, the Church has become more clearly aware of herself and of her mission, which mission is one and the same as the mission of Christ. The Church must preach the Gospel. To spread the "good news," how-ever, it is not su~cient to preach of Christ--to remind the People of the "historical" Christ. To be sure, they must be keenly aware of the great event of Christ, but the Church must do more than remind the world of Christ. Such a knowlege is not an experiential knowl-edge and cannot counteract the world's experience of selfishness. The Church must, like Christ, give this mod-ern world the experience which Christ gave to those who met Him in Palestine--the Church must give to all who know her and meet her the experience of true selfless love, of a love that seeks only to give. This world, like all men of all times, is a wounded world and in dire need of personally experiencing true and genuine selfless goodness. Without such an experience, this world will not easily believe in God. The Church must make God credible by her total self-giving. Considering the actual situation of fallen man, she will not convince him that love is a reality without an actual self-empty-ing in the very act of love. What has been said of Christ as witness applies also to the Church. Indeed, through the Church, it is the risen Christ who continues His witnessing of love. It is Christ Himself who con-tinues to live on in His Church; it is Christ, therefore, who continues through the Church to make God credi-ble to the world at an existential level. The Church can hide the face .of GOd by not willingly accepting its tremendbus mission of total self-emptying for others. It must be emphasized that all Christians are caught up in this mission of making God credible by witnessing love and selfessness to a world suspicious of love. Every Christian must be willing to love the other,, receiving nothing in return, and, if necessary, losing what he has in order to more clearly demonstrate to this world the reality of love. No doubt there are, within the Church, different' charismatic vocations concerning thi~ witness-ing of God's love. All, however, are committed to .wit-ness .love wherever they are and in whate~;er activity they are involved. ,' ' ' . VOLUME 27° 1968 " 205 Rene H. Chabot, MS. REVIEW FeR RELIGIOUS Religious It is only within this context of the Church as a wit-ness of the selfless love of God that one can truly appreciate and understand the meaning and richness of religious life. The religious must be a witness of love--an outstanding witness. To be an outstanding witness to a fallen world, the religious must love with a selbemptying love, that is, he must actually not re-ceive and even lose what he has in the very act of loving. This explains why a religious must live a truly self-emptying way of life. As seen in the historical ob-servation of Christ's life, next to martyrdom, the greatest self-emptying and, therefore, the clearest witness of pure love, is the life of virginity. All three vows are meant to help the religious witness love in a most beautiful way to the fallen world, but, above all, the vow of chastity does so. In order, therefore, for a religious to understand his particular way of life, and more es-pecially his life of virginity and identification with the poor, he must at all costs understand that he is first of all for others and must witness to them in an "outstand-ing" way the reality of God's love. This presup-poses, then, that he has understood the existential sit-uation of modern man, of fallen humanity. His wit-nessing cannot be in the abstract, but, rather, to man as he exists. Man as he exists is self-centered. He must experience true love by meeting people who love in such a way that they receive nothing in return, and, if love so demands, lose what is theirs by right in the act of loving. The religious is one who is called to witness this self-emptying love in a unique manner-- especially and more clearly through a life of chastity. To the extent that the Church and religious are faith-ful to their vocation and mission, to that same extent will God be made credible. The opposite is also true, for to the extent that they fail to live out their voca-tion, to that same extent also will they "have more than a little to do with the birth of atheism., and conceal the authentic face of God and religion" (The Church in the Modern World, n. 19). .Only when unbelief encounters love will the death of atheism take plac.e, only then will its ugly head be crushed, never again to cryu"Th~re is no God." This meeting will some day take place, for man, in whom unbelief exists, was created by and for the One who is love. It is inevitable that their paths should cross. The "heirs of the kingdom" must do all in their power to insure that this meeting takes place here below. Christ is their power, and through them the sign which He came to give must shine forth for all to see. They must be persevering in their efforts, for encounter might even be delayed until the "eleventh hour." Atheism ~,ill not die without a battle. Its greatest opponent will be the living proof, given by the historical Christ and continued in the risen and mystical Christ, that love without any strings attached, a love that is willing even to cut off the last thread of life to prove its sincerity, has existed in the past and continues to exist here and now. ÷ ÷ VOLUME 27, 1968 2O7 SISTER JOANN OTTENSTROER, P.B.V.M. A Position Paper on a Functional Approach to Silence One of the common elements to be found in the rules of the various religious orders in the Church down through history is silence. Today when each aspect of religious life is being rethought in the light of the modern milieu it seems right that silence should also be reexamined. In many areas of religious living modern needs and changing circumstances demand a different emphasis or viewpoint than have been used in the past. It has been suggested by Donald L. Gelpi, S.J., that this new approach should be a functional one, that is, one which has a practical purpose in mind. It is possible to apply this idea of functionalism to silence. In exploring this possibility the most fundamental starting point is Scripture. A scriptural view of silence reveals the most basic rea-son for silence, that of providing an atmosphere con-ducive to a deep personal relationship with God. In the 01d Testament silence of itself does not stand out as a theme. It is always related to prayer or awe of the Almighty. Instead of being commanded to keep silence the Israelites are often commanded to speak: "Take to + heart these words which I enjoin on you today. Drill + them into your children. Speak of them at home and ÷ abroad, whether you are busy or at rest" (Dt 6:67). Sister Joann O~- Silence in the life of Christ is also related to His tenstroerisaf~u.'ul~ periods of prayer: "And when he had dismissed the rnernb~ of Sacred crowd, he went up the mountain by himself to pray" Heart School; Aber-deen, South Dakota (Mr 14:23). "Now it came to pass in those days, that he 57401. '. , " ¯ went out to the mountain to pray and continued all REVlW¢ r0R~EL*e.n1i0gUhSt iwnh penra Cyherri stto f eGlto tdh"e (nLeekd 6 f:o1r 2s)il.e Intc cea Hne b wei tnhodtriecwed f rtohmat 208 those around Him. He did not impose His need for silence upon others but rather showed them by His example that a man needs frequent periods of time alone with his God if he is to learn to know and love Him in a deep, personal way. The few times when it is specifically recorded that Christ kept silence in the presence of others He was using it as a rebuke or a seeming rebuke. This can be seen in His refusal to answer Pilate and Herod: "But Jesus gave him no answer" (Jn 19:9). Now he put many questions to him, but he made him no answer" (Lk 23:9). The Canaanite woman certainly felt this rebuke as Christ tested her faith: "He answered her not a word" (Mr 15:23). So also did the men who had accused the adulteress while forgetting their own guilt. The appli-cation of this use of ~silence to the life of a Christian would of necessity be rare since the all-pervading spirit of a Christian, as it is of Christ, is love and joy, not rebuke. When Christ speaks of the use of the tongue it is mainly an encouragement of the correct use of speech, to praise God, to greet all not just friends (Mt 5:47), to preach the good news; or it is a warning against the misuse of speech. Thus He warns: "But I tell you, that of every idle word men speak, they shall give account on the day of judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be cbndemned (Mt 12:36-7). It would not be correct to conclude from this warning that Christ expected His followers to abandon the use of their tongue in order to avoid idle words. A more logical conclusion would be that He expected His followers to use their speech to communicate the spirit of brotherhood which He had given them. As Sister Rose Alice, s.s.J., has said: "Perhaps we need to be reminded that nothing is idle which conduces to charity." 1 Like their Master the writers of the Epistles encourage the proper use of speech and warn against its misuse: "Let no ill speech proceed from your mouth, but what-ever is good for supplying what fits the current necessity, that it may give grace to the hearers" (Eph 5:29). "Let the word of Christ dwell in you abundantly: in all wisdom teach and admonish one another by psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing in your hearts to God by his grace" (Col 3:16). "Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. These things, my brothers ought not to be so" (Jas 3:2). James fully recognizes the. difficulties which a Christian encounters as he tries to live out this positive use of his speech to bring joy rather than pain to others. However, 1Sister Rose Alice, s.s.J., "On the Art of Small Talk," REWEW FOR RELIGIOUS, V. 23 (1964), p. 766. + + + Alflrroach to Silence VOLUME 27, 1968 SistePr~ ]Boa.Vnn~I. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS it do~s not seem that he wants his fellow Christians to de.spair of ever suc.ceeding in this task and to lapse into negative silence. The attitude toward silence which reveals itself in the Scriptures is ~a positive one o[. using silence as a more direct and conscious awareness of one's relati6nship with God. It does not mean a cutting~6ff of the positive use of speech to share this. awareness and its consequent joy with others. Scriptural silence callg for a control of one's tongue whenever speech will wound another person or betray the spirit of ~Jnity and love which Christ wills His followers to share with those they meet as they live their daily lives. Thus from the Scriptures it can be seen that silence and speech complement each'othe~ 'silence pro-viding an atmosphere~ f6r personal contact with God and speech providing a sharing of the results of this contact when the' Christian is again in the presence of other persons. This positive attitude to'ward silence which is found in the Scriptures can also be found in the history of the rules of ~silence and the place of ~ilence in religious o~ders as they developed in the life of thd Church. At times it may seem that ~t more negative, approach, of silence for its own sake,'had darkened this'httitude in the early religious communities' but /~ more Chreful study shows that basically the idea of silence as a functional means to union with'God was never lost. The first religious had as their main purpose a per-sonal union with God acquired by. withdraw!rig from the World of sin in a physical, and mental way, Thomas Merton points oht how° these monks differ frdm other religious: "The monk is distinguished, even from other religious vocations by the fact that he is essentially and conclusivel~ dedicated to seeking God, rather than seek-ing souls for God." 2 Since St. Beiaedict's Rule has .bedn one of the greatest influences on later religious orders, it ma~y be used to show how silence was viewed at the beginning of monas-ticism and on through history. In the rule of St. Benedict these quotations about silence may be found: Chapter 6 of Silence. Let us act in .conformity with that say-ing of the Prophet: 'I have set a guard.to my mouth; I was dumb and Was humbled and kept silence from good things.' Here the prophet shows that if we ought at times for the sake of silence to refrain even from good'words, much more ought we to abstain from words on account of the punishment due to sin. Therefore, on account of the importance of silence, let permission to speak be rarely given even to the perfect disciples, even thougli their" words be good' and holy and conducive to edification because it is written: 'In the multitude s Thomas Merton, The Silent L~fe (New York: Farrar, Cudahy and Strauss, 1957), p. viii. of words there shall not want sin,' and elsewhere: 'Death and life are in the power of the tongue.' 'For to speak and to teach are the province of the master, whereas that of the disciple is to be silent and ligten. Therefore; if anything is to be asked of the superior, let' it be done with all humility and subjection of reverence lest one seem to speak more than is expedient. Buffoonery, however, or idle words or such as move to laughter we utterly condemn in every place, and forbid the disciple to open his mouth to any such discourse? That No One May Speak After Compline. Monks ought to have a zeal for silence, at all times, but especially during the hours of the night and this should hold at all times, whether on days of fasting or othbi" days., and on ,coming out from Compline no one shall bb allowed thereafter to speak to any-one. But if one be found"~o have violated this rule' of silence, let him be subjected to severe punishment--unless the presence of guests make it necessary, or perhaps the Abbot should give one a command. But even.this must be done becomingly and with all gravity and mo.d~rfition.' The most profound silence shall be kept at table so that the whispering or voice of no one save that of the reader ~lone be heard. The brethren will so help'each other, to what is neces-sary as regards food and drink that no one may have need to ask for anything. Should however something be required, let it be asked for by means of Some sign rather thanby words. Let no one ask any question there ConCerning What is being read or anything else, lest occasion be given to ~e Evil One, unless perhaps the superior should wish to say something briefly for the edification of the brethren? The idea of silence which emerges from these quota-tions is one of absolute; complete silence within :the monastery. How did' silence~ come ' to be h~ld as" such an important, discipline 1~3;' St. Benedict? First '6f all, it must be understood that Benedict presupposed that the ob-servance of external silence would bring the desired union with God. If he were questioned m6re about it, iv is likely ~that he would answer as Thomas Merton has: Monastic solitude, poverty, obedience, silence and p~a~er dispose the soul for this mysterious destiny in "God. Asceticism itself does not produce divine union as its direct result. It only disposes the soul for union. When ascetic practices are misused, they serve only to fill the monk with himself and to harden his heart in resistance to grace? Secondly, it must°be kept "in mind that the withdrawal from the world of men was basic to the life of a monk. This cannot be said of modern, active rell~ious. As one looks back to what the early Church fathers hav~ said about silence it may seem that the~ too praise silence for its'own sake as if it alone could produce a true spiritual life. "Where the severity of silence is strictly observed, religion thrives most commendably The Holy Rule o/ Our Most Holy Father Saint Benedict (St. Meinrad: Abbey Press, 1937), p. 25-6. Ibid, p. 68-9. Ibid, p. 64. Merton, The Silent Li~e, pp. 3--4. Approach Silence VOLUME 27, 1968 211 ÷ Sister ]oann, P .B. V .M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS and fully" (John Gerson, chancellor of Paris).¢ How-ever, here again these men presupposed a purposeful use of silence. This is shown in many other examples of thoughts on silence from men of the early Church. "For it is in vain that the tongue remains silent unless the spirit addresses itself to God" (Cardinal John Bona, Cistercian).s "Silence is an excellent thing, in fact, it is nothing other than the mother of the wisest thought" (St. Diadochus).O "Speak, if you have something to say that is better and more excellent than silence. But when it is more advisable to be still rather than to speak, embrace silence" (St. Gregory of Nazianzus).1° "For it is written: 'A wise man is silent till the right time comes' (Sir 20:6), that is to say, when he sees it opportune to speak what is fitting, he sets aside the rigorous observance of silence and directs his effort to be of assistance" (St. Gregory the Great).11 As time went on, the living out of the Rule of Benedict began to change. The primitive observance of labor, obscurity, and solitude came into contact with the urban monasticism of the cities. These monks or canons of the city existed only to furnish choirs for the great Roman basilicas. From these two groups one emerged in which the liturgy was their whole life. "The offices 'became longer, liturgical, ceremonies were added, work was curtailed or ceased to exist, and the monk became in-tensely conscious of his function as one deputed to carry out with solemnity the public worship of the Church." 12 Shortly after the death of St. Benedict his monks be-came missionaries. However, even as they became more active they cl'ung to the original purpose of the primitive order, that of withdrawing from men to approach God dire~ctly. "The monks had been chosen for the work of spreading the Christian faith and preserving what could be preserved of Roman order and culture. But their vocation was to remain, as it had always been, essen-tially contemplative, sedentary and silent." 13 It is not until later in history when such people as Vincent de Paul, Angela Merici, and Nano Nagle ap-pear, that one finds religious orders whose purpose has changed from that of the primitive monks. Of course they still seek a personal union with God but now it is through other people, not by withdrawal from them. Each of these founders saw that the rules of the earlier 7Maurus Walter, O.S.B., The Principles of Monasticism (St. Louis: Herder, 1962), p. 71. s Ibid, p. 70. s Ibid, p. 67. 10 Ibid, p. 63. 11 Ibid, p. 72. m Thomas Merton, The Silent Life, p. fig. la Ibid, p. 70. monastic orders would not fit his group. Each struggled to keep his community free from the observances which would cut it off from the People of God with whom they wished to work. Yet these rules had become so rigid that in order to survive at all, the founders were forced to accept what they so desperately opposed. Only centuries later, when secular institutes appeared, did anyone succeed in establishing a religious group without taking on all the rules of early monasticism. If this desire to escape monastic rules were applied to silence, it would no doubt be seen that, while silence would certainly be necessary for prayer and personal re-evaluation in any apostolic religious group, so also would the correct use of speech be necessary. Such extremes as condemning what causes laughter or using sign language would not be considered proper for a group working directly with other people. As history continues to unfold, perhaps the most not-able change in mankind is the rate of this change. Devel-opments which once took centuries now happen in a few years. The multitude of new facts, ideas, and situa-tions is fabulous and ever growing. To handle these changes and integrate them in a meaningful way man has seen the need for better communication. Both mass media and small group discussions have been brought to bear on this problem of rapid change. Vatican II has considered communication important enough to issue a decree on it. This is one aspect of the world in which modern religious groups find themselves. Thus, for religious use also, communication becomes ever more important. If their purpose is union with God through God's people living today, then they too must know how to communicate and integrate the vast number of new ideas and situations which confront them. They must look at silence and find its essence. They cannot tolerate accidentals which belong to another age and serve an-other purpose. Since it can safely be said that "silence is not classified as a virtue, but it is the atmosphere in which virtues develop," 14 it follows that it is possible for this atmos-phere to fail to produce the desired virtue. There are other elements in any given situation which can make silence destructive instead of productive. This is recog-nized even by authors who have devoted an entire chapter or article to the praise of silence. There is usually included a warning against the misuse of silence: "Care must be taken not to use obligatory silence as a cloak for a silence willingly practiced to spurn a neigh-bor for real or imagined injury. There is not only no 1~ Luis M. Martinez, Only Jesus (New York: Herder and Herder, 1962), p. 36. ÷ ÷ + Approach to Silence VOLUME 27, 1968 ÷ ÷ + Sister $oann, P.B.V.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS merit in this type of silence, but it can actually be sin-ful." 1~ "The manner in which religious silence is some-. times practiced causes one to Wonder whether the whole matter is at all feasible. At one time silence in a con-vent or monastery or seminary appears to be a cold indifferent rudefiess. At another it seems to offer a nega-tion as answer to real human needs: the need to share with a special friend or the need to unburden oneself to another. Surely, if religious silence meant this kind of thing it would be incompatible with the second greatest precept, a warm sympathetic understanding love of our brother or sister." le Perhaps the most obvious danger of silence is the tendency to use it as a cloak to diguise selfishness. It is very easy to become so involved in one's own work and concerns that other people do not matter. Silence be-comes a convenient way to avoid getting involved with others. In many cases the effort required to say something encouraging or cheerful to a sister one meets is much greater than simply not speaking to the sister. Often this silence is simply an ignoring of even the thought that this sister might' be in need of a friendly word from someone. Getting involved in the problems of another will demand time. It is much more simple to just keep silence. God will help the sister if she needs help. But the fact which is forgotten is that God will use the lips, heart, and mind of another person to bring the aid of which the sister is in need. One author has made this attitude clear by using this example: Those who have enjoyed the gift of ill-health will remember vividly their return, after a long absence, to their religious house. More than the uncarpeted floors, and perhaps the hard bed, the thing that impresses most as different is the observance of silence. After the first greeting, people settle down to passing you in the corridor without the flickering of the eyelid; they look for no sign of recognition and give none. Rather they look through you . They will sit mute beside you at meals, mouths active only in the intake of calories. During the previous weeks it would have been considered ill mannered to ignore a nurse or doctor or patient, and might have caused comment on the aloofness or snobbery of religious. In a lay community of any kind, even if your intention were to save people from boredom or embarrassment or waste of time, they would interpret your behavior as unfriendly and resent it . Now, ina religious house we develop a flair for ignoring each other. We have chosen to absolve each other from the necessity of speaking whenever we meet; indeed we oblige ourselves not to speak for long periods of the day.1~ 1~ Rev. Charles Hugo Doyle, Little Steps to Great Holiness (West-minster: Newman,. 1956), p. 256; ~OThomas Dubay, S:M., "Silence and Renewal," REw~w FOR RELX~;~OUS, V. 15 (1956), p. 93. l~Michael Sweetman, S.J., "Silence," R~vmw Fog RELm~ous, v. 22 (1963), p. 450. A second danger of too much silence is a retarding of interpersonal relationships which are necessary for each person if he is to become more fully human. In religious life one important task is the building of a real com-munity. To do this each sister must get to know the other sisters with whom she lives to a more than superficial depth: This union demands that religious discover and love each other in their individuality, that they be aware of the needs of others, that they seek the interests of others and appreciate those with whom they live. Only in so doing do the members discover and become themselves. There is required a spirit of openness and honesty among the members in order to effect this personal contact as opposed to the individual being wrapped up in self as an isolated unit in an aggregate.~ Just as in a family, unity in religious" life breaks down when the members do not communicate with each other: Building family trust is a big, big job. And the toughest ~aart is learning to talk things out. Without talking, few milies can get along well. The members can't really under-stand family hopes and problems unless they have been dis-cussed.~ If this is true of families which are united by blood and common background, it certainly would be more true in a group with varying backgrounds which wishes to form a common uniting bond of understanding and love. This type of deep relationship cannot be acquired with-out much time given to real communication between the persons involved. The opportunity for such com-munication has not been provided for religious in the past: The personal relationship that has been characteristic of the religious' relationship to Almighty God has almost fenced her off from communicating with her fellow religious. Outside of stylized and formalized recreation, certainly among religious women, there is very little opportunity to sit down and talk things over.= Some of the attitudes religious now have toward talk-ing in order to establish a personal relationship with another sister must be changed if this misuse of silence is to be overcome. A deeper level of communication is often reached through small talk: "It has been a common experience among college teachers that small talk with their stud- ~sWilliam F. Hogan, C~S.C., "Community Life, an Event," Sisters Today (1966), p. 356-7. :tJim Carroll, "Let's Start Talking," Witness, v. 3 (April 23, 1967), p. 8. =John J. Evoy and Van F. Christoph, Maturity in the Religious Li/e, New York: Sheed and Ward, 1965, p. 230. ÷ ÷ ÷ A~oo~h to Silence VOLUME 27, 4. 4. 4. Sister Joann, P.B.V.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 216 ents often paves the way for some very serious talk." 21 "Yet it [small talk] will always be other-oriented, not naive prattle, but the practical expression of that socia-bility which can be described as 'patient, kind, seeking not its own, not puffed up.' " 22 An appreciation and respect for the kind of communication which builds real personal relationship and thus a community of united persons must be developed in order to make silence purposeful rather than a destructive force. Another situation in which maintaining silence would be damaging is in failing to give a concrete expression to one's ideas and opinions. A person's thoughts on any given subject are tested and either strengthened or modified by exposing them to the criticism of others: Those in charge of religious, particularly at the beginning of their training, should reflect that the religious who finds that she is isolated constantly and must do practically all her thinking alone, and does not have a chance really to com-municate with others, is going to be deprived of a richness which is there, if only permitted and encouraged.= Now it is true that each of them presumably thinks re-peatedly about many important things in her meditation and other prayers. But her significant thinking must also in large ~reaqrut ebnet wopipthoirntu an istoiecsi atol ccoomntmexutn. iAca tree.l~igious should be given Training in communicating ideas would be needed for all religious, but especially for those who came from families in which there was little discussion or sharing of ideas. These people would need to be led to see the value of such sharing as well as how to carry it out: But it may be objected, is it so necessary that everyone ex-press himself at the group, meetin. .g? Surely the Sister who says nothing during an entire d~scuss~on does not seem to be par-ticipating to the full, but she may help very much by her presence and encouraging demeanor. True her presence may do much for the atmosphere, but effort is needed if she is to express herself, to voice her agreement, or the lack of it--all these call for the inter-functioning of body, intellect, will, and emotions: for integrated self-activity. The result of such effort is an enhancement of the self--and benefit to her and all those who hear her. The chance to give an opinion, be it ever so brief, to express her views, places her in a condition of openness and dialogue with others, while silent consent can never reproduce such a state. The prudence, kindliness, discre-tion, and frankness which such expression of opinion will elicit from her will develop her personality and give her inmost thoughts in concrete form. Moreover, she has the some-times new experience of having her opinion taken seriously, received with respect, and given consideration by her peers. Again, this is enrichment; community is being fashioned. In the warmth of give and take her ideas are multiplied, Sister Rose Alice, "On the Art of Small Talk," p. 766. Ibid. Thomas Dubay, "Silence and Renewal," p. 231. Thomas Dubay, "Silence and Renewal," p. 2~0. broadened, and deepened. Ramifications she never dreamt of are now added to her stock of ideas and impressions on the subject. She begins to "experience community" through the gift of her speech-attempts, through the gift of herself to the gro.up; and the group's acceptance of her continues the ex-perience in their lives as well.~ Since sisters today are expected to be able to think for themselves and form their own opinions, it is absolutely necessary that they be given frequent opportunities to clarify their ideas by sharing them with others. Only then will their opinions be strong but still flexible enough to meet other opinions and produce worthwhile results. It is obvious that something which has been valued as highly as silence has been for so many centuries must have many valuable uses which counteract the dangers involved. The first use of silence, which has already been mentioned in the scriptural and historical development of silence, is that of prayer: "The positive reason for silence is, of course, to give ourselves a chance to find God and live in his presence/' 26 If prayer is considered as a conversation with God, needed to develop a deep personal relationship, then it can be seen that much time must be spent in this conversation just as much time is needed to develop deep human relationships. Just as in human love, after the relationship has been developed silence itself can communicate: "When love has reached a high degree words are not necessary. Silence becomes a form of communication." 27 By the very fact that prayer is an expression of a per-sonal relationship with God it will vary greatly with each person in the kind, the amount, and the place of this expression. It would be supposed that the union needs daily strengthening if it is to continue todevelop. Each religious should be free to take the periods of silence she needs to engage in prayer. It should not be necessary to set up strict legislation on this matter. When a sister withdraws from the company of others to the chapel, her own room, or a quiet place outdoors a mutual charity among the rest of the community should allow her the silence she needs. However, she should not expect to impose on the other sisters her need for silence at any given time. A mutual understanding and reasonable-ness on each side is needed. It seems logical to expect that each sister who has professed a desire for an intimate union with God would feel the need for a reasonable portion of each day to be spent in loving conversation with Him. Another activity which needs frequent periods of ~nSister Gertrude Joseph Donnelly, C.S.J.O., The Sister Apostle, (Notre Dame: Fides, 1964), p. 42. ~ Michael Sweetman, "Silence," p. 431. ~ Luis M. Martinez, Only Jesus, p. 36. ÷ ÷ ÷ Approach to Silence ~/OLUME 27, 1968 4. SistePr~ ].oVa~nnI., REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS silence is reading. Related to this is serious study of new views and ideas as they appear on the world scene: "It [silenCe] provides the only possible atmosphere for serious study." 2s .As the profusion of worthwhile books and magazines continues to grow, each sister should feel a corresponding growth in the need to take more and more time to read. This demands periods of silence. A sister who lacks the self-discipline to provide increased time for reading and study or who does not realize the need for such study cannot expect to be able to have an intelligent understanding of the world around her. Nor will she be able to appreciate the renewal taking place within the Church and her religious community. This use of silence for intellectual growth is becoming in-creasingly important to religious life today. A use of silence which has a great effect on the moral and spiritual development of the person is the re-evalua-tion of himself. This might be thought of as examina-tion of congcience but actually it should be much broader. Included in the evaluation should be the goals to be reached, the means used to reach the goal, as well as neglects or failings in using the means. This type of evaluation would not need lengthy, daily times of silence but rather a few minutes a day with longer periods on days of recollection and retreats. The person who fails to reevaluate himself periodically is very likely to become too rigid in his attitudes and ways of doing things. He runs the risk of becoming irrelevant since the circum-stances in which he must strive for his goals are con-stantly changing, thus requiring him to change his re-sponse also. Silence is a~so needed for the carrying out of most creative activities. One who is fortunate enough to have the ability to see the things around him in a uniquely perceptive way needs times of silence in order to produce an expression of his experiences through which they can be shared with others. If he is not allowed these times of leisure and quiet the community to which his works would have been presented is impoverished by this loss. Whether the creative person expresses himself through poetry, prose, painting, music, or in other ways matters little. What is of importance is the greater insight into rea~lity which those who share in his creations come to possess. Religious who are expected to be aware of the sl~iritual aspect oLlife should value highly these expres-sions of the spirit of things. Religious communities should provide opportunities for these creations to hap-pen. This requires that each sister show respect for the need of the creative sister for periods of silence not needed by other sisters. Michael Sweetman, "Silence," p. 432. Somewhat related to creative activity is the aesthetic appreciation of art and culture in its various forms. This also frequently requires a type of silence. Serious music cannot be fully experienced if other noises interfere. WatChing serious or cultural television programs loses much of its value if it is frequently interrupted by talk-ing or other noises. It often happens that the insight gained by exposure to a particular art expression or a fascinating idea produces an inability to express the new insight until it has been integrated into the person receiving it. Respect for this period of inarticulation should be shown by those who may not, for a. variety of reasons, have felt this experience. Again since sisters are expected to be cultured, they should automatically perceive situations in which silence is called for in order to provide the spirit with the quiet needed for apprecia-tion. This would be true even if the sister herself had a low level of appreciation since consideration for others present should be shown. Possibly the lower level of cultural appreciation could be. raised by more frequent exposure to cultural events. Another very important type of silence is the receptive silence needed for listening. From all sides the cry for the need to listen is heard. Certainly this is also a need in religious communities where persons are striving for unity with each other to provide an example for the rest of mankind. There can be no real community with-out real listening. The religious who is able to listen to the real message her sisters are communicating to her and who is able to respond to their needs in an in-dividual way without passing judgment is invaluable to her community. It can be seen that the functional uses of silence are many. If a religious intends to satisfy the various needs which call for some type of silence she must look at her personal life and decide when, where, and how much silence she should have. Since each individual in a community does not need the same amount or kind of silence, what kind of legisla-tion should there be in the rules of religious orders con-cerning silence? It may be helpful to consider the article on silence as it now appears in the Constitutions of the Presentation Sisters to see if it promotes functional silence. Article 121 of the Modified Articles of the Con-stitution calls for silence after evening recreation, "dur-ing the time when not actively engaged in assigned duties or at recreation," 29 and at meals. Each of these will be discussed separately. / ~ ModiIied Articles of the Constitutions oI the Congregation ol the Sisters of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin MaT, May 1, 1966, p. 5. VOLUME 27, 1968 ÷ ÷ Sister ~oann, P.B.V.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS ~o The value of silence at meals is being questioned more and more: "We have to re-evaluate the pattern of so much silence connected with eating in religious com-munities. Eating is a social activity." a0 The social aspect of a meal is hard to miss. Usually it is one of the few times the religious community is together. It is an opportunity to begin the personal relationships which later can be deepened by more intimate and serious conversation. The value of the reading done at table can also be questioned. As Fathers Evoy and Christoph have, said, the reading is often merely tolerated or if someone is trying to listen he is distracted by the clatter of dishes, a poor reader, or the eating itself. Their comment on silence at lunch can also be applied to meals: If I have to stand up and just eat in silence, it breeds this attitude: "You are in the world, and I am in the world. Don't interrupt me. Don't disturb me. I am communicating with God." But I am not. I am just dying to say somethingmsome-thing worthwhile.= Possibly the effort required to develop good table con-versation would require much more self-discipline and unselfishness than keeping silence. Many sisters need practice in the art of general conversation. Table discus-sions could provide for this practice. The practice of night silence is an example of a regu-lation which belongs to another age: Again, it is a matter of suiting the need of the times. Sisters, there was a time in this country and in Europe when after evening recreation the whole day was over, and the great silence started. This was sensible because the Superior did not want the Sisters just chatting away all evening, and they really h~d little else to do. Ours is another age.a-" The milieu of today is very much orientated toward evening activities. Most culture events and many meet-ings take place in the evening. The stress and tension of the day's work just begin to lessen in the evening. The increased demands of modern life as compared to medie-val life must be considered: These create tensions which require more than just occa-sional breaks from the common order, or we are going to go berserk . I think we should take another look at some of the strictures that are made on our so-called "breaking of silence." = With the ever increasing need for discussion of new ideas and re-evaluation of the old, as well as an increased need for communication in order to develop deeper rela- =John 'J. Evoy and Van F. Christoph, Maturity in the Religious ¯ LiIe, p. 279. = Ibid, p. 278. m Ibid, p. 303. m Ibid, p. 303. tionships among religious, more time must be found in which to satisfy these needs: Your leisure should be able to provide you with opportunity, at least, for a "gab session." You should be able to com-municate, because there are many areas in which you cannot think richly and productively unless you are communicating with other persons.~' When we get together,it is in recreation or in silence or in prayers. The recreation is too formalized at times even to be recreating so we need that freedom to talk. to fellow religious as long as we are not gossiping.~ The only opportunity for this kind of talking often comes after nine o'clock. Instead of legislating a time for night silence, a silence of discretion and of charity should be kept. This would mean a consideration for those who have already retired as well as those doing work needing silence. In order to provide a reorientation of the complete person directly to God at the close of the day, Compline and preparation for morning meditation could be made privately by each sister before she goes to bed. The counsel to observe silence at all times when not active in assigned duties or recreation seems to be the antithesis of functional silence. It does not take into ac-count the freedom of speech which is necessary for the mature growth of the sister into a person able to express herself in a charitable, intellectual, and cultural way. Instead it seems to oblige silence for the sake of silence and presupposes that absolute silence is needed for rec-ollection. As religious communities mature and individual reli-gious are made more and more responsible for their own actions there should be less need for legislation on silence. It should be possible to educate the sisters in the value and functional use of silence rather than to legislate the times and places of silence. If a group feels the need for definite regulations these should be decided on a local level. In speaking of her ideal community Judith Tare says: "But there are no set periods for prescribing silence in this ideal community. Loving awareness of the needs of others, particularly at night, provides the guidelines for that kind of quiet." 36 There will always be those who will be too immature or negligent to take the responsibility for silence themselves. However, the regulations set up for the whole community should not be made just to protect these people. If this is done the community as a whole will fail to reach the higher level of maturity of which the majority of the members are capable. 3~ Ibid, p. 277-8. an Ibid, p. 231. ~Judith Tate, O.S.B., Sisters [or the World (New York: Herder and Herder, 1966), p. 127. + Approach to Silence VOLUME 27, 1968 22] As stated in the title of this paper, an attempt has been made to present one position or view on silence. It seems to be a position which has. basis .in Scripture and history as well as one suited to modem life. If there are some who hold another view of silence it is hoped that they will be willing to present their ideas, keeping in mind what the Council fathers have said about lawful div~er.siiy: "Hence, let there be unity in what is necessary, freedom in what is unsettled, and charity in any case." aT If this can be done then each sister no matter what her views may be, will be able to follow the recommendation of St. Paul: "Whatever you do in word or in work, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him" (Col 3:17). ~ Walter Abbott, s.J., The Documents "o1 Fatica~ H New York: Guild Press, 1966, p. 306~ ÷ ÷ ÷ SistePr.B ]o.Fan.Mn,. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 222 THOMAS DHBAY, S.M. Indwelling Transfiguring Consummation Any* living being is best appreciated in its final com-pletion. The rose plant does. not. fully enchant the eye as it grows through its six-inch stage but only as it blooms with scarlet exuberance. The dignity of the hu-man person is not entirely apparent at the age of two months but only when a fullness of days has brought wisdom and virtue. ,The indwelling mystery in the newly baptized infant is a subject worthy of reflection, but it is far more impressive when considered in the contemplative mystic. This we have already studied: But even the contemplation ot earth, unspeakable as it is, is but a dim prelude of the final issue of the divine inhabitation when the abiding Guests shall be seen face to face. St. Paul's description of supernatural wisdom as surpassing man's wildest imagination is especially relevant to the indwelling of the beatific vision: "Eye has not seen or ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for those who love him." 1 Indwelling Vision In a definition both simple find majestic Benedict XII declared that the souls of the blessed "see the divine essence by an intuhive and'even facial vision without the intermed~ation of any creature acting as a seen principle. Rather they see the divine nature showing it-self unveiled, clearly, openly. By this vision they enjoy the divine essence, and from this vision and fruition ¯ Previous articles in this series were published in REWEW FOE RELIC~OUS, v. 26 (1967), pp. 203--30 ("Indwelling God: Old Testament Preparation'); pp. 441-60 ("Interindwelling: New Testament Com-pletion'); pp.632-50 ("Indwelling Dynamism'); pp. 910-38 ("Eu-charist, Indwelling, Mystical Body'); pp. 1001-23 ("Indwelling Sum-mit'); and v, 27 (1968), pp. 21-45 ("Virginal Temples'). 1 1 Cot 2:9. Thomas Dubay, S.M., is a faculty member of Mary-crest College; Dav-enport, Iowa; ad-dress: Box 782; Bettendorf, Iowa 52722. VOLUME 27, 1968 223 4. 4. Thomas Dubay S.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS their souls are truly happy." 2 The Council of Florence taught .that the souls of the blessed see the very inner life of the Trinity as such: "They gaze .clearly upon God, three and one, just as He is." 3 This clear, direct, open sight of the divine nature obviously implies the supreme perfection of the indwell-ing presence, for how could man gaze upon the Trinity with the mediation of no creature unless the divine es-sence were immediately present to his intellect? So true is this that Leo XIII said that the divine indwelling of earth differs from that of heaven "only in condition or state." 4 They are ~ubstantially the same mystery differ-ing as incomplete to complete, obscure knowledge to clear vision, interrupted love to continual love, imper-fect enjoyment to perfect enjoyment, bud to bloom. The Scriptural Account Before we explore the implications of these magiste-rial statements, we must first look into the biblical de-posit and note how all "the doctrinal essentials are al-ready contained in the divine self-revelation. Although many Scripture scholars hold (or did hold)5 that in the old dispensa.tion God did not as a matter of fact reveal the ultimate destiny of man, we are not doing violence to the ancient revelation in seeing old texts in the light of the new. If the Old Testament does not contain a revelation of the beatific vision, it at least contains a number of statements that are most fully realized only in our indwelling mystery of the patria.n The Book of Wisdom simply and gracefully describes the final blessedness of those who have suffered well on earth: The souls of the just are in the hand of God, and no torment shall touch them. They seemed, in the view of the foolish, to be dead; and their passing away was judged an affliction and their going forth from us, utter destruction. But they are in peace. For if before men, indeed, they be punished, yet is their hope full of immortality; chastised a littl.e, they shall be greatly blessed, because God tried them and found them worthy of himself. As gold in the furnace, he proved them, and as sacrificial offerings he took them to himself. The Lord shall be their king forever. The faithful shall abide with him in love.7 ~ DB 530. 8 DB 693. *"Haec autem mira coniunctio, quae suo nomine inhabitatio dicitur, conditione tantum seu statu ab ea discrepans qua caelites Deus beando complectitur." Divinum illud munus, Acta Sanctae Sedis, v. 29 (1896-1897), p. 653. ~ Recent discoveries at Urgarit strongly suggest that the beatific vision was as a matter of fact revealed to the Hebrews; see Dahood's discussion of the Psalms in the "Anchor Bible." 6Ps 15:11; 16:15; 35:9-10; 48:16. 7 Wis 3:1-9. The New Testament is brief and clear in its revela-tion of the indwelling presence of vision. We shall rise in our bodies because of the Spirit lodged within. "If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you," declares St. Paul, "then he who raised Jesus Christ from the dead will also bring to life your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who dwells in you." s We are destined to be forever in the presence of the Trinity and to enjoy the very inner trinitarian life: "In my Fa-ther's house there are many mansions. Were it not so, I should have told you, because I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I am coming again, and I will take you to myself; that where I am, there you also may be. Father, I will that where I am, they also whom thou hast given me may be with me; in order that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me. Well done, good and faithful servant; because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will set thee over many; enter into the joy of thy master." 9 This presence and this joy imply a gazing upon the very face of God, knowing the divine essence face-to-face, clearly, just as it is: "Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God. Now this is everlasting life, that they may know thee, the only true God, and him whom thou hast sent, Jesus Christ. We see now through a mirror in an obscure manner, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know even as I have been known. Beloved, now we are the children of God, and it has not yet appeared what we shall be. We know that, when he appears, we shall be like to him, for we shall see him just as he is. And I heard a loud voice fro~ the throne say, 'Behold the dwelling of God with men, and he will dwell with them. And they will be his people, and God Himself will be with them as their God. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. And death shall be no more; neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away.' " 10 All this shall be so splendid that we have nothing in this life with which to compare it: "Eye has not seen or ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for those who love him." 11 Think, suggests Paul, of the most brilliant sunset you have ever seen--it is not like the wisdom of God. Re-call the most soothing melody you have ever heard--it 8 Rom 8:11. aJn 14:2-3; 17:24; Mt 25:21. ~ Mt 5:8; Jn 17:3; 1 Cor 13:12; 1 Jn 3:2; Apoc 22:3-5. u 1 Cot 2:9. The beatific vision is the culmination of all wisdom in the Christ economy. What is true o1~ obscurely seen wisdom on earth is all the more true of facial vision. ÷ ÷ ÷ Consummation VOLUME 27, 1968 225 Thomas Dubay $.M. REV~EWFOR REHG~OUS is nothing compared to the divine harmony. Imagine the most charming, innocent, pure maiden's face that has ever rejoiced your eye it is dullness next :to the splen-dor of what lies ahead. Yes, "eye has not seen or ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for those who love him." Indwelling Presence We commonly say of a person who has just died that he has gone to God. Literally and in a bodily sense he has gone nowhere. We mean that his soul, released as it is from its union with the body, is no longer in time but in eternity. It has "gone" to its particular judgment "before God." This going before God is an appearing,: a manner of speaking, a metaphor. We are expressing a change in state by what is so familiar to us, a change in place. Except for the case of the risen body--for a body is in a place,---our expression, "going to heaven," means the possession of .the intuitive vision of the Trinity. If a man dies without the need of purgatory's cleansing, his . "going to heaven" is simply a dropping of the veil, a transformation from the state of the indwelling Trinity not seen to the state of the indwelling Trinity seen. The one presence continues from time into eternity, ~rom faith into clear knowledge, ta'om inchoate love and joy to consummate love and joy. The beatific vision is nothing other than the indwelling mystery in its final completion: an indwelling, but no longer a dark mystery. "God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and Gbd in him. When he appears, we shall be like ~o him, for we shall see him just as he'is," la that is, the triune God abiding in our s6uls. . A moment's reflection immediately shows why the beatific vision must involve an indwelling presence. As a matter of fact, the knowledge of the divine object in this facial vision must be closer to man than any other object he has ever known. Any knowledge requires the immaterial presence of the known within the knower. My knowledge of a tree demands an intentional, mental, representational presence of the tree in my mind. Other-wise I could not possibly know it. However, the tree is not present in "its material being. It remains itself in its own place, but at the same time it does take up an ideal presence in my imagination, and intellect. Knowledge demands a presence of the known object within the knower. In the beatific vision this knowledge.-demanding-pres-ence principle attains its perfect fulfillment, for God is ~ l'Jn 4:16; 3:2. immediately present in His own being without the aid of a representational idea to express Him. I know the tree through the aid of an idea expressing the tree, but no created idea can express God as He is in.'Himself. Any created idea, because created, must be more unlike God than like Him. He is infinite, never exhaustible; the idea is always finite, easily exhaustible. If the Trinity is known as it is, it must be by an idealess, immediate union with the human_ intellect. Because there can be no created idea between the human intellect and "the di-vine reality, the latter is more intimately present to man in .the beatific vision than anything man has ever known. It was St. Thomas' judgment that "no creature can come more close to God than in seeing His substance." la The beatific vision, therefore, is the indwelling pres-ence at its ultimate pinnacle. It is a presence singular, unique, ineffable. It is the maturation of the whole su-pernatural economy. We must, therefore, examine more closely this con-summation of our mystery. Essential Glory.: Vision , By what precisely does the soul possess the° Trinity in the facial presence of eternal life? All theologians agree that total essential glory consists in seeing, loving, and enjoying Father, Son, and Spirit, but they do not agree as to which of these three operation.s is the crucial one. St. Thomas held that the intellectual vision is flae es-sential act of glory because it is by knowing that man possesses God, and this knowing is the root reason he can also love and enjoy. Scotus held that the essential act is love because love is :the .most perfect of man's operations and unites him really and not merely inten-tionally with the beloved. Knowing in this view is merely a condition of love and joy. Aureolus placed the core of beatitude in delight because it is only by delight that man is completely satiated. Suarez plied a middle course in proposing that essential glory is a combina-tion of vision and the love of friendship. His reason was that both knowledge and love are needed for a perfect possession. And further, delight supposes both of them. We believe that the view of the Angelic, Doctor is the preferable, and that for several reasons. It seems to us that the dominant scriptural evidences point to vision as the root of our final glorification: "Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see. God. Now this is everlasting life, that they may know thee, the only true God. We see now through a mirror in an obscure manner, but then face to face. Now I-know ih part, but Summa contra Gentiles, 3, c.62, n.lO. 4" ÷ ÷ VOLUME'27, 1968 227 ÷ ÷ Thomas Duba~ $.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS then I shall know even as I have been known. We know that, when he appears, we shall be like to him, for we shall see 'him just as he is." a4 The .basic theological reason behind this position points to knowledge as that by which the blessed possess God. Love and joy suppose the presence of the Trinity and it is by the intellectual act that this special pres-ence is effected. While we do not deny that love and delight are necessary to perfect happiness, we submit that their root must be vision, since one cannot love and enjoy what he does not know. Hence, the first root o~ essential glory itself must be the intuitive sight o[ Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Suarez' attempt at conciliation is commendable but inadequate. If intellect and will bear diverse relations to essential glory, they can hardly both be the root of it. Garrigou-Lagrange pointed to the weakness of the Suarezian view: Intelligence and will are two faculties, specifically distinct, and therefore unequal. The will is subordinated to the in-telligence which directs it. The will is carried on to a true real good, but only on condition that it follows the right judgment of the intellect, a judgment conformable to reality. We desire only what we know, and we do not rejoice except in a good which we possess. Joy does not constitute the possession, but presupposes the possession. Hence, intelligence and will are not equal in the possession of God. They arise in order, one after the other. By vision the soul possesses God. By love it enjoys Him, rests in Him, prefers Him to itself.1" Our faith on earth is so orientated to eventual vision that one who believes may be said already to possess final glory in its seed: "He who believes in the Son has everlasting file." 16 Just as faith is the first step in the divine encounter on earth, so is vision .the first root o[ its final completion in heaven. Light o[ Glory The sight of God in His intimate triune nature is so staggering an activity that no creature, no most lofty angel, no Mary even can by native power attain it. So truly does this God dwell in a light inaccessible that no wildest hope of man could grasp even a flickering spark of it. For He is "the blessed and only sovereign, the king of kings and lord of lords, who alone has immortality and dwells in light inaccessible, whom no man has seen or can see.17 If, then, man is to attain one day to the indwelling :*Mt 5:8; Jn 17:3; I Cor 13:12; I Jn 3:2. LiIe Everlasting, p. 221. X°Jn 3:36; see also Jn 5:24 and 6:47 for the same idea. Tim 6:15-6. consummation of direct sight, his intellect must neces-sarily be elevated above its utter native incapacity in order to be able to make the leap into infinite beauty. The gap between creature and Creator is limitless. Only God can bridge it. Only He can do something to the created intellect to make the intuitive vision possible. Only Light can cause light. What He does to the intel-lect theologians call the light of glory. And it is the light of glory that transforms the divine inhabitation from the realm of faith to that of vision. Sacred Scripture furnishes a basis for our theological speculations. Although we cannot confidently hold that the ancient Hebrew knew much about the beatific vi-sion, we can assert that he said many things that fit this vision as a glove fits a hand. Among his remarks we may single out as singularly appropriate here the words of Psalm 35:9-10: "From your delightful stream you give them to drink. For with you is the fountain of life, and in your light we see light." It is eminently true that man drinks of the best gifts of the Trinity's delightful stream when finally he drinks from the intuitive vision of .the divine essence. This is the fountain of life, everlasting life. And it is precisely in the divine light that we see light. It is the Word who enlightens the intellect of all men both on eart'hxs and in heaven that they may believe by faith and see in vision. The eternal city needs no creaturely light for this same incarnate Word is its light and the blessed live by the light He gives: "The city has no need of the sun or the moon to shine upon it. For the glory of God lights it up, and the Lamb is the lamp thereof. And night shall be no more, and they shall have no need of light of lamp, or light of sun, for the Lord God will shed light upon them; and they shall reign forever and ever." 19 What is this light of glory that so transfigures the human intellect that man beholds his divine Guests just as they are? It is called light, surely, not because it is a refined sort of energized quanta, but because by analogy with natural light which makes colors and bodies visi-ble it renders the divine essence "seeable" by the created intellect. This lumen gloriae is not uncreated Light, pure intelligibility, subsistent truth, God. Rather it is a created participation in uncreated Light. It is drawn from our supernature, sanctifying grace, and it perfects and elevates the intellect intrinsically, thus rendering it apt for the intuitive vision. The knowing strength of the created intellect is completely unable of itself to reach out and bridge the infinite gap between it and subsist- ~Jn 1:9. 1~ Apoc 21:23-4; 22:5. ÷ ÷ ÷ Consummation VOLUME 27, 1968 4. Thomm $.~. REVIEW FOR' RELIGIOUS ~0 ent light and so the latter must bend down and raise the Creaturely intellect to the level of the beatific vision and render, it capable of "attaining the divine essence. We may say, too, that the light of glory disposes.the in-tellect for union with the divine essence as the im-pressed species disposes the same. intellect for the act of natural knowledge. Because of this disposition the splen-dor of the divine essence will not dazzle or wound the intellect (as the sun wounds sight .if directly gazed upon), for the intellect is not a sense and it has been elevated. So marvelous is this elevation that it makes man godlike and hence a very member of the divine family: "Beloved, now we are the children of God, and it has not yet appeared what we shall be. We know that, when he appears, we shall be like to him, for we shall see him just as he is." 20 In the act of vision, however, there is no impressed species that determines the intellect, no created simili-tude that takes the place of. or represents God, for noth-ing created can represent Him as He is. Even the most perfect created likeness of God must be more unlike than like Him. Rather the divine essence itself takes the place of the species of similitude, but it does not inform the intellect as an accident. Moreover, the divine essence also takes the place of the expressed species, that is, the concept or idea produced by the intellect and in which the intellect knows a created object. In the beatific vision there is no created word or concept, because if there were, knowledge of earth and knowledge of heaven would differ only in degree, not in kind. And further, the presence of a created idea between the intellect and the Trinity would weaken if not destroy the immediacy and directness Sacred Scripture demands in the terms it uses. to de-scribe essential glory: "face to face.as I have been known., just as he is." Clear Intuition The knowledge of faith is essentially dark, obscure, in a mirror--and a very imperfect mirror at that. The knowledge of vision is essentially bright, clear, direct. The New Testament itself insists on this contrast: "We see now through a mirror in an obscure manner, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know even as I have been known.Always full of courage, ~then, and knowing that while .we are in the body we are exiled from the Lord--for we walk by faith and notby sight." 21 , " 1 Jn $:2. zt I Cor 13:12; 2 Cor 5:6-7. What does this clarity mean? Severa! things. We have already remarked that in the beatific vision the blessed do not see God as represented in some bril-liant idea they form of Him. No matter how brilliant a created idea may be, it shall always be more unlike God than like Him. Hence, dear intuition means that noth-ing will stand between the intellect and the divine es-sence. After the hypostatic union there is no physical intimacy with the divine .so dose as the indwelling of vision. Clarity means likewise that the knowledge of the blessed will not be through effects produced by God in creation or in the soul. Knowledge through effects is highly imperfect and obscure. If one saw footsteps on a beach leading to a discarded suit of clothes, a pair of gloves, a watch, and if he had no knowledge at all of the human creature as we know him, he might with some accuracy conclude to the passage of a moving two-footed animal approximately o six feet tall and endowed with intelligence. But his. insight into this strange fellow would be quite imperfect, obscure. Knowledge through effects-is anything but clear. In our example it would be opposed to sitting down with this newly discovered human being, touching him, gazing at him and espe-cially speaking with him and learning what he had ~to say of himself. Vision knowledge is dear. It is face to face, a seeing just.as the object is. Such is the blessed's grasp of the Trinity. Earthbound darkness and obscurity and reasoning are gone. Just clear, intuitive, direct experience. The blessed see the threeness of persons in the unity of nature and they understand that to be God, God must be a trinity: three in person, one in nature. They see the Father in His eternal now begetting His Son in a perfectly intellectual and virginal generation. They see Father and Son breathing forth in mutual love their Gift, the Spirit. They see the Son in the bosom of His Father and His Spirit, the Father in Son and Spirit, and the Spirit in Father and Son. They see this God "just as He is," and lodged in the deepest center of their subjectivity. Non-comprehensiveness We are not God. And only God can sound the depths o[ God. When we say that the blessed see the divine Trinity just as it is, we do not mean that the created elevated intellect can exhaust the inexhaustible. The term, comprehensor, can have two meanings: (1) one who possesses an object by vision; (2) one who sees into an object as far as it is seeable. In the first sense one comprehends when he grasps some truth, say, the simple structure of an atom. In the second sense he compre- 4- VOLUME 27, Z968 + ÷ ÷ Thomas Dubay S.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS hends everything knowable about the atom. Some men comprehend the atom in the first sense; no man com-prehends it in the second. The elevated intellect of the blessed grasps the Trinity in the first sense but not in the second. Even the soul of Christ does not comprehend the divine essence exhaustively32 The finite cannot en-compass the infinite3~ Yet this raises a problem. How can we reconcile this nonexhaustiveness of essential glory with the simplicity of God? It would seem that if one sees an utterly part-less, simple being at all, he would have to see Him comprehensively. Theologians would ask, how can God be known "totus sed non totaliter--whole but not wholly?" The usual answer is that the infinite simplicity of God demands that He be known totus, whole, for other-wise He would not be seen "just as He is." But consider-ing the principle of the vision, the created intellect raised by the light of glory, the act cannot drink all of the divine intelligibility, non totaliter, not wholly: "Every being is knowable to the extent that it is a being in act. God, therefore, whose to be is infinite is infinitely knowable. Now no created intellect can know God infinitely." ~4 Degrees in Glory An immediate consequence of the inexhaustibility of the divine Trinity is the possibility of created intellects and wills knowing, loving, and enjoying Him in vary-ing degrees. If a fountain were endlessly deep, diversely shaped buckets could draw varying amounts of water. So with the Fountain. But tempting as this explanation may be, the reason the blessed drink diversely is not that their intellects are differently "shaped," that is, of un-equal natural capacities, for essential glory is no natural matter. Nor does the diversity arise from the object seen, for it is one and .the same Trinity. Nor is our problem explained by supposing more or less perfect similitudes of God---there are none in the beatific vision. The ex-planation must be related to merit and grace, for these are the roots of glory. St. Thomas offers several reasons for the diversity among the elect. Since the light of glory is a principle of the vision, and since the measure of this light is the measure of the vision, and since there are degrees in the perfection of this light, one soul is more completely m The Council of Basle condemned a proposition affirming this idea. ~ This non-comprehensiveness of the beatific vision is indicated too by the inequality in the perfection of the vision among the elect. --4 I, q.12, a.7. enlightened than another even though both see the same Trinity:25 "Therefore, the intellect participating more in the light of glory will see God more perfectly. But he will participate more in the light of glory who has the greater love, because where love is greater, desire is also the greater and desire in some fashion makes the desirer apt and fit for receiving the sought object. Hence, he who has more love will see God more perfectly and be more happy." 26 Approaching the problem from another point of view, Thomas points out that in any type of reality in which one thing causes another like it (for example, fire and heat) that which is closest to the supreme source of the perfection shares most in it. Because God most perfectly sees Himself, the soul closest to Him Will participate most in His light. From still another vantage point the Angelic Doctor notes that since the end is proportioned to the means, those who are better prepared by the means (in this case, the virtues) will share more in the end, in this case the intellectual vision, love and delight in the divine substance.2Z Eternal Novelty The intuitive vision of the Trinity dwelling in the bosom of the elect is never dull. Even more, it cannot be dull. Created joys can become commonplace, stale, flat, wearying, but never this one. The weariness and even disgust that arise in extended sense pleasures are due to an overstimulation of an expendable (because material) faculty. Such overstimulation, however, is im-possible in any purely intellectual activity because there is nothing material in it, and especially is it impossible in the purely intellectual activity of the beatific vision, for the divine substance, far from weakening the in-tellect, marvelously perfects it. In this vision there is never a lessening of delight and joy.2s This same conclusion can be reached from a consider-ation of the inexhaustible beauty of the Trinity. "Noth-ing," remarks St. Thomas, "that is gazed upon with won-der can be distasteful, because as long as wonder remains, desire does also. The divine substance is always seen with wonder by any created intellect because no created intellect comprehends it. Therefore it is impos-sible that an intellectual substance would find that vi-sion become dull." 29 On an infinitely lower level we can Summa contra Gentiles, 3, c.58. I, q.12, a.6. Summa contra Gentiles, 3, c.58. Ibid., c.62, n.7. Ibid., n.8. 4. 4. 4- Consummation VOLUME 27, 1968 233 ÷ ÷ ÷ Thomas Dubay $.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS see this reasoning in'the differences in hhman personali-ties. A dull person' soon tires us with his conversation and presence~ while one deeply rich in talent, knowledge, and goodness charms us for hours on end. Because He is infinitely rich God charms the blessed for an infinite eternity. St. Bonax;enture encourages the wayfarer with the prospect of this radiance unadorned: Then shall your delight overflow in that unspeakable vision of the divine brilliance; then will you marvel at the joyous realization of your own splendor; then will you be magnified in the perfect knowledge of all creatures. 0 stupendous and wonderful contemplationl O delightful and charming vis, ion! O joyful and unutterable sight.~ Love Fulfillment The psychological experience of men indicates that the knowledge of a good and beautiful person is nor-mally followed by the disposition to love. But no matter how good or beautiful the creature may be we always remain free to choose the act of love or not. Love for a created person does not necessarily follow on the knowl-edge of him. In the beatific vision, however, the elect are so enthralled by their experience that they neces-sarily embrace the three indwelling Guests in the act of beatific love. Loves on earth are free because they al-ways follow on the perception of an imperfect good (which as such cannot necessitate the will) or i~t least a good that is viewed as mixed with some hardship or dis-advantage. But the love that flows out of the intuition of unmixed, perfect goodness is necessary It is also continual---one eternal, uninterrupted act. The.beatific love of Father, Soia, and Holy Spirit is not interfered with by other acts and affections of the blessed because the divine essence clearly seen is the mo-tive for all these other activities. The love-clasp with the indwelling Trinity is, therefore, the perfect fulfillment of man's desire to love and be loved. It is es~pecially here that St. Paul's observation is .true, "he who clea-~es to the Lord is one spirit with him." al The blessed clings to his triune God abiding in his soul through one eternal love rooted in the divine loveableness sought both for itself and for the blessed. This love is likewise total. Man is absorbed in ,the Trinity as a sponge is saturated in an ocean. When St. Thomas discusses the totality of beatific love he makes three distinctions because there are three elements ifi the act of love: the lov~r, the beloved, and the love. If the totality of beatific love refers to the last named, that is, ~ Soliloquium, c.2, n.25. ~ I Cor 6:17. to the act of love, the elect do not love God totally, be-cause the measure of the act of love is taken in a com-parison between the lover's capacity and the beloved's goodness. Obviously the divine goodness infinitely sur-passes the creature's capacity to love it. In this sense only God can love Himself totally. But if totality refers to the 'beloved, the elect do love the Trinity totally, because there is nothing in the divine essence that they do not see and love. Beatific love clasps the whole that is God. So also if totality is understood of the lover, the blessed do love totally, since, they withhold nothing of their capacity to embrace Father, Son, and Spirit.as They pour out their whole being in this perduringly final consummation of the great commandment, for now in-deed do they love the Lord their God with their whole heart and with their whole soul and with their whole strength and with their whole mind. Continuous Actuality More needs to be said of the uninterrupted actuality of the interpersonal relations of eternity. The beatific vision is poles apart from the Buddhist nirvana. In the latter concept there is a loss of personal consciousness as one is absorbed into the divine. Christian essential glory cannot be oblivion; it cannot even be a passive state. It tingles with actuality. Any being is perfect insofar as it is actual, since a mere potentiality is imperfection. But by definition es-sential glory or beatitude is man's last and consummate perfection. Now the last and ultimate perfection of any agent is to operate'---so much so that a thing exists for the sake of its operation. Therefore, since man is very much an agent and especially so through his intellect and will, his ultimate destiny cannot be a mere inert-ness, nor even a mere habit. It must be an intense but calm act. Our destiny is dynamic. The perfection of this calm intensity requires that it be unique and continuous. Our happiness on earth is neither unique nor continuous nor everlasting, for we are engaged in one round of a hundred different activi-ties ~rom one end of the day to the other. Because hap-piness is the more perfect as it is more one and con-tinuous, "there is (even on earth) less happiness in the active life, whida is concerned about many things, than in the contemplative, which deals with one, that is the contemplation of truth." 3~ In this unin.terrupted actuality of vision man finally 3 Sent., dist.27, q.3, a.2. 1-2, q.3, a.2, ad 4. 4. 4. VOLUME 27, 1968 4. + Thomas Dubay S.M. REVIEW FOR RELiGiOUS reaches an entire fulfillment of the crucial command-ment of the Christian dispensation, the love of God with one's whole soul, mind, heart, and strength. It is in this essential glory that the rational creature will love God with his whole heart, when his entire purpose is directed to God in all that he thinks, loves, or does; with his whole mind, when his mind always and actually is borne toward God in seeing Him continually and judging all things in Him according to the divine truth; with his whole soul, when all his affection is directed to loving God continuously and all other things are loved for His sake; with all his strength and powers, when the reason for all his ex-terior acts will be the love of God.u The elect's communion with his inabiding God is, there-fore, a consummate perfection of continuous actuality. Eternal Nozo When Sacred Scripture refers to our final victory it uses a variety of words to indicate its unfailing charac-ter: everlasting, imperishable, eternal, unfading: "These will go into everlasting punishment, but the just into everlasting life. And everyone in a contest abstains from all things--and they indeed to receive a perishable ~rown, but we an imperishable.Our present light affliction, which is for the moment, prepares for us an eternal weight of glory that is beyond all measures; while we look not at the things that are seen, but at the things that are not seen. For the things that are seen are temporal, but the things that are not seen are eternal . When the Prince of the shepherds appears, you will receive .the unlading crown of glory." 35 Our indwelling delight that awaits us, therefore, is not merely future. It is a limitless, unending, non-successive joy in perfect good. It is a drinking of beauty, a seeing of light that known no termination. Beatitude would not be man's last end, his entire ful-fillment, if it were not perpetual. We necessarily desire to live and love and delight forever. If we were to sus-pect that the beatific love might cease even after a bil-lion ages, a clond would be cast over the experience. Furthermore, a cessation in any vision must be due either (a) to a failure in the human faculty, or (b) to the will of the one seeing not to see, or (c) to a removal of the object seen. But none of these is possible in the elect who gaze upon the Trinity lodged in their souls. Their intellect as a spiritual faculty is incapable of cor-ruption and failure and so is the light of glory which elevates it. The elect cannot will not to contemplate the loveliness of their inabiding Lord any more than they Thomas Aquinas, De perlectione vitae spiritualis, c.4. Mt 25:46; 1 Cor 9:25; 2 Cor 4:17-8; 1 Pt 5:4. could wish to be unhappy. They are clinging to limitless beauty and cannot let go. Nor can the object of their contemplation be removed, for God cannot change and He will not withdraw what He has given as long as we do not first withdraw from Him.3~ And, as we have just noted, the elect cannot withdraw from their cling-ing to the Trinity. The Angelic Doctor delved even more deeply into this mystery of man's participation in the eternity of the eternal when he pointed out that the elects' immobile enjoyment of the Trinity derives from the intimacy of their union with immobility itself: The more anything is close to God, who is utterly immutable, the less is it mutable and the more is it persevering. But no creature can draw more closely to God than in seeing His sub-stance. Therefore, the intellectual creature who sees the sub-stance of God attains a supreme immobility and consequently cannot ever fall away from that vision.~7 We may describe the eternity of beatific joy by styling it a new moment that is always new. It is a simultaneous entirety always freshly crisp. It is forever novel in the best sense of the term. The tangible pleasures of earth are exactly the opposite. They soon wilt and grow old. They are always successive and therefore partial in their very nature~ They soon lose their freshness and novelty; eventually they bore. "Everyone in a contest abstains from all things--and they indeed to receive a perishable crown, but we an imperishable. We look not at the things that are seen, but at the things that are not seen. For the things that are seen are temporal, but the things that are not seen are eternal." 3~ Harmony of Impeccabilit7 Implicit in all that we have just said is the calm pro-portion, tranquil integrity, smooth harmony flowing into the elect's being from the sight of Father, Son, and Spirit. The blessed cannot see God and leave Him. They cannot sin. On earth we can know God by reason and faith and still offend Him. We can even reject Him. But this is due to the fact that our knowledge is obscure, partial, as in an imperfect mirror. We do not now see beauty just as He is. In the intuitive vision of eternity, however, the elect see the very essence of goodness with no admixture of disadvantage or difficulty. It is a clear, complete en-counter with goodness itself. The will is filled. It cannot say no. It cannot sin. Summa contra Gentiles, 3, c.62, n.5. Ibid., n.10. I Cot 9:25; 2 Cor 4:18. + + VOLUME 27, 1908 4. 4. 4. Thomas Dubay $.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS Completing De, light The consummating perfection of indwelling glory is delight. The blessed cling to the Trinity with their in-tellects and love their Guests with their wills, Crowning this essential glory is the consequent joy, a sharing in the very joy of the Lord: "Enter into the joy of thy~ master," He will tell us.89 It is an unimaginable good: "Eye has not seen or ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man, what~.things God has prepared for those who love him." 40 This delight is not the essence of beatitude but a con-comitant of it. Delight is joined to beatitude as conse-quent upon it, as a consummation of it.41 It completes Vision and love as beauty Completes youth and vigor. Though we on earth can never reach an adequate appreciation of this crowning delight, we can deepen our understanding by contrasting it with what a merely natural last end for the human race would have been. Had there been no elevation to the supernatural grace-glory economy, our knowledge of God would have been the inferred, partial, obscure reflection of the divine in creation. Our love would have been natural, too, based on this effects-to-cause understanding. Our joy could not have transcended the same plane. Our actual destiny, however, unimaginably surpasses all this. The knowledge of the elect is not partial, ob-scure, effect-to-cause, but a'direct seeing of the Cause in Himself just as He is. Their love corresponds to this vastly superior knowing and is itself necessarily more in-tense, more lofty, more supremely delightful. It is a very entrance into the joy Of the Master, a godly thing, a thrust into the very bosom Qf joy. It is an experience that defies all description, fo~: man cannot imagine what things God has prepared for those who love Him. He has prepared Himselfl Risen 'Body , Though the beatific vision is essential glory, it is not all'of our indwelling mystery of eternity. The temple of the. Trinity is itself to be transfigured body and soul, that it might become at last a worthy habitation for the divine purity within. It is a transfiguration modeled after the very pattern of the risen body of the Word, who "will refashion the body of our lowliness, conform-ing it to the body of his glory." 42 It is a glorification like. that of Jesus who "was transfigured before them. Mt 25:21. 1 Cot 2:9. 1-2, q.3, a.4, c. Phil 3:21. And his face shone as the sun, and his garments b~- came white as snow." 43 It is a state described by St. Paul when he said that "thEre is one glory~bf the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another of the stars; for star differs from star in glory. So also with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown in corruption rises in incorruption; .what is sown in dishonor rises in glory; what is sown in weakness rises in power; what is sown a natural body rises a spiritual body." 44 Our risen temples shall be incorruptible, impassible, brilliant, agile, spiritualized--and all because of the Spirit within them: "If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, then he who raised Jesus Christ from the dead will also bring to life your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who dwells in you." 48 The qualities of the risen body shall stem ~rom the perfection of its subjection to the soul. The original body-soul harmony found in the innocent Adam will be restored together with gifts even he never had. And all of this will be caused by the indwelling Spirit. The soul is transfigured by the facial sight of the indwelling Trinity and the transformed soul in turn transfigures the body. The transfiguration is passed.from one to the other in a manner analogous to that in which a glowing red coal receives fire from a cause and then transmits its glow to a second coal. St. Paul closely ties the transfiguring spiritualization of the risen body to 'the indwelling mysteky: it is the Spirit within Who spiritualizes man's flesh even on earth. and causes his eventual resurrection in heaven: "You, however, are not carnal but spiritual, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, then he who raised Jesus Ghrist from the dead will also bririg to life your mortal bodies because of his Spirit Who dwells in you." 40 By some mysterious power the abiding Spirit shall so transfigure our mortal temples that they will shed the imperfections of their earthly state. What qualities shall the indwelling Spirit leave in His risen temple? Theology follows St. Paul and distin-ghishes four. The gift of subtility is a more complete subjection of the body to the spirit so that the risen body no longer impedes the activities of the Spirit. For St. Thomas sub-tility does not include the power of the risen body to be in the same place with another body, since this gift does not remove dimensions from the body and it is ~s Mt 17:2. u 1 Cor 15:41-4. ~s Rom 8:11. ~e Rom 8:9,11. VOLUME 27, 1968 239 4, 4, 4, Thomas Duba~ S.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS due to dimensive quantity that bodies must occupy diverse sites. Hence, the power of the risen body to penetrate another material being arises from a special divine intervention. Other theologians, however, see compenetration as a consequence of the gift of subtil-ity. Though the risen body continues to resist other bodies (Christ could be touched after the Resurrection), at the same time it can Penterate them (He rose through the tomb and entered the cenacle through closed doors). Thus it remains a body and is palpable, but becomes like a spirit and can coexist together with other bodies. The gift of agility, the rapid motion of the body at the wish of the soul, stems from our principle that the risen body is perfectly subject to the Spirit-glorified soul that has transformed it. The explanation given by the An-gelic Doctor relates the two gifts of subtility and agility to this one fact. "The soul is united to the body," says Thomas, "not only as its form but also as its mover, and in both ways the glorified b6dy must be supremely subject to the glorified soul. Therefore, just as by the gift of subtility it is .totally subject to the soul insofar as the latter is the form of the body giving it its specific essence, so also by the gift of agility the body is subject to the soul as to its moving principle, namely, that the body be free and fit to obey the spirit in all its move-ments and actions."47 In this manner the risen body of Christ enjoyed the gift of agility, for it was perfe~ctly subject to His soul as we learn through His various ap-pearances and disappearances in different places and through His ascension into heaven. In the elect, therefore, agility means that the risen body will be freed by the indwelling Trinity from the burden by which it is now prevented from readily mov-ing whither the soul desires. As St. Augustine puts it: "we shall abide in such bodies that wherever we will to be and whenever we will to be, there shall we be." 4s This is the power of which St. Paul speaks when he says that the body which is sown in weaknessrises in power. Incorruptibility or impassibility is a gift whereby, the glorified body is likened to a spirit in the double inca-pacity to suffer or to die. By nature the human soul cannot disintegrate, be ill, or die. By privilege and by incorporation into the risen Christ the elect shall never taste illness, corruption, or death, in their bodies: "What is sown in corruption rises in incorruption." By the gift of brilliance the blessed shall shine as the sun with a splendor that overflows from the joy o[ the '~ Suppl., q.87, a.1, c. ~sSermon 242, c. 3, n. 5; P.L. 38:1140. St. Thomas held (contrary to Suarez' opinion) that this movement is very rapid but not instan-taneous; see Suppl., q.87, a.3. soul in gazing upon the divine beauty and splendor. This brilliance will be like that of Jesus Himself in the Transfig

Issue 14.4 of the Review for Religious, 1955. ; Review Religi.ous JULY 1~,5, 1955 To Religious Men . Pope Plus XII Mother St. Bernard . Sister M. Cassilda Grace of Example . John Maffhews Sister Formation ¯ ¯ " Joseph F. Gallen Our Jubilarian Questions and Answers Notes for Contributors Book Reviews VOLUME XIV NUMBER 4 RI::VII:W FOR R LIGIOUS VOLUME XIV JULY, 1955 NUMBER 4 CONTENTS FATHER ELLIS' GOLDEN JUBILEE .1.6.9. TO RELIGIOUS MEN--Pope Plus XII .1.7.0. MOTHER" ST. BERNARD, HELPER OF THE HOLY SOULS-- Sister Mary Cassilda .181 NOTES FOR CONTRII~UTORS .1.9.4. OUR CONTRIBUTORS . 196 THE GRACE OF EXAMPLE--John Matthews, S.J .1.9.7 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS-- 16. Period to be Covered by Quinquennial Report .2"00 17. Rank of Religious after Re-entrance .2.0. 1 18. Illness and Computation of Years of Novitiate .201 19. Indulgences and Eastern Rite .¯. . 202 20. Typed Ballots for Voting . 203 21. Combining Benediction or Holy Hour with Meditation . 204 RELIGIOUS CLERICAL FORMATION AND SISTER FORMATION-- Joseph F. Gallen, S.J .2.0.5 BOOK REVIEWS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS-- Editor: Bernard A. Hausmann, S.J. West Baden College West Baden Springs, Indiana .2.16 REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, July, 1955. Vol. XIV, No. 4. Published bi-monthly: January, March. May, July, September. and November at the College Press, 606 Harrison Street, Topeka, Kansas, by St. Mary's College, St. Marys, Kansas, with ecclesiastical approbation. Entered as second class matter January 15, 1942, at the Post O~ce, Topeka, Kansas, under the act of March.3, 1879. Editorial Board: Augustine G. Ellard, S.J., Adam C. Ellis, S.,L, Gerald Kelly, S.J., Francis N. Korth, S.J. Literary Editor: Edwin F. Falteisek, S.J. Copyright, 1955, by Adam C. Ellis, S.J. Permission is hereby granted for quota-tions of reasonable length, provided due credit be given this review and the author. Subscription price: 3 dollars a year: 50 cents a copy Printed in U. S. A. Before wr;tincj +o us, please consult notlce on ;nslde back cover. ~ATHER ADAM C. ELLIS, the senior editor of thi} REVIEW, will celebrate his Golden dubilee as a Jesuit on August 31, 1955, at St. Mary's College, St. Marys, Kansas. Father Ellis was born in Buffalo, New York, where he attended St. Michael's Parochial School and Canisius High School. On August 31, 1905, he entered the Society of Jesus at St. Stanislaus Novitiate, Cleveland, Ohio. In August, 1908, he was transferred to St. Stanislaus Seminary, Florissant, Missouri, for his second year of juniorate. His years of teaching as a scholastic were spent at Mar- , quette Academy, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and at Rockhurst Acad4my, Kansas City, Missouri. He made his philosophical studies at St. Louis University and began his course of theology af the same place. After the second year of theology, he was sent to Spain. There, at Off'a, near Burgos, he was ordained to the priesthood on March 10, 1921. He returned to the United States in the summer of 1921 and spent the following school year teaching at St. Ignatius College, Cleveland, and in the juniorate at Florissant. Then followed his ter-tiansh, ip at St. Stanislaus, Cleveland, September, 1922, to June, 1923. After his tertianship Father Ellis was assigned to special studies in civil and canon law at" St. Louis University. The course in canon law was later completed at. the Gregorian University, Rome, where he received the doctorate in 1926. He has just completed thirty years of teaching canon law: one year at Mundelein, Illinois; three years at the Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome; and the remaining time at St. Louis University and St. Mary's. As a canonist, Father Ellis has used his time, energy, and talent largely in favor of religious. He is a Consultor to the Sacred Con-gregation of Religious, editor of the English edition of Father Creusen's Religious Men and Women in the Code, and co-author with Father T. L. Bouscaren, S.J., of Canon Lau;: A Text and Commentary. Co-founder of this REVIEW, he has not only contrib-uted numerous articles'but has also ans~vered most of the questions. Father Ellis is spending the summer at Canisius College,'°Buffalo; but he will return to St. Mary's to celebrate his Jubilee with a class-mate, Father Michael J. Gruenthaner, S.J. His fellow editors wish him God's choicest blessings; and we are sure our readers join us in this. 169 To Religious Men Pope Pius XII [EDITORS' NOTE: This address was given to the Delegates of the General Con-gress of Religious Orders, Congregations, 8ocieties, and Secular Institutes, in Rome, December 8, 1950. We publish it now because we have had many requests about it and because we think it should be available to the REVIEW. The English trans- "lation was made by Father S. F. McNamee, S.J., and other members of the Mary-land Province of the Society of Jesus.] TO the Delegates of the General Congress of Religious Orders, Congregations, Societies, and Secular Institutes, Rome, 8 De-cember, 1950. 1. The Holy Year, through no merit of Ours, but through the favor of God's mercy, has proved more bountiful in blessings than the fbresight of men had anticipated. In the eventful cycle of its notable achievements, it has manifested the strong faith and richly abundant life of the Church of Christ, our Mother. Your Congress rightly takes its place among the more sigriificantly important events, and Over them your fraternal gathering reflects its own characteristic lustre. To you now We wish to address Our words of affectionate greeting. 2. The annals of church history record no meeting similar to this. Here, for the first time, religious organizations, whose mem-bers have selected as the goal of their lives the attainment of con-summate evangelical perfection, have assembled in large numbers over a period of several days to discuss and weigh the problems of their common interest. 3. It was Our judgment that the circumstances of the times made it altogether necessary to do so. For the changed conditions of the world which the Church must encounter, certain points of doc-trine touching upon the status and condition of moral perfection, not to mention the pressing needs of the apostolic work which you have so widely and so generously undertaken, all these have called you to devote yourselves to" this systematic study and discussion. 4. Your work is at its close. It was energized by careful dis-cussions; it has been prolific in proposals; and it will be no less fruit-ful, We hope, in perfecting the virtues which .will realize your pro-jects. With the resolute cooperation of your wills, the grace of God will enkindle those virtues, the grace, that is, which your prayers and religious acts of self-denial, more especially, because of their burning devotion, those of your sisters in Christ, have already in-voked upon this present undertaking. 5. You have requested the fatherly blessing of the Vicar of 170 July, 1955 TO RELIGIOUS MEN Christ as a pledge of divine guidance and assistance so that your Congress might be fittingly completed and terminated. But before imparting that blessing to you, We think it proper to present to you orally certain thoughts on the religious life which call for an explanation and which, once explained, may serve hereafter as a norm to direct your thoughts and actions. I 6. First of all, it will be useful for Us to indicate briefly the place held in the Church by the religious orders, and congregations. You are, of course, aware that our Redeemer founded a Church en-dowed with an hirarchical organization. For between the apostlds and their successors, with whom must also be grouped their assistants in the ministry, and the ordinary faithful He drew a definite line of demarcation; and by the union of these two elements the structure of the kingdom of God on earth stands firm. Consequently, the distinction between the clergy and the laity is fixed by divine law (cf. can. 107). Interposed between these two grades is the religious state which deriving its origin from the Church has its existence and strength from its intimate connection with the end of the Church herself, which is to lead men ,to the attainment of holiness. Though every Christian should scale these sacred heights under the guidance of the Church, nevertheless the religious moves towards them along a path that is peculiarly his own and by means that are of a more exalted nature. 7. Moreover, the religious state is not restricted to either of the two groups which exist in the Church by divine right, since both clerics and lay persons alike can become religious; and, on the other hand, the clerical dignity lies open to religious and those who are not religious. One would therefore be mistaken in appraising the value of the foundations which Christ laid in building His Church if he should judge that the peculiar form of the secular clerical life as such was established and sanctioned by our divine Redeemer, and that the peculiar form of the regular clerical life, though it is to be considered good and worthy of approbation in itself~ is still secon-dary and auxiliary in nature, since it is not derived from Christ. Wherefore, if we keep before our eyes the order established by Christ, neither of the two special forms of clerical life holds a prerogative of divine right, since that law singles out neither form, nor gives to either precedence over the other. What then the difference is between these two forms, what their mutual relations are, what spcial task 171 POPE PIUS XlI Review for Religious in working out the salvation ~f mankind has been assigned to each, all these details Christ left to be decided according to the needs and conditions of succeeding ages; or, rather, to express Our mind more exactly, He left them to the definitive decisions of the Church herself. 8. Undoubtedly it is according to the divine law that every priest, be he secular or regular, should fulfill his ministry in such a way as to be a subordinate assistant to his bishop. This has always been the customary practice in the Church, and the prescriptions in the Code of Canon Law whic.h deal with the members of religious societies as pastors and local ordinaries make this clear (can. 626-31 ; 454, ~]. 5). And it often happens in missionary territories that all the ci~rgy, even including the bishop, belong to the regular militia of the Church. Let no one think this is an extraordinary or ab-normal state of affairs to be regarded as only a temporary arrange-ment, and that the administration should be handed over to the secular clergy as soon as possible. 9. Again, the exemption of religious orders is not contrary to the principles of the constitu_tion given to the Church by God, nor does it in any way contradict the law that a priest owes obedi-ence to his bishop. Fo~, according to canon law, exempt religious are subject to the authority of the local bishop so far as the admin-istration of the episcopal office and the well-regulated care of souls require. But, even putting aside this consideration, in the discus-sions of the past few decades concerning the question of exemp-tion, perhaps too little attention has been paid to the fact that exempt religious even by the prescriptions of canon law are al'ways and everywhere subject to the authority of the Roman Pontiff as their supreme moderator, and tbat they owe obedien,ce to him pre-cisely in virtue of their religious vow of obedience (can. 499, ~1 1). Indeed the Supreme Pontiff possesses ordinary and immediate juris-diction over each and every diocese and over the individual faithful just as he does over the universal Church. It is therefore clear that the primary law of God whereby the clergy and the laity are sub-ject to the rule of the Bishop is more than sufficiently observed as regards exempt religious, as it is no less clear that both branches of the clergy by reason of their parallel services conform to the will and precept of Christ. II 10. There is another question connected with what has so far been said which We wish to explain and clarify. It concerns the way in which the cleric and the religious should strive for their due 172 Jul~j, 1955 To RELIGIOUS MEN moral perfection. 1 1. It is a distortion of the truth to say that the clerical state as such and as divinely established demands either by its very nature or by some postulate of that nature that the evangelical counsels be observed by its members, and that for this very reason it must be called a state of achieving evangelical perfection. A cleric therefore is not bound by the divine law to observe the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience; above all he is not bound in the same way or fdr the same reason as the one for whom such ob-ligation arises from vows publicly pronounced upon entering the religious life. This does not however prevent the cleric from assum-ing these bonds privately and of his own accord. So, too, the fact that the priests of the Latin rite are bound to observe holy celibacy does not remove or lessen the distinction between the clerical and the religious states. Moreover, a member.of the regular clergy professes the state and condition of evangelical perfection not inasmuch as he is a cleric, but inasmuch as he is a religious. 12. And though we have declared in Our Apostolic Consti-tution Prooida Mater Ecclesia that the form of life followed by the secular institutes is to be considered as a state of evangelical per-fection and recognized as such by the common law of the Church, since their members are in some way bohnd to the observance of the evangelical counsels, still this in no way contradicts wh~it have just affirmed. Assuredly ther~ is no reason preventing clerics from joining together in secular institutes so that by their choice of this manner of life. they may strive for the attainment of religious perfection; but in that case they are in a state of acquiring perfection not inasmuch as they are clerics, but inasmuch as they are members of a secular institute. After all, such an institute adopts, in the way of life it proposes to follow, the evangelical.c6unsels which are proper to the religious state and are ther~ realized-in their highest perfection; but the institute so achieves that end that it is nSt' de-l~ endent on the traditional pattern of the religious state but stands by itself in an external form of life which bears no necessary relation to the perfection just mentioned. III 13. We think it timely now to touch upon some of the rea-sons which the religious state hol~s out to men'as motives for em-bracing it. 14. There are.some.who,assert that the religious state by i~s POPE P~us XII Review for Religious nature and purpose, even though m~riting approval, is nothing but a safe refuge offered to the fearful and timid who have not the strength, to stand u.p to the dangers of life's storms, and, lacking the knowledge, 0r perhaps the will, to face difficulties, are led by their indolence, to bid farewell to the world and fly to the haven of cloistered peace. XVherefore we must inspire self-confidence and reliance on God's grace in those who see.k such idle tranquility, so ¯ that they may overcome these traits of character and attain the courage to face the struggles of common life. Is this indeed true? 15. It is not Our purpose here to evaluate the various motives inducing individuals to betake themselves to the religious life. XY~Te do wish however to indicate the principal and indeed the valid rea-son that should induce one to enter the protected enclosure of the cloister. And it is certainly different from that distorted opinion. stated above, which,-if taken as a whole, is both untrue and unjust. For not otherwise than the resolution to ente~ the priesthood, the resolve to embrace the. religious state, together with a firm constancy in executing it, demands greatness of. soul and an ardent zeal for self-consecration. The history of the Church in its record of the glorious.ochievements of the saints in heaven and of the religiQus institutes on earth, in its account of ~uccessful" missionary enter-prises, in its sketchi.ng of. the Church's ascetical teaching, no less than experience itself, indicates more clearly than the light of day that men and women of indomitable and whole-souled courag~ have flourished in the religious state as well as in the world. Again, do those religious men aiad women who so strenuously exert them-selves to spread the kingdom of the gospel,., who tend the sick, train the young, and toil in the classrooms, shun the society of their fellow men and shut them out from their love? Are not very many of them, no less than the secular priesthood .and their lay helpers, fighting in the very front rinks of the battl,e.for the Church's cause? 16. Here XVe cannot refrain from directing Our attention to another matter which completely denies the false assertion mentioned previously. If the number of candidates wishing to enter the enclosed garden of the religious life is diminishirig, especia!ly among young women, the reason very frequently is that they find it too difficult to divest themselves of their own judgment .and surrender their freedom of action, as the very nature of the vow of obedience de-mands. Indeed some praise as the real peak of moral perfection, not the surrender of liberty for the love of Christ, but the curbingof such surrender. The"norm therefore to be prdfekred in the formation 174 dulv, 1955 TO RELIGIOUS MEN of a just and holy person would seem to be this: restrict liberty only where necessary; otherwise, give liberty free rein as far as possible. 17. We transmit the question whether this new foundation on which some are trying to erect the edifice of sanctity will be as ef-fective and as solid in supporting and augmenting the apostolic work of the Church as was the one which through fifteen hundred years has been provided by that ancient rule of obedience undertaken for the love of Christ. What is now of supreme importance is to ex-' amine this proposal thoroughly, to disclose what lies concealed be-neath the surface. This opinion, if carefully considered, not only fails to appreciate the nature of the evangelical counsel, but it some-how twists it to a meaning in accord with its theory. No one is obliged to choose for himself the counsel of perfect- obedience, which essentially is a rule of life whereby one surrenders the control of his own will; no one, We repeat, be it an individual or a group. They can if they wish conform their conduct to this new rule. But words must be understood and accepted according to their obvious mean-ing; and, if this norm is compared with the vow of obedience, it surely does not possess the same "supreme value; nor is it an adequate expression of the wonderful example recorded in Holy Scripture: "He humbledHimself becoming obedient unto death" (Phil. 1:8). 18. He therefore is deceived himself and deceives others who, forgetting the propensities of the soul and the inspiration of divine grace, offers as a guide to one .seeking advice about entering the re-ligious state only that new norm. Hence, if it is clear that the voice of God is calling someone to the heights of evangelical perfection, without any hesitation he should be invited for the attainment of this lofty purpose to offer freely the sacrifice of his liberty as the" vow of obedience demands, that vow, We proclaim, which the Church through so many centuries has weighed, has put to the test, has properly delineated, and has approved. Let no one against his will be compelled to this self-consecration; but, if he does will it, let no one counsel him against it; above all, let no one hold him back. IV 19. But enough on this point. At the moment, We wish to speak on external works and the interior life. Hardly any question of grave importance for the life of regulars, or for the religious life. in general, has been treated at greater length. Nevertheless We wish to present Our own judgment on this matter. ¯. 20.- It was not mere.chance that brought about in our day the 175 POPE PIUS XII Reuiew ~'or Religious rise and elaboration of the philosophy known as existentialism. The men of our time, when confronted by events which bring up diffi-cult metaphysical and religious problems to be solved, gladly, with-out a thought of higher principles, persuade themselves that it is enough to act. as the exigeficies of the moment demand. But the man who professes our holy faitb refuses to follow such principles and to makeeach passing moment of time his whole concern, hurling him-self head-long into the stream of life. He knows that the "things that appear not" (Heb. ll:l) are to be considered of supre.me worth, are pre-eminently true, and so enduring in the future as to last forever. Yet--be it said with sorrow--though warnings and exhortations have not been lacking, even some ecclesiastics,' not ex-cepting religious, have been deeply infected by this contagion; and, while not denying a reality that transcends the senses and the whole natural order, they esteem it of little.importance. 21. Has this grave and dangerous crisis been overcome? Thanks be to God, We may hope that it has. Certain things which We have Ourselves witnessed, and which events bare made known to Us, offer this assurance. 22. The most active zeal can be closely allied with the quest for the riches of 'the interior life. Two stars that shine in the firma-ment of the religious life, St. Francis Xavier and St. Teresa of Jesus, are brilliant proofs of this. 23. An ~eager external activity and the cultivation of the in-terior life demand more than a bond of fellowship; as far at least as evaluation and willed effort are concerned, they demand that they should march along together step by step. With the growth of de-votion to exterior works therefore, let there shine forth a corres-ponding increase in faith,.in the life of prayer, in zealous consecra-tion of self and talents to God, in spotless purity of conscidnce, in obedience, in patient endurance of hardship, and in active charity tirelessly expending for God and one's neighbor. 24. This is true not only of the individual religious, who really is such in heart as well as in habit, but it is also the reason why communities as a whole are~solidly founded in the sight of God and men, and are deserving of the most generous praise. The Church in-sistently demands of you that your external works correspond to your interior life, and that these two maintain a constant balance. Do you not, both clerical and lay religious, profess that you have~ embraced the state of evangelical.perfection? If so, bring.forth the 176 Jul~l, 1955 TO RELIGIOUS MEN frhits proper to your state, so that the Mystical Body Of Christ, which is the Church, may draw ever-increasing vitality from your strength and fervor. This is the very reason why religious orders totally dedicated to the contemplative life are in their own way necessary to the Church, since they are for her a perpetual ornament anda copious source of heavenly graces. 25. You know, of course, that it has often been remarked that charity to the neighbor is gradually losing its religious char-acter and is becoming secularized. But an honorable and kind treat-ment of others that has no foundation in faith, and springs from some other source, is not charity; nor may it be called Catholic. Charity possesses a. dignity, an inspiration, and a strength that is lacking in mere philanthropy however endowed with wealth and other resources. Thus, if We compare our Catholic sisters who nurse the sick with some others who perform this same task out of mere humanitarianism or for pay, We discover in them something en-tirely different and of higher value. They may at times be inferior to others in technical advantages, and We take this occasion to urge them not only to keep abreast of others in this matter but even to surpass them. But where our religious women, deeply imbued with the vital spirit of their institutes and daily prepared for the love of Christ to lay down their lives for the sick, perform their labors, a different atmosphere prevails, in which virtue works wonders which technical aids and medical skill, alone are powerless to ac-complish. 26. Therefore let those religious orders and congregations that devote themselves to the active life keep ever before their eyes and inwardly cherish all that stamps their souls with the lineaments of holiness and nourishes the fire of the Holy Spirit in the depth of their pure souls. V 27. Dearly Beloved, We wish also to refer briefly to the ef-forts of religious institutes to adapt themselves to our changed times, and to join the new and the. old in harmonious union. 28. When young people hear the statements: "We must keep up to date" and "Our efforts must be commensurate with the times," they are fired with an extraordinary ardor of soul;' and, if they are serving unde'r the standard of the religious militia, they keenly de-sire to direct the efforts of their future religious undertakings accord-ing to this principle. And,.to a certain extent, thisis proper. For it often has happened that th~ founding fathers of religious insti- 177 POPE PIUS XII R~oiew for Religious ,tutes conceived new projects in ordei to meet the challenge which newly emerging needs were urgently presenting to the Church and her works; and in this way they harmonized their enterprises with their age. Hence, if you wish to walk in the footsteps of your pre-decessors, act as they acted. Examine thoroughly the beliefs, con-victions, and conduct of your own contemporaries; and, if you discover in them elements that are good and proper, make these worthwhile features your own; otherwise you will never be able to enlighten, assist, sustain, and guide the men of your own time. 29. However, the Church possesses a patrimony preserved in- .tact from her earliest origin, which is unchanged in the course of 'ages, and which is in 'perfect accord with the needs and the aspira-tions of the human race. The Catholic faith is the most important part of this patrimony, and in the encyclical letter Humani Generis 'We recently defended it from new errors. Preserve most diligently this faith undefiled by any blemish: hold firmly to the conviction that it contains within itself exceedingly powerful forces that can mold any age. 30. A part of this patrimony is the good pursued in the state of perfection; and this you must seek with the utmost zeal, so that °by the use of its methods and resources you may become holy your-selves, and either directly or indirectly make your neighbors also :holy. In this manner they, sharing ever more richly in divine grace, may live a holy Iife and die a holy death. Another factor in this patrimony is the lofty and sublime truth that self-denial for the love of Christ must be considered the only path to perfection. This truth the changing times can never change. 31. There are, however, circumstances, and not a few, when you can and ought to accommodate yourselves to the temper and the needs of men and the age. Indeed to a great extent this has actu-ally been done, and now the task is being completely and perfectly accomplished by our combined counsel~ and plans. As may be seen from the variety of your undertakings both as individuhls and as institutes, you have already initiated many adjustments in schools, in the training of youth, in the alIeviation of human misery, and in the cultivation and promotion of learning. Hence it must be ad-mitted, and Our affirmation admits of no denial, that a vast amount of energy is even now being expended to meet the altered conditions of our era with new and effective resources. 32. Nevertheless, in striving to adapt yourselves to the ex-igencies of the present, it is, in Our judgment, of paramount con- 178 Julg, 1955 TO RELIGIOUS MEN cern that you shrewdly investigate what spiritual forces lie latent in your contemporaries, by what secret,desires they are motivated, and what the true picture .is of their souls. We do not of course mean the picture that manifests their detestable and censurable qual-ities and expresses the tumult of passion and the corruption of vice. But in men as men, and most of all as Christians, though entangled in error and sin, there is not a little good and even a desire for greater good. You must encourage these good impulses and foster these aspirations, being always careful however not to-accept from the world what keeps it wretched and evil, but rather to infuse into the world what is good and holy in yourselves, and in harmony with these salutary longings. Being solicitous therefore for that feeble good in the hearts of others, furbish and develop it, molding from its grains of gold precious vessels and gathering its rivulets into mighty streams. 33. Some think, and perhaps rightly, that three marks are characteristic of our age: amplitude in thought and discussion, uni-fication of plan, and organization and speed in execution. Are riot these three notes also distinctive marks of the Gospel? Are they not characteristic of those who profess the Catholic faith and live ac-cording to its principles? opened to our minds than "All things are yours and Cor. 3:25) ? What closer simplicity and the unity What greater amplitude of vision can be that offered in the words of the Apostle: you are Christ's and Christ is God's" (I unity in understanding and love than the declared to you in the Sacred Scripture: "God, all in all" (I Cor. 15:26) and "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart and with thy whole soul and wil~h thy whole mind and with thy whole strength . . . Thou shalt love 'thy neighbor as thyself" (Mk. 12:28-34)? 34. To enable us to be swift and spirited, and unhampered by the recollection of perishable things, we are admonished: "No man putting his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the Kingdom of God" (Lk. 9:62). And if you wish to behold models of virtue in whom these thr~e laudable qualities shine forth, recall tO your minds the Apostle Paul and all those who have been en-gaged in wondrous exploits worthy of an immortal remembrance. 35. Moreover, the ideals which light your way to contempla-tion and action, as well as the goal of the Church's other children, both priests and laity, are the achievement of Christian perfection and the salvation of the human race. For your part, you have at hand the most effective aids, namely, the evangelical counsels through 179 ¯ POPE PlUS XII,. Reoiew for Religious the'profession of your vows of 'religion, and through these by un-remitting warfare you can overcome the concupiscence of the flesh,. ¯ the concupiscence of the ~yes, and the pride of life (cf.I 3o. 2:16), -~ind thus become ever holier and efficient servants of God for the .salvation of mankind. Direct your thoughts and your actions to [reach these lofty heights, "so that being rooted and grounded in 'love" (Epb. 3:17), steadfast in the power of faith and rich in hu- ¯ mility, you may lose no opportunity to lead men, your brothers, ¯ to their Creator and. Redeemer, as stray sheep returning to their Shepherd. 36. Faithful and true to your duty of good example, see to it that your conduct harmonizes with the name you bear, and that ¯ your whole manne~ 9f' life conforms to your profession. According 'to the words of the Apostle of the Gentiles: "Careful to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace" (Eph. 4:3), let peace reign within you and among you, among members of the same institute and among members of the same community, and with those of other institutes, between you and all who labor with you and with whom you labor to win men for Christ. Put far from you discords and disagreements which weaken and cripple undertakings begun with the highest hopes. The Church, as a field for apostolic en-deavor, is spread out all over the world; and an opportunity for toil and ~weat is open to all. 37. If the faith of religious is strengthened by the example of a life whose pattern is unyielding observance of the vows, if the priest regards nothing as hard or irksome in his quest for the salva-tion of souls, then the expression of the Apostle when referring to the word of God will also be true of them today, "living . . . and efficient and keener than any two-edged sword" (Heb. 4:13). We recently warned the faithful that in these calamitous days, when the misfortune and grievous want of many is in sharp contrast to the immoderate luxury of others, they should be willing to live tem-perately and to be generous to their neighbors oppressed by poverty. Come then, excel all others by your example in this insistent work of Christian perfection, justice, and charity; and thus lead them to imitate Christ. 38. Finally, with a great hope that the efficacious grace of our Lord Jesus Christ may bring forth from your Congress benefits of enduring value, and as a pledge of our abiding love, We affection-ately bestow upon all here present and upon religious communities everywhere in the world the Apostolic Benediction. 180 4 t Mot:her ern d, I--lelper o[ :he bloly Souls Sister Ma~y Cassilda TAKE the Blessed Sacrament, Mother! Keep Jesus with you!" / Startling words from a priesl~ to a humble religiou's woman! Yet, on the night of fire and consi~rnation following the San Francisco earthquake of 1906, the most unexpected ~became reality; and Mother St. Bernard could not doubt tba'~ this most redoubtable commission was for her. For to bet was held out the veiled ciborium Father Casey had just removed f~om the tabernacle. To her care was being confided in the terrors of that ni~ght the most precious of treasures, to be conveyed to'a place of safety. Our Lord clearl~z willed to accompany and 'protect the bewildered superior and her little community in their wearying flight. They were in sehrch of shelter from the adv~incing fl.ames, laden with what they could save from their abandol~ed convent. Mothe~ St. Bernard helps us to visualize the scene¯ "In the pres-ence of Jesus thus abased, entrusting Himself to me, tears filled my eyes," she writes; "I carried Him close to my heart, with a few of the commumty as escort, while the others saw to the transportation of our belongings. Walking alon'g the crowded streets, we prayed. I adored Christ hidden in my arms. When for a moment I lost sight of the others, my heart cried out in fear .t.o .my[ Lord, and there they were with us once ,more!" He assured them a safe ar-rival at the Church of St. John. Our Lord was theft replaced in the taberngcle and the HelpFrs spent the rest of the night in the base-ment of the church. This cross marking their, recent foundation was destined in the designs of God's providence to be the starting point of great development, for the San Francisco house. The Helpers devoted themselves amongst the homeless and destitute in the camps immediately organized; and, when, in the influenza epidemic of 1918, they showed themselves not only ready, but eager to nurse the plague-stricken, their place was forever fixed in the warm hedrts o]~ the West, from their archbishop down. But who was this religious selected by God fo.r so signal an honor, and how.had His providence T~onducted her thither from the quiet ancestral domain of her parents in sunny France? She was Marie Antoinette de Cherg~ and was born not. far from 181 SISTER MARY CASSILDA Review for Religioias Poitiers, France,. in 1850. There had been time since 1356 for the roar of battle tb die away; but the spirit of chivalrous France lived on in the line of Cherg~s, priding themselves on their loyalty to their traditions and their faith. Her father, Charles de Cherg~ eminent lawyer, archeologist, and writer of his time, was deeply Catholic and an admirable father. A prayer he composed for his sons has come down. to us written in fine French verse. "In Thy goodness, Lord; keep them ever faithful to their family motto; 'Straight on in the path of honor.' " The mother of Marie Antoinette was a pious, deeply affectionate woman, remarkable for distinguished gifts and devotedness in her home. The future Mother St. Bernard's character, ardent in the pursuit of holiness and dauntless in her zeal for the glory of God, can be easily discerned in her noble parents. She was a lovable, gentle child, fond of the games of her age, but already drawn by grace to the "greater things" of the saints. At the age of five, the farewell visit of a Jesuit leaving for the missions in China, and his blessing bestowed on her, left in her soul a grace which, she believed, de-veloped later into her immense desire to be a missionary herself. He had baptized her, child though she was, with the astonishing title of "Mother Abbess"; and it was spontaneously adopted. But her graces ran deeper than this. She found herself gradually drawn toward an absorbing love of God. As her own words tell us, "A mysterious recollection would steal over all my faculties, without my understanding what it was. I thought that everyone experi-enced the same, especially on First Communion day. I would with-draw to pray. I would have wished to be always alone to enjoy our Lord's presence. He seemed near to me in a way quite.different from anything faith or the imagination can produce; it was as if with my eyes closed I was sure someone was near me. Gradually I could think only. of Him." Marie Antoinette had need of a great interior strength, for natur-ally- and perhaps because of her interior favors--she was painf.ully timid, and frequently troubled with scrupulosity. N~ar her there was no one to help her. "I begged Our Lady," she wrote, "to send me someone to guide me in God's Name." Our Lady answered her child by-first enabling her to find in the family library the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius. By these a clear and solid Christian phil-osophy of life laid in her soul a foundation and support for further graces. Then, in the person of an old. friend of the family, 'Father Rabeau, S.J., she found the "someone" she had asked, for as guide. 182 MOTHER ST. BERNARD. He directed her also in her works of charity, visiting tl~e poor and catechising the children of the neighborhood. Finally, seeing that her attractions were leading her toward the religious life, as lived by the Helpers of the Holy Souls, he put her in contact with the mother general. Marie Antoinette found in these religious the ful-fillment of all her desires of perfection and apostolate--even of the missi6ns in China. They lived the dee[i, interior life 0f Ignatian spirituality that she had learned to appreciate; they were zealous for souls, all souls, even those in purgatory, whom they assisted by their works of charity toward the living. Among them a warm family spirit sustained and cheered their apostolate. But it was only at the age of thirty that she was able to over-come a too-loving opposition and break away from her dearly loved family. She entered the novitiate in the old Premo.nstraten~ian Abbey of Blanchelande, where the souvenirs of the former holy monks spurred on the young to fervor. The Society of the Helpers of the Holy Souls had been founded only in 1856 by Eug~nie Smet, of Lille, France. She was born in 1825 of a fine family. The li~¢ely faith and enterprising spirit of the brave Normans was her inheritance. From early childhood she' had been drawn towards the suffering souls in purgatory; and un-accotintably so, for no death had marred the joy of her happy home surroundings. Her education at the Sacred Heart of Lille left its im-print on her; she determined to consecrate her life to God. Purga-tory was calling her, and the thought of it was stimulating her to constant sacrifice and devotedness. As a young girl, in her works of charity, she would leave gifts at the door of the poor or the sick with the written appeal, "Say a prayer for the Souls in Purgatory." Along with her solicitude for these Holy Souls, there was grow'ing in Eug~nie a childlike and ardent devotion to Divine Providence. "He gives me everything," she ended by saying, "I will give Him these souls He wants, and cannot have: I will be God's Providence!~'- This noble ideal awoke in her all her abilities for practical social work. Soon she was forming an Association of Prayer--others be-sides herself must be God's providence--and, thanks to good or-ganizing, she had thousands working for purgatory in many dio-ceses of France. For these Holy Souls she was even ready to tear herself away from her loved home and go to Paris, as she had been invited, to found an order for ~heir deliverance. The saintly Cur~ Of Ars, her counsellor at this difficult time, qualified~ her project as "a thought of love from the Heart of Jesus." When be'hearSt later SISTER MARY CASSILDA Review [or Religious that the rules of St. Ignatius had been granted to her struggling group; he exclslimed, "The poor littles ones, they are saved'!" "ires, throfigh the dire poverty of their beginnings, the disappointments, and anxious searchings inherent in such an enterprise, God was' re-vealing to Eug~nie (now Mother 'Mary 'of Providence) His plan for her work of aiding purgatory. Prayer there would be--and of the deepest !--with " expiation in the form of charity toward the living as the most effective means of helping the dead! The Helpers would give themselves to spiritual and corporal works of mercy, ac-cording to the needs of the country in which they would live, under the direction of the Church. A call to visit apoor woman sick in the neighborhood indicated their most precious means of expiation: care of the sick poor. Other works followed from this: instruction of converts, catechism in parishes, preparing belated bap.tisms, First Communions, confirmations, arranging for the validation of mar-riages, etc. Guilds were soon formed to meet at the Helpers' convent; and, as they became known, cases of all kinds were sent them by priests. The Helpers were launched to succor not on!y the Holy Souls, but all needy, helpless or hopeless ones, by personalized social service. Their works were to be gratuitous. Into the fervor of the early years of the order, Marie Antoinette de. Cherg~ plunged with her ardent desire for sacrifice, fruit of her special graces. There they xvere--all the sacrifices she wished for, and more besides! She had to learn during her novitiate to leave behind her, at the word of obedience, all fears or hesitations, as well as her frequent interior disturbances, and go straight forward, still, honoring the family motto. Her mistress Of novices discovered -%-e. ventually, shall we say ?--qualities of a great apostle glowing under her timid exterior. The occasion appeared in an .unexpected call on Sister St. Bernard to replace another novice for. a catechism lesson to the parish children. The novice companion, who assisted at the course, could not get home soon enough to relate to the mother mistress what she "had seen and heard"; a fire of. zeal had burst forth in Sister St. Bernard's clear exposition of doctrine, enflaming both children--and novice. At the following lesson to the same group, it was the mistress of novices--present to verify the marvel --who was herself enflamed. Soon after her: vows Mother St. Bernard was named superior of the Helpers' Convent at Montm~artre, Paris, built beside the site of the'chapel where-St. Ignatius and his compani6ns had pronou.nced their first vows. In this populous and ignorant quarter of the city, 1'84 MOTHER ST. BERNARD Mother St. Bernard's zeal found full scope for its activity: a transL formation in the neighborhoc~d was achieved. But the mother general trembled at the price being paid. In'a letter to Mother St. Bernard at this time, she wrote, "Dear d~ughter, it is the lack of care of your health and the ardor with which you undertake more than you can" do, that makes you ill. Yoi~ are to obey implicitly the mother in-firmarian; otherwise you will have roe dying of anxiety." Several years of very successful apostolate here and at Liege put the finish-ing touches to Mother St. Bernard's preparation for a more distan~ field of action. She was called, to head a group of Helpers for the first American foundation early in 1892. New. York bad been chosen. In her journal Mother St.Bernard wrote: "On learning the Divine Will I felt both joy and sorrow in my soul. This first step towards the missions rejoiced me, but I was broken by the thought of the sacrifices awaiting me. Lord Jesus, I give you all that I hold dearest!" On the pier at New York on a bright May morning, the new-comers were welcomed by two friends, chosen, it seems; by divine providence to further this latest enterprise of the Helpers. Miss Addle Le Brun and Miss Anne Cronise represented a group of Cath-olic ladies who were eager to have the Helpers extend their work to the United States. They had behind them Father John Pren-dergast, S.J., and Father Robert Pardow, S.J., who, on' visits to Europe, had learned to appreciate the practical character of this new congregation and had urged widely'among their friends that an in-vitation be sent to the mother general to found a house in New York. This appeal had been made, and fell in happily with the Helpers' rule which sends them to any part of the world where there is hope of God's greater service by procuring more efficaciously the relief and deliverance of the souls in purgatory. Archbishop Corrigan's blessing and hearty cooperation had been assured. And so.at last Miss Le Brun, as the chronicle tells us, "is receiving us as long-desired and much-loved sisters; even weeping "for. joy.", She conducted them to the small house prepared for them on Seventh Avenue near Twenty-third Street where other friends welcomed them no less warmly. A letter to the mother house remarks on the delicate it-tentions of their kind reception. ".'. even a lamp was burning bex fore a picture of Our Lady of Providence, Queen of Purgatory; there were flowers, arid holy water! and all. was provided, for the first meals of our little Community. I could never express to yoi~ fittingly the affectionate interest which dear Miss Le Brun and her 185 SISTER MARY CASSILDA Review [or Reli~iou~ family have shown us. Gratitude fills all hearts." ¯ For newcomers, surprises were to be expected. "Think: of it!" one wrote back to France, "the first to call on us after our arrival was a colored gentleman, a tbarming individual! He showed .us how to make the kitchen fire.". Through their refectory window catalogues, advertisements, etc., were flung at almost every meal. On their way across the East River, the ferryman would take no fare. Material help in varied fo~ms came at their prayer through the "visible Providence" of benefactors--it might be "bread," or "coal," or "a desk for Mother Superior's room." At Iast they ended by cry-ing out in return, "Good St. Joseph, you spoil your children!" On June 13, the first Mass was said by Father Wucher, provin-cial of the Fathers of Mercy. Devoted friends had surpassed them-selves in their zeal for the Lord's glory that the tiny chapel might be adequately fitted out in time. During Mass, it was with tears of emotion and gratitude that all present welcomed our Lord. The Helpers were ready now to do their humble part of constructive work in the service of the Church in the archdiocese of New York, discounting such handicaps as the unaccustomed heat, the language (a problem to some), and the :'caresses of holy poverty." To this day they feel how much they owe to the encouragement of the clergy and°the generous help of their friends. From these sources they drew, in great part, the confidence with which they began and the success they later achieved. Only two days did they wait for their first sick call. It was an old Alsatian woman confided to them by their chaplain. She was ~o receive Holy Communion on the Feast of the Sacred Heart, and they were asked to prepare her room. The home was in rehlity an bld shack set up in a small, damp yard. The sick woman was stretched on a low bed--in the midst of discomfort and disorder-- and welcomed as angels from heaven tl-ie "Sisters" who offered to "lend a hand" foi house cleaning and to be "sacristans" for the welcome of the adored Visitor of the morrow. Some sheets, here-tofore unknown in the home, brought a little material comfort; while a new bedspread, some clean towels, and a simple altar adorned with candles and flowers added a note of cheerfulness and hope. "You will come back again, Sisters, won't you?" asked .the sick wo-man; after the ceremony. A hearty "As long as you need us" was her reassurance. Cases of even greater poverty and need ~were soon discovered. .:. A.~Helper writing to he'r mother general makes light of the difti~ 186 dul~!, 1955 ., MOTHER ST. BERNARD culties ¯encountered. "What a pity .we can't make more often ex-. cursions such as we did lately on our rounds! Our visit to Mrs. X ended, we were preparing to climb down the stairs to go next door, but Mrs. X directs us, 'dust go by the roof, Sisters!' And so we did,: and continued down the block by the same route! I wonder how we shall fare this week--the roofs are deep in snow." Father Schleuter, S.d:, chaplain of Blackwe11's Island, sent the Helpers a call for help in his work there. In the Hospital and Home for Colored Incurables, they began their visits of cheering and in-structing, which they continue to this day. Other hospitals have since been added. Their first case among the colored was the subject of another letter of triumph to Paris. Love for the least of Christ's little ones ¯ drew the Helpers to these--so destitute of all in those days. And they realized they were loved by the "new Sisters." Hearts opened at their approach, and soon we read of the baptism of nine little Negro children under five years, along with a good woman whom human respect did not deter from "joining up." They all had been collected in the same street, one which resembled nothing so much as a camp of outcasts. In one home three children slept on fi heap of rags as a bed; no furniture at all was to be seen; the father, doubt-less as bead of the family, ' had the honor of a seat on the window sill. We may easily surmise what an amount of ingenuity and ac-tivity was needed to produce the ten neophytes washed and pro-perly dressed for baptism. These souls and others discovered in the Helpers' visiting needed further attention and spiritual development. Guilds at th~ convent were formed for different groups, and the prompt and" numerous attendance at meetings showed they were appreciated. The "colored ladies" of Friday evenings could hardly be persuaded to go home when the time came. "You tell us such beautiful things, Sister, that we would want to stay all night. No one ever before talked to us like that." Indeed, the impression of. the Helpers was something akin to astonishment as they found they Cguld speak everywhere of religion without fear of indiscretion. Souls seemed to expect the mention of the name of God and an invitation to draw nearer to Him; indeed, they seemed even to long for it. A glimpse of activities on their first Christmas day in New York might give an idea of what progress was being made: (1) several First Communions at the midnight Masses (friends who had,bein. invited to assist had hastdned to fill the chapel);.~(2)-~a.receptidn of. 1,87~ SISTER MARY .CASSIED~. sodalists of ourLady'scheduled' for'~t later hour in.'the morning; ~lnd (3)one fo'r tiny tots (boys and girls)" in the.afternoon--the last ended with a "party" for' all concerned. The bell for Offiice at last put" an end to the prolonged rejoicings, and also to the ceaseless smil-ing and entertaining of the hostesses. Instruction of converts was hnother' item of Helper apostolate. The first soul to be thus tended was a young girl who called and presented to.Mother St. Bernard.a note of introduction from Father Van Rensselaer, S.,J., of St. Francis Xavier's. Another case was that pointed out to us by a ~lesuit with the information; "Protestant woman ill: her "little granddaughter to be brought up Catholic:" A little later the priest asked news of his patient. "She is learning her catechism w'itb much fervor, Father," was the reply. "The child, you mean? . No, the grandmother." "You are .joking, Sister! That can't be! There is nothing to be done with that wo-man . she is a bigoted Protestant." "I can assure you, Father, she is well on the way to" conversion; and it wasn't diffi:ult, either." The 'Helpers' constructive efforts were tending not only to re-lieve misery but to promote development socially and spiritually. First of all, their guilds for young girls and women carried in their programs cultural help fitted to the abilities of their members; sew-ing, languages, singing Under able direction were attractions much appreciated:those displaying talent for music were assisted and en-couraged. A primitive lay apostolate was started among the most fervent members; they were to "bring others," "notify of cases," etc. Italian groups also (of both men and women) received par-ticular attention; soon their Lenten missions were bringing, the re- "treat master immense consolation by the great number of returns to God. As the chapel was filled to capacity, the Helper in charge would give as direction to bet more fervent members, "Don't come tonight; leave your place for that one who needs it more." The formation of the Lady Associates also was a work towards which Mother St.' Bernard's far-sighted zeal turned most .prayer-fully. Favored by God as she was, she seemed to have only to evolve a project in order to draw God's blessing down upon it. Her power was her trust in the "fluidity" of her apostolic 'vocation--its perfect adaptability to.the mentality and needs of America--and in this trust she went straig,ht 6n. The group.of Lady Associates, in the idea of the foundress, Mother Mary of Providence, was called to share closely'in .the Helpers' prayers and. apostolic labors, sharing thus in-their merits for purgatory. From these ~lite were to com~ 1':88~ July, 19~ MOTHER ST. BERNARD the indispensable contributions.towards the Helpers' upkeep an.d works, cooperation in organizing parties or outings, for other groups, companions for the sisters in their visits to .the sick, the poor, or the hospitals. Indeed, it was.no small consolation, for Mother St. Bernard to see certain ones arm themselves with sick-case kit and contribute humble personal service. They bad monthly conferences by the best-known speakers amon. g the clergy, and a three-day re-treat in Lent. By November, 1894, twenty-seven ladies bad already made their .promises of prayer and work for the Holy Souls and bad received their silver crucifix. Mother St. Bernard on this occa-sion stressed their "joy on being received as ou~; Associates, their happiness in the bond of closer union it established with the Helpers." For these souls Mother St. Bernard stood-out as an inspiration and a subject of veneration. One of the first group, who is still living and still a devoted Associate, loves to recall the thrilling im-pression of reverence they experienced when they.stood in her pres-ence. They could not but feel that in the depths of those gentle, smiling eyes was a Presence, whose radiance awed and won them. A ~roof of their esteem for her is found in a life-sized marble statue o(the Sacred Heart erected in memory of her in the convent garden at Eighty-sixth. Street. The uplifted eyes and arms of Christ ex-emplify well her spirit: "That they may know. Thee, the one true God, and Jesus Christ Whom Thou hast sent!" Mother St. Bernard, then, was the life of these varied projects: The generous response of New York Catholics to her zeal w~is the more and more numerous attendance at convent meetings. By 1894 the house could no Idnger contain them. The house itself, moreover, was becoming unsafe: c~uarters must be found elsewhere. This amidst general protestations; "our poor clients were for having the Arch-bishop oblige us to stay!" A' site on East Eighty-sixth Street, be-tween Park and Lexington Avenues, was "deemed suitable, since it placed the Helpers just between their dear poor and the friends not less dear on whom they relied for charitable help. Funds for the moving'were needed; the ladies, volunteered to sponsor a bazaar on the new premises. Let us hear an eye-witness tell of their fervor. "The Octave of the Holy Souls (November 2nd to 9th) :has closed as brilliantly as it began. The Archbishop had had his 'inevitable' absence ex-plained on the invitation cards. The chapel in its feast-day decora-tions gave sensible devotion, and our ladies.' kept it a bower of flowers for the full eight days. A bouquet for our Lord of still more ~189 SISTER MARY CASSILDA agreeable, perfume was the throng that crowded the chapel and drank in the words of Rev. Father Campbell, S.J., former provin-cial of the Jesuits. Father lent himself graciously to all the desires of our ladies for interviews, confessions, etc . " Father Campbell showed his appreciation of the organization by calling it "a great work destined to do much good, one in which good spirit and at-tachment to. their group is far above the ordinary." Nor was purgatory lost to view outside the convent by the Helpers. The Association of 'Prayer founded by Mother Mary of Providence was gathering in treasures for the deliverance of the Holy Souls. The Associates at present are numbered by thousands in each of the Helpers' convents (six now in the United States); they ap-preciate what is being done for their own dear deceased and are glad to obtain for them even more suffrages by participating actively in the "relief" work. For eleven years Mother St. Bernard had been praying, working, suffering, to give God to the souls whom providence directed to her in New York for purgatory's sake. She had loved God as St. John computes charity, for indeed she had "loved her neighbor." She had loved, too, her community; otherwise, how explain the un-failing response of its members to her unceasing calls on them "to relieve the misery of Purgatory by tending the needs of earth"? The fire of zeal that consumed her she knew how to communicate strongly and sweetly to her daughters; they ran gladly in the path she traced for them. But tbey were now to pay the price of further spiritual con-quests by sacrifice. Proposals for a foundation from various quarters :had been set aside by major superiors in favor of St. Louis. Arch-bishop Kane desired the Helpers for his flock, and Mother St. Ber-nard was charged to car'ry help. thither. Consternation reigned 'among her many friends; but Mother'St. Bernard, with ;i group of six Helpers, left in May, 1903, for her new field of activity. They 'found the little house that had been, rented for them on Delmar ¯ Avenue had been stripped by robbers the night.before their arrival. Of whatever furniture or provisions had been collected" for them, 'nothing .remained--and no 'wonder! Not fi door nor a window could, be closed securely; a state:of dilapidation.prevailed. But the exterior had the charm of St. Louis spaciousness' and verdure; the Helpers breathed gratefully an atmosphere of most cordial welcome; ~they,were delighted. Two beds were considered en6ugh .to start with; others'would come. Acarton would arrive correctly address~d.-~".'!.But 9'0 ~lulv, ¯ 1955 MOtHER. ST. BERNARD who sent us that?" would query the Helpers. "You bought it this mbtning," declared the grocery boy delivering it. "Not we, certainly!" "Well, someone just'as "certainly has v'aid for it." The ddnor was never discovered.; The large-l~eartedness of St. Louis Catholics assured the Helpers hearty support, frdm clergy and laity. Bishop Glennon, replacing Archbishop Kane taken sudde.nly ill, was delighted,~ when he heard no distinction of religion, race, or color was mad~ in their works. "You nurse the sick--colored?" he inquired. "Of course!" was the eager reply. The best families, with their deep spirit of faith, were glad show their appreciation of a work for their beloved deceased; g!fts of all kinds flowed in to lighten the rather severe poverty of the first weeks. It must have been great since the ~tory gores, that .the sister cook appeared one day in her superior's room to report a difficulty: she had just one dollar to get the commun!t~' thrbugb day. Mother St. Bernard, in her inimitable way. replie.d, we did not (ome here to eat; we came to save souts!" The incident ended happily, however, for the sister cook; she was called back to have an addition made to her capital. Sympathy was widely awakened. The "new Sisters' " arrival had got into the newspapers. Even bef6re the door bell had been repaired, friendly calls began. "You have come from so far, poor things !--have you been. expelled from France?" '.'The French hav~ such good taste., do you give instructions in millinery? or French?': or just, "Welcome to St. Louis . . . we will help you get started!" Work began at once; calls for nursing the sick around them--or even far from them--were answered. By June the Helpers already had sixty young girls forming a sodality. By October, thirteen ladies had gathered for serious apostolic work, and eight of their daughters and their friends in a group, apart. When the Octave of the Dead was solemnly celebrated with daily sermon and Benediction, one hundred of their friends fillefi chapel, ha.llways, veranda, etc. And their ardor .was no whir damp-ened if the preacher¯failed them unexpectedly; af~er'a wai~ o'f an h~ur and. a half,.they would have Benediction only, .anti depa;t-- l~ving the.work more than. ever! ~ " " ¯ . By. Januar.y .pf.'the next yea}r! sixty-two, colbred" w?.men we)~ attending a "weekly meeting. ¯ In thr~e years: time :(~is.soon as t.hei¯Helpers had settled in. their Review for Religions present home, 4012' Washington Boulevar.d) we read. of two. hun-dred and fifty poor who were~ served'ice cream .and cake at.a party,r How? W.e may 'wonder: All to the credit of.providence and St. 'Louisan generosity ! ,:~. Work. among the colored was pursued with an almost heroic courage. Along the banks of the Mississippi were to be found the poorest and m0,st abandoned of these; some of~the hovels 'were even a menace td~the lives of the religious. One Helper was warned that an infuriated husband was preparing to knife the next Helper who entered his house to care for his wife and cbiidren! The great need of the f~am!ly made the religious discou,n,t the possible danger; she "~ent again. But prudence.would nbt allow her to return--for the present ! The little c61ored children were collected for catechising when 'and where they could be i%u'nd. If a basement that h~id been "their ~e6tre" was needed ~or some other purpose, Helper-and pupils moved off res!gnedly with chairs and benches to the nearest hospitable-- iand still temporary--quarters. From contact with the parents of th~s~ children, bapt!.sms followed, often of whole families. Mother St. Berriard left St. Louis in 1905 to serve her order as foundress of a new house in San Francisco. But l~e} shpernaturai thirst fo.r the" total immolation"of foreign-mission life was not yet slaked. In her corresponderice with the mother ~eneral, allusion was frequeiatly made to China as a much-desired future post. At last ~.h:e latter w~ote her d~ar daughter to be in peace for the present, ~.'for if God Wants you in Chinal He will upset the earth to get you there!" We shill see bow, literally, He was soon to do so. " From the beginning San Francisco was to show'itself a worthy successor of New York and St. Louis as the "Providence" of the He!pets. Archbishop Riordan declared himself ~'their father," and ~ven complained paternally that he v~as not invited to do more for them. Providence also furnished friends, who, for the' sake of pur-gatory and its Helpers, were. glad to help "the Sisters" find a house and begin their charitable works. These were soon in full swing. A p~a~eful apostolate seemed assured them when, at five-fifteen in the morning, April 18 brought i~pon the city the historic earth-quake. When calm began to reappear and Mother St. Bernard was able to write, she began the account of the great catastrophe with the words, "God be praised for ha~cing enabled us to pass through these sad days in peace and joy in Our L'ord! All are saved, and not too exhausted, considering recent fatigues and emotions:" The 192 July, 1955 MOTHER.ST. BERNARD tale of these latter the .Helpers like to forget, remembering only the marked instances of divine protection, the touching, charity they had experienced, and the good they had been allowed to do for "souls. As a matter of fact, once the time of actual danger passed, they found a temporary residence, which promptly become an ark of salvation for many. ,lust a little later, Bishop Montgomery, on a visit to see how they were faring, discovered that the Helpers were making hay while the sun shone. Starting to open a door to the right, be was stopped by "Not~there, Excellency, confessions are being heard!" To the left, a group was being instructed for baptism; upstairs, souls in sorrow and distress had discovered the Helpers and were being consoled and helped. That morning eighty persons had assisted at a Mass said on the stairway; the absent members of the community were on their intensive tours in the camps. His Ex-cellency could only express his satisfaction with his Helpers for their readiness to meet the emergency. The catastrophe, indeed, which had shaken the city, ,bad not less deeply stirred the hearts of the victims: many saw in it the chastening hand of a Father long 9eglected, and were ready to turn to Him, or recognized in the Charity they' witnessed the one true church, and.desired to enter it. It was the happy lot of the Helpers to bring these to the priest. Five camps, each'comprising thousands of souls, were confided to their care;, and," before the refugees were able to find homes, the apostles bad again and again filled their nets wi'th the almost mirac-ulous draughts provided by the Lord; months of labor and fatigue, lightened by accompanying joy. By October a conventual life could be resdmed once more in a house temporarily rented, and the ordinary ,works of their voca-tion be resumed. To these were to be eventually.added extensive work among the French and the Chinese. But it was not to be Mother St. Bernard who would cultivate the new field as she had done in St. Louis and New York. The present shattering experience had seriously" fiffected her health, and she was recalled to Paris by an anxious mother general to be moth~red in her turn. Looking back over the labor of the year, she could say, "Our efforts have certainly borne fruit in Purgatory; and even if We had come to San Francisco only to give to God the souls re-cently converted, and to prevent, as we hope, 'so many mortal sins, ou~ sacrifices would be Well rewarded!" 'On September 19 Mother St. Bernard and a companion arrived once more at the'Jr home-land and were welcomed w. ith the warm affection that character- 193 NOTES ,FOR CONTRIBUTORS Reuieu.~ "for ,Religious izes the Helpers' family life. The time spent there¯ shou!d'~h~v~ been for her an epoch of peace and repose by the°side of her ~beloved mother general; but the Lord's way for her was still alternately one of extraordinary graces of union, and of interior¯ unrest and torment. Temptations, scruples, a too-ankious striving for a per-fection ever eluding her were now a 's~nctifying.fire in which' a last. mystic purification was being accomplished: and graces were being bbught for her apostolate. Finally, the mother general, yielding to the entreaties of Mother St. Bernard, gave her as assignment the missions. 'And in December, 1908, her last journey--this time to China !--was begun. The Helpers had been in that country since 1867, assisting the Jesuits in Kiang-su by training Chinese maidens for their priests' mis-' sionary work, caring for abandoned babies and orphans, and even opening schools for Chinese and European girls. Mother St. Ber-nard was welcomed there as a gift of God to the mission. She was appointed superior of one of the Helpers' convents in Shanghai, to which several European schools and free dispensaries were attacbed. The ~ictive part of her li'fe, ~however, was over; for her health had failed her completely now; but from her room, or even her bed; she' governed her establishment and had the consolation of 'designing and constructing a new altar for the chapel. It was the last time she would arouse and guide the latent abilities of her daughters for the adornment of the I£ord's abode among them. The Jesus she had ever so faithfully served was surrounded to the end by the care of her adoring love. After a long decline, patiently accepted, she went at last to find rest in Him who .had been her "All" in her struggles here below. His sacred name was the last her dying lips were heard to utter. She rests now in the convent cemetery; her remains, a long silent prayer for the welfare of her beloved China. Not es t:or Con!: 'ibutors tin our March number (pp. 104-112) we,publish~d the main part of a new style sheet. The material given here completes the .project.] VII. PAREN 'HESES EN,U.MERAT[ONS 1. Pla~e between parentheses figures or letters used to mark divi, sions of. enumer~ations,run., into the. .text. . :,,~ The,reasons for his resignation were three: (1) advanced age, (2) failing health', and (3) a desire to travel. 2. Pa'refitbe.ses a}e ~sed in pairs except that, when enum~;~d "di@- sions are pa~agrapl~ed, a~single parenthesis is ordmardy"u~ed {6 r94 NOTES FOR CONTRIBUTORS follow ~l lower-case (italic) letter or a lower-case roman numeral; a period is used instead of the parenthesis with Arabic figures and capital (roman) letters. He gave three reasons for not coming: a) He was not sure of the appointed time. b) He had no available transportation. c) He was sick. He 'gave three reasons for not coming: i) He was not sure of the appointed time. ii) He had no available transportation. iii) He was sick." He visited briefly the cities of-- 1. St. Paul, Minnesota; 2. St. Louis. Missouri; 3. Kansas ,City, Missouri. He visited briefly the cities of-- I. St. Paul, Minnesota; II. St. Louis, Missouri; III. Kansas City, Missouri. 3. If one or more of the enumerated items is a complete sentence, a period is the proper end punctuation; if all the enumerated items are. incomplete sentences and do not contain internal pur~ctuation, a comma is the proper end punctuation;if all th'e enumerated items are incomplete sentences and one or more of the items contain in-ternal punctuation, a semicolon is the proper end punctuation (cL the examples above). 4. If a period, comma, semicolon, or dash is needed at the end of a parenthesis that interrupts a sentence, place the mark outside.the parentheses. " Karen did not kfi'ow (or so she said). Here he gave .big strange, thofigh accurate (and' handsomely delivered), ac-count of the disaster. ]['ilton was.b.orn thi~ year of the flood (1894.) ; he doesn't remembe_r, much 5.' If a co, lon,.':question mark, or exclamation pbin~ I~elonks only"to th.e .p.a~[.enth_.~esi~, place the mark inside the p~ir~nth~ses' and end th~ sentence with another mark. : , ,~ : (Helen:) There is something .you'.are forget'tizig! "' '~' :. ' :: ~." .' Karen did not know (or did she?). ¯ :'" ¯ :" "''¢ Yates absconded with:'my fishing tackl~ (the.Scoundrel!;). d a , 6. If a colon, question mark, or exclamation point bel~n~ to the rest of the sentence or to.both the parentheses and the rest of the sentence, .place the mark outside the parentheses. .-" Pe'r6n nientions three ladrones (robbers) : Gonzales, Trega, and the'nameless . butcher. . ": . ¯ ¯ ;.Would.you care to join .us (in othei" words,, will you fake.the.d/ire)~ Chesterton said the most startling thing" ~oh. page 7) ! . ., .:i ¯ 1. NOTES 'FOR CONTRIBUTORS 7. Independent parenthetical sentences are enclosed in parenthese~ and are .punctuated and capitalized just like other independent sen-tences; the end punctuation is placed it/side the parentheses. I had just met the. man. (Oldenburg insists I met him a year earlier. Olden-burg, however, remembers things more or less as he pleases.) We had been introduced by Clesi, a mutual friend. VIII. COLON 1. Use a colon to introduce formally any matter that follbws-- usually matter in apposition. (A dash, less formal, may be used also for this purpose.) : She felt as .you would expect: worried, frightened, perplexed. 2. Use a colon to introduce a clause, that summarizes what has gone before. (A dash, less formal, may be [~sed also for this purpose.) You are to appear at exactly two o'clock; you are to be wearing a green cap; you are to leave at precisely th'ree: o'clock:" these things you must do . exactly and without fail, 3. Use a colon to introduce items tha~ are indented like paragraphs, provided that the introductory statement could stand as a sentence by itself. If the introducto;~z statement., is incomplete, use a dash. He'gave three ~easons for not coming: j ¯" 1. He~was not sure of the appointed time. . 2. He had no available transportation. 3. He was sick. He visited briefly the cities a) St. Paul Minnesota; b) St. Louis; Missouri; ,. c) Kansas ~City, Missouri. 4. Capitalize the first ~vord after a colon whenever you want to introduce formally a complete. :sentence following the colon. ., , The. '.next. questipn ~hat came up.for discussion was: Are the requirements for membership strict enough? . ,. 5. 0 D6 not capitalize the first ,k, ord after a colon, when. y9u are (I) merely giving an example or amplifying a preceding clause or (2) adding'brief iiems that do not make 'a" complete sentence. " Everything ffas~perfect for our walk' to Corona: the day was sun'ny a~id clear; the air grew cooler and scented as we climbed the Divide; and we seemed to have the .whole mountain to ot~rselves. Peace is not an accident:, it is built of law and self-restraint. Be sure to bring,these things .with you: .,swim.ruing trunks, slacks, and tennis shorts. OUR CONTRIBUTORS SISTER MARY CASSILDA, Helper of the'Holy Souls, went to China ~'i~h Mother St. Bernard!add spent the first twenty-five years of her religious life there; the latter part of her life has been spent almost entirely as mistress of novices. 3OHN MATTHEWS and 3OSEPH ,F. GALLEN are members of the faculty, of Wood-stock College, Woodstock, Maryland.: . ?1~,96 "['he ot: l x rnple John Matthews, S.J. GOOD example r(quires at least two persons --.the one Who gives and the one who receives the example. A man gives holy example b~; doing holy deeds; when these virtuous works move another to .imitafe them, that other is said to receive good example. Of course, all fine actions stir men to applaud them; but our human approval may go no further. At times, however, God appoints a worthy deed to serve as a grace. We call it an external grace' because it is a divine gift outside our souls-- for instance, the Bible. Thus when God wills that another's holy action be an example to us, then --and only-then-- can that act of virtue help us to do a like deed in a way leading to heaven. Then'the virtuous deed teaches us. It arouses our admiration. It draws us to imitation. It encourages us. It moves us to good thoughts and resolutions. It can even open up new paths of holiness. In this way a virtuous work prepares our minds and wills to receive from God the actual grace with which we can do deeds of superfiatural worth. So does the grace of example play its part in the divine plan for our salvation. Jesus Christ is our greatest model of holiness, our finest example of virtue. He practiced all the virtues in their fullness -- without defect and without sin. He excelled in love of and obedience to His heavenly Father. Towards men He was patient and merciful. He offered His enemies, a Heart of love. While humble, He evei spoke the truth with,courage. The perfection and harmony of virtue iri-spired all His actions. Rightly do we call one of such perfect holi-ness our greatest grace of example. Moreover, ou~ Lord had a mission to be for mankind the exem-plar of virtue. From ~ternity God the Father in His loving providence had willed expressly that the actio'ns of His Son should be graces of example for men of future ages. H~nce our Lord cafne into the.~orld to model holy deeds for us and to draw us to imitate His example. Our Savior was aware ofthis mission; and He completed it by model-ing ~vety virtue in every circumstafic6 of life--iia the family, in dealing with others, in poverty an'd labor, in honor and tempation, in prayer and pain a'nd death. $6 foi'countlesss'children 6f God, the actions of Jesus have been and are an external grace; throu'~-cen-t- ,197 JOHN MATTHEWS Review for Religious uries to come our Model will offer men the grace of holy example. "For I have given you an example that, as I have done to you, So you do also'[ (3ohn 13:15). Note those last words: "so you do also." Therein the Savior stresses our duty to be graces of example for our fellow men. Jesus has the right to command us; He is our Lord and Master. Yet He did not merely impose on His faithful the duty of imitating Him; He also practiced the virtues Himself: "As I have done to you, so you do also." Christ commands only what He first did. "For unto this are you called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving you an example that you should follow His steps" (I Pet. 2:21). In the likeness of ,Jesus, we too must give holy example to our brethren. This means, first, that we may not give bad example. Our ac-tions must never be a scandal to others. Hence priests and religious can well challenge themselves. Have I through discouraging advice failed to draw my neighbor to God when I could have? Has my neglect of duty been a bad influence on my flock? Has my failure led others to act remissly? Have my faults disedified those whom God has placed in my charge? We see readily that poor example can be very damaging to our neighbors' faith and .holiness. But our Lord also calls us to be sterling examples to those about us. Thus we are bound in Christlike charity to give .holy example, especially when it is needed to save others from suffering serious scandal or from committing mortal sin. This duty is uni-versal; on all men of all time rests the task of inspiring each other by worthy conduct. Particularly obliged to give good example are those having authority--religious superiors, parents, teachers, civil officials, bishops, and priests. Like Christ, her Head, the Catholic Church has the mission of being the exemplar of sanctity in the world. She must be holy her-self and she must also model holiness for every walk of life. In-deed, ~so clearly was the Church a pattern of virtue in her early days that even the pagans remarked this. "The practice of such a special love brands us in the eyes of some. 'See,' they say, 'how they love one another . . . and how ready they are to die for each other.'-1 Today likewise the Church's children must in .charity offer Christ-like example to those in and out of the fold. As Catholic~, there-fore, it is emine.ntly our duty to live. so virtuously, that God," if Hd wills, may use our holy deeds as patterns for imitation by other 1Tertullian, Apolo~y,'Ch. 3 9. duly, 1955 TH'E GRACE OF F.XAMPLE me'n. Then will Our Catholic life carry on the wonders our Savior did. Our practice of virtue will draw souls to Christ and to His Church. The duty of givin~ example will be an apostolate to our neighbors in the Lord. We will be our brothers' keeper, a good shepherd to sheep outside the fold, a leaven in the mass of mankind, and a flame lighting for men the way to God. Truly is our good example a help to the holiness of others--in the convent, seminary, school, parish, hospital, everywhere. It com-bats evil .example; it challenges bad will; it supplants ignorance (cf. I Pet. 2:12-15); and it offsets that fear of men which keeps the timid from acting rightly. Frederic Ozanam,2 hoping to begin his work amongst the needy, .was so hindered by obstacles that he almost gave up the idea. In search of strength he stepped into a church. There he saw a man praying before the Blessed Sacrament. It was his friend, Ampere, a scientist of renown, a pioneer in the field of electricity; and, from this man's prayerful example, Ozanam drew the courage to work again and finally to found the St. Vincent de Paul Society. The example of Ampere was an external grace, prepared by God from all eternity fbr the disheartened Ozanam. Again, worthy example helps man spiritually because it spurs others to imitation.In 1646, St. Isaac 3ogues, 3esuit missionary, died under the blows of an Iroquois tomahawk. As a young priest 3ogues saw two of his fellow missionaries returning from their labors to Quebec. He wrote3 of them to his mother. "They were barefooted and exhausted, their underclothes worn out and their cassocks hanging in rags on their emaciated bodies.", Yet the sight of these missionaries was an external grace for 3ogues--and the oc-casion of actual graces that made his missionary vocation stronger. He continues in his letter: "Their faces . . . expressive of content and satisfaction . . . excited in me both by their looks and conver-sation a desire to go and share with them the crosses to which our Lord attached such unction." That desire St. Isaac satisfied thr.oug.h torture and martyrdom. A last word. ~oncerns oumelves. God places us where we. can best~gain heaven and lead ot.he~s there. In this vocation all should give and receive holy example. Through the centuries the family heroes of~the Catholi+ Church--Christ, Mary, saintly men and wo- 2James Bro~terick; S.J.,'. Fred&ic Ozanam and His" Society (London: Bu~:ns, Oates f3 Washbourne Ltd., 1933:). . . ¯ -. . 3Dean Harris, Pioneers of the.Cross.in Canada (Toronto: McClelland and Good-child). QU~S.~IONS AND ANSWER~ Reoiew for Religious men and children--have been patterns of virtue for mankind. Today Catholics have the task of carrying on the work of their heroes and of being themselves graces of example for all those God brings into. th'eir daily life. Indeed, the Christian apostle will stand out amongst men as another light of the world, drawing souls to his Savior and his Church. Such a crusade can well be fruitful unto life eternal both for ourselves and our neighbors in Christ. As Catholics, we will also see the holy actions of others. These may not impress us much; indeed, we may even smile at them. When, however, God wills that another's act challenge us, we find heart and mind drawn to praise and imitate the virtuous deed. In this favorable situation God pours into our soul the heavenly strength of His actual grace, wherewith we ourselves can imitate the fine ex-ample of our neighbor. I~ is God who puts .us in the way of inspiring example. In His special care for each soul, He planned that from all eter.nity. We must, then, take to heart the example others give us; for thereby God seeks to help us grow more holy. We should profit by the worthy example we notice, be alert for the actual grace which fol-lows example, and use God's graces, both external and actual, to do those virtuous deeds which delight God and open heaven for us. ( ues ions and Answers 16 In Review {or Religious, XIII (1954), 251, it is stated: "Major superior-esses . . . shall send in their report as follows: . . . In 1956 . . . the super-ioresses of America (North, Central, South)." A doubt occurs to our minds as to whether the year 1956 is to be included in the quinquennial report, which then will be sent to the Sacred Concjrecjation of Rellcjious early in 1957. Kindly let us know. In a decree dated March 8, 1922, the Sacred Congregation of Religious determined the dates for the years in which the quinquen-nial report is to be sent to the Holy See by all religious institutes according to the" prescriptions of canon 510, and it provided as follows: "The five-year periods are determined and common for all religious institutes and they begin with the first day of January, 1923." Hence (he first report to be sent during the year 1928 began with Jantlary I, i923, and ended with December 31, 1927. Simi- 200 4.ul~l7 1955 . . QUESTIONS AND ANS,.WERS lar.ly .the report to be sent to the Holy See during the.year 1956 (nQt 1957) by all religious institutes of women' from the Americas (North, Central, and South) will cover the .entire five-year period beginning with January 1, 1951, and ending December 31, 1955. ml7-- When a sister v~hether temporarily or perpetually professed, who has left the community, is permitted for a good reason to return, should she take her rank in religion fron~ her first profession? Or should she be.' ranked according to her profession after her re-entrance? Supposing that by "left the community" you mean. that sister asked for and obtained a dispensation from her vows, then the an-swer is to be found in canon 640, § 2, which reads as follows: "If, by.virtue of an apostolic indult, he i~ received again into the insti-tute, he must make a new novitiate and profession, and his place, amongst the professed members, must be reckoned from the day of his new profession." On the other hand, "left the community" may simply mean that the sister was granted, an indult of exclaustration, that is, per-mission to live in the world for a time without the religious habit and in subjection to the local ordinary in conformity with the pro-visions of canons 638 and 639. In this case sister remains bound by her vows and the other obligations of her religious profession compatible with her state. She is, for the time being, not subject to the superiors of her own institute, but to the local ordinary in whose diocese she resides, and this even by virtue of her vow of obedience. Consequently, upon .her return to her institute, since she has never been released from her vows, she resumes that rank which she already had when she went out into the world for a time. A novice in a pontifical institutewhich has two full years of novitiate received the habi÷ on August IS, 19S3. During the canonical year the novice spent.twenty-two days in a hospital. Now two questions arise: (I) When does the second year of novitiate begin in this case? (2) What is the earliest date upon which the novice may tak,e first vows? First of all, l~t us recall to mind that' canofi 555; §12, states the foil.owing: "If the 'constitutions prescrib m6re than 6ne ~'ear for the novitiate, the extra time is not required" for the ;¢alidlty of th~ profession, except the constitutions expressly 'd'&la}{ btherwise." Since.nothing was said about such a provision, we may presume 201 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS Review for Religious that the constitutions have no special provision for the validity of the second year of novitiate. What folloWs~ therefore, applies qnly to the licit profession of tb~ first vows after two years of novitiate. :.- On February 12, 1935, the Commission for the Interpretation of the Code "of Canon Law declared that an apostolic indult is re-quired in order that, the canonical year of novitiate mentioned in canon 555, § 1, n. 2, may be transferred to the second year of novitiate according to § 2 of the same canon. In other words, when there are two years of novitiate, the canonical year must be com-~ pleted dur]ng the first year. A canonical, year of novitiate which has been interrupted by a period of more than thirty days must be begun over again. On the other hand, if the novice has passed more than fifteen days but no~ more than thirty days even interruptedly outside the novitiate'house under the obedience of the superior, it is necessary and sufficient for the validity of the novitiate that he supply the number of days so passed outside. This is the statement of canon 556 regarding thi~ interruption of the canonical year. To complete this canonical year the novice .in question, must spend twenty-two complete days extra in the novitiate after August 15. Hence the second year of novitiate cannot be begun until midnight: of September 6-7. This answers our first question. If the second year of novitiate begins at midnight, September 6-7, thenit will be completed at midnight ~f September 6-7 a year later; and the novice may licitly take his vows on September 7, 1955. Superiors cannot shorten the second year of novitiate (Normae of 1901, art. 75), nor can they dispens~"from a'-certain number of days by reason~of power granted to ',them 'in the constitutions; and the reason is that there is no questio~ here o~ a simple disciplinary norm from which superiors may dispense. However, in the present case,.the superior would be justified in.requesting a dispensation from the Holy See so that the novice ~ay make his first profession of vows aftertwo years with his class on A~g(st 15~ 1955. Are indulgences 9ranted ~y the Holy See limited to Catholics of the Latin rite? How may a Cafh01i~ o~ ~he ,~e~'.rit~' share, ih ~hese indul-gences ff they a~e so I[mffed? Do Cafhofic~ off, he Greek r[fe,have the[r own book on in ences? . ": ,: Since indulgences, pertain directly to'the spk~tual good'of souls, 202 July!, 1955 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS they must be intended for all Catholics.¯ In this matter there is no distinction between the Eastern and the Latin churches. As far back as December 23, 16'16, Pope Paul V assured the clergy and people of the Ruthenian nation in communion with the Apostolic See that they share with the rest of the faithful all in-indulgences upon fulfillment of the prescribed conditions (cf. Col-lect. Lacensis, II, col. 600 d). Within recent times a certain bishop of an Eastern. rite proposed the following question: "May the faith-ful of the Eastern Rites gain the indulgences granted by the Supreme Pontiff by a universal decree?" And the Sacred Penitentiary re-sponded in the affirmative on duly 7, 1917 (AAS, IX [1917], 198). Since these concessions refer only to indulgences granted to all the faithful by a universal decree, Vermeersch asks a very practical question (Periodica, IX [1920], 67, 68): "May Orientals by the use of scapulars and blessed beads gain the indulgences of the Latins?" He is inclined to the affirmative opinion, even in the case when 'the erection of a confraternity is required. His opinion is based upon an answer of the Sacred. Congregation of Indulgences which d~- clared it was lawful, for the master general of the Order of Preachers without a special faculty of the Holy See to erect confraternities proper to the Order also in churches of a different rite with the previous consent of the ordinary as among the Latins (S. C. Cong. lndulg., dune 21, 1893). There is no special book of indulgences for the Eastern Church. For such indulgences as have been granted by the Supreme Pontiff to all the faithful by a universal decree they may use the official Latin text issued in 1942 by the Sacred Penitentiary.under the ~itle of Enchiridion Ir~dulgentiarum (2nd ed., 1952). This has been ' translated into English under the official title of the Raccolta or Prayers and Devotions Enriched with Indulgences. ~-20-~-" In the case of a small monag:l'i~: chaptei', is it permissible to use fyped slips of. paper for votlncj inlplace 6f hand v~'riffen ones? Some elderly nuns do not ~e~h well:enodcjh:to write, and i~" would 'be very helpful if;they could be cfive~n"the typed namds of all th~ nuns 'enjoylncj ~passlve vblce. 'Our consti÷ufions do not specify "thekind bf ballot to be 'tJs~d b'i,t"onl~, i'hat it is to b~ "~leposffed in :÷heurn.; . .'. To avoid all .confusign~ and any~:pgssible, invalidity of votes because o~ a "lack of secrecy, only blank slips of paper should be.used ,203: QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS Review ~oF Religious in elections, even in the case of a small monastic chapter. When an elderly nun who does not see well enough to write advances to de-posit her ballot in the urn, let her give her blank ballot'io one of the tellers and ask him to write in the name of N.N. Since the tellers are bound to secrecy by oath (Canon 171, § 1) thiff method is proposed by a number of reputable canonists 'such as Schaefer (De Religiosis. ed. 4, p. 242, n. 499, 15), 'Jone (Commentarium in Codicem, I sub c. 169, n. 2, pp. 173-'74), De Carlo (Ius Religi-osorum, n. 125IV, p. 114.), Vermeersch-Creusen (Epitome, I, n. 287) and others. . On account of a very tight schedule it would seem necessary to have Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament on prescribed days during our medi-tation period. Would such a practice I~e considered desirable?. Or would it be better to have Benediction less often and have it outside of medi-tation time?" May a holy hour during which there is exposition of the Bles-sed Sacrament interspersed with vocal prayers and sincjincj be considered as a valid substitute for meditation?' Finally, is it permissible to substitute a second.Mass for par~ of the morning meditation? Geiaerallyspeaking, there should be no conflict between medita-tion period and Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. The consti-tutidns[ pres~rib'e th~ period of daily; meditation and no superior has the power to dispense in a "~enera! way from this obligation by shortening it. On the other hand, the sisters should not be de-p. rived of the blessing of 'their Eucharistic King on those days when Benediction fs permitted by the local ordinary. Schedules can and sfiould b~ arranged so as to avoid a frequent conflict. In single in-stanci~ s when, o'wing to iin unforseen difficulty, both cannot be had, superiors may dispense from a part of .the meditation period in order to make it possible to have Benediction ~f the Blessed Sac[a-ment. Provided that the holy hour has several periods free for silent prayer, it may be used. for the evening meditation. The chaplain may be ask.ed to provide such intervals for silent prayer. It is hardly c.orre.ct to talk about "substituting a second l~lass for meditation." What the writer has in mind un.doubtedly is the fact that occasional.l~r a "dsiting priest puts .in an. appearance and says Mass during the time allotted to the morning meditation. There is no objection to the religious finishing their meditation during this second.Mass (cf. t~EVlEW' FOR RELIGIOUS XI [1952]-, 3~:~3, q. " 30). , . 20.4 " Religious Clerical Forma!:ion and Sist:er Format:ion Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. [The following article is an address given by Father Gallen at the first Eastern regional meeting of the Sister Formation Conference, held at Fordham University, November 27, 1954. Ed.] thought WE can aptly begin our meeting by borrowing a of P!us XII. There is no doubt that progress has been made in the education and formation of sisters. Our spirit, there-fore, should not be one of discovery and reform but of greater progress. We are to direct our thoughts and efforts, not to the merely necessary or barely sufficient, but to the perfect. The state of perfection implies not only personal perfection but also perfec-tion in God's work. The topic a~signed to me may be entitled, "Religious Clerical Formation and Sister Formation." The comparison is not new. Father Larraona, the Secretary of the Sacred ~ongregation of Re-ligious, stated in 1951 that the teaching apostolate of sisters had a distinctive similarity to the priestly ministry. There is nothing in the Code of Canon Law on the studies or .professional formation of members of lay institutes, brothers, nuns, and sisters. The sarhe silence is verified with regard to non-clerical studies in clerical in-stitutes. The aim of this talk is to give the pertinent legislation, and especially the mind and spirit of the Church, on undergraduate clerical studies of religious men. This is to serve as a basis of con-jecture to the mind of the Church on the education and formation in lay institutes and as a partial foundation for your practical dis-cussions on this same point. My instructions were to emphasize the reasons for the legislation on clerical studies. Since these reasons are not found in the Code of Canon Law but in documents of the Holy See issued before and aftdr the Code, this talk will necessarily be, in great part, a documentation'. I. DURATION OF UND~ERGRADUATE CLERICAL STUDIES Presupposing the completion of high school, canon law com-mands two years of the humanities (first and second year of coi- , lege), at least two years of philosophy, and at least four years of theology for rehgtous dest~,ned for the priesthood. Exact 1y the same norm is .true of diocesan clerical studies. 205 JOSEPH F. GALLEN There is also an added .period of clerical formation immediately after the completion of the seminary course. This period is only of counsel, not of strict obliga.tion.; but it is a counsel strongly urged by Plus XII and the Sacred Congregation of Religious for both diocesan and religious priests. The words of Pius XII to the bishops of the world on this pont are: "We urge you, Venerable Brethren, as far as circumstances may permit, not to rush inexperienced priests into the life of full activity." On the time of this added formation, he states: "Accordingly, We heartily approve the plan. of assign-ing for several years the newly ordained priests, wherever possible, to special houses." "Several years" demand a minimum of two years. The S. C. of Religious had already urged the same practice for religious priests. The undergraduate preparation for the priesthood is thus at least eight years of obligatory study and traini.ng after high school and two years of counselled limited activity and further formation after the completion of the seminary course. The reason for the obligatory duration was expressed in the same words by Leo XIII and the S. C. of Seminaries and Univer-sities: "The preparation for the priestly duties must be long and arduous, since no one becomes familiar with things of such great moment easily or rapidly." The same Congregation also phrased this purpose as follows: "The work of the formation of a worthy ec-clesiastic is arduous and prolonged, but the fruits that are gained are no less useful to the Church and no less consoling to the heart of a bishop." Th~ reasons given by Plus XII and the Sacred Congregations of Religious and of Seminaries and Universities for the highly recom-mended added period of formation are: the dangers that exist at the beginning of the priestly life; the insufficiency of seminary training for the inc'reasing needs of the people; the necessity of training in doctrine, technique, and in the new forms of the apostolate; the need of competent and experienced individual guidance in the min-istry and also in the spiritual lives of young priests: and the need of learning the necessities, dangers, and difficulties of our times. The subjects I would suggest for your though~ and discussion under this betiding are the following: Isn't it in accord with the mind of the Church that the young sister should finish her under-graduate schooling, and training before, beginning to teach? Isn't teaching also a greht work and one that demands.a proportionately long and arduous preparation? 'Is the ill-prepared and unformed 206 July, 1955 SISTER FORMATION teacher in. accord with the 'norm of. excellence of Catholic education stated by Pius XI in his Encyclical on Christian Education and in a letter to his Cardinal Secretary of State: "Catholic establishments, no matter to what grade of teaching or learning they appertain, have no need of. defense. The universal favor they enjoy, the praise they receive, the.numerous scientific works they produce, and par-ticularly the outstanding men of' great learning and exquisite cul- , ture that they contribute to the service of government, to the arts, to teaching, to life finally in all its aspects are more than a sufficient testimonial of their renown." Are religious superioresses guilty of the imprudence that Plus XI censured in religious superiors who wish to abbreviate clerical studies thht they may apply their sub-jects more quickly to the sacred ministry? He declared that the de-fect of such a rapid and inverted preparation can scarcely ever be remedied in later life and that the utility is later proved illusory by the diminished aptitude of the subject for the sacred ministry. I almost sense the familiar rebuttal that springs to the lips of many: "But we need the sisters. What of the thousands of children who must be given a Catholic education?" Let the Holy See an-swer. In an Instruction of April 26, 1920, to the Ordinaries of Italy, the S. C. of Seminaries and Universities repeated a recom-mendation of the. S. Consistorial Congregation that newly ordained priests be assigned as prefects in minor seminaries. One reason for the recommendation was that it would give the young priests one or two years of added study, formation, and initiation in the sacred ministry. The S. Congregation proposed to itself and answered the one di~culty that existed against the recommendation, i.e, the immediate need of priests in the active ministry. The Congregation maintained that this difficulty was outweighed .by the good of giving later a perfectly and solidly formed priest, that the profit of the added formation of one or two years was immensely greater than the good of supplying the immediate necessity, and also that the delay in supplying the immediate needs would be only for one or two years. The system would be in full operation at the end of this time, and the same number of priests would then be assigned yearly to the life of full activity. We can add ,that it appears to be idle to oppose the necessity of teachers against the longer preparation of sisters. The Catholic population in the United States is not decreasing; the de-mand for teachers will no~ decrease in the future. If the longer preparation cannot be given now, when will it be possible to give this preparation ? 207 JOSEPH F. (]ALLEN Review [or Religious We may add here some pertinent and important details of cler-ical studies. Canon law forbids religious superiors to assign any duties to the students of philosophy or theology that would be' an obstacle or impediment in any way to either their study Or classes. Canonical authors are quick to explain that the usual violation of this law is the appointment of such students as 'teachers'or prefects in the schools .of the institute. Furthermore, the Code explicitly grants superiors the faculty of dispensing students from some com-munity exercises, including choir, if this is judged necessary for their advance in study. The length of the scholastic year in clerical studies is nine months, which gives a summer vacation of three months. In a letter of July 16, 1912, to the Ordinaries of Italy, the S. Con-sistorial Congregation decreed that there should be four hours of class daily in seminaries. Four and a half hours daily were permitted only if there was a full holiday each week. These hours were to be broken, not all consecutive. The S. Congregation opposed a greater number of hours as impossible and gave as the reasons: the religious exercises obligatory in seminaries and the interruption of labor and rest necessary to avoid harm to the physical health of the students. Care of the health of the students is to be exercised in all seminaries, and it is at least not unusual for one of the officials to have the spe-cial duty of prefect of health. ¯ Is the life of (he young and sometimes even of the older sister in dark and even frightening contrast to this sensible legislation, regulation, and reasoning of the Holy See? She'is confronted daily with the exhausting task of six or seven hours of teaching young children, of extracurriculaf activities, preparation for classes, several hours of religious exercises, domestic duties in the convent, and some-times of added parochial duties.' She may have to attend classes for her own education on some afternoons and on Saturdays. Her Christmas vacation is frequently¯taken up in great part by a second retreat, and her Easter vacation is sometimes devoted to the annual retreat. In the summer¯she is faced by summer school for her own education, her annual retreat, and sometimes by catechetical schools. In such a regime we can seriously doubt that she.is capable'of being sou,ndly educated' by the extra classes .during the year and the sum-mer school. We can affirm with certainty that sufficient care is not being taken of her physical and mental health and that she is not being given the maternal government demanded by Plus XII. With equal certainty we can hold that her spiritual life is endangered. She is faced by an impossible life. Something has to break; and 208 dulg, 1.o55. SISTER FORMATION experience proves, at least usually, that the first thing to weaker~ in such circhmstances is the spiritual life. II. Pu~post~ OF UNDERGRADUATE CLERICAL STUDIE~ The essential purpose of undergraduate clerical studies is to ed-ucate and train a competent and worthy priest for the sacred min-istry. This purpose was expressed by Urban VIII, in 1624, "that they may later be useful workmen for the Church"; by Benedict XIII, in 1725, "that they may be worthy, skilled, useful workmen"; by Plus X, in 1910, "the formation of a priest worthy of the name." In 1940 the S. Congregation for the Oriental Church made a comparison with regard to this purpose, which we can summa~'ize as follows: If lawyers, civil officials, doctors must study for years and obtain a prescribed degree, if even those engaged in the manual arts must serve a long apprenticeship, certainly the ministers of Christ need a much longer and much more careful formation both because of the sublime dignity of their office and the most important duty of directing souls. Isn't the office of the Catholic teacher also sublime, also most important? That office is to form the mind, the heart, the soul to this life and especially to eternal life. Is the~sister being given a for-mation that is commensurate with her purpose and that can stand unashamed before the preparation required for a lawyer, a doctor, before that demanded and enjoyed by her secular colleagues in the teaching profession? We religious live in the day of a great move-ment in the Church, the renovation and adaptation of the religi6us life, initiated and fostered constantly and intensely by .Pius XII. Doesn't this movement demand that we no "longer look to secular agencies and persons for leadership, that the principle of our life, our work, our advance, our progress be within, not without? If we go into this purpose in greater detail, we realize that cler-ical formation is a training in knowledge and in sanctity. Knowledge is of less import.ance, but it is of great importance. The purpose of the formation in knowledge is not to produce merely a skilled spir-itual mechanic, a man unlettered outside the sacristy and sanctuary. It is the intention of the Church, emphasized by Leo XIII, that the priest be a man of culture, of wide and varied learning. Pius XII stated: "Seminarians are to be formed in piety and virtue and are also to acquire a literary and scientific learning that will later en-able them to exercise an efficacious and fruitful ministry among all classes of citizens. A priest must be thoroughly familiar with 209 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review for Religious sacred doctrine but he also cannot be. ignorant of the knowledge possessed generally by cultured men of his own nation." To teach is to transmit culture. This is especially necessary in our country and age when, to paraphrase Pius XII, so many men work at machines and a much greater number think and live as machines. Every Catholic teacher should be distinguished by a strong family resemblance to her mother, the Catholic Church, the mother of cul-ture and the devoted parent of the liberal arts. Is the extension, the summer school, the discontinuous type of education of sisters apt to produce a person of information and methods ~ather than one of culture? Is the attainment of culture generally possible except in a continuous, prolonged, properly directed and properly regulated course of studies? " Seminary training is a preparation in knowledge; but, in the language of Pius XI, it is infinitely more a preparation in sanctity. Canon law sufficiently emphasizes this purpose and demands that common life be observed perfectly in religious houses of study, and this under the most severe penalty of privation of the ordination of the students, that only edifying religious be assigned to such houses, that the superior exert constant and careful vigilance to secure the most perfect observance of the religious exercises, that the students be committed to the care of a spiritual director of outstanding pru-dence, charity, spirituality, and religious observance, and that the professors are not only to be competent but also of conspicuous pru-dence and spirituality. The law on diocesan seminaries is perfectly parallel. The pre-eminence of this purpose does not escape canonical authors, who follow Clement VIII in classify!ng the period of cler-ical studies of religious as another noviceship. However, it is espe-cially in the constant directives of the Roman Pontiffs that the preparation in sanctity receive its adequate expression. Leo XIII and Benedict XV aptly summarized the purpose of diocesan seminary training not as mere observance of regulations, not as a mere mor-ally upright life, but as the formation in the students of the living image of Jesus Christ. In the thought of St. Plus X, the purpose of the seminary is to form the student in priestly sanctity, and the distinction between the priest and the merely upright man should be as great as .that between heaven and .earth. This purpose must be intensified for clerical religious, since Pius XII has clearly re-moved any possible doubt from the proposition that it is the ob-ligation of the religious, not of the cleric, to strive for complete evangelical perfectiOn. 210 July, 1955 SISTER FORMATION Thus the training in priestly sanctity, in the religious sanctity of the religious priest, demands this long noviceship of at least eight years. Plus XII stated to a gathering of members of the Society of 3esus: "As a long space of time is required to establish the sturdy oak, so prolonged patience is always necessary for the formation of the man of God. Therefore, the generous daring of young men that impels them immaturely into action must be curbed. Too hasty activity destroys rather than builds up and is harmful both to the subject and to the apostolic works themselves." In law the sister is no less the woman of God. She shares equally with religious men the obligation and the glory of striving for complete evangelical perfection. Isn't she being rushed immaturely into action? Is it conducive to her purpose of personal.sanctification to hurry a young sister into the life of full activity after only a year and a half or two years and a half of postulancy and noviceship? You must be aware that at times even postulants and second-year novices are assigned to this life of full activity. In the case of the novices, this practice, as customarily carried out in fact, is clearly contrary to an important Instruction of the S. C. of Religious. Are these facts in accord with the principle of Pius XII quoted above? In his Encyclical on Sacred Virginity, the same Pontiff demands the long segregation of the seminary and scholasticate for diocesan and religious priests and then asks the question: "What gardener in planting trees exposes his choice but weak cuttings to violent storms that he may test the strength that they do not yet possess? The stu-dents of the sacred seminary and the scholastics are certainly to be considered like young and weak trees that .must first be planted in places of shelter and prepared gradually for resistance and conflict." Shouldn't our age of the equality of woman have proved to us that she is the equal of man also in weakness? That she too needs a long segregation in the shelter of eternal things before she is strong enough to live eternal things even satisfactorily in the attractions and al-lurements of the things of time? III. ONE HOUSE OF STUDIES IN EVERY CLERICAL INSTITUTE The law of the Code is that every clerical religious institute is obliged to have at least one house of studies for philgsophy and the-ology. It is even somewhat probable that each province should have such a house. The same law is true of every diocese for the diocesan clergy. The reason for this norm is that the popes have identified the necessity of a seminary in every diocese with the necessity oLsem- ,JOSEPH F. GALLEN R~oieua Ioi" Religious. inary training itsklf. We may add that a seminary in every diocese and a house of clerical, studies in every religious institute a~e, gener-ally speaking, more conducive at least to spiritual formation and evidently permit greater control, direction, and supervision. This canonical norm prompts the following subject for your thought: Should not every congregation of sisters have its own juniorate where, immediately after the novicesbip, the young professed com-plete their undergraduate intellectual formation and continue their spiritual formation? An observation must be added here. In com-manding a seminary in each diocese and a house of studies in every clerical religious institute, the Church manifests that she has no excessive fear of educational inbreeding: This .difficulty will be overcome by having the juniorate teachers make their graduate studies outside their own institute. IV. EXCEPTION TO THE PRECEDING NORM According to canon law, if a religious institute or province can-not have a suitable house of studies for philosophy or theology or it is difficult to send the students to their own house of studies, t.hey are to be sent to the house of studies of another province of the same institute, or of another religious institu.te, or to a diocesan seminary, or to a Catholic university. In the same circumstances, a diocese is to send its seminarians to the seminary of another diocese or, if they exist, to the common seminary of many dioceses (interdiocesan) or to the common seminary of one or several ecclesiastical provinces (regional). These canons suggest the following thoughts for your consideration: the sending of the junior professed to the juniorate of another province, or to the classes of the juniorate of another in-stitute, or to the classes of a Catholic college or university, or to those of a diocesan college for sisters, or final!y to a central house of studies for all the provinces of the same congregation. One very important caution may and should be added here. A seminary is not a day school. By a seminary or clerical house of studies, the Church means a house where the students reside day and night. Otherwise, their principal purpose, the continued spiritual formation of the students, would hax~e to be classed as a practical impossibility. If we apply this concept to congregations of sisters, the following conclusion seems to be evident: If congregations send their junior professed to classes outside their own institute, these young-professed should reside in the one house of their own institute, under the direction of a mistress of juniors, whose office is to be 212 ,lulg, 1955 SISTER FORMATION analogous to that of the spiritual director in diocesan seminaries and clerical houses of study. If this is not done, the prihcipal purpose of a juniorate, the continued spiritual formation of the young professed, will also be a practical impossibility. A well-known authority on the law of religious, the Dominican canonist Pruemmer, has a per-tinent thought on this matter: "Experience proves sufficiently and superabundantly that clerical studies suffer when the students are scattered in small houses that serve only secondarily for studies; therefore, they are to be assembled in larger formal houses whose principal purpose is the promotion of studies." We can well add that their spiritual formation suffers even greater damage. V. SHOULD THE JUNIORATE, AT LEAST ULTIMATELY, BE Ex- CLUSIVELY FOR SIS:FERS; OR SHOULD THE JUNIOR PROFESSED BE SENT TO CLASSES WITH COLLEGE GIRLS? It is the repeated and insistent teaching of the Roman Pontiffs and the Roman Congregations, also in our day, that there is no such thing as a mixed seminary, that is, an educational establishment for both seminarians and secular students. The words of Pius XI on this point are: ". sacred seminaries are to be used only for the pur-pose for which they were instituted, the proper formation of sacred ministers. Therefore, not only must there be no place in them for boys or young men who manifest no inclination for the priesthood, since such association does great harm to clerics, but the religious exercises, the plan of studies, the method of government must all tend to prepare the mind of the student in the proper manner for the performance of his divine office. This .must be the sacred law of all seminaries and it admits of no exception." There are eminent canonists who maintain that the seminary is not to be classed as mixed if seculars are co~fined to attendance at the classes. However, the S. C. for the Oriental Church declared in 1940: "The doctrinal, moral and ascetical formation of the students is to be imparted in seminaries, that is, in colleges or houses devoted exclusively to the preparation of students for the priesthood and properly established and directed to this purpose." Therefore, the doctrinal formation also is to be exclusively for seminarians. This principle w'as affirmed more clearly for Italy by the S. Consistorial Congregation in 1912 and the S. C. of Seminaries and Universities in 1920: "Care is to be taken also that the classes be reserved to seminarians or aspirants for the priesthood, since the seminary classes, also of minor sem2 inaries, should have the distinctive spirit and orientation demanded for aspirants to the priesthood." The latter Congregation also gave 213 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Reoiew for Religious the essential reason for the principle, w'hich we can sumlharize as follows: As the formatioh of a Catholic must animate every Cath-olic teacher and be the soul of every Catholic classroom, so the for-mation of the priest must animate every seminary professor and be the soul of every seminary classroom; education is formation, not the mere imparting of knowledge; and every class must be a training in both knowledge and virtue. This doctrine of the S. Congregation is certainly not new; it is the basic concept of Catholic education. The reasons for the separation given by popes and the sacred congrega-tions are also: Clerical education is something entirely different from that of the laity and the association of the two is a cause Of loss of vocations, fatal to clerical formation, and the cause of great harm to clerical students. The distinction and separation of ecclesiastical and lay education are to be carefully pondered in the following em-phatic words of Leo XIII: "For this reason the education, studies and manner of life, in brief all that appertains to priestly discipline, have always been considered by the Church as something complete in themselves, not only distinct but also separate from the ordinary norms of lay life. This distinction and separation must remain un-changed also in our times, and any tendency to unite or confuse ecclesiastical education and life with lay education and life must be judged as reprobated not only by the tradition of the Christian centuries but by the apostolic teaching itself and the dispositions of Jesus Christ." Thus the subject for your consideration here is: Should not the classroom for the.young sister also have a distinctively religious spirit and orientation? Should not the religious formation of the sister animate all her teachers and be the soul of every class she attends? Is the classroom of secular girls the suitable place for the education of the young sister just out of the noviceship? VI. FINANCIAL SUPPORT OF JUNIORATES In his Apostolic Exhortation on Priestly Sanctity, Pius XII stated: "What is more, Venerable Brethren, We heartily commend the plans that you will discuss to insure that priests be provided not only with means to meet their daily needs but also with assurances of assistance for the future--as We are happy to see done in civil society--particularly for cases in which they may fall ill, be afflicted with chronic ill health, or be weakened by old age. Thus you will relieve them of all anxiety for the future." If we apply again the principle of comparison, the salary of sisters should be sufficient to 214 July, 1955 SISTER FORMATION provide for their daily necessities, at least all ordinary medical care and old age. It should also provide, at least in good part, for their for-mation. It is inherent and essential in every centralized religious in-stitute that there should be an annual tax on every house for the general and provincial expenses, and a very great part of such ex-penses is the education and support of subjects in the states of for-mation. This tax is a necessary item of thelbudget of every convent, and the income of any convent of a school or institution that does not belong to the institute is to be derived at least principally from the salaries of its sisters. VII. EDUCATION AND FORMATION OF SU~'BJECTS APPERTAINS TO THE INTERNAL GOVERNMENT OF [ITHE INSTITUTE The canons on clerical houses of studyi apply to all clerical re-ligious institutes, even if diocesan. These danons nowhere prescribe. any intervention of the local ordinary; but, on the contrary, they place houses of study under theauthority If the superiors and the general chapter of the particular institute.~l The reason is evident. The education and formation of subjects ih any religious institute, pontifical or diocesan, clerical-or lay, is a!matter that by its very nature clearly appertains to internal government, that is, to the authority of the superiors of the institute. ~he admitted concept of internal government in canon law is that it incl.udes not only the general relation of subje:ts to superiors but also the admission of subjects into the congregation and to the Iprofessions, their educa-tion and formation, appointment to various!offices' and employments, and transfer from house to house. Externallauthority and other per-sons outside the institute may and have h~elped; but the right, the obligation, and the rest{6nsibility for the e~ducation of subjects fall on the superiors of the congregation. I belileve it is necessary to em-phasize this point. In this matter higher religious superioresses are too prone to wait for those outside the institute to take the initiative, whereas they themselves have the responsibility for action. As a brief conclusion, we Imay approp~nate a thought of Pius XI: "There is perhaps nothing that the Church has promoted through the course of the centuries more tactively, maternally and carefully than the suitable training of he~r priests." In our own country, where Catholic educa}ion is so Important a part of the Church and of Catholic life and where sisters are so essential a part of that Catholic education, there is perhaps nothing that we should promote more actively, generously, and prog, resmvely than the proper education and formation of the sisters. " 215 Reviews INTRODUCTION TO THEOLOGY. Theology Library, Vol. I." Edited by A. M. Henry, O.P. Translated from ÷he French by William Storey~ Pp. 306. Fides Publishers, Chicago, 1954. $5.95. This is the first of a six-volume Theology Library, presenting a complete theological synthesis based on the Summa of St. Thomas. The translation of the other five volumes will appear during the next two years. The complete work, the result of eight years of collaboration by forty-one Thomistic theologians under Dominican inspiration, envisages as its audience: priests wishing "to continue to grow in the subject of their specialty"; religious seeking to pene-trate still more the subjects they teach in religion class: the laity in search of a systematic theology fo~ apostolic or professional reasons. Father Putz, in the introduction to Vol. I, after noting a gap be-tween the Latin manuals used by seminarians and the simplified textbook of religion courses, expresses the ~bope that the Theology Library will fill this.gap. Father Henry, the General Editor, prom-ises us no mere rehash of St. Thomas when he announces: "Each contributor has tried to rethink the questions and to present them under a form and in terms, nay, even in categories which are ac-cessible to the modern reader." This is, indeed, a bold promise, one whose fulfillment, especially in what concerns "the categories of the modern mind," will require that rare combination of a thorough knowledge of St. Thomas and of modern thought. Readers, then, will be justified in insisting upon some visible efforts at bridge-building between Thomas' mind'and that of today. Until the other volumes have appeared, one cannot determine how far the Theology Library suits the level of the audience en-visioned. To judge by the first volume, those who have had no formal training in thedlogy will find it very difficult to get the de-s

Issue 8.5 of the Review for Religious, 1949. ; .-~ - -SEPTEMBER P~qcjress ~hroucjh Thankscji~.in~ d~m onsecrat=on to ar . -. -. . ,~ Robe~Li opp _ Books as SpirituDairl~ cfors_ . J.H. Dunn R i::VI i::W -!:::0 R I::: E I G IO US VOLUME VIII . SEPTEMBER, 1949. NUMBER CONTENTS SPIRITUAL PROGRESS THROUGH, ACTIVE THANKSGIVING -" Ciarence McAuliffe.'S.3 . " . . : 225, REPORT TO ROME--Adam C. Ellis. S.d~ . VOCATIONAL LITERATU"'~ ~R -E .~.,". . -: . ! 240 ADM~ISSION OF ORIENTALS INTO LATIN INSTITUTES " " doseph ~.~Gallen, S.d. ; . 241 ~O,TAL CONSECRATION TO MARY BY ~OW-- Robert L/. Knopp. S.M . ~ 254 BOOKS AS SPIRITUAL DII~.ECTORS--d. COMI~IUN I C A T I O N S " ~\ . ~., . ¯ . 268 QUESTIONS ANb ANSWERS-- 35. "Toties quoties" Indulgence in Convent Chapel . '~ . 270 36. Recdption and Profession on Same Caldndar Day ,. ." . . 2-71 ~-37. Safeguarding Secrecy of, Elections . ~ . * . -. .~ 271 "38.Changes in.Prayers and "Legal Articles" of Consutut~ons . "~. . 272 39. Right to Say Funeral Mass of Sister . ~BOOK ~ 'REVIEWS-- The Little Office of the 'Blessed Virgin: The Veil. Upon the Heart: ;., De La Safle. a Pi6neer of Modern Education' . BOOK NOTICES . : ¯ . ~'. . 277 'BOOK ANNOUNCE~MENTS .¯.' . ~ . 278 REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, September, 194'9, Vol.' VIII, No. 5. P.ublished bi-monthly : 3~nuary. March, May, July, September, and No,cember at ~thd College PresL 606 Harrison Street, Topekdi, Kansas. by St. Mary'sCotle.ge, St.-Marys0 Kansas," wi.th,ecclesiastical approbation.~ Entered as second ~:lass matter danu~.ry 15, 1942. at the Post Office, Topeka, Kansas. under theact of March'3"~1879. " ~Editorial Board: Adam C.°E!I~is._S.J. G. Augustine Ellard. S.d. Gerald Kelly. S.J. Editorial Secretary: A~fred F. Schneider, S.d, CoPyright, 1949, by Adam C. Ellis. Permission ii~hereby granted40~ quota~io~ns of reasonable-length/ provided due credit be given~ this review': and the author. Si~bs,cription price: 2 dollars a y~ear~ ~ : Printed in U. $~ A. Before wrltincJ to us, please consult notice on 'inside b~ck cover . Spiri :ual Progress Through Active Thanksgiving ~ Clarence McAuliffe, S.J. THAT a spirit of thanksgiving is one of. the basic threads in the '| fabric of Christian virtues is clear.'from various theological sources, but especially from the let!;~rs of St. Paul. In thirty-five different ~exts the Apostle of the Gen files either expresses thanks to God for persohal favors received or urg, for benefits to themselves. He asks the "What hast thou that thou hast not re received, why dost thou glory as if thou admonishes the Colossians (Col. 3:15.) : rejoice in your hearts, wherein also you "be ye thankful." To the Ephesians he tion (Eph. 5:20): "Giving thanks ah name of our Lord ,Iesus Christ, to God th ~'s his readers to thank God '.orinthians (I Cor. 4:7) : rived? And if thou hast hadst not received?" He iAnd let the peace of Christ e called in one body: and aakes a sweeping exhorta-ays for all things, in the Father." Undoubtedly priests and religious do harbor in their souls an abiding spirit of gratitude to God. Moreover, they do not allow this virtue to remain in a purely passive condition, since they are ca'lied upon to exercise it every day. They make a thanksgiving after Holy Communion; another, after meals. They begin their examinations of conscience with an act of thanks. At every Mass they express their gra'titude to God, since gratitude is one of the four purposes that are infallibly achieved by every unbloody immolation of the Savior. Granted, then, that religious and priests d,o make certain acts of thanksgiving, even though they may be dulled by that common ene-my routine, it would, nevertheless, be conducive to spiritual advance-ment if those consecrated to God were more actively thankful. A few considerations may show why this is true and provide inspira-tion for its accomplishment. Even natural gratitude is a winning virtue, and we find its exer-cise praised and inculcated even bY pagans. Mothers are rare who do not, instruct their children to say "Thank you." How.ever, the gratitude with which we are concerned is supernatural. It is based on faith; it is activated by co-operation with actual grace, and it merits an eternal supernatural reward if the conditions for merit are veri-fied. But it-~does not conflict with natural gratitude. In fact, its 225 CLARENCE MCAULIFFE Reoiew for Religious psychological effects and its outward manifestations will be very much the same, and this truth should be borne in mind. Yet it is radically and intrinsically superior to natural gratitude because it can be obtained and exercised only by God's helping hand, and it leads to a reward far transcending the natural capacities of man. The thanksgiving of which we speak, therefore, is a super-natural virtue that inclines us to acknowledge and recompense the gifts that come to us from God or from another person under God. The virtue becomes alive when we say prayers or perform acts. that are motivated by the virtue. It is true, of course, that this virtue is not as lofty in dignity as the virtue of perfect love of God. Since, however, .it is easier for the average religious to act from a spirit of thanksgiving than from perfect love, and since the exercise of thanks-giving is an open door to perfect love, this virtue is worth culti-vating for its own sake. By making acts of thanksgiving to God, we practice a form of the more general virtue of religion. When we make such acts to parents or other superiors under God, we exercise one species of the virtue of piety. If we render thanks to our equals, we exercise one aspect of the virtue of justice. It is worth remem-bering that when we give thanks to superiors or equals for their favors, we can nevertheless exercise the supernatural virtue of grati-tude. ¯ We thank God by thanking them because we know by faith that they themselves are gifts of God to us. In order to realize more vividly how the exercise of supernatural gratitude can promote spiritual progress, it might be well to rdflect briefly on the energizing effects of merely natural gratitude. Suppose we recall some definite occasion in the past when we were briskly stirred by the emotion of thanksgiving. At one time or another we may have been thoroughly mean and .cross-grained "towards someone who had a full right to our love. : If that person was a parent.or teacher or superior, he might have rightfully punished us for our meanness. But he did not. He passed it over, never mentioned it, treated us as though we had done nothing wrong. Gratitudh surged up spontaneously in our souls." Or we might remind ourselves of that occasion when death visited our home and we were consoled by the visits and condolences of so many people. We were stirred by an active gratitude to them." Or, if we have not had such experi-ences, we might remember any other: the time that the doctor or a neighbor, at great personal inconvenience, lent us assistance when we needed it badly; some occasion.such as Christmas or graduation, 226 8epternber, I ~4~ PROGRESS THROUGH THANKSGIVING when parents and friends showered us with gifts. All of us have had these or other experiences in our lives when our natural gratitude was stimulated to a high peak of activity. Having recalled some such occasion from the past, we need not make any profound study of psychology to recall also the natural concomitants of that active spirit of thanksgiving. In the first place. we certainly looed our benefactor or benefactors. They had been good to us, and we by a praiseworthy natural reaction wished good to them. We resolved never to forget their kindness. We would be loyal to them and they would be the objects of our praise, never ot~ our blame. Secondly, the gratitude we felt prompted us to refrain from criticism not only of our benefactors, but of others als0. It even prompted us to disregard various circumstances that chafed us in one way or another. It made us satisfied with our lot. Thirdly, ,are were conscious of a spirit of humility. We realized that we had been treated far better than we deserved, and this realization put us in proper focus towards God and all men. Fourthly, we found that our active gratitude enkindled a special reverence towards our bene-factors. Fifthly, we were drawn out of ourselves and were inspired to do,good to others, even to those to whom we were in no way obligated. Finally, we recall that. on these occasions of animated thanksgiving our,souls expanded with joy. The whole world took on a different hue, and our hearts beat faster. A mere superficial glance at the psychological effects of a living thanksgiving reveals the truth of all this, and, be it remarked again, the manifestations of supernatural gratitude will be substantially the same as those of the natural virtue. .If, then, at diverse times in our lives we were so thankful for single gifts bestowed upon us by mere human benefactors, what should be the extent of our active gratitude to God? The degree of gratitude due a donor is measured partially by the number and kind of gifts received. And is it not a fact that we owe every single thing we have or ever will have to the munificence of Almighty God? In the purely natural sphere, my very presence in this world as a living person, drawn from the chasm of utter nothingness, is the result of God's generosity. It is the sustaining hand of God that keeps my soul and body united at every instant. I oannot even take a breath or blink an eye without His help. Every talent of my soul, every power of my body is a present with God's name written on it. My friends, my country, all the circumstances of my past, present, 227 CLARENCE MCAULIFFE Reoiew /'or Religious and future life are so many tokens of God's liberality. Even the physical and mental sufferings that come to me are His benefits and will redound to my good if I use them properly. Moral perversity is the only (hing that I can claim as my own. All this we know by our faith; we know it even by reason; but it has a hard time holding its footing on the slippery foreground of our consciousness. Moreover, these natural gifts are mere shadows when compared with the supernatural favors God has bestowed upon us. Our Catholic faith, our priestly or religious vocations are the result of God's thoughtfulness and labor. We have but a misty notion of sanctifying grace, but we know that it is in some ineffable manner a sharing in God's own nature. Besides, not an hour of the day goes by but God manifests His personal concern for each of us by enlight-ening our minds and fortifying our wills with His actual graces. Again, the sacraments are so many rivers flowing down from the cross on Calvary to irrigate the world with both sanctifying and actual graces. Indulgences, sacramentals, intellectual guidance, spir-itual consolations are but gifts of God delivered to us by the Cath-olic Churdh. Our dignity surpasses powerful monarch because we are the Ghost and the adopted children of liberality;. It is also worth remembering that, are conferred upon all or many men that of the world's most living temples of the Holy God Himself through His though some of God's gifts equally, most of them are decidedly individualistic, earmarked for me personally either by their very. nature or by the manner in which they are presented. For instance, the providence which God exercises towards me differs from that which He exercises' towards anyone else. I had fny own distinctive parents. I have my own distinctive qualities of body and soul, and my 9wn special circumstances of life. The touches of God upon my mind and heart by actual grace are adapted to my special needs and are tinged with His thoughtfulness of me personally. God worked out my vocation by a series of external circumstances and internal helps that were verified in no other case. Only in heaven will I realize the vast number of gifts that God addressed to me personally, but a little reflection will reveal some of them even now. This reflection will be time well spent since it will sharpen my active spirit of thanksgiving. So much f6r the number and kind of God's gifts. We are literally walking bundles of God's benefits. It should fill us with 228 September, 1949 PROGRESS THROUGH THANKSGIVING humility to realize that at times we are so briskly grateful to some human benefactor for a single favor whereas we are s.o sluggish in expressing our appreciation to God, the "Source of all blessings." However, gratitude should be m'easured not only by the number and kind of gifts received but also by the nobility of the giver. On this score also our thanksgiving to God should be intensified. Other things being in balance, we appreciate more a present from a superior than one from an equal. The modern craze for autographs rests upon this principle. We are not personal acquaintances of either the Holy Father or his secretary, but we would value more a rosary sent us by the Holy Father than we would the same rosary given us by his secretary. If, then, on various occasions we have been impelled to active gratitude because some other person has been generous towards us, what should be our active gratitude to God, the Lord and Ruler of the universe and the Father of us all? One other factor enters into the degree of gratitude that we owe another. It is the intention of the giver. The greater the love of the donor, the'more heartfelt should be our appreciation for his gifts. "The gift without the giver is bare." The nobleman who tosses his unfeeling coin to the'beggar at the castle's portal is a benefactor, but not a lover. He deserves thanks; but not very much, because he does not give himself in his gift. His coin, no matter how precious, does not symbolize any self-giving. So necessary is this disposition of love on the part of the giver, that a present bestowed out of unal-loyed selfishness, for instance, solely to obtain some favor from the recipient, really merits no thanks at all. It would probably be correct to say that those people who by their kindness really activated our natural gratitude in the past were motivated by a personal regard for us, a love more or less intense. But even so, their love cannot compare with God's when He com-municates His gifts to us. God is never ~imply a benefactor. He is always the supreme lover, and this spiritual truth is manifested strikingly in some of His gifts. Consider, for example, the gift of sanctifying grace. By it we are in some mysterious way made "sharers in the divine nature." It is the seed of the future flower of the beatific vision wherein we shall one day be enabled to perform in a finite way acts of knowledge and love that properly belong to God alone. No creature by its natural powers could ever behold God intuitively and experience the ineffable love and joy that follow upon that knowledge. In short, sanctifying grace is not only a symbol of 229 CLARENCE MCAULIFFE Ret~ietO for Religious God's desire to give Himself, but it is an actual giving of Himself in as far as it is possible for Him to do so. It is evident that God could not possib!y assimilate us into His divinity. " The result would be paiatheism, Which would conflict with His infinite perfection. But by sanctifying grace He has conferred upon us powers that truly resemble His own. Again, this effort of God to give Himself to us as far as possible is revealed by His constant bestowal of" actual graces. These are outright gifts. By them God Himself stimulates our minds and wills. He illuminates our minds by endowing them with a bit of His own divine wisdom, and He spurs on our wills to do good by communicating to them a mite of His own power. If a blood donor saves our life, we are deeply.grateful. He has truly given up a part of himself. God is constantly renewing our spiritual forces by transmitting to us through actual graces tiny sparks of His own knowledge and might. Moreover, these visitations of God are frequent. They come many times every single day. They are directed to our welfare. They benefit only ourselves,.not God. No self-seeking mars God's activity in our souls. These graces are tokens of a perfect love that seeks only the good of the beloved, and by these graces we see with God's own light and we act with God's own power. Finally, we note God's loving intentions towards us in His gift of the Blessed Sacrament. By this marvel of God's omnipotence Our Lord becomes corporeally present, not merely in one place but in thousands throughout the world. He does not walk about now in His visible body to visit us in our homes, but He remains on the altar in an invisible manner so that we can walk to Him and con-verse with Him. Furthermore, not only has He blessed us with this gift of His abiding presence, but He comes to us daily in Hol'~" Communion, a tangible proof that He is not just a benefactor but an ardent lover. He literally gives us Himself for a short time every day in a union that transcends any possible union between mere human beings. Holy Communion, then, together with sanctifying grace and actual grace lends us some tiny ins.igbt into the flaming love that inspires God in all of His gifts to us. On all scores, therefore, we should be more actively grateful to God than to any human benefactor. We are indebted to God not for one gift or a thousand, but literally for everything. .Even the gifts of other people to us are in reality God's gifts. He is the 230 September, 1949 PROGRESS THROUGH THANKSGIVING ultimate source of all our blessings. Moreover, in dignity God the Giver excels infinitely all human donors. Then too, no human benefactor can possibly be motivated by the unbounded love of God as this is manifested particularly by His gifts of grace and the Blessed Sacrament. Yet despite all this we are at times deeply moved to gratitude by one trifling gift from another person, whereas our grati-tude to God remains ineit and lifeless. No doubt one reason for our lethargy arises from the fact that God does not visibly appear when He confers His gifts. We are so tied to our sense perceptions that our emotion of gratitude does not spontaneously react when we cannot sensibly perceive the donor. To counter this difficulty we should vivify our faith, since we know b.v faith (and also by reason) that God as a matter of fact does give us everything we have. A good reason for our failure to be more actively grateful springs from a selfish trait or quirk in human nature. When we recei~'e many gifts from another, our spirit of thanksgiving instead of waxing tends to wane. We tire of saying "Thank you." We begin to take favors for granted, or we even begin to look upon them as our right. We all know this from per-sonal experience, but we also realize that we should fight against this natural tendency not only in regard to God but also in regard to our human benefactors. Suppose, then, that by God's help we do manage to weave into our souls a rhore active spirit of thank, sgiving to Him. What bene-fits will accrue to our spiritual lives? To answer this we need only recall the benefits deriving from an active natural gratitude. First, an active supernatural gratitude will lead us to more intense love for God. In fact, such gratitude is one of the avenues that leads directlx." to perfect love for God, as all spiritual writers admit. Secondly, this energetic gratitude inspires us with humility towards God and towards our fellow meri. Realizing that we have been given so much despite the fact that we deserve absolutely nothing, we descend to our proper level with reference to God 'and our neighbor. Thirdly, such living gratitude, represses grumbling and criticism. The truly grateful man does not complain. He does not have his adverse com-ments to offer about every new regulation of his superior. He does not make the round of the community spreading cheap gossip about others. He is too grateful. This effect of gratitude is expressed by the poet, ,Josephine Pollard, in her poem "Grumble Corner": 231 CLARENCE MCAULIFFE Ret~iew got Religious And man a discontented mourner, Is spending his da~ls in Grumble Corner: Sour and sad, whom I long to entreat, To take'a house in Tbanks-gi~ing Street. Fourthly, this energetic spirit of thanksgiving will give us the right perspective on the circumstances that enter our lives. We will evaluate them correctly. We will not allow our minds to focus attention on minor irritations which, if unchecked, may upset our peace of soul for days at a time. The grateful recollection of the uninterrupted series of benefits flowing to us every minute from God's liberality will reduce such irritations to their right size.and keep our minds in proper balance. Fifthly, this vigorous gratitude to God will not permit us to forget our fellow men. It will impel us to do favors for others, and it will guarantee that these favors will be supernaturally motivated. Sixthly, just as the expression of natural gratitude wins more gifts from a benefactor, so an active supernatural gratitude brings down more favors from God, especially by augmenting the flow of His actual graces. ¯Lastly, and very important, this brisk spirit of gratitude, just like its natural counter-part, fills the soul ~vih joy. The grateful man is always happy, and this atmosphere of happiness, correctly understood, is indispensable for spiritual progress. Since God is the ultimate giver of all things, we purposely emphasize the value of active gratitude to Him. However, the exer-cise of this virtue towards Him does not exclude the propriety of 'exercising it also towards our fellow men. In fact, it would be spiritually profitable for us to say "Thank you" to others much more often than we do, always remembering that we are really thanking God even when we address our thanks to others. Various people contribute to our welfare every day by their services for our spiritual, intellectual, social, and bodily needs. These benefactors should be thanked, at least on occasion. It would be detrimental to spirituai progress for a priest or religious to adopt the viewpoint either explicitly or implicitly that those who provide these services ¯ are merely doing their job. True enough, such benefactors may have an obligation in conscience to perform some duty for us, and in some cases we may have a right to their service. But it would be profitable to remember that even the rights we have are gifts of God to us and that-all those, therefore, who minister to u~ in any way deserve our thanks. Among those who merit special and lasting thanks are 232 September, 1949 PROGRESS THROUGH THANKSGIVING superiors since they more than others supply our spiritual, intellec-tual, and temporal wants. ~ Just as with all other virtues, if we wish to develop our spirit of thanksgiving, we must practice it. This means a fight against our natural inclinati6ns. By nature we take favors for granl~ed. Even the child, model of sanctity in a general way, has to be taught to express gratitude. In order to exercise this virtue more energetically we might, then, make it the subject of our particulaz examination of conscience. It would be helpful, too, since we are dealing with a supernatural virtue whose exercise depends on the grace of God, to pray often for a gradual increase of our active thanksgiving. Finally, we may make progress in this matter by pr~ayerful reflection on the fact that God is our loving Father. Father Faber in All for Jesus has a lengthy chapter on thanksgiving, and he attributes our lack of spirit in the practice of this virtue 'mainly to our failure to reflec( prayerfully on the truth that God is our Father. To conclude, we are aware that many motives urge us to advance in our exercise of thanksgiving. We know that God wants it, because we have read some of His words as contained in the writings of St. Paul. We know, too, the gospel story of the ten lepers in wbich Our Lord expressed His disappointment when only one returned to say "Thank you." We know also that the Church wants more gratitude to God. In her prayers during Mass she says in the Gloria: "'Gratias agimus tibi'" (We give thanks to Thee) ; in the verses before the Prefac,e she prays: "'Gratias agamus Domino Deo nostro'" (Let us thank God our Lord) ; and in the beginning of the Common Preface she sings: "'Vere dignum et justum est, aequum et salutare, nos Tibi semper et ubique gratias agere". (It is truly right and just, proper and salutary for us to thank You at all times and in all places). It is possible that we are urged to be grateful to God even by the rules of our order. St. Ignatius lays it down in his constitutions that his fol-lowers should "thank God in all things." Even reason tells us that we can never thank God enough. Prudence, of course, must regulate this virtue as it regulates all others, but most of us will probabl'! admit that we have not gone to excess in the exercise of thanksgiving. If there has been any imprudence, it has been in the dullness of our spirit of gratitude. The removal of that dullness will contribute substantially to our spiritual progress. 233 Report: !:o Rome Adam C. Ellis; S.J. "Introduction AS EARLY AS 1861 we find a clause put into the constitutions of congregations of religious women approved by the Holy See (Sacred Congregation of Bishops and Regulars) pre-scribing that the superior general must send in an occasional report to the Sacred Congregation. For example, in the Constitutions Of the Sisters of Nazareth of Chalon (September 27, 1861) the obli-gation was worded as follows: "The superior general is bound every three years to send to this Sacred Congregation a report on the condition of her own institute. This report must cover both the material and personal condition, that is, the number of houses and of the Sisters in the institute and their disciplinary condition, namely, the observance of the constitu-tions, as well as whatever pertains to the economic administration.'" Gradually some such paragraph became a regular part 'of all constitutions approved by the Holy See. When the Normae were established in 1901, Article 262 covered this point: "Every three years the superior general shall give a report to this Sacred Congregation regarding the disciplinary, material, personal, and economic condition of her institute. The ordinary of the place where the mother house is located will certify this report by signing it." Left to th'emselves, superiors general of congregations app'roved by the Holy See wrote their reports on the four salient points as best they could. Sometimes minor matters were stressed and written up at great length while more important matters were either merely mentioned briefly or omitted altogether. As a result, in order to pro-cure uniformity and to be sure to get all the essential information desired in these reports, the Sacred Congregation of Bishops and Regulars issued an instruction on July 16, 1906, regarding this tri-ennial report and added a list of 98 questions to be answered. In 1917 the Code of Canon Law extended the obligation of sending a report to the Holy See to "the abbot primate, the superior of every monastic congregation, and the superior general of every 234 REPORT TO ROME institute approved by the Holy See" (canon 510) but made the concession that the report need be sent only every five years unless the constitutions prescribed that it be sent more frequently. With the increase in the number of reports sent to the Sacred Congregation by all institutes approved by the Holy See, the work of the Sacred Congregation became greatly involved. Hence it was not surprising that it issued a new instruction (February 23, 1922, approved by Pope Pius XI on March 8th) in which it divided all institutions into five sections--religious men according to the nature of their institutes, religious women according to their geogral3hicat location--Leach section being assigned a definite year in which to send in its report. The old questionnaire of 1906 was replaced by a new list of 105 questions to be answered when making the report. Only organized religious institutes approved by the Holy See and societies of men and women living in common without public vows were bound to make this report; independent monasteries of men and women as well as diocesan institutes were not bound. Meanwhiie a new form of religious, perfection had been devel- Oped in the Church. This new form was recently approved by Pope Plus XII, who officially applied the term "secular institutes" to societies which embrace it. These secular institutes may also receive the approval of the Holy See in due time. The aftermath of two world wars manifesting itself in modern life has made it necessary for religious institutes of all kinds to adapt themselves to the external circumstances in which they are living. A consideration of these modern problems which beset religious prob-ably induced the Sacred Congregation of Religious to issue a n~w instruction (3uly 4, 1947) regarding the quinquennial report. Two days later Pope Plus XII approved this new instruction which super-sedes all previous decrees on the subject. We shall give the provi-sions of this new instruction and then add a few brief comments. The Instruction "I. According to the Code (canon 510) the abbot primate, the abbot superior of a monastic congregatioia (canon 488, 8°), the "superior gen.eral of ever,y religious institute, of eve.r,y societyoof, comr mon life without public vows (canon 675) and of secular institutes approved by the Holy See, and the president of any federation of houses of religiou~ institutes, societies of common life, or secular 235 ADAM C. ELMS Review ior Re:igious institutes (or their vicars in default c~.~ tL'e above-named persons or if they are prevented from acting ]canon 488, 8°]) must send to the Holy See, that is to this Sacred Congregation of Religious, a report of the state of their religious institute, society, secular insti-tute, or federation every five years, even if the year assigned for sending the report falls wholly or partly w~:hin the first two years from the time when they entered upon the office. "II. The five-year period shall be fixed and common to all those mentioned above in n. I; a1:d they shall continue to be computed from the firs~ day of dzn:iary, 1923. "III. In making :he reports the following order shall be observed : "1. From among the religious institutes, societies of common life, secular institutes, and federations approved by the Holy See whose members are men the report is to be sent: "in the first year [|948] of the five-year period: by the canons regular, monks, and cnlitary orders; "in the second year [1949]: by the mendicants, clerics regular, and other regulars; "in the third year [I950] : by the clerical congregations; "in the fourth year [1951]: by the lay congregations; "in the fifth year [1952]: by the societies of common life, secular institutes, and federations. "2. From among the religious institutes, societies-of common life, secular institutes, and federations approved by the Holy See whose members are women the report is to be sent according to the region in which the principal house is .juridically established: "in tl~e first year~ [1948] of the five-yea~ period': by the supe-rioresses of religious institutes in Italy, Spain and Portugal; "in the second year [1949]: by the superioresses of religious institutes in France, Belgium, Holland, England, and Ireland; "in the third year [1950]: by the superioresses of religious institutes in other parts of Europe; "in the fourth year [1951]: by the superioresses of religious institutes in tlie countries of America; "in the fifth year [1952]: by the superioresses of religious insti-tutes in other parts'of theworld and moreover by the superioresses of societies of common, life, secular institutes, and federations throughout the world. 2.36 September, 1949 REPORT TO ROME "IV. In order that the Sacred Congregation may be able to obtain certain and authentic information regarding all those monas-teries and independent houses approved b~r the Holy See--both men and women--which are not bound by canon 5 10 to send the quin-quennial report, and regarding congregations, societies of common life, and secular institutes of.diocesan approval, the following are to be observed: "1. Major superiors of monasteries or independent houses of men which, although they" are approved by the Holy See, neither belong to any monastic cofigregation nor are federated with others shall send to the ordinary of the place, at the time and in the order mentioned above (n. HI, 1), a summary report of the five-year period signed by themselves and by their proper councilors. The ordinary in turn shall send a copy of. this report signed by himself, with any remarks he may see fit to add, to this Sacred Congregation within the year in which the' report was made. "2. Major superioresses of monasteries of nuns with their proper council, according to the order above prescribed (n. III, 2). for general superioresses, shall send a brief and concise report of the five-year period, signed by all of them, to the ordinary of the place if the nuns are subject to him: otherwise to the regular superior. The ordinary of the place or the regular superior shall carefully transmit a copy of the report, signed by himself with any remarks he may see fit to add, to this Sacred Congregation within the year in ~hich the report was made. "3. The general superiors of congregations, of societies of'com-mon life, and of secular institutes of diocesan approval shall send a quinquennial report, signed by themselves and by their proper coun-cil, to. the ordinary of the place where the prihcipal house is, at the time and in the order above prescribed (n. III, 1 and 2). The ordinary of the place shall not fail to communicate this report to the ordinaries of the other houses, and he shall within the year send to this Sacred Congregation a copy, signed by himself, adding his own judgment and that of the other ordinaries regarding the "congrega-tion, society, or secular institute in question. "4. Independent and autonomous religious houses and houses of a society without vows or of a secular institute which are not united in a federation, whether they be of diocesan or of papal approval, shall send a summary report of the five-year period to the ordinary 237 ADAM C. ELLIS Re~ieto for Religious of the place in the order above prescribed (n. III I and 2). The ordinary in turn shall send a copy of the said report, signed by him-self and adding any remarks hi may see fit to make, to this Sacred Congregation, likewise within the year. "V. In making out their reports all religious institutes, monastic congregations, societies of common life, secular institutes and fed-erati~ ns approved by the Holy See, even though they be exempt, must follow exactly the schedule of questions which will be made out by the Sacred Congregation and sent to them directly. "Monasteries of nuns, autonomous houses ot? religious institutes and of societies and secular institutes appproved by the Holy See, and congregations, societies and secular institutes of diocesan approval shall use shorter formulas which will be approved for them. "VI. The replies given to the questions proposed must always be sincere and as far as possible complete and based on careful inquiry; and this is an obligation in conscience according to the .gravity of the matter. If the replies are deficient in necessary .mat-ters or if they seem uncertain or not sufficiently reliable, the Sacred Congregation will ex o~cio see to it that they are completed and, if need be, will even itself directly conduct the investigations. "VII. Before the report is officially signed by the superior and by the individual councilors or assistants, it is to be carefully exam-ined personally and collectively. "The general superioress of religious institutes of women and 6f societies of common life, secular institutes, and federations approved by the Holy See shall send the report, signed by herself and by her council, to the ordinary, of the place in which the mother house is located, so that he according to law (canon 510) may sign the report; then in due time she shall see that the report signed by the ordinary of the place is sent to this Sacred Congregation. "VIII. If any of the superiors or councilors who has to sign the report has an objection of any consequence to make to it which he was not able to express in giving his vote, or if he judges that any-thing concerning the report should in any way be communicated to the Sacred Congregation, he may do this by private letter, and may even be in conscience bound to do so according to the case. However, let him be mindful of his own condition and remember tha, t he will gravely burden his conscience if he dares in such a secret 238 September, 1949 REPORT TO ROME letter to state anything which is not true. "IX. At the end of each year all religious institutes, societies of common life, and secular institutes and federations, whether of diocesan or papal approval, shall send directly to the Sacred Congre.- gation of Religious an annual report, according to the schedules contained in the formulas which will be made out and distributed by the Sacred Congregation, stating the principal matters which con-cern the state of persons, works, or other things which ~nay be of interest either to the Sacred Congregation or to superiors, "His Holiness Plus XII, in' the.audience given to the undersigned Secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Religious on July 9, 1947, .approved the text of this decree, and ordered that i~ be observed by all and that it be published, all things to the contrary notwith-standing." Comments I. Who must make the report?--All superiors general of orders, congregations, societies living in common without public vows, and secular institutes are bound to make the quinquennial report from now on. It makes no difference whether they are still diocesan or whether'they have received the approval of the Holy See. Superiors of independent monasteries or houses not attached to a monastic con-gregation are also bound to make the report. The term "'federation" refers to a union of independent houses which have the same family name, live according to the same spirit, and are grouped together under the direction of a president who is a visitor rather than a superior. 2. When the report must be sent.--Whe division into five sec-tions follows that already in existence since the decree of 1922. The one exception is the case of clerics regular who pass from the third to the second year. 3. Forms for the report.--These will be of two different kipds. The first (revised and extended over that of 1922) will be for all institutes of whatever nature which have been approved by the Holy See. These will be sent directly to the Sacred Congregation after the ordinary of the place where the mother house is located has authenti-cated the signatures of the general council by appending his own sig-nature. The second form for diocesan institutes will be shorter and will be given directly to the ,ordinary of the place where the mother 239 ADAM C. ELLIS house is located. He in turn must read the report and, after having added his own comments, forward it to the Sacred Congregation. 4. Annual short report.--Every religious institute and every ¯ independent community, whether papal or diocesan, will be obliged to fill out a one-page report rega.rding the number of members, houses, and works performed. 5. Forms to be sent from Rome.--Since the new forms or ques-tionnaires'are to be sent by the Sacred Congregation, superiors are not obliged to make their reports until they have received them. When the forms appear, we hope to publish them in REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS. In conclusion we may say that this entire instruction applies only to institutes which are directly subject to the Sacred Congregation of Religious. Institutes directly subject to the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith will be guided by the instruction published by that Sacred Congregation on June 29, 1937. VOCATIONAL LITI:RATURE Since many of our readers are engaged in various forms of vocational coun-seling, we make a special effort to. keep them.informed of any vocational literature we receive. Leaflets and booklets on religious and priestly vocations that we have recently received may be obtained from the following: Vocation Director, St. Paul's College, Washington 17, D.C. (An illustrated leaflet entitled, "'Whtj Not Be a Paulist Missionary!.") Brother Recruiter, St. Francis Monastery, 41 Butler St., Brooklyn 2, N. Y. (Script and pictures describing the life of the Franciscan Teaching Brothers.) Ft. Superior, St. Joseph's House. Graymoor, Garrison, N.Y. (An illustrated booklet entitled The Gra~jmoor Brother.) Mother General, Franciscan Sisters of the Sacred Heart, 372 N. Broadway, Joliet. Ill. (Script and pictures illustrating the life of the Sisters.) Mission Sisters, Mesa, Arizona. (An illusrated booklet describing the work oi the Mission Sisters of the Spouse of the Holy Ghost.) House of the Good Shepherd, 8830 W. Blue Mound Road, Wauwatosa 13, Wis. (The life of St.Mary Euphrasia Pelletier in a pamphlet entitled A Harvester of Souls.) , Mother Vicaress, Corpus Christi Carmel, Keatney, Nebraska. (An illustrated leaflet concerning the work of the Corpus Christi Carmelites.) 240 Aclmission oi: Orientals into Latin Insl:il:ul:es Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. THE Code of Canon Law forbids, but does not invalidate, the admission of Oriental Catholics into the novitiates of institutes -of the Latin rite. Canon 542, 2° reads : ""The following are illicitly, but validly admitted: Orientals in institutes of the Latin rite, without the written permission of the Sacred Congregation for the Oriental Church." This prohibition extends to all Latin reli-gious institutes, whether clerical or lay, of men or of women. The Code is speaking here only of Oriental Catholics. Oriental schismat-ics are non-Catholics, and their admission into a Latin religious institute is invalid, in virtue of canon 538. Oriental Catholics are commonly called Uniates; Oriental schismatics, Orthodox. It is evi-dent that the Catholic Oriental rites do not and cannot differ from the Latin rite with regard to the natural law, divine positive law, or revelation in general. The differences are in rites, ceremonies, laws, and customs that are purely of ecclesiastical origin. We may be inclined to consider the present impediment as one of little practical import. It is true that very many institutes in the United States have never received an application from an Oriental. Many institutes, however, have received such applications and on more than one occasion. In several of these cases the impediment was not discovered until after the candidate had been admitted into the noviceship and even only after final profession. This should arouse greater attention to the impediment. It is also true, as we hope to show in the following pages, that there exists a .very prac-tical problem of recognizing that the candidate is an Oriental. The principles for handling cases of this impediment are contained in the explanations that follow. I. The Impediment An Oriental in the sense of canon 542, 2° is a Catholic who is an Oriental at present. Evidently a Catholic, formerly an Oriental, who has already legitimately transferred to the Latin rite, is not an Oriental but a Latin Catholic and would not be affected by the impediment. The intrinsic reason for the necessity of the permission 241 JOSEPH F. GALLEN ,Review for Religious of the Holy See is that admission to a Latin institute" implies the entrance into a state of permanent and necessary conformity to the Latin rite. Therefore, the permission of the Holy See is not required in the relatively infrequent case of the admission of an Oriental can-didate who is destined either to establish Oriental houses or provinces of the Latin institute or to be affiliated with those already in exist-ence. II. Rite of Baptism of Children A child who has not attained the use of reason must be bal~tized in the rite of l~is parents (canon 756, § 1). 1. If both parents are Catholics and of the same rite (canon 756, § 1) and (a) both are Latins, the child is to be baptized in the Latin rite; (b) both are Orientals, the child is to be baptized an Oriental. 2. If both parents are Catholics, one a Latin and the other an Oriental, (a) the child is to be baptized in the rite of the father (canon 756, § 2). Therefore, if the mother is an Oriental and the father a Latin, the child is to be baptized in the Latin rite; if the mother is a Latin and the father an Oriental, the child is to be baptized an Oriental. (b) A contrary provision for a particular rite can change'the prece~.[ng general norm (canon 756, § 2). Such a contrary provi-sion exists: (1) in the Italo-Greek rite, in which the child of an Italo-Greek father and a Latin mother may be baptized in the Latin rite with the consent of the father; (2) for the Greek-Ruthenian rite in Gaiicia, in which sons follow the rite of the father, daughters the rite of the mother, but all children of both sexes follow the rite of a father who i~ a Greek-Ruthenian cleric. (c) A child born after the death of the father is more probably ro be baptized in the rite of the mother. ' 3. If one parent is a Catholic and the other a non-Catholic, the child is to be baptized in the rite of the Catholic parent (canon 756, § 3). Therefore, if the mother is a non-Catholic, the child is to be baptized in the rite of the Catholic father, whether the latter is a Latin or an Oriental; if the father is a non-Catholic, the child is to baptized in the rite of theoCatholic mother, whether she is a Latin or an Oriental. 4. If both parents are non-Catholics (either unbaptized or 242 September, 1949 ADMISSION OF ORIENTALS Oriental schismatics or heretics from birth), the parents may choose the rite, Latin or Oriental, of the Catholic baptism of their child. This favor does not extend to Oriental scbismatics or heretics who have apostatized from the Catholic faith, either in the Latin or an Oriental rite. Such a child is to be baptized in the Catholic rite from which his parents have apostatized, according to the norms given in 1-3 above. 5. Illegitimate children are to be baptized: (a) in the rite of the father, if. his name is to be legiti:natelv inscribed in the baptismal register (cf. canon 777, § 2) : (b) in the rite of the mother, if her name alone is to be legiti-mately inscribed in the baptismal register (cf. canon 777, § 2) : (c) in the rite of the place of birth, if the name of neither the father nor the mother is to be legitimately inscribed in the baptismal register; in the rite of the minister of baptism, if many rites are in existence in the place of birth. 6. Abandoned children are to be baptized in the rite of the place where they are found; if many rites are in existence in this place, they are to be .baptized in the rite of the minister to whom they are given for baptism. IlI. Rite of Baptism of Those Who Haae Attained the Use of Reason 1. A person who has attained the use of reason may rece'~ve bap-tism in the ri~e be cboc,~es, independently of the rite, whether Latin or Oriental. of his parcnt~. IV'. Title of A~liation to a Farticular Rite in the Church By baptism a physical pets,on is endowed with juridical person-ality in the Church, that is, be becomes the subject of rights and obligations in the Church (:.~non 87). The unbaptized are not sub-ject tc~ purely ecclesiastical la~vs, but all b~ptized are subject to such laws unless some are exempted by the Church in a particular matter. The ecclesiastical diriment impediment of consanguinity does not invalidate the marriage of two Jewish first cousins, but it does nul-lify the marriage of two Episcopalian first cousins since baptism sub-jects the latter to laws that are purely ecclesiastical. It is only natural, therefore, that the Church has enacted that baptism is also to determine the rite of a physical person, since affiliation to a particular rite in the Church implies subjection to distinctive laws and customs and thus produces distinctive rights and obligations in the individual. 243 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review for Religious Canc;n 98, § I states that a person is affillated to the rite in which he was baptized. Obviously this canon intends the rite in which the individual was legitimatel~! baptized according to the norms given in the two preceding sections. If baptism administered contrary to these norms determined the rite of the subject, there would have been no adequate reason for establishing such norms. Therefore, the principle that determines affiliation to a particular rite in the Church is the following: (1) a person belongs to the rite in which he was legitimately baptized; (2) if, contrary to the above fiorms, he was.!llegitimately baptized in another rite, he belongs to the rite in which he should have been baptized. The gdod or bad faith of the parents, the subject or the minister of baptism does not alter such a case of illegitimate baptism. For example, if two Maro-nite parents, thinking that their child may be licitly baptized in the Latin rite, offer the child to a Latin priest who does not even suspect the Oriental affiliation of the parents and baptizes the child in the Lati,n rite the child is an Oriental, not a Latin. Exactly the sam~ conclusion would be verified if there was bad faith or even deception on the part of the paren.ts, the priest, or both. A most noteworthy feature of this case is the difficulty it can cause religious superiors. The candidate will present a Latin baptismal certificate which will give no indication that he is an Oriental. There are two cases in which even a legitimate baptism in a p~r-ticular rite does not effect affiliation to that rite. The first is the case of serious necessity, when a person.is baptized in another rite becaus~e no priest of the proper rite can be secured (.canon 98, § 1). Such necessity is verified not only in danger of death but also when the baptism would be unduly deferred by awaiting a priest of the prdper rite. The consideration of the eternal salvation of the subject ren-ders the baptism in another rite licit in these cases of necessity. How-ever, the subject is not affiliated to the rite of his baptism but'to the rite in which he should ordinaril~t have boen baptized, according to the above norms. For example, if a Latin priest, with or without the request of two Melkite parents whose child is in danger of death, baptizes it in the Latin rite, the child is an Oriental, not a Latin. It is a well-known fact that these baptisms of necessity are of frequent occurrence in the United States, because of the scarcity of Oriental priests. The Latin.priest, in the example given above of the Melkite child, should have noted the Oriental affiliation of the child in the parochial bapt, ismal register of the place of baptism and should also 244 September, 1949 ADMISSIO~q OF ORIENTALS have sent a notification of the baptism to the proper Oriental pastor of the child. It is safe to assert that this law of annotation and notification with regard to an Oriental will oftentimes not be observed. It is not a law that is emphasized by the ordinary text-books of moral theology. We~ can thus again have the case of a can-didate for admittance into religion who Will present a Latin bap-tismal certificate that will give no indication of his Oriental affilia-tion. ' The" second case of a li~it aptism in a particular rite which does not cause affiliation to that'rit~e is a dispensation from the Holy See to the effect that one may be bfiptized in a particula~ rite xvithout, however, being thereby made ~i member of that rite. V. Transfer to Another Rite 1. Transfer from an Orielntal to the Latin rite, from the Latin to an Oriental rite, or the return to such a rite after a legitimate transfer is forbidden and is ilnvalid without the permission of the Holy See (can. 98, § 3). ' 2. When parents legitimatelly change their rite, the rite of children alread~l born is regulated by the following norms: ¯ (a) if the children have nlot attained the use of reason, they fo!- low the changed rite of the parents if both of the latter have changed their rite; if only one of the Iparents his changed rite, the children belong to the changed rite of tl4e father but not of the mother. (b) if the children haoe attained the use of reason, they have the choice of passing to the changed rite of the parents or of remaining in their present rite (c) if the children have completed their twent~l-first ~lear, they retain their own rite and are not affected by the change in rite of the parents. 3. There is one exceptio to the prohibition of passing to another rite. Canon 98, § 4 ,permits to a woman only, not before but at the beginning of or during marriage, to pass to the rite of her husband. She may also return to her former rite on the dissolution of the marriage. This latter right is limited by any contrary pro-vision made for a particular rite. Such a contrary prox?ision exists in the Italo-Greek rite, in which an Italo-Greek woman who had passed to the Latin rite of her husband is forbidden to resume the Italo-Greek rite on the death of her husband. 4. Oribntal schismatics and heretics from birth, upon their con- 245 JOSEPH F. GALL'EN Review [or Religious version to the Catholic faith, may .choose any Oriental rite they pre-fer. They have also the right of chooying to be affiliated with the Latin rite at their conversion. In the latter case they retain the right of returning to the Catholic Oriental rite that corresponds to their schismatical rite. If they are to be rebaptized conditionally, this rebaptism should, except in case of necessity, be in the rite they have chosen to follow. This favor, does not extend to Oriental schismatics and heretics who have" apostatized from the Catholic faith, either in the Latin or an Oriental rite, nor to occidental heretics dr schismatics. The former must return to the Catholic rite from which they aposta-tized, and the latter are to embrace the Latin rite. VI. Participation in Another Rite Does not Effect a Change of Rite Canon 98, § 5 affirms the principle that participation in another rite, no matter how prolonged, does not effect a change of rite. This norm follows clearly from the fundamental principles that one belongs to the rite in which he was or should have been baptized and that the permission of the Holy See is required to effect a valid change in rite. All the faithful, merely for the sake of devotion, may receive the Holy Eucharist in any rite (canon 866), may go to confession in any rite (canons 881, § 1; 905), and they may also attend Mass in any rite (canon 1249). All such participation in another rite, matter of what duration, does not effect a change in rite. Religious superiors in the United States will be compelled to exercise special care with cases that fall under this heading. It fre-quently happens that Orientals have been completely educated in schools of.the Latin rite or have for years participated in the Latin rite. They can readily believe that they are thereby Latins. They are Orientals. This¯ case is made more difficult when the baptism was also in the Latin rite (cf. section IV), for the Latin baptismal certificate will oftentimes contain no notation of the Oriental affilia-tion of the baptized. VII. The Permission The Holy See alone can grant the permission for an Oriental to enter a Latin institute. The competent congregation is the Sacred Congregation for the Oriental Church. The impediment is to admis-sion to the novitiate, not to postulancy. The common practice is to 246 September, 19 4 9 ADMISSION OF ORIENTALS apply for the permission 0nly before the noviceship and not before the postulancy. Since ecclesiastical authorities have .not objected to this practice, it may be safely followed. It has always seemed to the present writer that dispensations from any of the impediments of canon 542 as well as from those of the particular law of the institute¯ should regularly be sought before the postulancy. A sufficient reason for this doctrine is, to speak in general, that the refusal of a dispensa-tion is a practical possibility. A candidate who after several months in tbe postulancy should be compelled to leave because of the refusal of a dispensation would not be in an enviable state. This doctrine is more cogent in the case of lay institutes, whose superiors cannot be expected to know either the impediments or the conditions under which the Holy See is acct~tomed to dispense. It can be objected that the suitability of the candidate should be tested by the postulancy before a dispensation is secured for admittance to the noviceship. This argument does not appear to possess any great efficacy when it is considered that the Church does not impose the postulancy on all classes of candidates for the religious life. The petition is to contain the name, age, specific rite (not merely Uniate, but Antiocbene Marionite, Byzantine Rutbenian of the Philadelphia Ordinariate, Byzantine Ruthenian of the Pittsburgh Ordinariate, etc.), diocese of the candidate, and a statement that the competent superior is willing to admit him into ~he ~eligious insti-tute. A petition for a male candidate is to state whether or not he is destined for orders. A proportionate reason should be given for a dispensation or a favor that partakes of the nature of a.dispensation. The universal reason in the present case is the greater spiritual profit of the individual by religious profession to be made in a Latin insti-tute. 1 This reason does not have to be explicitly stated, since it is implicitly contained in the petition itself. The S. C6ngregation readily grants permission for an Oriental to enter a Latin institute. It has been said that the Holy See desires an Oriental to enter an Oriental province of the Latin institute he has chosen if such prov-inces exist in the particular institute. A study of several rescript, gives no indication that this desire has been urged. Furthermore, there are relatively very few institutes in the United States that have such provinces. Considerable variety is found in the manner in ~Religious profession as such constitutes the greater spiritual good, and in this case the profession is to be made in a Latin institute. 247 JOSEPH F. CIALLEN Review ~or Religious which the permission has been given, as will be clear from the fol-lowing : 1. If the candidate is not destined for orders (Brother, Nun, Sister).--Formerly a petition had to be made both before the nov-iceship and before first profession. The first rescript granted permis-sion to conform to the Latin rite during the noviceship, and the second definitively transferred the novice to the Latin rite at first pro-fession. In some of the rescripts it was stated absolutely that the subject was forbidden to return to his native rite without the permis-sion of the Holy See, while in others it was indicated that the sub-ject was transferred back to his native rite by the mere fact that he ceased to be ~i member of the Latin institute. In the present practice of the Holy See a petition is necessary only before the noviceship. The rescript does not transfer the subject to the Latin rite but merely grants permission to conform to the Latin rite. Obviously the subjedt who ceases to be a member of the Latin institute must return to the practice of his native rite, since the entire reason for granting permission to conf6rm to the Latin rite has then ceased to exist (canon 86). This is also explicitly stated in the rescript, as is the fact that the novice or religious retains his Oriental rite. Many of the latest rescripts also contain a clause that empowers religious superiors to permit the subject to use his native rite when-ever they judge this to be useful." The petitions for lay institutes are at least ordinarily being for-warded through the Apostolic Delegate. In this case the following 2The standard form now used by the S. Cong~'egation in granting the permission is: Prot. N . BEATISSIME PATER, rltus . dioecesis . ad pedes Sanctitatis Vestrae provolut . humiliter petit ut ad novitiatum admltti possit et dein in eodem . religiosam professionem emittere valeat, titui latino sere conformando. SACRA CONGREGATIO PRO ECCLESIA ORIENTALI, vigore facul-tatum a Ssmo D. N . Divina Providentia PP . sibi tributarum, benigne concedit ut Orat . in . de qu . in "precibus ad Novitiatum et ad religiosam professionem admitti possit. Eidem Orat . fit insuper facultas sese in omnibus conformandi ritui latino, ea tamen lege ut ritum nativum retineat ira ut si, quacuinque de causa, ad praefat . pertinere desierit, ritum originis sequi teneatur, quo interim legi-time uti potest quoties, Superiot?um iudicio, id utilitas suaserit. Contrariis quibuslibet non obstantibus. Datum Romae, ex Aedibus Sacrae "Congregationis pro Ecclesia Orientali, die . mensis . anno . 248 September, 1949 ADMISSION OF ORIENTALS formalities are required: (1) the petition in duplicate must be signed by the candidate: (2) the petitioner is to.state also the rite. place, and date of his baptism and that there are no Oriental provinc-~s in the Latin institute he wishes to enter; (3) the religious superior is to append a document in duplicate in which he states: (a) there are no Oriental provinces in his institute; (b) he is willing to admit the petitioner into his institute; (c) the date on which the noviceship of the petitioner is to begin: (4) all of the above documents are to be sent to the proper Latin local ordinary who will forward them to the Apostolic Delegate with his own approval in duplicate. 2. I[ the candidate is destined for orders.--The manner of giving the permission has varied also in this case. Foimerly one petition bad to be made before the novicesbip ~and another before first pro-fession. The subject was permitted to conform to the Latin rite during the noviceship and was canonically transferred to this rite b.y first profession. If he ceased for any reason to be a member of the institute, he was by that very fact transferred back to his Oriental rite. In some rescripts he was explicitly forbidden thereafter, with-out the permission of the Holy See, either to exercise any order he might have received in the Latin rite or to receive any higher order in his Oriental rite. From a study of several rescripts, it is clear that the present prac-tice of the Holy See is the same for a clerical religious as that for a lay religious described above. The rescripts read exactly the same. This is true also of the clause empowering the use of the native rite, which was mentioned above. This clause is written in on the stand-ard form, either by hand or typewriter, and it is difficult to account for its absence in some rescripts. If such a permission is given to some clerical and lay religious, it is not easy to see why it is not granted to all. Petitions for candidates destined for. orders are usually forwarded through the procurator general of the institute. If the petition is transmitted through the Apsotolic Delegate, the same for-malities are required as those listed above for a lay religious. 3. Urgent cases. Since the petition must be forwarded to the Holy See, it should be sent about three months before the beginning of the noviceship. If there is insufficient time to secure the permis-sion before the beginning of the noviceship or if the impediment is discovered only after profession, the petition is to be sent to the Apostolic Delegate, who in all likelihood can grant permission for a 249 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review for Religious temporary conformity to the L~tin rite. He will then forward the petition to the Holy See for the permanent conformity. VIII. An Oriental Admitted to a Latin Nooitiate or to Profession without'the Permission of the Holg Such an admissi6n does not invalidate the noviceship or profes-sion. The case, with an explanation for the failure to ask for the permission before the novic~ship, is to be presented to the Holy See. The petition is to contain the' same information and the same for-malities are to be observed as described in the preceding section. The case, as one of urgency, is to be bundled first as explained immedi-ately above. The reason why permissi6n must be asked even after profession is that an Oriental who is received into a Latin institute places himself in a de facto state of permanent and necessary con-formity to the Latin rite in the religious institute. This is the intrinsic reason for the necessity of the permission of the Holy See before the novicesbip, but the same reason is equally verified after the beginning of the noviceship or after profession. IX. Aids for Detecting the Impediment The difficulty of recognizing whether the candidate is a Latin or an Oriental has already been emphasized. Baptism and participation in the Latin rite.are sources of this difficulty. Or~e author has also called attention to our tende, ncy to rank all Italian-speaking Italians as Latins. They can be Italo-GreeksJ from southern Italy. The primary aid is the baptismal certificate if it is from an Oriental church or from a Latin church With a notation of the Oriental affiliation. Without such a notation the Latin baptismal certificate will be of no help unless the names of the parents suggest one of t'he Oriental countries. The same thing is true of the.confirmation cer-tificate. It is to be noted that in most Oriental rites the priest, as the extraordinary minister, a'dministers confirmation immediately after baptism. The Maronites do' not follow'this custom. Oriental priests may confirm in this way the members of their own rite and of other Oriental rites that enjoy the same privilege. The help given by the marriage certificate of the parents will depend on the same facts. The marriage certificate may be merely civil or non-Catholic, and an inquiry concerning such a marriage may bring out the fact that the parents are Orientals. If one of the parties in a marriage is a Latin or a Greek-Ruthenian, the marriage is invalid unless contracted 250 September, 1949 ADMISSION OF ORIENTALS before a competent priest and at least two witnesses. However, as a general principle, the other Oriental rites in the United States did not demand the presence of a priest for the validity of a marriage. Therefore, when such Orientals contracted among themselves or with a non-Catholic, the marriage was not invalidated by the fact that it was contracted before a civil official or a nbn-Catholic minister. The Holy See has recently promulgated new marriage legislation for the Oriental Rites. In virtue of this legislation marriages con-tracted from May 2, 1949, by members of all the Oriental rites are held to the same law as that stated immediately above for Latins and Greek-Ruthenians. The outline ofltheOrientalCatbolic rites appended to this article'~ is intended as something of an aid for detecting the impediment. The native country and language of the parents of the candidate, if they coincide with those of any Oriental rite, are indications that a reli-gious superior should make further inquiries about the rite of the candidate and "parents. This outline has been compiled from several sources, principally from Attwater, The Christian Churches of the East.'~Places outside the eastern countries, such as Canada, South America, France, Belgium, Australia, and Mexico are territories of modern immigration. This outline, as regards.the total number of the faithful of any rite and especially with regard to the number and places in the United States, is only a hazardous approximation of fact. It is sufficiently accurate to fulfill the present purpose, that is, to provide a working norm of caution. Lay religious who desire a general knowledge of the Oriental r'~tes can read: Attwater, Donald. I. The Christian Churches of the East. ll. The Dissident Eastern Churches. Milwaukee, Bruce, 1947. Fortescue, Adrian. The Orthodox Eastern Church. Catholic Truth Society, London, 1907--The Lesser Eastern Churches. Catholic Truth Society, London, 1913.--The Uniate Eastern Churches. ed. G. Smith. Burns, Oates ~ Washbourne, London, 1923. The Catholic Encyclopedia, under Rites. zSee pp. 252 and 253. 9 4Material from Attwater, The Christian Churches of the East, is used with the per-mission of the publisher, The Br,.uce Publishing Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 25l RITE TOTAL NUMBER IN . FOUND PRINCIPALLY NUMBER UNITED STATES OUTSIDE U. S. IN I. ALEXANDRIAN RITE 1. Copts -. . 63,000 2. Ethiopians . 30,500 Egypt Ethiopia, Eritrea II. ANTIOCHENE RITE I. Malankarese 50,000 2. Maronites . 391,000 1 60,000 India Syria, Uruguay, South Africa 3. Syrians . 74,500 III. ARMENIAN RITE 150,600 IV. BYZANTINE RITE 1. Bulgarians . 5,500 2. Greeks . 3,300 3. Hungarians . 140,000 4. Italo-Greeks 60,000 5. Melkites . 173,000 6,800 5,000 1 1 10,000 20,000 Syria, Irak, Brazil, Argentina Syria, .Near East, " Russia, Greece, Galicia, Rumania, France, Belgium Bulgaria .Greece, Turkey Hungary Italy, Sicily Syria, Egypt, Pales-tine, Turkey, Australia, Mexico, Brazil FOUND PRINCIPALLY IN U. S. IN DIOCESES OF 1 VERNACULAR LANGUAGE Arabic Amharic, Tigre ~1 Malayalam Boston, Brooklyn, Buffalo, Cincit~nati, Arabic Cleveland, Detroit, Fall River, Hartford. Los Angeles, Mobile, New York, Phila-delphia, Pittsburgh, Raleigh, Richmond, St. Lot~is, St. Paul, Scranton, Seattle, Springfield, Mass., Syracuse, Trenton, Wheeling Boston, Brooklyn, Columbus, Detroit, Arabic, Syr;.~c Galveston, Hartford, Newark Brooklyn, Newark, New York, Spring- Armenian field, Mass. ~- Bulgarian 1 Greek o. Magyar Brooklyn, New York Italian, Albanian, Greek Boston, Brooklyn, Chicago, Cleveland. Arabic Detroit, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, New-ark, New York: Providence, Springfield, Mass., Toledo 6. Rumanians .1.434,000 8,000 Rumania 7. Russians . 22,500 1,000 Russia, Europe, Far East 8. Ruthenians .5,000,000 a. Galiciansa . 302,100 Galicia, Canada, Brazil, Argentina b. Podcarpath- Cleveland, Detroit, Fort Wayne, Rock-ford, Trenton Los Angeles, New York In states of I11., Md., Mass., Mich., N. 3. N. Y., Ohio, Pa. Rumanian Russian Ukrainian inns4 . 293,871 Czechoslovakia, In states of Conn., Ill., Ind., Mich, N. ,l. Rusin Bukovina (Rumania)," N.Y., Ohio, Pa., W. Va. (Ruthenian) Canada, Brazil, Argentina 9. Yugoslavs . 55,000 .o Yugoslavia __ u Croat V. CHALDEAN RITE I. Chaldeans . 96,000 800 Irak, Syria Chicago, Detroit, Hartford, Los Angeles, Arabic, Syriac New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco 2. l~Ialabarese . 632,000 __1 India __1 Malayalam 1There are either no Orientals of this group in the U. S. or no figures exist as to their number. ~The Hungarians and Yugoslavs in the U. S. belong to the Diocese of Pittsburgh, Greek Rite. There are 14 parishes exclusively . for the Hungarians, with a total of 8,000 souls. The others are mixed in with the predominantly Ruthenian parishes. There ard two exclusively Croatian parishes, with a total of 1,000 souls. The others are mixed in with the Ruthenian parishes. ,SThe Ruthenians of Galicia form the Diocese of the Byzantine Rite (Ukrainian Greek Catholic), Philadelphia, Pa. ~The Ruthenians of Car~atho-Russian,. Hungarian, and Crotian nationalities constitute the Diocese of Pittsburgh, Greek Rite, Homestead, Pa. The two preceding groups are frequently termed Greek-Ruth~nians. They are the only Orientals in the United States who have their own Ordinaries. All other Orientals in this country are under the jurisdiction of the Latin Ordinaries. Tot:al Consecra!:ion !:o ary by Vow Robert L. Knopp, S.M. IN THESE DAYS ~vhen the message of Fatima is at last fanning the world to flame, any form of consecration to Mary must immediately claim the interest of her children. Her revel~tion that the world can be saved only through consecration to her Immaculate Heart-~consecration complete enough to sustain prayer and penance--must increase this interest if the consecration in question is a total one involving .the whole being and activity of the one consecrated. And finally, the urgency of her request, attested by the divine stamp of a cosmic miracle, must still further intensify this interest if the consecration has itself been attested by the Vicar of Christ on earth. Papal approval and commendation have long been accorded the total consecration to Mary by which.Marianists (members of the Society of Mary) are perpetually professed in the religious state. This year, especially, seems a most fitting time to explain this reli-gious consecration, for the Marianists are celebrating their American Centennial and anticipating two more centennials for next year-- that of the death of their saintly Founder, Very Reverend William Joseph Chaminade, and that of the foundation of their first American school, the University of Dayton. A further appropriate circum-stance is the recent arrival in America of the Daughters of Mary, a congregation of Sisters also founded by Father Chaminade and sharing with the Marianists the same total consecration to Mary by the vows of religion. This article is a small part of the Marianist expression of grati-tude to God for those hundred years during which they have been privileged ~o make their contribution to religious life in America through the 'total consecration which Father Chaminade always called the "gift of God" to the Society. Certainly, on their part, the Marianists and the Daughters of Mary, through the wise choice of, their Founder, have received gratefully both inspiration and breadth from many other religious institutes, to the enhancement of their own religious consecration. They humbly hope that in their turn 254 CONSECRATION TO MARY they may contribute by their Marian spirit to the vitality of other religious, both men and women. It is a curious circumstance that Father Chaminade founded the Marianists one hundred years before the Fatima miracle, even to the month. He had been waiting twenty long years in Bordeaux for the sign evidently foretold in revelations granted him during his exile in Saragossa at the famous shrine of Our Lady of the Pillar. That sign came off May 1, 1817, when one of his most promising young sodalists, John Lalanne, put his future entirely at the disposal of Father Chaminade. In October, 'the first seven members, repre-senting quite different walks of life, formed the new Society. They had already been consecrated to Mary as sodalists: then, desiring to belong to her more completely, they had under Father Chaminade's direction dedicated themselves to her by private vows while still living in the world. Now they prepared to give themselves totally ' by a consecration that constituted them religious, whether as priests, teaching brothers, or working brothers--the diverse categories which this new religious consecration united in harmonious social equality. To grasp the true significance of this total consecration, we must see it in the setting of Father Chaminade's full concept of religious life. To delineate this concept in all its completeness has required a family document, The Spirit of Our Foundation, over 2,000 pages in length. Hence, only a brief idea of the underlying principles can be sketched here. In the following developme.nt, quotations from the writings of Father Chaminade are taken from this family document. Father Chaminade followed the traditional concept of religious life as the state of perfection--a state constituted by the three vows, a perfegtion consisting in the highest love of God, attained through conformity with Christ, the Model sent to"men by the Father. Con-formity with Christ is an inward union by grace, a union of bein;l, an incorporation into the Mystical Body of which Christ is the Head. It is bestowed through faith and baptism and perfected by the sacra-ments, by prayer (especially mental prayer), and by the practice of virtue. In all this, with a special emphasis on the role of faith as the foundation of conformity with Christ, Father Chaminade followed the general tradition of religious life. In addition to these channels of the supernatural life, Father Chaminade stressed a prior channel, but one that is really not to be separated from them since it flows into and through them and at the same time disposes the religious to use them more perfectly. This 255 ROBERT L. KNOPP Review for Religious channel is Mary, our spritual Mother find Mediatrix of All Graces, through whom ~hrist first came to us and through whom we must therefore go to Him. To unders~;and the strong emphasis Father Chaminade laid upon this concept, we must begin with his vital grasp of Mary's part in the Incarnation, a grasp which he owed largely to St. Augustine. One of Father Chambiade's favorite thoughts was that before Mary conceived Christ in the flesh, she had conceived Him in spirit-- not, of course, in the sense that she was the source of His spiritual power, but in the sense that by her Immaculate Conception she was given a holiness so vast that, as St. John Damascene declares (It~ Dormitionero, 1, 13), by her grace she exceeded the expanse of the heavens, encompassing Him whom the whole world cannot contain. At the moment of her Immaculate Conception, then, Mary was granted by her fullness of grace such a complete participation in the life of God that she might be said to have conceived the supernatural life among men. This complete union with God was the dawn of our own redemption. For God could look down upon our race and see among us a creature whose full-blown supernatural beauty was at last worthy of His infinite love. Or rather, already dwelling in her so completely by grace, He gave that intimate spiritual union physical expression by the Incarnation. Because God Himself in His infinite wisdom had conceived from all eternity this ideal of human purit;/ informed by the fullness of His own divine life, because He had cre-ated in the midst of our race this His Immaculate Conception, because he could now find an adequate response to His divine love in a crea-ture, God became one of our race in the womb of Mary. We had lost the union of grace by the sin of Adam, committed at the solici-tation of Eve. Christ, the new Adam, most fittingly chose to win us back to God by becoming one with us at the consent of His new Eve, having been Himself won by her humble, supernatural love. It is because the Son of God has become the Son of Mary that our human race, as a race, has been united again to God, so that it is now pos-s. ible, through conformity with Christ', for each individual of our race to attain to this union with God. It is because, as the Son of Mary, Christ has become one of us that We can now become one with Him. And He has completed the winning of this divine life for us through His. lifework of redemption. His whole life was a unity comprise.d of the two great mysteries of the Incarnation and the re- 256 September, 1949 CONSECRATION TO MARY demption. By His Incarnation He took upon Himself the state of Son of Mar~/. By His redemption He acted i,n that state even unto His death as Mary's Son. And to accentuate her role as the new Eve co-operating with Him in the whole unity of His lifework of regen-erating mankind, He associated her in that work at every significant step along the way. Thus, from her arms He revealed Himself to mankind in the person of shepherds and Magi. At the Presentation He offered Himself to His heavenly Father from her arms. He spent His thirty years of preparatio.n in her company at Nazareth. Although He said His time had not yet come, He inaugurated His public life at Cana at her mere suggestion. Finally, He united her sorrow-pierced heart with His own in consummating His lifework c.n Calvary. Because Mary has been so closely associated' with Christ in the 'mysteries of the Incarnation and redemption, it is through her that we are conformed to the incarnate Redeemer. At the very moment that the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity became man in. her womb, all of us became her children, for at that moment Christ embraced us all as members of His Mystical Body. Father Chami-nade, therefore, delighted in recalling St. Augustine's teaching that Mary is the Mother of the Whole Christ, of the Body as well as of the Head: "As Jesus Christ has been conceived in the virginal womb of Mary according to nature through the operation of the Holy Ghost, so all the elect are conceived according to the spirit through faith and baptism in the womb of the tender charity of Mary" (S.F., 456). It is, then, first of all through Mary that we have been conformed with Christ in grace: "It is by her transcending grace that this Virgin Mother conceived us; in her superabounding charity she communicated to us her being of grace, which is nothing else but a participation in Christ, that all things might be consum-mated in unity: "Consummati'in unum' " (S.F., 106). As by Hi~ physical conception in the Virgin Mary the Son of God conformed Himself to our nature, so through our spiritual conception in Mary we are conformed to Christ, made. partakers of His divine nature. Having once willed to unite Himself to us through Mary, God never "repents"; He always comes to us through her. Every new grace by which our conformity with Christ is perfected, He applies to us through her mediation and distribution. Just as her motherly care of Jesus did not cease at His birth, so her motherly office toward us does not cease with our spiritual birth: "Mary nurtured Jesus in 257 ROBERT L. KNOPP' Review [or Religious His infancy and was associated in all the various stages of His life, in His death and in His resurrection; the elect attain the fullness of age, as St. Paul terms it, only in so far as Mar~" becomes in their regard what she was for Jesus" (S.F., 10.9). Hence, the more perfectly we are sons of Mary, the more perfectly we conform to Christ. For Father Chaminade this was a cardinal principle of the spir-itual life. A Christian may receive grace through the sacraments, for instance, and thereby be united to Christ without even thinking of the spiritual Mol~her who distributes to him this sacramental grace. But how much closer to the full reality and therefore how much better disposed he will be for perfect reception of the sacraments if, conscious of Mary's role, he fully submits in filial love to her work of spiritual formation: "We have all been conceived of Mary.; we must be born' of Mary and formed by Mary to the resemblance with Christ, that we may live only the life of Christ, that we may, together with Christ, as so many Christs, be Sons of Mary: "Cure Cbristo unus Christus." Following up this principle, what devo-tion, what confidence in Mary will not the director inspire . . . in order to obtain ever more by Mary . . . resemblance to Christ oper-ated by the Spirit of Christ!" (S.F., 893.) Even as did Jesus, the religious must prove his filial love of Mary by a child-like abandon-ment of himself to her care: ". the Society intends to rear each of its members as Jesus was reared by her care, after having been formed in her virginal womb" (S.F., '115). The total consecration of the religious, then, consists in a com-plete surrender of self to Mary by which the religious participates spiritually in Christ's Incarnation. Like Christ, the religious "gladly intrusts to Mary both his person and his future" (Cons'fftutions, art. 4). In the practical order, he accomplishes this by his religious profession of vows made to God through Mary as a total consecra-tion of self in a Society entirely devoted to her service. If the Society itself is hers, i~s children form her family and abandon them-selves to her by devoting themselves in loyal "family spirit" to her Society. That is why Father Chaminade could identify the religious consecration and the consecration to Mary. Lived perfectly, this total consecration consists in complete detachment from all that is not Christ; for, by placing the religious voluntarily in the state of dependence on Mary that corresponds to reality, it removes the ¯ obstacles to her free maternal action in him, rendering him pliable in 258 September, 1949 CONSECRATION TO MARY bet hands so that she may form him, both directly through her power of mediation and indirectly through her Society, to the like-ness of the Model she knows so well---bet First-born: ". her entire ambition is that all the children whom her charity has brought forth after Him, be so united to Him, that with Him they may be but one Son, one and the same Jesus Christ" (S.F,, 440). But this total consecration demands of us not only the passivity of surrender; it also demands the activity of conquest. Christ, the Son of God become the Son of Mary, is our Model not only ~n being but also in acting, not only in His Incarnation, but also in His redemption. Since a man acts according to his nature, in the measure that he partakes of Christ's being he also partakes of His action. Religious life, then, especially as Father Chaminade con-ceived it, must also be considered a.s conformity to Christ in His activity through imitation of His virtues. Conscious effort to increase this conformity of action is also a meritorious means for perfecting the essential conformity of being. It is ordinarily in this area of imitating Christ's virtues that we find religious institutes differing in that wide and beauteous variety that fills up those things otherwise wanting to the Mystical Body of Christ. For as St. ~Fbomas quotes Abbot Nesteros: " . . . it is impossible that one and the same man should excel,in all the virtues at once, since if he endeavor to practice them equally, he will of necessity, while trying to attain them all, end in acquiring none of them perfectly" (II-II, q. 189, a. 8). Hence,. different religious institutes select different virtues of Christ upon which to center their attention. Since the teaching of Christ Himself, charity has been universally accepted as the greatest of the virtues. It is the tradition of religious-life, therefore, to see the charity of Christ's redemptive action as His outstanding virtue, manifesting first His love for His heavenly Father, then His love for all mankind. Differences arise from_~the various expressions of. this charity of Christ, whether through His obedience, His poverty, His mortification, or some other special virtue. It was typical of Father Cbaminade to see the most complete expression of these two loves of Christ in His filial love of Mary. She is for Him the embodiment of the divine authority, so that He can subject Himself to His Father only by being subject to her, and He can please His Father only by giving her the most complete filial 259 ROBERT L. KNOPP Reoiew for Reli'gious lo~'e; since Jesus owes "His body solely to her body from which alone the Holy Ghost formed it, she concentrates upon her Son the rights and the duties of both a father and a mother" (S.F., 119). And as the greatest of all mankind, she won from Him the greatest share of His infinite love for men. She won His love long before He became man. Back in eternity she was His Immaculate Conception, playing before Him at all times, even as He laid the foundations of the world. It was she whom He chose out of all mankind and filled with grace to become His Mother in the Incarna-tion and His Spouse in the redemption. Fundamentally, 'Christ's love for His Father and for man'kind finds its perfect expression in His. love for Mary not only because she is His own chosen Mother, but also because she is His chosen.means and associate for the who!e work of redemption. He was able to act as our Redeemer because' of her. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, became the Son of Mary for the salvation of mankin~l: "Qui propter nos homines et propter nostram salutem descendit de coetis, et incarnatus est de Spiritu Sancto ex Maria Virgine, et homo factus est." That is why Father Chaminade declared: "Jesus Christ prac-ticed every virtue in the highest degree of perfection. But of those virtues one which particularly entered into the accomplishment of His adorable mysteries was His love for the most holy Virgin, in whose bosom He was conceived and lived for nine months, and of whom He v~as born, who was associated with Him in all His mys-teries and who was made Mother of all those who were to be regen-erated in Him" (S.F., 440). .And therefore Father Chaminade found this filial love of Mary to be the "most salient feature" in Christ's life, the virtue by which Christ realized His desire for a life of activity devoted to His Father's Will for the salvation of man-kind. Redemption was the act of His state of Son of Go~(, but it was likewise the fulfillment of His being Son of Mary. For the man, then, who has embraced the religious state as son of Mary, zeal for the glory of God and the salvation of souls must embrace his whole activity. And therefore, in his filial love for Mary, he finds the perfect inspiration, expression, and embodiment of his love for God and for men. Father Cbaminade's deep conviction in the all-embracing value of this filial piety was rooted in his firm belief in Mary's central position in Christ's whole work of redemption. Moreover, like St. Grignion de Montfort, whose True Devotion to Mary was 260 September, 1949 CONSECRATION TO MARY unfortunately still hidden from the world, he was absolutely con-vinced that God had entrusted to Mary the leadership in the battle to overthrow Satan and re-establish the reign of Christ. On at least five solemn occasions he referred this mission of Mary especially to modern times. In 1839, for instance,, nineteen yearsbefore Lourdes, he ~nade this thought the very core of his long letter to the priests who were to conduct the annual retreats of the Society. Describing in vivid language the tremendous evils wrought in the world by ,religious indifference and secularism, so like those of our own day, be foresaw the loss of the masses that we are now trying to cope With, "a general defection and an apostasy really all but universal." But he was not discouraged: "Mary's power is not diminished. We firmly believe that she will overcome this heresy as she has overcome all others, because she is today, as she was formerly, the incompa-rable Woman, the promised Woman who was to crush the serpent's head: and desus Christ in never addressing her except by this sublime name, teaches us that she is the hope, the joy, and the life of the Church and the terror of hell. To her, therefore, is reserved a gre~t victory in our day: hers will be the glory of saving the faith from the shipwreck with which it is threatened among us.'" (S.F'., 101.). It was because of this firm faith in the leadership of Mary in the modern world, a faith that Lourdes and Fatima among a host of lesser apparitions have since strikingly vindicated, that Father Chami-nade enthusiastically called upon his spiritual children to realize in themselves the full valor of their knighthood: "We have enlisted under her banner as her soldiers., to assist her with all our strength until the end of our life, in her noble struggle against the powers of hell." (Ibid.) Such a dynamic ideal demands direct apostolic action, universal and intense, like the redemptive action of the first Son of Mary. Though the Society at present devotes itself chiefly to the education of youth, it is but applying Father Chaminade's principle of employing "means best adapted to the needs and spirit of the times" (S.F., 53). For such was the bigb dedication to which he called his children that they must labor with all their strength, not just to win Christians, b~t to "multiply Christians." And so, even as the knights of old dedicated themselves by their chivalrous vows, Father Cbaminade would have his modern knights. with ~'Maria Ducet." as their battle cry, vow a total consecration of themselves, to Mary their Queen and Mother: "She communicates to 261 ROBERT L. KNOPP Review for Religious us her own zeal and entrusts to us the projects ~vhich are inspired by her almost infinite charity, and we . . . vow to serve her faithfully till the end of our iife, to carry out punctually all that she'tells us. We are glad that we can thus spend in her service the life and strength that we have pledged to her." (Ibid.) To give this total consecration concrete expression in the religious profession itself, Father Chaminade added to poverty, chastity, and obedience, a fourth vow, stability, to which he specifically attached the meaning of consecration to Mary. This vow of stability, byl which the religious is constituted a Marianist forever, is officially described in the Constitutions as the vow by which the religious "intends to constitute himself permanently and irrevocably fn the state of a servant of Mary, of her to whom the Society is especially consecrated. This vow is, in reality, a consecration to the Blessed Virgin, with the pious design of making her known and of perpetu-ating love and devotion to her." (Art. 55.) This vow really expresses, therefore, the formal motive for embracing the Marianist life: ". it is in the name of Mary and for her glory that we embrace the religious life; it is in order to conse-crate ourselves, all that we h~ve and are, to her to make her known, loved, and served, in the intimate conviction that we shall not briw,~ men back to Jesus except through His most holy Mother, because with the hol~z Doctors we believe, that she is our only hope-- tota ratio spei no.~trae--our Mother. our refuge, our help, our strength, and our life" (S.F., 101). ' Consequently, by constituting the religious state itself, this vow of stability inspires, expresses, and effects conformity both with Christ's incarnate being and with His redemptive action, investing all the elements of re.ligious life with a special Marian significance. The three traditional vows, for instance, :partake of its character by stripping the religious, like another Incarnation, of all that he for-merly was or had. Thus, 'poverty imitates Christ who divested Himself of all His divine wealth to confide in Mary's care; it releases the religious from all l~aterial goods that he may be radically at the disposition of his spiritual Mother. .Chastity imitates the virginal integrity of Christ, Son of the Virgin of virgins; it releases the reli-gious from the ties of wife and family that he may present himself inviolate for the total service of his Immaculate Mother. Obedience imitates the loving subjection Of Christ to His Mother; by it the religious renounces his own will that he may follow hers, trans- 262 September, 1949 CONSECRATION TO MARY mitted to him by his superior, according to her word, "Do whatever he tells you." Since by these three vows the Marianist views the Soci(ty as Mary,'s property, its members as her sons, and its superiors as her representatives, he finds in his total consecration a very real counterpart of the Incarnation by which Christ completely sur-rendered Himself to Mary's motherhood. If he is wholly faithful to his state, he no longer lives, but Christ lives in him, returned again to earth, become again the Son of Mar'y for the salvation of mankind. And consequently, by acting according to his consecra-tion to Mary, loving her, obeying her, honoring her, confiding in her, living'with her, resemb!ing her, and especially assisting ~her ia her mission to .save the modern world, the religious finds his conse-crated activity a real counterpart of the redemption by which Christ sacrificed Himself entirely out of love for His Father and for mankind. If space permitted, the other elements of religious life by which the Marianist enters into this redemptive activity of Christ might be developed in great detail. Here, only a few indications of the practical implications of this total consecration may be presented. The Fatima visions suggest that cgnsecration to Mary must involve, special stress on prayer and sacrifice as redemptive instruments. It is not at all surprising, then, that Father Cbaminade should have laid great emphasis upon mental prayer, which he characteristically taught as union with Jesus and Mary in the mysteries of the Creed, the very goal of the rosar)~ as presented to Lucy in the final Fatima vision. He prescribed a full hour of formal mental prayer for all his reli-gious, no matter how actively engaged, and he constantly insisted on a "spirit of faith and of mental prayer" by which the whole day, encased between morning and evening meditations, is spent with Jesus and Mary in the presence of God and thereby becomes a con-tinual mental prayer, a prayer of the heart fixed in God rather than of the mind straining for considerations. With this in mind, be could write in the Constitutions: ". the more a, religious devotes himself to this exercise, the more he approaches his end . con-formity with Jesus Christ" (S.F., 247). And this prayer-life is so intimately bound up with the apostolic consecration that in the second article of his Constitutions Father Chaminade clearly stated his design to combine "the advantages of the active life with those of' the contemplative, to attain the ends of both." In that same article, he stressed the sacrifice that Fatima leads us 263 ROBERT L. KNOPP to expect: "The Society designs, 'as far as God will aid it, to unite zeal with abnegation . " Concerning this abnegation, or sacrifice, Father Chaminade was as emphatic as with prayer: i'.The Savior of the world came as a victim, He lived in privations, He died in sor-rows; the same sword pierced the heart of His . . . Mother. No better lot can befall the disciple and the child his Master and his Mother. The professed, as a victim, is not surprised at the privations to try him . he considers himself all than that of resembling regarding himself, then, by which it pleases God the days of his life as fastened to the cross, in order to continue., the oblation and sacri-fice of, desus Christ." (Art. 173-4.) aust as in the life of Christ the redemptive work itself was sacrifice, so the Marianist is to find his daily cross chiefly in the trials, fatigues, and difficulties inherent in a life of intense apostolic activity. Moreover, this self-sacrifice must consist principally in the interior self-denial of humility, simple and sincere, like that of ,lesus and Mary. Such, in briefest outline, is the conformity with Christ, S6n of God become Son of Mary for the salvation of mankind, that this total consecration of filial love for Mary expresses and effects. If. however, in order to be fully realized this consecration demands the religious profession, nothing prevents the faithful in the world'from embracing its spirit as completely as their state of life permits. It is to be expected, then, that Marianists hold as their "work of predi-lection" the spreading of this spirit of filial consecration to Mary among their own students, and through them to the world at large, by such means as the establishment and maintenance of sodalities, always intensely apostolic. Before Fatima and after it, Marianists have always held as their inmost conviction, the fruit of their own 'life-experience, that the world can be restored to Christ only through Mary. In this year of their American Centennial, they dedicate themselves anew to this work of bringing men to consecrate their lives to Mary, not merely in word but in being and in act-- in prayer and in sacrifice. 264 Books as Spirit:ual Direc!:ors J. H. Dunn, O.R.S.A. ~N PIONEER DAYS the early settlers of this country had a phrase which showed a nice blend of confidence in God and self-reliance: "Trust. in God and keep your po.wder dry." A religious of today might well make one small change, inspired by modern technological progress, and use that same phrase as a watchword in his own spiritual life: "Trust in God and keep your battery charged." Certainly one of the best means to keep the battery of zeal for increased perfection charged is spiritual reading. No one can deny its imperative necessity in the daily life of a religious; so much so, that progress in perfection is, to a large extent, contingent upon daily use of this important means of advancing in sanctity. Spir-itual reading is, then, one of the best means that a religious has for charging his spiritual batteries. But spiritual reading can be made to serve another end. When necessity demgnds, it can be used as a means of spiritual direction. Books can be substituted for men. About seven years ago, the REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS published a series of articles on spiritual direction that gave rise to a discussion which furnished a very good survey of its state in contemporary American religious life. At that time, it seemed to be the consensus among religious that adequate spiritual direction was a felt need in many communities. No doubt, the situation has changed but little since those articles and letters were written. What, then, is the religious to do who with all the good will in the world cannot find someone to act as spiritual director? It is the opinion of the author that, when every opportunity for human help has been canvassed and found wanting, the religious may with a .clear conscience turn to the next most perfect means of spiritual direction--books. In such a case as this spiritual reading can be used not only as a battery-charging agent, but as a generator and, some-times, as a mechanic. Spiritual reading can be used to supply an incentive to higher things and to fix up a "stalled" religious so that he can go on. After all, the spiritual .director has a twofold task--to give advice that will help or keep a person out of difficulties and, What is 265 J. H. DUNN Review for Religious far more important, to spur him on to h!gher things. Now if there is no director at hand, spiritual reading can be used to fulfill both these ends. In the matter of difficfilties to be solved there is probably no religious who will think that his particular problems are unique. It stands to reason, therefore, that most questions are answered some-where in print. The only problem is to find the right book. Any large work covering the spiritual life extensively will serve such a need as this. Christiar~ PerFection by Father Rodriguez leaves little untouched in the matter of spirituality. Many difficulties can be solved by articles in back numbers of the REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS. Such works as these bare the one drawback--that it is sometimes hard to find what is needed quickly or easily because of inadequate indexing, dr because of improperly filed back numbers. On the other hand, such a work as Tanquerey's Spiritual LiFe is excellent in this respect. It.is sufficiently extensive to handle any problem that might arise in the. normal religious life, and it is well enough indexed to enable the reader to find a solution in a matter of seconds. It may be objected that such books as these will serve only for beginners in religion or for those who are not far advanced in per-fection but .will be of little or no use to those who have to contend with the complications characteristic of the higher reaches of sanc-tity. It is certainly true that the problems which arise in the later stages of the spiritual life are more personalized than earlier ones, but that does not mean that the broad general principles upon which such problems must be solved have not been fully .expounded in numerous spiritual books. Father Garrigou-Lagrange, for instance, in his Three Ages oF the Interior LiFe offers a sharply delineated plan of spirituality, extending as far as a man can hope to go and treating almost every difficulty that could arise. St. Teresa cannot fail to be helpful; and few problems are met in striving for the ultimate in divine union that have not been anticipated by St. John of the Cross. Besides, anyone who has progressed so far in perfection with-out a spiritual director may surely hope without presumption that God will continue to help him to bring the work to ultimate success. It is in the second phase of the spiritual director's work, that of spurring a person to higher striving arid keeping him going, that spiritual reading really comes into its own. In this respect there are some things that books can do even better than men; they can be more severe, for instance, and they are more patient at repeating 266 September, 1949 BOOKS AS SPIRITUAL DIRECTORS what needs to be said over and over. Nor can it be validly objected that many technical books will be needed if the printed page is to be used as a substitute for the living voice. A few good books will do the job and do it well. If in an ordinary novel the reader can find new matter at a second or even a third perusal, the same will certainly bold true of spiritual books. In this respect it_is important to note, even to insist upon, one point. However else a religious uses hi~ time for stfiritual reading, he must choose books which are a challenge. The time spent in spiritual reading should never be spent with books that might be called in Mark Twain's phrase, "flowers and flapdoodle." Espe-cially is this true if these same spiritual reading books must perform at least some of the functions of a spiritual director. Books that are to help religious souls to overcome their diffi-culties and urge them on to greater perfection--books that are to encourage them when they are in danger of stopping their progress through human frailty or going astray through ignorance of the way, must be carefully graded. A novice who could be helped by Gehon's Secret of the Saints wouldoonly be discouraged or bewil-dered by Tb~ Ascent of Mount Carmel. A person who might be helped immeasurably by Saudreau's Life of Union with God would no longer need Leen's Progrdss Through Mental Prayer. Each must choose for himself according to his own need, but it would certainly be folly to expect Saint Among Savages to be conducive to progress for someone who has long ago reached a measure of union with God. The book is fine, though, for a novice who must be weaned from comic books. A religious, then, who finds blmself without the help of a spir-itual director need not, because of that fact, give up all hope of spir-itual direction. That same religious would be the first to insist that God would take care of him somehow. What is more natural than that He should do so by means of help that is always at hand, the help of spiritual books? One who has tried by every possible means to get spiritual direction, yet, cannot find it, may turn with perfec~ confidence to those spiritual books which will keep his battery charged. 267 ommun{cal:{ons Who May "Follow Him"? Reverend Fathers: It is not without a coi~siderable degree of temerity that I even attempt a reply to Sister Mary Digna's scholarly article, "That God's Will be Better Known," published in the 3uly issue of REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS. However, as it deals with a subject of paramount importance to fill religious orders, I would like to express what is a purely personal'reaction to the article. Let me begin by saying that I definitely do not approve of any diagnostic tests being given to a candidate on admission to a nov;- tiate or at any time during the novitiate training period. In the first place, any of these tests--that is: I.Q., aptitude, per-sonality, or emotional reaction tests--are vary likely to defeat their purpose not only by failing to give accurate information about an applicant to religious life but also by conveying actual ~nisinforma-tion. What was this novitiate period for many of us? Wasn't it a time when our hearts almost broke with homesickness, when every fibre of our being was taut and strained in an effort to adjust our-selves to a mode of life different in almost every detail from the old one left bebin:d? Might not the score, of a diagnostic test be very different .just a few years later when, as a professed religious, one has achieved a serenity and poise that is seldom compatible with a period of grave adjustment? Secondly, should not even a reasonably' capable master or mis-tress of novices be able to know fairly accurately, after two or three years of constant companionship and supervision, something of the intelligence, aptitudes, and emotional reactions of the novices? But, one may object, this purely subjective opinion should at least be supplemented by a purely objective score. Maybe so, but remember that in this case the subjective verdict is frequently based on years of experience with young novices and also on a knowledge of the spe-cific needs and requirements of a particular congregation. In regard to that typ_e of emotional reaction test designed to convey information concerning impulses and emotions of the sex instinct, I will admit that there may be factors involved here with which I am not familiar. That any anomaly along this line cer-tainly makes one an unfit subject for religious life is unquestionable. But again, I am willing to place this too in the hands of a shrewd, 268 COMMUNICATIONS alert, and spiritually wise master, or mistress of novices. "I'o boil it all down--isn't this idea of injecting these various tests into our novitiates find religious communities merely an unneces-sary form of secularization? Doesn't it tend to overlook a little the tremendous power of divine grace operating in a soul seeking to serve God? The use of a "natural aptitude" test whiCh would tend to prevent a superior from placing a "round peg in a square hole" might also undervalue the tremendous power of a work done in simple obedience. Certainly the religious literally writhing under an unpleasant, distasteful employment has infinitely more-opportunity to follow the divine precept to "take up your cross daily" than she who is happily and efficiently employed in a work agreeable to nature. What were the requirements stipulated by the first Novice Master on the shore ~f Galilee? Just the briefly stated "Come, ~ollow Me." But oh, the infinite possibilities for courage, sanctity, and even ultimate martyrdom contained in those three simple" words! Would not a modern psychologist be rather gravely concerned over the prob-able I.Q. of James and John, who were obtuse enough to hope for an earthly kingdom from a carpenter's Son? What would a present-day psychiatrist think of the apparent emotional instability of Peter who in one exultant outburst cried out, "Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God," and then, not so long afterwards, muttered mis-erably to an illiterate barmaid, "I know not the Man"? But Christ knew what patient training could accomplish with His novices, and ¯ He took them for what they were Worth and in spite of their weak- ~esses. In conclusion, may I ask what one of us in religion would like to feel that a Mission a~ssigned or an employment given was in any way the result of tests administered perhaps years ago in one's novitiate days? What infinitely greater security there would be in knowing that an obedience had been given after a provincial or Other superior had knelt humbly before Christ in the tabernacle and with a fervent, heartfelt "Veni, Sancte Spiritus'" begged for guidance in placing her subjects. The religious then accepts her charge, whatever it may be, knowing it to be sanctified by obedience, fortified by faith, and ulti-mately made the "sweet yoke" and "burden light" because of that burning love for her Divine Bridegroom which had made it possible for her to "leave all things and follow Him." --SISTER MARY OF ST. GERTRUDE, R.G.S. 269 .uesE ons and Answers 35 Is it possible to gain ~he "tofies quoties" indulgence for the Poor Souls on November 2nd in a prlvafe chapel in which Mass is said daily but which is usedoonly by religious? This chapel is part of parish church It will be' well to explain the meaning of private oratory before answering our question. Before the Code of Canon Law was pro-mulgated in 1917, it was customary tocall the ordinary chapels of religious communities either domestic chapels or private chapels. Now the Code defines a private o'r domestic chapel ~s one erected in a pri-vate house in favor of a family or private lay person; whereas the chapel erected for the benefit of a community or group of the faithful is called a semi-public chapel. Of higher rank are public chapels and churches (see canon 1188). Generally speaking, the chapels in reli-gious communities are semi-public chapels. The officiai book on indulgences, Preces et Pia Opera, states spe-cifically under No. 544 that the indulgences for the Poor Souls may be gained by the, faithful on November 2nd "as often as they visit a church or public oratory or (for those who may legitimately use it) a semi-public oratory." Again, in an introduction which explains some general prin-ciples about indulgences, this same official text states under No. 4 that when a visit to a church is required it may be made "to a church, or to a public chapel, or (for those having the legitimate use of it according to canon 929) to a semi-public oratory." Religious, the.refore, may, make all "required~ visits t~ a church" in their own chapels according to the conditions laid down in canon 929: "The faithful of either sex who, for the pursuit of religious per-fection, or' for education, or for health's sake, live a common life in houses established with the consent of. the ordinaries, but which have no church or public chapel [of their own], and likewise all persons ¯ who live in the same place for the purpose of ministering to them, whenever a visit to any unspecified church or public oratory is pre- ~ scribed for gaining irli:lulgences, may m'ake the visit in :the~h~pel of their own house where they can legitimately satisfy the obligation of hearing Mass, provided that they duly perform the other works prescribed." 270 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS We may, therefgre, conclude that religious who legitimately enjoy the benefit of a semi-public chapel, may make whatever visits are required for gaining indulgences in their own chapel, even though there is a parish church nearby, provided that it is not required that a determined church be visited. If a specit~c church or public oratory is prescribed for the visit, then it cannot be made in the community chapel but must be made ifi the church or public chapel specified. m3b--. We have fwd years 'of novitiate. The reception is held on August !2th, and two years later, on the same date, the novices take their vows. Is this in accordance with canon law, or should the vows be fa~en on the 13th of August after the completion of the two years of novitiate? Canon 555, § 2 tells us that if the constitutions prescribe more than a year for the novitiate, the extra time is not required for valid-ity unless the same constitutions expressly declare otherwise. There-fore, unless your constitutions expressly declare t~at the second year of novitiate is required t~or oalidit~t of the subsequent vows, you need have no worries about the past. As for the future, it is a probable opinion, which may be fol-lowed in practice, that, if the constitutions prescribe two years of novitiate but do not expressly require the second year for validity, the profession of t.emporary vows may be validly and licitly made on the same calendar day on which the habit was received or the novi-tiate begun (See Larraona, Commentarium pro Religiosis, 1942, p. 16, note 973; Schaefer, De Religiosis, ed. 4, 1947, p. 513, n. 906). Hence you many continue your. practice of having the reception on August 12th and of allowing the novices to take their vows two years later on August 12th. According to our constitutions, to be elected superior general the candidate must obtain half the votes plus one. We have been following 3ardi's system of voffn9 (El Derecho de las Religlosas, Vich, 1927, articles 2:~0-242), namely, the name of the candidate is written in the cen-ter of the ballot. The ballot is then signed by the voter at the bottom: and the signature sealed. In case a candidate receives exactly one vote more than half, all the ballots in his favor are opened and the signatures examined in order to make certain that the candidate has not voted for h~mself'thus~ making the election null and vold. This method of procedure 271 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS Reoieto for Religious has .been severely criticized as being contrary to the spirit of the law, if not contrary to the letter. Please give us your opinion in thematter. The manner of election suggested by Father Jardi, which you follow, is the manner prescribed by Pope Pius X for the election the Holy Father by the cardinals. There is one difference, however, to which Father Jardi obviously did not advert. In the papal elec-tion, each cardinal, after signing and sealing his name at the bottom of the ballot, put on theoutside of the sealed part a secret symbol (three numbers, three letter~, a drawn image, etc.) which is known to him, to the presiding officer, ~nd to the scrutators alone. Then in case a cardinal received exactly two-thirds of the votes, his personal oote alone would be opened to make sure that he had not voted for himself. It was not necessary to open all the votes of all those who voted for him, since his vote was recognized by his cryptic symbol. It would certainly be contrary to the spirit of the canons of the Code regarding elections to open all the ballots of those who voted for a candidate in order to find out whether the candidate had voted for himself, since to do so would embarrass at least half of the voters. I do not think that it wc.uld make the election invalid, becausethe informaticn is given to those who are bound to secrecy. As a matter of fact, in a recent constitution of December 8, 1944, Pope Pius XII revised the method of electing a pope, especially the r~oi~t in ~,uestion. A vote of two-thirds of the ballots plus one is now required for a valid election; and the cardinals are no longer obliged to sign their ballots, since this provision makes it unnecessary to inquire whether the person elected voted for himself or not. In conclusion I would suggest that you change your constitutions by dropping the obliga~.ion of .having the members of the chapter sign their ballots, annd by requiring that the candidate must obtain two votes more than half the ballots cast. In this way it will always be certain that the candidate received at least one more than half the votes, even though he voted for himself. These changes will have to be approved by the Holy See, if your congregation has papal approval; or by all the bishops in whose territory you hav~ houses, if you are a diocesan congregation. .38 when it is found necessary to change some of the "legal articles" in the constitutions of a religious community, does that give the liberty fo 272 September, 1949 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS make changes in the prayers and other spiritual articles confMned in the same consfifutions? Some think that it does; others maintain that the original constitutions should be adhered to as much as possible. When the Code of Canon Law was promulgated in 1917, it became necessary for all religious institutes to revise their constitu-tions to bring them into conformity with the new laws of the Church. I.suppose that is what our questioner refers to when he speaks of "legal articles." As a matter of fact, the Sacred Congrega-tion of Religious issued a declaration on October 26, 1921, stating that "the text of the constitutions is to be amended only in those things in which the constitutions are opposed to the Code; or, if it is a case of deficiency, additions may be nhade; and as far aspossible the words of the Code itself are to be used." The same declaration, how-ever, made allowance for other changes also, provided that "the pro-posed changes have been discussed and approved by the General Chapter." In the new Normae (A.A.S. 13-317), which the Sacred Congre-gation has drawn up for itself as a guide in the approval of new constitutions, it recommends that all formularies of prayers as well as longer ascetical instructions, spiritual exhortations, and mystical considerations be put into the directory or some other such ascetical book, "since the constitutions shduld contain only the constitutive laws of a congregation as well as the directive laws of the actions of the community, whether those pertaining to government, or those pertaining to discipline and the norm of life." This does not mean that all ascetical articles are to be excluded, because the Normae state explicitly that "brief statements regarding the spiritual and religious life are opportune" in the constitutions. To answer our question: For all changes in the constitutions of a religious institute: the permission of the Holy See is required in the case of a pontifical institute; that of all the bishops in whose diocese the institute has houses in the case of a diocesan institute. These changes should be discussed and voted upon in a general chapter before being submitted to the proper authority for approval. The mind of the Church is that the constitutions of religious institutes should not contain formularies, such as prayers, daily order, and so forth. These should be put into the custom book or director3~, or some such similar book. 273 BOOK REVIEWS Religious Does the chaplain have the r;cjht fo say the funeral Mass and hold the exequles for a deceased religlous Sister of the house where he is chaplain? The common opinion, both before and after the Code, held tha~ nuns ("rnoniales") were exempt from parochial jurisdiction; hence, before the Code the chaplain alone had all the parochial powers in their behalf; but after the Code these powers were divided between the chaplain and the confessor (see canons 514, § 2 and 1230, § 5). In the case of nuns not exempt from the local o~din, ary's jurisdic-tion, the chaplain's powers under canon 1230, § 5 were questioned: but the Code Commission, on January 31, 1942, decided that even in this case the right to conduct the funeral of the nuns belonged to the chaplain, and not to the parish priest. Other lay religious (Sisters---not nuns)are subject to canon 1230, § 1, that is, the pastor has the right to conduct their funerals unless the local ordinary has granted the community exemption from the jurisdiction of the pastor in conformity with canon 464, § 2. In this latter case the chaplain, not the pastor, has the right to conduct the funerals of the members of the community. took Reviews THE LITTLE OFFICE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. By a Master of Novices. Pp. x -}- 431. The Newman Press, Westminster, Maryland, 1948. $3.50. Priests, religious, and laity alike will welcome this new edition of The Little ONce of the Blessed Virgin. In this ~-olume is contained an explanation of the origin and history of the Office, a chapter on attention and intention, and one on the rubrics. This latter chapter is especially helpful in solving the difficulties that may arise in the recitation of the Office. The procedure to be followed for each of the hours is carefully outlined in detail. Following these introductory chapters, the Office itself follows. On one side of the page the Latin text is given, and parallel to that on the opposite page is an English translation. Directions are given at the beginning of each hour. It is to be regretted that in making this new edition the publishers did not avail themselves of the new approved translation of the Psalms and that the Pater, Ave, and 274 September, 1949 BOOK REVIEWS Credo in Latin were omitted. Surely everyone knows the English version of these prayers; but for those who are required to recite the Office in Latin, the Latin version is essential. One of the finest parts of the.book is the commentary that fol-lows the Office proper. The greater part of the commentary is taken from the Mirror of Ot~r L'adg. This commentary not only sup-plies an explanation of the prayers of the Little Office, but also provides excellent topics for contemplation. It is full, complete, beautiful, and reverent. Explanations in praise of the Blessed .Vir-gin by the great St. Bernard and many of the other outstanding saints are interspersed throughout the commentary. Finally, in an appendix, is given the Office of the Dead, and also the new Office for November 2. This little book is certainly to be recommended to those religious who must recite the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin according to rule. It will certainly help one to acquire a deeper understanding of the Office, and lead to greater reverence and devotion. -~L. 3ANSEN, S.J. THE VEIL UPON THE HEART. By George Byrne, S.d. Pp. viii -f- 103. The Newman Bookshop, Westminster, Maryland, 1947. $2.25. This booklet of essays on prayer from the penetrating pen of an Irish ,lesuit will be read with relish by saint as well as by sinner. Scripture texts worn from use take on a newness that only a man of prayer can put into them, for example: "There is no better commen-tary on the nature of prayer and its efficacy than the meeting of the virgin disciple and the impure woman in a supreme act of divine faith: 'T

Issue 3.2 of the Review for Religious, 1944. ; :Review,fo¯ r R e h g o u s" MARCH 15, 1944 ,; ~' ~"The Worst of Sinners" . Ar, nold J. Benedeff~' ~ 7 B~beuf on Missionary Vocations . Augustine Klaas - Your PredominantXendency ~ "Pafrlck M. Regan . ~-Su, cjge.~hon from the Fec÷Ory . . . John E~ CQogan~ ':The 'Badder,' the Better" . . ." . . . G_. Aucjusfin~e Ellard Concern|ng, Vocat|ons . The Editors Book Reviews Ouestlons 'Answered Decisions 5f the Holy See. krOLUME III NUMBER :~.VOLUbIE III MARCH 15, 1.94.4 NUMBER 2' Im CONTENTS ON BF.ING "THE WORST OF SINNERS"--Arnold J. Benedetto, S.J. 73 BRI~BEUF ON" MISSIONARY VOCA,TIONSmAugustine Klaas, S.~1. 80 OUR CONTRIBUTORS . , . 93 WHAT IS YOUR PREDOMINANT. TENDENCY?m Patrick M. Regan,,S.d . 94 A SUGGESTION FROM THE FACTORYmJohn E. Coogan, S.3. 103 D~CISIONS OF THE HOLY SEE OF INT,EREST TO RELIGIOUS111 "THE 'SADDER,' THE BETTER" G. Augustine Ellard. S.d. 112 BOOKLET NOTICES . ~24 CONCERNING VOCATIONS The Editors . 125 WANTED: LETTERS ON RETREATS! . 128 TRY' ITH S IN YOUR EXAMEN!~RIchard L. Rooney, S.J .:. .,,1,29 WH0'IS SAINT JOS.EPH?Wililam Stritch, S.J .1.3.0 BOOK REVIEWS (Edited by Clement DeMuth, S.J.)-- Aids to Will Training in Christian Education: Instructions~ on Chris-tian Doctrine: St. Theodore of C~nterbury; Thirty Years with Christ:' White Fire: The Spiritual Conferences of St. Francis de Sales; From a - Morning Prayer; The Path of Love; Latin Gra~nrnar; Know Yourself; .The Text ,of the Spiritual Exercises: History of the Third Order of St. Francis of Penance and Charity; Mother Immaculata of Jesus BOOKS RECEIVED . 131 139o QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS~ 10. Jurisdiction of Ordinary Confessor . 140 11., Mass Stipends and Poverty .° . 140 12. 'Permission to Give Away an Inheritance .: ¯ ¯ 141 13. Appointing an Administrator, and Making a Will 141 14. Blood Relatives in Same Community . 141~ 15. Lace V'eil for Tabernacle ." . ~. ¯ 142 16. Number and Quality of Candles for Benediction . 142 1~7. 'Place f¯or the Christmas Crib . 143 , . 18. Duration of Office for Local Superior .143 19. Sacristan Should Wash Chalice and Ciborium -. . 20~. Frequency o~ Cofi~ession o~ Devotion . 144 REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS. March, 1944 Vo[. lII. No. 2. Published bi-monthly: January, March, May, July, September. and November at the College Press, 606 Harrison Street, Topeka, Kansas, by St. Mary's College, St. Marys, Kansas, with ecclesiastical approbation. Entered as second class matter. January 15, 1942. at the Post Office, Topeka, Kansas, under the act of March 3. 1879. Editorial Board: Adam C. Ellis, S.3., G. Augustine Ellard. S.J., Gerald Kelly, S.J. Copyright, 1944, by .Adam C. Ellis: Permission is hereby granted for quotations of/reasonable length, provided due credit be given this review and the author.,. Subsc.ription price: 2 dollars a year. Printed in U. S. A. Before writing to us, please consult notice on inside back cover, ¯On Being "The ~X/Orst ot: Sinners" Arnold J. Benedetto, S.J. N ANYONE;S list of "Perplexing Sayings of the Saints'" there is likely to be found a host of statements in which the greatest of saints profess themselves to be the "worst bf sinners." Now, since self-knowledge is a presupposi-tion for progress in the spiritual life, how can such self-deception .exist in. those who supposedly are far advanced? Or, since humility is based on truth--some saints consider the wo~ds synonymous~--how can we,. without doing violence to our intelligence, consider as examples of humil-ity those whose statements wandered, as it seems, so far from the realms of rigid fact? After all, there is no separate code of morality for the saints. Untruth is untruth. There can be only one "worst" among sinners, and no saint with .regard for truth can claim that he is that one. Of course, we can make allowances for the exaggera-tions of the 01d-style biggraphers of saints. Thei~ love of rhetoric and of paradox, their eagerness to cull from their heroes some "quotable quote", no matter how eccentric it appears when taken out of context--all this, rather than care and attention in making clear the saints' mentality and spirit, may account for some of the less attractive features one comes across in reading the lives of saints. But when all due allowance has been made, there still remains a goodly residue of strict biographical fact leading one to the unescapable ~onclusion that. many saints really did feel themselves to be the least among men, the worst of all man-kind. Further, the Church--which canonizes neither untruths nor errors--seems to extol the humility of the saints precisely in these pa.radoxicaI statements of theirs. 73 ARNOLD J. BENEDETTO Review for Religious The prbblem becomes excruciatingly acute when we read certain books of spiritual guidance and discover to our horror that toe, we o.urselves, are expected to believe, in all humility arid truth, that we, too, are inferior to all other men and more ~inful than all others. We all feel more or ~less willing to accept hi~mbly our place in the universe, but with all the goodwill in the world we fail to see how the proper place for every man is below his neighbor and how each and every person can be a greater sinner than every other person. One" should avoid making even "pious" errors of judgment. Perhaps No Comparison Is Meant One. possible solution of how a saint could ihave said, "I am the worst of sinners," is that the saint was not really making.a rigid comparison with others, bu~ was thinking simply and solely about himself. Thus, the sentenqe prac-tically means, "I am a very great sinner." If theoriginal statement can be reduced to these terms ~:hen we are to c~n-sider the sain~ as completely ignoring the sins of others and as concentrating only upon his own faults. The saints know God much better than others do, they realize more deeply the tremendous value of His gifts, they are more aware of His helping graces. As a result, they are in a bet-ter position to. see the wickedr~ess, the ingratitude, of sin. They contrast th~ boundless sanctity of God with the insufferable wilifulness of the puny man who refuses to admit his dependence on God. Even the least sin is an abomination in the sight of the Lord. Overwhelmed at the thougl~t of~having chosen any finite good rather than the v.ery great, nay, the infinite Good, the saint cries out that he is a very great sinner. A Shift in the Terms of Comparison A very common interpretation given to this difficult 74 March, 1944 ON BEING ~'THE WORST OF SINNERS" saying is that when the saint claims to be the worst of sin-ners he is comparing what he has of himself with what his neighbor has from God. This means either that the saint is comparing his own natural gifts with others' super-natural gifts, or else is comparing his own sins with his neighbors' good acts. In either case, certainly, such a com-parison justifies the conclusion, "I am worse than all oth- .ers." With this interpretation it isquite easy to see how anyone can claim that he is the worst of sinners, for the things that are being compared are no longer on the same plane. Obviously the supernatural is better than the natural, obviously sin is worse than virtue. Such a Simptiste explanation, with its shift in the terms compared, may appear irrational. What it really amounts to is just a clever--some may think, ineptMway of sa)~ing that sin itself is irrational.~ It implies that a certain minimum degree of humility is required if we 'are to avoid sin. At any rate, such an explanation is given by many iearned theologians. It is mentioned by St. Thomas in the Summa Theologica (2-2, q. 161, a.3). Four-Fold Ignorance Some of thesaints, however, when they assert that they are worse than their neighbor, very plainly do not mean that this is so only when comparison is made between what is of God in their neighbor with what is of man in them-selves. .They mean that their own character, apart from the gifts which God has given them, is much more vile than is their neighbor's character considered, likewise, apart from his supernatural gifts. St. Francis of Assisi (one of the most ardent devotees of the policy of. self-depreciation) explains himself thus: "I feel that I am the worst of sin-. nets, for if God had shown such mercy to a criminal hs He has shown to me, that criminal would be ten tim~s holier 75 ~RNOLD d. BENEDETTO Review for Religious than I am.-" St. Francis dearly suggests that the natural dispositions of the criminal are superior to his own. The explanatioh, however, is not.altogether satisfac-tory. Only God knows with certainty the natural dispo-sitions ofeach man. Because of our ignorance of these dispositions of others, arid because we do not know what hidden gifts God may have given others, we cannot claim to .be better than our neighbor. But neither are we strictly justified in asserting that we are worse than he. We may conjecture that we are worse, we may say that possibly we are worse. We cannot claim absolutely to be worse. Similar to our two-fold ignorande regarding the state of our neighbor is our. ignorance regarding our own present and, especially, our own future state. "Man knoweth not whether he be worthy of love or hatred" (Eccles. 9: 1):. .Quite possibly many~ persons who at present are leading holy lives will not.persevere in such a state. God sees the final disposition of their souls and in His sight they very . definitely are great sinners. Experiential Knowledge The solution that we offer as the final one really includes the other solutions," namely, the comparisons and ¯ the four-fold ignorance. But, presupposing those solu-tions, this final solution brings us more deeply into the .psychology of' the sai.nts. It tries to show not 0nly that, ~with certain limitations and qualifications, there is some .objective.truth in .the statement of the saints, "I am wo. r.se than everybody else," but also to give an account of bow the saints actually, within themselves, could feet Sincerely and intensely that they were the most wretched of sinners. The saints did, indeed, have some knowledge of the limitations of others (though they generally ignored that) ; but of their own unworthiness they had an intense:inner 76 ¯ March, 19 4 4 ON BEING ""~HE WORST OF SINNERS" experiential knowledge. The sins and deficiencies of others they knew by observation, :inference, or. hearsay. But knowledge by actual personal experience is more impres-sive and compelling than any other. Whatever might be said of others, they felt, and felt most keenly, that their themselves were guilty. Whatever arguments pro and con one might bring forward juridically regarding the malice .of others, the saints had actual and direct consciousness of their own wickedness. Seeing their own sins and imper-fections in the sigh.t of God, the horror that rose up in their consciousnbss was just as vivid an experience as an attack of acute indigestion. They may have had painful encoun-ters in.the pas.t, when brought face to face with the malice of their sins; this present experiencing, this tremendous illumination laying bare their utter nothingness and worse-than- nothingness, together with the consequent revulsion of a pure, ardent, and sincere soul, this present experience impresses them mdre vividly than any recollection of:past experiences. "Let others claim that they have had o? are having painful experiences when they recounf their sins within themselves--but really they could hardly be suf-fering as I am. My sins must be the worst p6ssible sins. Never could anyone offend the good God as I have." With reference to their very real, present experiential knowledge they are truly the worst of sinners. These "hard sayings", of the saints thus-contain not absolute truth but relative truth--relative, that is, to the source of knowledge. Having this intense experiential knowledge of their own sins, and l~nowing the sins of their neighbor only by observation or conjecture, the saints based their practical conclusion on the evidence of the inner experience and affirmed that they were worse than their neighbor. With reference to the particular type of evidence which alonethey ar.e considering, they are worse than their 77 ARNOLD ~, BENEDETTO neighbor. Another situation in which,~ similarly, the prac-tical,, working truth is different from the theoretical, abstract truth is the case in which a judge knows, as a pri-vate citizen, that the defendant is guilty but, with refer-ence only to the legal evidence at hand, he must, in his o~.- cial capacity, pronounce the judgment that the defendant is not guilty. One may prefer the following example: If a very brigh~ light is focused upon some particular object and one fixes his gaze for a'long while on the object, then that object ~ill be very. cons~picuous, While objects on either side of it will scarcely be noticed; they will be in. the dark, or, at most, in the penumbra surrounding the illuminated object. Ohio's judgment based on what one sees in the light will be much more accurate and detailed than any judgment made coficerning the unilluminated objects. By their inner experiential knowle~lge the saints become acutely aware of their own littleness and of the infinite contrast between even their leastmoral defect and the wondrous sanctity of God. In the light of this knowledge the saints focus their attention on their own defects and at the same time lose sightof, or but dimly notice, their own good qual'ities and thi~defects and gross sins of their neighbor: According to this light they are worse than their neighbor. The Dominican beatus, Venturino da Bergamo, explains that. the intense feeling and percep.tion of one's own defects may be compared to. the suffering of a tooth-ache. The stifferer feels that he is enduring more pain than anyone else; not that he sees in the light of reason that his pain is greater, but that his.own pain is closez tohim than is that of another. And even if he should know intellec-tually that somebody else has an equally bad or a worse toothache, it is still very true that he experiences and his own, not that of the other person. ,Judging on this 78 o ! March, 1944 ON BEING "'THE WORST OF SINNERS" basis, and relatively to this limited criterion, ~ae could say, "My toothache is the worst," "My toothache feels worse." " Conclusion To account for the unusually'intense pain which the saints feel at the consciousness of their, sins and for the' apparent ease with which they become thoroughly con-vinced that they are the greatest sinners in the world, Father de Guibert1 suggests that these great saints receive a very special divine illumination regarding their own sins, that this illumination is of the same order as the higliest degrees.of infused contemplation. We believe, however, that it is also within the power, of each human being to arrive--with less facility and with a less degree of conviction, it is true, than that of the specially enlightened saints--at the. conclusion, that he is the &orst sinner in th~ world. And many saints and spir-itual writers exhort us to judge in this fashion of ourselves. Pride is one of our worst enemies. It is very deep-rooted. J(ny consideration having in itself some real degree, of truth and helping to make us more humble should be wel-comed. It is humbling to consider oneself the worst of sinners. Possibly We shall be aided in forming this judg-ment by making use of the explanations given in the course of this article, namely, by contrasting our natural endow-ments with our neighbor's supernatural ones, by main-._~ "taining the prudent, doubts and suspense caused by our ignorance regarding our neighbor and ourself, and,. espe-cially, by basing our judgment on the evidence or objective truth furnished us by our experiential knowledge of our own faults as opposed to our unfelt knowledge of the sins of others. 1J.de Guibert, S.J. : l~tudes de Th~ologie Mgstique. Toulouse: l~ditions de la Revue ¯ d'Asc~tiqu~ et de Mystique;, 1930. pp. 283-298. :Br beut: on ¯ Missionary Vocal:ions Augustine K!aas, S.J. ON JULY 16, 1636, Father dean de Br~beuf wrote a lengthy " report to his religious superior, Father Paul Le deune, on the. state of .his mission among .the Huron savages, to the east of what is nov,; Lake Huron. The document contains' some fascinating chapters, illustrating what might be called the iomance of the mis-sions. In chh~ter three, however, by way of interlude, the heroic missionary decides to give a timely Word of advice to those in Fiance, .presumably his younger religious brethren, who are ardently longing tpou ngc6h oens' t.'h.e .w floireenig hne m teilslssi oonfs t hoef Nhaerwd sFhriapnsc, et.r iHmes d, oaensd n soutf "feprui.lnl ghsi so(f missionary life, but neither does he omit the ompensatio.ns and con-solations of that aposl~olate. In these lines Br~beuf seems to be giving us the proper technique in dealing with a vocation to the mis-sions. It is' this:~ don't overemphasize the romance, but tell the truth, the whole truth, the bitter along with the sweet, of. the call to the foreign missions. Incidentally, the cbapte~ also reveals the saint's.own virile spir-ituality-- his love of God, his life of prayer, suffering, and apostolic" zeal. Nor is 1-iis human side left out~ He was forty-three when he wrote it. Thirteen years later, tow~irds four o'clock on the after-noon of Tuesday, March 16, 1649, amid dreadful torments, dean de Br~beuf would die manfully the martyr's death for which his whole missionary life was a conscious preparation. BRI~BEUF'S ADVICE TO PROSPECTIVE MISSIONARIES1 We have learned that the salvation of so many innocent ,souls, washed and made white in the Blood of the Son of God is stirring very deeply the hearts of many, and is excit-ingin themnew desires to leave Old France in order to come 1The original French of this chapter appears in The Jesuit Relations, edited by R. G. Thwaites, V, ol. 10, pp. 86-115. I have added ~hereferences to the ~Scripture texts, which in the, original are quoted freely and.in Latin. Except for the added captiofis and a few changes in paragraphing, the document is presented intact. ¯ BRI~BEUF ON MISSIONARY VOCATIONS. to the New. God be forever blessed, who thus shows us that He has finally ope.ned to these tribes the bowels of His infinite mercy. I do not wish to chill the ardor of~-this gen-erous resolve. Alas! it is these very hearts according ,to God's own Heart whom we are expecting. I wish only to give them a word of advice. It is true that "love is strong as death" (Canticles 8:(5). The love of God has power to do what death does, that is, to detach us entirely, from creatures and from ourselves. Nevertheless, these desires that we feel .of working for the salvation of infidels are not always sure signs of that pure love. Sometimes there may be present a little self-love and Self-seeking, if we look only at the blessing and s~atisfaction there is in putting souls in heaven, without duly conlcider-ing the sufferings, labors~ and di~culties, inseparable from these evangelical works. Dit~cult Journe~t " Wherefore, that no one may be deceived on this point, "I will show him how much he musi suffer here for the name of Jesus" (cf. Acts 9: 16). True, the t.wo who came last, Fathers Mercier and Pijart, did not have as much hard-ship on their journey as we who came up the year before. They did not paddle; their men were not sick, as ours were; the.y did not have to carry heavy loads. Still, no matter how easy the trip with the savages may be, there is always enough to greatlydiscourage a heart not.well mortified. The readiness of the savages does not shorten the road, nor smooth bver the rocks, nor remove dangers. No matter with whom you may be, you must expect to be at the very least three or four weeks on the way, to have as compan-ions persons you have never seen before, and to be cramped rather Uncomfortably in a bark canoe, with no freedom to turn this way or that, in peril fifty times a day of being 81 AUGUSTINE KLAAS Revieu~ [oc Religious upset or dashed upon the rocks. During the day the sun scorches you; at night you are likely to be a prey to mos-quitoes. You sometimes ascend five or six rapids a day, and in the evening you have for refreshment only a little corn crushed between two stones and cooked with ycery clear water. Your bed is the ground and often rough, uneven rocks. There is no shelter but the stars. And with all this--perpetual silence. If you are accidentally hurt, or if you fall sick, do not expect any help from these barbar-ians; for .whence could they get it? And if the sickness is dangerous and you are far from the villages, which are very scattered, I should not guarantee that they would not abandon y6u, if you could not follow them unassisted. When you reach the Hurons you will indeed find hearts full of charity: We will receive you with open arms as an angel from paradise; we will have all the good will in the world to do you good, but we are almost powerless to do it. We will receive you "in a hut so miserabIe that I do not think there is in France any by comparison so wretched that I might say: "That is how you will be lodged." ~Harassed and .tired as you will .be, we can give you only a poor mat, or at most a skin for your bed. And besides, you will arrive at a season ' when miserable little insects, which We call taoul~ac here, but "fleas" in straight French, will keep you for almost entire nights from dosing your eyes, for in these parts they are incomparably more bothersome than in France. The dust of the cabin breeds them; the sa3~ages bring them to us; w.e get them in their dwellings. And this petty martyrdom, not to speak of.mosquitoes, sandflies, ahd other like. vermin, continues usually through the three or four summer months. Instead of being the great professor and learned .tl~eo-logian y6u were in France, you must reckon on being here a humble little school-boy, and, good God! .with. what 82 March, 1944 BRI~BEUF ON MISSIONARY VOCATIONS teachers!--women, small children, 'and all the savages-- and exposed to their laughter! The Huron language will be your .Saint Thomas and your Aristotle.; and clever man that you are, and glib speaker among learned and talented persons, you must make up your mind to be for a long time mute among these barbarians. You will have achieved much if, after a considerable time, you begin to stammer a little. Trials and Dangers oI Mission Life And then, how do you think you are going to spend the ¯ winter here? Having h~ard of all that is endured in winter-ing among the Montagnets savages, I can say that it is almost the li~e we lead here among the Hurons. I say it without exaggeration: the five or six months of winter are spent amid almost.continual discomforts~xtreme co!d, . smoke, and the importunity of the savages. We have a cabin built of simple bark, but so well jointed that we have to go outside to learn what the weather is. Th~ smoke is very often so thick, so acrid, and so persistent that, for five or six days at a time, if you are not entirely used to it, about all you can do is to make out a few lines in your breviary. Besides, from morning until night, our fireplace is almost always beset with savages---~:ertainly, they sel-dom fail to be there at mealtimes. If yOu happen to have anything more than usual, no matter how little it may be, youmust reckon on most.of these gentlemen as your guests; if you do not share it with them, you will be considered mean.As regards tl4e food, it is not so bad, though we usually content ourselves with a little corn, a piece of dried smoked fish, and some'fruits, about which I shall speak further on. Up to now we have considered only the roses. As we have Christians in almost all the villages, we must count 83 AUGUSTINE KLAAS on making the rounds of them at all seasons of the year and of remaining there, according to necessity, for two or three whole weeks, amid indescribable hardships. -Add to. all this, our lives~depend upon a. single thread. If, wherever we are in the world, we are to expect death every hour and to be always prepared for it, this is particularly the case here. For, not to mention that your cabin is like straw and, despite all your care to prevent accidents, may catch fire at any moment, the malice of the savages gives, you cause for constant fear on this point. A malcontent may burn you down or split your head open in some lonely spot. Then, too, you are responsible with your life .for the sterility or fecundity of the earth, You are the cause of droughts. If y6u cannot make it rain,, they talk of nothing less than doing away with you. Moreover, I need only mention the danger there is from our enemies. Suffice it to say that, on the thirteenth of this last month of 3une, they killed twe!vi~ of our Hurons near the village ofContarrea, only a day's journey from us. A short time before, at four leagues from our village, some Iroquois were discovered in the fields in ambush, onl~r .waiting to strike a death-blow at some passer-by. This nation is very timid; they take no precautions; they are not careful to prepare arms or to inclose their villages .with pali-sades. Their usual recourse, e.specially when the en.emy is strong, is flight. Amid these alarms, which affect the whole country, I leave you to imagine if we have any grounds for security. However, if wehad here the exterior, attractions of piety, as in France, all this might still be put up with: In France the large number and the good example-of Chris-tians, the solemnity of the feasts, and the majesty of the ~churches so exquisitely adorned, all preach piety to you. And in our houses, the fervor of our brethren, their mod- 8~ March, 1944 BRgZBEUF ON MISSIONARY VOCATIONS esty, and the noble virtues that shine forth in all their actions--the~e are so many powerful voices which cease-lessly cry out to .you: "Look, and do thou also in like man-ner" (cf. Luke 10:37). You have the consolation of saying Holy Mass every day. In a word, you are almost beyond the danger of falling--at, least the falls are insig-nificant and you have help immediately at hand. Here we have nothing., it seems, which invites to good; ¯ we are among peoples who are astonished when you speak to them of God and who often have only horrible blas-phe~ nies in their mouths. Frequently you will be com-pelled to deprive yourself of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass: and, when you have the chance to say Mass, a little corner in your cabin will be your chapel, and even if you had the means, the smoke, the snow, and the rain would hinder you from decorating and embellishing.it. I pass o_.v.er the little opportunity for privacy there is among barbarians, who almost never leave you alone and who hardly know what it is to speak quietly. Above all, i do not dare to speak of the danger there is of ruining oneself among their impurities, in th~ case of any one whose heart is not suffi-ciently full of God to firmly repel this poison. But enough of this; the rest can be known only by experience. "But is that all?" some one will say. "Do you think that by your arguments you haVe thrown water on the fire which consumes me, and hhve lessened ever so little the zeal I have for the conversion of these nations? I say that these things have served Only to confirm me the more in my vocation. I feel more affection than ever for New Frange. I bear a holy jealousy towards those Who are alr, eady 'enduring all these sufferings. All ~hese labors seem to me nothing, in comparison with what I should like to endure for God. If I knew a place under heaven where one could suffer yet more,:I would go there." ~ 85 AUGUSTINE KLAAS Reo~eu2 for "Reli#ious The Briofit Side Ah! whoever you are,.to whom God gives these senti- :ments and this light, come, come, my dear brother, it is workers such as you that we ask for here; it is to souls like yours that God has decreed the conquest of. so many others whom the devil holds even now in his power. Fear no hardships; there will be none for you, since your whole consolation is to see yourself crucified with the Son of God. Silence will be sweet to you, since you have learned to corn- ¯ mune with God and to converse in heaven with the saints and angels: The victuals would be insipid indeed, if the gall tasted by our Lord ,did not make them sweeter and more savory to you than the most delicious viands in thd world. What a satisfaction to ascend these rapids and to climb these rocks for him who has before his eyes that loving Savior, wracked with torments and ascending Cal-vary laden with His cross. The discomfort .of the canoe is very easy to endure for him who thinks of the Crucified. What a consolation--for I must use such language to please youmwhat a consolation, then, to see oneself even abandoned on the road by the savages, languishing with sickness, or .dying of hunger in the woods, and still being able" to say to God: "My God, it is to do Your holy will that I am-reduced to the condition in which You see me," and to consider above all. the God-man" dying on the cross and crying out to his Father: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?." (Matthew 27.:46). If God preserves you in health amid all these hardships, without a do.ubt you will arrive pleasantly in the Huron c~ountry with these holy. thoughts. "He sails pleasantly, whom the grace of God carries along." Now, as regards shelter, food, and bed--shall I dare to say to a hea'rt so generous and disdainful of all that I have. already said on this point, that, although we are hardly in '86 ,Marcia, 1944 BRI~BEUb ON MISSIONARY VOCATIONS a~better position than the kavages, still, in some unknown way, the Divine Goodness makes every difficult thing easy, and each and all of us find everything filmost the same as in France. The sleep we.get lying on our mats seems to us as" sweet as if we were in a goo~l bed; the native food does not disgust us, although there is scarcely any other seasoning than that which God has put into it. No~withstanding t-h~ cold of a six months' winter "spent in the shelter of a bark cabin, open to the daylight, we have.yet to' experience its evil effects; no one~ complains of his head or stomach; we do not know what diarrhea, colds, and catarrh mean. This ¯ leads me to say that delicate persons in France do not know bow to protect themselves from the cold. Those rooms so well carpeted, those doors so well fitted, and those windows closed so care.full);, serve only. to make its effects more keenly felt. It is an enemy from whom one wins almost more by proffering him one's hand than by waging a cruel" ~var against him. As for our food, I ~hall say this, that God has shown us clearly a very special providence: we have secured within a .week our pro.vision of corn for the whole year, without taking a ~ingle step beyond our cabin. Dried fish has been brought to us in such quantities that we are compelled to refuse some of it and to say that we have sufficient. You might say that God, seeing that we are here for His service, wishes~Himself to act as our provider, in order that we may labo.ronly for Him. This same Goodness takes care to give. us from time to time a change of provisions in the form of fresh fish. We areon the shore of a large lake, which affords as good fish as .I have ever seen or eaten in Frfince. It is true, however, aS I have mentioned, that we do not ordi-narily procure them, and still less do we get meat, which is even more rarely seen here. , Even fruits, in season, are not lacking to us, provided 87 AUGUSTINE KLAAS Reoiew [or Religious the year be somewhat factorable. Stra~cberries, raspberries, and blackberries are to be found in almost incredible quan-tities. We gather plentyof grapes, which are .fairly good; the squashes last sometimes four or five months, and they are so abundant that they are to be had almost for nothing, and .so good that, on being cooked in the ashes, they are eaten, as apples are in France. C0nsequently, totell the truth, as regards provisions, the change from France isnot very great. The only grain of the country is a sufficient nourishment, when one is somewhat accustomed to it. The savages prepare .it in more. than twenty ways and ye, t employ only fire and water; it is true that its best ~auce is - that contained in it. Spiritual Advant.ages As for the dangers Of the soul, .to speak frankly,-there are none'for him who brings to the Huron country the-fear and love of Godl On the contrary, I find here unequalled opportunities for acquiring perfection. Is it, no( a great deal to have in your food, clothing, and bed, no other. attraction than simple necessity? Is it not a glorious oppor-tunity to unite yourself with God, when there is at hand no creature whatever to which you can possibly become attached, and when the spiritual exercises you perform con-strain you without effort to inward meditation? Besides your spiritual exercises, you have no other task than the_ study of the language and conversation with the savages. Ab! h6w much pleasure there is for a heart devoted to God " to become the pupil of a savage and of a little child, in order to win them afterwards for God and make them disciples of our Lord! How willingly and liberally God commuiai- -rates Himself to a soul which practises out of love for Him these heroic acts of humility! The words he learns are so many treasures he amasses, so many spoils he carries off 88 March, 19 4 4 BRI~BEUF ON MISSIONARY VOCATIO,NS from the common enemy of the human race; so that he has /eason to say a hundred times'a day: "I will rejoice at thy ~vord.s, as one that hath found great spoil" (Psalms 118: 162). ,Viewed in this light, the visits of the s.avages,, h.owever frequent, cannot annoy him. God teaches him the beau-tiful lesson he once taught Saint Catherine of Sienna, to make of his heart a chamber and a temple for Him, where he will never fail t~o find Him, as often as he withdraws.to it. And if h~ encounters savages there, . they do not inter-fere with his prayers; they serve only to make them more. fervent, and from. this he takes occasion to present these poor wretches to His sovereign Goodness, and to beseech Him earnestly for their conversion. Certainly we have not. here that exterior solemnity which awakens and sustains devotion. We see only the sub-stance of our religion, the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar, to Whose marvels faith must open our eyes, aided by no sensible mark of Its grandeur, just as in the case .of the Magi in the stable. Nevertheless, it seems that God, supplying for what we lack. and recompensing us for the favor bestowed on us of carrying It, so to speak, beyond ~o many seas, and of finding a.place for It in these wretched cabins, wishes to confer the same blessings on us. which He is wont to confer on persecuted CatholiCs in heretical countries, These good people.scarcely ever see either a church or an alfar, but the little.they see is worth double what, they would see, were they entirely free. You can imagine what consolation there is in prostrating ourselves at times before a cross in the midst of this barbarism, and, engaged in our petty domestic tasks, in turning our eyes towards and entering into the place which the Son of God has been pleased to take in our little dwe!ling. Not to be separated from this Well-.Beloved of the nations, except by a little 89 AUGUSTINE KL'AAS Re(~iew for Reli~lious bark or tree branch, is it not to be in paradise day and night? "Behold he standeth behind our wall" (Canticles 2:9). "I sat down under his shadow, whom I desired': (Canticles 2:3). SQ much fo~. the interior. If we go outside our cabin, heaven is open to us, and those great buildings which lift their heads to the clouds in large cities, do not conceal it from our view; so that we can say our prayers with com-plete abandon in that grand oratory, which Saint Francis Xavier loved more than any other. With regard to ,the fundamental virtues,~ I will glory, no~ in myself, but in the lot which has fallen to me. Or if I must humbly acknowledge it at the foot of the cross, which our Lord in His grace gives us to carry after Him, certainly this country, or ~ourwork here, is much more suited to feed a soul with the fruits of heaven than with those of earth. I may be mistaken, but Ithink that there is here a spli~ndid means for advancing in faith, hope, and charity. Are we t0sow the seeds of the Faith here, and not ourselves profit by it? Could we put our trust in anyone but God in a region where,, on th~ human side, everything is lacking? Cbuld we want a fine~ opportunity to exercise charity than there is amid the roughness and discomfort of a new world, where no human aft'or industry has y~t pro- Vided any conveniences? is there a. better occasion for prac-tising charity .t'han by living here in order to bring back to God men who are so unlike men that we must live in daily expectation of dying by their hands, should the fancy take them, should a dream suggest it to them,.or should we fail to open or close the heavens at will, giving them rain or fine weather a~ command. Do they not make us responsible for the state of the weather? And if God does not inspire us. or if we cannot work miracles of faith, are we not con-tinua~ ly in danger of seeing them, as they have threatened 9O March, ~1944 BR~BEUF ON MISSIONARY VOCATIONS to do, fall upon us who have done no harm? Indeed, if He who is Truth itself had ~not declared that there is no greater love than to lay down one's life really and once for all for one's friends, I should deem it a thing equally nobl.e, or even more so, to do what the Apostle said to the Corinthians (I, 15:31): "I die dai.ly, I protest by. your glory, brethren, wh'ich I have in Christ, Jesus our Lord"-~-that is,-to d[ag out a miserable life amid the fre-quent and daily perils of an unforeseen death, which those whom you are trying to sa;ce will procure for you. I some-times call to mind what Saint Francis Xavier once wrote to Father Simon, and wish tl:iat it mhy please God so to act that at least the same may be said or written one day even of us, although we may not be worthy of it. Here are his words: "'Excellent news comes from the Motucbas, namely, dohn Beira and his companions are laboring amid the [Treat-est l~ardships and continual danger of death, to the great increase of the Christian religion.'" . About Chastity, in Particular There seems to be one thing here which might cause ¯ apprehension in a son of the Society, that is, to see himself in the midst of a brutal and sensual people, whose example, unless special precaution is taken, might tarnish the luster of the most and the least delicate of all the virtues--I mean chastity. Inorder to obviate this difficulty, I make bold to say that, if there is any place in the world where this virtue so precious is safe, for a man who wills tO be on his guard, it is here. "Unless the Lord keep the city, he watcheth in vain that keepeth it" .(Psalms 126: 1). "I knew that I could not otherwise be continent, except God gave it, and this also was a point of wisdom, to .know whose gift it was" (Wisdom 8:21 ). They say that the victories won by~ this .91 AUGUSTINE KLAAS ¯ Review I:O? ~Reli~tious daughter of heaven over her enemies are .won by flight. But I believe it is God and no one else.,who, in the most severe encounters, puts to flight this same enemy before those, who, fearing nothing so much as his approaches, go where His g!ory calls them, humbly and with hearts full of confidence in His goodness. And where are we to seek this glory of His? I should say, rather, where find it more purified and freed from our own interests than in a place where there is nothing to hope for other than the reward of ¯ having left all for the love of Him of whom Saint Paul said: "I know whom I have believed" (2 Timothy 1:12). You remember that plant called "the fear of God," with which it is said our Fathers at the beginning of our Society charmed away the spirit of impurity. ¯ It does not grow.in the land of the Hurons, but it falls her~ abundantly from Heax~en, if one is only a little careful to foster what he brings here Barbarism, ignorance, poverty, and misery, which ren-der the life of these savages more deplorable than death, are a constant reminder to us to mourn Adam's fall,, and to submit ourselves entirely to Him who, after so many cen, turies, still cbastizes disobedience in His children in so remarkable a way. Saint Theresa said once that she never made better meditations thi~n in those mysteries where she found our Lord apart and alone--as though she had been present in the Garden of. Olives--and she called this a sample of her simplicity. You may reckon this among my follies, if you like, but it seems to me that we have here go much the more leisure to caress, so to speak, and to enter-tain our Lord with open heart in the midst of these unin-habited lands, because there are so few people who trouble themselves about Him. -And on account of this favor we can say boldly "I will f~ar noevils, for thou art with me" (Psalms 22:4). 92 March, 1944 BR~BEUF ON MISSIONAR'/ VOCATIONS In short, I i.magine that all the guardian angels of these uncivilized and abandoned nations are continually endeav-oring and striving to save us from these dangers. They know well that if there is anything in the world that ought to give us ~¢ings to fly back whence we came both by obedi-ence and by our own inclination, it would be this misfor-tune, were we not shielded from it by the protection of 'heaven. This is what urges them to prqcure for us the means to guard, against it, that they may not lose the brightest hope they have ever had through the grace Of God, of the conversion of these peoples. I close this discourse and this chapter with the fol-lowing words. If at sight of the difficulties and crosses that are here prepared for us, some one feels himself so strengthened from above that he can say it is too little, or like Saint Francis Xavier "amplius, amplius" ("more, more"), I hope that our Lord, in the midst of the consola-tions which He will give him, will also. draw from his lips another admission, namely, that the consolation is too much for him and that he cannot endure more. "It is enough, Lord, it is enough." OUR CONTRIBUTORS ARNOLD J. BENEDETTO is a student of Theology at"St. Mary's College, St. Marys, Kansas. AUGUSTINE KLA^S, Professor of Sacramental Theology at St. Mary's. made special studi~s in Ascetical Theology. PATRICK M. REGAN, Pro-fessor of Apologetics at St. M~ry's, is the author of a previous article on Se_lf-knowledge. JOHN E. COOC~N, a professor at the University of Detroit, has written much on social questions, and will be remembered by our readers for his~ articles on Spiritual Direction. G. AUGUSTINE ELLARD will be remembered particularly for his very "original" article on Hygienic Mortification that appeared in the first number of this review. 93 What: Is Your Predominant:.Tendency? Patrick M. Regan, S.J.~ 441"='EW things better reveal a man than zealous and *"=| persistent efforts to decrease his handicap. That profound and ancient maxim 'know thyself' might be inscribed on the portal of every GoTf Club. He who would attain self-knowledge should frequent the links. If one seriously attempts the task, one will find oneself in golf." Thus writes Arnold Haultain in :his book, The M~jster~t of Golf. '~Know thyself; frequent the links: attempt the task seriously"--these might be styled the ascetical principles of golf. Religious will be quick to see that, routatis mutandis, these principles also express the asceticism of the spiritual life. "Know thyself" would not be out of place on the portal of the religious house. "Frequent the chapel" is excellent advice at all times. "Attempt )our task seriously" is always necessary for the follower of Christ. Such thoughts are a fitting prelude to the study of the predomi-nant tendency, which, in the language of the author cited, is our "handicap" in the spiritual life. In a former article ("Self-knowledge" in REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, II, 223), we stated: "Many spiritual writers maintain there is one evil tendency that predominates, bne at the root of most of our .defects and imperfections; that, if we work diligently at controlling this one, we need scarcely expe~id any time.or energy on the rest." The present article will furnish meth-ods and suggestions for determining this predominant tendency. According to many .spiritual writers, everyone is apt 94 WHAT IS YOUR PREDOMINANT TENDENCY?" to discover his predominant tendency among the seven prin- . cipal tendencies to evil, the capital sins, as they are called. Hence it will be helpful at the very outset to make a study of these tendencies, together with opposite virtuds. The following definitions and explanations will greatly clarify our ideas. Pride is ihe exaggerated esteem of self. The evils that spring from pride are: stubbornness, rebellion and independence manifested towards those over us: contempt, harshness and abuse towards tl~ose subject to us: conceit, touchiness, vanity, arrogance, impudence, boasting, striving to magnify one's own importance. Laudable pride is the esteem of one's dignil~y as being Wholly. due to God's free gift. "My soul magnifies the Lord and .my spirit rejoices in God my Savior" (Luke 1:46). Such pride is. ordinate, for joy at success is permissible provided it be so controlled that' it preserves the correct evaluation of self. Humility is a true estimate of s~lf, of talents possessed, together with acknowledgement of lack of talents. Through humility we recognize that we are creatures of God and hence subjec~ to Him; that our bad qualities counterbalance the good that is in us:. that many others surpass us in various accomplishments; that our .talert~s are G~d's free gift~ rather than our own achievement. Avar;ee (Covetousness).is the indulgence of d~slre forthings we may not possess in present circumstances, at least not Without sin or imperfection. Avaiice leads to: violations of .the vow o~ poverty, discontent, unhappiness, dullness of soul towards spiritual things. In a religious it often involves hankering for trifles to give to friends or to retain fo~: ond's own comfort. Conte.ntment is satisfaction with wl~at, we have or with being poor with Christ. Liberality is readiness to share with others, especially with Christ's poor. En~--bitterness towards those we judge superior to us in talents and advantages. It brings such evils as: dislike, hatred, malice; desire 't.o'deprive those we envy of their advantage or to, injure them. Like pride this tendency springs from the intellectual side of our nature. But whereas pride inflates self, giving a.sort of satisfaction, envy emphasizes shortcomings and lack of talent, making us miserable 95 PATRICK M. REGAN Ret~ieto for Religious with consuming bate. Religious are especially exposed to this tend-ency because they.observe a whole array of excellent, even brilliant, accompl!shments and achievements in their brethren. Beneuolence is good will towards othdrs by which we rejoi.ce over their success, or at least resist bitter feelings aroused by e.nvy. Anger is a hot, strong feeling against somebody or something that displeases us, driving us to destroy or injure them. Anger leads to quarreling, fighting, violence; also to hatred, revenge, and bitter talk against people aiad things; to ill-temper and disagreeableness. Gentleness (Meekness or Patience) controls angry feelings, deters from harshness, calmly endures what.displeases, thus conditioning the soul to restrain the burst of anger. Controlling an irascible nature had" much to do with sanctifying St. Andrew Bobola and has sanctified many another to a lesser degree. The same is necessary to sdme extent for ivory religious. Lusf is the desire for sexual pleasure, urging to indulgence not per.- mitred Us. Evils consequent on lust are: immodest thoughts, imagina- ¯ tions, and actions by oneself or with. others; also the tempting of others to the s~ime sin. Lust closes the mind to higher things, destroy-ing the attraction of spiritual realities. A word of warning is here in place. This tendency is so obtrusive, even when not extraordinarily stro.ng~ that one might easily be led to mistake it for the predominant tendency. Hence mature d~liberation is needed before anysuch con-clusion is re.ached. Chastity is control of the desire for sexual pleasure, avoiding every indulgence of it in thought, word, or deed contrary to God's plan in matters of sex. Religious by their vow of chastity have relinquished all right to marriage and its privileges. Hence absolute control of this appetite is obligatory on them in allcircumstances. "GluH'ony is excessive indulgence, of the pleasure of eating and drinking. Iri religious it usually assumes a milder form, ~uch as inor-dinate interest in food, over-anxiety about quantity/ and quality, crlticism of the meals and the cook, an ill-controlled appetite for cer-tain foods.' Excessive indulgence in food results in ill health, laziness, andsensuality. Excessive drinking is apt to lead to a strong.inclina-tion to lust, anger and quarreling. Both forms of gluttony are debasing and cause distaste for everything' worthy of man. Sobriety (Moderation, Temperance, Abstemiousness) consists in retricting one's food and drink to. the needs of health. For religious. 96 "March, "I 944 WHAT IS YOUR PREDOMINANT TENDENCY? some self-abnegation in food and drink is a matter of daily practice. $lo÷h (Laziness) is a slow, heavy habit of. body or mind, shrinking from effort and cultivating idle ease and comfort. Its'consequent evils are: neglect of duty, shirking the unpleasant and troublesome, listless-ness. Idleness leaves the mind open to evil thoughts and desires, and excites temptations to gluttony and lust.: Diligence (Industry) is an instant and constant"fidelity to duty, an eagerness for work. Religious, lacking ihe stern sanction, "work or starve,".can easily fail in dilig.ence, especially in spiritual exercises. Hence" for them. diligence involves zeal for God's glory and the salva-tion of souls. ~ Elimination - Though we may understand perfectly the nature 6f these various tendencies described above, the problem still remains; which one predominates in our souls? A check of the list just giv.en will show us immediately which tend-encies do not hold sway in our soul~. By this simple pro-cedure some individuals have succeeded in eliminating all but the ohe ruling tendency, ' though it must be confessed that this is rather the extraordinary occurrence. As a mat-ter of fact. though, almost invariably five Of the seven can be eliminated even With this cursory examination. There remains then the task of determining which of the remain-ing two predominates. For. approaching this latter ta.sk, let it be noted here, readines~ to face the issue honestly.is the necessary disposi-tion of soul. For that matter, the same disposition is also needed at every point along the way. Hard as it is to admit deordination in our souls, it is still harder to admita ruling ¯ evil inclination. To be good-naturedly indolent is not half as bad as being under the complete .dictatorship Of sloth~ So we incline to deceive ourselves that it is not as bad as painted, .or that it is something else not, quit.e so humiliating. -We even surrender to Satan, allowing him to take over andblind us with his deceits. Courage, there- 97 PATRICK M. REGAN Reoieto for Rel~giotts fore, and honesty, together with a strong resolve to see the task through to ~ finish, are necessary in this quest that leads to self-knowledge. So~trces We begin our quest right in the depths of .our' own souls. Our search is for an outstanding inordinate motive behind our actions. For example, the desire to impress others may ever and relentlessly drive us forward to the various objectives we pursue. On the other hand, the same motive-may sometimes retard us or stop us completely as threatened-frustration drives us to seek an avenue of i~scape. Thus. the deflation of our self-esteem may turn us aside altogether from a praise'~'orthy undertaking.~ It is quite possible for such a relentless drive to exercise considerable dofiaiffation over us without our adverting to the fact. The reason is that We ordinarily observe only our surface acts without ever examining the underlying motive. If upon investigation our findings happen to coincide wi(h the examples just cited, then pride would be indicated as the driving force in our scheme of life and would be set down tentatively as the predominant tendency. We would then proceed to further examination to confi'rm our findings. ,Our next step would be to investigate whether it will explain, at least to a great extent, the deformities we find in our pattern of life. ¯ Hence we question ourselves whether~it explains the difficulties we have in dealing with our superiors, and with others witl~ whom we live or associate, whether it clarifies the reasons for the difficulties which others experience in dealing with us.; whether i~ sheds light on ~he problem of our failure to make progress in the spiritual life. 'If the answers to these various questions point back to the same predominant tendency, we can be quite certain our tenta- 98 March, 1944 WHAT IS YOUR PREDOMINANT TENDENCY? tive judgmentwa~ correct. As the work of self-examination goes forward, mbre and more evidence accumulates to increase this certitude. Aversions are excellent indicators of the virtues most needed~ A long-continued aversion for work tells us ever so plain.ly that we need frequent large doses of exhausting labor to build up the virtue of industry in our souls. Hence we ought to examine o~rselves in this matter of aversions. A simple and brief process it will be, since it is intended rather to confirm our previous findings. "Another help in this effort to unravel the mystery of self is to be more observant ofour thoughts and reactions,. even in unrestrained moments. On these occasions it is well to note what is uppermost in our minds. How often, for instance, all unconsciously, we are busy offering i~,zense to self as we give ourselves credit for being better religious than others, of having more brains, of working harder and accomplishing more. The thought that comes first to mind Oh awakening is significant, as is also the thought l~hat recurs most frequen,tly during the day. These are ungfarded moments in which nature is disarmed, stripped of self-deceit; henc~ like a candid child itcan be very ~elf-revealing. But put it on its good behavior in time of meditation, as it gazes on the meek and humble Christ, and the wolf will don sheep's clothing. How exemplary itwill make itself out to be, in its sweet humility and shining obedience. The final check of this search within our souls will be of our daily examens and our confessions. Getting back to that first motive that prompts our sins and faults will fur-nish new confirmatory light. We shall ~ind, for example, that.what on the surface was a flashof anger, at bottom was a manifestation of pride. Incidentally, with this new lightshed on our habitual faults and sins .we shall be able ~o take effective measures to guard against routine confes- 99 PATRICK M. REGAN Reuieto for Religious sions and to reap more abundant fruit from our reception" of this sacrament. Searching Abroad Besides examining within our souls, we must also ven-ture abroad seeking information concerning outselves. The judgments of others on our characters frequently offer revealing sidelights. For one thing there is less danger of their being prejudiced in our favor; hence, if they but will, they can tell with fair accuracy whether we are proud, or whatever it may be. Since accidental circumstances of time and place or of individual prejudice may falsify the judgment, the more trustworthy-opinion, is the one deduced from many testimonials extending over a long period of time. We gather thes~ by recalling what others said of our failings as children. Parents, family, teachers. companions, friends, playmates instinctively recognized outstanding traits, and in their dealings with us adapted themselves accordingly. Our present daily companions are also discerning of our main character weakness; nor do they always hesitate to tell us about it. Their manner of acting towards ui announces it; their joking remarks are often occasions for their pronouncing judgment on us. Nor- .must the advice of. our spiritual director be overlooked, since, if he knows and understands us, he can afford us .very superior help in our search abroad. Critics Disagree It sometimes happens that those we consult in our se,ar~ch abroad disagree in their opinions of us. A certain author gathered the criticisms of his book and found that it was good and bad, dull and entertaining, slow and swift; clumsy and graceful, strong and weak, a romance and a ser-mon, a drama and a tract. He concluded that, though 100 March, 1944 WHAT IS YOUR PREDOMINANT TENDENCY? critics always claim to be right, it was irfipossible for his book to be all these things. Shouldwe encounter the same rather exceptional experience, .we can console ourselves that nothing" of serious consequence is .lost; we have all the other means of self-knowledge still at our disposal. Ashing God rThe last and greatest help is prayer to the Holy Spirit ¯ for light. A strong conviction that we need divine help above all in this search is a powerful aid in this as in every spiritual undertaking. A short aspiration from the longer prayer of St. Augustine is quite appropriate: "Lord Jesus, may I come to know Thee, may I come to know myself." God "will gladly communic,ate, that knowledge, flooding otir souls with light as a reward of all our soul-searching. Humility, let it be n~ted again, is necessary, lest we be deaf to.every admonition, blind to every light, hardened against the love that corrects. God will be giving directions and inspirations about our predominant tendency, but without humility we shall ignore them. Confessors, retreat mas-ters, and others will be telling us ever so plainly of our besetting weakness, but we shall never heed unless, as we seek self-knowledge, we simultaneously grow~in humi~ity. Finally, salutary lessons in self-knowledge, to be gleaned from meditating on the example of Christ and the. saints, will never be learned unless the heart is hungering to know - self no matter what the~cost to that same. self. Godward Self-kn0wledge should lead us to God; otherwise it is not 0nly useless but even a great hindrance to our spiritual advancement. Well did St. Augustine pray: "Lord Jesus, may I dome to know Thee; may I come to know myself," In the foregoing explanations the demands of the subject 101 PATRICK M. REGAN made it necessary to focus attention on self-knowledge to ~he apparent exclusion of other phases of the spiritual life. This fact should .not betray us into putting too much emphasis on the need of.self-knowledge. We should also understand what true knowledge of self really is. A cita-- tidn from a former article on the subject (REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, July, 1942) will make this clear. "Many are prejudiced against self-knowledge, even fear to undertake the task of acquiring it.; they misunderstand it. It is not to be .confused with morbid, introspection--that avid, uncontrolled interest in self which excludes all else and can be so harmful. No, the acquiring of self-knowledge pos-tulates not only looking inward, but also considerable looking outward to God, to our neighbor, and to our mod-els. the saints. Nor does the study of ~elf mean constant cold analysis of self, for the very reason that it can also be accomplished by noting the ~rirtues of others that impress us and reveal how much we fall short of perfect .design in our own lives. Self-analysis can be a considerable aid to self-knowledge but it does not lead to it infallibly. Some are expert at analyzing themselves, but their self-knowledge is mediocre; while'others have a deep knowledg~ of self, with very little power of self-analysis." As is evident, then, from the method suggested, the predominant tendency itself can be determined~ in a com-paratively~ short space of time, and with not too great diffi.- culty./ But the fruit of our examination we may re, ap all through life, developing for ourselves an intelligent, well-ordered, unified plan of lifeto meet our personal spiritual need and Weakness. This plan will be distinctive of our asceticism; it will assure us spedial'advantages in mounting GOdward. I02 A Suggest:ion ~rom !:he Fact:ory John E. Coogan, S.J. THE factory system, as is now. generally recognized, tended t6 dehumanize labor, making man almost a part of the machine. Little need was left him for intelligence; instead intelligence was "built into the machine." One great manufacturer .remarked, "Any one can work for me who has brains enough to hang up his hat." Even those workmen who had intelligence were often given no adequate opportunity to use it:" the .employer commonly thought of a workman as a "hand," at a time when even cattle were counted by the "head." "i~o stop this debasing of labor, Pius XI, in his encycli-ca!, "Reconstructing the Social Order," reminded employers that man is placed here on earth to develop and evolve all his faculties to the full, to the praise and glory of his Cre-ator. Hence, the Holy" Fathei: declared, "We deem it advis-able that the wage-contract shoul~d, when possible, be modified somewhat by a contract of partnership." Com-menting on these words, Father R. A. McGowan says the workman, in order to develop as ahuman being, should be given some voice in planning the general production policy of his industry, for thus "the soul of man, his will and mind, and his body can breathe more freely, and grow and develop in such work, whereas under any form of regimen-tion., his soul is .starved." If some such participation of subordinates in the planning of the operation of a business enterprise is so, necessary for their full development, it might well be asked whether we are as yet taking full. advantage of such par- 103 ,JOHN E, COOGAN Review for Religious ticipation in our rdigious communities. Among us the practice is of course used widely by a few, less widely by many. But are we even close to exhausting ~ts possibili- " ties? It is true that among us the need in general is not so extreme. Few of our religious are employed at tasks involving continuous mechanical repetition; hence their tasks usually give more opportunity for self-exp~ession and mental development than do the tasks of the ordinary industrial employe. But on the other 1-Jand our religious, because of their frequently superior abilities and education, are capable of a more notable self-exp~ession; hence they languish more if they lack the appropriate opportunities. Every man, the Pope said, is meant by God to develop alI " his faculties to the full. The whole man gives himself to God through the vows; and the whole man, with all his talents, be they one or five, should be used and brought to flower. Since those words of Plus XI urging employers to give their workmen a chance to .use their minds, many employ-ers have seen fit to give such men some share in the formu-lation of the production policies of management. The reason for this more generous policy need not have been that urged by Plus, for even from the standpoint of their own interests employers have cbme to see the wisdom of using more fully the talents of their workmen. It has occurred to them that "the average intelligence ,of the working force is higher .in the United States than in any other country, and native ingenuity, combined with intimate familiarity with processes, can not fail to produce ideas that may advantageously be adopted by the man-agement." This movement,looking to the increase of employe participation in solving the problems of industry has been developing for some years, but early in 1942 it w~is tre- 104 ¯ March, 1944 A SUGGESTION FROM THE FACTORY mendously accelerated when War Production Chief Don-ald Nelson asked that throughout the munitions industry labor-management committees be formed in the interest of increased production. He felt that the laborer's brain-power wa~ largely going, unused where, no positive and .systematic encouragementwas given him to place his sug-gestions before the management with an assurance that he ~vbuld get a respectful hearing, and for fruitful, suggestions a;suitable keward. Within fifteen months after Mr. Nel-son'sp~ 0posal at least 2,000 committees looking to such cooperative efforts Were formed. The result has been a gusher of employe ideas that has contributed heavily to the success of our war effort. In one .automobile plant alone a total of more than 116,000 ideas have been submitted, of which almost 20,000 have been accepted. "War bonds, ranging as high as $1,000 .in value, are awarded for the ideas and $660,895 has been paid out. during the 15-month period. Cash payments--currently are running better than ~ $90,000 monthly:' in that one auto plant. Many of the awards are going to young women still llttle more than novices at machine methods. One such "hand," working on a rifle barrel, promptly suggested an ingeniou~ change in boring thatbrought her a $1,000 award. Another devised a pencil-like tool for picking up small rivet washers, thu~ eliminating the tedious task of picking them up by hand and thus increasing her output. Another hit upon a clever arrangemeiat for telescoping a three-step job into one. '~ In One plant manufacturing cannon, a single machine was devised to take the place ~of ten. machihes, thus "reducing the time on a gun barrel operation from seventy-five'minutes to four.In another plant a worker's sugges-tion reduced the rifling of the barrel of an automatic cannon from three hours and twer;ty-five minutes to thirty minutes. 105 JOHN E. COOGAN Review for Religious ¯ In East Pittsburgh alone, in a single year, the' Westing-house Electric gave awards for more than 2,000 sugges-tions, the largest of these to a grandfather of sixty-two years. And thus the story goes. One device, designed in spare time from scrap mate'rials, has raised the output of certain army tank fire extin, guisher parts from 100 to 400 per eight-hour working shift. Another machine fhat bites off 400,000 rivets a day from spoo.ls of wire is .likewise the happy idea of afactory "hand." Among the first 500 sug-gestions submitted at Douglas Aircraft were enough good ideas tO producea saving of 2,000 man-hours per day. General Electric received more than 40,000: suggestions in ;i single year, 12,000 of these proving worthy of accept-ance. Such suggestions pouring in across the country.have iffsingle instancesmeant savings of hundreds of thousands of dollars, one as much as five hundred thousand dollars in a single year: and this in addition to the many lives saved through speedingup our ~winning of the war. NO wonder, then, that the War Production Board has insti-tuted a system of merit awards, corresponding,to military decorations, for employes who devise means, of increasing or improving war production; these awards" to be in addi- ¯ tion to cash prizes and medals bestowed by employers themselves. The success of this encouragement of employe sugges-tions has been such as to guarantee the continued use of the scheme by intelligent industiialists "after the war., Thor-oughly discredited is the notion that. the workman is only a "hand." One great manufacturer has .predicted .that the .next .fifty years will see "the exploring of the unlimited possibilities of human beings workilag together for a corn- .mort cause ' through mutual understanding, respect, and teamwork." 106 ~- The success of this democri, tizing of industry is but an echo of the success that analogous efforts have long since met with at times in religion. It was in the interest of free-dom for the subordinate that St. Ignatius refu~ed to attempt to prescribe in detail for meeting contingencies that could be only dimly foreseen. "Cut your coat according to the cloth," was the extent of his direction in commissioning a subordinate. Ironclad~directions canonly make for inflexible, blind driving. Wise religious supe-riors have felt themsel~res fortunate at being able to borrow from the pruden.ce and variedexperience of their communi-ties. It is proverbial that those best fitted to govern are the most willing to be governed. In consequence of their -reluctance to rise above their fellows, they minimize their difference of status as much as is compatible.with discipline. Consequently they lend a ready ear to the well-meant sug-gestions of their subjects. Admirers of a more militarized religious discipline have demurred at such deference, feeling it somehow beneath the digni~y of superiors; it is for such that our~ remarks are mbst especially intended. They resemble a friend of New-man's, who felt the latter was being talked down to by an ,intellectual inferior. But the humble author of "Lead, Kindly Light," quietly replied: "'Ar~/or~e can lecture me, and I'll be grateful for it." Thus the large-minded, kindly superior sees no loss of dignity in tt~rning an interested ear to the last and least of the community. .Such ~ superior reflects that only the Holy Father is infallible, and even he only within limits. He knows too that many of the ablest minds in the Church have spent long lives in complete subjection; fortunate the superiors who were able to profit by their wisdom. Many, too, who were once in positions of authority, return with matured minds to the ranks; how valuable may the suggestions of 107 JOHN I~. I~OOGAN" Review for Religious these.be to even the most competent superior~ governing in the, awesome .place of Christ'and only. too. aware of his limitations~ . ~ ~ . ~ ." A Writer of conferences for priests tells t.he: story--v~e hope it is only :that,--of a pastorwho expressed his opinion of his. assistant and house-keeper in the. words, ~'I'm the only One around here-who has brains enough to commit a mortal sin.': That frame of mind will seem inconceivable to the true superior. It~means, for one thing, drawing the blinds against the light; it means poisoning the wells. ¯ In matters coficerned with the salvation and perfection Of immortal souls, there can never be too much light; the .wills dannot flow too clear and pure. If, as has been beau-tifully. said, "One soul' is 'enough for a diocese,"' then the gove.rnment of a religious community can use all the light and wisdom.that might be found in an entire ecumenical council. But readiness to listen to and encourage the suggestions of subjects insures much more than increased .light .in gov-ernment; it makes for more docile, loyal, cdntented, sub-jects: Knowing that their views have been treated with. respect, subjects obey. more promptly-and interiorly. Treated like adults, like adults they now obey. The per-s~ n of the superior is loved and deferred to; and, as St. Ig-natius reminds us, "It is easy to' obey where we-love'that which is.commanded." Gracious superiors thus make for gracious subjects; these subjects in turn are gracious to.their own cbarggs. The example.is fertile and its fruits increase. Another very worth-while result of such respect shown bysuperiors for the judgment of their subjects has been the latter's increased s,elf,respect. An eminent, holy English priest exclaimed some years ago, "Oh, the timidity of the virtuous.". Sometimes.one may wonder whether we do not inculcate in young religious diffidence in:place of humil- 108 March, 1944 A SUGGESTION FROM.THE FACTORY ity.Diffidenceisparalyzing, humility is clarifying. Diffi-dence salts, ~"I can-.do nothing"; humility says, ~"I can:diS all things in Him Who strengthens me.'.'. Sometimes young ¯ people .come to. religion who have. had. responsible pos.i~ tions in the world, and .yet by Vow-time they have hardly enough self-confidence left to pay.their wayon a street-tar. At an age when their companions in the world are managing, large .businesses, these religious tremble at making, the. simplest public appearance or at meeting a, stranger. ¯ Timidity is' not. an apostolic virtue; self-respect emphatically is. Self-respect is prope.r surely to an "Alter Cbristus" or to a "Sponsa Christi," and the deference of _ superiors to. subjects; even to the youngest, by which .that self~respect is built tip must be pleasing to.Christ. It is not enough, as the wise superior knows, that this deference .be shown only to a few.The last and least are most exposed to crippling diffidence and self-contempt~ and they espe.- cially should be encouraged. Even those inclined to be.less-than- loyal~ can be won through this deference; this of course is an essential part of the Boys Town method of Father Flanagan. It is a truism to say tha~ the superiors of tomorrow are the subjects of today. They are now presumably being trained for their high destiny. In.a democratic Order sub-jects can hardly be ~predestined for superiorships and .be given formal and specific training as such. A future Latin teacher may be prepared by courses in Latin, and so of the other branches of instruction. Obviously, future Superiors cannot be set apart and trained in this manner; something of the present system, of relying on Providence for their development must always remain true. But wise"supe~. riots will continue to lend Providence a hand by keeping close to their future successors, letting them see and feel andmwith due proportion--participate in government-in- 109 JOHN -action. ¯ The modern pedagogy is, "Learn.by doing"; and even in the matter of superiorship there is no other way. The experienced superiorfeels, as did the Baptist, "You ¯ must increase; I must decrease," in order that, when another generation must take the helm, it will, be prepared. A final advantage found resulting from the superior's respect for the judgment of the ~ubjects is.a great love of ¯ their vocation: "All good thin, gs have come to me together ¯ with her." Religious are enthusiastic inspirers of new .-recruits when they find supreme contentment in their, reli-gious home. On the.other hand, the attitude of the dis~ satisfied religious to prospective enlistments is, "Enter at your peril." And how could they promise a newcomer the joy they themselves have not found? How important, . then, is this encouragement of joy-in-vocation, as a means of gaining the vocations needed now especially in view of . their recent sharp decline. If religious subjects are encouraged to.a greater initia-' rive, they will quite naturally manifest a greater enthusiasm for the common cause. And here, perhaps, lies a danger. Enthusiasm tends to become insistent. Hence it might be well to remark inclosing that, even with the humblest superior, subjects must always be deferential. After all, it is the superior Who holds the place of God. And while suggestions from a subject may well be in order, not so his insistent demand. Nothing would so discredit a sug-gestion as its giver's failure in religious spirit; for "the wisdom of this world is folly before God." Intelligence is not enough; Satan has that in abundance. But the wise superior will know how to moderate the naturally impe,tu-ous without at the same time discouraging the timid; he will not "quench the smo.king flax." 110 Decisions orr Ho}y January II, 1~44: The Sacred Congregation of Rites, in the pres-ence of Pope Pius XII, approved the decree tuto in the cause for the canonization of Blessed Frances Xavier. Cabrini, foundress of the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart. hll the prerequisites to h~r formal canonization are now completed. B~sides the cause of Blessed Mother Cabrini mentioned above, there are four other causes completed for canonization. They are those of Blessed Louis-Marie Grignon de Montfort, founder of the Daughters of Wisdom and of the Company of Mary, who died in ¯ 1716; Blessed Joan-Elizabeth ,Bichier des Ages, cofounder of the Daughters of the Cross, who died in 1838; Blessed Bernardino Rea-lini, Jesuit orator who died in 1616; and,~ Blessed John Peter de Britto, Jesuit missionary ~vho was martyred in India. in 169,3. Five causes .for beatification have also been compl~ted: those of Ven. Contardo. Ferrini, professor of RomanLaw in various Italian universities, who died in .1903; Ven. Mother Joanna Delanoue, foundress of the Sisters 6f St. Anne of Providence, who died in' 1.736~; Ven. Mother Gioachima de Vedruna de Mas, foundress Of ~he Carmel-ites of Charity,. who died in 1854; Ven, Vicenta Maria Lopez Vicuna, fouhdress of the Spanish Institute. of the Daughters of Mary !mm]lculate, who died in 1'890: and Ven. Alice LeClerc, foundress of the Institute of Our Lady,. who died in 1622. August 18, 1943: The Sacred Penitentiary published a decree an-nouncing that Pope Plus XII granted the following indulgences for saying the prayer, "Lord, save us: we perish": (I) A partial indulgence of 500 days to all who say, the prayer 'with contrite heart. (2) A plenary indulgence, under, the Usual conditions, to all who say the aspiration daily for a full month. .° SOME year's ago, before the Legion of Decency made its influence felt, it was said that the rule in Hollyw.ood was, "The 'badder,' the better!"--that is, the-worse the moral tefidency Of. a. cinema, the more Profitable it was. Whether that statement was true or not, the expression lends itselfto another more wholesome interpretatio~i. In.many cases it is.very dear ~hat.,the worse a thing0is in one respect, the better it is in others. Thus, the harder the examination, the:greater' the satisfaction of the student .-after be'has passed, it. Thelonge~ the workingman's toil, the.higher his pay, especially if it be at the rate of time and a half. The more serious the peri!.that a soldier or sailor .faces successfully, the more honorable the medal or cross . "that he will receive. What is true in life generally is true. particularly in the moral and spirituallife. ¯ The greater a man's trials, the holier and happier he can become. Two classes of people especially could profit by filling their souls with the conviction and persuasion that the :: "badd'er".a thing is from.certain points of.view, thebetter :.,it is from others. Evidently it would be a Source of solace. .and strength to all who are suffering to Se~ that the v~iSrse ¯ "! their plight may seem, to b.e., the'.better 'it :really is,. when considered from the divihe point o.f ,view and in the light of eternity. Again, there are always some strong and vigorous persons who are looking for the shortest and straightest, though it be also the steepest and hardest, path up the mountain of sanctity. Both those who are over- .112 "THE 'BADDER,' THE BETTER" taken with misfortune and those who are.seeking thebest short cut to high holiness should find it advantageous to consider the truths implied in the words "the 'badder,' the better!" And any sensible person who finds that he has to put up with something that is not to his tastemay well be pleased to discover a means of making the best of a bad situation. Pain in the Christian Economy In God's original and preferred plan for man there was no place for pain. Everything was to be p!easant. But since Adam and Eve and all sinners after them have wrongly and perversely sought pleasure, though in itself it is no evil, it is central in the.whole order of providence sub- - sequent to the fall that there should be pain and suffering, and that the happiness of man should be looked for and achieved very largely through them. Man's guilt in tasting forbiddefl pleasure and the unbalanced tendency of his-nature toward pleasiare were to be remedied through pain. Disorder, once introduced into human life, naturally works itself out in difficulty and distress, if not disaster. But it is the merciful and marvelous plan of God that we should convert the consequences of disorder into means to a higher order, the effects of stupidity into helps to a more excellent wisdom, the results of malice into aids to a nobler goodness and sanctitiy. 0 felix culpa! Hence in the entire scheme of the Incarnation and redemption suffering gets a more prominent ~mphasis. It is a leading characteristic of Christ Himself, of His sorrowful Mother, of the Apostles, of all who have done much for the Church, of all who h~ve reached an outstanding degree of sanctity, and in fact of the whole Mystical Body of Christ. In view of the function and purpose of suffering in the whole of the present Chris-tian economy, it is not surprising that, certain necessary 113 (3. AUGUSTINE ELLARD' ¯ conditions being presupposed, the greater the pain, the greater the supernatural results that may be expected. However, pain of itself is not a good, but an evil (physical) ; not a value, but the very opposite, Hospitals, concentration camps, and the world in general are full of people in torment, and unfortunately many of them'do not become better by reason of their suffering; rather, they deteriorate. But pain, borne well, put to morally good ends, can and does occasion an immense amount of good. .The.infinitely wise and loving prbvidence of God sends or permits all.the evils that afflict us for definite good pur-poses, and indeed proportionate good purposes. His ¯ immediate aims are often obscure andindiscernible, but His ultimate and supreme ends we know very well, and the time wil! come when His whole plan will be clearly revealed ¯ to us. Whether or not we see His proximate intentions, we can realize them by prudently, applying His precepts and counsels to the facts of our situation. The wise and good man considers the evils that befall him as parts of the grand divine plan for the universe, reacts as God wishes that he should,.and thus wills and achieves the divine purposes, in this way he pleases God and satisfies himself, and 'also, since our destinies are all bound together, he helps others toward less discomfort and more comfort. Limitations The dictum "The 'bad&r,' the better!" is proposed as true generally, not absolutely and without limitations. If, for example, a man is losing his faculties and sinking into .the moral impotency .of dementia, coma, or death, then it would not be true in the sense in which it is taken here. Sufferirig--and how much there is of it!-~--that is the con-sequence of. one's own folly or fault is not of much use .until at least the error be corrected and good will re-estab- "114 March, 1944. "THE 'BADDER,' THE BETTER" lished. But then al! that is affirmed of the value of suffer-ing is verified. Difficulty may diminish, as well as increase," the moral worth of a good action; it may even completely prevent it from coming into being. Henceit is not corn: mended for its own sake: But if, other factors remaining equal, difficulty calls forth greater goodwill, then it will have the advantages that we are about to indicate. Nothing in these considerations would justify one in imprudently or presumptuously or morbidly seeking to make more trouble for oneself. suffering is like that Pain is an evil, and The rational, attitude to take toward of God Himself in His providence. therefore, except in view of propor-tionate good; to be avoided whenever possible. But,~ in the present state of things, it is also a necessary evil, and, what is more to the point for us, an evil from which intel-ligence and goodwill and effort can extract good. Hence the prudent man will take the ills of life, and, when inspired by the Holy. Ghost, even voluntarily inflict others upon himself--such as, for instance, fasting--in the spirit in which God Himself chastens and corrects His children and puts them upon their mettle. " These limitations being undeistood, we may consider in a simple and practical manner some of the salutary~ truths implied in the prindiple "The 'badder,' the better!" General Values ' In general, therefore; the greater the difficulty or dis-tress or dishonor, the greater.one's opportunity, by reacting ¯ appropriately, to exercise and perfect one's love for the Infinite Goodness of the Blessed -Trinity, to increase the divine glory, to. compensate for past deficiencies; to aug-ment one's own eternal beatitude, and to assist souls in the way of salvation and sanctification. In this sense, the worse a thing is in time, the betterit may be in its results in eter- 1:5 G~ AUGUSTINE ELLARD Review ~:or Religious .,nity. The more Unpleasant it is, humanly sigeaking, the more valuable it may be according to the divine standards of judgment. The Worse it is physically, the better it m'ay be morally and spiritually. The ~harper the pain, the greater the hope of enjoying keener pleasure in the future. The more narrowly pinching one's poverty, the greater the likelihood of amassing better and enduring riches in the h~reafter. The more heartbreaking the mental anguish, thet more exquisite the joys bf the reward that may b~ expected for bearing it well. The deeper a humiliation well borne, the more highly exalted the honor a man can look forward to before God and eventually before the wh~le human race. The harder the .temptation to struggle against, the more glorious the crown of justice that awaits the vic-tor. As creatures become less and less satisfactory, it Is easier to find satisfaction in the CreatOr. In prop6rtion as lovely persons or things of the world allure and beguile us less, the more apt we are to retain the right pe~spectixre and sense of proportion with r~ference to ~reatures and the Cre-ator. To sum up, the worse the evil that afflicts a person, 6f whatsoever nature it may be, thegreater and better the ~pfirposes of God in allowing it, for H~mself, for the suf-ferer, and for others. It is precisely toward the accomplish-ment of these aims, neither more nor less, that these reflec-tions are directed. Means to this Attitude. There are two great means Of truly making the ¯ ".badder" thing turn out to be the better thing. The first is to develop a deep, calm, whole-s0uled, pratical, conviction of these two facts: first, that God in His superior wisdom, benevolence, and power really is directing everything that touches us, including the sins and injustices of others toward us, to our own true and best good; and, secondly, 116 March, 1944 "THE 'BADDER,' THE BETTER" that the best possible thing that we can do for ourselves is to show our good sense and good w{11 by fully co-oper-ating with the operations of divine providence. When God's immediate aims are obscure, then ggeate~r faith and confidence are in order. God could of course give us better opportunities, but wd can never do better for ourselves than to make the most of the opportunties that He does give us. The Other great means is earnestly to cultivate, by serious reflection.and prayer, a true and just appreciation or evaluation of the excellence of the persons whose interests are concerned, and of the magnitude and multiplicity of those interests, in time and in eternity. Among the values suggested by the rule "The 'badder,' the better," the following may be noted. Special Values in the Present Difficulty or dist'ress is a present challerige to one's intelligence and goodwill. It is there to be overcome and vanquished: at least that is the magnanimous attitude toward it. ¯ It tends to provoke and evoke all that is best in a man, to put it to the test, to improve ~nd perfect it. The humble soul will not be presumptuous and overconfident in its own strength, but neither should it be diffident with regard to God. " 'For strength is made perfect in infir-mity.' Most gladly, then, will I rather boast of mine infir-mities, that so there may rest upon me the si:rength of Christ. Wherefore I am well content in infirmities, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in straitsnfor Christ's sake. For when I am Weak, then I am strong!" (II Corinthians 12:9, "10).1 It has always been considered one of the most remark-able manifestations of God's excellence" that He is wise and good and strong enough to.draw good out of every evil that aNew Testament texts in this article are cited from the Westminster Version. 117 AUGUSTINE ELI]ARD Reoieto ~o~ Religious occurs in His universe, and no doubt the w0~se the evil,:the greater the good must be. "We know that for them~that love God.He worketh all things together unto good,~ for them that are called according to His purpose" (Romans 8:28). It is understood that those who love God are intel-ligent and virtuous enough to co-operate with Him. The Christian life was long ago defined as an imitation of God; and to be able to extract good out of evil, and greater goods out of greater evils, would be a mark of an excellent Chris-tian life. In increasing one's efforts to meet the challenge, one's own wisdom and goodness and power are perfected and made more and more like God's. Thus difficulty over-come or pain well borne gives one something of 'which to be supremely proud. "We. exult in the hope of the glory of God. And not only so, but we exult.in our tribulations also, knowing ,that tribulation worketh endurance, and endurance experience, and experience hope: And hope doth not prove.false" (Romans 5:2-5). An aviator: who is trying to run up a high record of victories against enemy planes would seek out, rather than shun, dangerous encounters; so. the good man who would like to distinguish himself in the service of the Divine King would look upon-any hardship or surfeiting as so much opportunity to win glory for his Sdvereign and for him-self. The very best physici)ins and surgeons prefer the more difficult, the "more interesting," cases, because thus they have a chance to use and to improve their superior ~kill. They feelthe challenge and are glad to accept it. Many good people have moments when they regret that they do not, have more occasion to showthe magnanimity and heroism that are in them. To be consistent, they ought to acknowledge practically, when the time comes to put up with the unpleasant, that the worse it is, the greater the opportunity for which they have been looking. Since the 1'18 Marc& 1944 "THE 'BADDER,' THE BETTER" time of Aristotle, the difficult has been-considered to be in a peculiar way the province of art and virtue. St. Paul knew and welcomed the.challenge we speak of: "But as for me, Heaven forbid that I should make boast of aught save the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, whereby the world is crucified to me, and I to the world" (Galatians 6:14). With. Respect to Past Our principle contains most 'valuable lessons with respect to the past. Perhaps nothing discourages people more in their moral and spiritu.al lives than a past record which brings shame rather than pride. Even here these people have their chance. The worse they have been, the greater their need to make up for what they havelost, and hence the more welcome the opportunity to. effect that compensation. When one.has sinned, the sensible attitude to take Would seem to be: "Willy hilly, now I must suffer for it! The sooner it is Over, the more patient I am, the better!" The deeper one is in the red in his accounts with God, the more solicitous one should be about getting into the black again. A person who attacks his past in the spirit of "the 'badder,' the better!" Would have the optimism, ~lan, and force that go with taking the offensive. A little punishmer~t here may save one from much torment in, pur-gatory, and besides it has a positive value (merit), whereas that after death does not. The souls already undergoing the penalties of ptirgatory must have an overwhelming conviction that they would have done well to bethink themselves seriously and see the advantages of their disad-vantages, the comforts of theirdiscomforts~ ~nd the abili-ties of their disabilities. When a man sins or even omits the better alternative in a choice between two goods, God's antecedent plan for His own glory is to that extent frustrated. God would like 119 G. AUGUSTINE ELLARD Review for Reliqious ~o see the loss made good, unless, 6f course,, it betoo late. In sending or permitting difficulty or tribulation, He intendsand hopes that it Will be used for that end: Thus again, the worse one's affliction, the better the chance it gives to satisfy God for past failures. ,Many devout people nowadays talk much about making reparation fo~ t.he injuries and insults that have been heaped upon the patient and-!ong-suffering FIe~art of 3esus. D0 they realize always that the better their patience in. all that is disagreeab!e, the fuller the measure in which they make that reparation? Other fervent, souls: would imitate St~ Paul and would make up in their "flesh :what is lacking to the sufferings of Christ, on behalf of his.b6dy, which fs the Church'~ (Colossians 1:24). The more and better they suffer, the less they will leave lacking to that Mystical Bgdy. For ~he Future ." But it is with reference to future values that :the rule :"'T.he 'bad&r,' the better!" is best verified. ,The most obvious advantage here is the merit of suffering well. The tiniest and most minuscule bit of discomfort, or dishonor borne meritoriously means an increase of grace: of.sancti-fying~ grace,".that, is, of higher participation in the nature and life of. the.Divinity; of the infused virtues and the,gifts ¯ of the Holy Spirit, that.is, of proximate principles of dei- ¯ form thought, volition, .and activity; of actual graces, that is;.o.f-salutary ideas,., impulses, and aids helping one to live .On:a~ higher plane of the rational and the diyine life; and finally; of a richer share in the . ineffable, beatitude of the most blessed Trinity in. heaveia .throughout the unending aeons of eternity. One's ability to behold: and contemplate .the,Infinite Truth, to love.th4 Infinite Goodness, to enjo.y ¯ .the.Infinite. Beauty, and to.rejoice in the company of: the Divine Persons and : of: .the .whole . celestial society, is pro- .t!20 March, l 9 4 4 ¯ " "THE 'BADDER,' THE BETTER'.' portionately augmented. God is glorified more," the quondam sufferer himself thrills with a more exquisite sense of the divine beatitude, and everybody else in that. blissful region is better pleased and more happy. And Goal repays sincere human effort£, not according to results, but according to a generous~cost-plus system. Meanwhile his own moral stature will be rising at an accelerated speed. Faith will be clarified,, hope fortified., ahdcharity intensified; prudence will become more sharply discerning, religion more devout, humility deeper, fortitude stronger, patience more enduring, and magnanimity greater. Really and consistently to face suffering with ,the disposi-tion "the worse, the better!" is no child's play, and if it be kept up in severe trials and over a protracted period' 6f time, the man who does it shows himself to be something of a hero. If personal sanctity is raised to higher,levels, then, other things being equal, one's efficiency and ability to.d0 God's work and to save souls will be increased also. General resolutions and offerings of self to God cast in some such form as this: "All that Thou Willest, O. God, and the harder, the better!" should prove to be more ¯ effectual. If in the crisis of temptation a person can exclaim ,"The harder, the better!" or, "The worse I have been, the better I am determined to be!" his chances Of coming of( ~he victor will be enhanced. . A JoyousAttitude Taking this view of the unpleasant makes it less unpleasant and more bearable. Evidently this attitude ig less pessimistic and more cheerful. Moreover, such a posi-tive and aggressive reaction,, besides conferring the advan-tages .of offensive strategy over the merely defensive, lessens pain, partly because of the consciousness" of .doing the nobler thing, and partly because a man suffers less when 121' G. AOGUSTINE ELLARD Review ~'or Rdigiotts ¯ he is active and not simply passive. Every football player and every soldier knows that while he" is in actual combat . minor hurts are not felt so keenly. The saying of the old Roman poet that it is sweet as.well as honorable to die for the fatherland, has received universal approbation. For a much stronger reason it ought to be sweet and consoling to suffer for God's sake, or for souls' ~sake, and that swee(ness should bear a proportion both to the loveliness of the Great Beloved and to the amount of evil endured. Everybody who has been in love knows well from experience that there is a certain satisfaction in demonstrating love by sacrifice. As a matter of fact, it can only be suggested, not at all adequately expressed, that in suffering in union witch ,Jesus crucified holy men and women have been thrilled with the most exquisite and indescribable delights. Not that they ceased to feel their agony; but with it, or after it, and by reason of it, they also felt the most rapturous and ecstatic joys. "For according as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so through Christ doth our comfort also abound" (II Corinthians 1:5); they who "for a while. h~i.ve beeia grieved somewhat by divers teHptations . . .~ exult with an unspeakable and glorified joy" (I Peter 1: 6-9). ¯ Moreover, heavier crosses have always been consid-ered a sign of divine predilection. To acquire the heroic attitude.toward suffering,.cert~iin. ardent souls will find themselves helped most by .such reflections as the following. Who is desus who suffered for me.? .What His dignity, goodness, lovableness? How worthy of being pleased even if He had never felt incon-venience because of me? How much didHe suffer for my sake? With what love, mercy, patience, and l'ong-suffering? Why did He suffer? What does He desire of me? With what right? How much-pleased would He be ifI.~hould suffer with Him? To.what extent could I.thus 122 March, 1944 "THE 'BADDER,' THE BETTER" help Him "accomplish His aims in enduring so much pain and humiliation and. such a death?' How much could I aid His Church and His cause with souls? .Would it gratify Christ to see me pr.efer.ring poverty, pain, and opprobrium, not of course for their own sake--that would be perverse-- but for His sake and to further His designs? Pertinent Prayers John of the Crossl-who taught, and in his own person illustrated the fact, that one who is destinedfor a very high degree of divine union, "of total transformation into God,:' must first undergo very severe and thoroughgoing purifications, was v~.ont to pray: "O God, to suffer and to be despised forThee!.". Before Teresa of Avila reached the summit of her myst.ical ascensions, she, Whose latter years ~vere one great battle with difficulty and distress of every sort, would exclaim: "O Lord, either to suffer or to die!" The Italian Carmelite, Mary Magdalen de' Pazzi, outdid her: "O Lord let me suffer or let me die---or rather--let me live on that I may suffer mote!" But before the end Of Teresa's life, .when a furious st6rm of troubles was begin-ning to break over her head, she wrote to a less stouthearted confidant and collaborator:. "Let use make the :attempt, ¯ . . for the more we suffer, the better it Will be" (Walsh, Saint TereSa o[ Avila, 567). It would seem that anybody with faith and reason could pray: "O God, enable me through Thy grace to see ~11 that befalls mein the light.and setting of Tby wise and benevolent and pcwerfu[ providence, to realize practically that Thou makest all things, good and bad, to work together for the best interests of those who love Thee and react rightly, and. thus really and truly to achieve Tl~y beneficent, purposes; all this, out of love for the infinite, .eternal, and ineffable goodness of Thy most blessed Trin- 123 G.' AUGUSTINE ELLARD ity; out of zeal to co-operate with Thee in communicating that same goodness and Thy knowledge and Thy love of it; out-of eagerness to participate in the redemptive sufferings and work of. the God-man crucified; out of fear lest, being too. shortsighted and cowardly, I incur more grievous woes; and finally from a longing to share, and to bring others to share, in Thy own inexpressible and everlasting beatitude." All things considered, whatever is to be said of the theory of evil, the best practical philosophy of evil seems tO be found in the alliterative and ungrammatical oxy-moron: "The 'badder,' the better!" It provides a rational ¯ and Christian means of transforming negative, into posi-tive values, disorder into order, discomfort into comfort, and dishonor into honor. BOOKLET NOTICES Sp;rifual ChecI(-up for Religious, by Rev. Lawrence G. Lovasik, S.V.D. A good booklet t:or occasional examination of conscience and for monthly" recollection. 32 pages. Single copies, 10 cents: 9 cents each in lots of 25; 8 c~nts each in lots of' 100. Published by: The Catechetlcal Gdild, St. Paul, Minnesota. Heart of Jesus. Our Consolatlon---Special devotions to the Sacred Heart of Jesus for the Sick and Afflicted. written and compiled bs' Clara M. Tiry. Contains a veritable treasury of devotions in honor of the Sacred Heart. 72 pages. Single copies, 15 cents: 4 copies for 50 cents: 8 copies for $1.00; cloth bound copies, "50 cents each. Published by: The Apostolate of Suffering, 1551 North 34th ~t., Milwaukee 8, Wisconsin. Good Samaritan Almanacman almanac forthe sick. 64 pages Single copies, 25 cents; 5 copies for $1.00. Published by: The Apostolate of Suffering. What Tho Mass Means, an explanatio~ of the prayers and ceremonies of the Mass, .by the Rev. Victor J. Hintgen. For study clubs. 92 pages. Single copies, 30 cents: redhction in pri~e for 6 or. more. Published by: Our Sunday Visitor Press, Hunt-ington, Indiana. Listens-It's God's Word, an introduction to the New Testament, by the Rev. '"Victor 3. Hintgen: For study clubs. 144 pages. Single cop!es, 30 cents; re~tuc-tion in price for 6 or.more. Published by~ Our Sunday Visitor Press. Modern Youth and Chastity, by Gerald Kelly, S.J. in collaboration with B, R. Fulkerson, S.3., and C. F. Whitford, $,J. Formerly published for restricted cir-i: ulation under the.title Chastity and Catholic Youth. 105 pages. Single copies, 25 cents; 12 copies, $2.70; 25 copies, $5.00;. 50 copies, $8.75: 100 copies, $17.50. Published by: The Queen's Work, 3742 West Pine Blvd. St. Louis 8, Missouri. 124 Concerning Voca!:ions The Editors ~a~JlTH this number of the REVIEW we. close our correspondence W on Vocations. Since we asked for communications on this subject (July, 1943) we have received a number of letters, suggestions~ leaflets, programs; and so forth. We give .he.re a brief account of the material sent us that has not yet been mentioned in the REVIEW. Booklet : Follbw Him, by Godfrey Poage, C.P., is a vocational booklet on the Sisterhoods. It is the companion .booklet to the boys' Follow Me (see REVIEWFOR RELIGIOUS; II, p. 385). It is an dxcellent piece 6f workmin explanation, pictures, and in its universal appeal.J~ll possible .communities are listed and briefly described. No favoritism is shown. This-. booklet is distributed.exclusively by the Thomas .More Book Shop, 22 West Moriroe St., Chicago 3, Illinois. Prices: single copies, .postpaid, 15 cents; 2 or more copies, 10 cents each; per hundred, $8.00. Programs. Father Poage sent us the Program for the Promotion of Voca-tions for use in the Archdiocese of Chicago during Vocation month. The essential points in the program.are of value, not merely during Vocation month, but all through the year. . . To deepen the spiritual life of the students ik the first objectiv~ of the Chicago program. This is to be done by prayer, more frequent Mass and Communion, and the cultivation of a spirit of sacrifice and ~enerosity. The program points out that we should ~train our youth more in the use of ejaculatory prayer, as there is a common misunder-standing that by "prayer" we mean long prayers such as the Rosary or the Stations. With regard to frequent Mass and Communion the suggestion is made that all too often boys and girls have the.f_alse notion that they must go to confession every time they, go to Com-munion; hence we should impress them with th~ truth that ,confes-sion is "necessary only after mortal sin. Thi,s, of course, does-not mean that we are not to teach our students ihe manifold advantages 125 THE EDITORS Review for Religious. of fre~quent c0nfessio~. It seems to us that the last point in the program--the cultivation of a spirit of generosity and sacrifice-- cannot bestressed too much. Today, in particular, all vocations-- not merely religious--require such a spirit; and only too often fail-ures in marriage, as well as in religion and the priesthood, must be attr~ibuted to sheer selfishness. To impart adequate instruction is the second.objective of ~he Chicago program. This. is to be done by allowing questions, by suggesting reading (especially of Follow Him and Follow Me), and by simple talks on such subjects as: The Signs of a Vocation; How to Overcome Ditticult.ies; The Apostolate' that Lies Open; and The Need of Generosity in Following the Promptings of Grace. The. Mission Helpers of the" Sacred Heart (West Joppa Road, Towson, Maryland). sent in this sample program for a Dag of Retreat made by the Our Lady of Good Counsel Club: i0:30: Assembly in Chapel, H~'mn, Prayer. ' 10:45: Is It for Me?--conference by a Sister. I 1 : 15 : Interviews, Visits to Chapel, Stations. 12:00: Lunch. 1:00: Rosary (on the grounds). 1:30: What Would It Mean?-:-cbnference by a Sister. 2:00: Interviews, Visits to Chapel, Stations. 3:30: Address--by a priest. ¯ 4: 15: Benediction. The re£reatants were urged to keep strict silence. Bdoks and pamphlets about various religious communities were placed at their 'disp6sal. An~l they were asked to make known iheir requests for any specifil literature beforethe opening of the retreat. Leaflets l~ather Thomas Bowdern, S.J., (The Creighton University, Omaha 2, Nebraska), once made a. nation-wide survey of those who followed vocations to the priesthood and the religious life during the y6ars i919-1929. He :has written several articles about his survey. and be now prints a 4opage leaflet giving some of the principal findings and a definite program for fo~teriiag vocations~ The leaflet is entitled A Study of Vocations. It may be obtained from Father Bowdern--~2 copies for 5 cents. Marcl~f 1944 . CONCERNING VOCATIONS The Sisters of the Good Shepherd i931 Blair Avenue, St. Paul 4, Minr~esota) sent us a very attractive leaflet, also a postcard folder containing 22 pictures, used to inform lik.ely candidates of the tre-mendous apostolate carried on by the Sisters. Communications Reverend Fathers : For many years while.traveling about the country as a missioner I have been absorbed in the problem of the dearth of vocations. Here are a few brief observations that may throw some additional light on the subject. ~ There is no foundation for the complaint that our Catholic . youth lack the spirit of sacrifice. The communities that have been overwhelmed with vocations are those which offer the greatest hard-ships. The newer communities attract in proportion many more voca-tions than the older established communities. Some of the former had more subjects than missions, while many of the latter had to refuse new missions for lack of subjects¯ Some may attribute this to-, their American foundation, while too many of the older communb ties were of "foreign" origin. Another factor that is Overlooked is pu'blicity.° Many of~- the older communities are forbidden by rule to u~e persuasion in seeking subjects. This has.been interpreted rigorously as forbidding adver-tising of any kind. .If the community in question is not established in the large Catholic centers, it can hardly expect to attract vocations' there. One cannot join a community unless one first knows of its existence. It is unreasonable to expect God to work. miracles to com-pensa. t.e for our neglect o~ human means readil~ ;ivailable. )~ simple attractive pampble't stating the origin arid purpose of the.community would merely make God's work known. More popular pamph!ets on the saints of the Order would also attract vocations. The new communities advertise. Too many of the older-communities are still unknown. Virtue will attract,.vocations. Let.me qu'ote from a letter of a young novice: "My thoughts and .~tesires were of One Whom I wished to serve, so naturally I observed those who were already serving Him, and seeing the goodness and happiness they seemed to display I was quite convinced . . . that the convent was my life'~ home.'~ On the other hand I could quote examples of otfiers who ¯ 127 THEI EDITORS Review for Religious had practically made up their minds to join ii certain community but were absolutely repelled from doing so because of the obvious lack of ~ustice and charity in someone wearing the garb bf that order. Care in selecting subjects means more vocations eventually. Abil-ity to judge character on ~the part of the Novice Master or Novice Mistress will help to exclude those who do not belong. Weakness in admitting one poor subject may mean the subsequent loss of ten worthy vocations. A Priest Reverend Fathers: PerhaPs my experience is no( a common one, but I have found that one thing that sometimes creates'dissatisfacti0n with a reiigious Vocation is the fact that many of us older religious refuse to allow our former pupils to "grow up." Even after these former 'pupils have beeri in religion for several years, we continue to look upon them and treat them as our "boys .and girls." Many of them feel this intensely. E~ienwhen they do not actually give up their vocations, the sense of frustration hampers their work and their natural, growth to a whole-some independence. As a means to p~eserving voc~itions, and to the full fructifying of vocat,ions, I suggest that we "old teachers" examine 0ur~elves periodically on our "maternal" and "paternal" attitudes. A Priest WANTED: LETTERS ON RETREATS! Whim you make a retreat, are there some things that you find particularll, h~lpful--things that yo~. expect and that you'd like the retreat director to be sure to give? And when you give [1 retreat, do you look for a certain disposition on the ~art of the retreatants, yearn for a response that som~,times does not come? :- If you have good ideas, why not air them in our Communications? We w~nt to start some communications on this very practical subject in our next number ¯ (May 15). If you have Somethingtb say and~you want to say it in that num~ber, send it to us immediately. Keep the following points in mind: (1) Make communications as brief, ai possible--withdut, 6f course, sa~rific- ~ing thought for brevity. . (2) Save us editorial wor~ by writing neatly and clearly. Typewritten letters are:~preferred. .(3) Your name will not be printed unless you. explicitly request this." (4) Address communications to: The Editors of P~eview for Religious. St. Mary's'College, St. Marys, Kansas. 'i28 Try This in Your Examen! Richard L. Rooney, S.~. THE Archangel of Religious sat at his celestia! equivalent of a desk in the Mansion of the Guardians and ruefully read the recent reports. For the most part the vows were intact and the spirit of'work was tremendous. But by and large, the particular examens just weren't being kept! His friend~. Ignatius of Loyola, who dropped in now and then for a chat, wouldn't like that, for he had put great. stress on the examen as a means of sanctification. And even the mod-ern psychologists (some of whom had arrived in heaven!) considered it a good device for. self, improvement. But these modern religious-- priests, Brothers, and Sistersmseemed to think quite" differently, if .one might judge from results. The Archangel leaned back and pondered the situation. Perhaps these poor human ¯beings found the thing tedious, had let routine creep in and rob them of zest. Perhaps they had asked the same'old-questions in the same old way and, seeing no advancement, had given up in disgust. Or perhaps they had forgotten th_attheir firs~t job is to be g.o'od human beings; hence they had been pitching their examen= too high ! The Archangel scribbled a set of questions on a piece of skyey paper. He would have the Angel Guardians suggest these to their charges, and then see if the examens wouldfi't improve.~ Here is what he wrote: -1) Do you get along with practically everyone in the com-munity? " 2)~ If not; is it because you practise one or more of the following easy ways of getting yourself disiiked: a) Do you'do your best to let the "other fellow" know he doesn't amount to much?¯ make it clear that his ideas are. awrY, that¯he expr.esses them poorly? that what he does is°really not im-portant? b) ~ Do you try to arrange other people's lives, for them? . c) Have you let your disposition become morose, mood_y, touchy, and sarcastic? " d) Do you find fault on every possible occasion with the R~¢HARD.L. ROONY , food, the weather, the work, superiors, the whole life--always, of course, for the glory of God? e) Do you pick.out and air" abroad tO certain chosen souls the small defects of others? f) Do you pass over no chance to argue--to turn-every recreation into a debate? g) D6 you gossip? (Absolutely the best way in the world of wasting time--God's time--~as well-as showing your own inferiority.) b) Are ygu suspicious, sure that no one is up to any good or has a good motive? i) Are you always center-stage, in the spot-light, talking about that most interesting of topics, yourself? j) Or are you just the opposite--a silent, uninterested bore at recreation? k) Do you always take orders in bad grace--make things as hard for superiors as you can? 1) Are you one of those omniscient people whom no one can tell anything? WHO IS SAINT JOSEPH? Saint Joseph is: ¯ . ¯ the guardian of chastity and of the honor of virginity,---St. Augustine ¯ . .~ the faithful coadjutor of the Incarnation.---St. Bernard . . the perfect example of humility and obedience to God's inspirations. -~t. Francis Borgia . . the man mbre beloved by Jesus and Mary than ail other creatures.---St, lsidore . . the master of prayer and the interior life.-~St. Teresa ¯ . . the model of priests and superiors.---St. Albertus Magnus ¯ . ¯ the mysterious veil which covered the virginity'of Mary.mBossuet ¯ . . the third person of the earthly trinity.--Gerson The foregoing are but a few of the brief panegyrics of St. ,loseph that can be culled from such books as Cardinal Vaughan's Who is St. Joseph? and Pete Binet's Divine Favors granted to St. Joseph. They might be apt subjects for brief medi-tations, during the month of March. w'qC'ILLIAM STRITCH, ¯130 ook Reviews AIDS TO'WILL TRAINING IN C~HRISTIAN EDUC:ATION. By TWO Sis-fers of Nofre Dame. Pp. xvl ~ 237. Frederick Pusfef C~o. (Inc.), New York and C~inclnnaff, 1943. ¯ $2.S0. This work is mostly a development and adaptation of Lind-worsky's doctrine on training the will.The will is formed prin-cipally by suitable motivation suitably inculcated, rather than, for instance, by a sort of will-gymnastics: The three great instincts in human nature, namely, those to superiority, s6ciality, and to self-preservation, are, since the fall, perverted and lead todisorders of every kind. With the help of divine grace; a clear conception and an adequate evaluation of the true destiny of man, and constant co-operation of the will, these three fundamental tendencies can be redirected to what is wholesome, and re-educated, and thus help, rather than hinder, man in reaching that destiny. Character ~s to be judged by these three c~iteria: what a man wills, wh~/, and how. A person is good or bad like his motives. Right motivation depends~ very largely upon keeping attention and thought turned to what is true and good and bea.utiful, and upon appreciating its values. Right emotions follow naturally, and then right attitudes, and these tend to bring about righ~ volition. If all these be maintained and strength: ened with appropriate habits, the result will be the desired good will ¯ and go.od character. The procedure recommended for correcting--n0t for breaking-- the will may be adduced as representative of the book. Suppose a student has an excessive fondness for freedom. It is likely that he really .does not well understand the differences between trueliberty and license. These must be clearly pointed out to him. Then he is to be brought to see and appreciate the advantages of liberty and the disadvantages of license. The corresponding emotions are aroused and fostered~ Then opportunity is given for practice and for finding satisfaction in it. Th~ will must always be cultivated from within, that is, by exciting a.genuine desire for what is good; external rneans~ like setting up sanctions; should be secondary. What has been said will give an idea of the main .psychological principles entering into the structure, of the book. Over and above these there is a multitude of minor pedagogical aids, tables of values, 131. BOOK REVIEWS .- Review for Religious natural and supernatural, lists of attil~udes, of virtues and faults, questions and topics for discussion, etc. The religious and Catholic note is most prominent throughout. As far as~I know, there is no work which would seem to promise more help. for the generality of religious teachers who are eager to direct and perfect the wills of their students. " G. AUGUSTINE ELLARD, S.J. INSTRUCTIONS ON CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE: VOLUME IV. By the Rev- " erend Nicholas O'Rafferfy. Pp. viii -f- 300. The Bruce Publishing Company, Milwaukee, 1943. $3.25. The first three volumes of this series treated of the Creed, the Sacraments, and' the Commandments of God. The present volume includes instructions on Prayer (the Our Father, Hail Mary, and prayer in general), the Precepts of the Church, Sin (mortal, venial, and the capital sins), and the Virtues (the theological virtues and those contrary to the capital sins). It is difficult to estimate the value of a book like this. Judging the matter as objectively as I can, I should say that priests and Reli-' gion teachers who have the time to consult several books in preparing sermons, instructions, or classes, would find in this book an added help, especially because it contains a wealth of Scripture ,texts. But it is hardly ideal for those who must confine themselves to one or two books. In general it makes .rather hard reading. Except for the fact that the divisions are indicated in introductory paragraphs, con-cluding surveys, and numerals'sepagating the various sections, no ¯ effort has been made to use the 'abundant mechanical .helps that im-press matter on the mind and memory. There are some minor ihac-curacies in the text " inacc~aracies that might escape the notice of those who are not well-grounded in theology. One inaccuracy in particular should be called to the attention of our readers. The authorstates that the Church demands physical intdgrity in those who enter the cloister (p. 226). This'must be a slip of the pen. Perhaps some orders require this; but it certainly is .not demanded by canon law.--G. KELLY, S. d. ST. THEODORE OF CANTERBURY. By the Very Reverehd William Reany, D.D. Pp. ix ~ 227. B. Herder Book Co., St. Louis, 1944. $2.00, The scholarly Doctor Reany has added to his former publica-tions, the biography of a great seventh-century Churchman. This St. Theodore is usually known, from the Nace of.his.birth, as St. 132 ~ March. 1944 . BOOK REVlE~WS Theodore of.Tarsus, but is here more properly call~d .from' the place of his See. Divine Providence had very .leisurely prepared the simple.--. monk, Theodore, by studies at Athens and monastic life in both EaSt and West.for the appointment as Archbishop of Cantdrbury in his sixty-sixth year. Tonsured, ordained, and consecrated, h~ came ~to England in 668. He was the first prelate to rule over all of Eng-land, and to weld its differing Christian missions, of Celtic, Roman, and Gallic origins~ into one unified national Church. His hand held the l~elm until his eighty-eighth year, securely guiding the youtig Churc,h into orderly and scholarly currents so truly beneficent for generations to come. The late Cardinal Lepi'cier, O.S.M., Who writes-the preface of this volume, states that it is the firs~ completew0rk bfi Theodore. The painstaking assembling of fragmentary data on Theodore's activities, in chronicles, bishops' installations; ~onciliar acts and the like, is se~ out in such seemingly artless fashion that the writer has had the pain that we may have ttie pleasure. It is easy to see why Engli~hmen of today, who do not share Theodore's Catholid faith, can still see in him one who "laid the foundation of English national unit~;." --- GERALD ELLARD, S.J. THIRTY YEARS WITH CHRIST. By Rosalie Marie Levy. Pp. 2,46. Pub-" llshed by the Author, P.O. Box 158, Station. O, New York I I,.N.Y., 1943. $2.00. . This autobiogiaphy discloses how Miss Levy in her thirty years as a Catholic ~onvert from Judaism has sought to bring the truth to her own race and to whomsover else she can. It tells of her leanings toward Catholicism from youth; of her attempt at religious life in a convent, frustrated by ill health: of a visit to Europe and a pilgrim-age to the Holy Land. The narrative reveals a zeal for Christ that shames the matter-" of-fact attitude of.many a "cradle" Catholic toward the faith. In ¯ 1936 Miss Levy organized the Catholic Lay Apostle Guild whose members circulate Catholic literature and spread Catholic truth bY answerin, g questions regarding Catholic. truths and practices at opeii-air. meetings. Since 1922 she has been active in the Guild of our Lady of Sion~an.organization aimed at the conversion of Jews. Her books include The Heavenl~l Road, designed to bring Jews to the true faith. Other devotional and apologetic titles total six books and~two pamphlets." " : The present work concludes with short biographical sketches of 133 BOOK REVIEWS Ret~iet~ for Religious four notable 3ewish converts; a valuable chapter entitled "The Proper Approach to the 3ewish Mirid"; a short presentation of apologetic q~est[ons and answers; and a ~ollection of correspondence odcasioned during the years of Miss Levy's apostolic work. It is an inspiring autobiography, a valuable handbook for the apologist, and an indispensable aid to those working toward the cofiversion of Jews.--R. SOUTHARD, S.J. WHITE FIRE. By the Reverend E. J. Edward, s. S.V.D. Pp. 219. The Bruce Publishing Company, Milwaukee, 1943." $2.7S. Effective contrast points to artistic pla.nning and execution. To take such seemingly diverse physical phenomena as a convent garden, brilliantly beautiful with tropical flowers, under a Pacific summer sun, and the malformed, rotting, shocking face of "a half-dead leper in a leprosarium ward; such antagon.istic characters as a young American nun, filled with the love of God and enthusiasm for her work among the lepers for whbm she has willingly given up every-thing, and a despondent, despairing victim of the disease, whose love of God and man and self has turned to fierce hatred; the hdart-wa. r.ming hu.mor of a 'F~ther Doro, and the d~pth,touching pathos of a self-sac.rificing little leper girl, Dolores; nigh-breathless action of plot, and periods ~)f quiet, pr6found contemplation; to take all these--and more and blend and shade and work them into a pleasing comP0.sitel devoid of hash impressionism, calls for an artist's gift arid touch. Father Edwards has done this. Some. may feel that the story--the action--lags occasionally because of the "introspections" of Sister. Agnes Marie. However, the~e are integral parts of the whole an'd give the motivating force of ardent love of God and neighbor which makes Sister Agnes the heroine she certainly is. There-are scenes in White Fire which will beo long remembered: .old Lion Face, the realistic picture of the scourge of. leprosy; the simple, sincere,, and heroic offering of self niade by Dolores to the Santo Nino: and the finale on Christmas Eve which leaves dne thriliing.~M. F. HASTING, S.J. THE SPIRITUAL CONFERENCES OF ST. FRANCIS DE SALES. Pp. Ixxl ¯ -f- 406. The Newman Bookshop, Wesfm;nsfer, Md., 1943. Repr;nf. $2.75. Two or three times a week, when the weather was fine, Bishop Francis de Sales Would go over to the convene orchard of the Visita- 134 March, 1944 BOOK REVIEWS tion motherhouse at Annecy, in southern France, and sit down on. a rustic bench¯ When the nuns, among' them St. Jane-Frances de Chantal, had grouped themselves on the ground around him, he would talk informally on spiritual topics and answer questions; In bad. weather; for he came "even in bad. Weather," they would assemble in the convent p~rlo~. After the conference,a nun, appointed .because of her good memory, jotted down what the bishop had said and supplied, omissions from the memories of her companions. These conferences continued with lessening frequency from 1610 until the l~ishop~s death in 1622, the audience numbering three in the beginning, ten in the second.ye~ar, and increasing steadily thereafter, As other convents of the Visitation were established, the conferences were copied, sometimes not too carefully, and read with great avid-ity and profit¯ in them also. When some Un.scrupulous editor got hold of a copy surreptitio.usly

Issue 1.1 of the Review for Religious, 1942. This is the first issue of the publication. ; A.M.D.G.- -~ Review for ehg ous " " JANUARY 15, 1942 ,~>The Vow of P~overfy . ~The oE udta÷ O~Iotn er ¯ Hygienic M6rfificafio~ -- Exemptions from F~s+ing ~.~ ~Bellar~ine's S[gn of The:~Lmfurgy ih'Mo~ern ~r ¯ Religious Cg~secration : . By M~ffhew Germlng,-S.J. . By Adam C. Ellis, S.J. ~.By, William J. McGucken, S.J. ~' " By,'~. Augustine Ellard, S;J. '~ ~. By Gerald Kelly, ~S.J. '/ By C!pm~nt DeMufh, S.J. B~. ~rald Ellard, SfJ. .° VOLUME. NUMBER 1 Review ~:or Religious Volume I January--December 1942 Published at THE COLLEGE PRESS Topeka, Kansas Edited by THE JESUIT FATHERS SAINT MARY'S COLLEGE St. Marys, Kansas REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS VOLUME I JANUARY 15, 1942 NUMBER CONTENTS GREETINGS FROM THE BISHOP OF LEAVENWORTH Tlie Most Reverend Paul C. Schulte, D.D. 4 PLANS AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS~The Editors .6 RELIGIOUS CONSECRATION--Matthew Germing, S.J . 8 JOHN NEPOMUCENE NEUMANN . 14 THE VOW OF POVERTY IN THE CODE OF CANON LAW Adam C. Ellis, S.J . 15 THE EDUCATION OF SISTERS--William J. McGucken, S.J .2.7. HYGIENIC MORTIFICATION---G. Augustine Ellard. S.J .3.2 EXEMPTIONS FROM FASTING--Gerald Kelly, S.J .4.2. SAINT ROBERT BELLARMINE'S SIGN OF THE CROSS Clement DeMuth, S.J . 47 LITURGY IN THE PATTERN OF MODERN PRAYING Gerald Ellard, S.J . 51 BOOK REVIEWS .THE MASS. By the Reverend Joseph A. Dunney . 63 A CATHOLIC DICTIONARY. Edited by Donald Attwater . 63 ALL THE DAY LONG. By Daniel Sargent . 64 "FEAR NOT, I~ITTLE FLOCK.'" By the Reverend George Zimpfer 65 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 1. Period of Recollection before Perpetual Vows . . " . 68 2. Shortening the Second Year of Novitiate . 68 3. Permission of Parents for Emergency Operation .69 4. Recital of Little Office by those absent from Community Recitation 69 5. Private Vows by Professed Religious . 70 6. Curtain between Priest and Penitent in Convent Confessional 70 DECISIONS OF THE HOLY SEE OF INTEREST TO RELIGIOUS 71 REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, January, 1942. Vol. I, No. 1. Published bi-monthly: ,January, March, May, July, September, and November, at The College Press, 606 Harrison Street, Topeka, Kansas, by St. Mary's College, St. Marys, Kansas, with ecclesiastical approbation. Application for second class entry pending. Editorial Board: Adam C. Ellis, S.3.,~ G. Augustine Ellard, S.3., Gerald Kelly, $.J. Copyright; 1942, by Adam C. Ellis. Permission is hereby granted~for quotations of reasonable length, provided due credit be given this review and the author. Address all communications to: Review for Religious, St. Mary's College, St. Mar/s, Kansas. Printed in U.S.A. Greet:ings-t: 'om !:he Bishop ot: Leavenw0rt:h WE ARE reminded of the striking analogy that exists between the Mystical Body of Christ and our own physical body. As the human body is made up of mil-lions of tiny ~ells, each cell in a sense a distinct entity having its .own function, so too, the Church is made up of millions of individual members, living individual lives; yet, even as ehch cell in our body draws life from the soul, ~so also is ~ach member of the Mystical Body of Christ quickened by the spiritual life of Sanctifying Grace. Carrying the analog~r further, we are reminded that, as the tiny individual cells are grouped so as to form individu.al organs and members of ~our body,, so too, in the Mystical .Body of Christ, individual men and women are o/~ten grouped into societies andorganizations, distinct, yet work-ing for the common good and drawing life and inspiration from th~ one spiritual head. As St. Paul reminds us,, "the eye cannot say to the hand: I need not thy help; nor again the head to the feet: I have no need of you,'; neither can the various groups within the Church be self-centered, but" they must work for the common good of the whole Church under the guidance of its head, Christ's Vicar on earth. The religious form what might be called the right arm of the Mystical Body of Christ. Ever since our Divine Savior gave the invitation to the young man in the Gospel, "if thou Wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to .the poor . and come, follow me," noble souls have been inspired to lea~e all things and seek perfection in the life of the religious. The very earliest centuries of the Church already found the deserts filled with the cells of the anchor-ites, from which soon was to be born the great monastic sys-tem as we have it today. Naturally, the unusual form of life led by the religious presents for them unusual problems. The Church in her canon law has taken cognizance of this and has devoted much space to defining the rights and duties of religious, both as indi'viduals and as institutions. However, the rami-fications of these rights and duties are so far reaching, and the field of direction towards spiritual perfection is so vast that the volumes upon volumes of commentaries that have been Written have not begun to exhaust the subje.cts. Besides, new .problems are ever arising. We have today many reviews of a general ecclesias-tical character dealing withthe multitudinou~s phases of the Church ~n general, yet we can readily see the need of a special review for the religious, not only to explain .the general laws governing their lives, but also to keep them abreast of the problems that theever-changing world is presenting to them. We feel confident therefoie that REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, which is making its bow. with this issue, will be .not .only very helpful to the religious but welcomed by the entire Church. We are happy to give it our personal approbation and fed honored that it is to be published in our Diocese. We are confident of its success under the editorial guidance of the Jesuit Fathers of St. Mary's. May it live long and effect much "pro Deo et Ecclesia!" PAUL C. SCHULTE, Bishop of Leaventvortl~. Plans :nd. ' . Acknowl dgem.ents N THIS initial number of REVIEW FoR RELIGIOus .wish tO say something Of our purpose,and ourplans, so that our readers may know rather definitely what to expect of us. ,, Our 'review is for all religious, clerical and non-clerical. However, we shall consider primarily the needs of brothe~ and nuns, bec~iuse clerics, particularly those in sacred orders, already have many excellent reviews at their disposal. This policy need not make the review less interesting to clerics, and it should increase its utility for those who may be entrusted with the spiritual guidance of other religious. In this latter connection, the review may also be of service to diocesan priests, as many of them are confessors and spiritual directors of religious. We have founded this magazine for a two-fold purpose: first, to aid °religi"ous in their personal sanctification; and secondly, to be of some service to them in carrying on their respective °apostolic works. The first purpose evidently call~ for articles of a purely ascetical nature; also for solid articles on the doctrines, legislation, and liturgy of the Church, as all true piety must ultimately conform to the Church's doctrine and practice. In line with the second purpose w~ll be a~'ticles which may have no direct bearing on ~he personal li:¢es of the religious themselves, such as background articles on various sections of the catechism, suggestions.for the care of the sick and the dying and for the ~arrying on of other ministries. Our general policy will be to offer articles of interest to all, but this policy cannot be inflexible. Some topics will be of use to superiorsand of slight value to subjects; some will be esl~ecially for brothers, others for nuns: some may concern only those engaged ina definite work such-as teaching, caring for the sick, and so forth. We think it well to adopt no general policy that would exclude such special-ized articles; otherwise our power for good would be great-ly diminished. We antidpate difficulties. The war situation evidently increases the difficulty .of .making definite plans. Some of our articles will be quite theological in content, yet these must be written in a non-technical, and understandable manner--an accomplishment that is not easy. On the part of our subscribers, some superiors have already suggested to us that a huge difficulty will be to find time for reading the review. We realize the force of. this practical objection: yet we hope that a fair number of individuals will find the time for private reading, and we suggest, that some articles frbm each issue will be suitable for community reading. The launching of. this project is the result of extensive dreaming and planning. Indeed, we should have begun many years ago, had not a certain unforeseen event delayed 9ur plans. Today, as we finally go to press, we are moved with an intense spirit of gratitude, to God for His assistance, and to all others who have helped us. Almost universally we have met with encouragement andcooperation. Our Bishop has been most kind in appro;cing our venture; our own and other re.ligious superiors were constantly helpful. Higher superiors, in general, responded very promptly and generously to our request for lists of houses to circularize: in many instances the superiors themselves sent subscrip-tions for entire congregations or provinces, thus saving us considerable labor and expense. May God bless them a11, and may He prosper this work begun for His greater glory! -~THE EDITORS. Religious Consecrat:ion Matthew .Germing, S.3. HOLY,SCRIPTURE says: "He that contemneth small things ~hall fall by little and little" (Ecclesiasticus 19:1). Spiritual writers commenting on these words rightly insist on the importance of little thing~ in the spiritual life. In the present consideration I wish to call attention, primarily, not to little things but to a big truth. I say, "primarily," because I believe that often enough interest in little things is best promoted by insistence on some large fundamental truth or fact on which the little ¯ things depend. Such a truth, once it has been thoroughly understood and assimilated, once it has. permeated the very marrow of our being and is thereafter kept vig.or.ously alive in mind an, d heart, will be a wonderfully energ,zmg force in the daily routine of life. It will extend its influence to the smallest actions of the day and thus compel us to take heed of even the little things. . Of this character is the consecration to God made by the members of every religious order and congregation. We are familiar in a general way with the meaning of consecration. Persons or things are consecrated when they are set apart and with the proper ceremonies dedicated to God or the Service of God. Thus the chalice used by the priest at Mass is consecrated; it is sacred and may not be used for any other purpose. To use it for other purposes would be sinful and sacrilegious. The same holds of a consecrated church. All religious are consecrated to Gdd by means of the three vows of religion. They are sacred in the eyes of God, far more sacred than consecrated church or ~halice. Whether they bel6ng to an active or a contemplative order, whether they are engaged in school work or hospital duties, whether in charge of orphans or caring for the aged and infirm, no matter what their function or task or position in the com-munity, all are consecrated to God. And they are so con-secrated by their three vows. There is a twofold aspect to these vows, the .negative and the positive. The negative aspect is "the privation involved in the vows, but privation is not the distinctive feature of religious poverty, chastity, and obedience. The mere lack of temporal goods does not make anyone accept.- able or sacred in God's sight. Poverty .as'such makes.many people in the world at large discontented and miserable, leading to complaints and rebellion against Providence. Nor does celibacy with its privations have of itself a sancti-fying effect. And as for obedience, a man may be a slave and be far from Christian and ev.angelical obedience. It is the motive that counts. It. is the love of Christ, the conse-cration to God which is the purpose and end of.all these sacrifices and privations, that makes them precious in the sight of heaven. And this is the positive aspect of the vows of religion. When we pronounced our vows for the first time we offered to God, to Christ our King and to His Sacred Heart all we had or possessed, and made ourselves entirely depen-dent on God and His representatives on earth. When St. Francis of Assisi bade farewell to his father and gave away the very clothes he wore, he said: "Now I can truly say, our-Father who art in heaven," Certainly Francis knew that God was his Father before that time, but he meant to say that only now was he absolutely without all earthly support whatever; he had only his Father in ¯ heaven to rely upon. And this gave him perfect joy and perfect cbnfidence. Blessed are we if our renunciation of the things of earth was nearly as complete as that of St. Francis and made in the same joyous~spirit. Then we can exclaim with him in ~ransportsof seraphic love, "My God and my all!" and pray to God in the word of another saint, "Give me only Thy love and Thy grace and I am rich enough and desire nothing more." But in pronouncing our vows we did much more than despoil ourselves of all temporal possessions out of love for Christ our Lord. We offered ourselves. There is recorded for us in Holy Scripture (I Paralipomenon 29: 16, 17) the touching prayer of King David when, surrounded by a vast multitude of his people, he offered to Almighty God the gold and silver and precious stones he had gathered from far and near for the temple which his son Solomon was to build. And David prayed: "O Lord our God, all this store ¯ that we have prepared to build thee a house for thy holy name is from thy hand, and all things are thine. I know, my God, that thou provest hearts and lovest simplicity, wherefore I also in the simplicity of my heart have 'joyfully offered all these things." We also on the day of our vows made our offerings to God in joyful spirit, presenting not gold or silver or precious stones but gifts, far more precious m the sight of heaven--the loyalty and devotion of a con-secrated soul. We knelt before the altar and in simplicity and sincerity of heart pronounced the vows of poverty, chas-tity, and obedience. Thus we made an oblat.ion to God of our entire being, our body with its senses and all their pleasures, our soul with its intellect and free will, promising to understand and do all things in accordance with the rules and constitutions of the religious life we then and there embraced in all its fulness. And we made these promises solemnly before the throne of God, in the pres-ence of Mary, Queen of heaven, of our Guardian Angel, our patron saints and the whole heavenly court as witnesses of our oblation. With holy David we acknowledged to God, "All things are thine, and we have given thee what we received of thy hand." Thus we vowed eternal loyalty to Christ and became consecrated and sacred in His eyes. This consecration was the most important event in our life, a spiritual fact of tremendous import. For it meant the abandonment of all selfish interests and complete devo-tion to the cause of Christ. Up to that time self had chiefly been the focus of our thoughts and desires; now our L6rd and Savior was to be enthroned in our mind and heart. Our. aims in life, our thinking and planning, .our capabilities of soul and body, our work and r.ecreation, our time itself, all were consecrated and must be directed to God. We are en-tirely His. We ought to make it our serious effort to understand and appreciate this fact. We should do what the Blessed Virgin did during her life on earth. And what did she do? St. Luke tells us in the second chapter of his Gospel. Toward the end of his account of the nativity Of our Lord, after narrating the apparition of the angel to the shepherds and the visit of the latter to Bethlehem, he adds: "But Mary kept in mind all these words, pondering them in her heart." We may be sure that what is told us so explicitly of her conduct in the present instance she did on many other occa.- sions in connection with the mysteries in the life of our divine Lord in which she had a large part. She treasured up in her memory the words and events, meditated on them, 10 prayed over them in the silence and quiet of her chamber, thus ever increasing in faith, hope, and the 10ve of God. Thus too she secured for herself the divine assistance, sup-port and guidance and encouragement in the daily happen-ings and sufferings of her life on earth. We ought to imitate this practice of our Blessed Mother in regard to so sacred an event in our life as our consecration to God. In the first place, we should recall it often and prayerfMly. Many religious have the commendable custom of making the renewal of'their consecration part of their morning prayer, using for the purpose a short formula; even purely mental renewal is .beneficial. We may do the same at intervals .between exercises during the day, even in the course of work which does not require dose and continu-ous attention. Our Blessed Lady gave us the example. Doubtless her mind and 1,ieart were frequently, if not habitually, occupied, with thoughts of sbme of the great mysteries in the life of her divine Son. This kept her in a state of recollection, transforming all her work into .prayer. Because of the difference of circumstances and the nature of their occupation, religious living in the modern world with its multiplic!ty of work are unable to practise recollection to. the same extent to which our Blessed Lady practised it in her home at Nazareth. Nevertheless, we must not lose sight of the fact that some degree of recoll~ction is essential for living the religious life as it should be lived. For all religious, whether members of an active or contemplative order, are consecrated to God. Consecration means total devotion to the cause of God, the cause of Christ and His Church. But they cannot effectively promote the cause of Christ unless they are devoted to prayer. And the prayer of consecrated souls must be something more than a casual and routine performance at stated times and places. Reli-gious must be penetrated and imbued with the true spirit of prayer, which comes only with thought and reflection and intimate converse between God and the soul. How can they achieve this spirit and continue it once they have achieved it if they do not strive with all the means at their disposal to attain to some degree of interior recollection? It is easier to keep up a high degree of recollection in somepositions or spheres of duty than in others. This holds of all religious communities whose members are engaged in the active life. But to whatever duty individual religious are assigned, all 11 must remember that their life of prayer, their spiritual life in generall will not take care of itself. The' saying is true that no one will be much more in prayer than he or she is out of prayer. In other words, they who outside of praye~ scatter their attention over a variety of interests, neither necessary nor useful for their work, will be unable to pray well beyond a few minutes when the hour comes for their devotional exercises. The inference is not that recollection is to interfere with attention to duty. Duty comes first. But there are moments and intervals when thoughts are free from assigned work and the employment of time is left to each one's discretion. These are favorable moments for the care and attentio.n which religious ought to have for their personal spiritual welfare. And if at such times they follow the promptings of mere curiosity, seeking the news of the day or other information not necessary or useful for them, thus spending the time in useless reading or. idle con-versation, they are losing precious opportunities' for sanc-tifying themselves. I said above that, in the first place, we ought frequently and prayerfully to recall the fact of our consecration to God. It is a thought pregnant with meaning for all of us and will be a great aid to recollection in the course of the day. Secondly, it will be decidedly profitable to take~ our consecration now and then for the subject of daily medita-tion. In such a meditation we may first consider, the ¯ meaning of our consecration. It means complete dedication ¯ "to God by means of the three vows, oblation of all that we have, all that we are, all that we are able to do--our thoughts, words, and actions; it means an act of the most perfect love of God. Then we may reflect on its obliga-tions. They are the observance of the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience; of the rules and constitutions of the order, and obedience to the commands of superiors. Finally, we may think of its adoantages. The most impor-tant ones are that it frees us from many s~rious dangers of sin, furnishes numerous aids in the practice of every kind of virtue, aligns us with that choice company of the army of Christ which would signalize itself by special service to its Leader, renders us sacred in the eyes of God, is a sign of God's predilection, has Christ's promise of the highest reward-- they "shall receive a hundredfold and shall possess life ever-lasting" (Matthew 19:29). Conclusion. We may Con- 12 clude-with sentiments of esteem and love of our vocation with its consecration to God; humility; gratitude to God. Another opportunity for strengthening ourselves in our consecration to God is the Monthly Recollection. It is a time of spiritual grace, when God reveals Himself more fully to our souls. We should do our part by making a brief survey of the month that has passed, considering in detail and with more than ordinary scrutiny whether we are living up to ~:he requirements of our state. It is not a question of merely seeing whether we have avoided deliber-ate sin. This too merits our attention, as a matter of course. We must look to our religious ideals, the perfection of our daily actions, the motives that animate us from early .morning till late at night. Are we seeking God in all things in all our doings? Are ,Jesus Christ and His interests habitually in our thoughts, or is self frequently uppermost in our minds, controlling and directing our purposes and policies? Our Blessed Lord said: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whold strength" (Mark 12:30). This is the perfection we are bound to strive after in its literal sense. It is the epitome, the compendium of all that is contained in our consecration to God. We are consecrated to God, sacred in His eyes. It would be quite wrong and detrimental to our spiritual life if, by reason of this, we were to fall into the error of conceiving and fostering self-complacency, as though we were the favorite~ of Almighty God and better than other people. If God has manifested His predilection towards us by bestowing the efficacious grace of a religious vocation, He has by that very fact also imposed on us graver obligations and responsibilities. In all humility we should thank God for what He has done for us and for all other men, each of us saying with the patriarch ,Jacob, "I am not worthy of the least of all thy mercies and of thy truth which thou hast f.ulfilled to thy servant" (Genesis 32:10). It is very important for .us to maintain~ an attitude of thankfulness and humility. Let us remember our Lord's words to His Apostles: "You have not chosen me, .but I have chosen you". (,John 15:16). He has chosen us out of the world and transferred us into a kingdom of light and grace that, like the Apostles; we might "bring forth fruit." It-remains for us to distinguish ourselves in His service by an ever increasing love and generosity, a more steadfast loyalty to the consecration which we made of ourselves when we pronounced our vows. In this way a big fundamental spiritual truth, kept fresh in mind and heart by daily prayer and recollection, will exercise oa salutary influence On the little things of every day life. It will have the effect Of sweepingaside in a moment the petty and narrow views arising from selfish-ness, just as the bright rising sun scatters the mist on a mid-summer day.' JOHN NEPOMUCENE NEUMANN Just before the first issue of REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS went to press, we received a letter from the Reverend Albert H. Waible, C.SS.R., Vice-Postulator of the Cause for Beatification of the Venerable John Neumann, C.SS.R. John Nepomucene Neumann was the first pro-fessed Redemptorist in the United States and the fourth Bishop of Philadelphia. On December 11, 1921, Pope Benedict XV approved the decree declaring that John Neumann had practised heroic virtue, and he was given the title of Venerable. The Holy Father's words on that occasion are singularly appropriate for readers of REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS : "We deem it proper to say that all our children should profit by the. Decree of today by reason of the peculiar character of the heroic virtues of Ven. Neumann. Perhaps the very simplicity of these virtues has been misunderstood by those Who thought there was no heroic degree in the virtues of the Servant of God. because in their eyes the good works and holy deeds performed by Neumann are. the holy .and good deeds which every good religious, every zealous missionary, every good bishop should perform. ¯ We need not repeat that works even the most simple, performed with constant perfection in the midst of i~aevitable difficulties, spell heroism in any servant of God. Just because of the simplicity of his works, We find in them a strong argu-ment for saying to the faithful of whatever age, sex, or condition: You are all bound to imitate the Ven. Neumann.,. If, in spite of this, there should be some who still seem surprised and cannot pic-ture him to themselves as a hero apart from grand undertakings, We hasten to say that wonderful results can spring from simple deeds, . provided these are performed as perfectly as possible and with unre-mitting constancy." Those interested in Bishop Neumann's cause can procure a small pamphlet biography from the Mission Church Press, 1545 Tremont St., Boston, Mass. 5 cents a copy; $3.50 per 100. 14 The Vow ot: Poverl:y in !:he Code ot: Canon Law Adam C. Ellis, S.,L IIF't LESSED are the poor in spirit, .for theirs is the king-dom of heaven" (Matthew 5:3). This poverty of spirit for which the Gospel promises the kingdom of heaven consists essentially in keeping one's heart free from attachment to temporal goods. It is the first means, though not the most important, which man must make use of to win heaven.or to attain to perfection. The reason for this is that poverty of spirit is the cure for that evil which is the root of all others according to the Apostle: "For covet-ousness is the root of all evil" (I Timothy 6:10). That is why our Lord not only began his preaching with it, but also gave us the example in His own person of a life of pov-erty from the crib in the stable of Bethlehem to the cross on Calvary. And when He wished to teach men the secret and the way ot~ perfection, he tells us again, in the instance of the rich young man, that. poverty is the starting point. "If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast. and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me" (Matthew 19:21). The first persons who took this lesson to heart and put it into practice were the Apostles, who in turn imparted it to the primitive church, and thus impressed upon religious communities the form of perfect poverty. In canon 488 of the Code ot: Canon Law, the Church tells us that the three vows ot~ religion, obedience, chastity, and poverty, are means by ~vhich religious strive at~ter per-t: ecfion; Hence in all orders and congregations approved by the Church these three essential vows must be taken, either explicitly, as in modern congregations, or as least implicitly, as in the older orders. In its essentials the vow 6f poverty is the same: for all religious, but the constitutions of different orders and congregations add details to these fundamental notions according to the particular spirit ot~ each institute. Evangelical poverty as set forth in the constitutions of a religious institute, may be considered from different points of view. It-is not our intention to give an ascetical ¯ or a moral.interpretation of the vow of poverty; we leave .15 that to others, who, we trust, will favor us later on with articles in the REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS dealing with these aspects. It is our purpose now to study the present laws of the Ghurch regarding the personal poverty of religious, as promulgated in the Code of Canon Law, since these laws are applicable to all religious, and are usually incorporated into the constitutions o~ all religious institutes. The Nature of the Vow of Pooert~/. The vow of pov-erty is a promise made to God by whicla the religious deprives himself of the right to place any act of proprietor-sbip over any material thing having a money value, with-out the lawful permission of his superior, The proper and distinctive character of proprietorship or ownership of property is the power to dispose of it freely and independently/: that is, to use it, to give it away, to sell it, to destroy it, at will, as an absolute master over it. without any obligation of having recourse to the will of another, hence independently of the will or permission of another. The essence of the simple vow of poverty consists, therefore, in the privation of this right to dispose freely and independently of temporal goods, of whatsoever kind they may be. The subject-matter of the vow is the possession and use of temporal things, independently of the will of superiors. Whatever the degree of poverty prescribed by the con-stitutions of any particular institute may be, only such things as come under the heading of temporal goods or property constitute the subject-matter of poverty. Other things, such as health, the use of one's bodily members, one's mental and spiritual faculties, talents, supernatural gifts, are not the subject-matter of the vow of poverty. Temporal goods or property, therefore, include any object of money value that a person can acquire and possess or hold, anything that can be owned. Personal goods or property are such things as can be kept on or near one's per-son, usually all movable goods. Real property or real estate consists in lands and whatever is attached to the land, houses and buildings of any kind. The general term, prop-. erty or temporal goods, therefore, comprises every material thing which has a money value, such as: money, real estate, stocks, bonds, mortgages, jewelry, and all movable and per-sonal objects having a money value. By his vow of poverty 16 the religious refiounces his right to place any act of owner- Ship over such goods without the permission of his supe-rior. The vow of poverty, therefore, forbids the religious: 1) every independent act of appropriation, e.g. to acquire, keep, use, receive, borrow from another; 2) every act of disposal of property: to give away, to sell, to lend, or lease to another, to allow goods to deteriorate or perish. All these acts, placed without the permission of the superior or of the constitutions, are contrary to the vow of poverty. The various degrees of sinfulness of these acts is a moral question and outside the limits of this article. Let us now take up the general legislation of the Church regarding the vow of poverty, keeping in mind that these laws obligate all religious, and that any contrary leg-islation in the constitutions has been revoked by the Code of Canon Law, unless a special apostolic privilege has been obtained. I. A religious who has tatien a simple vow of poverty, whether temporar!t or perpetual, retains the ownership of his property, as well as the capacity to acquire, more, unless the constitutions provide otherwise (cf. canon 580, § 1). The distinction between a simple and a solemn vow ~s the result of church legislation. ~ A religious who takes a solemn vow of poverty deprives himself not only of every right to place act~ proprietorship, as explained above, but he freely gives up even the right to own temporal goods. Such a religious must give away all that he. possesses, within sixty days preceding his solemn profession. After taking the solemn vow, he can no longer acquire temporal goods for himself, since by his vow he has renounced his very right to own, hence whatever may come to him by way of inheri-tance or gift, he acquires for his institute (cf. canons 581 and 582). The religious who takes a simple vow of poverty, on the contrary, retains his right to own, that is to possess property; hence he is not deprived of his property by the simple vow, but continues to be the owner of all that he possessed at the time of his religious profession. Further-more, he retains the capacity to acquire more property or temporal goods even after he has taken the simple vow of poverty. Such is the provision of. the general law of the Church today for all religious. The Church allows the constitutions to limit this right, but since there are very few constitutions ;which do so,,we.shall omit any comment On this detail, and we shall suppose hereafter that no such limitation has been placed. iI. The simple vow of poverty makes a" contrary a~t illticit, but not invalid, unless the contrarg, has been expressly decreed (cf. canon 579). The effects of the vow of poverty are determined by the law of the Church. That law says that the simple vow of poverty makes a.contrary act illicit, which means that if a religious with a simple vow of poverty disposes of or in any way exercises rights over his property without permis-sion, he-.commits a sin,. venial or grave acc.ording, to the gravity of the illicit transaction. However, the act which he places, for example, the gift or s~ile of temporal goods, is valid, that is, it is recognized as legal by canon law, unless the contrary is expresslydecreed. Such a prohibition may be contained in the general law of the Church," as 'happens in the case of a religious who takes a simple vow of poverty in an order in which he is to take solemn vows later on. Canon 581 § 1. forbids .him under pain of invalidity to give away his property, except within sixty days preceding his solemn profession. If such a religious gives away any property, the act is null and void, ~which means that the person to whom he,gave it must return it, and may not keep it. Thus if Sister Generosa, a member of a religious congregation, gave all her property to her needy family off the day 9n which she took her first vows, her parents may keep it, since the act is a valid act. Sister Generosa, how-ever, acted illicitly, that is, she violated her vow of povert.y :by transgressing the law of the church, unless she. did so m good faith, being ignorant of the law. Off'the other hand, if Brother John, a member of the Carmelite order, gave away all his property on the day he took his first simple vows, the person to whom he gave it would be obliged to give it back to him, because his act was not only illicit but also invalid. He can give away his property validly only within sixty days of his solemn profession. III.' If during his novitiate, a novice in any way what-ever renounces his property, or.encumbers it, such a renun-ciation or encumbrance is not only illicit, but also null and void (cf. canon 568). This legislation comes down to us from the Council of Trent. It applies to all novices, whether in a pontifical or 18 in a diocesan institute, and to all their temporal goods, whether movable or immovable, real or personal. The pur-poseof the legislation is to safeguard the freedom of action of both the novice and of the institute regarding the profes-sion to be made at the end of the novitiate. The novice may wish to leave, the institute may be unwilling to admit him to profession. Hence the wisdom of the legislation. To renounce one's property means to give up the right to it by freely and lawfully transferring it to another with-out recompense. A novice may, therefore, sell his.property and invest the proceeds, or. put the money in a bank for the time being. He may, likewise, freely~dispose of the income of his property during the novitiate, or add it .to his capital. He must pay his.debts, of course, and may pay for his board and clothing during the'novitiate provided this is required by the constitutions, or agreed upon before entrance into the postulancy, or novitiate in conformity with canon 5 70, §1. To er~carnber one's property means to put a burden or obligation upon it. Hence a novice may not promise to give away a certain part of 'his property or all of it on condition that he perseveres in the religious state and is admitted to profession. He may not mortgage his property.,-as that would be placing an encumbrance .upon it. While the law of the Church does not forbid such renunciation and encumbrance during the postulancy, the same reasons make such an act inadvisable. If such a renun-ciation is made for grave reason during the postulancy, it should be made conditionally, so that the postulant may be able to regain his property in case he does not persevere in religion, and must return to the world. Even before the Code went into effect i~ was a common opinion of canonists that novices could give alms to the poor, to pious causes, and even to their own institute, pro-vided that small amounts were given on rare occasions, The same is permitted under the Code. Thus a novice would be allowed to have a number of Masses said for the repose of. the soul of his father or mother who dies during his novitiate. Supposing that our novice persevere~, and that his institute is ready to admit him to his first profession~, the .law. of the Church requires him to place certain acts in rdgard to his property before he takes his first ~vows. 19 IV. Before the profession of simple vows, whether temporory or perpetual., the novice must cede, for the entire period during Which he wilt be bound bg simple vows, the administration of bis~ 15ropertg to whomsoever he wishes, and dispose freelg of its use and usufruct, unless the consti-tutions determine otberu;ise (cf. canon 569, § 1). We have seen above that the simple vow of poverty does not deprive the novice who takes it of the ownership of his property or of the right to acquire more property after he. has taken the simple vow of poverty. On the other hand, one of the purposes of the vow is to free the religious from the worries and distractions connected with the care and management of temporal goods. Hence the Church wisely decrees that the novice must turn over to another the administration of his property if he has any. He may choose any person he wishes to act as his administrator: his parents, a brother or sister, a friend, a lawyer, a trust com-pany. He may also ask his institute or province or house to assume this task if superiorslare willing tO accept it. Let us u.nderstand what an administrator is. All of us have heard on occasion, after the death of a person, that the deceased had appointed an administrator of his estate in his will, or if he died intestate, the court appointed somebody to fill this office until the estate could besettled. The per-son appointed cares for the estate or collection of temporal goods owned by the deceased, pay bills, collects rents, as well as interest on money deposited in banks or due on stocks and bonds, keeps buildings in repair, pays taxes and the like. In a word, an administrator performs all those ordinary acts which the deceased person performed during his lifetime for the preservation and increase of his prop-erty. Once the novice has appointed his administrator, he must leave to him all these acts of ordinary administration of his property. He may be consulted as regards extra-ordinary acts of administration, such as the sale of his property, and the investment of the money derived from such a sale, and be has the right to receive an annual report of the condition of his property. The administrator is entitled to some recompense in proportion to his labor. Once the administrator has been freely appointed, the religious may not replace him by another without the per-mission of his superior general, unless the constitutions of his institute allow him to do so of his own accord (cf.canon 20 580, § 3). It4s evident that the novice who has no prop-erty at the-time of his first profession .need not appoint an administrator. The disposition or: his income: The novice must dispose freely of the use and usufruct of his pr.operty, if he has any. If his property consists of real estate, a farm, a house and lot, etc. he may ~rant the use of such property to anybody he wishes. If his property is productive, real estate which brings in rents, or stocks and bonds producing income or interest, such income is called the fruits of his property, or .the usufruct. It is evident that were the religious to retain the free disposal¯ of such income in his own hands, it would become a source of distraction and worry to him. Hence the Code prescribes that, before he takes his first vows, he must determine, once for all, the person or persons who are to be given the use of or the income of his property for the duration of his vows. He may choose whomsoever he wishes as the beneficiary of bis income: his parents, a brother or sister, some charitable work, his own institute. It would be well for the novice, before making his decision, to think seriously on those words of our Lord: "give to the poor." His parents may be in need, or he may have a brother or sister struggling to raise a family or to get an education; then there are so many forms of Christian char-ity in need of funds to carry on their work: hospitals, or-phanages, homes for the poor, etc; lastly the novzce should also consider the needs of his own institute before coming to a decision. But the final decision rests with him, unless the constitutions of his institute determine otherwise. There are some constitutions approved before the promultzation of the Code which deprive the novice of the right to dispose of the use and usufruct of his property, or restrict that right or define it, e.g. by limiting such disposal in favor of a char-itable work, or by designating or excluding the institute as the beneficiary. Whatever the dispositions of such consti-tutions may be, they must be observed (Code Commission, Oct. 16, 1919). Once the novice has made this disposition of the use or income of his property, he may not change it in favor of someone else without the permission of his superior gen-eral, unless the constitutions' allow him to do so of his own accord (canon 580, § 3). It will-be Well to call attention here to a restriction which this same canon places on 'th~ 2I right to chahge the beneficiary with the permission ~of the superior general.~ Such modification or change mustnot be made, at least for a notable part of the income, in favor of the institute. Permission of the Holy See is necessary to make such a change in favor of the institute (Code Com-mission, May 15, 1936), if there is question of a notable part, say one-fourth, or certainly one-third Of the same. This point should be made clear to the novice before he chooses the person who is to have the use or the income of his property. While he is free before taking his first vows to appoint hisown institute (orhis province or house) as the beneficiary of his income, ifas a matter of fact, he does not do so, but appoints some other person, he may not later " cbang.e .this disposition in favor of.his ihstitute without the permission of the Holy See, if there is question of one third or more of the entire income. If, later on, after having taken his vows, the religious should leave his institute and the religious life, these appointments of an administrator and of the beneficiary of his income cease to have a.ny effect, and he regains comple.te control of his property. It may happen that a novice has no property at the time be takes his first vows. Later on, after takin~ his vows, he acquires pkoperty by inheritance or gift. What is to be don~? " " V. :In case the novice, because he possessed no property, omitted to make the cession and disposition mentioned above, but later on acquires p. ropertq, or i~:, after making the cession and disposition ~n question, be becomes the possessor of more property under whatever title, be must then' make the cession and disposition for the ~irst time, or repeat it, iri regard to the newI~/ acquired property/, his simple vow o~: povern.] notwit.bstanding (cf. canon 569, §2). In this case the religious whopossessed no property at the time of his first profession, but. later on acquires prop-erty, needs no permission to appoint an administrator and to determine who is to have the use of this newly acquired property, or the income thereof. The law obliges him to do .so. Similarly, if, after having appointed an adminis-trator and determined a beneficiary of the income of his property, a religious, after taking his vows, acquires new property by inheritance, gift, and so forth, he must then 22 repeat the same acts in regard to h!,s. newly acquired prop-erty. Of course he may simply say: I wish the same admin-istrator, already appointed, to take care of it, and I wish the same person or persons, already recei~,ing the income of my property, to receive the income of this new property like-wise." He may, howe.ver, appoint a different person administrator, and a different person the beneficiary of the income of this newly acquired property, if he wishes to do so, It may be noted in 1Sassing that an increase in value of property already possessed does not constitute a new acquirement of property .within the meaning of the law. Hence if the real estate, or the stocks and bonds which a religious owns, increase in value because of a land boom, or because of a rise in the stock market, such a religious may not consider that increase in value as a new acquirement of property. Nothing is to be done in such a case. VI. In ever{] religious congregation the novice, before taking his temporarg vouJs, must freetg make a will or tes-tament regarding all the propertg he actuatl~l possesses, or mag subsequentl~l possess (cf. canon 569, § .3). A will is a legal declaration of a man's intentions as to the disposition of his property that he wills to be carried out afterhis death. Strictly speaking, a testament differs from a will in that it bequeaths personal property only; but the terms are used interchangeably. By his will, there-fore, the novice does not give away his property here and now. ° He merely indicates the person Or persons whom he wishes to come into possession of it after his death. As long as he lives he retains the ownership of all his prop-erty. The beneficiary of his will becomes possessor of the property of the. religious only after the latter dies. Every novice in a religious congregation must make a will before taking his first, temporary vows, whether he actually owns any property or not, the reason being that the will includes everything that may come to the religious dur!ng his life-time, and of which he dies possessed. Novices about to take their first, temporary vows in an order are not obliged to make a will, since they must give away whatever they possess before they take their solemn vows. They are not forbidden, howe~er, to make a will valid for the period of their profession of simple vows, ~hould their wish to do so. ¯ Members of a religious congregation who took their 23 first vows before the Code went into effect (May 19, 1918), are not obliged to make a will, even though they acquired more property after that date, or will akquire such property in the future. But they ar~ not forbidden to make a will, should they wish to do so, and generally speaking, it is advisable for them to make a will.But all religious in every congregation who took their first, temporary vows after May 19, 1918 are obliged to make a will as soon as possible, if they have not done so already. The law requires this, even though it had been omitted in good faith. Even though the novice who is about to take his first vows cannot make a will valid in civil law because of a lack of the required age, he is still bound by canon law to make his will, and later on, when he becomes of legal age, he must tlake the steps necessary to make his will'valid in divil law as well. The Code says that the novice must freel~t make a will. This does not mean that he is free to make a will. or not, but that he who makes the will prescribed by canon law is free to choose the beneficiary of his will, that is he freely chooses the person or persons he wishes to take possession of any property he may own at the time of his death. May a religious ever change his will after he has freely made it? VII. No religious may change his will once made in "conformity with the requirements of canon law as explained above without the permission of the Hotel See, or. in case of urgencq, abd time does not permit of recourse to the Holg See, without the permission o3 his superior gen-eral, or of his local superior if the former cannot be' reached (cf. canon 583, 2°). A will is not considered altered or changed if certain prescriptions are merely made clearer, or if a will'which is invalid in civil law is changed merely to conform with the requirements of that law, so long as in both cases the bene-ficiary remains the same. Should the person named as bene-ficiary in the will of a religious die, the will becomes ineffec-tive and has no value. Hence no permission is needed to make a new will, since by so doing the religious is simply fialfilling the law of the Church which requires him to make a will. The will he had made is no longer valid, hence he is without a will, and must make another in order to fulfill the law, 24 As long as the religious with simple vows continues, to live in a religious congregation he may ~not give away his property. VIII. It is forbidden to the professed of simple" uows in a congregation to abdicate gratuitously the dominion ouer their property b~/ a voluntary deed of conveyance (cf. canon 583, 1°). To abdicate gratuitously means to give away one's property without receiving any monetary recompense in return. The motive for giving away one's property may be a spirit of gratitude, or friendship, or a charitable desire to help others in need, or to further 'the cause of some pious work. No matter what the motive may be, the Church forbids all religious with simple vows in a congregation to give away their property as long as they remain in religion. Due to the uncertain times in which we live, it can and does happen that religious freely leave or are obliged to leave their institute, or the institute itself may be dispersed by reason of persecution which is 'always present in the Church in some part of the world. Should any one of these con-tingencies arise, the religious will not be obliged to return to the world penniless, thus bringing Shame on religion, or becomin~ a burden to others, but he will be able to support himself with the aid of the temporal goods he brought with him when he entered religion, or which he received by. way of inheritance or gift during his stay in the religious life. Since the law says a religious is forbidden to give away his property, but does not say that such an act is invalid as it does in the case of a novice and of the religious with simple vows in an order in which he is to take solemn vows later on, it follows-that if a religious in a congregation has actually freely given away his property contrary to the pre-scription of the law, the act is a valid act, and.the religious cannot reclaim his prbperty. If he did so in good faith, in ignorance of the law, he will be free from all moral guilt in the matter. But all religious in congregations, whether papal or diocesan, should understand clearly that their supe-riors cannot give them permission to dispose of thei~ patri-money, as the sum total of their temporal goods is. called, during th~i~ lifetime in religion. The permission of the Holy See would have to be obtained before this couId be done licitly. A final question arises with regard to the property of O~ 25 religious with simple vows. We have seen that such a re!igidus retains his ownership over the property, he-pos-sessed at the time of his entrance into religion, as well as the capacity to acquire more property, even after he has taken his simple vow of pover~;y. How are we to decide what a religious may and must keep and add to his patrimony, what be must give to his institute of the temporal things which come to him during his life in religion? IX. Whatever a religious acquires b~j l~is own industrg, or in respect to his institute, he acquires for his institute (cf. canon 580, § 2). A religious with simple vows acquires for himself, that~ is, as part of his patrimony or collection of his temporal possessions, whatever he receives by way of inheritance, legacy or personal gift. But whatever comes to him by reason of his own industry goes to his institute. To acquire b.u one's own industrtl means by one's mental and physical efforts, such as writing a book, or making a work of art, a painting or fancy needle work, or by reason of one's profes-sion, recompense received for teaching, nursing and the like. Since the religious has become a member of thereligious family by his profession of vows, and is suppotted, fed, clothed and educated by the institute, which supplies all his reasonable wants, it is but meet and just that the fruits of his:labors should go to the institute. To acquire in respect to the institute refers to what is given to a religious not as an individual person, to John Jones; or to Mary Blank, but to the religious as a religious, to Brother Plus, or to Sister Martha, for the community to which he or she belongs, in order to help the Charitable or educational work in which the community is engaged, or because of the confidence and respect which the institute as a whole inspires in the donor because of its religious activ-ity. In a word a religious acquires in repect to his insti-tute whatever is g.iven to him because be is a religious. In cases of doubt, when it is not certain that the gift was per-sonal to the religious, the presumption will be that it was made in favor of the institute. This presumption applies especially to superiors. Small gifts given on special occa-sions such as feast days or at Christmas time to a teacher by his pupils, and so forth, are presumed to be given to the religious because he is a religious, not for personal reasons. The constitutions usually regulate such gifts. 26 The I::ducafion ot: Sis :ers William 3. McGucken, S.,J. THIS IS an altogether extraordinary book that should be of particular interest to the readers of the REVIEW FOR RELIGIDU$. It is not a dull book, despite the fact that it is in the genre of the much despised doctoral dissertations in Education (with a capital E). Sister Bertrande has a reporter's sense of what constitutes news, a reporter's abil-ity to penetrate beyond the barriers and get a "story" from. her unwilling victim. Very briefly, the book is the narra-tive of what has been done in America for the religious, social, cultural, and professional education of sisters, what is being done, and, most significant of all, what should be done. With the first two parts of the book no one can disagree; the facts are presented with such ingenious clarity that he who runs may read.In the third part one may question some of the proposals on the ground that they are too detailed, too rigidly regimented after the immemorial fashion of nuns, but with the main features of her proposal to give a truly sound and truly Catholic education (this time without the capital E) to American nuns there can be no disagreement. The true story of Catholic education in the United States, especially the education .of women, has yet to be written: its tale of heroisms, sacrifices, blunderings, and fatal failures have been chronicled in part. here and there. notably in Mother Callan's excellent study, The Society! of the Sacred Heart in North America, but nowhere can one find a complete picture of the whole scene. Particularly is this the case with American Catholic ~ducational policy as it affects the religious qua religious. The old saying "Cucullus non.facit monachum" is all too dreadfully true, but unfortunately many religious superiors believed the wimple made the nun. Every religious over fifty years of age knows that there was a time in the history of the sister-hoods in America when a young woman, often not even a high school graduate, was passed through a rapid postu- 1 THE EDUCATION OF SISTERS. A. plan for Integrating the Religious~ Social, Cul-tural, an'd Professional Training of Sisters. By Sister Bertrande Meyers. New York: Sh~ed add Ward, 194i. Pp. xxxiii + 255. $3.75. 27 l~ncy, given a Veil, and sent out to teach. Granted that mother superiors were forced by circumstances, the impor-tunings of bishops and parish priests, granted that the nuns thus sent off the assembly line with less than a year's training made up for their lack of acquaintance with the vchole idea and ideals of ~eligious life by their practices of piety, their simple devotion, their childlike faith, yet it still remains an inscrutable mystery of divine providence that there were not more individual catastrophes as a result of this short-sighted policy. The first .World War came along; there was a multi-plication of school~; especially of sisters' high schools and colleges: there was also a tightening of the reins by the accrediting agencies. .Moreover, Rome. was insistent on religious communities adhering to their constitutions. At last, it is true, the nuns were obliged to, spend, at least a canonical yeay in the novitiate, but in order to satisfy the professional requirements necessary to teach, many .of the sisterhoods had to resort to miserable subterfuges in order° to securethese "credits." A tragic.story, truly, this filching from the r~eligious training 9f the novice to satisfy ttie craze for credits. Nor is it over even now. Sister Bertrande says (of the year 1940) : "Isolated instances were even found where credit was given [dur!ng the Canonical Year] in Church History or World History for reading Lives of the Saints, in Home Economics for the daily.domestid work, and in Philosophy Of Education for the daily instructions of the' Mistress of Novices. iiO,,ne of ~he Mistresses of N0yices co,mplai~is bitterly: In the first place, there is a sii nion~h s postulate. But. lJefore the postulant can be.inducted into religious life She :is made conscious of credits to be earned towards her teaching credentials;.so her day is full of classes. That is not so bad, since this is just the Posti~late, but it would be better if she ~studied something like Logic--that would teach her how to think. But no. Methods of teaching, all professional subje.cts come togeth~er to make the girl more conscious of the need to become a good teacher rather than a true religious. " 'Then--the Canonical YEar. It is so taken, up with studies in the field of education that when a novice is asked how she is coming along in recollection, she says: "Recollec- 28 tion? Why I can think of nothing but getting my school work"done--there is no time even for class preparation." Spiritual exercises ar~ curtailed; classwork takes precedenc~ over interviews with the. Mistress of Novices--often I have to scheme little ways of finding an opportunity to give direction to a novice-who stands in need. " 'Two and one-half hours a day are allowed for Novi-tiate routine such as. instructions, spiritual reading, confes-sions, etc. If anything must be put aside it must be any-thing but classwork. Thus it happens that a thin, super-ficial religious decorum takes the place of depth and breadth in the spiritual life. And no real, permanent culture comes from this cramming of normal work. " 'The second, year the novices are sent out to teach. They go out to teach with good will, but with no concept of the interior life. There was a time when the second year was strictly a part of the Novitiate; .but it began With "bor-rowing" two or three novices for sorely pressed missions, and the Borrowed novices, were .never returned. Then, a few more were borrowed. Now, there is no pretence at leaving them in the Novitiate for a second year. They are robbed of their Canonical Year with a full program 0f studies; the second year they leave for the local schools, and as a~result we have teachers with no real Understanding of their Community or of' the obligations of religious life'." It should be noted that this condition has held ever since the State Departments have insisted on professional requirements for teachers; it still holds today, let us hope only in "isolated instances." It can be left to the reader's imagination what the situation was in the period immedi-ately after World War I when every major superior was confronted with the choice of closing a certain number~of schools or getting credits for her sisters somehow, some-where. The result: a conflict, was set up in the mind of the young religious; she was told that her spiritual develop-ment comes first, and yet much was done to interfere with her allowing her religious life to take first place. A very interesting part of the book is Sister Bertrande's discussion of the effect of secular universities on religious women. The majority of provincials,~mistresses of novices, deans of nuns' colleges feel that it does~harm, that there is a weakening of the Catholic: sense, but some are sure that they are forced to attend for certain courses in the graduate field. 29 It is not explicitly stated that the real reason for the danger tO sisters at secular graduate schools is the haphazard quality of the undergraduate preparation received by many of them: they have not a Catholic view of life, even though they may be very devout religious. "One point was uniformly expressed.m that the courtesy and consideration which sisters met in dealing with the officials and the faculties in secular universities outdis-tanced that which was experienced in Catholic centers." One just wonders if it is not possible that the more poorly prepared for graduate work attend Catholic universities, the brilliant students, the ones superiors are absolutely sure of, frequent the non-Catholic institution. Moreover, Catholic institutions have possibly far more experience of those "isolated instances" where nuns present transcripts of worthless credits than the officials of the secular universi-ties. It is g.ratifying to see from Sister Bertrande's tables that there is a tremendous increase in the attendance of sis-ters at Catholic institutions and a corresponding decrease in attendance at secular universities. One startling fact in the picture presented of the con-temporary education of Catholic sisters is this: relatively t~ew ot~ our nuns receive a thorough grounding in liberal arts. Even where the situation in the Canonical Year has been bettered, 'it is very rare indeed for a sister to be set aside to complete her course for the Bachelor of Arts degree. ~here. there is a second year of novitiate, studies are crowded, into this year--too many, alas, professional studies; that year ended, the novicepronounces her vows and is immediately sent on a mission. Carrying a full teach-ing schedule, she attempts to garner credits after school hours, on Saturday mornings, and in summer sessions. After she has attained the mystica! number of 120, she may be sent to graduate school, utterly unprepared for graduate work by this hurried amassing of credits which she has had no time to digest. It is not thus that bachelors of ar~s are made. One can say that many, not all, bachelors of arts in American colleges are in no better fix. This may be true, but the fact remains that sisters because of their profession as teachers should be thoroughly grounded in systematic fashion in the liberal arts. What this crowding of the day of the young religious does to her spiritual life can be left to the imagination. If this or a similar condition were bad a 30 generation ago, when life was .simpler, when our' novices came from good Catholic families with a tradition of reli-gious practice,, what must it not be today when we find the product even of our convent schools woefully lacking in Catholic principles and practices because of poor home training and the prevalent paganism of the American scen~. Sister Bertrande's plan for the education of postulants, with its emphasis on instruction in Catholic faith and prac-tice, so necessary at all times but especially in these times, its ignoring of all secular subjects except. Speech and Music, is espe.cially commended to all major superiors. So too her plan for the Canonical Year--one might wish that this part~ were continued everywhere for two years--with its rigid exclusion of everything but Religion and Gregorian Music will help to make our sisters strong religious women. Some Will quarrel with the curriculum Sister Bertrande out-lines for the two-year curriculum for the Community Jun-ior College. Too many of the courses, some would think, bear the mark of superficiality so characteristic of survey courses. However, that is a minor detail. The one point is brought Out that the postulancy and novitiate are devoted to God and the development of the spiritual life in the indi-vidual; two yeais of junior college are to be added to com-plete the foundation of their liberal arts program, with the leisure necessary for that. purpose. After that Sister Bert-rande recommends that the new sister be sent to a Catholic college for the completion of the work that is needed for the degree. The author does not say that they should be sent immediately. Perhaps it is too far away from the prac-ticalities of American convent life for her to recommend that. All in all this is a book that should be read and digested by everyone who has anything to do with the education of sisters,--major superiors, Catholic college professors and administrators, at least that they may acquire the saooir i:aire~ of their non-Catholic confr~res,.last but not least, pastors, that they may understand the difficulties under which the sisters in their parish schools are laboring. It is a book that had to be written: the candid objective presen-tation of facts can do no harm; it may prove to be of ines-timable benefit to future generations of sisters, if .present superiors heed the pointed lesson that is written here. 31 i~lygienic Morfit:ic~fion G. Augustine Ellard, S.J. ~'~NE of the most prominent ascetical writers of the ~ J twentieth century and at the same time an authority ~ on the history of the spiritual life in the Church, namely, Msgr. Saudreau, states that the principal defect in the cultivation of the interior life in our days is a lack of bodily mortification (1). Moreover, the want of mortifi-cation is assigned by Father De Guibert, of Rome, a leader among contemporary ascetical and mystical theologians, as the reason why so few pass beyond mediocrity in the spir-itual life (2). Perhaps one of the main reasons or pretexts why most devout people do not practice more external mortification is the fear that it would injure their health, or at least lessen their strength and capacity for work. One might answer that an abundance of mortification, and that too of a supe-rior form, may be found precisely in learning and living up to the principles of hygiene. Let us assume, for the present purpose; that mortifica-tign consists in any or all acts of virtue in as much as these involve foregoing what is pleasant or undergoing what is unpleasant. Thus it would be coexten,s, ive with the spher, e, covered by the old rule of the Stoics: bear and fork;ear. Though the word mortification (putting to death) may suggest the contrary, all sound ascetical authorities would hold that the purpose of it is posltix;e: life, a~nd more life. If inferior vital tendencies are checked and thwarted, it is only in order that the higher vital tendencies may bd saved from being checked and thwarted, and that they may be more freelyand richly developed. By all means, the aim of sound mortification is more and better life rather than less. "Ever we bear about in our body the dying of Jesus, so that the life, too, of Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies. For we who live are ever being delivered up to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life, too, of Jesus may be made manifest in our mortal flesh" (II Corinthians 4: I0-1 ! -~Westminster Version). (I) Auguste Saudreau. La Pi~tl d Travers Les Ages, page 661. (2) J. De Guibert. J:h'ctionnaire de SpiritualitY, Fascicule Premier. page 106. Hygienic mortification would consist in foregoing whatever is pleasant and undergoing whatever is unpleas-ant with a view to preserving, or improving, o.r regaining, one's health and vigor, and ultimately to.furth~ering God's glory and to-growing in that participation of, the divine life which comes with grace. Three degrees of hygienic mortification may be distinguished: first, avoiding any sin-ful neglect in the care of one's health; second, steering clear of whatever would .involve danger of such neglect; and third, refraining from wh~itever is less commendable in favor of the more commendable in this matter. Health is either physical or psychical. For the present, let us confine our. discussion to physical hygienic mortifica-tion. The psychic is more important in many respects, and more akin to the° "interior mortification" of the spiritual masters. Possibly in a subesequent paper we may revert.to it. Up to a certain point there is a strict obligation from the divine natural law to care for one's life and health. "Thou shalt not kill," either others or thyself. It is ethical to regulate our conduct in accordance with rational human nature and to avoid what tends to damage or destroy it. This d.uty requires .that one should use the ordinary means of sa.feguarding and preserving life and health. Nature is necessary for the supernatural life. If nature can do nothing in the supernatural order without grace; "neither can grace do anything without nature. It is .equally helpless. The Code of Canon Law, 1369, pr~scrib'es that those who are in charge, of seminaries should exhort the ~emii~arians Con-stant. ly to obs'erve the principles of hygiene and personal cleanliness. Presumably it is in .keeping with the mind of the Church that religious should do at lea~t~ as much. One who is. striving to become perfect will not stop with what is of strict obligation. He will constantly endeavor to do the better thing. Thebetter thing will indlude what-ever, other things being equal, is more conducive to bodily strength and effid~ncy. God counsels solicitude for health. "Better is a poor man who is sound, and strong of constitution, than a rich man who is weak and afflicted with evils. Health of the soul in holiness of justice, is better than all gold and silver: .and a sound body, than immense revenues. There is no riches above the riches of health of the body; and there is no pleasure above the joy of the heart. Better is death 33 t/~an a bit~ter life: and everlasting rest; than continual" sick-ness" (Ecclesiasticus 30: 14-17), In his inspired epistle to Timothy, St. Paul did not disdain to give this advice to one of the first bishops: "Drink no longer water only, but use a little wine, on account of thy stomach and thy frequent illness" (I Timothy 5:23). The divine counsel to have a concern for health is implied in all the numerous exhorta-tions to accomplish good works. As Pope Plus XI wrote in his "Encyclical on Education,"--.something, by the way, especially deserving notice by teadhers--"The true Chris-tian does not., stunt his natural faculties; but he develops and perfects them, by coordinating them with the super-natural. He thus ennobles what is merely natural in life and secures for it new strength in the material ond temporal order, no less than in the spiritual and eternal" (3). This is not the place for a presentation of the principles of hygiene, nor, even if it~ were, should I be presumptuous enough to. attempt such a thing. I should be:like the patient in the medical adage: "He who has himself for a doctor, has a fool for. a patient." If any religious should not know the elementary rules of h~giene, that is, the ~ules for living on the physiological plane, then let him begin his hygienic mortification by taking the trouble to-l~arn them. This is not an original suggestion ot: mine. A first-rate ascetical theologian of the twentieth century, namely, Zimmermann, the author of the excellent treatise Lel~rbucl~ der Asz~tik, counsels everyone seeking perfection to learn both the general prindiples of hygiene which may be studied, and the individual applica-tions and variations which must be gathered by personal experience (4). My attempt will be confined to indicatingcertain points on which the autldorities in hygiene do have something to prescribe, and to suggesting certain possible deviations that may perchance be found among religious. Posture migh~ be considered first. Constantly to pre-serve a wholesome and becoming posture of the body would not 6nly make for health, especially of the lungs, but it would also be something that would please others, and it would add to the influence of one's personality on others. Were it better observed, there would be fewer ill-looking (3) Pius XI. Christian Education of Youth; The Paulist Press: page 37. " '(4) Zimmermann. Otto. Lerhbueb d~r Asz.e. tiko page 516. 3# religious whose very appearance is, to put it mildly, not pleasing nor apt to inspire respect in Others. Certain religious seem to be given to the use of an exces-sive amount of clothing. To see them Out in winter weather, one might suspect from the. great number of thi~ngs 'which they are wearing, that they were planning on visiting the polar regions. Habitu'ally they are over-dressed. Then, sooner or later, iinevitably they are caught in some unex-pected exposure to cold, and, being sensitive like hot-house plants, rather than possessing the normal adaptability .to moderate variations in temperature, they~may catch cold,~ or develop a sore-throat or something of the sort. In any case, one would not expect a man who is ~eally mortified to be meticulous about slight changes in the temperature. Per- 'haps just the same persons are those who, believing that, as everything has its place, the proper place for fresh ai~ in winter is outside, insist on an immoderately high tempera- ~ure, and along with it, a bad atmosphere in the room. Thus .they diminish their alertness and efficiency, and at the same time waste steam and coal. Keeping the rules df etiquette at table would presum-ably be beneficial rather than harmful to one's health. At all events, it could be real charity and mortification. Cer-tainly, very certainly, it would be a great kindness to others, and tend to promote good appetite and health in the com-munity, as the neglect of good manners may be so great as to become disgusting to others. If there should be any re-" ligious who do not already know the ordinary pr~escriptions of table etiquette, then, by. all means, let them get Emily ¯ Post, and study her. It could be a very genuine act of vir-tue. Probably there are very few religious, those excepted who are already on a diet ordered by a physician, who could not make some change in their habits of eating and drinking that would not redound both to their physical well-being and to the glory of God. The right amount, the right balance of,diet, the right way of taking it,--these are points in which it is most human to err. Some, like chil-dren, may be inclined to slight the simple, solid substantials, and to show themselves too fond of sweets, desserts, and such better-tasting things. Possibly there are some who could at the same time reduce the community butcher-bill and improve their health. Some, though they lead a very 35 Sedentary lifd, may eat as if they had to dig ditches or. pitch. hay all day. .It i~ often said now that many Americans, even thosewho eat as much as and 'whatever they like, are star.ring themselves for the want of certain necessary ele-ments in their,diet: vitamines; for instance. Perhaps some ~.religious could drink less coffee, and thus improvetheir nerves, their t.emp~rs, their sleep, and their work. ~ The problems.of overweight and underweight, and all .their consequence.s, which may be 3r.ery serious indeed,hatur- :ally.suggest~ themselves in this context. Perhaps one ~eli-gi0us needs tO drink more milk, though he ~tislikes it~ and .another ought to'take.less of it, though he Iovesit. Pos-sibly one religious should mortify his pride and ask for permission to have an extra lunch~ between meals; "and an: other would do w~ll to obtain leave.to Omit the midday l_uneh. Iridi.vidual applic.ations of this point are~ infinite: If one realizes that he should dos0mething, gut not ~know what, it .would be easy to question the community phys, ician and find out. Thereare many religious who CgUld pr.actice this particular form of hygienic mortification, arid while making themselves more healthy and robust and fit for work and for a lon.ger life, also add very great!~; ~o the glory of God and the glory of His Elect in the hereafter. If one were to accuse, many male religious of smoking too much and thug really injuring themselves, one wduld only be repeating what they themselves accuse themselves of. Their oportunityiS obvious~ and the mortification involved would b~ great; but So ~ouldothe returris, at least in supernatural merit. T, he possibilities for mortification and for edific~ation, in connection with alc6h61 need only to ¯ be suggested. No,doubt there are many religious, who, if they be well-informed and sincere, would have to admit that some ~hangeinz~their lives ~ith respect to exercise Would, even from the spiritual pointof view, be an excellent thihg for them. If they need more physical exercise and can get it in some pleasant way, relaxing the nerves and mind as well as stirring the muscles, somuch the bett~r. " But get itthey ought, if they are fully to accomplish the tasks assigned to them by Providence. If nothing else .be possible; some form of calisthenics or setting-up exercise~ might be" tried fo~ a. prescribed number of minutes every day. If anybody think that there is no great mortification in faithfully per~ severing° in such a routine day after day and' month after m0nth,~let him try it . Many religious women would probably: be spared many troubles of mind and conscience, would performtheir exeicises of.piety with more energy and devotion, and would be more ready°in their obedience~ and work, as well, as morse healthy, if they h'ad a little walk every day' in the fresh air. Younger sisters, who until rather recently were college girls taking part in college athletics, might play a short game of tennis, or something of the kind. It would make for sound nerves and clear heads, and these in turn could obviate many. temptations and worries. It is:.true indeed that St. Paul wrote to Timothy: "For whereas bodily training oi~.,profitable for little, pietyis profitable for'all,things, .pos-sessing promise of life both here and hereafter" (I Tim-othy' 4:8). I take this to mean th~it bodily.training is of .little value in comparison with piety; but in as much as it is subordinated to.the purposes of wirtue and is a requisite condition for more vigorous piety, or piety in a longer life, its .wo.rthmay bereallY~very~great. ' " -" The ancient ascetics by way of reaction, it seems, to abuses connected with.the old public baths, mortified them-selves by not bathing. Could it be true that some.modern ascetics might practice mortification and virtue .by-making more use of it? ~ Care of the eyes deserves special mention. Apparently there are many who could deny themselves at times by taking the trouble to get better light when they are reading. Work, since it takes most of .the time and energy of religious, is a very fertile field for mortification. Some over-w' 6rk themselves for a time, and then for. a longer time they ¯ cannot do the normal amount, and perhaps~ ~hey evens:need the work of others to attend to them. Their ~problem is to avoid excess here, asin the practice of virtue generally. would Seem to be a good rule that there should.~nev~er:~.be overwork or overstrain except in emergencies. In the long run it is very poor economy and ef[iciency. They especially should cultivate self-abnegation'm avoiding overfatigue wh6 do not let superiors know that too much has been assigned to them; or who deceive themselves into believing that they. are heroically sacrificing themselves for noble motives when in 'reality there is an admixture of piide or human respect or merely human desire of success in thei:r 37 motivation. Sisters who in difficult days are attempting the double tasks of teaching and of getting their own edu-: cation at the Same time need more than others to guard themselves, even as the dreaded examinations approach, against overstudy and excessive exhaustion. Overfatigue -begets irritability, diminishes intelligence and liberty, and unbalances the nerves. Then the way is open to evils of all sorts, physical, mental, and moral. "So that ye may not grow weary and lose heart" (Hebrews 12:3). Humbly to be satisfied with a modest accomplishment when that is all that is possible without injuring oneself, or diminishing one's achievement in the end, is a very salutary form of mortification. There are others whose fault is too little exertion. Some of these, could benefit themselves physically, and perhaps mentally, as well as spiritually, by increasing their efforts until they reach the mean between excess and defect. Occu-pational therapy is an important kind of treatment for certain cases. After work, recreation and rest. For people who lead a life as strenuous and tense and uniform as the religious life is, recreation is of great importance. If they do not unbend at times, they will break. But are there not some religious who do not take even that minimum amount of recreation which is enjoined for them by their rules or their superiors? Here, in a peculiarway, to mortification charity could also be added. It is understood of course that what is supposed to be recreation or relaxation, really is recreation. Prob-ably no one will deny that there are at least a few religious who could advance in self-abnegation, and in prayer (especially the next morning), and in .virtue generally, by beginning their night's sleep betimes. Thus far certain points which may be the subject of ~mortification that is good for the body as well as for the soul. Only those in normal health, or at least in health that is nearly normal, have been considered. If one be sick already, evidently one has a greater need for hygienic mortification, and a greater opportunity to bear what is unpleasant and to forbear what is pleasant. Those who as yet are well, but, through some neglect or other, are slowly but surely undermining their health, could more easily and readily mend their ways if they could imagine to some slight extent what pain and torture, whaf 38 disappointment, what bitter sense of frustration, they are bringing upon thems~elves. Mortification is hard; other-wise it would not be mortification. But it is still worse to be sickand incapacitated, particularly if that be owing to some negligence or fault. An initial, though negative, advantage of hygienic mortification is that nobody can object to it on the score that it might injure his health. By definition, it makes for better health. Then, it possesses the-advantages and values of other forms of mortification, and besides, it is more thor-oughly positive and constructive than some of them. It is real and genuine mortification, involving, as it does, the suppression of much that is pleasant and the enduring of much that is unpleasant. :If anyone should think other-wise, he can try the experiment. Religious have a special need of keeping fit physically. There is the importance, in time and eternity, of their work, and this depends in great measure, on health and strength. An intense interior life--and this is always the ideal of religious--makes greater demands upon physical resources than the intellectual life, which in turn is hard enough upon the physique. The cultivation of mental prayer, of supreme importance in the spiritual life, demands that one's physical resources be at their best. Community o,bservances require health in the members of the com-munity, and if a sickly person drags himself along somehow to follow them, he is likely to become still worse and more incapable of continued community life. The great foundress, St. Theresa of Avila, who knew well the problems of religious women, and particularly the difficulties of mental prayer, wrote: "It is this resolution [to be always thinking of Him and loving Him] that He [God] seeks in us; the o~her anxieties which we inflkt upon ourselves serve to no other end but to disquiet the soul-- which, if it be unable to derive any profit, in one hour [of prayer], will-by ttiem be disabled for four. This comes most frequently from bodily indisposition--I have had very ~reat experience in the matter, and I l~now it is true; for I have carefully observed it and discussed it afterwards with spiritual persons--for we are so wretched, that this poor prisoner of a soul shares in the miseries of the body. The.change.s of season, and the-alterations of the humors,,. very often compel it, without fault of its own, not to do what if would,, but rather to suffer in every way. Mean-while, the more we force the soul on these occasions, the greater the mischief, and the longer it lasts. Some discre-tion must be used, in order to ascertain whether ill-health be the occasion or not. The poor soul must not be stifled. Let those who suffer thus, understa'nd that they are i11: a change should be made in the hour of prayer, and often-times that change should be continued for some days. Let souls pass out of this desert as they can, for it is very often the misery of one that loves God to see itself living in such wretchedness, unable to do what it would, because it has to keepso evil a guest as the body" (5). Other things being equal, alacrity of spiritand intensity of good will in exercises of piety, in keeping religi0us disci-pline, and in doing the work of the order or congregation, are to be expected rather from those who are physically fit ai~d strong than .from those who ,are unfit. The supernatural values of sickness and suffering~are very great, but it is understood and presupposed that the illness should not be due to indiscretion or negligence. ¯ Hygienic mortification~ will. contribute to poverty, because it is cheal~er to be well than to be paying for medi-cines, hospitalizations, and operations, and because healthx,, religious do more work. It will help chastity, by precluding certain temptations due to abnormal physical conditions, and by promoting, that soundness and stability of the ner-vous system which are so necessary for self-control. It will promote obedience, by removing obstacles both to readiness of will ai~d to actual performance, and by conferring greater positive strength and effciency. It will enhance charity and perfectibn it~self, by forestalling irritability and other impediments, and by enabling one to accomplish better and greater things for God and for souls. The present incumbent of the See of Peter and his immediate predecessor seem to offer an illustration in point. If Msgr. Ratti ha~d not been a very energetic Alpine climber, it is not likely that as Pius XI, and as a septuagenarian and an octogenarian, he could have achieved so much for the good of the Church. If I mistake not, the ascetical Car.- dinal Pacelli,while Secretary of State at the Vatican, used gymnastic apparatus installed in a room near his office. (5) St. Theresa, Life, translated b.y D. Lewis: chapter-XI. 40 There is one group of re.ligious for whom hygienic, mor~ tification, as thus far suggested, is not at all recommended. They are the hypochondriacs, to be found, here and there throughout the whole body of religiousl that is, those who are already excessively or even morbidly, solicitous about their health and all that appertains to it. For them it would be poison. However, they still need hygienic mortification: only it is of the psychic form. This they may need very rfiuch ideed. To quote St. Theresa again: "Take care, then, of the body, for the love of God, because at many other times the body must serve tl~e s0ul;.and let recourse be had to some recreations~holy ones such as conversation; or going out intothe fields . . . Altogether, experience is a great matter, and it makes us understand what is convenient for us. Let God be served in all things--His yoke is sweet; and it is of great importance that the soul should not be dragged, as they say, but carried gently, that it may make greater pro-gress" (6.). In conc!usion, a religious practicing physical hygienic mortification, as here proposed, will not by any means put care of his health above things that are of greater value, but rather, with the purest and noblest motives, make the most of the physical constitution that God has given him, and thus be better prepared and disposed to accomplish the very utmost for the glory of the Triune God, for the devel-opment of his own supernatural life, and for the sanctifica-tion of his brethren. He would simply and fully be helping to carry out the grand objective of the Incarnation: "I am come that they may have life, and may have it more abun-dantly" ¯ (2ohn 10: 10). (6) Ibidem. l:::xernpl:ions J:rom Fasting Gerald Kelly, S.J. THE PENITENTIAL season of Lent always brings with it the personal question: what should I do about fasting? Very likely the practical solution to thi~ problem in most religious communities is a regulation to consult one's confessor' and abide by his decision. This is certainly a wholesome custom; and it is notthe purpose of this article to criticize it in any way. Nevertheless, it seems profitable for the religious themselves to know something of the mind of the Church regarding exemptions from fast-ing. This .knowledge should be particularly helpful to superiors, since there may be times when they must pass judgment on their subjects' obligation to fast. Other re-ligious also can profit by the knowledge, for it sometimes happens that they cannot consult their confessor, at least for several days, and, even when they can consult, they can do so more intelligently and follow advice more reasonably if they are familiar with the principles governing their cases. This article, therefore, is intended to answer only one question, which may be phrased as follows: In what cir-cumstances is one exempt from the general law of fasting? The only point to be considered is the obligation to keep the general fasts of the Church. There is no question here of the obligations of rule concerning fasting as these exist in various religious communities. Nor is there question of the ascetical aspect of fasting. We can take for granted that fasting is. a splendid act of penance and mortification, as is evidenced by the entire Catholic tradition in the matter; take for granted also that the keeping of the common fasts of the Church in union with the other members of the Church is highly pleasing to God and of great profit to souls. These are interesting questions, but beside the point of the present article, the whole purpose of which is to determine who, according to the mind of the Church, may omit fasting without violating her law. The first expression of the Church's mind is found in the ecclesiastical law itself. Canon 1254, which contains the fasting law, exempts al! who have not completed their twenty-first year and all who have begun their sixtieth year. 42 Canon.1245 makes provision for other exemptions by granting the power of dispensing to local Ordinaries~ pas-tors, and superiors of exempt clerical orders. Custom, the unwritten law of the Church, exempts all who are engaged in hard and protracted manual labor. The foregoing are the only reasons for exemption con-tained explicitly in the law of the Church. They do not, however, exhaust the reasons which the Church acknowl-edges as valid excuses from the obligation of fasting. By far the greater number of excuses can be found in the teaching of the moral theologians. To put the matter briefly, these theologians, applying a principle approved by the Church as a legitimate method of interpreting the law, teach that fasting is not obligatory when it involves extraordinary difficulty. The word, extraordinarg, has a technical meaning which is perhaps best explained by contrasting it with what might be termed ordinarg difficulty. Evidently, the fasting law is intended to impose on the faithful some inconven-ience, that is, the inconvenience of self-denial. An incon-venience of this kind is termed ordinarg, and it would not excuse anyone from the observance of the fast. On the other hand, in a general law of this nature, the Church does not wish to impose exceptional hardship on anyone; much less does she wish to do harm or to hinder greater good. Such difficulties as these would be termed extraordinaru~, with respect to this law; that is, they are outside the scope of the law, and they excuse the faithful from the obligation of observing it. Applying this principle of extraordinary inconvenience, moralists teach that the sick and convalescent are excused from the obligation of fasting. Also exempt are those who, though perhaps not technically "sick," are of frail consti-tution; also extremely nervous people. Such persons nor-mally need nourishment frequently; fasting would prove harmful to them. It sometimes happens that even those in rather normal health cannot fast without severe headaches or dizzy, spells; also that the fast will render it impossible for them to get ¯ their needed rest at night. Some people are unable to get the one substantial meal allowed to those who fast; some are physically unable to eat or digest such a meal. Finally,. there are many who find that fasting interferes with their 43 necessary work; they lose valuable time and are quite inef-ficient. All cases like these are included under the exemp-tion by reason of extraordinary inconvenience. One might ask this very practical question: How am I to know if fasting would be exceptionally difficult for me or be harmful to me or my work? Perhaps the simplest way of answering this question is to tell such people to experiment a bit. This is the simplest but not always the most prudent method. Unless the experimentation is car-ried on very cautiously, it can work harm, and it can do this so quietly that the harmful effects are not perceived until it is too late. To avoid such injurious effects, one may legiti-mately follow certain recognized presumptions in deciding one's obligations to fast. The presumption of excuse favors those who are engaged in hard mental labor, for example, teachers and students. Regarding teachers, one may notice an interesting development~ in the opinions of theologians. The older theologians were quite ready to excuse a. professor of the higher branches, even though he had to lecture only one hour a day. They presupposed, of course, that he had to spend the day in preparation and that he did not merely read lectures which bad long since been cast into permanent mold. But these theologians were not always so benevo-lently inclined toward teachers of the lower grades (the equivalent of our high schools and grammar schools), even though these had to spend several hours a day in the. class-room. Father Ballerini, an eminent moral theologian of the last century, citing the especially severe opinion of one older school, remarked very tartly: "we should note that these great doctors were always engaged in teaching the higher branches; they had no experience in this humbler art." Also in the case of students there has been a progres-sive development towards leniency. Today, it is quite safe to say that the presumption of excuse favors those who spend several hours a day in teaching the lower grades, as well as diligent students who spend most of the day either in attending lectures or in preparing their lessons. When I say "the presumption of excuse favors" those mentioned in this paragraph, I mean that these persons may consider that they are not obliged to fast, unless they have very solid grounds for assurance that they can fast without, harm to 44 themselves, or their work. Those able to fast while carrying on these works are the.exception, rather than the rule. . The same presumption favors those who must spend long hours in the confessional or who are engaged in strenu-ous preaching.It may also be used in favor of those who are engaged in fatiguing works of mercy, such as caring for the sick. It should be noted that. in a!l these.cases, it is not only the strain of ~the work which favors exemption, but also the fact that the works themselves are of, great impor-tance. There should .be no danger that fasting will inter-fete with their proper performance. The foregoing examples of extraordinary ir~con~cen~ ience were chosen because they are of particular interest or practical value to the readers of this magazine. In cases such as these, the Church law does not bind. Furthermore, merely from the point of view of general legislation, there is no strict obligation Of consulting anyone, if one can form a prudent judgment of his~own case. A community regula-tion of consulting the confessor or spiritual director should; of course, be followed; and in general it is considered wise for everyone to consult about the matter. Often enough, it is diflScult to form a prudent, and especially a quieting; judgment of one's own case. Mention has already been made of those who have the power of granting a dispensation from fasting; local Ordi~ naries, pastors, and superiors of clerical exempt orders. These generally delegate the power to other priests, espe-cially at a time like-Lent: and the Holy. See. occasionally delegates other priests by special indults. None of these, even the Bishop, can give a dispensation without some rea-son; but the reason need not b~ so serious as would be required for exemption by reason of extraordinary~incon-venience. A dispensation is perhaps the best of all means for setting one's mind at rest regarding the obligation 0~ fasting. Even those religious superiors who have no power to dispense can pass judgment on their subjects' ability to keep the fast, and if they judge that a reason such as those described as extraordinary inconveniences is present, they may tell the subject not to fast. For passing such a judg-ment, no special jurisdiction is necessary. Certainly supe-riors are in a position to make a prudent judgment, for they 45 should know both the capacity of their subjects and the strain or importance Of their work. From what has been written here, it will appear that a fairly large number of religious engaged in the active life are not strictly obliged to keep the general fasts of the -Church. They have the same right as others to take advan-tage of exemptions. Someone might object, of course, that religious have an added obligation to give good example. The objection does not appear to have much weight in the :present instance. Religious should, by all means, give example to the world of a spirit of self-denial and mortifi. cation, but it is not necessary that this example extend to ,the letter of the law concerning fasting. In fact, without attempting in any way to minimize the general importance of the fasting law, one might advance several obvious reasons why religious have less need of this particular austerity than have others. ' Their life is a well-regulated, well-disciplined one, and those who lead it faithfully are being constantly schooled in self-denial. Furthermore, the very regularity of their life makes them feel more keenly the change brought about by fasting and renders them more apt to be upset by it. Finally, their work itself is of great spiritual importance.i As for bad example, the sharp or sarcastic word spoken by the confessor, teacher, or nurse is much more harmful than the so-called "scandal" of religious who do not fast. Perhaps these few remarks Will prove helpful to reli-gious, particularly to those who are inclined to worry about the fasting obligation or to lament the fact that they are judged unable to fast. They should take consolation in the thought that they can practise an even more meritorious self-denial by observance of their rule, by fidelity to duty, and especially by a constant and delicate charity. The inability to fast does not deprive them of the opportunity of glorifying God or of helping souls. 46 Saint: Rober Bellarmine's . Sign of the Cross Clement DeMuth, S. J. CATHOLICS with a greater than average knowledge of their religion are ~sometimes at a loss when they are called upon to render an. account of some simple reli-gious truth. They discover in themselves, not so much a lack of technical knowledge that lends itself to explanation only in learned phrase_s, but rather a failure to appreciate thd mental capacity of the child or other unlettered person to be instructed. To adapt one's knowledge of even the simpler God-give~i truths to the understanding of such a person is an art that must be cultivated, and developed, and integrated with one's deepening knowledge of human nature itself. The great catechists in the course of the Church's history practiced this art in signal fashion. One of the greatest of these, if indeed not the very greatest, was St. Robert Bellar-mine, Cardinal, Theologian, and Doctor of the Universal Church. In 1597 Pope Clement VIII requested St. Robert to publish his catecheticai method which was proving so successful With the unlettered people of Rome. The saint prepared two catechisms, the first of which was a compen-dium of Christian Doctrine in form suitable for learning by rote. The second, with Which we are here partkularly con-cerned, was a kind of teacher's manual and was entitled An explanation of Christian Doctrine u;ritten in the form of a Dialogue, for the use of those who teach it to children and to other simple people. The success of the little, two-fold work, written in Italian, was immediate and, What is more significant, enduring to an extraordinary degree. In the words of St. Robert's biographer, Father Brodrick, "wi~h the exception of the Bible and the Imitation of Christ, it would be difficult to name any other book which went round the world so rapidly and became familiar to so many different races." A series of Roman Pontiffs com-mended, prescribed, and in general promoted the little work down through the years from the time of Clement VIII. until our own century. With its richness of content, the saint's early chapter on that most obvious---and not always fully appreciated~ ~prayer, the Sign of the Cross, is representative. Its atten-tive perusal brings the conviction that "children and other simple people" are not the only ones who may profit by the saintly, Doctor's explanation of a simple prayer. The style of composition is informally conversational, with the pupil thoughtfully asking questions which would naturally occur to one listening attentively to the explanation of a rather difficult truth. It may be noted that the teacher makes, continual use of examples and illustrations, never permitting himself to forget that the pupil is little used to abstractions. Here is a translation of the chapter on THE SIGN OF THE CROSS PUPIL: Please give me a brief account of the more important mysteries contained in the Creed. TEACHER: There are two principal mysteries of our faith, and both are included in that sign which we call the Sign of the Cross. The first is the unity and trinity of God. Thesecond is the Incarnation and Death of the Savior PUPIL: What is meant by the unity and trinity of God? TEACHER: These are very deep truths and the explana-tion of them is a very slow process. For the time being, however, it will be enough to learn just the names, :and a very little bit more. The unity of God means that besides all created things there is one thing that had no beginning. It has always been and it will always be. It has made all ¯ other things, and it supports them and governs them. It is the highest, noblest, most beautiful, most powerful, the absolute master of every thing; and this being is called God. There is just one God. There can be only one true Divin-ity, that is, one nature, one essence infinitely powerful, wise, good, and so forth. Nevertheless, this Divinity is found in three persons that are called the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. These three persons are just one God ¯ because they have the same Divinity, the same essence. As for example, if three persons here on earth, named Peter, Paul, and John, had the same body and the same soul, they would remain three persons; because one would be Peter, and another Paul, and another John. Nevertheless, there would be just one man, not three men, there not being three bodies and thr~e souls, but just one body and one soul. 48 Such a state of affairs is not possible among men, because the being of man is little ~and finite, .so it cannot be in many persons. But the being of God, the Divinity of~ God,. is infinite. The same being, the same Divinity is found in the Father, in the Son, and in the Holy Spirit. There are then three persons because one i~ the Father~ the second.is the Son, an.d the third is the Holy Spirit, and there remains nevertheless just one God, because these persons have the same being, the same power, wisdom, goodness, and so forth. PUPIL: Now tell me what is meant by the Incarnation and.Death of the .Savior'. TEACHER: The second divine person, whom we called the Son, besides his divine being, which he had before the 'world was created, indeed from all eternity, this second person took for himself a human body and a human soul, that is, our whole human nature, in the womb of a most pure virgin. Thus he who-was at first just God now began to bd both God and man. After living among men for thirty-three years, during which time he taught the wa~ of salvatioh and worked m~an~r miracles, at last he let him-self be crucified, and on the Cross he died tO make satisfac-tion to God for the sins of the whole world. After thfee days he rose from death to life, and after forty days he a~cended into hea~ce.n, as we say in the article of the Creed.~ That is what we mean by the Incarnation ~ind Death of the Savior. '~PUPIL~ Why are these the principal mysteries of fdith? " " ~FEACHER: Because in the fi~st ~is contained the first principle and last end of man; in the second we have ttie unique and most efficacious means of knowing that first piinciple and of arriving at that last end. And beck/use by our belief in arid confession of th4se two mysteries we~ are distinguished from all th4 false sects, from Turks, ~dews; and heretics. And finally, because without b41ieving and confessing these two mysteries, no one can be saved. PupIi~:. How are these two mysteries included in the Sign of the Cross? TEACHER: ;The Sign of the Cross is made saying: In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy 49 Spirit; at the same time signing oneself in the form of a cross, putting the right hand to the foreh_.ead when one says: In the name of the Father, and then to the breast when one says: and of the Son; finally to the left and right shoulders when one says: and of the Holy Spirit. The words, in the ' Name, show the unity of God, because we say name and not names; and by name is meant the power, and the divine authority, which is one in all three persons. The words, of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, show the trinity of persons, Signing oneself in the form of a cross represents the Passion, and consequently the Incarnation, of the Son of God. Moving the hand from the left to the right, and not from the right to the left, means that by the Passion of our Lord we are transferred from temporal to eternal things, from sin to grace, and from death to life. ~ (NOTE: It may be well to observe that St. Robert, in illustrating certain spiritual realities by the movement of the hand from left to right, can be said to be exercising his ingenuity. He'would no doubt find another interpretation if his catechism were for oriental Catholics, who make the Sign of the Cross moving the hand from right to left!) PUPIL: What is. the effect of making the Sign of the Cross? TEACHER: First, it shows that we are Christians, that is, soldiers of our High Commander, Christ: because this sign is like a flag, or uniform, which distinguishes the sol-diers of Christ from all the enemies of Holy Church; from . gentiles, Jews, Turks, and heretics. Further, this sign is made to invoke the divine assistance in all our works. With ¯ it we summon the aid of the most Holy Trinity, through the Passion of the savior. Accordingly good Christians are .accustomed to make the Sign of the Cross when they rise from bed, when they leave the house, when they sit at table to eat, when they are about to go to bed, and at the beginning of every action that ~hey have to perform. Finally, this sign is made to arm oneself against eirery as-sault of~the devil, because the devil is terrified by it, and flees from it, as do criminals when they encounter the sign of th~i~ police. Very often by means 6f this sign of the holy - Cross man has escaped many evils, both spiritual and tem-p6ral; when he makes it with faith and confidence in the divine meicy and in the merits of Christ, our Lord. 50 Li!:urgy in !:he ¯ P !:t:ern of Modern Praying Gerald Ellard, S.J. WHEN the history o~ our times is written, chroniclers will dwell on the fact that they are characterized by three great, world-embracing prayer-movements. They will speak of the widespread initiation of large groups of the laity of both sexes into systematic asceticism,, be it that of the Spiritual Exercises, or other forms, collectively centering in what is known as the retreat movement~. Again, they will point how this age, .the world,over, has shown a sudden deep concern' practical as well as theoreti-cal, in that communion with God, that apperception of God, known as Catholic mysticism. Lastly historians will take pains to record that twentienth century Catholicism is endeavoring once more to integrate the layman and lay-woman into the offices of public worship. Doubtless, too, the portrait-painters of our age will pause a bit to discourse on the mysterious power possessed by this Church twenty. centuries young to renew its life and reform its institutions by drawing upon fresh streams of vita!it~ welling strong within her. ".So it has been in each great crisis," we can well imagine one of them concluding-; "when the forces of the Church seems spent, then it is she finds new power surging up within her: in the twentieth century the Church refreshed herself and the world by refashioning the pattern of her praying." This article concerns itself in elementary fashion with indicating what is to be expected from the restoration to the people, in the pews, after many long ages, of their organic contact with the ministry in the sanctuary in the joint performance of divine service. The better to visualize the goal o[ this reform in Cath-olic corporate worship, suppose we ask ourselves why such a thing as the. current liturgical movement was simply inevitable, and must have come sooner or later, if the Church were not content to see one. of her chief organs wither to full atrophy. The present-day reform of Cath-olic worship seeks to redress the multiple losses that laymen. and laywomen have suffered in the course of time in their parr in our common worship, seeks to lower the wall of separation, which quite literally in many medieval churches to be seen to this day, and figuratively in them all, shuts the laity out from active sharing in what went on within the holy place where the priestly mediator stood at the altar. It was characteristic of Christian worship from the very outset that it was planned precisely to allow the fullest understanding on thd part of all, the fullest sharing in their respective roles .by ministry and people in their joint asso- Ciation with Christ, theirPriest, their Liturgist. Pagan altars were accessible to the pagan priests alone; the ,Jewish Temple admitted' lay-worshippers to the outer court near to the altar. But with Christians the altar itself stood con- ~picuous and accessible to every least, last Christian, because m the new priestly race, all had some sharing, priestly or lay, in the perpetuation of Christ's priestly ministry in the covenant of 10ve. St. Paul thankedGod that he efijoyed the miraculous gift of speaking God's praises in unknown tongues: "Nevertheless," he said, "in church I had rather speak five words with my understanding, so as to instruct Others, than ten thousand words in a 'tongue' " I and my hearers do not understand" (I Corinthenians 14:: 19). Now Catholic worship in the West turned from the primitive Greek to the Latin, when that became the tongue the com-mon man understood best. It then took the liturgy of 'the Western Church a fairly long period in which to grow and develop, until at Rome under Gregory I, Pop.e from 590 to .°.6. 04, it achieved its zenith, the perfect expression of the Latin Christian's corporate worship of almighty God. How regrettable that Gregory lived in an age of indescrib-able upheaval, which rendered the realization of his ideal in worship impossible in any ecumenical manner! Particu- ¯ lar features excepted, the liturgy of the Roman Rite has never since received such a thorough-going reform and readjustment to current life as Gregory gave it then. In one way or another the layman's place in the liturgy has become more circumscribed with every century since Gregor3~ lived. To illustrate how this has been the case, suppose we imagine a sevent.h-century man or woman living on as a 'Wandering Christian" through the intervening centuries, and note how such a pilgrim would find lay-participation in worship further impoverished age by age. 52 In Gregory's day, for all greater occasions, people met at a fixed rendezvous and then marched to church .with Cross and banners, prayer and song~ At the common type of Mass, what we call high Mass, pedple and choir of clerics together madd, in the language of everydayiife, those responses to the celebrant, which, if they are not exactly the structure of the service, are nonetheless so many short, vibrant bonds with the altar. At the entrance of the clergy, in alternation with the choir, there was singing. So, too, did the people come singing to bring their gifts to the altar at the Offering (Offertory). They shared the~cle'rgy's ceremonial postures, standing, extending their arms, bowing or kneeling with the ministers, and gave each other the kiss of peace. So did they join in the psalmody, singing at leas~ the Gloria Patti, the K~rie, the Sanctus, and, when it was later introduced, the Agnus Dei. Singing too they came to the altar, the Table of Union, itself the sign, as the Fathers of Trent were to phrase it later, "of that one Body of which He is the Head, and to which He would fain have us as members united by the closest bond of faith, hope and love." The Roman of Gregory's day could in many ways feel himself "concorporate" in his' worship with every one sharing that worship with him. In the following century, had our pilgrim attended Mass in England, France, Germany, notto mention other coun-tries, he would look in vain for the procession to Mass. Save on Christmas, Easter or Pentecost there would be few communicants at Mass, and correspondingly few offerers giving visible expression of the basic concept of the worship of God by sacrifice. Then, too, he would have found him-self one of the very few laymen able to follow the stately Latin,and, as we see from conciliar enactments, not all the priests able to translate for him! But.our pilgrim would: note with a sigh the people's' eagerness in singing as far.as circumstances allowed. There at least he could still join. with them in prayer that sang. After a second century of wandering, during let us say the pontificate of Nicholas I ( 8 5 8- 8 6 7), our pilgrim would have noted with growing apprehension how elementary part-singing had already been discovered. "I sadly fear this may in course of time lead to the neglect, or even-the corruption, of unison singing, planesong,* alone possible to *Concerning this spelling, see note at the end of the article. 53 the congregation as a whole." But he would have hailed with delight the opportunity given him in the appearance of the sequences,~ to sing simple, homely rhyming lines with lustiness and joy, Could he have foreseen the future, he would have known that after their period of development, and luxuriance, there would follow such decay that with fewest exceptions the sequences were all to be expunged from the Missal. When that happened, there was taken from the layman the last impoitant element of the Mass he could still sing. And so it goes across the ages. When St. Thomas was writing in the thirteenth century his explanation of the Mass, he takes it- for~granted that "there are words which the l~riest begins and thd people take up . the Creed and the Gloria.'" In St. Thomas' day the people stil.1 answered Et cam st~iritu tuo, Amen and the like. Shall we follow our weary pilgrim into-the fourteenth century? In The Low Countries, England, France, Ger-many and elsewhere we find him complaining that the new measured music in such rising vogue everywhere was by its very difticulty robbing him of his chance to sing his prayer to God. "Soon.all singing in church will be the monopoly of the expert musicians, and to them will be restricted the fulfillment of St. Augustine's words, 'He that sings prays double.' " What was more, the new type of music, by its sensuous character, so said Pope John XXII, was under-mining his virility of soul. But Pope John XXII was one of the popes of the so-called Avignon Captivity; and for that reason people considere~l him unduly influenced by the French court. His admonitions drew little attention. ~ There was a period when the Council of, Basle was Cath-olic and well-inspired, and thither our pilgrim might have looked for reform of long-standing abuses. How he would have been cheered to note the Council's condemnation and abolition (?) of that abuse whereby "low Mass was said in such a tow .tone that it cannot be heard by those attending." That abuse seems to-have been spreading then in the northern parts of Europe: "If this is not stopped,~' our pilgrim grimly reflects,"even my few answers at low Mass will soon be made impossible." But that was at a day when the Church hadjust healed :the great scandal of the Great Western.Schism, and papal prestige stood too low to effect far-teaching reforms just then. in 15.18 Cardinal Louis of Aragon went into The Low Countries. ~Hadour pilgrim gonein his train be might .have seen the cardinal's secretary~ write in his journal about the Flemish priests:"They say .[Mass] . . . so low that no ohe hears their voices. They do not permit anyone .to make the responses, except the servers, and no one else."' That was~ noted, of course, because it was cbntrary to Roman practice come down from time beyond memory. But in 1518 Rome was suffering the baleful consequences of Italian Humanism, and suggestions a cardinal.might make on 1.ittle points like letting the'people respon~l at low Mass would fall with little weight. Then, too, when the car; dinal's secretary made that entry in his notebook, it was already soinemonthssinceMartin Luther had appended.his theses to the door of the Cathedral of Wittenburg, and thereby set in motion a chain of events that led to the calling of.the Council of Trent. "At long last the-layman'~s losses over a_period of a thousand years will surely be redressed at this greht Council," said our pilgrim as he faced the journey to Trent.Let us see how Trent prescribed for the cure of this pernicious aenemia of the layman's worship, only to have the administration of the remedy, postponed by yet further troubles. The aging Luther ,did not see fit to attend the Council, to .which he had once so solemnly appealed, and indeed he was in- his grave beforeits sessions were completed. But despite~his absence, he was the greatest chalienge to the Council, because he had become the symbol of every kind of error, the accuser of every discoverable abuse. Not a few,of those abuses were related to public worship, and as our pilgrim could have testified, were associated-with th~ fact that for centuries the layman was being deprived by force of circumstances ,of an active and intelligent part in divine service. All.this, it Was then hoped, would be remedied in this great Council. ~' Of all the Cotincils, Trent claims a position unique in many ways, one of which was that from the very outset the definition of. doctrine and the enactment of reform-decrees went forward simultaneously. From the Second Session (the decree opening the Council being the sole. business, of the First Sesson), ,lanuary 7, 1546, to the Twenty-Fifth 55 Session, December 4, 1563, the multiple questions to.ucl~ing the reform of Catholic public worship came up again and again. The Council's solicitude' was most in evidence in all that referred to holy Mass, becau.~e, as the Fathers said, "of all holy things this Sacrifice is the most holy." In resisting the Protestant demands, the Council deemed it "inadvisable that Mass should be celebrated everywhere in the vulgar tongue." Yet on all having the care of souls it laid the obligation, "lest the little ones ask for bread and there be none to break unto them, to explain frequently during the celebration of the Mass, especially on Sundays and festival days . some mystery of this most holy Sac-rifice." If Trent similarly rejected the Reformers' petition " that the entire Mass be said aloud, it did reaffirm "that some .things in the Mass be pronounced in a low tone and others m a louder tone." Masses at which the priest alone com-municated were emphatically declared to be valid Masses, yet in crystal-clear language is affirmed the desirability of having all worshippers communicate: "The holy Council wishes indeed that at each Mass the faithful who are present should communicate, not only in spiritual desire, but also by the sacramental partaking of the Eucharist, that thereby they may derive from this most holy Sacrifice a more abun-dant fruit." With regard to nuns the. Council here went .further and decreed that they must communicate .at least once a month: "Bishops and other superiors of monasteries° shall t~ike special care that the nuns., confess their sins and receive the most holy Eucharist at least once a month." The reforms of the Missal and the Breviary, begun at the .Council, were then handed over to the Holy See for com-pletion. In a hundred minor ways the Council showed its zeal that anything savoring in the least degree of unworthi-ness be kept from the public worship of the Church. The thorny problem of having only proper music in the churches was given much more serious consideration than might be judged from the brevity, of this enactment: "They [local Ordinaries] shall also banish from the churches those types of music in which, whether by the organ or in the singing, there is mixed up anything unbe-coming., so that the house of God.may be truly a house of prayer." Indeed many a bishop at the Council may have had the painful experience of the force of that saying, that .more people were sung into Protestantism than argued into 56 it. As early as 1523; in his Form for Mass and Communion, Luther had touched upon the desirability of German singing: "I would wish among us to l~ave as much as pos-sible in the vernacular what the people sing at Mass." Within a year Luther had contributed no less than twenty hymns of his own composition to his cause, and after Ein /:este Burg had made its sensational reputation, reli-gious rebels in non-German countries began to sweep peop!e into their conventicles by giving .them the chance to sing at divine service. Small wonder that the Fathers of Trent, with all this before their eyes, wished to purge away the corruption that had overlaid the ChUrch's once so popular planesong. This once restored to the people, these would be saved the sad choice of active participation in unorthodox worship, or mute and silent worship in the Church of Rome. Thus our long-suffering pilgrim, attending the ses-sions of Trent, might have envisaged a veri

Issue 48.5 of the Review for Religious, September/October 1989. ; R~:.vn~w voa R~:.t.~c,~ous (ISSN 0034-639X) is published bi-monthly at St. Louis University by the Mis-souri Province Educational Institute of the Society of Jesus: Editorial Office: 3601 Lindcll Blvd. Rm. 428; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. Second-class postage paid at St. Louis MO. Single copies $3.00. Subscriptions: $12.00 per year; $22.00 for two years. Other countries: for surface mail, add U.S. $5.00 per year; for airmail, add U.S. $20.00 per year. For subscription orders or change of address, write: Rl~v~'0,, ~:o~ Rl-:t.~c;ous; P.O. Box 6070: Duluth, MN 55806. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Rt:v~t:w roa RELIGIOUS; P.O. Box 6070; Duluth, MN 55806. David L. Fleming, S.J. Iris Ann Ledden, S.S.N.D. Richard A. Hill, S.J. Jean Read Mary Ann Foppe Editor Associate Editor Contributing Editor Assistant Editors September/October 1989 Volume 48 Number 5 Manuscripts, books for review and correspondence with the editor should be sent to Rv:vt~w you R~:~.~;~otJs; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. Correspondence about the department "Canonical Counsel" should be addressed to Rich-ard A. Hill, S.J.; J.S.T.B.; 1735 LeRoy Ave.; Berkeley, CA 94709-1193. Back issues and reprints should be ordered from Rv:\'~v:w voa Rr:~.~;~o~JS; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. "Out of print" issues are available from University Microfilms International; 300 N. Zeeb Rd.; Ann Arbor, MI 48106. A major portion of each issue is also available on cassette recordings as a service for the visually impaired. Write to the Xavier Society for the Blind; 154 East 23rd Street; New York, NY I0010. PRISMS . We Christians come to know our calling to a certain kind of minis-try in the Church through our fidelity to prayer--a continuing dialogue in our relationship with God. By way of analogy, those in the vocation of married life know that the sacramental celebration of matrimony rep-resents only the start of a new relationship together with God. It will take a married lifetime of dialogue with each other and with God and of so living to make the reality of the sacrament come true. Similarly, those in the vocation of religious life signify in some way (commonly through some kind of vow-taking) that they are professing and aiming at a spe-cial relationship with God with the wholeness of their lives. Again re-ligious are well aware that vow or profession day is only the beginning of the dialoguing and of the living out of this "aimed-at" relationship. In these vocations of married and religious life, the Christian prayer of both the individual and the community (marital or religious) is a neces-sary part of the continuing dialogue which keeps alive and nourishes the particular vocation undertaken by our first responding to God's initia-tive. The call to minister in the name of Christ and officially authorized in the service of the Church also remains grounded in the prayer-dialogue. Ministry, not rooted in prayer, is no ministry at all. Good deeds done may represent admirable humanitarianism which we honor and appreciate, but we do not grace it with the identity of ministry. Min-istry flows from a consciousness of God and God's ways of acting and from a sense of responsibility in acting in the name of Christ's Body, the Church. The pervading consciousness of God and the connatural way of acting as God acts are the fruit of a prayer life, which is consistently fostered "for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health." This dialogue pei'meates and empowers our Christian life as well as our ministry whatever it may be. In this issue, we highlight two aspects of this continuing dialogue so necessary for our vocation and for ourmin!stry. The passion or fire in our Christian way of praying is reflected in the articles "The God of the Scriptures: An Invitation to Passionate Prayer" .by Anthony Wieczorek, O. Praem., "Romantic Relations with the Sacred" by Richard J. De- Maria, C.F.C., and "A Joyful Supp!ication for Justice" by A. Paul 641 642 Review for Religious, September-October 1989 Dominic, S.J. The passion--meaning self-emptying and often a sense of dying--is also a part of our Christian experience of growth in prayer; the articles "Negative Floating" by Barbara Dent and "Spiritual Dryness: Some Practical Guidelines" by Eamon Tobin give some insight into these always difficult moments. Three articles, viewing various aspects of our religious life vocation, are written within the specific prayer context of our lives. "Religious Formation: A Contemplative Realignment" by Jane Ferdon, O.P., con-siders the formation task. "Discernment and Elections in Religious In-stitutes" by Marcello De Carvalho Azevedo, S.J., focuses the very spe-cial moments of leadership choice and policy-making in religious in-stitutes. Finally, "Rituals of Death, Denial, and Refounding" by Ger-ald A. Arbuckle, S.M., reflects on the importance of religious celebrat-ing in a truly Christian manner the dying and death moments in their con-gregational life if revitalization or refounding is to occur today. In the northern hemisphere, the summer months are coming, to an end, with the traditional vacation time behind us for another year. We move on to another "work" year and whatever our ministry may be. With the help of God's grace, .we find ourselves at an opportune time to assess again how our lives, our ministries, and our prayer truly form one healthy and supportive ecological system. May our various authors in this issue contribute to our insight and give us perspective in our quest. David L. Fleming, S.J. The God of the Scriptures: An Invitation to Passionate Prayer Anthony Wieczorek, O.Praem. Father Anthony Wieczorek, O.Praem., is currently chaplain of the Sign of God Deaf Ministry office which serves the Deaf and Hearing Impaired community of the Green Bay diocese. He also directs the Theological Institute, a summer program at St. Norbert College in De Pere, Wisconsin. He continues to write a weekly article for the local diocesan newspaper. His address is St. Norbert Abbey; De Pere, Wiscon-sin 54115-2697. We all have them. Most of us have learned to control, even ignore them. But for some, they appear unasked for and when they do they are toler-ated with all the patience we have for a head cold. They are our emo-tions, our deep seated emotions, the dark and passionate side of our hu-man nature. We enjoy them when, at sports activities, we give ourselves permis-sion to act outraged or triumphant and they suit our moods. We like it when they sneak out quietly in the form of tears at the end of a touching movie. They may also try to make their presence known during prayer, but here they are often considered most distracting and least desired. And yet, if there is a time for emotion, if there is a time for passion at all, it is during prayer. Prayer is a naturally revealing activity. Ii is natural that passionate emotions should arise within us during.prayer. They are conduits to the parts of ourselves God wishes most to go. It is little wonder we should find them straining to emerge. Could it be that they are even called forth by a God eager to touch this part of ourselves so seldom shared? Unfortunately, they are the parts of ourselves we least of all like. Most often, they are corridors to the side of ourgelves we fear. They lead 643 60,4 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 into the cauldron of emotion we have not yet learned to control. We may not be really sure what lurks there but we are fairly confident that God has no part of it, that it is best shielded from God,-that what surges there is best atoned for in secret, not something to be proud of and shared openly with God. But are passionate emotions like anger and jealousy and lust called forth during times of prayer so that we can "confess" to them? Or are they summoned at God's own invitation? Can it be, might it be, that God can desire a passionate prayer as well and as much as a prayer that is con-templative, tranquil, and serene? Might it be that the God who appears ¯ throughout the pages of the Bible speaks to us best and can identify with us most through the part of ourselves we keep most hidden? The God of the Scriptures is indeed a passionate God. This article is an exploration of that theme and of the constructive relationship that exists between passion and prayer. The Passionate Nature of God Pascal was right when he said that there seemed to be two Gods: the God discussed by philosophers and the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of the Scriptures. Most people prefer the philosophers' God. That Being is reasonable, controlled, logical. The God of the phi-losophers thinks, plans, orders, foresees. There is, of course, a "feel-ing" side to this God too. God does, after all, feel compassion and love for creation. But those "feelings" are held well in check and are dis-pensed cooly and properly. This God seems to resemble a fine Victorian gentleman/scholar. And, very often, especially here in the Western world, that is the image we would like to have of ourselves. That is the standard and goal we set for ourselves. The point is not that this image of God is false. But is it all there is? Is it only one side of a much more complex personality? Do we, with a too exclusively philosophical model of God, lose some of God's mys-tery because we fail to pay proper attention to God's emotion and pas-sionate nature? Perhaps such a theology is no more complete than an anthropology that deliberately ignores the emotional and passionate side of human be-ing? The point of human growth is to integrate and harmonize the parts of our nature i'nto one. To ignore our emotions is to ignore half of our selves. In addition to being rational, thinking creatures, human beings also love, feel anger, jealousy, crave revenge, desire, and feel pity. We are indeed complex beings. Can we dare imagine a God who is any less? Moreover, if we are so thoroughly emotional and if we were made in The God of the Scriptures / 6t15 God's own image and likeness, what can we conclude about God? Scripture tells us that "God is love." Love is, to be sure, more than an intellectual attitude or disposition toward life. Love is an emotion. Peo-ple in love are known sometimes to do strange things, spontaneous things, unpredictable things. Or so they seem to us. But to them, fol-lowing the "logic of love," their actions have a rationality, a purpose, an order. Finding it, though, and seeing the reasoning behind such ac-tions can be almost as hard as finding the sense and reason behind some of God's actions in our lives. God is not illogical nor is God emotion-ally unstable. God is simply love. God is simply in love with us "and with ¯ all of creation. God is a Being of great and passionate emotion. That, at least, is what the Scriptures tell us. Perhaps, to beg the question a bit, that is why God chose the Jews in the first place as recorders of divine revelation. The Jews, and all Near Eastern people for that matter, were extremely emotional and passionate people. Check the papers--they still are. But if you were God, would you have chosen them to write the record of your revelation? Many people would probably have preferred the Greeks. Their philo-sophical bent would more likely have appealed to us. And indeed, they would probably have done an admirable job at revealing God's mind. But could they have matched the Jewish brilliance for revealing God's heart? The Jewish passion for life was a most fitting medium for the man-ner of God's message. For the Scriptures reveal in emotional and pas-sionate imagery and terms the heart as well as the mind of God. Maybe, we argue, the Jewish people were simply transferring their own emotional nature onto God and that God no more has passionate feel-ings than God has legs withwhich to walk around in the garden of Eden. Yet, even though they were not meant to be read literally, all the images and words do reveal and communicate something about God. To glean this, though, the Scriptures must be read with an open mind and heart. God's Emotional Involvement in Life What do the Scriptures tell us about God? The Bible reveals a God who is very much alive and near. The biblical God does not observe the glories and follies of creation from afar. This is not a God who aloofly administri~tes creation and human history. Rather, this is a God who min-isters, to it and within it. The God of the Bible is pastorally involved in human life. We know that because the Scriptures reveal a God who is emotionally involved in human life. There are levels and degrees of involvement in community, in fam-ily, in politics, in everything regarding life. One criterion for measuring 646 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 or determining the depth of involvement is the amount of emotional in-vestment shown. In community living, for example, it is easy enough to state one's involvement in community affairs. One may even show up at community meetings and functions. But does that person's words and presence communicate an active involvement or a benign disinterest? Does body language alone, for instance, tell the others present that, "I am here to observe. Really, I couldn't care less what happens. It is some-what interesting, even humorous though. Just continue and pretend I'm not here." No words may communicate that. But the message is made, communicated through posture, through sleepy eyes and flacid facial e~- pression. On the other hand is the person very much involved in the pro-ceedings. Like the other, thi~ person says not a word. Yet through all the same means the message communicated is much different. This per-son exhibits interest through a tense body, through a face that while si-lent is red with anger or aglow with satisfaction. The eyes hold an inter-est, the palms sweat, a leg fidgets nervously. This person is truly and pastorally present and alive. Why? Because the person is visibly emo-tionally involved. And that is what we want from each other and from God. Similarly, why do we become upset with the "professional" pastor who runs the office well and administrates the parish efficiently but who cannot feel his people's pain, who cannot rejoice at someone's birth or mourn at another's death? Why do we feel cheated? Why does the per-son seem pastorally out of touch and somehow less a priest than the pas-tor who is able and willing to be emotionally present to the people? Why does the emotionally uninvested pastor seem to communicate less God's presence? Why do we feel disappointed? For what reason do we feel we should be able to expect and receive more? All of this speaks to an image or a set of expectations we have about God. Because God cares, God's ministers should also care. Because God is able to and does feel with the people, so should God's priests and pas-toral workers. We want and need to feel God present in our lives and feel cheated by those who serve in God's name if somehow we cannot sense from them a deeper presence of God than the merely physical. We want and feel a right to expect an emotional presence and involvement. We want our pastoral workers to be passionately present and active. We want and expect that because we feel God is passionately present and ac-tive. But why? Does that expectation and feeling originate within us alone? Or is that the image Of God that is mysteriously and boldly com- The God of the Scriptures /647 municated through almost every page of the Bible? Indeed, God is most emotionally present and involved in the lives of the Jewish people. That is true from exodus to exile, from restoration through resurrection. God communicates through the Scriptures a presence and involvement that is intensely passionate. The Passionate God of the Prophets Nowhere is this more evident than in the writings of the prophets. Within the prophetic books we see a picture of a God at wits' end. The people had rebelled from God's love and were running headlong toward destruction. We hear a response from God that is the emotional equal of what is politically, socially, and spiritually at stake. Read with the emotion befitting the texts Amos 8:4-8 or 4:!-3 or Hosea'l !:1-11 or Jeremiah 7:i-20 or Isaiah 54:78 or any of the other prophets, and you find the words of a person on the edge, the words of a person who is not at all detached or even mildly interested. In those words and so many others we receive a message of a God filled with pas-sion for the welfare of his people, a God who is truly emotionally in-volved in the life, past and future, of his people. If there is anger in God's words, it is the anger of a parent or lover, the passion of someone who cares tremendously about another. It is an anger born of frustration and love. Who has been in love without feel-ing anger? Love is a powerful emotion that opens us up to other equally powerful feelings. And what of the energy invested in both love and an-ger? Passion has a high price in emotional energy that is paid only by those truly sincere about what they feel. The quality and quantity of God's emotion so naked and strong throughout the prophets is testimony to the sincerity of God's passionate love. Moreover, it is a passion and sincerity that God expects in return. Love that is deep and intense expects a return in kind. One of our ways of showing love is through our prayer, both private and liturgical. Note, then, in Isaiah I:11-16 and Amos 5:21-25 and Jeremiah 7:21-28, the re-action of God to worship that is liturgically correct but void of sincerity and feeling. God expects a worship from the heart, a worship that is a reflection of our love. To be proper and true to the rubrics is not enough, not even the most important thing. What God seeks is what God gives, a prayer that is emotionally sincere. What God "hates" and "detests," what is "loathsome" to God is prayer empty of affect. That does not mean that worship must be a wild and ecstatic affair. However, it must be sincere; it must reveal an authentic human warmth. Worship, prayer, is more than so many words or lack of them. We can 648 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 meditate quite correctly and all without opening our hearts in love. A prayer that is emotionally fl~t.and cold is the sacrifice displeasing to God. Perhaps that is why Paul tells.us that because "we-do, not know how to pray as we ought, the Spirit makes intercession f~or us with groanings that cannot be-expressed in speech" (Rm 8:26). That is an invitation to pray our feelings, to pray from and with our emotions. That is what God asks for and longs to share, for it is that which is most truly in our hearts. The Spirit helps us to raise what we are feeling in prayer, even if it can be expressed in no other way than by a groan. Since we are to live as we pray, God expects from us a life that is emotionally honest and open. How often we repress our feelings and hold in check our passion. We refuse to allow ourselves to feel and that pre-vents us from being as effective and compassionate as Jesus was and calls us to be. The "cry of the poor" is too painful to hear so we learn to close to the poor not only our ears but also our hearts. We dull our abil-ity and willingness to feel and so lose a major motivating force behind Christian action. Pity is not the issue here, rather compassion and jus-tice. Perhaps it was because Jesus was a man of such strong emotions that he was as compassionate and sensitive as the Scriptures say. Yet not only did Jesus have strong feelings, he was willing to live with them and feel them. Because he did not repress what he felt but lived what he felt he could be moved enough to touch and heal the leper (Mk 1:41) and raise the widow's son (Lk 7:11-17). If Jesus was the troublemaker and law-breaker the Pharisees claimed, it was because he allowed his emotions to so move his charity and inspire his faith that he saw not simply the law but the people the law did not and could not serve. God's Call for a Passionate Faith Jesus' emotion is most manifest in his faith. Many people were raised to believe that faith is something we do with our minds, that faith is an intellectual act of agreement or obedience to a tradition or set of beliefs. While it may be that, it is not only that. This is clear from the way Jesus lived and how he believed. For Jesus, faith was an emotion that gripped not only his mind, but his heart and body as well. Oftentimes one emotion is held in check by another. A boy, for in-stance, may want to introduce himself to a girl. The "love" he feels for her is held in check, though, by his "fear" of being rejected. He de-cides to say nothing. Fear has overruled his young love. Similarly, a per-son may feel inclined to speak out on a justice issue. That person too feels fear. But this time the person's convictions on the matter, the per- The God of the Scriptures / 649 son's belief, is the stronger of the two and bids the person to speak out. Here faith overruled fear. All of us know what fear is, all of us have felt it. Reflect for a mo-ment what happens when you feel fear. The mind freezes, it becomes difficult or even impossible to think. The entire body is also affected. Knees shake, palms sweat, the mouth runs dry. If the fear is sharp enough we may even close our eyes and prefer to block out the cause of our fear. Fear, to be sure, is a powerful emotion. It would require, then, an equally powerful emotion to counter it. Only two emotions give us the courage to overcome fear: love and faith--although the two are intimately related. A mother stands terrified at the sight of her burning home when she hears the cry of her child from within. Her fear of the flames and smoke cause her to stand for a mo-ment paralyzed until love for her child overpowers the fear and forces her in to rescue him. Jeremiah the prophet stands equally terrified be-fore the people gathered at the Temple. He too, however, hears--or rather feels--an inner voice, the call of God bidding him to speak in God's name. For a moment his fear prevails before the faith within his heart overwhelms it and causes him to cry out. . How many of us have had our faith compromised by fear? By clos-ing ourselves to our feelings, by repressing our emotions, we have been eliminating a source of strength that could well empower our faith to ri-val that of tl~e prophets. If our faith is solely intellectual it is but half, at best, of what it could be. Faith is authentic when it flows from our hearts, when it flows from our love for God. Jeremiah, for example, and Jesus after him, may have seemed like people without faith because they spoke against the traditions and cus-toms of the people. They could rightly be asked, "Have you no faith, Jeremiah, in the Temple and the promise God made to dwell in it always? Why is it so hard for you to have faith in what our traditions teach.? Why can't you agree with them?" Faith in this sense is an act of the intellect. But for Jeremiah, for the other prophets, and for Jesus, faith was an act of love; its motive force was an intuition of God's abiding presence within. They felt God's love and returned it as they could (that is, they believed) and it was that faith in God's love that enabled them to stand up and say what their hearts could not deny. The love they felt empowered them, gave their faith the spirit of cour-age. All of us are given the gift of that love. All of us have within our-selves the courage to truly use our faith. But so often in closing ourselves to our emotions, in denying them, we deny ourselves the grace, the love, Review for Religious, September-October 1989 that gives us the courage to truly believe. Jesus and the prophets before him were not ashamed of their emotions. Indeed, they prayed with them (Jeremiah's lamentations, for example) by bringing them before God in-stead of hiding them in the dark recesses of their spirits. By so doing, they provide an example for all us of authentic living and prayer. Praying with our Emotions Oddly enough, it is the emotion of fear that most inhibits us from bringing our.other emotions to prayer. As mentioned earlier, prayer is a naturally revealing activity. In prayer, the love and union we share with God is revealed and made known to us. We may receive the revelation of truths and intuitions about questions and problems we may have, as well as insights into God and ourselves. It is this that often scares us into emotional and spiritual repression. In the quiet, centering communion of prayer with God, we forget to maintain many of the blocks and barriers we place between our conscious selves and our more disquieting emotions. Suddenly and quite unexpect-edly we can find the composure of our prayer compromised by unwel-comed feelings. The person whose thoughts continue to center upon feel-ings of passion for a lover, the religious whose heart is suddenly filled with anger and resentment toward a superior, the person who becomes aware of his or her jealousy and envy--all of these people find the re-warding calm of prayer ruined by the onslaught of emotions. In each of these cases, whether or not prayer has been ruined de-pends upon whose agenda is being followed. Prayer is a dialogue. How-ever, especially with meditation, prayer can become a monologue of si-lence. Our meditation can be but another way of saying, "Listen God, there are just some things I'd sooner not think about. Why don't we just sit here quietly and ignore them together." Our prayer agenda calls for some peace and quiet, a bit of reprieve, a break in the action of confron-tation. Yet we find ourselves continually pestered by thoughts and feel-ings we've decided not to share. Might it be, however, that their contin-ual interruption is an effort on God's part to make it part of our prayer? Might God have an agenda too? And might that agenda include the very feelings we are so desperate to ignore? It might do well, then, since prayer is a dialogue, to "ask" God about what should be shared. One way of doing so is by beginning our prayer with a bit of soul searching journaling. We might record what and how we are feeling, any significant encounters we have had with peo-ple, good and bad. The point is not to dwell on any of them. Rather we acknowledge what is already inside of us. We acknowledge it to God and The God of the Scriptures / 651 to ourselves. Then, having done that, we set it aside and open ourselves to God. Yet, the very action of having been honest with ourselves about what we arefeeling has already opened the doors to our deepest selves to God. We have laid everything bare and have effectively told God, "Well, now that you know, what do you say?" Then if our prayer is quiet, perhaps God is saying, "Let it rest for now," and so we should. If, however, we find the emotions returning, perhaps we should pay them some prayerful attention. It is one matter to continually harp on a feeling and another tO at-tend to one that finds its way to the surface. Yet it is here that fear can overcome all else and totally inhibit our communion with God, not to mention any communion with ourselves. We are afraid of what may come if we allow our emotions to flow. We are afraid of what God may think if we stood before God with emotions bare. Perhaps most of all, we are afraid of what we would have to admit about ourselves if we al-lowed our spiritual vision to focus upon our feelings. Especially in times of stress, when we need prayer most, we are most reluctant, most afraid to pray because the emotions we so fear are so close to surface, so hard to dispel. In such cases the fear and shame we so strongly feel should be the opening movement of our prayer. But here is the test. Have we the faith to share what we fear? Here we become the shy person struggling to talk to a friend. Here we become the mother rooted in fear or stirred by love into action. Here we find the revelation, not of God but of ourselves, that prayer so powerfully conveys. Here we find a truth about ourselves. Prayer is a dialogue. Has God been speaking, shouting through hands pressed tight against our ears, trying to get through? Summary We can repress our prayer and weaken our faith because we are un-willing to face the passion of our own emotions. Why? Is it God's rejec-tion or wrath that we fear or is it facing the truth about ourselves? Some people are simply ashamed that they are emotional people at all. Some-where many of us have learned that we should be rational at the expense of being emotional. Emotions are something to master, signs of weak-ness, occasions for sin. To be holy is to be emotionally controlled. Pei-haps. To be sure, some emotions need to be held in check. Some need to be confessed. But not all. Our emotions are occasions for grace, provided we let our God work through them. They can be conduits leading to deeper prayer. They can be the means for facing and overcoming our fear of living. For indeed, 652 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 without emotions we are less than human. We were made in the image and likeness of a living, feeling God who is revealed in the pages of Scrip-ture as a truly passionate lover, a God who, for example, is quite honest about being "jealous." We were made to have feelings and to use our emotions to feel and act alive. If Jesus was not ashamed of the force of his emotions, why should we? As Christians we are called to become fully alive. That means learn-ing to live with and harness our emotions. Truly, our emotions are gifts from God, gifts to be enjoyed, gifts for which we can be grateful. But before any of that can happen, our emotions must first be accepted. The Dancer Is falling in love with you autumn leaves swirling in the wind, fish swimming in the flooded ,,;hallows after a heavy rainfall? Is this love a meditative symphony, where the listener is impelled to pause, be attentive to the secret voice talking with his heart? Is this love a walk without fear into the forest of Solitude, where I go to plant my tree of hope? Is this love an ancient la Jota, sometimes graceful and slow, at other moments fast and exciting? How do I overcome my reluctance? Become like David, who danced before the Lord because it was pleasing to him? Brother Richard Heatley, F.S.C. De La Salle Centre 45 Oaklands Avenue Toronoto, Ontario M4V 2E4, Canada Romantic Relations with the Sacred Richard J. DeMaria, C.F.C. Brother Richard DeMaria, C.F.C., currently serves as Executive Vice President and the Vice President for Academic Affairs at lona College. His address is lona Col-lege; New Rochelle, New York 10801. In the recent, surprisingly successful film, Th~rOse, based on the life of St. Th6r~se of Lisieux, there is a scene that has remained with me for months. Th6r~se's sister visits her during what was to be a terminal ill-ness, and noticing that Th6r~se has pinned a small crucifix to her pil-low, observes: "So you two are back together again." To which, as I recall it, Th6r~se blushes and nods in agreement. The audience--a New York City audience--to my amazement did not laugh here or at any time during a movie which portrayed Th6r~se as a woman engaged in a ro-mantic relationship with Jesus, a relationship characterized by falling outs, jealousies, reunions, disagreements, and coquetry. And by love. And by passion. The film places Th6r~se in a very old tradition of spirituality, a tra-dition which uses the language and ways of romantic love to describe a person's interaction with the sacred. The romantic poem "The Song of Songs" comes immediately to mind: the longing of a bride for her bride-groom is used as an image of the human experience with the sacred. Ap-parently that image was found sufficiently apt among the Hebrew peo-ple for the poem to be included and preserved in its canon of sacred litera-ture. We find in other religions similar spiritualities linking sexual im-agery and prayer, the link sometimes explicitly recognized and cele-brated, at other times, we assume, camouflaged and unrecognized but fairly apparent to those who read between lines. As R. Zaehner, the Oxford authority on mysticism, observes: 653 654 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 There is no point at all blinking at the fact that the raptures of the theis-tic mystic are closely akin to the transports of sexual union, the soul play-ing the part of the female and (~od appearing as the male. ~ In the history of religion, one finds many spiritualities that approach life as if there were two lovers involved. In Hinduism, one finds among the different paths by which one can yoke himself or herself to God, the path of bhakti in which one takes on the Lord as lover. Kabir, the fif-teenth- century Indian mystic, as translated by Bly, uses the term "the Guest" to name the inner lover: My body and my mind are in depression because you are not with me. How much I love you and want you in. my house! When 1 hear people describe me as your bride I look sideways ashamed, Because I know that far inside us we have never met. Then what is this love of mine? I don't really care about food, I don't really care about sleep, I am restless indoors and outdoors. The bride wants her lover as much as a thirsty man wants water. And how will I find someone who will take a message to the Guest from me? How restless Kabir is all the time! How much he wants to see the Guest!z The existence of a relationship between mysticism and sexuality is clear and widespread in the historical record. The question is: how shall we interpret and understand the presence of romaritic and sexual lan-guage in religious writing? More to the point are the following questions: Is it possible to carry on a love relationship with an invisible, non-human lover? Does this spirituality find any basis in the way things are? Is there someone there to love? Is this use of romantic language healthy? Unless we at least advert to these questions from the outset, they stand as obstacles to our ability to approach this tradition with openness. There are many analysts who interpret experiences of romantic spiri-tuality as situations in which sexual energy, having been denied its usual outlet, finds a (distorted) outlet in the religious arena. Accordingly, mys-ticism is in reality sexual energy that is misdirected. Although this sub-limation is usually unrecognized by the person involved, its true nature can be readily recognized by the perceptive observer. In sum, people in-volved in religious romanticism are victims of misplaced energy; their lives are based upon an unreal perception of the way things are. Other analysts suggest that the situation is quite the opposite: a ba-sic drive, a basic need within humans, is for union with the transcendent. Romantic Relations with the Sacred / 655 According to this theory, the mystic is a person who is responding quite directly to this basic drive. Other humans respond to this drive by en-gaging themselves in sexual, romantic relationships with other humans. This is a valid way of fulfilling this need. The power of human, inter-personal sexuality, and the way that relationship is experienced and de-scribed, derive from the more basic desire of the human to interact with the sacred. Because the inter-human sexual experience is one form of the more general mystical experience, it should not surprise us that the lan-guage of human love and the language of mystical 10ve are quite simi-lar. Alan W. Watts, in Myth and Ritual in Christianity makes the fol-lowing observation: But a sexually self-conscious culture such as our own must beware of its natural tendency to see religion as a symbolizing of sex, for to sexu-ally uncomplicated people it has always been obvious that sex is a sym-bol of religion. That is to say, the ecstatic self-abandonment of nuptial love is the average man's nearest approach to the selfless state of mys-tical and metaphysical experience. For this reason the act of love is the easiest and most readily intelligible illustration of what it is like to be in "union with God," to live the eternal life, free from self and time.3 Perhaps it will never be possible to prove convincingly which of these two theories is true. Some look to an epistemology which concen-trates its attention not on questions about the way things are but rather on questions about what ways work. Such an approach considers a the-ory to be true, or a path to be true, when it works. Pragmatic approaches to understanding our lives can reflect a careless and shallow attitude about truth, but not necessarily so. The form of pragmatism discussed here, recognizing the complexity of the human psyche and the mystery of the sacred, and recognizing the inability of the human mind to under-stand these with any clarity, reasons that if a particular construct or the-ory works, it works because it approximates the way things are. This is an epistemology often used in the physical sciences. Consider, for ex-ample, the solar system model of the atom. No one has seen an atom. Serious scientists do not think that the atom is composed of electrons, circling a nucleus of neutrons and protons, like a solar system. Scien-tists, however, have used the construct of a solar system when thinking about the atom, because when they have followed out the implications of that model, they have been able to explain many past experiences (ex-periments). And, even more importantly, when they devised new experi-ments and applications suggested by the model, these led to important new discoveries. Science has done well, then, to think of the atom as if 656 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 it were a solar system. Even if the atom is not a solar system, the solar system picture predicts how the atom will work. And it is not unreason-able to conclude from this that in many ways the solar system model ap-proximates the reality of the atom. In sum, while recognizing that a con-struct is an imagined picture, a person follows it because she believes that it will lead her close to the way things are. Against the background of this epistemology, we can now turn our attention to those paths in which a person is involved in a relationship with a person who is not physically present but who is perceived to be real, important, and worthy of ~ittention; a relationship which according to the person herself and according to observers, gives direction and strength. Whether the other is perceived as guru, teacher, patron, guide, angel, patron saint, or--as in the particular spirituality we are discuss-ing-- as the romantically loved one, the relationship has a real effect upon the growth and behavior of the participant. In his play Big Shot, Jack Gelber portrays the positive, powerful influence which two "imagi-nary" persons--a wise, aged prophetic man, and a seductive woman-- have upon a young man's ability to make decisions about his life and to move toward maturity. (Interestingly, these two visitors never appear to-gether in the boy's thoughts; the appearance of one signals the exit of the other. At the play's end, however, they interact with one another and exit together, perhaps symbolizing something of an integration of the re-ligious and the sexual in his consciousness.) According to what was said above, one should evaluate the tradition of romantic spirituality by asking: What happens to persons when they act as if there were an inner sacred person there? Does it lead to desir-able ends? In this approach one judges a religious path worth consider-ing if it has "worked" for many people, in many religions, in many dif-ferent ages. What is meant by "worked"? The validity of this or any path is established by its ability to lead practitioners into that special con-sciousness which is called "religious." In the Christian faith, people in that consciousness are said to be in the state of sanctifying grace and ex-hibit characteristics such as love, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, trustfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Ga 5:22). History attests that the path of devotion, of romantic love, is a path that has led many to that consciousness; the way works. The seeker of God who utilizes the con-struct of romantic love does not need to know for certain whether there is a real person with whom she can interact in love. She does know that when she acts as if there were such a person, wonderful things do hap-pen. In Bhakti Yoga, the author writes: Romantic Relations with the Sacred / 657 All our attitudes, moral or emotional, as well as religious are due to the objects of our consciousness: the things which we believe to exist whether really or ideally along with ourselves. Such objects may be pre-sent to our senses or they may be present to our thought; in either case they elicit from us a reaction and the reaction due to things of thought is notoriously in many cases as strong as that due to sensible presences. It may even be stronger . 4 How does one follow this path? By undertaking the same practices which a man or woman utilizes in establishing a love relationship with a human being. By conversing. By sharing feelings. By trying to please. By actions of union. By admiration. By efforts to merge into one an-other. By writing poems of love. By singing songs of love. By making sacrifices. By exchanging gifts. By establishing rituals, special places, and special times. By secrets shared. By anger expressed. And by hurts told. By arguing. By compromising. How does one advise or counsel a person on this path? As one would advise or counsel a person struggling with any experience of love. The spiritual director will help him to recognize the stages of love. The di-rector will lead her to expect periods of doubt, of loneliness, of seeming neglect, of loss of attraction--the dark nights of the soul. He must be assisted in learning the art of conversation, and especially the art of lis-tening. (For let there be no doubt about it: the person does experience conversation, responses and answers that surprise by their unexpected-ness. Where do these answers come from? Suffice it to say that when questions are asked of this inner lover, this inner guest,' one "hears" answers.) The director will need to counsel the practitioner about the im-portance of fidelity, to help recall the good times in moments of dark-ness, and to point her to better times ahead. The person engaged in this path does experience another actor in his life. Outside observers may wish to interpret this experience as the ef-fects of the "alter ego," or the "subconscious," or the "repressed self." These interpretations should not be allowed to discourage the lover, if forhim the experience of this other is real, and if the effects of carrying out a relationship of love with that "person" are beneficial and if they are leading her into grace. This path does not work for everyone. In New Wineskins,5 Sandra Schneiders observes that in earlier times it was assumed that all women entering into the religious life would find in this romantic spirituality a comfortable and effective path. Women religious, on their day of pro-fession, came to the altar dressed as brides, as the choir sang "Veni Review for Religious, September-October 1989 Sponsa Christi," in a ceremony that was designed to imitate in many ways that of a marriage. Schneiders suggests that in fact many Sisters did not find this path to be effective for them. For many, it was a kind of play.acting, which in later years---especially if they were influenced by Freudian thinking--they came to regard as a childish effort to subli-mate energies better redirected in other ways. Today, almost all traces of this bridal spirituality have been removed from the rituals and from the language of contemporary religious women. Women who have en-tered religious life in recent years may not even be aware of this spiritu-ality. By way of conclusion, two questions about this path of spirituality suggest themselves. First, in this relationship, does the soul always take the role of the feminine to the masculine God, a role in which the hu-man seeks to be filled, empowered, or taken over by the other? The male poet, Kabir, cited before, who wrote in a culture which knew of both male and female gods, always--at least in translation--describes him-self as feminine in relationship to the sacred. Listen to the following poem: I played for ten years with the girls of my own age, but now I am sud-denly in fehr. I am on the way up some stairs--they are high. Yet I have to give up my fears if I want to take part in this love. I have to let go of the protective clothes and meet him with the whole length of my body. My eyes will have to be the love candles this time. Kabir says: Men and women in love will understand this poem. If what you feel for the holy one is not desire, then what's the use of dressing with such care, and spending so much time making your eyelids dark.6 Can one approach the sacred as masculine? Or must one utilize the feminine side (the anima) in one's relationship with the sacred (assum-ing of course that every person, regardless of gender, is both animus and anima)? And if this is true, will this path of spirituality come more natu-rally to women than to men? Or, again if it is true, would the fact that a person has a gay or lesbian orientation affect the attractiveness and ef-fectiveness of this spirituality? A second questign.: what (if any) is the connection between this spousal spirituality and celibacy? Clearly, spousal spirituality does ap-peal and does work for non-celibates as well as celibates. Does celibacy enable one to pursue this path more quickly or more deeply? Does the fact that one is not pursuing the path of romantic human love dispose one Romantic Relations with the Sacred / 659 toward this path more urgently? Or, to take the quite opposite position, would familiarity and experience with human romantic love give one the lexicon and the understandings that enable one to move more quickly into this more interior love? To conclude: the spiritual path of romantic relationships with the sa-cred has been neglected in recent years, perhaps because twentieth-century psychology has called into question so many of the foundations upon which it was based. There is, however, a way of understanding our ways of knowing, consonant with contemporary science, which gives 'permission' to those so attracted to follow this path, to see whether it leads them into grace. While the path will not attract, nor work for, eve-ryone, a knowledge of its history and dynamics should be made avail-able to those who are searching for ways into the world of the sacred. NOTES ~ R.C. Zaehner, Mysticism, Sacred and Profane, (New York, 1961), p. 151. 2 Robert Bly, trans., The Kabir Book, (Boston, 1977), p. 20. 3 Alan W. Watts, Myth and Ritual in Christianity, (Boston, 1968), p. 104. 4 "Bhikshu," Bhakti Yoga, (Chicago, 1930), p. 19. 5 Sandra Schneiders, New Wineskins, Re-imagining Religious Life Today, (New York, !986), p. 116. 6 Bly, p. 42. Negative Floating Barbara Dent Barbara Dent, mother and grandmother, has been for eigthteen years a Secular Carme-lite. She published "The Floating Prayer" in our issue of March/April 1988. The current article is a part of a book-in-process called Floating in Endless Love. She may be addressed at Poustinia; 7A Cromwell Place; Pukekohe, New Zealand. In this article I use the word "floating" to indicate the kind of detach-ment and freedom that is attained once we have ascended a certain dis-tance up the nada path. When I write of "floating in endless love," 1 mean the traditional self-abandonment to divine providence as exemplified by holy people of any age, and written about by such recognized saints as Teresa, John of the Cross, Francis de Sales, Jane Frances de Chantal, Caussade, Th~r~se. Our Lady is, of course, the supreme exemplar, and her "Be it done unto me according to your word," a succinct summary of the doc-trine. Divine providence is God's endless love. It had no beginning and will never have an end. It is conterminous with his Being and expresses itself throughout his creation. When he made us in his own image, he gave us the ability to be ef-fortlessly immersed in this love, borne along in the currents and eddies of its movement in time and space, as it ordained and controlled the cir-cumstances of our lives, and we rejoiced in its faultless wisdom and ten-derness. At that beginning-time we had our Creator's discerning Spirit within us, and joyfully cooperated with the process of floating in the divine will, for through it the perfection of his love for us expressed itself, and we were fully open and receptive to it. We were in the state of innocence, which means single-mindedness and wholeness of heart. 660 Negative Floating / 66"1 Then came the "aboriginal catastrophe"--in one, or many, of a num-ber of possible forms. Its basic effect was to confuse, divide, and mis-lead us about the nature of our relationship with our Master. We were, and are, no longer in that original state of love-union's positive, effort-less floating. Instead, we are too often thrashing about in protest at being in the water at all. We persist in struggling to reach some imaginary shore, strik-ing out against the current, gulping water, feeling terrified that we are drowning, pushing away Love's hand held out to draw us to safety, and generally being at odds with our spiritual environment. Our innocence lost, we have become acquainted with sin--actual or potential, deliberate or involuntary. Floating in endless love does not any longer seem to be the obvious, healthy, joyous thing for us to do. We have lost the art, and have to be taught all over again by grace. And because we no longer learn the mys-teries of God effortlessly through direct infusion, the Spirit's modes of teaching us often register on us as nay-saying, destructive, painful, and incomprehensible. This is because God's endless love flowing into us is constantly encountering obstacles of self-love and self-will within us. These cause the flow to be interrupted, dammed up, diverted, and im-peded in numberless ways. We now have to re-learn what we were fashioned to know without even thinking about it. This learning is painful and arduous, and regis-ters on us as a state of negative floating. It entails erasure of all those obstacles against floating--whether personally manufactured, handed on to us by our families and social milieu, or inherited and buried so deeply in our mysterious inner being that we shall never even catch sight of them, let alone drag them up and free ourselves from them, unless the Spirit helps us in a very special way. We are weighted down so that we are more likely to sink to the ocean bed than to float in delight in the surface currents of God's purpose, rev-elling in their effortless, exact progress towards our ultimate fulfillment in him. Positive and negative floating are part of the normal cycle of conso-lation and desolation in the spiritual life. If we persevere in floating in God's loving purpose for us, there comes a time when, just as his crea- ¯ tive energy evolved birds out of fish, he somehow dispenses altogether with the metaphorical liquid element in order to lift us up so high in the Spirit that we are suspended in midair. We usually think of such suspension as bodily levitation and miracu- 662 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 IOUS. But the essence of free-floating in the atmosphere, metaphorically speaking, is entirely spiritual and interior, a flight of the spirit that usu-ally has no physical, exterior signs at all. It is the result of an opening up to God's love that on our part includes the complete abandonment of our whole selves to his usage, and on his part such lavish infusion of his grace that its energy elevates us temporarily into his own Being. This is the ultimate in positive floating. It mysteriously and paradoxi-cally also includes the ultimate in negative floating, for in order to give ourselves up to it, we need to have renounced all the not-God elements so that there is now nothing at all in us or our lives opposing his desire to take full possession of us. God is non-corporeal. When this moment of total possession takes place, he draws up our non-corporeal spirit to merge with his own. This merging, can be accomplished in both, or either, of the positive and nega-tive floating states. After about six months of intensely positive floating immediately af-ter my reception into the Church in 1956, I was gradually translated into the negative floating state and remained there without any remission for nearly twelve years. During my conversion year, 1955, I had already learnt to enter Christ's passion with him by uniting my personal suffering with his in Gethsemane and throughout the various aspects of his passion, especially his cross-carrying and crucifixion. At one particular time in 1958 when I vividly experienced what I came to call the crucifixion of my heart, something extra happened within me that I could at the time define only as "entombment." Yet the crucifixion did not cease. I was somehow still on the cross with Christ even while I was lying dead with him in the cave tomb's cold darkness. I cannot explain how this was. I only know it happened, and was spiritually and interiorily real in an agonizing way. I think I was able to endure these years of intensely negative float-ing only because, during most of them, I was fully occupied being a daily Mass-goer, solo mother, housekeeper, teacher, breadwinner, writer, and student. There was not much opportunity for what my mother disparag-ingly used to call "navel-gazing"--adding, in exasperation, "Why don't you go out and have a good game of tennis!" In spite of immersion in an undoubtedly and unavoidably active life (my form of a good game of tennis!), I yet received insights from time to time that infused some sense into the non-sense of my relationship Negative Floating / 663 with God. For this was where the nonsense, the absurdity, occurred. My rela-tionship with Jesus in his incarnational work of suffering redeemer and crucified Lord made very good sense to me, and gave me the courage to go on enduring. It was from God and his ways that the conundrum originated. Once more he had become for me the "cruel, sadistic mon-ster" who, during the early war years, had caused my rejection of my personal and inadequate version of the Christian religion. One of the key insights I received in the earlier of these negative float-ing years of the 1960s came about as follows. I can visualize clearly where it happened, just as I can vividly recall .where other significant, instant comprehensions occurred, for example, those about "the abyss of corruption" and the self-love involved in my mechanism of setting out to "fascinate" certain people. Such instant dis-cernments come to me like a crystal globe enclosing the truth, and put whole and clear in my mind all at once. The experience is completely different from arriving at a similar conclusion by the laborious process - of ratiocination. It is a matier of immediate comprehension received as a whole and in passivity. In fact, in a floating state, as it were. On this particular occasion I was sitting one morning at the desk in the home of my eldest daughter and her husband, alone in the house ex-cept for a sleeping child. Then in one instant the insight came whole-- just like a very bright light being turned on in my mind, then extin-guished almost immediately, yet leaving behind it the vivid impression of a particular mystery made plain in its illumination. In this case, I "understood" what caused Jesus to cry out, "My God, my God, why have you rejected me?" Just as I had become one with him in other aspects of his passion at various times, now I had become one with him in his cry of derelic-tion. His cry was one with the cry of my own heart to an alien, absentee God, whose face was turned away from me in contempt. Jesus' despair-ing question was to do with his having consented to be "made sin" for us. This was the central point-of the illumination given me. I had bought my Knox bible in 1956 and used it until I obtained the Jerusalem version in 1969. The texts I have marked in the Knox were the ones that had very special meaning for me personally during these darkest years of the cry of dereliction. I have underlined, "Christ never knew sin, and God made him into sin for us, so that in him we might be turned into the holiness of God" (2 Co 5:21). I "saw" that sin was absolutely abhorrent to and automatically re- 664 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 pudiated by God because it was the antithesis of his own unblemished holiness and purity. "God was in Christ, reconciling the world to him-self, establishing in our hearts his message of reconciliation, instead of holding men to account for their sins" (2 Co 5: 19), and "In Christ the whole plenitude of Deity is embodied." Hanging on the cross, dying for us, "made sin," Jesus, though God himself, consented to be relegated in his manhood to the furthest possi-ble distance from God--as f~ir as pure sin must be, of its nature, dis-tanced from pure holiness. It must have been the most elemental, cata-clysmic, schizoid split of all time. In and through this alienation Jesus endured, "the world"--all of us sinners of all time--could be "reconciled" to God instead of being eternally severed from him in self-induced banishment. In effect, Jesus willed to go through the experience of damnation as our proxy, as vic-tim instead of us. This meant knowing God only through the aching void of his ab-sence; submitting to the punitive action of the total recoil of pure holi-ness from pure unholiness; being invaded by a sense of rejection so ab-solute as to know what the hell-state meant, and to be engulfed in it. There is impenetrable mystery here, a paradox so extreme that the human mind cannot encompass it. How could Christ, in whom "the whole plenitude of Deity" remained unimpaired, yet experience himself as "the totality of sin" rejected by that Deity? The how, the mystery, is beyond our human comprehension. The paradox is mind-blowing. I cannot explain fully what I "saw" in the illumination. At the time, I knew it without intellectual explication. This came later, as I meditated upon what I had received, and thought more about what Paul said, out of what was obviously his own personal experience and given insight. Enli/~htenments about this mystery hidden within Christ's dereliction cry have continued to come spasmodically to me up to this present time. "All alike have sinned, all alike are unworthy of God's praise. And justification comes to us as a free gift from his grace, through our re-demption in Christ Jesus. God has offered him to us as a means of rec-onciliation, in virtue of faith, ransoming us with his blood" (Rm 3:23- 25). I had already understood how the solidarity of the human race was such that the salvation or damnation of any one of us must involve and concern all of us. In pouring out in his shed blood his "free gift of grace" for us, Jesus excluded no one, for none of us is sinless. We are all inevitably born programmed for possible disaster by the racial accu- Negative Floating mulation of wrong turnings made while trying to reach a destination whose nature and location we are confused about. Our tendency to get lost is in our genes. ~ "In sin my mother conceived me," is not a reference to the sexual act as such, but to the fact that the whole of humanity is in a state of at least partial alienation from God and can be reconciled only through Christ. Jesus entered the furthest reaches of this alienation when, as the vic-tim for our sins, he uttered his cry of dereliction on the cross. I saw in my moment of illumination that, once I had in 1957 told God he could have me as a victim for the salvation of souls (if he wanted me), I had implicitly consented to enter in some way into this dereliction of Jesus, and keep him company. At the same time, I was not certain God had accepted my offer, for no one had yet confirmed that I was indeed a victim, and I was not to have that assurance for several years yet. It was only then that everything fitted together coherently. But I did see in that moment of revelation that here was the meaning and purpose of the annihilating experience of my-self as spurned and rejected by God, even while at the same time, in my will, I refused to let go of him, and clung on with all my strength. Much later, I realized that even while God "rejected" me, he gave me that very grace I needed to cling tenaciously to him. At the same time, the illumination did not bring me any comforting reassurance, for I could not really believe it applied to me. This may seem a contradiction, but the grace of comfort is an extra grace, and for those years of torment God chose to withhold it from me, no matter what insights he gave my intellect. That I already had a well-established, deep-seated rejection syn-drome as part of my emotional makeup made it simpler and easier for all of this to happen. Grace had only to activate and utilize what was al-ready there, so deeply rooted in my inner being. I believe that God did this in order to use me for others as I had pleaded with him to do. In the terms I have since evolved for myself, I was "floating". in the negative way with Jesus on the cross, as part of "the Dali image." I was there tb help my neighbor, any neighbor--it was for God to choose whom, I never asked to be shown who, how, or where. "Enemies of God, we were reconciled to him through his Son's death; reconciled to him, we are surer than ever of finding salvation in his Son's life. And, what is more, we can boast of God's protection; al-ways through our Lord Jesus Christ, since it is through him that we have 666 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 attained our reconciliation"(Rm 5:10-1 I). "We who were taken up into Christ by baptism have been taken up, all of us, into his death . We have to be closely fitted into the pat-tern of his resurrection, as we have been into the pattern of his death" (Rm 6:3, 5). Sin and salvation, death and life, crucifixion and resurrection, Jesus and all of us--inseparable. It is all mingled together like the confluence of two mighty rivers flowing as one towards the ocean of eternity and infinity. We have to "share his sufferings if we are to share his glory" (Rm 8:17). Some refuse the suffering and do not believe in the glory. Proxies must, in their stead, agree to be immersed in the passion with Jesus, so that the glory will permeate them, too. He came to save all. His will to redeem the whole of humanity can-not and will not be thwarted, but we are all one with him, and so those who are willing must help him save those who are unwilling. He expects and requires this of his lovers, though not necessarily as explicit victims, for this must be a given vocation. "For thy sake, we face death at every moment, reckoned no better than sheep marked down for slaughter. Yet in all this we are conquer-ors, through him who has granted us his love" (Rm 8:36-37). In the "inscrutable judgments" and "undiscoverable ways" of God is hidden the mystery of the redemption of the human race, in which all participate, consciously or unconsciously. The willing "offer up their bodies as a living sacrifice" because "though we are many in number" (trillions and trillions of us back to the beginning and on to the end of time), we yet "form one body in Christ and each acts as the counter-part of the other" (see Rm 12). Paul insists we are "Christ's body, organs of it depending upon each other" (1 Co 12:27), and therefore "the sufferings of Christ overflow into our lives"--together with divine comfort (2 Co 1:5). For Paul, shar-ing in the sufferings of Christ in order to bring forth spiritual children for him, is a fundamental Christian vocation. He writes, "It makes me happy to suffer for you, as I am sufferi.ng now, and in my own body to do what I can to make up all that has still to be undergone by Christ for the sake of his body, the Church. I became the servant of the Church" (Col 1:24-25). All these teachings of St. Paul, marked in my Knox bible, had had dynamic personal meaning for me ever since 1956, the year of my re-ception into the Church. They had been fortified and elucidated by stud-ies of such theological works as The Whole Christ by E. Mersch, S.J. Negative Floating / 66"/ (Dobson, London, 1956). They were in the very fiber of my interior life, yet, though I knew, believed, and lived what Jesus exemplified and Paul taught and lived, no felt comfort and consolation resulted. I was given strength to endure (while experiencing myself as weak and destitute) and that was all. But to endure and to persevere is at the very basis of the nada path journey, and the grace given me to do this was among the supreme ones of my life. Father Basil had now become my director, though, as he had been transferred, we seldom had the chance to meet. What he wrote to me in a letter of July, 1963, is relevant to the above. I quote: God does love you very dearly. Think of the tremendous graces that you have received from him. Your desire to give him everything in return is all that matters. You give, generously, only to the One whom you love . I am not so much concerned about the aridity and difficulty that you are experiencing at your prayers and the seeming loss of God. What I am concerned about is your loss of peace and near panic, because of the difficulties. The temptation to discouragement is one of the most insidious and dangerous for an interior soul. If you are patient and do not allow this temptation to dictate any change in your program of the day, you have nothing to fear. In his own good time he will give you the light and the warmth that seem to have disappeared. There is noth-ing in your day that is not worthy of being offered to him. This means that you are every hour united more intimately with him. You are grow-ing in charity and all the virtues, without being conscious of the growth. The increase in charity is all that matters. His reassurance was a blessing, calming me until the next spasm of self-doubt and apparent rejection by God afflicted me. Then I would re-read what he said, and be comforted again. In a queer way it was as if God himself was telling me, "Don't worry. Everything's all right-- even though it seems to be all wrong." Again he was loving me through "a soul in which he had established himself," just as he had promised as I lay so ill and weak in the hospital. One or two entries in my journals record various aspects of my nega-tive floating at this time. In the following, I think my way through to a grace-enlightened conclusion in faith, hope, and trust. It was not given to me in~stantaneously as a crystal globe. I quote from a 1963 rare entry: It is the risen Lord who permeates the whole of creation. 1 have been experiencing the suffering Christ. The climax came in the crucifixion of my heart. Then entombment and silence. Only the dead Christ there, un- 668 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 stirring~ and myself numb and seemingly dead with him year after year, waiting and praying and longing for the resurrection. Now I see the the Lord is risen. He fills my soul and the whole of his Mystical Body. He has risen as he said he would, even while I mourned him dead in me, and I dead with him. He is risen. How can this become more real to me, so that I too rise with him? Let me think . It is the risen Lord who permeates the whole of creation. Therefore he is not dead in me~ for his resurrection truly hap-pened. But something did die in me and was entombed. What was it? The overwhelming sense of entombment. Christ dead and in the tomb. And it was a significant turning point. What died? My attachment to and need of natural love? But the process of purgation through hu-man relationships still continues. Yet it is different. How? What died and was buried? "You have undergone death, and your life is buried and hidden away with Christ." I made a heartbreaking renunciation of my own free will, and I gave up--what? What died? My heart died. Yet I found other loves. "Christ, having undergone death, cannot die any more . He is not here; he has risen as he told you . We have to be closely fitted into the pattern of his resurrection, as we have been into the pattern of his death . We'know that Christ, now he has risen from the dead, cannot die any more. Death has no more power over him . " It was not Christ who died in me, for he cannot die any more. It was something in myself that died. And all the while I have been entombed, he has been living in my soul the life of the risen Lord. His resurrection is continuous just as much as his passion is. Somehow I have to become united with this.risen Christ. Like La-zarus called forth from the tomb, I have to shed my grave clothes and answer the call of the Lord, but "how? How? I don't know how. He has to say, "Come forth," and then I shall be able to move. Yet he eternally says, "Come forth," inviting me to share his life of glory in the Trinity, the life he is already living in my soul all the time I am in a state of grace. Only somehow I cannot unite myself with it, because the tomb wall seems in the way. What is the tomb wall? My compulsion to suffer psychologically in a certain way? Perhaps. Lord, give me light. Holy Spirit, whom he sends, lead me forth. Pray in and for me. I have been in a state of inertia, feeling I could do nothing till Christ rose in me--but he has never been dead in me. It was a part of myself that died, not he. All the time he has been waiting for me to come to him. Perhaps he has already said, "Come forth," only I have been so busy with my self-inflicted mourning, that l haven't heard him. My anguish was the death of some form of self-love, the crucifix- Negative Floating / 669 ion of some kind of seif-will, some aspect of the "world" that I clung to. "The people that lived in darkness have seen a great light . And he shall reign forever and ever . Come and bring forth from the dungeon the prisoner sitting in darkness and the shadow of death . " The shadow of my death. Just one of the excruciatihg deaths one must die before one can mount to a higher level on the nada path. Death and renewal. Part of his passion, but the passion is always inseparable from the resurrection, and the resurrection is. I don't have to wait for it--it is. 1 am already in it by the power of g~:ace and the presence of God in my soul. How then do I.realize and live consciously this risen life? That is the question. The "how" was to remain unrealized by me for some years yet. In the meantime I had to live in pure faith the reality of the crucified, en-tombed, but already risen Lord in me and in the whole of creation. 1 had to stay on the cross and in the tomb till God himself chose the time and way for my personal resurrection. I could not raise up myself. It had to be a work of pure grace. The words I use in another brief entry near the end of 1964 all re-veal a state of unalleviated negative floating. They are: Emptiness. Noth-ing. Waiting. Search. No finding. Grief. No.comfort. Dryness. Frigid-i'ty. Impotence. Waiting. Alone. Loneliness. Wa, iting--on and on. Dead-ness. ~umbness. Insensibility. No tears . . . too dry . . . But I believe. I hope. I suffer. I love. I wait. He loves. 1 know he loves. I believe he loves. Amen. In her Life Teresa of Avila tells of a spiritual state that reminds me of what I call "negative floating." First she mentions how St. Paul wrote about "being crucified to the world." Then she comments on how this reminds her of the soul that is receiving comfort from neither heaven nor earth, nor from any other source either. She says that in such a/ state of suspension and denial the soul is "crucified between heaven and earth; and it suffers greatly, for no help comes to it either from the one or from the other." It is "sus-pended by (its) distress, just as in union and rapture (it is) suspended by joy . It is a martyrdom." She records that when she is not physically occupied so that her mind is on something else, she is "plunged into these death-like yearnings." The "pain is so excessive that (she) can scarcely bear it"; she feels as though she has "a rope around (her) neck, is being strangled, is trying 670 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 to breathe . . . and crying out for help to breathe." She longs and longs to be able to talk to someone "who has passed through the same torment, for she finds that, despite her complaints of it, no one seems to believe her." (See Life, Ch. XX.) It was not till my own darkest years were past that I came across the above and was forcibly struck by its similarity to what I myself had ex-perienced. When actually immersed in that suffering, I remember having read that one of the worst sufferings of Jesus on the cross must have been be-ing stifled by his inability to breathe. This was caused by the constric-tion of lungs, heart, and ribs in his hanging posture. To ease it he must have had to heave himself up repeatedly on his nailed feet--an extra ag-ony. I think Teresa is describing the spiritual equivalent of this condition for those in the negative floating state of union with Jesus hanging on the cross. John of the Cross, using different metaphors, writes of what I take to be a similar state. He says it is caused by "purgative contemplation" during which the inflowing of God's presence into the soul "in order to renew it" reaches down into its depths, into its very "spiritual substance." The soul seems to itself to be "drowned in darkness," to be "melting away" and to be enveloped by "a cruel spiritual death." Metaphorically it is like Jonah in the whale's belly. (In relation to this present article, it is worth recalling that Jonah's ordeal has been accepted as a scriptural symbol for Jesus' entombment.) John writes that "in this sepulcher of dark death (the soul) must needs abide until the spiritual resurrection which it hopes for." It is consumed by "the lamentations of death., the pains of hell ¯ . . the clear perception that God has abandoned it, in his abhorrence of it, and has flung it into darkness." It feels "itself to be without God, and chastised and cast out, and unworthy of him; and it feels he is wrathful With it." John also speaks of spiritual stifling and "afflictive suffering" that consists of the soul's feeling as though it "were suspended or held in the air so that it could not breathe." The state is intensified by the fact that the sufferer cannot find help or understanding from any human be-ing. He concludes by writing, "Of such are they that in truth go down alive into hell" (purgatory). (See Dark Night H, Ch. VI.) Negative Floating / 671 I do not know whether what I experienced during these years was the same as what is described by Teresa and John. I only know that when I read them now, as in the above passages, I feel I understand exactly what is being reported, because I myself have been through it. Shall it be N or N plus I lamN. I accepted that. I buried deep in my mind My mathematical knowledge Of what N could really be. Not satisfied with status quo But dreading the pain That moving might mean, I embraced N-fixed, safe and therefore undemanding. Memory would not be stifled. Knowledge that N can be expanded Would twist and turn and peek out Coming to the surface unexpectedly And at times unwanted. There is more. Why not N plus one? Expanding toward potential Could hurt, could be dearly bought. Surely, only here is progress, Expansion toward great goals. Why else do I exist? Except to know N is not complete Without Him as plus One. Sister Marjorie Sweeney, S.S.J. St. Joseph Convent 734 Willow Street Lebanon, PA 17042 Spiritual Dryness: Some Practical Guidelines Eamon Tobin Father Eamon Tobin, having completed the Master's degree in Formative Spiritual-ity at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, is currently pastor of a parish in Cocoa Beach, Florida. His address is Church of Our Savior; 5301 North Atlantic Avenue; Cocoa Beach, Florida 32931. The Lord, your God, will circumcise your hearts., that you may love the Lord, your God, with all your heart and all your soul, and so may live (Dt 30:6). Blessed. is the person who can call the darkness holy, who can desire its purification, who can rest in its presence. Such a person will grow rapidly because the process of purification is facilitated by generosity (Source Unknown). [~'very praying person sooner or later experiences what is called dryness in prayer. In spiritual dryness we have no felt sense of God's presence. We may,even think we have lost our Beloved or feel abandoned by him. In the sch~)ol, of prayer, few things are more important to understand than the nature and role of spiritual dryness, I intend to deal with this impor-tant dimension of the spiritual life by responding to five important ques-tions that one can ask about prayer in the desert. Question 1: What is it that praying people experience during the desert periods of the spiritual"jou~rney? The actual desert experience of praying persons will vary depending on the level of faith and spiritual maturity. For example, for the beginner in prayer spiritual dryness fre-quently means not just the absence of a felt sense of the presence of God 672 Spiritual Dryness / 67'3 but also feelings of what Saint Ignatius calls desolation--that is, feel-ings of anxiousness, sadness, or lo.ss of peace flowing from the thought, "I have lost God," or "God has abandoned me." On the other hand, for the person who is more mature in faith and advanced in the ways of prayer, spiritual dryness may not be an experience of desolation. The ex-perience will be one which lacks a felt sense of God's presence but may be accompanied by the conviction: "Even though I can't feel his pres-ence (at least on the external level), I do believe he is close and active in my life. Even though I cannot feel his presence (that is, spiritual dry-ness), I don't feel anxious, sad, or abandoned (that is, desolation). In fact, I feel peaceful." ~ To believe that God is present and active despite his apparent absence can be considered one of the greatest blessings of the spiritual life. For most of us, particularly in the early years of prayer, spiritual dryness usually includes the experience of desolation ("I have lost God; God has abandoned me"). Usually it is a time of spiritual suf-fering. We think we are getting the "silent treatment" from God. We "call out to him all day long, but he never answers" (Ps 22:3).2 Spiri-tual dryness is like journeying in the desert with no water in sight. Prayer is no longer exciting; rather, it is a weary struggle. Spiritual exercises that once nourished us now are empty, and we have little or no desire .to do them. Another dimension of the desert experience may be a feeling of dis-couragement as we become keenly aware of our own sinfulness. (We may not yet know that one of the surest signs of growth in the interior life is a growing awareness of our own sinfulness.) We may begin to think we are regressing rather than progressing. We may begin to expe-rience one of the great paradoxes of the spiritual life: the closer we come to God the further it seems to us that we are away from him. As we get closer to the all-piercing Light of God, the more our own darkness will show itself. Our lives will appear to be hollow and mediocre. The Scot-tish priest, the late Father John Dalrymple, writes: "It is as if I were to bring the sleeve of my coat toward the window of the room, and as I move into the light, the dust and dandruff on the sleeve become more obvious. It is not that as I moved the coat got dirtier, but that the light got brighter.''3 All in all, the thing that scares us most and even hurts us is the thought, "I have lost my Beloved; he has abandoned me" (See Song of Songs, Chapter 3). This thought or feeling is the experience of desolation described above. To sum up, we can say that while the actual experience of the desert will be different for different people, for all of us it will mean a felt sense 6"/4 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 of the absence of God. And for those of us whose faith in God is still fragile, it will frequently involve the experience of desolation (the "I have lost God" feeling). In reading the above description of spiritual dryness, one may think that it is something only experienced by monks, religious, and the ex-ceptional lay person~ Yet spiritual directors tell us that this experience is quite .common in the lives of many average, prayerful people who dis-cover somewhere in the midst of their spiritual journeys that spiritual ex-ercises that once nourished them spiritually now do nothing for them. Question 2: Why is an understanding of this dimension of prayer so important? There are at least three reasons why some understanding of spiritual dryness is important. First, if we do not know the role of the times of dryness, we may think that we have "lost God" and that our prior, positive feelings in prayer were not a gift from God but the crea-tion of our own imaginations. This frequently happens. Many people who have a genuine conversion and get all excited about prayer quit when the well runs dry. This is sad because it is now that God wants to do his real work in such persons. Second, lack of knowledge about the purpose of spiritual dryness may cause us to continue praying in a way that, at this particular stage in our spiritual journey, may be more of an obstacle than a help to our spiritual growth. Many people are unaware that at some stage in the spiritual journey God calls us to become less active in prayer so that he can be more active in our spiritual transfor-mation. Third, the experience of spiritual dryness may be something caused by ourselves or something permitted by God. When it is permit-ted by God, it is meant to purify us and bring us closer to him. Such dry-ness is a gift to be accepted and embraced. When spiritual dryness is our doing, we need to work at removing the causes of such dryness. Lack of knowledge about the nature and role of spiritual dryness may lead us to believe that a particular experience of dryness in prayer is authentic and God-given when in fact it is something brought on by our own infi-delities. So the time of spiritual dryness is a critical time in the spiritual jour-ney. How we respond to it will determine whether we move forward spiri-tually or stagnate. Question 3: Why does God permit us to experience desert peri-ods in the spiritual journey? So I will allure her 1 will lead her into the desert and speak to her heart (Ho 2:16). Spiritual Dryness / 675 God permits us to experience spiritual desert periods in order to pu-rify us of those things that hinder our spiritual transformation and to teach us some important lessons about the spiritual life and how it works. In our answer to this question we will look at some specific purifications that God works in us and lessons that he teaches us in the desert. Purifications of the Desert In the desert God will want to purify us of any excessive attachment we may have to consolation in prayer. If in prayer God blesses us with a lot of consolations (or "spiritual highs" as we often say today), there is a danger that we may seek and love "the consolations of our God more than the God of our consolations" (Saint Teresa of Avila). In time of spiritual consolation it is easy to pray. The challenge is to remain faith-ful to prayer when we experience little or no felt sense of God's pres-ence or action in our lives. During such dry periods God is asking us to love him for himself and not just for the spiritual highs or consolations he offers us in prayer. He is asking us to show that we are not just fair-weather friends but all-weather friends. And he is teaching us the im-portant lesson that he is to be found more deeply in the desert than in the garden of superficial delights. Secondly, in the desert God purifies us of spiritual vanity. John Dal-rymple explains sp!ritual vanity in this way: Someone taking to religion in all zeal, becoming caught upI in a cam-paign of prayer, fasting, spiritual reading, liturgical practice, and retreat weekends might be indulging unawares in one big ego-trip. Conversion of the soul from a worldly life to a spiritual life is at first s, uperficial only. The convert has been given new, spiritual goals; but the conver~- sion is only external. In itself the sofil is as full as it ever was of unre-generate tendencies to vanity, arrogance, acquisitiveness, the only dif-ference being that after conversion these tendencies are now attached to spiritual instead of worldly objects . The zeal of such a person is infectious, but it is, as yet, chiefly the expression of the person's vanity or self-centeredness, dressed up in Christian clothes.4 For God to do his work of spiritual transformation in us, he must pu-rify us of such spiritual vanity. God often brings about this purification in us by bringing to naught our best efforts to change ourselves and eve-rything and everyone around us. As we sit on the ruins of our self-made temples and projects, we are purified of spiritual vanity and arrogance, and we learn the meaning of spiritual poverty, which is realizing our com-plete dependence and need for God to bring about any spiritual growth 676 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 in others or in ourselves. In the desert, God's intention is not to punish us but to purify us. In the journey of life we consciously or unconsciously become overly-attached to persons or things--so much so that they become idols (that is, more important to us than God). This happened to Israel after she lived in the Promised Land for some time. She became so enamored with the blessings of the land that she forgot the One who gave her the land. To purify her of this idolatry God led Israel into the desert for a second time where she would be free of all her attachments and free to listen anew to the Word of God (See Hosea, Chapter 2). Lessons to Be Learned in the Desert Now let us briefly look at some of the lessons that God wishes to teach us in the desert. When God takes away consolation in prayer (that is, the felt sense of his presence), he wants to teach us the important lesson that he can be encountered at a deeper level than our emotions. He wants to teach us that we are no longer dependent on emotional returns to know we have encountered him. As we grow in our relationship with God, the more we will "learn to be at home in the dark because we are sure, in faith, that the potter is truly shaping the clay, even though the clay sees nothing of what is happening."5 An example about eating food might help to illustrate this point more clearly. Sometimes we may immensely enjoy eating a delicious meal. We may savor every morsel of the food. All in all, it is a delightful ex-perience. On another occasion we may not enjoy at all another type of delicious meal. We may not be feeling well, or the food may not appeal to us. Yet from a nutritious point of view, both meals are equally good. Our lack of enjoyment of the second meal in no way diminishes its nu-tritious value. The same principle is at work when it comes to prayer. Sometimes when we pray we really feel and savor God's presence and love. At other times the prayer is empty and dull. Who are we, though, to say that the latter time is of no benefit to our spiritual growth or is less pleasing in God's sight? A second lesson God teaches us in the desert is that spiritual conso-lation is his p.ure gift to us and not something we can earn by being good or by praying :in a particular way. In prayer God teaches us this impor-tant lesson by "dropping in" on us when we least expect him and by "failing to show" when we very much want to experience his presence. A third lesson that God wishes to teach us in the desert is that spiri- Spiritual Dryness / 677 tual growth is totally dependent on his work in us and not on anything we do. Our task is simply to be flexible and cooperative with the move-ment of his Spirit. In the spiritual life, "working at it" often means "be-ing still," "just being there" and exercising discipline over our doing and achieving self which so often wants to run the show. This is a diffi-cult lesson for us because so much of our training for the outer journey of life has told us to be "take-charge" and self-sufficient persons. It is not easy for us to switch gears in the inner journey. In the spiritual life God is the Chief Actor; we are the acted-upon. Mary, at the Annunciation (Lk 1:26-38), is our perfect model. When God mysteriously breaks into Mary's life and invites her to become the mother of Jesus, she doesn't respond, "Sure, Lord, I'll do it!" Rather, she says, "I am your maidservant; work in and through me as you want." Mary's response was, "Fiat, be it done unto me," not, "I'11 do it." This attitude is one of active receptivity, and it is the secret of Christian spirituality and spiritual growth. Active receptivity is charac-terized by the effort to place our energy, will, and freedom at the dis-posal of God so that he can do with us and in us what he wills, Finally, when God our Father allows our prayer to run dry, he is in-viting us to participate in the cross of Jesus. In times of dryness we are experiencing the thirst of Jesus on the cross. If the cross was Jesus' way to the Father, then surely we, the disciples of Jesus, cannot expect to travel the scenic route free of all pain and hardship. When we experi-ence darkness in prayer or in the marketplace, we are being invited to identify with Jesus in his suffering, in his experience of feeling aban-doned by the Father. Also in the desert we are being invited and chal-lenged to trust that our God will not abandon us but will come to rescue us and redeem us (See Exodus, Chapter 16). Question 4: How can I tell when a particular desert experience is caused by my own infidelity or is something permitted by God to help me to grow in my relationship with him? When dryness occurs in prayer, particularly in the early stages when God is giving alternating periods of dryness and consolation, wemay tend to blame ourselves for dryness. We may wonder what latest infidelity we committed to bring about this dryness. The fact may be that we have done nothing wrong . to occasion the dryness. God may be allowing us to experience the dry-ness bechuse he wants to teach us some lesson and/or purify some as-pect of our relationship with him. On the other hand, we may think the dryness is from God when in fact it is caused by our own laxity and sin-fulness. Therefore, it is important that we be able to discern the true 6711 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 cause of the dryness because our response to it will differ, depending on whether the dryness is permitted by God or is something brought on by ourselves. Let us now identify several ways that we can bring about our own spiritual desert. ( 1 ) Indifference to a Sinful Pattern of Behavior: If we are indifferent to some sinful pattern of behavior in our lives, then we can expect diffi-culty in prayer. In a human friendship a negative pattern of behavior (for example, a critical or lying spirit), which we make no effort to ,change, will have a destructive effect on the whole relationship. Likewise, if in our relationship with God, we are deliberately ignoring a sinful pattern of behavior (for example, involvement in an illicit relationship, unfor-giveness, unethical business practices), then we can rightfully expect ten-sion in our relationship with God. When we do the above, we are delib-erately excluding the Lord and his influence from some area of our lives. In such a situation we should not be surprised that we do not feel God's presence very much in prayer. Here it is important to note that I am not referring to a sinful pattern of behavior that we are trying to change and that we are bringing before the Lord in prayer. In this case we are rec-ognizing sin and struggling with it. Instead of keeping us from God, our struggle with a particular sin or weakness may be the very means that God will use to allow us to experience his love, mercy and power. (See 2 Co 12:7-10 for Paul's famous example of how his thorn in the flesh became the very means of God's power.) In the former case, we are not even confronting our sin or seeking God's help with it. Instead we are deliberately ignoring its existence or trying to rationalize its O.K. 'hess. In the latter case, our sin grieves us and we are doing what we can to remove it from our lives. (2) Repressed Anger at God: Two highly-respected spiritual direc-tors, Fathers William Connoily and William Barry, write in a co-authored book: "When prayer flattens out, or appears tO be facing an iron wall, the director must always suspect the presence of unexpressed anger."6 To add to this problem, many of us were raised in a culture where appropriate expression of anger was socially unacceptable. "Hence resentments, holding a grudge or subdued rage, when they are present, are all likely to be given other names like indifference and ra-tional analysis."7 When someone hurts us, our relationship with that per-son will diminish, even if we decide to present an affable, friendly front; but in reality we will distance Ourselves emotionally from the person. In a similar way, if we become angry with God about something, we may Spiritual Dryness / 679 continue to be faithful to our prayer time, but on an emotional level we can be fairly sure we have distanced ourselves from him. (It is impor-tant for us to be aware that if life is handing us a raw deal, we may well be unconsciously blaming God, the Source of all things, for our lousy situation.) (3) Separation of Prayer and Life: The spiritual life is all of life and not just one segment of it. The Lord refuses to be a compartmentalized God; he wants to be a part and parcel of our whole life. When we try to keep God in church or in our prayer closet and not allow him to guide all the activities of our day, we can be sure that we are setting ourselves up for dryness in prayer. If we exclude God from the activities of our day, then we should not be surprised if he is missing from our prayer time. Even on a human level, no one likes to be a "tag-along" in some-one else's life. (4) Overwork: When our prayer life dries up, it is good for us to ask if we are pushing ourselves too much on the vital and functional dimen-sions of life. "Am I overworked? Am I over-tired? Am I coming down with the flu? Am I neglecting physical exercise? Do I have a tendency to make leisure time work? Or do I have leisure time--period?" These are important questions to ask. These things affect our prayer life. If we fail to care properly for our bodies, then we are neglecting a dimension of ourselves that we depend on to help us to pray. When we are very tired and overworked, prayer may well be seen as just another duty or thing to do. (5) Lack of Honesty in Prayer: Just as shallow or dishonest sharing dulls human relationships, it also dulls the Divine-human relationship. If our prayer is no more than "sweet talk" to "sweet Jesus," we should not expect Jesu~ to be too interested in our conversation. We must learn to talk to the Lord about the real stuff in our lives. (6) Halfhearted Efforts at Prayer: On a human level two friends may fail to really connect with each other because their conversations are "just words," words that fail to express what they are truly thinking and feeling. The problem may be that deep down they don't want to or are scared to encounter each other in a deep way. When a relationship is char-acterized by this type of communication, then we should expect it to be empty and unfulfiiling. In a similar vein, when our prayer time mainly consists of the rote recitation of certain prayers or of inattentive spiritual reading--if beneath the "saying of prayers" and the acts of piety there is no real desire to encounter God and grow in relationship with him-- then we should expect little or no satisfaction in prayer. In fact, our spiri- Review for Religious, September-October 1989 tual exercises may become a substitute for a real relationship with God. If we discern that we are the cause of our spiritual dryness, we should do all we can to remove the particular obstacle. For example, if the problem or obstacle is that we are holding onto a grudge and doing nothingto let it go, then we may need to pray for forgiveness for that person and/or we may need to have an open chat with the person with whom we are having a problem. If we discern that our experience of spiri-tual dryness is due to our tendency to separate prayer and life (see ob-stacle number three above), then our solution will be to work at allow-ing the Lord to walk with us in all the activities of our day. In short, when we discern that we are the cause of the spiritual dryness, then we ought to do something to remove the obstacle. It is the experience of most, if not all, disciples of the Lord that once they begin to struggle with an obstacle, prayer again becomes alive and they experience a new closeness to God. Finally, it should be noted that in trying to discern the cause of our spiritual dryness we would be well advised to seek the coun- ¯ sel of a good spiritual director. When we experience spiritual dryness most of us have a tendency to think that it is due to some infidelity on our part. The truth may be that God is permitting us to experience the desert so that he can continue his purifying work in us. This brings us to the second part of our response to Question 4: "How might we know that it is God and not us who is calling us into a spiritual desert?" While we can never be absolutely sure--since we live by faith and not by clear vision--when spiritual dryness is being per-mitted by God, we can say that the following are good indicators that the dryness is the purifying work of God: --If during the time of dryness we remain faithful to prayer. --If our prayer is honest and flowing from the real stuff of our lives. --If we are trying to integrate prayer and life. --If we are trying to live a life of charity; if our prayer is helping us to be more loving. --If we are genuinely trying to avoid sin and live our lives accord-ing to God's Word. --If we thirst for God as we walk in the desert. (It is crucial that we, remember that our desire for God is in itself a tangible sign of his pres-ence in our lives. We couldn't even desire God if he didn't place that desire in our hearts.) You will notice that the above signs are pretty much the opposite of the ways that we ourselves bring about our own spiritual desert. Prayer, like so many other things in life, is a series of "arrivals" Spiritual Dryness and "starting points." We arrive at a point where we feel good. We ex-perience the grace of consolation. But that only lasts a little while and then a certain discontent (a kind of desert) sets in--a discontent that may be caused by ourselves or permitted by God. Then we are faced with the challenge of discerning who is causing the discontent: "Is it God or me?" The purpose of the discontent caused by him is to create in us a longing for more, to create in us a desire to move closer to God. In the spiritual journey God brings us to a particular point or state; he lets us rest there and enjoy that plateau for a little while, and then he says, "O.K. Let's move ahead and seek for more" (see Ex 40:36-37). Of course, it is not easy to move when we are not sure where he is leading us. All he says is, "Move and trust that I'll take you to a new and bet-ter place." Finally, if we are in doubt about the cause ofour discontent or dry-ness, then we should talk to a spiritual guide or, if that is not possible, simply say a prayer like this: "Lord, if this dryness I am experiencing is due to some failing of mine, please reveal it to me. Until you do I am going to assume that I am not the cause of the dryness." Question 5: What are some resources available to us to sustain us in the desert? Four resources that will sustain us in the desert are: --a wise spiritual director; --a strong faith; --fidelity to prayer; --the support of fellow pilgrims. Our first help is a wise spiritual director. By wise I mean one who understands the role of the desert in the spiritual life and hopefully one who has experienced and grown through the desert in his or her own spiri-tual journey. Many people whom God led into the desert for purifica-tion have suffered much at the hands of well-intentioned but misinformed spiritual guides. Saint John of the Cross reserves some of his harshest words for such misinformed guides.8 For example, a misinformed guide may insist that a directee continue to meditate and do a lot of spiritual reading when God is calling her to the prayer of contemplation. In the desert a good spiritual director will be a source of guidance, encourage-ment and inspiration. When we are in a spiritual desert, it is important that we learn to place our trust in a good spiritual director. But, as most of us know, wise spiritual directors are nearly as scarce as palm trees in the northern states of America. The truth is that the road to authenticity is dangerous, hard, and narrow, and few decide to travel it. In the ab-sence of a wise spiritual director (and there is really no substitute for such Review for Religious, .September-October 1989 a person), one may receive some guidance from books that are written or recommended by people who are recognized guides of the inner jour-ney. A second important resource is a strong faith--a faith that enables US" --to believe that God knows what he is doing when he allows us to ex-perience the desert (Rm 11:33-36); --to believe that in the desert God is not punishing us but is purifying us (Dt 30:6); --to believe that God grows his best flowers (virtues) in the desert (Ho 2); --to believe that God works in us while we rest in him (Mk 4:26-29); --to believe that in the struggles of life God is on our side fighting our battles (Ex 14:13-14 and Dt 1:30-33); --to believe that in the desert God's seeming absence is just a different type of presence, one that we may not as yet have recognized (Ex 16); --to be secure with insecurity (Rm 8:28); --above all, to generously abandon ourselves to the purifying work of God (Lk 23:46). A third important resource as we struggle in the desert is fidelity to prayer. In the desert, prayer is usually dry and therefore all the more dif-ficult to remain faithful to. When it comes to praying in the desert, spiri-tual guides counsel us to avoid two extremes or temptations. The first temptation is to quit prayer, thinking that our best efforts are leading us nowhere. The second temptation is to "junk up" our prayer time with extra prayers, rosaries, Scripture reading, and so forth, thinking that if we only try harder maybe we will feel the presence of God. This second temptation needs to be resisted not only because it blocks what God is about in the desert but also because it is (usually unconsciously) our at-tempt to stay in or get back into the driver's seat. In general, prayer in the desert will become much less active, more passive--less us, more God. The challenge will be to learn to sit quietly in the presence of God, trusting that he is at work in us while we rest in him. Le~.rning to "waste time doi.ng nothing" in prayer is, without a doubt, one of the most difficult lessons we have to learn in the school of prayer. Unfortunately, most of us never learn to waste time gracefully in the presence of God. Such a practice goes completely against our west-ern, work-ethic nature that is usually driven to do, to achieve, and to pro-duce-- that likes to see tangible results for its efforts. Because of this need in us, most of us fill the vacuum that we feel in the desert with read- Spiritual Dryness ing or prayers of some sort. For those of us who are willing to try and do less (that is, to be less active) in prayer so that God may do more in us, the following suggestions might be helpful. -Spend some time just "being there" with the Lord, aware that as "we rest in him he is at work in us." We put aside all effort to achieve because now we are learning that achievement (growth) is God's work. By periodically spending some time "doing nothing" in the presence of the Lord, we are expressing our faith in an important spiritual dictum: "God's activity in prayer is more important than my activity." -Spend some time slowly repeating prayers like: "Incline my heart to your will, O Lord." "Make me want you, O Lord, more than anyone/ thing in my life." -Take a phrase of Scripture like "You are my beloved Son" and dwell on it. -Simply take one word like "Jesus" or "love" and repeat it gent-ly and slowly, letting God work in us, leading us beyond conceptual thoughts, images, or feelings to wordless depths. -Image and be present to Mary in the Temple after she lost Jesus (Lk 2:41-50) and at the foot of the cross (Jn 19:25-27) which must have been a real dark night of the spirit for her. Ask Mary to intercede for you so that you may have something of the faith which she had when she thought she had lost Jesus. -Finally, you may want to read something on spiritual dryness. By simply reading and rereading portions of a book like When the Well Runs Dry, I am encouraged to persevere in the desert. Personally, I need to hear over and over again the teaching and encouragement that a book like Father Green's offers. In prayer our role is to be faithful in coming aside, to be at God's disposal. What actually happens in prayer is God's business. For me this piece of wisdom has always been very consoling. It helped to free me from thinking that it was up to me to make things happen in prayer. Now I am more relaxed, knowing that my role is to be faithful in coming aside, to do what I can to eliminate distractions from within and with-out, and to pray as I feel led. ("Pray as you can, not as you can't.") The rest is in God's hands. If he chooses to bless me with a deep sense of his presence, I am indeed very grateful. If he chooses to bless me with his seeming absence (God is always only seemingly absent), then I try to be grateful for that, also believing that God knows what will best help me to grow. "Our prayer is good when our hearts are fixed on God, even if it is filled with boring aridity or passionate turmoil.' ,9 Review for Religious, September-October 1989 A fourth resource in the desert is the prayer and personal support of fellow pilgrims. While each person's inner journey is very personal and unique, still we can learn much from the journeys of co-pilgrims. Only the foolish try to travel the inner jou~rney alone. In the desert we are all beggars sharing morsels of bread with each other. Also, if we are blessed enough to be a part of a small, faith---sharing group, then we have avail-able to us an excellent resourc_~e for the dry times. In the dry times the prayers of'fellow pilgrims are usually a big help. I wbuld like to conclude our discussion on spiritual dryness with a prayer that I have found to be a source of great encouragement during times of spiritual desolation. Dear Lord, in the midst of much inner turmoil and restlessness, there is a consoling thought: maybe you are working in me in a way I cannot yet feel, experience, or understand. My mind is not able to concentrate on you, my heart is not able to remain centered, and it seems as if you are absent and have left me alone. But in faith I cling to you. I believe that your Spirit reaches deeper and further than my mind or heart, and that profound movements are not the first to be noticed. Therefore, Lord, I promise I will not run away, not give up, not stop praying, even when it all seems useless, pointless, and a waste of time and effort. I want to let you know that I love you even though | do not feel loved by you, and that I hope in you even though I often experi-ence despair. Let this be a little dying I can do with you and for you as a way of experiencing some solidarity with the millions in this world who suffer far more than I do. Amen.~° NOTES ~ See Thomas H. Green, S. J., Weeds Among the Wheat (Notre Dame, Indiana, 1984), Chapters 6 and 7. Also see Thomas H. Green, S.J., When the Well Runs Dry (Notre Dame, Indiana, 1979), p. 92. 2 Some other Psalms that reflect darkness in the prayer of the psalmist are Psalms 60, 69, 74, and 88. 3 Father John Dalrymple, Simple Prayer (Wilmington, Delaware, 1984), p. 69. '~ lbid, p. 93. 5 Thomas H. Green, S.J., When the Well Runs Dry (Notre Dame, Indiana, 1979), p. 119. 6 Fathers William Barry. and William Connolly, The Practice of Spiritual Direction (New York, 1982), p. 73. 7 Ibid. 8 Saint John of the Cross, The Collected Works of John of the Cross, translated by Kieran Kavanaugh, O.C.D. and Otilio Rodriguez, O.C.D. (Washington, D.C., 1979), pp. 620-634. 9 Father John Dalrymple, Simple Prayer, (Wilmington, Delaware, 1984), p. 66. ~0 Henri J. M. Nouwen, A Cry for Mercy: Prayers from the Genesee (Garden City, New York, 1983), p. 102. That God Might Be Father .Laurel M. O'Neal Sister Laurel O'Neal, a solitary (hermit), is familiar to our readers. Her address is Stillsong Hermitage; 80 Lafayette Circle; Lafayette, California 94549. Perhaps the only question more problematic than that of the possibility of prayer is the question of its, genuine significance and necessity. Sur-prisingly, however, this is also a question we generally fail to consider explicitly or face squarely. More typically, the meaningfulness and re-quisiteness of our prayer are matters we tend to take for granted, even though the notion of prayer may lie at the heart of important or even fun-damental expressi6ns of self-understanding and definition. But the ques-tion is an important one, and one we cannot easily afford to avoid or care-lessly dismiss, if we intend to take prayer seriously or maintain a proper sense of its place and role in our daily lives. After all, why really are we called to pray? What, if anything, is truly and uniquely at stake in our prayer? Is there any reason to regard our own personal prayer as a matter of compelling urgency and real ne-cessity, or is the matter really more nugatory? Clearly, as Christians we are called to believe that our prayer is a meaningful, even indispensable activity, vital to the transformation and healing of all we know, and the realization of all we are made and hope for. But how do we justify such a belief? What is it about prayer that makes such claims credible? The answers to all of these questions are based in our recognition that in prayer something deeper and even more fundamental is at stake, some-thing in which all healing and human growth in wisdom and sanctity are rooted, and upon which all our hope depends. Like Christianity in general, and like God himself, prayer is pro-foundly paradoxical, and this is particularly true of the question at hand. 685 Review for Religious, September-October 1989 Although we must acknowledge that prayer is the gift and activity of God attended to by sinners (that is, by persons whose lives are fundamentally marked and marred by fragmentation and alienation), we must also af-firm that the deeper truth is the paradox that prayer is primarily some-thing we undertake on God's own behalf, insofar as prayer is the experi-ence of God as the One he wishes to be for us. Quite simply, what is truly and uniquely at stake in our prayer, at each and every moment we pray, is nothing less than the life and destiny of God himself. As Chris-tians, as persons who pray--that is, as persons who share as heirs of God in the obedient Sonship of Jesus Christ, we do so primarily that God might truly be the Father he has willed to be from the beginning. This insight is easy to lose sight of, something that occurs particu-larly whenever God's paradoxical nature is obscured or forgotten, and an immutable or even (as commonly misunderstood) "triune" God is substituted for a Living One. Most of us are well aware that on the one hand, our God is the "High and Holy One," the one who reveals him-self in sovereignty and self-sufficiency. Indeed he is Yahweh, "the one who will be who (he) will be," ~ in absolute authority and awesome auton-omy. But this dominant Old Testament image is just one side of the para-dox whom we Christians know as God; and if on the one hand he is the High and Holy One who is absolutely self-sufficient, he is also the one who has determined not to remain so, but rather has resolved to make his own destiny subject to the responsiveness of his creation. Our God is on the one hand without beginning or end, absolutely self-sufficient, in need of no one and no thing. Yet on the other hand he has willed from all eternity not to remain alone but to turn to another--a person who will be his counterpart. He is the eternal decision to speak to this other and to hearken to the word which this other speaks. He is the eternal deci-sion to love this other and to accept this other's love. [The God of the New Testament] who is eternally self-sufficient wills not to be; God who is eternally of and for himself wills to be for another.2 This means quite simply that God has determined to be for us as well as dependent upon us. We must allow this determination to be realized, and let God be who he wills to be for us. This is indeed the most human thing we can do, just as it is the most loving. Those who truly appreci-ate that our own destiny is dependent upon the proper exercise of human freedom should not be surprised that God too is dependent upon it. In fact, we should be aware that the Christ event reveals that it is human freedom which is the true counterpart to divine omnipotence. For many, this will be an astounding assertion. However, if we reflect on precisely That God Might Be Father / 687 what occurred in the Christ event, perhaps this critical point will become more acceptable to most people. Certainly such reflection is necessary if we are to truly appreciate the importance and urgency of our prayer. It is true that in the Christ event--in the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus--God drew near to every moment and mood of his creation. This is truth but the truth cuts far more deeply than even this awesome reality. In the Christ event something absolutely s'ingular and unsurpassable occurred. For the first time in human history someone, in this case Jesus of Nazareth, in living a life wholly responsive to the God who would be Father, accomplished two things. In the first place, he lived the first genuinely human existence ever known in the history of humankind, and secondly, in his proper exercise of true human freedom he allowed God to become the Father he had willed to be from the be-ginhing. In the dialogue which existed between Father and Son, both hu-man and divine life reached a fullness for which they had yearned and groaned through time and eternity, the realization of human and divine destinies were forever linked, and divine omnipotence and human free-dom were inextricably wed as counterparts of one another. Nor is this all. In Jesus' resurrection from the dead, this abundant life was made a continuing and unconquerable reality in our world. It is in prayer that we enter most deeply into participation into this abundant life, and in prayer that Jesus' Sonship becomes our own and the Fatherhood of God is further realize~t. Through our participation in the Sonship of Jesus, we come to know genuine human life, and we become aware that it is a life characterized and constituted by an ongoing and all-consuming dialogue with the Fa-ther, who is in turn constituted as Father in this dialogue. In the Christ event Jesus responded to God as Son. He allowed God to be the author of his life, and he allowed God to be authored as Father in the process. Truly human existence is nothing less and nothing other than daughter-ship or sonship to the Living God whose own inner truth and dynamism is realized in Fatherhood. Prayer is simply and always the mutual out-working of these inextricably linked divine and human destinies. God is Father neither before, nor apart from, the response of Jesus as Son; neither is he our Father apart from our participation in that de-finitive Sonship which we call prayer. (Note well, in all of this it is im-portant that, according to the prologue to John's gospel, we are very clear that it is not the Logos that is Son; rather it is Jesus as Son in whom the Logos is incarnate. The two realities are quite different, and are often tragically confused. As the term is commonly but perhaps naively used, Review for Religious, September-October 1989 the Logos is "preexistent"; the Son is not, and whenever this confu-sion occurs, it becomes impossible to appreciate the true significance of the obedient Sonship of Jesus or of our own prayer.) Although he is the one "who will be who (he) will be," the God of the New Testament turns to the world as the one who would be Father, that is, as one who would find his counterpart and true completion in those who would turn in response as daughters and sons (that is, as those who are of him and from him) and, as one whose deepest identity would remain unrealized and unrealizable apart from this response. What are the implications of all this for our prayer? In the first place, we must concede that our prayer has real meaning and urgency, not only and not even primarily because we are saved through God's activity in our lives, but because in our prayer we concern ourselves with the very life of God. Whether or not prayer is a profound experience for Is, it is a significant experience for God since it is in prayer that he is allowed to achieve Fatherhood and truly realize himself. Whatever we perceive happening or not happening in our prayer, we must not lose sight of the fact of what does occur there. In prayer God is given the chance to love fully, and thus to fully be. It is not simply the'case that God is love; it is also true that in loving, God is (and it is this fact which allows us to speak of prayer in terms of the glorification or magnification of God). Prayer is possible only to the extent that our God has willed not to remain remote, that is, only to the extent that he has drawn near. But prayer is meaningful and necessary for the most part because the God who has refused to remain remote has also willed not to remain self-sufficient and has, in a very real way put his own destinyinto the hand of those to whom he would be Father, and whom he has thus willed re-spond to him as daughters and sons. Without our prayer, God remains the High and Holy One who has drawn near to us in all of life's moments and moods, but who remains deprived of real presence, and thus whose deepest will and identity remains unrealized and frustrated in our regard. It is particularly telling that the first word and entire Lord's Prayer is contained in the invocation "Father." Jesus' whole life and prayer, which were essentially synonymous, were devoted to allowing God's will to Fatherhood to be accomplished. Claiming this realization of the Fatherhood of God is the heart of all prayer. Allowing him to love us in the way he wills is the heart of all truly human activity. It is impor-tant that our prayer remain the God-centered activity it is meant to be. This is the reason Jesus gave his life and his way of praying as a "para-digm of perspective," and in fact, in what is most essentially and pro- That God Might Be Father 689 foundly the lesson of the New Testament, taught his followers to pray. We lose proper perspective if we forget that God has drawn near, but it is at least as tragic to forget that prayer is the way nearness is transformed into real presence. We said in an earlier essay3 that prayer begins, ends, and is sustained by our concern for and commitment to the life of God. Let us remember why we are present to him and what our appreciation of his nearness means for him, and may this knowledge sustain us in even the driest of moments. NOTES t The usual translation of "Yahweh" in Exodus 3:14 as "I am who am," or even the more cryptic "'I am" is inadequate insofar as it disregards the dynamic element, and promise of active and effective presence also contained in the Hebrew (see Ex 3:12). A better translation is "I will be who I will be". 2 Dwyer, John C., Son of Man attd Son of God, A New Language For Faith, (New York: Paulist Press, 1983). 3 O'Neal, Laurel M., "Prayer, Maintaining a Human Experience": R~.vl~.w R~.~.~¢~ous; Nov/Dec 1987, p. 883. Musing Fragile as a crisp autumn leaf, Hard as flint on flint, Soft as nestling down, Resilient as blue tempered steel-- You and I--this planet ours-- Cradled in God's tender arms Of Grace. Walter Bunofsky, S.V.D. 1446 E. Warne Avenue St. Louis, Missouri 63107 Mary of Bethany-- The Silent Contemplative Carlos M. de Melo, S.J. Father Carlos de Melo, S.J. is professor emeritus of Canon Law and Spiritual The-ology at the Pontfical Athenaeum of Pune, India. His address is Papal Seminary; Nagar Road; Ramwadi; Pune 411 014 India. Teresa of Avila, that incomparable mistress of the spiritual life--"Mater spiritualium" as she is called in the inscription at the foot of her statue at St. Peter's, Rome--was never tired of repeating to her daughters of the Reformed Carmel that prayer is not so much a matter of much think-ing as of loving much.~ The soul of prayer is faith and love. Going through the gospels ! found this basic truth or principle beautifully illus-trated in the attitudes of Mary, the sister of Martha and Lazarus, vis-~t-vis our Lord. Bethany is a small hamlet about three kilometers southeast of Jerusa-lem, separated from the capital by the Mount of Olives. Mary of Bethany appears in five places in the gospel narratives: I) Luke 10:38-42; 2) John 11 : 1-53; 3) John ! 2: i - l l ; 4) Mark 14:3-9; and 5) Matthew 26:6-13. The last three references cover one and the same episode, that of the supper at Bethany, in the house of Simon, the "leper." True, the material is not over abundant, yet it is sufficient enough to give us a fair idea of the personality, the mind and heart, the ways and attitudes, the character of this well-known biblical figure. However, I wish to bring out in this es-say one particular trait that distinguishes her, and that is her contempla-tive attitude of life, as it comes across to us in a striking manner in two of those passages--Luke i0 and Matthew 26 (see Jn 12; Mk 14). Symbol of Contemplative . Indeed, in these passages, Mary stands out before us as a symbol and 690 Mary of Bethany / 69"1 teacher of the contemplative life particularly inspiring and helpful to per-sons "consecrated to God," whether they live in convents and monas-teries or elsewhere in the world. She thus becomes our guide, silent yet sure, to a simple, intimate relationship with our divine Master, such as will not only bring us true fulfillment but can even radically transform our life. For, as the saying goes, tell me with whom you walk and I shall tell you what sort of a person you are. When did Mary first meet Jesus? In Luke 10 the new Rabbi figures as an already familiar guest in the house of Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, one whom they all highly esteemed, loved and revered, a dear friend whose visits were eagerly looked forward to and whom they welcomed with undisguised joy and profound satisfaction, as though they could never have enough of him. From him they held no secrets; they could share with him their every thought or sentiment, every joy or sorrow, and in him they were always sure to meet, in any life situation, under-standing, sympathy, guidance. First Meeting Decisive True, the gospels do not tell us when it was that Mary first met Je-sus. One thing, however, seems to be certain. Whatever might have been the time, place or occasion, that first meeiing was decisive in Mary's life; it made a lasting and ineffaceable impression on her youthful, sensitive nature. It reminds us of another such decisive encounter narrated in an-other gospel--that of the Master with the beloved disciple (Jn 1:35-39)-- one of those unforgettable events that make an impact for good and give a new turn to life. Like that of John, Mary's life, too, was deeply touched by her meeting with Jesus, for, from then on, that mysterious guest became as it were everything for her, the center of her thoughts, sentiments, deeds. It was as though interiorly taught from on high, Mary sensed in Jesus of Nazareth not only a new rabbi, or a great religious leader who taught as one having authority (Mt 7:29), who spoke as no man ever did (Jn 7:4-6), or even a worthy prophet like Moses, Isaias or Jeremias of old, but--in a way she herself was not able fully to under-stand or explain--the very incarnation of the Father of Israel, of Yah-weh himself, and at the same time, her own personal friend and guide-- her 'guruji' we might say, with all this term, and the reality it represents, means in Indian life and tradition. This explains Mary's unconditional surrender to him, her loving contemplation of him, her total openness and docility to his word, her silent "adoration"--attitudes proper to a creature before its God, its divine Lover. 692 / Review for Religious, September-October 1989 Lovable Character Mary is a lovable character--lovable because she is so

Issue 48.1 of the Review for Religious, January/February 1989. ; R F.vu-'.w FOR RF.uG~OUS (ISSN O034-639X) is published bi-monthly at St. l_x~uis University by thc Mis-souri Province Educational Institute of the Society of Jesus: Editorial Office: 3601 Lindell Blvd., Rm. 428: St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. Second-class postage paid at St. Louis MO. Single copies $3.00. Subscriptions: $12.00 per year: $22.00 for two years. Other countries: for surface mail. add U.S. $5.00 per year: for airmail, add U.S. $20.00 per year. For subscription orders or change of address, write: REviEw FO~ REt.~GOUS; P.O. Box 6070; Duluth, MN 55806. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to REVtEW ~'oa RE~ol~;totJS; P.O. Box 6070; Duluth, MN 55806. David L. Fleming, S.J. Iris Ann Ledden, S.S.N.D. Richard A. Hill, S.J. Jean Read Mary Ann Foppe Editor Associate Editor Contributing Editor Assistant Editors Jan./Feb. 1989 Volume 48 Number I Manuscripts, books for review and correspondence with the editor should be sent to REVIEW FOR REI.IGIOUS; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. Correspondence about the department "Canonical Counsel" should be addressed to Rich-ard A. Hill, S.J.; J.S.T.B.; 1735 LeRoy Ave.; Berkeley, CA 94709-1193. Back issues and reprints should be ordered from R~:vtEw r'oa REU~aOUS; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. "Out of print" issues are available from University Microfilms International; 300 N. Zeeb Rd.; Ann Arbor, M! 48106. A major portion of each issue is also available on cassette recordings as a service for the visually impaired. Write to the Xavier Society for the Blind; 154 East 23rd Street; New York, NY 10010. Review for Religious Volume 48, 1989 Editorial Offices 3601 Lindeil Boulevard, Room 428 Saint Louis, Missouri 63108-3393 David L. Fleming, S.J. Iris Ann Ledden, S.S.N.D. Richard A. Hill, S.J. Jean Read Mary Ann Foppe Editor Associate Editor Contributing Editor Assistant Editors R~:vIEw FOR RELIGIOUS is published in January, March, May, July, Sep-tember, and November on the twentieth of the month. It is indexed in the Catholic Periodical and Literature Index and in Book t~e te~I Index. A microfilm edition of R~:v~Ew FOR RELIGOUS is available from University~ Microfilms International; Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106. Copyrighl© 1989 by R~vmw FOR RELiGiOUS. A major portion of each issue of REvmw FOR RgL~G~OUS is als~o regu-larly available on cassette recordings as a service for the visuallyl' im-paired. Write to the Xavier Society for the Blind; 154 East 23rd Street; New York, NY 1 O010. PRISMS . Religious life today presents a varied landscape of images. Some would see the landscape more in the fading light of autumn colors or, perhaps, far more somberly in the gray bleakness of a barren wintertime. Others look out and observe a springtime of new growth, with tender fresh green shoots and small delicate blossoms just visible above the ground level. All the various ways we have of picturing religious life have some basis in reality. For there are various prisms through which we view all life, including religious life. Prisms are very important because they do provide a way for us to see, to highlight and to emphasize, to reject and to ignore. As others share their prisms of vision with us, we gain en-trance to worlds of different colors and new life. Of course, if we main-tain our vision only through our own prism, our world begins to take on a singleness of color and a frozen artificiality of life. REVIEW FOR REL~C~OUS, from its first January issue in 1942, has tried to provide various prisms through which we might view the whole worldscape which must be a part of a vibrant Christian spiritual life and so necessarily a part of religious life. As newly appointed editor of this journal, I intend the variety of insights into the consecrated lifeform, tra-ditionally called religious life, to remain an essential contribution of REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS. This contribution seems all the more necessary at our particular moment in the Church when often more time is spent in defining and establishing one's own position than in listening or learn-ing of another's. I do not want to wear out an image, but there is another important pointer for us in the kaleidos6ope. The prisms of a kaleidoscope only pro-duce their beauty because of their relationships, one to another. I find that the prisms through which we view life only present us with adequate truth, new life, and fresh ways ofacting if we maintain the relationship of various viewpoints. That is the great strength of the Church who pos-sesses various pictures of Jesus in her gospels, who allows differing phi-losophies and theologies to provide understanding to her faith, and who approves the charisms of vastly differing forms of religious life to be le-gitimate icons of Christ for all the Christian faithful and for the world. It is in the maintenance of relationship that we possess the criteria of le-gitimacy, continuity, and true creativity. 4 / Review for Religious, January-February 1989 In our current issue, the usual variety of articles gives indication of the richness of interests which help form the context of religious life. In subsequent numbers I intend to take the opportunity to highlight one or other article because of the importance of its issue or the insight or un-derstanding it provides. Sometimes I would like to reflect more broadly about certain key concerns of religious life as it is being lived in our Churc,h and world today. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS in this way will continue to provide prisms as well perspectives on the relationships of the many prisms that make up our religious lives. David L. Fleming, S.J. What Do You Want?m The Role of Desires in Prayer William A. Barry, S.J. A frequent contributor, Father Barry wrote "God's Love Is Not Utilitarian" for our issue of November/December 1987. His address is Jesuit Community: Boston Col-lege; Chestnut Hill, MA 02167. know: you're going to ask what I want. "As I was driving up to the retreat house, I thought of your perennial question: 'What do you want?' and here's what l~came up with." I have often noticed that peo-ple who see me for some time for spiritual direction or directed retreats say things like this. It even becomes a bit of humorous byplay, as though they want to beat me to the punch. Clearly, one of my favorite questions for directees is the one Jesus put to the two disciples who began to fol-low him: "What do you want?" (Jn 1:38). If directees pick up on this predilection and start asking themselves the question, then, I believe, a good deal of my work as spiritual director is done. If we know what we want in prayer, we are going to find our way. After a practical belief that God wants an intimate relationship with each one of us and that God is directly encountered in our experience, nothing is more important for the development of our relationship with God-~-for our prayer, in other words--than knowledge of what we want and of what God wants. In this article I want to discuss the role of desires in prayer. Anyone familiar with the Spiritual Exercises knows that among the preludes to every meditation or contemplation is: "I will ask God our Lord for what I want and desire." In the various stages or weeks of the Exercises, Ignatius states what the desire is in each case. For example, in the First Week I "ask for a growing and intense sorrow and tears for my sins," and in the Second Week I "ask .for an intimate knowledge 5 Review for Religious, January-February 1989 of our Lord, who has .become man for me, that I may love him more and follow him more closely." In an earlier article in the R~v~Ew, l tried to show that each of the desires of the Exercises is a desire for some par-ticular revelation by the Lord. ~ On the face of it, it looks as though Ignatius is saying: "Here is what you should desire at each stage of the Spiritual Exercises." One conclu-sion might be to take a person through the four Weeks and just put be-fore him or her what Ignatius gives as the desire. In fact, this has been the procedure in preached retreats, including the preached thirty-day re-treats we older Jesuits and other religious made in novitiate and tertian-ship. But what happened if, as a matter of fact, I did not really desire to know Jesus more intimately when the Second Week was presented to me. Suppose, for example, I was still too afraid of what he thinks of me. In most instan(es, I would guess, we just presumed that we had the de-sire if it was Second Week time. But I would contend that without the real desire we never got very intimate with Jesus. Indeed, I believe that "what we really desire" is diagnostic of the stage of the Exercises we are actually in. To demonstrate this thesis we need to look at the role of desires in any relationship. If you get a call from someone asking for a.meeting, is not your first question, at least to yourself, "What does she or he want?" In fact, many meetings between people come off badly because the individuals involved have mistaken ideas of what each other wants. For example, I want to become your friend, and you believe that I want help with home-work; you want to help me, but are not even thinking of a deeper friend-ship. At the end of the meeting both of us are going to be pretty frus-trated unless we talk about our different desires and come to some understanding. Often enough, too, relationships become frustrating be-cause of ambivalent or incompatible desires in one or both parties. For example, I want to get closer to you, but I am also afraid of you. Or I want a friendship with you (a happily married woman), but I also want to goto bed with you. Every intended encounter with another person is accompanied by a"desire or desires'. We are not always aware of our de-sires, but they are present, and they condition our behavior in the encoun-ter. Now suppose that I want to befriend you and you do not want my: friendship. Will my efforts :at befriending get me or you anywhere? Only to frustration and resentment, probably. But let us say that I persist in trying to do nice things for you. What will happen? You will probably get more and more irritated and thus less and less likely to become my Role of Desires in Prayer friend. And like many a "do-gooder" whose good deeds are rejected, I may eventually wash my hands of you and call you an ingrate who de-serves his fate. Friendship is possible only when the desires are mutual, when you freely desire my friendship and I freely desire yours. Friend-ship cannot be coerced. "But," someone may object, "we often do things that we don't want to do. Because of my friendship for you, for example, I will go to a movie I don't like." But what do you want? If it is because of friend-ship with me that you go to the movie, is not your deepest desire to please me or to be with me? The friendship is more important than the movie. I believe that the centrality of desire for the developing of a rela-tionship cannot be denied. Now let us look at the importance of desires for the relationship with the Lord. In the first chapter of John's gospel, the two disciples of John are intrigued by this Jesus whom John has just pointed out as the lamb of God. So they start following Jesus. When Jesus asks them what they want, they say, "Rabbi, where are you staying?" They do not yet have strong desires, it seems; curiosity seems to be the desire. Jesus does not disdain this desire. "Come," he replies, "and you will see." Unless we have some attraction toward God, some curiosity or hope or desire, we will not take the time to begin our side of the relationship. If I be-lieve in my heart and feelings that God is an ogre, ready to pounce on any infraction, then I may try to placate him, but I will never want to get close to him. And God, as it were, does handstands.to convince us that he really is benign, that he is, as Jesus asserted, Abba. The p.rofli-gate wonders of nature, our own creation and life, the words of Old and New Testaments, Jesus himself, and other loving, caring people in our lives--these are all signg of God's desire that we find him attractive and let him come close. But he cannot force himself on us, or will not. We must have some desire to get to know him better. Sebastian Moore af-firms that God's creative touch which desires us into being arouses in us a desire for "I know what," that is, a desire for the Mystery we call God.2 This experience (understood as the experience of one's creation and continued creation) can be seen as the affective principle and foun-dation for the development ofone's relationship with God. The desire for "I know what" is what makes' our hearts restless until they rest in God. Many people need help to recognize that they have such a desire. Be-cause of life's hurts they may not recognize any other desire but to be left alone, or not to be hurt any more. Telling such people that God is Review for Religious, January-February 1989 love has little or no effect. They may need help to admit to God that they are afraid of, him and desire to be less afraid. Indeed, they may need help to voice some of their anger at life's hurts which seem to them to have come from the Author of life. The fact that they have not completely turned away from religion indicates that they may still want something from God, even if only an acknowledgment that he knows what hap-pened to them in life. Like Job some may cry out: "Then know that God has wronged me and drawn his net around me. Though I c~'y, 'I've been wronged!' I get no response; though I call for help, there is no justice." Only after he has poured out his sorrows, seemingly, can he say: "I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth" (Jb ! 9:6-7.25). In other words, it may take a great deal of pas-toral care and patient spiritual direction for some people to come to the point where they can trust life and the Author of life enough to let into their consciousness the desire for "'I know what.'" Job's friends have tried to derail him from expressing his desires to God: In his misery he wants God to speak to him. He will not lie and say, as his friends insinuate,, that he deserves his calamities because of his sins. Hewill not accept the just-world hypothesis proposed by his friends according to which anyone's sufferings must be deserved. No, he knows~that he does not deserve the awful fate that has befallen him and desires to speak directly .to God and to hear God's answer. Often enough we Christians are like the friends of Job. To a mother who has just.lost her only child we might say, "God knows best." and thus make it difficult for her to voice her outrage at God and her need for God's own answer to this awful loss. Sometimes we feel that we have to de-fend God against the anger directed at him by people in pain. Yet the anger may be the most authentic way for a person to relate ~o God and to ex.press a desire to know God's response. Finally in chapters 38 through 41 God does answer Job out of the whirlwind. The response may not sound very comforting or apologetic to _us, but apparently Job is satisfied, for he says: "My ears had heard of you but.now, my eyes have seen you. Therefore I despise myself and repent in ~du.s.t and ashes." Moreover, then God speaks to Job's friends, "I am angry with you and your two friends, because yQu have not spo-ken of me what is~right, as my servant Job has" (Jb 42:5-7). Whatever else God's speech from the whirlwind means, it certainly does not mean that Jg~bohas lost God's friendship by voicing so strongly his desire to have God answer him. Another biblical instance of an attempt to derail a desire directed to- Role of Desires in Prayer ward God comes in the first chapter of the First Book of Samuel. Han-nah, one of the two wives of Elkanah, is barren and miserable. She wants a son. Her husband, seeing her weeping and fasting, says to her, "Han-nah, why are you weeping? Why don't you eat? Why are you down-hearted? Don't I mean more to you than ten sons?" In other words, Elka-nah wants Hannah to forget her desire and be satisfied with what she has. In the story we do not hear Hannah's reply, but her actions tell us that she is not put off by Elkanah's entreaties. She goes to the temple and "in bitterness of soul., wept much and prayed to the Lord." Indeed, when accused of drunkenness by Eli, the priest, she says, "Not so, my lord, I am a woman who is deeply troubled. I was pouring out my soul to the Lord." Hannah knows what she wants and is not afraid to tell God over and over what it is (I S 1:8, 10, 15). Often we tell ourselves or are told to quell our desires, to look at all the good we already have. We can be made to feel guilty and ungrateful for desiring what we want. But if we do suppress our desires without be-ing satisfied that God has heard us, then, in effect, we pull back from honesty with God. The result for our relationship with God often is po-lite distance or cool civility. Perhaps God cannot or will not grant what we want, but for the sake of the continued development of the relation-ship we need to keep letting him know our real desires until we are sat-isfi~ d or have heard or felt some response. In 2 Cbrinthians Paul says, "There was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to tor-ment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' " Now Paul could stop making known his desire because now he knew God's answer. "Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. :For when I am weak, then I am strong" (2 Co 12:7-10). Convictions such as Paul's come not from theological or spiritual nos-trums, but from the experienc~ of growing transparency between a Paul and the Lord. Too often we use the hard-won wisdom of a Paul to short-circuit a similar transparency in our own relationship with the Lord. A woman may, for example, be experiencing the "dark night of the soul" and not like it at all. Her desire may be for it to be removed. She may be helped by the knowledge that others have experienced the same thing before her and been the better for it, but such knowledge does not have to satisfy her desire to be rid of the "dark night." A short circuit in the Review for Religious, January-February 1989 relationship might occur if she is told by her spiritual director or tells her-self to squelch her desire "because the experience is good for you." What she needs to experience is God's response, not a theorem of spiri-tual theology. She needs to know (really, not notionally) that God does want this darkness for the good of their relationship. Such real knowl-edge comes only through mutual transparency. Most of the healing miracles of the New Testament depend on the desire of the recipient for healing.The example of the blind beggar Bar-timaeus (Mk 10:46-52) stands out, but is not unusual. "When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout, 'Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.' Many rebuked him and told him to be quiet, but he shouted all the more, 'Son of David, have mercy on me.' " Obviously Bartimaeus will not be hindered from expressing his desire by any num-ber of voices trying to quiet him. These "voices" can come from within us as well as from without, by the way. "Jesus won't have time for the likes of me; other people have more important problems; things aren't so bad." These interior voices may be expressing our ambivalence about being healed. Just as Bartimaeus had made a way of life out of his blindness, so too we may have made our own physical or psychological or sPiritual limitations a way of life and be afraid of what a future without them might be. One person on a retreat thought that he desired healing from a kind of dark-ness that seemed to rule his life. But then he heard the Lord ask, "Do you want me to heal you of this?" and he had to admit that he was not sure. Interestingly, he felt that God approved the honesty of his response. The inner voices may also express our fear of arousing strong desires for healing only to have them dashed. "Suppose I really want to be healed and I hear the answer Paul got? What a disappointment!''3 Desires are complex and often contradictory. However, once we have allowed the ambivalence and complexity of our desires to surface, we have some-thing else to ask the Lord about. In the Bartimaeus story Jesus calls him over and asks, "What do you want me to do for you?" Bartimaeus is quite clear and unambi-valent, "Rabbi, I want to see." "Go," says Jesus, "your faith has healed you." I have italicized Jesus' words. Without the faith of Barti-maeus, apparently, this miracle could not have occurred. The miracle re-quires a. partnership between Jesus' healing power and desire to heal and Bartimaeus' faith and desire to be healed. Indeed, Bartimaeus' desire is his faith in action. An example may help to illustrate this point. Once I was filled with Role of Desires in Prayer anger and self-pity about the turn a friendship had taken and thought that I was praying for healing. I was contemplating the story of the two blind men in Matthew 9:27-30. When Jesus asked them, "Do you believe that I am able to do this?" I knew immediately that I was not ready to give up my self-pity and anger. If I did desire healing, it was with the same "but not yet" desire with which Augustine at one time desired chastity. I did not have the "faith" found in the two blind men and in Barti-maeus, a faith that showed itself in unambivalent desire. Another exam-ple that shows how desire is faith in action is provided by the father of the boy with the evil spirit reported in Mark 9: 14-29. Instead of asking directly for a healing, the father said to Jesus, "But if you can do any-thing, take pity on us and help us." Because he did not believe in Jesus' power to heal, he could not desire the hea!ing directly. "If you can?" said Jesus. "Everything is possible for him who believes." To which the father replied, "I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief." In effect the man is saying, "Help me to desire healing." This last example brings us close to the hub of why desires are the raw material out of which relationships are made. In order for the heal-ing to occur, there must be a meshing of desires. Bartimaeus's desire for healing meets Jesus' desire to heal; without both desires there is no rela-tionship, at least no mutual relationship. This point is beautifully illus-trated in the story of the leper. "A man with leprosy came to him and begged him on his knees, 'If you are. willing, you can make me clean.' Filled with compassion, Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. 'I am willing,' he said. 'Be clean!' Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cured" (Mk 1:40-42). Clearly desire meets desire. The kind of relationship Jesus desires is a mutual one', where desire meets desire. The need for a partnership of.desires becomes even clearer when we look at friendship. In John 15:15 Jesus says, "I have called you friends," and then goes on to indicate what that means from his side, "for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you." From his side the desire has been to be fully transparent, to com-municate to them all that he is. His desire meets their desire to know him as fully as possible. Of course, full mutuality of friendship means that they desire to be fully transparent before him and he desires to know them fully. Take away one side of these desires and there no longer is a mutual relationship. Of course, on the apostles' part (and on ours) the mere desire for mu-tual transparency does not carry it off. "Between the cup and the lip . " Our desires are ambivalent and complex; we are fearful crea- 12 / Review for Religious, January-February 1989 tures, as well, and our fears get in the way of what we most deeply want. We need help and healing to grow toward mutual transparency with the Lord. But that help is available if we want it. If we notice, for example,, that we want to know Jesus better, but are afraid of the consequences, we can ask Jesus for help to overcome our fears. But again we notice that desire is the key to developing the relationship. The retreatant mentioned earlier who told God that he was not sure that he wanted healing of the darkness that ruled his life provides another example of the reciprocity of relationships. Later in the same day he be-came more sure that he wanted healing and asked the Lord to heal him. The Lord's response was perplexing; "I can't," he seemed to say. The retreatant was enraged at such a response when his own reluctance had been overcome, and he let God know in no uncertain terms. Yet still later in the day, out of the blue, as it were~ he heard the Lord say, "But we can." He knew immediately that the Lord meant that he could live more out of joy than sadness if he kept desiring the Lord's helpful presence rather 'than withdrawing into himself. "We can" meant partnership. At the beginning of this article, I stated that the real desires a person has are diagnostic of where the person is in terms of the four Weeks of the Exercises. Let me now return to that point. If retreatants do not have a real trust in God's loving care and providence, they will not desire that God reveal to them their sinfulness. Without an experienced-based be-lief in God's goodness and 16ve, without, in other words, what I have called earlier an affective principle and foundation, people are too fright-ened of God to be able to say and mean the last words of Psalm 139: "Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting" (23-24). If there is no such real desire, then the First Week of the Exercises is not on. And, it seems, at this point God's desire is not so much to reveal sinfulness as to convince the person that he is "Abba." Similarly, if a retreatant voices the desire to know Jesus in or-der love him more and to follow him more closely, yet in his prayer con-tinually identifies with those who need healing, perhaps his real desire is to be healed. The desire of the Second Week to know Jesus shows it-self in an interest in Jesus himself, his values, his emotions, his dreams, his apostolate. If the retreatant is not really interested in these matters, but continually focuses on his own needs and weaknesses, then the Sec-ond Week is not. really in progress. Jesus himself may at this time desire more to heal than to call to companionship. The difference between the First and Third Weeks also comes down to a difference in desire. In the Role of Desires in Prayer First Week I desire to know that Jesus forgives me (and us), that he died for my (and our) sins; the focus is on desiring to have a deep experience of how much Jesus loved us even though he knew how sinful we were. The desire of the Third Week is more to share the passion with Jesus in-sofar as this is possible. The focus is on what Jesus felt and suffered, and the desire is that he reveal that to me. Retreat directors, I believe, do their most important work when they help their directees to discover what they do in reality want. And so every retreat could begin with a con-templation of Jesus as he turns and says, "What do you want?" As re-treatants hear these words and let them penetrate their hearts, they will come to know better what they desire; in other words, they will know better who they are at this time in their relationship with the Lord. NOTES ~ "On Asking God to Reveal Himself in Retreat," REVIEW FOR REI.IOWOUS 37 (1978): 171-176; reprinted in David L. Fleming (ed.), Notes on the Spiritual Exercises of St. ignatius of Loyola (St. Louis: REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, 1983), pp. 72-77. 2 Sebastian Moore, Let This Mind Be in You: The Quest for Identity Through Oedi-pus to Christ (Minneapolis: Winston-Seabury, 1985). 3 In another context I have discussed the courage of Bartimaeus. See "Surrender: Key To Wholeness," REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 46 1987): 49-53. Perspectives on Parables and Prayer Donald Macdonald, S.M.M. Father Macdonald's most recent contribution to our journal was "A Pathway to God" (May/June 1988). His address continues to be: St. Joseph's; Wellington Road; Todmorden, Lancashire; 0L14 5HP England. A sister said that her annual retreat was less than satisfying because "the priest, who shall be nameless, seemed to spend a fair bit of time telling us how good he was. I nearly offered him a trumpet." My response was and is to wish that he could come for my annual retreat, if only to exer-cise my sense of humor, even though, as I suspect, he may be speaking tongue in cheek. If not, so much the better! This is not meant to be flip-pant, for it seems to me in recent years that retreats and such like are becoming more technical, esoteric, and managed. So often there has to be a title with content specified, ra~nging from privately directed to Bet- .ter World and charismatic, by way of the Spiritual Exercises, Inigo, Sadhana, Progoff, Zen, Yoga, and so much else; it seems a prudent step, therefore, to first inquire before one enters. The seeker for silence and stillness, for example, is likely to find an all-action organized retreat not a little off-putting. But it all seems so terribly earnest, with little humor. A retreat is undeniably important when seen as a chance for inspira-tion, encouragement, and vision, particularly if the opportunity comes only once a year. It is important that the Gospel is preached; arguably, over the years, some vocations may have gone by default, even among those who die as religious, inasmuch as the Good News, as the New Tes-tament would understand it, might not have been heard. It is sometimes asking much of a preacher during a retreat to try and shore up a creaking building on the verge of collapse when the day-by-day support has not been given. But what seems to happen today is a grasping for technique 14 On Parables and Prayer which is expected to provide the key to the Gospel. The search for the philosopher's stone is endemic. This, of course, may not be quite fair to someone who senses per-haps that "Thou [God] hast made us for thyself and our hearts are rest-less till they rest in thee" (Confessions 1:1).~ But expectation is not God, nor is disappointment nor, indeed, sat-isfaction. To set one's all on technique or the competence of the preacher or the receptivity of the audience is to risk losing everything. Humor will spare us that and much else. The late John Main, O.S.B., told a friend, a Ramakrishnan monk, who had asked him how he proposed to teach meditation, "Sit down, sit erect, say the mantra, and that's it.''2 His friend said that such an approach would never work with Westerners. It is so simple they will not believe you. His advice was to deliberately com-plicate it, saying you have esoteric knowledge which you can give only after they have been coming for at least ten weeks. Only then can t.hey be initiated. Throw in the name John Cassian for good measure. That should attract them. This raises a smile, as it is so close to reality as some of us observe it. A Greek Orthodox priest spoke similarly of students coming to his monastery asking to be initiated into the Jesus Prayer. "Say it." "But. ? . No, just say it." As you advance you need guidance. It is all rather deflating, for someone seeking the heights, to be told to begin at the beginning. It will be recalled that Peter L. Berger identified humor as one of his "signals of transcendence," a marvelous way out from all which might tend to dominate and frighten us in a seemingly locked-in world. It is crucial for perspective. "Laughter can show that power is ultimately' an illusion because it canno( transcend the limits of the empirical world. Laughter can--and does every time it relativizes the seemingly rocklike necessities of this world.''3 There is such a thing as gallows humor. Laughter can be a link with the divine and all that is, not just all that is here. How could a preacher or a community ever take themselves wholly seriously again after hearing this little story about a retreat director? He impressed a community as an obviously saintly man. His reputation grew as the week progressed--until he asked for meat on Friday. No saint would ever do that! On such are reputations built and lost. Favorite humorous authors such as P. G. Wodehouse or James Thurber can provide permanent links to God and reality. Once in their friendly and familiar company, we find space to simply relax and enjoy ourselves. We smile at Walter Mitty as we see ourselves in him. Our prob- 16 / Review for Religious,'January-February 1989 lems lessen in the face of what some of the Wodehouse characters have to meet. A Sergeant Bilko on black-and-white television can do as much. Holding on to the relative like this may help us see that there is always another chance--and if the Go.spei is to be believed, the time is now. I am far from underplaying the need for a properly prepared retreat or suggesting that one can laugh off whatever happens. Nor would I dis-count the value of any particular technique or approach. I would but say that everything here is relative and humor can help us see it. Father Enomiya-Lassalle once gave a day's Zen retreat to forty Korean novices, whose reaction was that "Up to now we used to have a scriptural text in our daily meditation to meditate on. Today for the first time we have felt that to meditate is to pray."4 One is grateful;for the sisters' experi. ence, but even if the priest had neve.r set foot in Korea, the providence of God would not have neglected them. Everything then can help, but nothing is essential. When the retreat .disappoints, all need not be lost. This is particularly so for those who know how to interpret their life in terms of Scripture. A fairly comprehensive experience convinces me that few can. If there is one cause of failure both in preacher and audience, it lies in the inability to do that. I would be astonished if novices knew how to do it, and very surprised to find it in the great majority of their senior brothers and sisters. One simple test is to listen for the Gospel when religious speak of what is happening to them and how they see it. The Gospel is the common coin of the Catholic Church, but many use it gingerly like a foreign currency. They do not know its value, or what to do with it. Authentic Sources 'Religious have been authoritatively urged that to genuinely live their calling they should draw "on the authentic sources of Christian spiritu-ality., in the first place they should take the Sacred Scriptures in hand each day" (Perfectae Caritatis, no. 6). Here faith and life are meshed as one. What a Jewish commentator, W. G. Plaut, said of the Torah, the Christian can wholeheartedly endorse for Scripture in its.entirety. "We hold that the Torah is a record of Israel's striving to meet God and un-derstand his will. In centuries of search, of finding and forgetting, of in-spiration and desperation, God touched the soul of his people and the sparks of these meetings burn in the pages of the Torah.' ,5 The "sparks of these meetings" are found in the pages of Scripture, and once prop-erly kindled they produce an enduring, not fitful, flame. In each meet-ing with God, which really means now, the religious by profession would wish his or her mind to be at one with the will of God, faith and life re- On Parables and Prayer flecting the one reality: "That man is Your best servant who is not so much concerned to hear from You what he wills as to will what he hears from You"(Confessions 10:26). That distinction is crucial, and none knew better than Augustine how hard it was to really make the transi-tion. All of us are innately self-centered, easily deceived. It is, then, prac-tical to go to the authentic sources of the Church's tradition, where "in the centuries of search, of finding and forgetting. God touched the soul of his people." Even Augustine intuitively seems to have felt this in his search for God. "I absolutely refused to entrust the care of my sick soul to the philosophers, because they were without the saving name of Christ. and whatever lacked that name, no matter how learned and excellently written and true, could not win me wholly" (Confessions 5: 14; 3:4). So while the attraction for God in Christ and authenticity was there, Augustine could not at first bring himself to find this, least of all in Scripture. He tells us honestly why: "So I resolved to make some study of the Sacred Scriptures and find what kind of books they were . My conceit was repelled by their simplicity, and I had not the mind to penetrate into their depths" (Confessions 3:5). He lacked "sincerity, openness of mind and that fundamental rev-erence which is a willingness to be commanded" which one who went deeper than most saw as minimum requirements before the Bible can do anything for a person.6 It is so hard to change one's mind radically, and that lovely quality of fundamental reverence before Scripture Js rarely found, especially in those who like to do things their own way--which means all of us, but for the grace of God. ~ Augustine was later to envy the Church's faithful whom he had once patronized as ignorant and unlettered. Once he himself had discovered the treasure which they so nonchalantly possessed, how his perspective changed: "Of what great harm to Your little ones was their far slower intelligence: since they strayed not far from You and so could fledge their wings in safety in the nest of Your Church, and nourish the wings of char-ity with the food of solid faith?" (Confessions 4:16). In thus moving from inauthentic to authentic existence as he saw it, he now realized that his "superior" stance was only that of the man with the empty stomach who does not know where to find food, in his case, "the food of solid faith." The search, tension, and struggle are perhaps heroic and the stakes are life or death, but nothing is gained by patronizing those who sit down each day at a full table. He finally knocked at their door and asked to come in and share what they had. Again his perspective changed: "It is with utter certainty that I love You. You have stricken Review for Religious, January-February 1989 my heart with Your word and I have loved You" (Confessions 10:6). It is well known that an appar.ently chance reading of Romans 13 and 14 finally enabled Augustine to see. Now from within the heart of the Church he is convinced that "Thou [God] didn't touch me, and I have burned for thy peace" (Confessions 10:27). This is not notional knowl-edge enabling him to speak to his intellectual peers, but the real insight given him by the word of God from within the Church enabling him to see faith and life as one. The sparks of the earlier meetings with God are now aflame in re-sponse to his word. His life and perspective are transfigured. It is per-haps not without its underlying humor to see this gifted man, with many of the gli~tering prizes within his grasp, now held enthralled by the faith of his mother and her nurse (see Confessions 9:8). He had traveled for miles and years searching for what he had left at home. If religious had this innate feeling of fundamental reverence before Scripture, always subordinating themselves to the word, never dominat-ing it, they might more easily warm to the sparks of the meetings with God in their own daily life, and so find a flame which they could never leave. Even among the trumpet calls of a preacher's self-proclaimed ex-cellence, the word of God isthere if one knows how to listen, but it is unlikely to be heard unless one is habitually doing this. That perspec-tive is all-important. A practical illustration may perhaps make the point. A Treasure Found Parables form much of the Gospel, and few strike a cord with the religious vocation more than "the kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up; then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field" (Mt 13:44). Taken from life, it is meant to make us think. What is being said here? We under-stand what is being said, of course, but we are meant to assimilate its implications. Its dynamic is as powerful as Christ is real. Insofar as I be-lieve that God in Christ is here speaking to me, I shall respond and so attempt to make the Gospel my own. In fact, that parable, for many, is little more than an interesting analogy. It is a helpful example, an exter-nal, verbal, and indeed visual aid, as useful in the junior school as in the religious community. Precisely because that may not unfairly be de-scribed as the most usual understanding of the parable, the true perspec-tive is little known, and so those words scarcely ever spark into a flame. If that is compared with the approach to parables of T. W. Manson in a fine book first published over fifty years ago and often reprinted, we will find ourselves in another world where the sparks of the meeting On Parables and Prayer between Christ and ourselves can really catch fire. He says: Jesus is not concerned to demonstrate that God exists but rather to show the nature of the God whose existence is common ground for him and his audience. His aim is not to make God an article of faith but the ob-ject of faith. We are often concerned to make God probable to man; .he set out to make God real to them. It is this fact which makes parable the inevitable form in which the teaching of Jesus on the nature and ways of God should be delivered . The true parable., is not an illus-tration to help one through a theological discussion. It belongs to the same order of things as altar and sacrifice and prayer, the prophetic vi-sion and the like . It is a way in which religious faith is attained, and, as far as it can be, transmitted from one person to another. It is not a crutch for limping intellects but a spur to religious insight. Its object is not to provide simple theological instruction but to produce living re-ligious faith.7 This is Scripture seen from the inside. How many readers of this page honestly think like that? If religious habitually think in those terms, it seems to me that they keep it well hidden. Could the average reader echo, from experience, all that Manson sees--parable, the obvious teach-ing medium to make God real . . . a mode of religious experience on the same plane as altar, sacrifice, prayer, and insight., a way in which faith is attained, not a crutch for limping intellects., producing living religious faith? The easiest way to answer such questions is to ask: What did we feel when the parable was first quoted--' 'the kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field."? If Manson was articulating what we have long known and felt, the resonances first produced by the par-able will still be there on the level of faith, not necessarily feeling. His comment would then simply buttress what we know to be true. Is our faith like a treasure found? Is this what has brought us to religious life? Is it a superb insight into reality? Is any sacrifice worthwhile to really possess it? What do we give in view of what we ~et? Can this treasure in any sense be found through the medium of an imperfect preacher? Do these words hold us up as they obviously show us up? One has to ask questions and link details together for the purposes of writing, but if the parable is properly assimilated to any degree, it is better to be silent and still and let the image absorb us and lead us where it will. We are then on the level of altar, sacrifice, prayer, and insight, willingly or even grudgingly, in view of the demands, letting ourselves be drawn into God through his Word. Perspectives that we perhaps know notionally are opened up to limitless horizons. Faith, not feeling, is seek- 20 / Review for Religious, January-February 1989 ing to really understand. For years we have known the parable by heart. Have our hearts ever got the point and made it our own? Only silence and wonder stemming from fundamental reverence will do that. Fundamental Reverence For some years now virtually all religious communities have the for-mal daily prayer of the Church as their morning and evening prayer. In-variably, individuals or groups are given charge of liturgy and prayer, which generally means that coming to daily prayer one has to first find out what has been rearranged. Pages have to be marked, hymns noted, and alternative readings attended to. The pattern is rarely predictable. All this is done, one hears, because the community wants it, for the ordi-nary daily office is boring and repetitive. This constant adaptation is then seen as a practical attempt to engage the community in really meaning-ful prayer. In view of what has already been said, much of this suggests that those who foster or want this, apart from the risk of choosing only what-ever has personal appeal, may have no real feeling for Scripture, which may be why continual rearrangement is felt to be necessary to hold at-tention. This is, of course, the technique of the junior school, .where the children's attention span is limited and meaning has to be immediate. Yet if one receives~a line, phrase, sentence, or sentiment of Scripture on the level of altar, sacrifice, prayer, or insight, one just cannot keep chang-ing the focus without fragmenting the reality. Even to move, pick up a hymnbook, attend to alternative prayer or reading, or in general to be .never quite sure what is happening next, can be to break concentration. There may be some gain in alertness but, arguably, loss in continu-ity and assimilation. The Psalms and readings from the daily office have not yet been heard for the first time as Augustine, Manson, the Jewish commentator Plaut, and others would understand it, and will never be if one constantly changes the focus of attention in terms of relevance. One is all the time being brought up to the surface, never left long enough to go down to the depths. Ideally, the Psalms and readings could be so predictable that one almost knows them without turning the page. Only then do they have a chance of becoming part of ourselves so that we can truly listen, not just hear. Fundamental reverence would ask no less. But, however well intentioned, when one has to scan the board for the next item on .the agenda of prayer, or wait for the inspiration of a colleague, one is perhaps paying too high a price for spontaneity. The seemingly prosaic parable as a "spur to religious insight" must be in-vited to speak, not ordered to. On Parables and Prayer When Scripture is approached like this in the context of prayer, what one hears matters little. In time, perhaps less and less comes to mean more and more. It has not been and cannot be quite assimilated. Occa-sionally its relevance may be all too clear, as when, on the morning fol-lowing news of the horrific deaths of the seven astronauts in January 1986, one read: "Naked I came from my mother's womb, naked I shall return. The Lord gave, the Lord has taken back. Blessed be the name of the Lord. If we take happiness from God's hand, must we not take sorrow too?" (Jb 1:21, 2:10). Even if the words appear as dull as a school textbook, it does not matter. Nor does immediacy or surface mood. On the level of prayer, altar, sacrifice, and insight, it is one's faith responding to God that makes the connection. In time the words will peel away and matter less and less as one is held in faith, just as a smile or wave from a friend has a mean-ing out of all proportion to the action. It is a perspective on reality for which one is grateful. NOTES t The Confessions of St. Augustine, translated by F. J. Sheed (London: Sheed and Ward 1944). All references to The Confessions are from here. 2 John Main, O.S.B., "Christian Meditation," The Grail, 1978, p. 19. 3.Peter L. Berger, A Rumor of Angels (Penguin Books, 1971), p. 91. 4 The Tablet, London, January I 1, 1986, pp. 31-32. 5 The Torah, W. G. Plaut and B. J. Bamberger (New York: Union of American He-brew Congregation, 198 I), p. 1294. 6 C. H. Dodd, The Authority of the Bible [1929] (Fontana Paperback, 1962), p. 269. 7 T. W. Manson. The Teaching of Jesus (CUP, 1931; paperback, 1963), pp. 72-73. The Gift of Not Giving Jane Kammer C.S.Bo In our issue of January/February 1983, we published Sister Jane's "Three Times I Asked: Reflections on Weakness." She is a pastoral associate at St. Benedict Church in San Antonio. She may be addressed at 5107 Ozark; San Antonio, Texas 7820 I. So Jesus said to them, 'Well, then, pay to the Emperor what belongs to the Emperor and pay to God what belongs to God ' (Mt 22:21). "Jesus exclaimed, 'You ask me for a miracle? No! The only mir-acle you will be given is the miracle of the prophet Jonah' " (Mt 12:39). "As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had had the de-mons begged him, 'Let me go with you!' But Jesus would not let him"(Mk 5:18-19). A popular Christian saying and song is "God loves a cheerful giver." Giving has been exalted as a hallmark of Christianity, and so it is. Didn't our leader, Jesus, give his very life to show us God's great love? Giving has also been extolled as the virtue of the ideal Christian woman. For most of her life, my mother gave. She waited on my father; she gave of herself for her children. For all but the last few years of her life, I never heard her say no to anyone who asked a favor. But after she had grieved over my father's death, a change took place in my mother. At sixty-two she learned to drive a car; she went on vacations; she joined groups and clubs; and she began to say no to requests she really did not want to fulfill. She had discovered another dimension of giving. Giving is not always healthy for the giver or for the receiver. It is not true respect when I continually do for another what the person can do for him/herself. I am beginning to learn the gift of not giving. Teilhard de Chardin said, "Your essential duty and desire is to be 22 The Gift of Not Giving united with God. But in order to be united you must first of all be --be yourself as completely as possible. And so you must develop yourself and take possession of the world in order to be. Once this has been ac-complished, then is the time to think about renunciation; then is the time to accept diminishment for the sake of being in another. Such is the sole and twofold precept of complete Christian asceticism" (The Divine Mi-lieu [New York: Harper and Row, 1960], pp. 70-71). I believe that part of developing myself is learning, through practice, the gift of not giving to everyone who seems to ask. If I continually place my focus on others, then I cannot really give myself in love to them, for I do not have a self to give. It is my task to discover and develop the unique person God intends for me to be. I am codependent. To me that means I tend to place my center out-side of myself. I am inclined to seek affirmation and validation from some-one else. I feel safest when giving, not receiving. I am a people pleaser who fears rejection. Taking things personally and blaming myself for whatever seems less than perfect are aspects of my codependence. I have lived with many "shoulds" from the past which I have interiorized. In many ways my life repeats the story of my mother. But it is not too late to refocus my center within myself. I can learn to allow the true "me" to emerge from within. In time I can become a self-validating, self-affirming person whose peace is permanent and whose happiness does not depend on the mood of another. If I stay with myself, I can learn to love and accept myself as I am, even while want-ing to change some things about myself. I can give myself the gift of not giving up on the real, beautiful, and exciting "me." Moreover, I can learn to give the gift to others of responsibility for themselves. By re-fusing to absorb and carry the emotions of others, I will gift them with the faith that they are capable of living their own lives, making their own decisions, and caring for themselves. One morning I attended a meeting of four people who work in the same field. One of the workers continually griped and complained. Ne-gativity flowed out of her every word and facial expression. At the end of the session, I felt depressed, oppressed, and.burdened. I had absorbed into myself the flow of her negativity. But I can give myself the gift of not taking responsibility for other people's feelings, for others' pleasant or unpleasant feelings. I can maintain my joy, peace, and positive out-look if I am aware of my tendencies and if I give myself the gift of not giving in to codependence. I can learn to trust other people to run their own lives. I can deepen my trust in God. Review for Religious, January-February 1989 As codependent I also try to control others, though I may not be aware that I am doing so. I have not seen my friend for quite a while. I miss him or her. I may long with emotional intensity to see and be with my friend again. This is all right; this is me~ I fall into codependence, however, when I expect my friend to feel the same emotions that I do, the same strong loneliness. Because he/she feels differently does not mean that we are no longer friends. We are still connected by the bonds of love and the union of our spirits, but my friend is entitled to his/her own emotional swings. Occasionally we may both experience the same feelings, but that just happens; it cannot be programmed. By giving the gift of not giving my friend the task of living up to my expectations, I free him/her to be a unique self, and I free myself from the frustration of unmet expectations. As I grow, I learn the gift of n6t giving allegiance to everything that is said about,~me, even when it is said by significant others in my life. Opefiness to consider feedback is good and necessary for growth, but I can take the comments offered, test them sincerely against what I know of my true self, and decide to allow them to influence me or reject them as not fitting. More and more I stand free: receptive but able to make choices and.changes for myself. Each of us operates out of a specific personality type. I know that those "unacceptable" aspec.ts of myself, my "shadow," can become for me sources of undreamt growth and expansion. If I am introverted, recognition' of the shadow invites me to promote the development of more assertiveness, more sociability. By taking up the challenge of my "opposites," I give myself the gift of not giving in and becoming com-pletely immersed in my dominant qualities. I also give to others the gift of my expanded personality., my versatility to be reflective and quiet, and to be spontaneous and outgoing. I then realize that I have the potential to grow in all qualities of personality. Giving the gift of not giving can be risky. This is especially so if one is looked upon as a professional "helper." 1 am supposed to rescue peo-ple, or so it is often assumed. But the divine in me nudges me to grow and to foster my own "undependence" so that I do not need to rescue in order to feel worthy or worthwhile. I can then rejoice with the other in his/her efforts that lead to confidence, success, self-esteem, and de-victimization. When I encourage the other to look within her/himself for the indwell-ing God, the source of strength and goodness, then the other's success in dealing with difficulties is truly authentic and lasting. I become, not The Gift of Not Giving a rescuer or savior, but a real companion and friend. Recently a friend said to me, "I am upset over certain events that have taken place lately. I feel I can share with you about those situations because you are concerned and will give your support and prayers, but you won't take on my problems and become as upset as I am, and so be-come an added problem and burden to me. And you won't smother me with sympathy either." I consider those remarks a confirmation of the rightness of the gift of not giving and an uncovering of the true meaning of compassion. Jesus gave the gift of not giving. He refused to give direct answers to the Pharisees who were trying to trap him. He did not allow them to control him or his mission. Jesus did not perform miracles for those un-believers. He refused to compromise himself in order to please them. He did not even accept the adoration of the man who was cleansed from evil. Jesus will not allow us to follow him out of coercion or ignorahce. We must make up our own minds. He gave us the gift of not giving easy answers; he taught in parables. Jesus leaves us free and invites us to re- .sponsible living and loving. He refuses to take on our responsibility for ourselves and our world even though we often try to put on him th~ blame for our misfortunes and our mistakes. o Christ's peace was from within. He was "self-centered," anchored in the depths of his love springing from deep within. We too are chal-lenged to anchor in the gift of self that we find within, put there by God. One way to self is through the gift of not giving. Chapters and Structures William F. Hogan, C.S.C. Father Hogan wrote "The Cross Reconsidered" for our issue of March/April ! 988. His address remains: Fratelli Cristiani; Via della Maglianelli, 375; 00166 Roma, It-aly. Postconstitution chapters in most congregations take a very different form from those in which much labor was directed to working out, concept by concept, word by word, texts of constitutions to be submitted for ec-clesiastical approval. If there was perplexity in some institutes as to what a chapter would do when there were no more constitutions to write, the wonderment soon dissolved as attention was focused on the principal calls of the times: justice, peace, preferential option for the poor, sim-plification of lifestyle, apostolic spirituality, and so forth. Less legisla-tion emerged from the chapters; the accent was on setting immediate goals for administrations and planning steps for implementation of di-rection by the community: simple documents of challenge for reflection, inspiration, action. A variety of formulas, techniques, and approaches have been used to provoke a deep listening to the Spirit during sessions and to share the chapter's reflections and concerns with the larger con-gregation. Our times have seen much effort and creativity to make chap-ters meaningful experiences, and more will be needed in the future be-cause there is no magical formula that can cover every set of concerns or apply to all chapter circumstances. The uniqueness of each chapter will demand an approach suitable to its particularity: what works for one may very well not be beneficial to another. The experience of many congregations would advocate that it is not necessary for chapters to go over every element of the life of a congre-gation, as ordinarily done in the past, because there are so many other 26 Chapters and Structures participative structures in place between chapters. More effective results emerge when one topic is pursued in depth and the congregation's ef-forts are channeled in a particular direction. At the same time it is im-portant that a chapter and other community organs related to a chapter devote some attention to important points other than the principal topic. The 1983 code of Canon Law determines a number of issues to be treated in the particular law of religious congregations, and these fall under the responsibility of a general chapter. Most of these matters have been leg-islated in the constitutions; there is widespread reluctance to touch them after experiencing the difficulties of having constitutions approved, even when a group intellectually acknowledges the need for modifications. Oth-ers are taken up in the secondary book and should be reviewed by the chapter, even though its primary thrust is not concerned with the particu-lar law as such. There are ways of accomplishing this so as not to dis-tract from the major chapter consideration--for example, through the use of an ad hoc committee reviewing the legislation and making recommen-dations to the assembly. Without this review there is always the possi~ bility of a gap developing between living and the calls of the Spirit to move forward in mission. One of the most basic areas not to be overlooked is that of the struc-tures of government, where there are many questions deserving ongoing congideration even though structures are usually treated in the constitu-tions and considered of more permanent nature than rfiatters'of the sec-ondary book. Frequently the particular law of a congregation will state that structures are for the mission:, that the participation of the institute in the continuing mission of Jesus is the determining factor for structures of authority and government and the division of a congregation into life-promoting and mission-serving units. It .is far too easy to let the concept of structures for mission become a dead letter, since the mission is not staticbut constantly undergoing variables. Reflective vigilance is needed to take into account the changing factors of the mission of Jesus today and be at the service of the mission in fact and not just in word. This is especially true in international congregations with their divi-sions into provinces, regions, sectors, and so forth, but finds application also'in national and diocesan groups. Religious institutes are experienc-ing decreases in some of their internal divisions because of aging, loss of members, and other factors with the result that some previously sta-ble units no longer appear capable of maintaining the autonomy neces-saryto function as a unit in the same way. In not a few instances there is occurring a reversal of what have up to this point been geographical Review for Religious, January-February 1989 central and peripheral areas in congregations; then, too, there often is dis-persion of individuals and communities, along with new forms of com-munity. New foundations in third-world countries being made by differ-ent provinces of the same congregation point to a need for a networking among them to provide for sharing of experiences and insights, even if situations are not yet sufficiently clear to establish more permanent struc-tures. And surely, sufficient reflection on the units of a congregation will give rise to other situations in need of monitoring. Canon law and practice leaves the regulation of internal divisions to the individual institute and the authority therein determined, as long as the basic points of the approved constitutions are followed. These latter often allow for more flexibility than seems apparent at first glance; where there may be lacking the necessary suppleness, recourse should be had to the appropriate Church authority. A desire for survival may force the issue of restructuring in some congregations rather than a more overt con-cern that structures serve the mission; whatever be the motivation in fact, watchfulness is called for and the occasion of a chapter provides an op-portunity to exercise a healthy vigilance. Reflection on structures is not meant to pull religious in on them-selves, but outwards to furthering the work of Christ and promoting the qualitative dimension of ministry, life, and contribution to the local Church--lest there be a discrepancy between what we say of ourselves in principle and the reality of what we live. Connected with this reflec-tion is the issue of identity and charism, in the sense that the question at times arises whether to bolster the presence of the congregation in one part of the world through bringing new members from countries where vocations are still in abundance or simply to let the presence eventually fade out of existence. The tendency is to give an answer in terms of the works the religious are doing and whether the apostolates should be con-tinued; yet there is a deeper element than simply the works: Are the re-ligious bringing anything different in terms of witness to the local Church that others cannot effect? Not just a question of doing, but the reality of being: How are we in wha~ we do? No simple answers can be given to this; much soul-searching about the identity to which we witness is en-tailed. And if there is nothing .particular being shared with the local Church in terms of charism, it may be that the Spirit is saying that the congregation's presence is no longer gifting the local Christian commu-nity. A number of other matters concerning authority structures deserve periodic consideration, such as terms of office, interimsbetween chap- Chapters and Structures / 29 ters, and whether chapters are the only or best vehicles to accomplish the promotion of the mission and life. Many congregations have gone through a number of changes during the last two decades concerning the duration of offices because of concern with people being in positions too long, the need for freshness of vision in monitoring change and the cur-rents of the times, and the promotion of participation and development of individuals' gifts and talents. Sometimes in addressing one set of val-ues and making decisions in accord with them, experience shows that other values suffer and perhaps there is conflict in trying to integrate all the facets. Thus some congregations have gone full circle and returned to their original terms of office after various experiments; others have opted for a longer nonrenewable mandate; and still others have deter-mined upon several shorter terms. It would be idealistic to think that the workable formula reached for the present should not be open for recon-sideration if changing circumstances would indicate the need for another solution. Frequently religious Speak of the amount of energy that is expended in preparing chapters and implementing their decisions and orientations; also of the insufficiency of time between chapters for a congregation to realize the implications of chapter decisions before being moved on as a group to other subject matters. The frustrations sometimes expressed in this regard, in conjunction with fatigue over the number of meetings in which religious at times have to participate on different levels, raise the issue of whether there are other ways to accomplish the goals with-out the mechanism of chapters so regularly and all that is entailed therein, and still preserve and foster the principles of members working together toward policies of life and mission. Creativity of thought is needed here to safeguard the values intended by the structure of chapter and at the same time to prevent excessive use of energy that could be more directly channeled toward mission. Further, it might prove opportune from time to time to reflect on some of the points brought over into religious structures from corpora-tion models to assure the rights of individuals and promote participation. Some were needed to correct abuses or remedy problem areas at a par-ticular time. Are they still needed? Has something been lost from the com-munity- of-faith dimension while stressing organizational approaches? Where is the congregation now in the balance of values? Some benefi-cial insights could be gained by a congregation relative to structures for mission from treating these and similar questions. Not to be overlooked either would be the number of people involved :30 / Review for Religious, January-February 1989 in community administration full time: too few? too many? enough for the needs of mission on the part of the congregation? How do we under-stand these needs now, taking into account the concept of community for mission and the need for good government and sufficiently broad-based decision making? The answer given at one time will apply only as long as circumstances remain basically the same: hence the need for periodic review. To look at some of these issues of structure from the viewpoint of service of the mission and the community's growth for mission may ap-pe. ar as an invitation to furiher instability in religious life; perhaps it would involve furthe~r unsettling, but in terms--hopefully--of the unset-tling aspe~zts of Jesus' message and mission a~d of the mentaJity of foun-ders and foundresses. Their primary passion, in following Jesus,,was to reveal the Father's love and assist others to experience it in their lives; institutionalization of religious life and structures as such generally arose after the founders' times. Stability of life is an important aspect of relig-ious life; it is expressed in the Church's definitions of consecrated life (see can. 573,1). However, stability must not be equated with no change, especially when the mission that gives meaning to the consecrated life demands change. Stability demands serious prayerful reflection on the whole issue of change, keeping our vision focused 'on the person of Je-sus arid his mission today. And while we concentrate our ,energies and attention on the great sweeping calls of the Spirit of Jesus as reiterated through the Church, we must also keep alert to whether internal struc-tures are enabling for response to mission. Meta-Expectations and the General Chapter J. Roberta Rivello, S.S.J. Sister J. Roberta Rivello is a Sister of Saint Joseph of Philadelphia. She is currently Dean of Graduate Studies Division at Chestnut Hill College in Philadelphia; prior to that she was research analyst for the Department of Army where she worked for the past seven years. This paper is about the difference between expectations reasonably held and "meta-expectations," and what happens when "meta-expecta-tions" are part of the agenda for a general chapter in religious institutes. Having to deal with these meta-expectations in the general chapter may be a part of the reason why so many religious institutes find themselves, in the years immediately following a general chapter, in the midst of a good deal of frustration, anger, even~outright rejection of some of the mandates of the general chapter. I believe this occurs because many of the expectatio.ns explicitly ex-pressed by the members of an institute are clearly not the substantive con-tent for the general chapter to consider. When a religious institute re-quests from the membership proposals, recommendations, and sugges-tions prior to a general chapter, it may be of some benefit to explain at the same time what is reasonable for the members to expect from the chap-ter, and to provide some criteria for arriving at the proper methods for expressing those expectations to the chapter delegates. Part of this edu-cation could include guidance into what constitutes "reasonable expec-tations," and how to differentiate between these and what I term "meta-expectations." I use the term rneta-expectations as a phenomenological description for the kinds of aspirations and expectations which are not structurally 31 Review for Religious, January-February 1989 . and substantively significant to the issues ~hich h~ive been identified as chapter material. Persons who express such "meta-expectations" through their proposals and letters certainly do not perceive them as meta-expectations-- or they would not submit them. I believe it is the job of the prechapter committees to communicate to those who submit such pro-posals, even personally if possible, why it is that their expectations are not reasonable for the chapter to include in its portfolio of proposals. Do-ing this would eliminate some of the postchapter frustration, even if in-itially the explanation is quite difficult to accept. A general chapter may, for example, need to deal with spirituality and prayer as they relate to the charism of the institute, and proceeds to invite proposals to that effect. When the proposals are reviewed, how-ever, it is found that some members have expressed a variety of expec-tations which~ are, not substantive.ly identifiable with the charism and spiri-tuality of the institute. If these .expectations were to become content for the~delegates' consideration during the chapter, they could seriously im-pair the effectiveness of chapter deliberations and could ultimately erode the charis~n itself of the institute. The "mandates" of a general chapter are simply directives with en-forcement p.ower. These mandates deal with matters which have an im~ pact on the~members' sPiritual development, community life, prayer, ap-ostolic works, or other important areas which are integral to the life of a religious.The precise direction which the general chapter should take is undergirded by the constitutions and charism of the institute. Whatever else, a chapter accomplishes, it ought to accomplish the ful-fillment of its members' first-order reasonable expectations. These rea-sonably held expectations, in turn, ought to flow from the institute's spiri-tuality and charism. Ageneral ch.apter,, however, need not attend with great detail to ful-filling second-order expectations since these do not necessarily consti-tute the ne'cessary and sufficient matter for a general chapter to entertain. It is these latter which I term meta-expectations. Meta-expectations are something which a newly elected leadership might need: to consider sometime soon after entering into their term of office. But religious institutes which choose to concern themselves with such non-reasonable expectations during the general.chapter frequently find that there are.significantly sharp differences between the way the dele-gates perceive of the proposals presented to them and the way the pro-posing me,.mbers perceive the resulting chapter mandates. They will ac-cept the mandates accord.ing to what their expectations were prior to gen- Meta-Expectations and the Chapter eral chapter. Even in the Church today there is a growing sense that religious in-stitutes are experiencing very serious differences in the way the mem-bership perceives the outc0me of general chapters. This is partially due to the way general chapters often conduct their prechapter preparations and the way that Chapters of Affairs are conducted. These differences in perception and interpretation area result of the failure to differentiate between the reasonable expectations and the meta-expectations of the in-stitute's membership. This failure further fragments the members and their acceptance of the mandates and authority of the chapter. In this paper I will try to clarify what are reasonable expectations for a general chapter, and to show the difference between reasonable expec-tations and meta-expectations and how they influence the general chap-ter, Conflict between these two kinds of expectations can exist whenever expectations of any kind are elicited and aroused. For example, if one is invited to dinner, it is all right to expect something to eat but it is not reasonable to expect filet of beefi That is a meta-expectation, and while it may not be wrong to hold such a meta-expectation, it certainly is not reasonable; nor need the host meet it. Neither should the one holding such a meta-expectation be disappointed or offended if the host does not ~erve filet! More relevant to our discussion are the expectations religious have about their general chapters especially when preparations for them evoke strong expectations among the members as well as among the delegates. As I gtated above, two. of the things which ought to be simultane-ously evolving in the months prior to a chapter are how to identify and clarify the proper content for consideration and how to prepare both dele-gates and members to be able to differentiate between meta-expectations and reasonable expectations. It is reasonable for members of a religious institute to e£pect its gen-eral chapter to ~nandate programs for renewal, for spiritual development, for apostoli6 works, and for good community life. But it is not.reason-able to (xpect it to'decide how the membership ought to rest and relax, even thou'gti such matters are very important and time arid thou~ht~ought to be given to their consideration. It is as unreasonable for the member-ship to expect this to be considered as it would 'be for the general chap-ter to consider it---even if some of the delegates want it added to the agenda. The business of a general chapter is to redesign the future of the institute as it finds itself called to reveal Christ to the world in its con-temporary situation. This is its first-order work and is the only claim any- Review for Religious, January-February 1989 one can reasonably make on a general chapter. If the institute is true to its charism, the general chapter will succeed in fulfilling reasonable ex-pectations, and a newly elected leadership, or a reelected leadership, will be confirmed and authorized in working together to find ways and means to carry out what the chapter has mandated. In doing so, general administration should act in such a way that it further clarifies the difference between reasonable expectations and meta-expectations. Acting thus after the chapter assures continuity as well as flexibility in the institute's lived-out charism, since it preserves the in-tegrity of the institute's constitutions even while assuring versatility in their application to the reality that presents itself here and now.~ After all, it is in the real world that the institute exists, and its contemporary situation should be the focus of the institute's energies if it is to survive. If, however, the general chapter takes into consideration everything sub-mitted to it, the real essence of the institute's life becomes obscured. In addition, every proposal presented to the chapter contains its own par-ticular character and language which force the delegates to unpack its meaning before addressing the issue it contains. By sifting out the recta-expectations from the agenda, the delegates will be freed to concentrate on the constitutions and charism of the institute and to interpret the con-temporary situation in light of the Gospels for the world the institute is called to serve. There is good evidence that the bishops did this in Vatican II docu-ments. The document Lumen Gentium shows that they were aware of their .responsibility to separate out the recta-expectations from the rea-sonable ones.2 Their emphasis was on common-good considerations. Common-good considerations evolve from whatever the community has in common, not from things incidental to it. I believe this is why the docu-ments are clearly and straightforwardly parousial (expectant), so fitting for a Church in labor to reveal Christ to the world. For religious insti-tutes, the emphasis should also be on the common good, that is, on what the institute holds in common and what it shares as an institute in labor to reveal Christ to the world. For religious, this is found in their consti-tutions and in the charism of its founding. The document Perfectae Cari-tatis expresses the expectation of the Church about what it believes re-ligious institutes are called to be: Religious should carefully consider that through them, to believers and nonbelievers alike, the Church truly wishes to give an increasingly clearer revelation of Christ. Through them Christ should be shown con-templating on the mountain, announcing God's kingdom to the multi- Meta-Expectations and the Chapter / 35 tude, healing the sick and the maimed, turning sinners to wholesome fruit, blessing children, doing good to all, and always obeying the will of the Father who sent him.3 Rather than stating the expectations of religious, the document states what it is the Church expects of the religious institutes. This sense of expectation is not alien to either the Old or New Tes-taments. Scriptures retell the sacred history of a people filled with ex-pectation for a Messiah. For some, that expectation was misplaced or mis-focused so that when the Messiah came, when the expectation was ful-filled, they did not recognize it. Likewise, the message of Christ was clearly a statement of what it was he expected of us as we await his sec-ond coming. It is this same degree of expectation which is the ground-ing for religious institutes coming into being in the first place, that is, to reveal Christ to others even as we await (expect) his second coming. At this time some institutes are preparing for their chapter. A great deal of preparation will take place, I am sure. Included in that prepara-tion should be some education on what constitutes reasonable expecta-tions for the membership to have and how to express those expectations in proposals, letters, and prechapter committee work. I believe that some of the meta-expectations expressed prior tochapter in proposals to the general chapter are the result of excessive reliance on congregational and personal self-analyses which, in turn, rely too heavily on current statis-tics, social analysis, and popular trends. This tendency is best described as the historicist versus the historical view of events.4 Both views are needed but if they are not balanced, the religious institutes are robbed of either their historical tradition and dynamism (charism) or of insights derived from knowledge of the cultural and intellectual shifts occurring in society. Needless to say, I believe the omission of either is wrong. In fact, one of the tasks of the general chapter is to ensure that the bal-ance between both perspectives is maintained. Furthermore, an advan-tage to holding the Chapter of Election after the Chapter of Affairs is to ensure that the elected leadership is committed to carrying out the man-date of the general chapter and to the mission of the institute visible in its charism. The business of meta-expectations derailing expectations occurs daily in society--in the system of justice, in education, in government and other natural systems. It ought to occur less frequently in religious institutes if they are open to the Spirit unfolding in them. One other example of the distinction between meta-expectations and Review for Religious, January-February 1989 expectations might clarify what I am saying. In a religious institute mem-bers may experience some dissatisfaction with the missioning process, and all kinds of proposals expressing both meta-expectations and expec-tations emerge. The dissatisfaction is with the process and not with the people doing the job. Instead of focusing on the dissatisfaction, the dele-gates begin, as a result of some meta-expectations, to design new roles and functions for the persons charged with missioning when they ought to have seriously looked at the process and analyzed the cause of dis-content. The process is in need of change; failure to redesign it changes nothing, and future chapters will find themselves still dealing with dis-content about the process. Sometimes an issue is finally resolved but only after it has resurfaced in several chapters. One cannot be sure, however, that the ultimate resolution flows from reasonable expectations or not. What is certain is that if it is the result of meta-expectation something of the institute's charism is diminished. A model for expectations showing the process involved in discern-ment of the kinds of things which happen as a result of responses pro-vided in proposals follows: -Perception: dissatisfaction with missioning process -Response: a change is needed in the process In this model the response is a ~reasonable expectation for members to have. The model also lends itself to scrutiny by the delegates who will then test various recommendations made in the context of chapter to see how they relate to the charism and spirituality of the institute. In doing this, no special interest or meta~expectation will drive the final outcome. After chapter, the information and proposals not used in chapter can be given additional study and perhaps even be used for input into some ad hoc trial period of experimentation. A second model based on meta-expectations follows: -Perception: dissatiSfaction with missioning process -Response: establishment of new roles for persons charged with process The response in this case is the fulfillment of a meta-expectation since it begins to deal with m'any different aspects of the dissatisfaction. The issue is clearly defined as dissatisfaction with the process; then the charism and spirituality of the institute should dictate the solution. The response in this model is expressive of one of the many meta-expecta-tions expressed, all of which are not substantively, relative to the insti-tute's charism and spirituality. This model is provided as example; it is not a definitive model. Religious institutes can substitute ever so many examples which violate their own particular charism. This is not to say Meta-Expectations and the Chapter / 37 that it is wrong to have the vision to redesign the institute or to follow "paths unknown." What this paper is addressing is the growing aware-ness among religious that somewhere things are going amiss and worse, that it is becoming increasingly more difficult for the institute to recog-nize its own charism and spirituality at work in the Church for which it is called to reveal Christ and through him the Father. In this brief essay I have tried to make a distinction between the jus-tifiable and reasonable expectations one might have for a general chap-ter and the meta-expectations one might have, which are not reasonable for a general chapter to consider in its deliberations, no matter how at-tractive or relevant those meta-expectations appear. NOTES ~ Bernard J.F. Lonergan, S.J., Insight: A Study of Human Understanding. London. 1958. passim. 2 Walter M. Abbot, S.J. (ed.), The Documents of Vatican !!, p. 225, n. 26. All ref-erences to the Documents are taken from here. 3 Documents, p. 77, n. 46. 4 For an insightful account of the distinction between historicism and historicalism, read Bernard J.F. Lonergan, S.J., Method In Theology: London, 1971. pp. 323- 326, 239, 318. See also the works of Wilhelm Dilthey and Ernest Troeltsch; Maurice Mandelbaum. Enc. Phil., 4:22-25. Thomas Merton and His Own Cistercian Tradition M. Basil Pennington, O.C.S.O. Father Basil's most recent article in this journal was "Simple Contemplative Prayer" (March/April 1987). He now resides at Assumption Abbey; Rt. 5, Box 193; Ava, Missouri 65608. I presume most of the readers of this essay are fairly familiar with the life and development of Thomas Merton. In the last pages of the Secular Jour-nal, Merton sums up his spiritual journey towards the Church and mon-astery: From Gilson's Spirit of Medieval Philosophy I learned a healthy respect for Catholicism. Then Ends andMeans taught me to respect mysticism. Maritain's Art and Scholasticism was another important influence, and Blake's poetry. Perhaps also Evelyn Underhill's Mysticism, though I read precious little of it. I was fascinated by the Jesuit sermons in Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man! What horrified him, began to appeal to me. It seemed to me quite sane. Finally G. F. Lahey's Life of Gerard Manley Hopkins; I was reading about Hopkins's conver-sion when 1 dropped the book and ran out of the house to look for Fa-ther Ford. ~ It is not surprising that this author would be influenced primarily by authors and their books. In a preface to A Thomas Merton Reader, published in 1962, six years before his tragic death, Merton summed up his monastic years: I would say that my life at Gethsemani has fallen roughly into four pe-riods. First, the novitiate. I was a novice in 1942-1944. Those were hard years, before the days when radiators were much in favor during the win-ter, when the hours of communal prayer were much longer, when the 38 Merton and Cistercian Tradition fasts were much stricter. It was a period of training, and a happy, aus-tere one; during which 1 wrote little. The best Gethsemani poems be-long to this period. At the end of the novitiate my health broke down and I was ap-pointed to write and do translations of French books and articles. I was also studying philosophy and theology in preparation for ordination to the priesthood. This second period extends from 1944, my first vows, to ordination in 1949. At first the writing was very bad . In 1946 I wrote Seven Storey Mountain, in 1947 Seeds of Contemplation, and in 1948 The Waters of Siloe. After ordination, in 1949, there was an-other brief period of poor health and nervous exhaustion. I was almost incapable of writing for at least a year and a half after I became a priest. Then after a rest period in the hospital, I wrote The Ascent to Truth and Bread in the Wilderness (both about 1951) and finished The Sign of Jonas, 1952. In 1951 1 was appointed the Master of Scholastics, that is, of the young monks studying for ordination in the monastery. This en-tailed a fair amount of work preparing conferences and classes. Books like The Living Bread and particularly No Man is an Island and The Si-lent Life belong to the end of this period. Finally, a fourth stage. In 1955 I was made Master of the Choir Nov-ices. This is an office involving considerable work and responsibility. No writing of any account was done in ! 956, but after that it was possi-ble to produce short books or collections of essays, and some poetry. Disputed Questions, The Wisdom of the Desert, The Behavior of Titans, and New Seeds of Contemplation belong to this last period. So too do more recent essays on nuclear war, on Chinese thought, on liturgy, and on solitude.2 It is notable that in all of this literary reminiscing, Merton does not mention specifically any Cistercian Father or any of the work he did con-cerning them. Actually he does not seem to have had any contact with the Cistercian tradition prior to entering the monastery. But, in fact, once he entered the Cistercian life he so immersed himself in it that it became the very matrix of his life and .thinking. In his early days as he was as-similating Cistercian spirituality, Merton wrote about the Cistercian Fa-thers explicitly. When he served the community as Master of Scholastics and as Novice Master, he spoke about them constantly; his notes and his taped conferences are full of them. Later they cropped up spontaneously in his writings, the paradigm against which he evaluated what he was then absorbing. One of his favorites would find his place in the final talk Merton gave a few hours before his sudden death.3 When Merton first entered the monastery, there was, as he said in the epilogue of The Spirit of, Simplicity,4 little of the Cistercian Fathers 40 / Review for Religious, January-February 1989 available in English.5 But this did not hinder him. He not only found no problem in reading the Latin texts in Migne, he strongly believed that translations always lacked something of the origin~il.6 How carefully he studied these texts is witnessed not only by his frequent use of quota-tions from them in his early writings and the talks he gave his scholas-tics and novices, but also by the .und.erlinings and annotations found in the voit]mes of the Fathers which he used. One of Thomas Merton's-- or Frater Louis, as he was then called-- earliest assignments was to translate a.report from the CisterCian Gen-eral Chapter, entitled The Spirit of Simplicity,7 and provide a suitable in-troduction for it. He'not only did that but gathered a complementary selection of texts from St. Bernard on interior simplicity in its fullness. He translated these and commented on them, turning the report into a full book. This part of the The Spirit of Simplicity has recently been published in a volume in the Cistercian Studies Series with two other early Bernar-dine essays of Merton.8 He wrote a five-part study of Bernard and St. John of the Cross for Collectanea which expresses his concern of that period when he was writing The Ascent to Truth .9 We can detect in these essays a certain struggle Merton was experiencing in trying to respond both to the rich, fully human patristic heritage Bernard offered him and the exciting, stimulating, scholastic approach which John of the Cross was able to integrate with a high mystical theology. It wbuld be Ber-nard's approach that would win him over. In the prologue to The Sign of Jonas he would write: "I found in writing The Ascent to Truth that technical language, though it is univer-sal and certain and accepted by theologians, .does not reach the average man and does not convey what is more personal and most vital in relig-ious experience. Since my focus is not upon dogmas as such, but only on their repercussions in the life of a soul in which they begin to find concrete realization, I may be pardoned for using my own words to talk about my own soul." ~0 The third piece in the Cistercian Studies volume witnesses to another early concern of Merton--the superiority of thecontemplative life. In an extensive essay which was first published serially in ~Collectanea and later appeared as a volume in French,~ Merton is at pains to establish that the apostolic life, though it may have a fullness beyond the purely contemplative life, as Bernard ,acknow!edges,.has true:value only inso-far as it flows out of contemplation. And thus the contemplative life is in itself more important or of greater dignity. Merton's~argumentation Merton and Cistercian Tradition here is not all that easy to follow, nor that cogent. Later he himself would comment negatively about such preoccupation.~2 The eighth centenary of Bernard's death led to a spate of publishing on the saint. Merton translated the papal encyclical produced for the oc-casion and wrote an introduction to it. ~3 He was invited to introduce other works. His preface to Bernard de Clairvaux, a collection of studies pub-lished by the Historical Commission of his order and edited by its chair-man, Father Jean-de-la-Croix Bouton, shows the increasing influence of Bernard on Merton.~4 The piece is filled with scriptural texts and allu-sions. We might.say it is a very Bernardine piece about Bernard. In line with his earlier concentration, Merton sees that Bernard added to the Cis-tercian reform "an emphatic call to contemplative union with God." ~5 At the same time Merton begins to reveal a more integral understanding of Bernard as a "man of his times . . . a many-sided saint." 16 This is further in evidence in the next piece. His .introduction to Bruno Scott James's translation of the letters of St. Bernard, he considered important. ~7 At his behest it was included in A Thomas Merton Reader in the section ".Mentors and Doctrines."~8 It revealed Thomas Merton's growth in his appreciation for Bernard in line with his own personal growth. Merton had had his experience on the cor-ner of Maple and Fourth. He now beheld all with a greater integrity. He had a new .appreciation for Bernard the man. H~e appreciated the letters because they so well brought out the human dimension of the great saint: They [the letters] show the man as he is, and because he is so much a man, readers who forget that saints must be men may sometimes be in-clined to question his saintliness . Bernard is sent to instruct us how human a saint must be to forge'out the will of God in the heat of the affairs of men . He had the humility to be himself in the thick of a silly argument. He had the good grace to admit that a saint might pos-sibly have to bicker with another saint . The angry Bernard, the pas-sionate Bernard . . . the merciful Bernard, the gentle long-suffering monk who could be as tender as a mother . 19 As Merton noted in his brief literary biography quoted above, liturgy came more to the fore in a later period of his life. In Seasons of Cele-bration he published one of his most beautiful pieces on St. Bernard: "The Sacrament of Advent in the Spirituality of St. Bernard.' ,20 It is undoubtedly St. Bernard, the "Theologian of the Cistercian Life" (as Merton's friend Jean Leclercq would name him), who received the most attention from Merton. Besides Bernard's prominence as the mas-ter of the Cistercian school, there would be the influence of Gilson. As 42 / Review for Religious, January-February 1989 we have seen above, Gilson was one of the first to open the way for Mer-ton towards Catholicism. Merton's respect for him never diminished, and his masterful work The Mystical Theology of Saint BerndrdZ~ was most carefully studied and wholly accepted by Merton.22 But Merton read all the significant Cistercian Fathers, and spoke and wrote on them as occa-sion offered. The "Bernard of the North," Bernard's disciple, the abbot of Rievaulx, Aelred, received special attenti.on. Merton has an extensive un-published piece on him, which looks like it was on the way to becoming a book. We can hope it will. soon appear in Cistercian Studies. It is an important piece, and I shall return to it later in this esgay. As one of his first projects for Cistercian Publications, Merton wrote an introduction for Father Amfd6e Hallier's Monastic Theology of Aelred of Rievaulx. Here again we see the later Merton rejecting earlier attitudes: Let us be quite clear the monastic theology of Aelred is not a partisan "theology of monasticism." It is not an apologia for .the life of the monk, and not a kind of gnostic system organized to prove some sup-posed superiority of "the contemplative life," urging a flight to ineffa-ble convulsions,z3 He saw that "the Christian life is, for Aelred, simply the full flow-ering of freedom and consent in the perfection of friendship. Friendship with other human beings is an epiphany of friendship with God." Mer-ton notes that "Not so long ago, some of Aelred's books were kept un-der lock and key in Trappist libraries. ,,24 Merton never wrote a particular essay on Bernard's closest friend, William of Saint Thierry, but he considered him "a profound and origi-nal theologian and a contemplative in his own right."25 He dedicated one of his first books to him, "one of the saints and mystical theologians of the Golden Age," and quoted him extensively in the foreword.26 In regard to the fourth of the evangelists of Citeaux, Guerric of Igny, we have the opportunity to get a sampling of Merton's more ordinary treat-ment of the Cistercian Fathers in his talks to the juniors at Gethsemani. Sister Bernard Martin of Chimay transcribed two of Merton's talks which had been taped and published the transcription in Cistercian Studies in 1972.27 For Merton, "Guerric was really deep and very spiritual and very mystical."28 And as Merton.opens him up for his novices, he is also very much alive, very practical and down to earth. It is in these intimate talks that we best see how the Cistercian Fathers reverberated in the mind and heart of this twentieth-century Cistercian Father. Merton and Cistercian Tradition There is a more formal treatment of Guerric of Igny and his liturgi-cal sermons in Merton's introduction to the Gethsemani Christmas book for 1959: Sister Rose of Lima's translation of Guerric's Christmas ser-mons. 29 Other Cistercian Fathers turn up in Merton's published writings. There are poems about St, Alberic3° and St. Malachy.3! When Cister-cian Studies began publishing Sister Penelope's translation of the ser-mons of Isaac of Stella, Merton provided an introduction for this "not the least interesting of the Cistercian writers."32 He found him a "more independent thinker and less subject to the dominant influence of Saint Bernard''33, whose writings reminded him "at times of Eckhart in their tone."34 Merton's spirit resonated with this abbot who withdrew from a large and important Cistercian abbey to an erernus, a poor and lonely island foundation. Merton provided an introduction for another Cistercian Father, one of his favorites, Adam of Perseigne.35 Earlier he had written about Adam's theory of monastic formation in an essay that was published in Charles Dumont's French translation.36 Adam was for Merton something of a mentor in his duties as novice master, and his admiration for the ab-bot of Perseigne remained till the end. In his final talk at Bangkok he brings him forth to illustrate a basic monastic theory.37 When the earlier essay was further developed, Merton gave it a new title, one that wit-nessed to his own development: The Feast of Freedom. Adam, Aelred, all the great Cistercian Fathers led Merton in the same direction. But Merton did not have an unbounded admiration for all the twelfth-century Cistercian writers, Here is an example, Gamier of Langres: Gamier was not deep and not spiritual and not mystical. He was a literal-minded person with a lot of learning. As a matter of fact he is quite in-teresting, On the liturgy, he has a lot of little statements about what they did at the time and what they thought they were doing and why they did it. But these are just little statements of historical fact. Today Gamier would be a scientific-minded critic. "But a scientific-minded critic in the Middle Ages is just about zero, because he has nothing to work on . He's finished, he's dated, he's way back. He is no more modern than 'a twelfth-century concept of the universe.38 He goes so far as to say: "His work., is not in English at all, and if it never gets translated into English that won't be too soon.' ,39 This does, though, give, us another indication as to the extent to which Merton worked his way through the pages of Migne4° and ex-plored all the published writings of the early Cistercian Fathers. 44 / Review for Religious, January-February 1989 Above I have mentioned the monograph that Merton was working on entitled "Saint Aelred of Rievaulx." This is a significant piece of work. In placing Aelred in context Merton gives a fine synopsis of Cis-tercian history and especially literary history from the foundation in 1098 up till the death of Becket (+ 1170). But I think one of the valuable ele-ments of this work is the insight that Merton has as a later Cistercian writer into these early Cisterclan writers. Indeed, as I read the pertinent section I ask.myself if this is not a candid insight into Merton himself as a Cistercian writer: ¯ . . the rich and elegant vitality of Cistercian prose--most of which is sheer poetry--betrays an overflow 0( literary productivity which did not even need to strive for its effects: it achieved them, as it were, sponta-neously. It seemed to be second nature to St. Bernard, William of St. Thierry, Adam of Perseigne, Guerric of lgny, to write with consummate beauty prose full of sound and color and charm, There were two natural explanations for this. The first is that the prolific Cistercian writers of the Golden Age were men who had already been thoroughly steeped in the secular literary .movements of the time before they entered the clois-ter. All of them had rich experience of the current of humanism that flow-ered through the twelfth-century renaissance . There is a second explanation for the richness and exuberance of theo-logical prose in twelfth-century monasteries of Citeaux. If contact with classical humanism had stimulated a certain intellectual vitality in these clerics, it hlso generated a conflict in their souls. The refined natural ex-citements produced by philosophical speculation, by art, poetry, music, by the companionship of restless sensitive and intellectual friends merely unsettled their souls. Far from finding peace and satisfaction in all these things, they found war. The only answer to the problem was to make a clean break with everything that stimulated this spiritual uneasiness, to withdraw from the centers in which it was fomented, and get away somewhere, discover some point of vantage from which they could see the whole difficulty in its proper perspective. This vantage point, of course, was not only the cloister, since Ovid and Tully had already be-come .firmly established' there, but the desert--the terra invia et inaquosa in which the Cistercian labored and suffered and prayed . The tension generated by the conflict between secular humanism and the Christian humanism, which seeks the fulfillment of human nature through ascetic renunciation and mystical union with God, was one 6f the proximate causes of the powerful mystical writing of the Cistercians. , However, once these two natural factors have been considered, we must recognize other and far more decisive influences, belonging to a higher order . It is the relish and savor that only experience can Merton and Cistercian Tradition give, that communicates to the writings of the twelfth-century Cister-cians all the vitality and vividness and impassioned sincerity which are peculiarly their own . The White Monks speak with accents of a more personal and more lyrical conviction that everywhere betrays the influence of an intimate and mystical experience . It is the personal, experiential character of Cistercian mysticism that gives the prose of the White Monks its vivid freshness . Since the theology of the Cistercians was so intimately persona! and experiential, their exposition of it was bound to take a psychological di-rection. All that they wrote was directed by their keen awareness of the presence and action of God in their souls. This was their all-absorbing interest.4~ Many scholars have noted that Merton's writings show a rather su-perficial knowledge of the Eastern religions. But when I traveled in the East and spoke with the spiritual masters there who had come into con-tact with Merton on his last journey, they said they had never met any-one from the West who had so fully understood their ways. I think the same might be said of Merton and the Cistercian Fathers. Certainly many scholars know more about the Fathers and the early history of the Cis-tercian order. But few, if any, so fully understand their spirit as does this twentieth-century Cistercian Father. Moreover, no one has been able to express so fully and clearly, and in a way that communicates to our times, what these Fathers have to say to our times and to the renewal of the Cistercian order. Cistercians cannot but profit from choosing Tho-mas Merton, their F.ather Louis, for their lectio, from spending time with him and letting him lead them into a deeper, fuller understanding and appreciation of their Cistercian Fathers. NOTES ~ Thomas Merton, The Secular Journal ofThomas Merton (New York: Farrar, Straus & Cudahy, 1959), pp. 268f. 2 A Thomas Merton Reader, ed. by Thomas McDonnell (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1962), pp. viiif. 3 Adam of Perseigne. See The Asian Journal of Thomas Merton (New York: New Directions, 1973), p. 333. 4 The Spirit of Simplicity: Characteristic of the Cistercian Order (Trappist, Ken-tucky: Abbey of Gethsemani, 1948). 5 Ibid., p. 137. Merton played an important role in remedying this situation in the part he played in the founding of Cistercian Publications, which has now published more than forty volumes of the Cistercian Fathers in English. 6 Reader, p. 317. 46/Review for Religious, January-February 1989 7 See note 4 above. 8 Thomas Merton on Saint Bernard, Cistercian Studies Series (hereafter CS), vol. 9 (Kalamazoo, Michigan: Cistercian Publications, 1980), pp. 103-157. 9 New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1951. ~0 Thomas Merton, The Sign of Jonas (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1953), pp. 8f. ~ Marthe, Marie, et Lazare (Bruges: Desclee de Brouwer, 1956). ~2 In the preface to A Thomas Merton Reader he would write: ". it would be a still greater misapprehension to say I am simply trying to prove that the contempla-tive life is 'better than the active life,' . Not only am I not trying to prove these propositions, but stated in this bald and unqualified manner, I do not even hold them. It is true that fifteen years ago I was able to get excited about such theses, but I have come to see that controversy about speculative matters of this sort is not only a waste of time but is seriously misleading. We are all too prone to believe in our own pro-grams and to follow the echo of our own slogans into a realm of illusion and unreal-ity"( p, viii). 13 The Last of the Fathers (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1954). ~4 Bernard of Clairvaux (Paris: Editions Alsatia, 1953). It was later published in The Tablet and Cross and Crown and in Disputed Questions (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1960),.pp. 260-276, under the title "St. Bernard, Monk and Apostle." ~5 Disputed Questions, p. 263. 16 Ibid., p. 262. ~7 Bruno Scott James, St. Bernard of Clairvaux Seen Through his Selected Letters (Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1953), pp. v-viii. ~8 Reader, pp. 315-319. 19 Reader, pp. 316f. zo Seasons of Celebration (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1965), pp. 61-87. z~ New York: Sheed and Ward, 1955. 22 There is a copy of Gilson's work in the Merton Center at Columbi~ University with Merton's underlining and marginalia which indicate the care with which he stud-ied this book. 23 Am~d~e Hallier, The Monastic Theology ofAelred ofRievaulx, tr. by Colum-ban Heaney, CS 2 (Spencer, Massachusetts: Cistercian Publications, 1969), p. viii. 2,~ Ibid., pp. xif. 25 "Saint Aelred of Rievaulx," MSS, p. 20. ??26ft2The Spirit of Simplicity, pp. vf. 27 Thomas Merton, "Guerric of lgny's Easter Sermons" in Cistercian Studies, vol. 7 (1972), pp. 85-95. 28 Ibid., p. 85. 29 The Christmas Sermons of Blessed Guerric of lgny, tr. by Sr. Rose of Lima (Trap-pist, Kentucky: Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani, 1959), pp. 1-25. 30 "Saint Alberic" in Selected Poems of Thomas Merton (New York~ New Direc-tions, 1959), pp. 44f. 3~ Ibid., pp. 75ff. This poem is reproduced in the Reader, pp. 177f. 32 Louis Merton, "Isaac of Stella: An Introduction to Selections from his Sermons," in Cistercian Studies, vol. 2 (1967), p. 243. 33 Ibid. 3,~ Ibid., p. 244. 35 "The Feast of Freedom: Monastic Formation according to Adam of Perseigne," Merton and Cistercian Tradition in The Letters of Adam ofPerseigne, vol. 1, tr. by Grace Perigo, Cistercian Fathers Series, no. 21 (Kalamazoo, Michigan: Cistercian Publications, 1976), pp. 3-48. 36 "La formation monastique selon Adam de Perseigne," in Collectanea Ordinis Cisterciensium Reformatorum, vol. 19 (1957), pp. 1-17. 37 The Asian Journal of Thomas Merton (New York: New Directions, 1973), p. 333. 38 "Guerric . . . Easter Sermons," pp. 85f. 39 Ibid. 40 He read Garnier in Patrologia Latina, vol. 205. 4~ MSS. pp. 10-17. Liturgy of the Hours: A Canticle for Canticles Three canticles encompass all our praise: Three sacred songs of trusting love and hope. At dawn there breaks upon us like the sun, Old Zechariah's paean to God's work. At dusk, like Vesper star, young Mary sings Magnificat for mercy to us all. Then at day's end in darkness gently fall Old Simeon's thankful words, as clear and bright As Compline candles glowing in the dark To mark the end of day, perhaps of life: To let God's servants go in peace to him. Three son~s that with their jeweled antiphons, Like winking diamonds, daily bring delight As we lift hearts at dawn, at dusk, at night. Maryanna Childs, O.P. Ohio Dominican College 1818 Sunbury Road Columbus, Ohio 43219 The Challenge of Church Teachings: How Do I Respond? Lucy Blyskal, C.S.J. Sister Lucy Blyskal, C.S.J., has a doctorate in canon law and is a diocesan judge on the Tribunal of the diocese of Rockville Centre, New York. Her article is the fruit of her canon law dissertation on the Church's teaching authority. Her address is Tri-bunal of the Diocese of Rockville Centre; 50 North Park Avenue; Rockville Centre, New York 11570. In view of the increasing number of official Church pronouncements on many debated issues, how can today's religious keep informed and re-flect intelligently on such statements? How does one discern and listen to the Spirit of the teaching Church and the Spirit within oneself? The purpose of this article, comprised of two parts, is to help us to respond appropriately to papal and episcopal documents. The first sec-tion discusses three main aspects of the Church's teaching authority: (I) the truths of the faith as given to the ff.hgle.Church; (2) the concept of infallible Church teaching; (3) the noninfallible teaching and the response owed to it by the faithful. The second part offers the reader a practical method for analyzing doctrinal statements, and then applies this method to evaluate three somewhat controversial doctlments issued recently. Hopefully, this information will lead to a deepened knowledge and love of the faith which ought to transform our hearts and impel us to serve justice and peace in the world. Part I: Church Teaching Authority Revelation as Given to the Whole Church To set the correct context for'a discussion of teaching authority, it is important to keep in mind that the Church is fundamentally a commu- 48 Challenge of Church Teachings / 49 nity of faith and witness which worships God in Jesus Christ and bears witness to the Church's divinely given message throughout the world. Because Christ handed over the deposit of revelation to the whole Church, it is in the possession of the whole body of Spirit-empowered people, not just the hierarchy. While Scripture calls Peter the "rock" on which the Church was to be built, it never refers to him or the twelve apostles as "the Church." Thus, to speak of "the Church" as having done something when in fact an office or official is the source is theo-logic. ally incorrect; one should name the office involved, for example, "the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith stated . "~ In its doctrine on infallibility, Vatican I carefully and explicitlyaf-firmed that the deposit of revelation is with the whole Church. The text of Vatican I names the Church as the primary subject of infallibility in stating that: "the Roman Pontiff. enjoys the infallibility with which the divine Redeemer wanted his'Church to be endowed in defining doc-trine concerning faith or morals."2 Vatican II in The Constitution on the Church (article 12) clearly reitera.ted that, thanks to a supernatural sense of faith which characterizes the People of God, "the body of faithful as a whole, anointed as they are by the Holy One (see Jn 2:20, 27) can-not err in matters of belief." Since all believers possess, can perceive, and have insights into the Christian revelation, what is the specific task and charism of the hierar-chy? By Christ's will, the disciples were commissioned: (I) to be his "witnesses. to the end of the earth" (Ac !:8); (2) to "go and teach all nations" (Mt 28:19) his full revelation, under the guidance of his Spirit. (1) The chief vocation of the disciples and their successors is "to witness" to the integrity and truth of the evangelical doctrine. This call to witness does not necessarily include the capacity to have and to ar-ticulate the deepest insights into the meaning of the mysteries of our faith,3 which is a special gift. It is noteworthy that this gift has produced some of the most significant developments in the understanding of the faith not in members of the hierarchy but in such persons as Thomas Aqui-nas, honored as the common teacher of the Church, and Teresa of Av-ila, named doctor of the spiritual life. (2) Because of Christ's command to his disciples to "teach all na-tions," the Christian community from its earliest days has also recog-nized the importance of an authoritative teaching body to maintain inner unity as the gospel was being spread. By Christ's will, this teaching authority, termed the "magisterium," belongs to the hierarchy who are 50 / Review for Religious, January-February 1989 sacramentally empowered and assisted by the Spirit to speak in the name of.Jesus Christ. Therefore, Catholics are to trust what pope and bishops teach, not because of their personal learning or stated reasons for their teaching, but precisely because of the spiritual authority of the office they occupy.4 Infallible Teaching Authority Vatican Council I first defined the infallible teaching authority of the Church as an article of faith in promulgating the dogmatic constitution Pastor Aeternus in 1870.5 While it reaffirmed this dogma of Vatican I, Vatican Council II integrated it into the doctrine on the collegiality of the bishops united with the pope and the doctrine of the Church as the People of God (Constitution on the Church, articles 12, 18, 25). Article 25 of this constitution6 states that when the pope or the episcopal col-lege (pope and bishops together) solemnly,proclaim matters of faith and morals, they are protected by the Spirit of Christ from misleading the peo-ple by teaching erroneous doctrine; hence their teaching is infallible. Several conditions need to be fulfilled for a teaching to be consid-ered infallible. First, the doctrine must deal with a matter of faith or mor-als. Second, it must be proclaimed by a duly authorized Church teacher as binding on the universal Church. Finally, it must be proclaimed "to be definitively held" by all Catholics as a dogma of faith. This infalli-ble teaching authority has been exercised only rarely since its cautious and circumscribed definition by Vatican Council I. More recently, the Constitution of the Church and the 1983 Code of Canon Law7 describe three ways in which this infallible magisterium can be exercised. (I) The pope may issue a solemn or ex cathedra pronouncement. Ac-cording to Vatican Council I, popes possess and can articulate the infal-libility with which the Divine Redeemer endowed his Church for defini-tive decisions in matters of faith and morals. For example, Pope Pius XII proclaimed the dogma of the Assumption by the bull Mun~ficentissimus issued November i, 1950. (2) The episcopal college may act solemnly in ecumenical councils. In ecumenical councils, the episcopal college, assembled in one place, acquires a special clarity and efficacy. Here the corporate episcopate can act in a solemn manner to define an article of faith; for example, Vati-can Council I promulgated the doctrine of infallibility in Pastor Aeter-nus in 1870. (3) The episcopal college may exercise its "ordinary and universal magisterium." In their ordinary and universal magisterium, the same bish- Challenge of Church Teachings / 51 ops, without coming together in one assembly, and with each remaining at his post, can definitively set forth some doctrine for the absolute ac-ceptance oLthe entire Church. In practice it is not always easy to ascer-tain whether or not the magisterium in a given case is exercising infalli-bility through this "ordinary" manner. It has been suggested that a pos-sible example of this level of Church doctrine is the common and con-stant teaching of pope and bishops throughout the world on the moral evil of abortion. How is an infallible doctrine to be received by the faithful? Vatican II's Constitution on the Church and the 1983 Code hold that infallible teaching must be accepted with obsequium fidei, translated as the 'as-sent of faith." This assent of faith is to be absolute and unconditional because it involves divine authority which utteriy excludes the possibil-ity of error. Consequently, the obstinate denial of truths proclaimed as infallible would constitute heresy. However, various Church documents warn the faithful to receive a teaching as infallible only when it has been definitively proclaimed as such. Vatican II, for example, declared that its statements on faith or morals should be seen as binding on the Church only when the council expressly declared them as such.8 Like'vise, the new Code cautions that no doctrine is understood to~ be infallibly defined "unless this is manifestly demonstrated. ,,9 From this review of the meaning of infallible teaching, it is obvious that the great majority of doctrinal statements issued on a day-to-day ba-sis do not fit into this category. Rather, most documents seem to belong to the nondefinitive level of authority--which makes the accurate under-standing of this noninfallible teaching crucially important today. Noninfallible Church Teaching The noninfallible magisterium is the term used to refer to the follow-ing exercises of the Church's teaching office: (l) the pronouncements of the pope when he is not teaching ex cathedra; (2) the declarations of an office of the Roman See with the special approval of the doctrine by the pope as his own; (3) the declarations of a curial office with routine but not special papal approval; (4) the promulgation of a doctrine by the pope toget, l~er with the college of bishops in council; (5) the teachings of an individual bishop; (6) the pronouncements of a grouping of bishops in an episcopal conference or a particular council. In order to respond appropriately to the numerous doctrinal state-ments issued by these official teachers, one needs to understand: (I) the nature of noninfallible teaching; (2) gradations among nondefinitive teach-ings; (3) inherent difficulties. Review for Religious, January-February 1989 ( I ) The Nature of Noninfallible Teaching. Three basic principles un-derlie this exploration of the noninfallible magisterium. (a) The concepts of noninfallible Church teaching and the response owed to it are evolving concerns whose complete meanings are not yet in the Church's consciousness. ~0 Recall that the definition of infallible teaching authority (1870) took place only within the last one hundred twenty years of the Church's two thousand year existence, (b) The issues of nondefinitive Church teaching and the response owed to it are being examined and applied by a Church that is itself an evolving reality as a community and an institution. ~ (c) With the spread and evolution of the Church, there has been a concomitant growth and development of doctrine, for example, "a growth in the understanding of the realities and the words which have been handed down" (Constitution on Divine Revelation, article 8). Vati-can II reiterated in its Decree on Ecumenism that: "If there are deficien-cies in the formulation of doctrine . these should be appropriately rectified at the proper moment" (article 6). More recently, the Congre-gation for the Doctrine of the Faith for the first time officially acknowl-edged that even the Church's expression of a truth of revelation at a par-ticular age may need to b~ reformulated in a subsequent era. ~2 These of-ficial statements on the growth possible in dogmatic teaching can be ap-plied afortiori to the noninfailible level of teaching. ,Basically, it is difficult to categorize the precise nature of nondefini-tire teaching. According to Orsy, noninfallible teaching is composed of two types of doctrine in an organic unity: some changeable h~uman thoughts (often of a particular school), and incorrupt expressions of the deposit of revelation. For this reason, simplistic statements such as "non-infallible statements by ecclesiastical authorities are binding," or, "dis-sent from noninfallibly stated doctrine should be always permissible" do not recognize .the complex content of the body of noninfallible beliefs. Orsy also makes the important observation that a particular document may, and. usually does, contain a mixture of infallible and noninfallible teachings without any indication of the different levels involved. ~3 In 1967, the German bishops referred to another significant aspect of noninfallible teaching authority when they pointed out that this level of magisterium "can, and on occasion actually does fall into error." 14 Francis Sullivan, a theologian, comments that it seems impossible to fault the reasoning of the German bishops: if the nondefinitive teaching of the magisterium is not infallible, it can be erroneous and can stand in need of correction. ~5 Here the basic principle of the development of Challenge of Church Teachings doctrine comes into play. Indeed the Church has corrected or reversed its stance on a number of occasions. 16 For example, the Decree on Ecu-menism of Vatican II clearly departed from previous papal teaching re-garding the Church's negative stance on relationships with non-Catholic Christians. Another obvious example is the final lifting of the condemna-tions imposed in the celebrated "Galileo case." ~7 In their pastoral letter, the German bishops point out that the Church has always been aware of the possibility of error. They conclude, how-ever, that in order to maintain the true and ultimate substance of faith the Church officials must, even at the risk of error in points of detail, "give expression to doctrinal directives which have a certain degree of binding force." (2) Gradation Among Noninfallible Documents. The weight or gra-dation of importance of a noninfallible statement can be indicated either by the person or body issuing the teaching, or the type of literary genre of the document itself that is utilized to promulgate the teaching. (a) As noted earlier, noninfallible statements can be issued by the pope or the bishops. Since the formal authority o.f the pope and the epis-copal college exceeds that of the bishops acting individually or con-jointly, there are obviously gradations among the various teachings prom-ulgated. (b) The second criterion for ascertaining the weight of a particular ~ondefinitive pronouncement is its literary genre, or, "the nature of the document" that is utilized (Constitution on the Church, article 25). Ap-ostolic constitutions, for example, are considered the most solemn form of papal documents. Then come papal acts in the form of letters in two categories, encyclical epistles and encyclical letters, the latter form be-ing less solemn than the former. The ordinary magisterium of the pope is also found in doctrinal dec-larations of the curia, for example, of the Congregations for Doctrine and for Seminari

Issue 24.1 of the Review for Religious, 1965. ; An Instruction'on the Constitution on the Littirgy by the Congregation of Rites 3 Historicity of the Gospels by the Pontifical Biblical Commission 26 The Nature of Religious Authority by Lor~azo Boisvert, O.F.M. 34 Influence of the Superior by Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. 55 Religious .Obedience by J. M. R. Tillard, O.P. 66 Sister Cursillistas by Sitter Elizabeth Ann, O.L.V.M. 87 ~ Administrative Forms by James L O'Connor, S.J. 91 ~ Canadian Religious Conference by Augustine G. Ellard, S.J. 105 Voveo Castitatem by Sister Mary Kieran, S.S.N.D. 112 Survey of Roman Documents 113 ; Views, News, Previews 120 Questions and Answers 131 Book Reviews 143 EDITOR R. F. Smith S.J. ASSOCIATE EDITORS Everett A. Diederich, S.J. Augustine G. Ellard, S.$. ASSISTANT EDITORS Ralph F. Taylor, S.J. William J. Weiler, S.J. DEPARTMENTAL EDITORS Joseph F Gallen, S.J. Woodstock College Woodstock, Maryland 22163 Book Norman Weyand, S.J. Bellarmime School of Theology of Loyola University 230 South Lincoln Way North Aurora, Illinois 60542 Published in January, March, May, July, September, Novem-ber on the fifteenth of the month. REVIEW FOR RELI. GIOUS is indexed in the CATHOLIC PERIODICAL IN-DEX. Volume 24 1965 EDITORIAL OFFICE St. Mary's College St. Marys, Kansas 66536 BUSIlqESS OFFICE 428 E. Preston St. ¯ Baltimore, Maryland 21202 SACRED CONGREGATION OF RITES' An Instruction on the Constitution on the Liturgy AN INSTRUCTION CONCERNING THE CORRECT IMPLEMENTATION bF THE CON-STITUTION ON THE LITURGY~ INTRODUCTION I. The Nature of This Instruction I. Among the first results of the Second Vatican Council there is deservedly included the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy since it regulates the most excellent part of the Church's activity. It will produce more £ruitful results the more profoundly pastors and the faithful grasp its true spirit and the more deeply eager they are to put it into practice. 2. The Committee for the Implementation o[ the Con-stitution on the Sacred Liturgy, established by the present supreme pontiff Paul VI in his apostolic letter Sacram liturgiara, eagerly and at once began the work entrusted to it of care£ully completing the directives of the Consti-tution and the apostolic letter and of providing for the interpretation and implementation of these documents. 3. Since it is of the greatest importance that from the very beginning these documents should be everywhere properly applied and that there should be removed any * This is an English translation of a document entitled Inter Oecumenici Concilii that was the work of the Committee for the Implementation of the Constitution on the Liturgy and that was is-sued by the Sacred Congregation of Rites on September 26, 1964; the translation was made from the Latin text of the document as given in Acta Apostolicae Sedis, v. 56 (1964), pp. 877-900. Titles and enumerations in the translation are taken directly from the Latin text. ÷ ÷ ÷ Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 Congregation o~ Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS doubts about their interpretation, the Committee at the order of the supreme pontiff has drawn up this present Instruction in which the functions of the conferences of bishops are more clearly defined with regard to liturgical matters, in which some principles expressed in the above-mentioned documents in general terms are explained with more precision, and in which finally some matters that can be put into practice at the present time even before the revision of the liturgical books are permitted or pre-scribed. II. Principles to Be Noted 4. The matters that are singled out as those to be put into practice even now have the aim of making the liturgy correspond more completely to the mind of the Council with regard to the promotion of the active participation of the faithful. Moreover, the general renewal of the sacred liturgy will be accepted by the faithful more readily if it proceeds gradually and by stages and if it is proposed and ex-plained to them by their pastors through an appropriate catechesis. 5. Nevertheless, the first thing that is necessary is that all should be convinced that the Constitution of the Sec-ond, Vatican Council concerning the sacred liturgy does not intend merely to change liturgical forms and texts; it rather intends to stimulate that formation of the faith-ful and that pastoral activity which considers the sacred liturgy both as a summit and a fountain (see the Con-stitution, article 10). The changes in the sacred liturgy that have been so far introduced as well as those that will be introduced later are directed toward this goal. 6. The importance of this pastoral activity that is to be centered around the liturgy stems from the fact that there is to be a living expression of the paschal mystery in which the incarnate Son of God, made obedient even to the death of the cross, is so exalted in His Resurrection and Ascension that He shares with the world the divine life by which men, being dead to sin and conformed to Christ, "should no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised to life" (2 Cor 5:15). This takes place through faith and the sacraments of faith; that is, especially through baptism (see the Con-stitution, article 6) and the sacred mystery of the Eucha-rist (see the Constitution, article 47), the focal point of the other sacraments and of the sacramentals (see the Con-stitution, article 61) as well as of the cycle of celebrations by which the paschal mystery of Christ is unfolded in the Church throughout the year (see the Constitution, articles 102-107). 7. Hence, although the litu.¢gy does not exh~iust all the activity of the Church (see the Constitution, article 9), great care should nevertheless be taken that pastoral work be duly linked with the sacred liturgy and that at the same time pastoral-liturgical activity be exercised not as though it were a separate and self-withdrawn thing, but in intimate union with other pastoral work. Moreo;cer, there is special need that a close union should flourish between the liturgy and catechesis, re-ligious education, and preaching. III. The Hoped-for Results 8. Accordingly, bishops and their helpers in the priest-hood should increasingly center their entire pastoral min-istry around the liturgy. In this way through a perfect participation in the sacred celebrations the faithful will derive a fuller share in the divine life; and, havin.g be-come the leaven of Christ and the salt of the earth, they will proclaim this life and communicate it to others. CHAPTER I SOME GENERAL NORMS I. The Application of These Norms 9. Although they are concerned only with the Roman rite, the practical norms found in the Constitution or in this Instruction as well as the matters that are permitted or prescribed by this same Instruction even now before the revision of the liturgical books may be applied to other Latin rites, the provisions of law being observed. 10. The matters that are entrusted in this Instruction to the competent territorial authority can and should be put into effect only by that authority through its legiti-mate decrees. In each individual case, however, the time and circum-stances in which these decrees begin to take effect should be determined with allowance always made for a reason-able period of suspension during which the faithful can be instructed in and prepared for their observance. II. The Liturgical Formation of Clerics (Constitution, articles 15-16 and 18) 11. With regard to the liturgical formation of clerics: a) In theological faculties there should be a chair of liturgy so that all the students may receive a due liturgi-cal formation; in seminaries and religious houses of study local ordinaries and major superiors should see to it that as soon as possible there is a special and properly pre-pared teacher for the course in the liturgy. b) Teacherswho are put in charge of the liturgy course ,4. '4" Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 5 are to be prepared as soon as possible in accord with the norm of article 15 of the Constitution. c) For the further liturgical formation of clerics, es-pecially of those who are already working in the vineyard of the Lord, pastoral-liturgical institutes should be con-ducted as opportunity allows. 12. The liturgy is to be taught for an adequate period of time to be indicated in the curriculum of studies by the competent authority, and the method used in its teaching should be an appropriate one in accord with article 16 of the Constitution. 13. Liturgical services are to be celebrated as perfectly as possible. Accordingly: a) The rubrics are to be carefully observed and the ceremdnies should be performed with dignity under the diligent watchfulness of the superiors and after necessary practices have been had beforehand. b) Clerics should frequently perform the functions of their order; that is, those of de,acon, subdeacon, acolyte, lector, and in addition those of commentator and cantor. c) Churches and o~atories, the sacred furnishings in general, and the sacred vestments should be examples of genuine Christian art, including contemporary Christian art. Congregation ol Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 6 IlI. The Liturgical Formation of the Spiritual Life of Clerics (Constitution, article 17) 14. In order that clerics may be formed to a full par-ticipation in liturgical services and to a spiritual life de-rived from them and able to be later communicated to others, the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy is to be put into full effect according to the norms of the docu-ments of the Apostolic See; and towards this end there should be a unanimous and harmonious collaboration on the part of all superiors and teachers. An adequate intro-duction to the sacred liturgy should be pro;tided for clerics by the recommendation of books on the liturgy, especially those which treat of it under its theological and spiritual dimensions, which books should be available in the li-brary in sufficient quantity; by meditations and confer-ences which are chiefly derived from the source of Sacred Scripture and of the liturgy (see the Constitution, article 35, 2); and by common exercises that are in accord with Christian custom and usage and which fit in with the various seasons of the liturgical year. 15. The Eucharist, which is the center of the entire spiritual life, should be celebrated every day, use being made of the various and appropriate forms that best cor-respond to the condition of the participants (see the Con-stitution, article 19). On Sundays, however, and on other major feast days a sung Mass should be celebrated with the participation of all who are in the house; there should be a Homily and as far as possible there should be the sacramental Communion of those who are not priests. Moreover, after the new rite of concelebration has been authorized for public use, priests may concelebrate, especially on the more solemn feasts, when the welfare of the faithful does not require their individual celebration. It is desirable that at least on the greater feast days the seminarians should participate in the Eucharist assem-bled around the bishop in the cathedral church (see the Constitution, article 41). 16. It is most fitting that clerics, even if they are not yet bound by the Divine Office, should engage in a daily and common recital or singing of Lauds in the morning as morning prayer and at evening of Vespers as evening prayer or of Compline at the end of the day. As far as possible, superiors themselves should participate in this common recitation. Moreover, in the order of the day sufficient time for saying the Divine Office should be pro-vided for clerics in sacred orders. It is desirable that at least on major feast days the seminarians should chant Vespers in the cathedral church when this is opportune. 17. Exercises of piety, regulated by the laws or customs of a given place or institution, should be held in honor. Care should be taken, however, especially if they are done in common, that they are in harmony with the sacred liturgy according to the intention of article 15 of the Constitution and that they take consideration of the seasons of the liturgical year. IV. The Liturgical Formation o] Members o[ the States of Perfection 18. What was said in the preceding articles about the liturgical formation of the spiritual life of clerics should also be applied with due adaptation to the members, whether men or women, of the states of perfection. V. The Liturgical Education o[ the Faithful (Constitu-tion, article 19) 19. Pastors of souls should earnestly and patiently strive to carry out the directives of the Constitution about the liturgical education of the faithful and about the foster-ing of their active participation, internal and external, "in accord with their age, condition, type of life, and degree of religious background" (Constitution, article 19).oThey should be especially concerned with the litur-gical education and the active participation of those who are members of religious associations of the laity since it is the latter's duty to share in the life of the Church in a 4. 4. 4. Instrt~tion on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 ÷ Congregation oJ Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS more intimate xbay and to be of assistance to their pas-tors also in the matter of appropriately fostering the li-turgical life of the parish (see the Constitution, article 42). VI. The Competent Authority in Liturgical Matters 20. The regulation of the sacred liturgy pertains to the authority of the Church; accordingly, no one else should proceed on his own in this matter to the detriment, as often happens, of the sacred liturgy and of its renewal by competent authority. 21. The following pertain to the Apostolic See: to re-vise and approve the general liturgical books; to regulate the sacred liturgy in those things that affect the universal Church; to approve or confirm the transactions and reso-lutions of the territorial authority; and to receive the proposals and petitions of the same territorial authority. 22. It belongs to the bishop to regulate the liturgy within the limits of his diocese in accord with the norms and spirit of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy as well as of the decrees of the Apostolic See and of the competent territorial authority. 23. The various kinds of territorial bodies of bishops to which the regulation of liturgical matters pertains in virtue of article 22, § 2 of the Constitution should be understood for the time being to mean: a) either the body of all the bishops of a given country according to the norms of the apostolic letter Sacram liturgiam, number X; b) or the already lawfully constituted body consisting of bishops or of bishops and other local ordinaries of several countries; c) or the body to be constituted with the permission of the Holy See by bishops or by bishops and other local ordinaries of several countries, especially if in the indi-vidual countries the bishops are so few in number that they more profitably convene together from different countries of the same language and of the same culture. If, however, special local circumstances suggest another type of grouping, the matter is to be proposed to the Apostolic See. 24. The following should be called to the above-men-tioned bodies: a) residential bishops; b) abbots and prelates nullius; c) vicars and prefects apostolic; d) permanently appointed apostolic administrators of dioceses; e) all other local ordinaries except vicars general. Coadjutor and auxiliary bishops can be called by the presiding officer with the consent of the majority of those who take part in the body with a deliberative vote. 25. Unless the law provides otherwise for certain places in view of special circumstances there, the convocation of the body should be made: a) by the respective presiding officer in the case of al-ready established bodies; b) in other cases by the archbishop or bishop who has the right of precedence according to the norms of law. 26. The presiding officer, with the consent of the fathers, determines the order of business and opens, trans-fers, prorogues, and closes the session. 27. A deliberative vote belongs tO all who are men-tioned above in number 24, including coadjutor and auxiliary bishops, unless a different provision is expressly made in the document of convocation. 28. For the lawful enactment of decrees a two-thirds majority of a secret vote is required. 29. The transactions of the competent territorial au-thority that are to be submitted to the Apostolic See for approval or confirmation should contain the following points: a) the names of those present at the session; b) a report of the matters that were discussed; c) the results of the voting for each decree. Two copies of these transactions, signed by the pre-siding officer and the secretary of the conference and with the proper seal, should be sent to the Committee for the Implementation of the Constitution on the Sacred Lit- 30. When, however, it is a question of transactions in which there are decrees concerning the use and extent of the vernacular in the liturgy, besides the matters enu-merated in the preceding number, the following must also be sent according to the norm of the Constitution, article 36, § 3 and of the apostolic letter Sacram liturgiam, number IX: a) an indication of the individual parts of the liturgy that are enacted to be said in the vernacular; b) two copies of the liturgical texts in the vernacular, one of which copies will be returned to the conference of bishops; c) a brief statement of the norms on the basis of which the work of translation was made. 31. Decrees of the territorial authority that require the approval or confirmation of the Apostolic See should be promulgated and put into practice only after they have been approved or confirmed by the Apostolic See. 4. + 4. Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 9 ÷ ÷ ÷ Congregation o~ Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 10 VII. The Office o] Individuals in the Liturgy (Constitu-tion, article 28) 32. Parts which pertain to the schola or the people, if they are sung or recited by them, are not said privately by the celebrant. 33. Likewise, the celebrant does not privately say the Lessons which are read or chanted by the competent min-ister or by the server. VIII. Avoiding Distinction oI Persons (Constitution, ar-ticle 32) 34. Individual bishops or, if it seems opportune, the regional or national conferences of bishops should see to it that in their territories there should be put into prac-tice the 'prescription of the Council that forbids special distinction for private persons or for social classes either in ceremonies or in external display. 35. Moreover, pastors should not neglect to work with prudence and charity to see to it that in liturgical services and especially in the celebration of Mass and the admin-istration of the sacraments and the sacramentals the equality of the faithful is evident even outwardly and further that all appearances of money-making be avoided. IX. Simpli]ication oI Cortain Rites (Constitution, arti-cle 34) 36. In order that liturgical services may be distin-guished for that noble simplicity that is more in harmony with the mentality of our age: a) the bows to the choir b,y the celebrant and the minis-ters should be made only at the beginning and the end of the sacred service; b) the incensation of the clergy, except that of those who have the episcopal character, should be done for all of them together with a triple swing of the censer to each part of the choir; c) the incensation of the altar should be done only at the altar at which the sacred rite is being celebrated; d) the kissing of hands and of objects which are pre-sented or received is to be omitted. X. The Celebration of the Word of God (Constitution, article 35, 4) 37. If in places that have no priest there is no oppor-tunity for the celebration of Mass on Sundays and on holydays of obligation, the celebration of the Word of God should be had according to the judgment of the local ordinary, with a deacon or even a layman, author-ized for this, presiding over the service. The pattern of this celebration should be the same as that of the liturgy of the Word in the Massi ordinarily the Epistle and the Gospel of the Mass of the day should be read in the vernacular with chants, especially from the Psalms, before and between them; if the one who presides is a deacon, there should be a homily; if he is not a deacon, he should read a homily assigned by the bishop or the pastor; and the entire celebration should close with the "common prayer" or the "prayer of the faithful" and the Lord's Prayer. 38. It is fitting, that the celebrations of the Word of God, which are to be encouraged.on the vigils of the more solemn feasts, on some weekdays of Advent and Lent, and on Sundays and feast days, should also resem-ble the pattern of the liturgy of the Word in the Mass, although there is nothing to prevent there being only one Reading. However, when several Readings are to be arranged, in order that the history of salvation may be clearly seen, the Reading from the Old Testament should generally precede the Reading from the New Testament; and the Reading from the Gospel should appear as the climax. 39. In order that these celebrations may be held with dignity and devotion, it will be the responsibility of the liturgical commissions in the individual dioceses to indi-cate and provide suitable aids. XI. Vernacular Translations o[ Liturgical Texts (Con-stitution, article 36, § 3) 40. When vernacular translations of liturgical texts are prepared according to the norm of article 36, § 3, it is expedient that the following be observed: a) Vernacular translations of liturgical texts should be made from the Latin liturgical text. Moreover, the trans-lation of biblical passages should also be in conformity with the Latin liturgical text. although there remains the full possibility of revising the translation, if deemed ad-visable, in the light of the original text or of another clearer translation. b) The preparation of translations of liturgical texts should be entrusted as a special concern to the liturgical commission mentioned in article 44 of the Constitution and in number 44 of this Instruction; and, as far as pos-sible, this commission should be assisted in this by the institute of pastoral liturgy. If, however, such a commis-sion does not exist, the responsibilities for the making of these translations should be given to two or three bishops who should choose persons, including lay persons, expert in Scripture, in liturgy, in biblical languages, in Latin, in the vernacular, and in music; for the perfect vernacular translation of liturgical texts must simultaneously satisfy many conditions. 4. 4. 4- Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 11 ÷ ÷ Congregation o~ Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS c) If the matter requires it, consultation concerning translations should be had with bishops of neighboring regions of the same language. d) In countries with more than one language vernacular translations in each language should be prepared and submitted to the special examination of the bishops con-cerned. e) Provision should be made for the fitting appearance of the books from which the liturgical texts are read to the people in the vernacular so that the very appearance of the book will lead the faithful to a greater reverence for the Word of God and for sacred things. 41. In liturgical services that are celebrated in some places with a congregation of people of another language, especially in the case of a group of emigrants, of members of a personal parish, and of other such instances, it is per-missible with the consent of the local ordinary to use the vernacular language known to these faithful in accord with the extent of use and the translation legitimately approved by a competent territorial ecclesiastical author-ity of that language. 42. New melodies for parts to be sung in the vernacular by the celebrant and the ministers must be approved by the competent territorial ecclesiastical authority. 43. Unless they are opposed to the Constitution, par-ticular liturgical books that were duly approved before the promulgation of the Constitution on the Sacred Lit-urgy as well as indults granted up to that time remain in force until other provision is made by the liturgical re-form as it is completed either in whole or in part. XII. The Liturgical Commission oI the Bishops" Confer-ence (Constitution, article 44) 44. The liturgical commission to be established when opportune by the territorial authority should be chosen, as far as possible, from the bishops themselves; or, at least, it should consist of one or other bishop with the addition of priests who are expert in liturgical and pas-toral matters and who have been specifically named to the commission. It is desirable that the members of this commission should meet several times a year with the consultors of the commission to deal together with the matters at hand. 45. The territorial authority can, if it seems opportune, entrust this commission with the following: a) to conduct research and experimentation according to the norm of article 40, 1) and 2) of the Constitution; b) to promote in the entire territory practical measures by which liturgical matters and the application of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy may be fostered; c) to prepare the studies and aids which become neces- sary as a result of the decrees of the plenary body of bishops; d) to o~cially regulate pastoral-liturgical activity in the entire region, to supervise the application of the de-crees of the plenary body, and to report to this body con-cerning all these matters; e) to have frequent consultations and to promote com-mon undertakings with associations of the same region that are concerned with Scripture, catechetics, pastoral, music, and sacred art, and likewise with every kind of religious association of lay persons. 46. The members of the institute of pastoral liturgy as well as the individual experts who are called to help the liturgical commission should not neglect to freely offer their help to individual bishops for the more effective promotion of pastoral-liturgical activity in their territory. XIII. The Diocesan Liturgical Commission (Constitu-tion, article 45) 47. The following pertain to the diocesan liturgical commission under the direction of the bishop: a) to investigate the status of pastoral-liturgical activity in the diocese; b) to execute with care the liturgical matters that have been proposed by competent authority and to be knowl-edgeable about studies and projects that are being under-taken elsewhere; c) to suggest and promote practical projects of every kind that can contribute to the promotion of liturgical matters, especially those that are helpful to the priests already working in the vineyard of the Lord; d) to suggest opportune and progressive stages of pas-toral- liturgical work for individual cases or even for the entire diocese, to recommend or even call upon compe-tent persons to assist priests on occasion in this matter, and to propose suitable means and helps; e) to see to it that projects begun in the diocese for the promotion of the liturgy proceed with the harmonious and mutual assistance of other associations in a way simi-lar to that described for the commission to be formed within the conference of bishops (number 45, e). CHAPTER II THE MYSTERY OF THE EUCHARIST I. The Mass Rite (Constitution, article 50) 48. Until the entire rite of the Mass has been revised, the following should now be observed: a) The parts of the Proper that are chanted or recited by the schola or the people are not said privately by the celebrant. 4. + + Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 ]3 ÷ Congregation o] Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 14 b) The celebrant can sing or recite the parts of the Ordinary with the people or the schola. c) In the prayers to be said at the foot of the altar at the beginning of Mass, Psalm 42 is omitted. Moreover, all the prayers at the foot of the altar are omitted whenever another liturgical service immediately precedes the Mass. d) At solemn Mass the paten is not held by the sub-deacon but is left on the altar. e) The Secret or the Prayer over the Offerings should be chanted in sung Masses and recited in a loud voice in other Masses. D The doxology at the end of the Canon from the words "Per ipsum" up to "Per omnia saecula saeculorum. R. Amen" inclusively are to be sung.or recited in a loud voice. Moreover, throughout the entire doxology the cele-brant should hold the chalice with the Host in a some-what elevated position, omitting the signs of the cross; and at the end he genuflects only after "Amen" has been answered by the people. g) In low Masses the Our Father may be recited in the vernacular by the people together with the celebrant; in sung Masses it can be sung by the people with the priest in Latin and also, if the territorial ecclesiastical authority shall so decree, in the vernacular to melodies approved by the same authority. h) The embolism after the Lord's Prayer should be sung or recited in a loud voice. i) In the distribution of Holy Communion the formula "Corpus Christi" should be used. While saying these words, the celebrant lifts up the Host a little over the ciborium to show it to the communicant who answers "Amen" and is then given Communion by the celebrant, the sign of the cross with the Host being omitted. I) The Last Gospel is omitted; the Leonine prayers are suppressed. k) It is lawful to celebrate a sung Mass with a deacon only. /) It is lawful for bishops, when necessary, to celebrate a sung Mass in the form used by priests. II. The Lessons and the Chants between the Lessons (Constitution, article 51) 49. In Masses celebrated with the people, the Lessons, the Epistle, and the Gospel are read or sung facing the people: a) during a solemn Mass at the ambo or at the edge of the sanctuary; b) during high Mass and during low Mass, if they are read or chanted by the celebrant, either from the altar or at the ambo or at the edge of the sanctuary as may be more convenient; if, however, they are said or sung by someone else, at the ambo or at the edge of the sanctuary. 50. At non-solemn Masses celebrated with the people, the Lessons and the Epistle together with the chants be-tween them can be read by a qualified lector or server while the celebrant sits and listens; the Gospel can be read by a deacon or by another priest; the one who so reads it says the Munda cot meum, asks for the blessing, and at the end presents the Book of the Gospels for the celebrant to kiss. 51. In sung Masses the Lessons, the Epistle, and the Gospel may be read without chant if they are presented in the vernacular. 52. In reading or singing the Lessons, the Epistle, the chants occurring after these, and the Gospel, the follow-ing procedures are to be followed: a) At solemn Mass the celebrant sits and listens to the Lessons and the Epistle together with the chants between them. After the Epistle has been sung or read, the sub-deacon goes to the celebrant and is blessed by him. Then the celebrant, seated, puts incense in the censer and blesses it; while the Alleluia with its verse is being sung or to-wards the end of other chants that follow the Epistle, he rises to bless the deacon; he listens to the Gospel at his seat, kisses the Book of the Gospels, and, after the Homily, intones~the Creed if it is to be said; when the Creed is finished, he returns to the altar with the ministers unless he is to conduct the "prayer of the faithful." b) In high or low Masses at which the Lessons, the Epistle, the chants that follow these, and the Gospel are sung or read by the minister mentioned in number 50, the celebrant follows the procedure just described. c) In high or low Masses in Which the Gospel is sung or read by the celebrant, while the Alleluia and its verse is being sung or read or towards the end of other chants that follow the Epistle, the celebrant goes to a position in front of the lowest step of the altar and there, bowing pro-foundly, says the Munda cot meum; then he goes to the ambo or to the edge of the sanctuary to sing or read the Gospel. d) If, however, in high and low Masses all the Readings are sung or read by the celebrant at the ambo or at the edge of the sanctuary, then, while standing, he also reads, if necessary, the chants that occur after the Lessons and the Epistle; and he says the Munda cor meum while turned toward the altar. III. The Homily (Constitution, article 52) 53. On Sundays and holydays of obligation a Homily should be had at all Masses celebrated with a congregation 4. 4" 4. InsCruvtion on th~ Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 ]5 ÷ ÷ ÷ Congregation oy Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 16 of people, no exception being made for conventual, sung, and pontifical Masses. On other days a Homily is recommended especially on some of the weekdays of Advent and Lent and on other occasions when the people come to church in greater num-bers. 54. By a Homily made from the sacred text is meant an explanation either of some aspect of the Readings of Sacred Scripture or of some other text from the Ordinary or the Proper of the Mass of the day, consideration being given to the mystery that is being celebrated and the par-ticular needs of the hearers. 55. If for certain periods a program is proposed for the preaching to be had during Mass, an intimate connection is to be harmoniously retained with at least the principal seasons and feasts of the liturgical year (see the Constitu-tion, articles 102-104), that is, with the mystery of 'the redemption; for the Homily is part of the liturgy of the day. IV. The Common Prayer or the Prayer of the Faithful (Constitution, article 53) 56. In places where the custom is already had of having: the common prayer or the prayer of the faithful, it should for the time being take place before the Offertory after the word Oremus and according to the formulas now in use in the individual regions; the celebrant shall conduct the prayer either from his seat or from the altar or from the ambo or from the edge of the sanctuary. The intentions or invocations may be sung by a deacon or by a cantor or other qualified server, though there should be reserved to the celebrant the words of introduc-tion as well as the concluding prayer which ordinarily should be the prayer: Deus, refugium nostrum et virtus (see the Roman Missal, "Orationes diversae," number 20) or some other prayer that better corresponds to a par-ticular need. In places where the common prayer or the prayer of the faithful is not in use, the competent territorial au-thority may decree that it should be done in the way just indicated above with formulas approved for the time be-ing by that authority. V. The Vernacular in the Mass (Constitution, article 54) 57. In Masses, whether sung or low, that are celebrated with the people, the competent territorial ecclesiastical authority, after its provisions have been approved or con-firmed by the. Apostolic See, may allow the vernacular: a) especially in the delivery of the Lessons, the Epistles, and the Gospel, as well as in the common prayer or the 13rayer of the faithful; b) according to local circumstances also in the chants of the Ordinary of the Mass, namely, the Kyrie, the Gloria, the Credo, the" Sanctus-Benedictus, and the Agnus Dei, and in the antiphons atthe Introit, the Offertory, and the Communion, as well as in the chants that occur between the Readings; c) and furthermore in the acclamations, salutations, and dialogue formulas, in the formulas: Ecce Agnus Dei, Domine, non sum dignus, and Corpus Christi at the Communion of the faithful, and in the Our Father with its introduction and embolism. Missals, however, that are employed in Iiturgical use should contain the Latin text in addition to the vernacu-lar translation. 58. It pertains solely to the Apostolic See to allow the vernacular in other parts of the Mass that are sung or said only by the celebrant. 59. Pastors of souls should carefully see to it that the faithful, above all the members of religious associations of lay persons, know how t6 say or sing (especially if simpler melodies are used) together in the Latin language the parts of the Ordinary of the Mass that pertain to them. VI. Receiving Communion Twicd on the Same Day (Con-stitution, article 55) 60. The faithful who go to Communion at the Mass of the Easter Vigil and at midnight Mass on Christmas, may go to Communion again during the second Mass of Easter and during one of the Masses that are celebrated on Christmas during the daytime. CHAPTER III THE OTHER SACRAMENTS AND THE SACRAMENTALS I. The Use o[ the Vernacular (Constitution, article 63) 61. After its provisions have been approved or con-firmed by the Apostolic See, the competent territorial authority can introduce the vernacular: a) into the rites of baptism, coiafirmation, penance, the anointing of the sick, and matrimony, including in all these the essential formula, as well as into the distribu-tion of Holy Communion; b) at the conferral of orders into the allocutions at the beginning of each ordination or consecration and also into the examination of the bishop-elect in episcopal consecration, and into the admonitions; c) into the sacramentals; d) into funeral rites. Whenever a greater use of the vernacular seems to be desirable, the prescription of article 40 of the Constitu-tion should be observed. 4. 4. 4. Instrurtion on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 17 Congregation oy ~t~tes REVIEW FOR REL]G[OUS II. Changes in the Rite lot Supplying Omissions in Bap-tism (Constitution, article 69) 62. In the rite for supplying omissions in the case of a baptized infant as given in the Roman Ritual, Title Chapter 5, theie should be omitted the exorcisms that are found under numbers 6 (Exi ab eo), 10 (Exorcizo te, immunde spiritus . Ergo, maledicte diabole), and 15 (Exorcizo te, omnis spiritus). 63. In the rite for supplying omissions in the case of a baptized adult as given in the Roman Ritual, Title II, Chapter fi, there should be omitted the exorcisms that are found under numbers 5 (Exi ab eo), 15 (Ergo, male-dicte diabole), 17 (dadi, maledicte satana), 19 (Exorcizo te- Ergo, maledicte diabole), 21 (Ergo, maledicte diabole), 23 (Ergo, maledicte diabole), 25 (Exorcizo te - Ergo, male-dicte diabole), 31 (Nec te latet), and 35 (Exi, immunde spiritus). III. Conl~rmation (Constitution, article 71) 64. If confirmation is conferred during Mass, it is fitting that the Mass be celebrated by the bishop, in which case he confers confirmation while wearing the Mass vestments. Moreover, the Mass during which confirmation is con-ferred can be ,said as a II class votive Mass of the Holy Spirit. 65. After the Gospel and the Homily and before the re-ception of confirmation, it is praiseworthy that those to be confirmed should renew their baptismal promises ac-cording to the rite in legitimate use in individual regions, unless this has already been done before Mass. 66. If the Mass is celebrated by another, it is fitting that the bishop should assist at the Mass in the vestments prescribed for the conferral of confirmation; these vest-ments may be either the color of the Mass or white. The bishop, should give the Homily, and the celebrant should resume the Mass only after confirmation has been conferred. 67. Confirmation is conferred according to the rite given in the Roman Pontifical; but only one sign of the cross is made at the words In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti that follow the formula Signo te. IV. Continuous Rite for the Anointing of the Sick and Viaticum (Constitution, article 74) 68. When the anointing of the sick and Viaticum are conferred at the same time, and a continuous rite is not already given in a particular Ritual, the following order should be observed: After the sprinkling and. the prayers to be said when first entering as given in the rite of the anointing, the priest hears, if necessary, the confession of the sick person, then confers the anointing, and finally gives Viaticum, omitting the sprinkling with its formulas as well as the Gonfiteor and the absolution. V. The Imposition of Hands during Episcopal Consecra-tion (Constitution, article 76) 69. All the bishops present in choir dress at an episcopal consecration may impose hands. However, the. words .4ccipe Spiritum Sanctum are to be said only by the consecrating bishop and the two co-consecrating bishops. VI. The Rite of Matrimony (Constitution, article 78) 70. Unless a just cause excuses from the celebration of Mass, matrimony should be celebrated during Mass ter the Gospel and after the Homily, which should never be omitted. 71. Whenever matrimony is celebrated within Mass, the votive nuptial Mass is always said or a commemora-tion made of it, even during the prohibited times. 72. As far as possible, the parish priest or his delegate who assists at the marriage should celebrate the Mass; but if another priest assists at the matrimony, the cele-brant should not continue the Mass until the rite of matrimony has been completed. The priest who assists at the marriage but does not celebrate the Mass should be vested in surplice and white stole and, according to local custom, in white cope; and he should give the Homily. But the blessing after the Pater noster and the one before the Placer should always be given by the priest who celebrates the Mass. 73. The nuptial blessing during Mass is always given, even during the prohibited times and even if one or both of the parties are not entering marriage for the first time. 74. In the celebration of matrimony outside of Mass: a) At the beginning of the rite in accord with the apos-tolic letter Sacram liturgiam, number V, there should be a brief talk that is not a Homily but a simple intro-duction to the celebration of matrimony (see the Con-stitution, article 35, 3); the Sermon or Homily from the sacred text (see the Constitution, article 52) should be given after the reading of the Epistle and the Gospel from the nuptial Mass. Hence the arrangement of the entire rite should be the following: a short talk; the reading of the Epistle and the Gospel in the vernacular; the Homily; the celebration of matrimony; the nuptial blessing. b) With regard to the reading of the Epistle and the Gospel from the nuptial Mass, if there is no vernacular text approved by the competent territorial ecclesiastical + + 4. Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 ]9 + + Congregation oI Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS authority, it is permitted for the time being to use a text approved by the local ordinary. c) Nothing prevents having a chant between the Epistle and the Gospel. Likewise, it is highly recom-mended that after the rite of matrimony and before the nuptial blessing there should be the prayer of the faithful according to a formula approved by the local ordinary in which petitions for the couple are also in-cluded. d) At the end of the rite the blessing should always be given to the spouses even during the prohibited times and even if one or both of the spouses are not entering marriage for the first time; the blessing should follow the formula given in the Roman Ritual, Title VIII, Chapter 3, unless another blessing is given in par-ticular Rituals. 75. If matrimony is celebrated during a prohibited season, the pastor should advise the spouses to take into consideration the special nature of that liturgical season. VII. The Sacramentals (Constitution, article 79) 76. At the blessing of candles on February 2 and of ashes at the beginning of the Lenten fast, one only of the prayers found in the Roman Missal for these blessings may be said. 77. The blessings that up to now have been reserved and that are contained in the Roman Ritual, Title IX, Chapters 9, 10, and 11 may be given by every priest with the exception of the following: the blessing of a bell for the use of a blessed church or oratory (Chapter 9, number 11), the blessing of the first stone for the building of a church (Chapter 9, number 16), the blessing of a new church or a public oratory (Chapter 9, num-ber 17), the blessing of an antimension (Chapter 9, num-ber 21), the blessing of a new cemetery (Chapter 9, number 22); the papal blessings (Chapter 10, numbers 1-3), the blessing and erection of the Way of the Cross (Chapter 11, number 1) since this is reserved to the bishop. CHAPTER IV THE DIVINE OFFICE I. The Celebration of the Divine O~ce by Those Bound to Choir (Constitution, article 95) 78. Until the revision of the Divine Office is com-pleted: a) Communities of canons, monks, and nuns, and of other regulars or religious that are bound by law or their constitutions to choir must daily celebrate the en-tire Divine Office in addition to the conventual Mass. Individual members of these communities who are in major orders or are solemnly professed, with the ex-ception of brothers [conversi], must, even though they are legitimately dispensed from choir, individually re-cite each day the canonical Hours that they do not cele-brate in choir. b) In addition to the conventual Mass, cathedral and collegiate chapters must celebrate in choir those parts of the Office imposed on them by common or particular law. Moreover, individual members of these chapters, in addition to the canonical Hours that all clerics in major orders must say (see the Constitution, articles 96 and 89), must individually recite the Hours which are celebrated by their chapter. c) However, in mission territories, without derogation of the religious or capitular discipline set down by law, religious or capitulars who are legitimately absent from choir for pastoral reasons may with the permission of the local ordinary but not that of the vicar general or delegate make use of the concession granted by the apostolic letter Sacram liturgiam, number VI. II. Dispensing [rom or Commuting the Divine Olfice (Constitution, article 97) 79. The power granted to all ordinaries of dispensing their subjects in individual chses and for a just reason from the obligation of the Divine Office in whole or in part or of commuting it is extended also to major su-periors of non-exempt clerical religious institutes and of societies of clerics living in common without vows. III. Little Olfices (Constitution, article 98) 80. No Little Office is to be regarded as composed after the pattern of the Divine Office if it does not consist of Psalms, Lessons, hymns, and prayers and if it does not take some account of the Hours of the day and of the liturgical seasons. 81. In order to take part in the public prayer of the Church, for the time being those Little Offices can be used that have been legitimately approved up to the present time provided that they are composed in accord with the requirements stated in the preceding number. New Little Offices, however, must be approved by th$ Apostolic See in order that they may be used for the public prayer of the Church. 82. The translation of the text of a Little Office into the vernacular for use as the public prayer of the Church must be approved by the territorial ecclesiastical au-thority with the approbation or confirmation of the Apostolic See. 4" Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 21 4. ÷ Congregation o] Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 83. The competent authority for allowing the use of the vernacular in the recitation of a Little Office to those 9bliged to it by their constitutions and for dis-pensing from or commuting this obligation is the ordi-nary or major superior of each subject. IV. The Common Celebration of the Divine Ol~ce or oI a Little 01rice by Members of the States of Perfec-tion (Constitution, article 99) 84. The obligation of reciting, in common the Divine Office or a Little Office or some part of them imposed on members of the states of perfection by their consti-tutions does not remove the faculty of omitting the Hour of Prime and of choosing that one of the Small Hours that best suits the time of day (see the apostolic letter Sacram liturgiam, number VI). V. The Language to Be Used in the Recitation of the Divine O~ce (Constitution, article 101) 85. In choral celebration of the Divine Office clerics must retain the Latin language. 86. The power granted to the ordinary of permitting the use of the vernacular in individual cases to those clerics to whom the use of the Latin language is a serious impediment to the worthy praying of the Office is ex-tended also to major superiors of non-exempt clerical religious institutes and of societies of clerics living in common without vows. 87. The serious impediment required for the preced-ing permission must be weighed by taking into con-sideration the physical, moral, intellectual, and spiritual condition of the petitioner. Moreover, this faculty, granted as it has been only to make the recitation of the Office easier and more devout, in no way diminishes the obligation by which a priest of the Latin rite is bound to learn the Latin language. 88. The vernacular translation of the Divine Office according to a rite other than the Roman one should be prepared and approved by the respective ordinaries of that language; however, in the parts that are common to both rites, the translation approved by the territorial authority should be used, and afterwards the entire trans-lation should be submitted for the confirmation of the Apostolic See. 89. The Breviaries to be used by clerics to whom the use of the vernacular in the Divine Office has been granted in accord with the norm of article 101, § 1 of the Constitution must contain the Latin text in addi-tion to the vernacular translation. CHAPTER V THE PROPER CONSTRUCTION OF CHURCHES AND ALTARS TO FACILITATE THE ACTIVE PARTICIPATION OF THE FAITHFUL I. The Arrangement oI Churches 90. In the new construction, renovation, or adaptation of churches, great care should be taken that they are made suitable for the celebration of the sacred actions in accord with their true nature and for the securing of the active participation of the faithful (see the Constitu-tion, article 124). II. The Main Altar 91. It is better that the main altar be constructed sepa-rately and away from the wall so that one can go around it easily and so that celebration facing the people can take place at it. Moreover, the place that it occupies in the entire building should be such that it is really the center towards which the attention of the congregation of the faithful spontaneously turns. In the choice of materials for the construction and ornamentation of this altar, the prescriptions of law should be observed. Furthermore, the presbyterium around the altar should be ample enough that the sacred rites can be performed with ease. Ill. The Seat for the Celebrant and the Ministers 92. According to the structure of individual churches, the seat for the celebrant and the ministers should be so placed that it can be easily seen by the faithful and so that the celebrant himself really appears as presiding over the entire community of the faithful. However, if the seat is placed behind the altar, the form of a throne is to be avoided, since this is reserved for the bishop alone. IV. Minor Altars 93. The minor altars should be few in number; and insofar as the structure of the building permits, it is highly fitting that they be placed in chapels somewhat separate from the principal part of the church. V. The Ornamentation of Altars 94. The cross and candles required on the altar for individual liturgical services may also be placed next to the altar in accordance with the judgment of the local ordinary. 4" 4" 4" Instruction on th~ Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 4. 4. Congregation o] Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS VI. The Reservation oI the Blessed Eucharist 95. The Blessed Eucharist should be reserved in a solid and inviolable tabernacle placed in the middle of the main altar or of a minor but distinguished altar; or, according to legitimate custom and in special cases to be approved by the local ordinary, it can be kept in some other part of the Church that is beautifully and properly adorned.- It is lawful to celebrate Mass facing the people even if there is a small but suitable tabernacle on the altar. VII. The Ambo 96. It is fitting that for the sacred Readings there should be an ambo or ambos so situated that the min-isters can be easily seen and heard by the faithful. VIII. The Place of the $chola and the Organ 97. The places for the schola and the organ should be arranged so that the chanters and the organist clearly appear as a part of the congregated community of the faithful and so that they can perform their liturgical functions more easily. IX. The Places .of the Faithful 98. The places for the faithful should be arranged with particular care so that visually and mentally they can have a proper participation in the sacred celebrations. It is desirable that ordinarily there be pews or seats for their use. But the custom of reserving seats for certain private persons is to be reprobated according to the norm of article 32 of the Constitution. Care should also be taken that the faithful can not only see the celebrant and the other ministers but that with the' use of modern technical means they can also easily hear them. X. The Baptistry 99. In the construction and ornamentation of the baptistry, it should be carefully attended to that the dignity of the sacrament of baptism is clearly shown and that the place is suitable for community celebrations (see article 27 of the Constitution). The present Instruction was prepared at the command of His Holiness Paul VI by the Committee for the Implementation of the Constitution on the Sacred Lit-urgy and was presented to him by Giacomo Cardinal Lercaro, chairman oI the Committee. The Holy Father, a[ter duly considering this Instruc- tion with the help of the above mentioned Committee and of the Sacred Congregation of Rites, in an audience granted on September 26, 1964, to Arcadio Maria Cardi-nal Larraona, pre[ect of the Sacred Congregation oI Rites, approved it in a special way in each and all of its parts and ordered it to be published and to be carefully ob-served by all concerned beginning on March 7, 1965, the First Sunday oI Lent. All things to the contrary notwithstanding. Rome, September 26, 1964. GIACOMO CARD. LERCARO Archbishop of Bologna Chairman of the Commit-tee for the Implementa-tion of the Constitution on the Liturgy ARCADIO M. CARD. LARRA-ONA Prefect of the Sacred Con-gregation of Rites ~ Enrico Dante Titular archbishop of Car-pasia Secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Rites + 4. 4. Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 25 PONTIFICAL BIBLICAL COMMISSION Instruction on the Historicity of the Gospels ÷ ÷ ÷ Biblical ~ommission REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS Holy Mother Church,* which is "the pillar and the foundation of the truth," x has always made use of Sacred Scripture in her work of bringing salvation to souls and has protected it from false explanations of every kind. Because there will never be a lack of problems, the Cath-olic exegete must never lose heart in his work of ex-pounding the Word of God and of solving the difficulties that are alleged against it; rather, relying not merely on his own abilities but having a firm trust chiefly in the help of God and the light coming from the Church, he must work strenuously to disclose the real meaning of Scripture to an ever greater degree. It is a cause of great joy that in the Church today there can be found so many loyal sons of the Church who have the proficiency in biblical matters that our times require and who in response to the insistence of the supreme pontiffs have devoted themselves completely and tirelessly to this important and difficult work. "All the other sons of the Church should keep in mind that the efforts of these hardworking laborers in the Lord's vine-yard should' be judged not only with fairness and justice but also with the greatest charity";2 for even exegetes of great reputation such as Jerome, in attempting to clear up the more difficult questions, have at times produced results that were not at all fortunate,a Care should be ¯ The original Latin text of this Instruction, entitled Sancta Mater Ecclesia, is given in Acta Apostolicae Sedis, v. 66 (1964), pp. 712-8. 1 1 Tim 3:15. ~ Divino affiante Spiritu; Enchiridion biblicum, 4th ed. [here-after referred to as EB], n. 564; Acta Apostolicae Sedis [hereafter re-ferred to as ,,lAb'], v. 35 (1943), p. 319. 8See Spiritus Paraclitus; EB, n. 451; ,'/,,IS, v. 12 (1920), p. 392. taken "that the limits of mutual charity are not trans-gressed in the heat of debate and discussion and that the impression is not given during such discussions that the revealed truths themselves and the divine traditions are being questioned. For unless there is harmony of spirit and the safeguarding of principles, it cannot be expected that notable progress in this branch of learn-ing will result from the various studies of so many schol-ars." 4 The work of exegetes is needed .today in an even more special way since wide circulation is given to many pub-lications in which the truth of the events and .sayings contained in the Gospels is being endangered. For this reason the Pontifical Biblical Commission, in the dis-charge of the duty entrusted to it by the supreme pon-tiffs, has thought it opportune to set forth and emphasize the following points. 1. The Catholic exegete, under the guidance of the Church, should profit from everything which previous interpreters, especially the holy fathers and doctors of the Church, have contributed to the understanding of the sacred text; and he should continue their work by ad-vancing it to a further stage. In order to bring out with all clarity the enduring truth and authority of the Gospels, the exegete, while carefully retaining the norms of reasonable and Catholic hermeneutics, will make an intelligent use of new exegetical helps, particularly those which the historical method has on the whole made available. This method diligently investigates sources, determines their nature and value, and makes use of textual criticism, literary criticism, and language studies. The exegete will follow the advice of Plus XlI of happy memory who enjoined that the exegete "should judi-ciously investigate what the literary form or type used by the sacred writer contributes to a valid and genuine in-terpretation; and he should be convinced that he cannot neglect this aspect of his work without great damage to Catholic exegesis." 5 In giving this advice, Pius XlI of happy memory was formulating a general rule of her-meneutics by the help of which the books of both the Old and the New Testaments are to be explained, since their sacred writers, in composing them, made use of the ways of thinking and writing in use among, their con-temporaries. Finally, the exegete will employ every available means by which he can attain a thorough knowledge of the characteristics of the testimony of the Gospels, of the religious life of the first churches, and of the meaning and value of the apostolic traditions. ~The apostolic letter Vigilantiae; EB, n. 143; Leonis XIII Acta, v. 22, p. 237. ~Divino afftante Spiritu; EB, n. 560; AAS, v. 35 (1943), p. 316. + + + Gospels VOLUME 24, 1965 + ae ae Biblical Commission REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS When it is applicable, the interpreter can investigate what sound elements there are in the "method of form criticism" and can use these for a fuller understanding of the Gospels. In doing this, however, he should pro-ceed with mature deliberation since often there are ad-joined to this method inadmissible philosophical and theological principles that not infrequently vitiate both the method and the literary conclusions that are drawn. Certain exponents of this method, misled by ration-alistic prejudices, refuse to acknowledge the existence of a supernatural order, the intervention into this world of a personal God through revelation in the proper sense of that word, and the possibility and existence of mir-acles and prophecies. Others begin with a false notion of faith, conceiving it as though it has no concern for his-torical truth and indeed is incompatible with it. Still others have a kind of a priori negation of the historical value and nature of the documents of revelation. Others, finally, minimizing the authority of the Apostles as wit-nesses to Christ, their office, and their influence in the primitive community, exaggerate the creative ability of this community. These matters are not only opposed to Catholic doctrine but also are devoid of any scientific basis and are foreign to the genuine principles o[ the historical method. 2. In order that the trustworthiness of what is related in the Gospels may be correctly established, the inter-preter should give careful attention to the three periods of tradition through which the doctrine and life of Jesus have come to us. Christ the Lord attached to Himself chosen disciples6 who followed Him from the beginning,7 observed His actions, and heard His words, thereby becoming qualified to be witnesses of His life and doctrine,s When the Lord gave His oral expositions of His doctrine, He followed the ways of thought and exposition in general use at that time; in this way He adapted Himself to the men-tality of His hearers and made sure that what He taught would be firmly impressed on their minds and could be easily remembered by His disciples. These latter cor-rectly understood that the miracles and the other events in the life of Christ took place or were arranged in such a way that through them men might believe in Christ and accept by faith the doctrine of salvation. The Apostles, when they witnessed to Jesus,° first of all proclaimed the death and the resurrection of the Lord; eSee Mk 3:14; Lk 6:13. See Lk 1:2; Acts 1:21-2. sSee Lk 24:48; Jn 15:27; Acts 1:8; 10:39; 13:31. See Lk 24:44-8; Acts 2:32; 3:15; 5:30-2. and they honestly described His life and doctrine?° tak-ing account in their way of preaching11 of the circum-stances in which their hearers found themselves. After Jesus had arisen from the dead and His divinity was clearly perceived?2 the faith of His followers was far from erasing the memory of what had happened but rather strengthened that memory since their faith was based on what Jesus had done and taught,la Nor was Jesus changed into a "mythical" personage and His doc-trine distorted because of the worship with which the disciples now venerated Him as the Lord and the Son of God. Still, there is no reason why it should be denied that the Apostles, when relating to their audiences what had been really said and done by the Lord, did so with that fuller understanding which, after their instruction by the events of glory in the life of Christ and after their enlightenment by the Spirit of truth,14 was theirs to en-joy. x5 Hence it was that just as Jesus Himself after His Resurrection "interpreted to them" 16 the words both of the Old Testament and of Himself?~ so also the Apostles interpreted His words and actions as the needs of their hearers required. "Being devoted to the ministry of the word," as they did their preaching using such various ways of speaking as were adapted to their own purpose and to the mentality of their hearers; for it was "to Greek and non-Greek, to the learned and the unlearned" x9 that they owed their obligation.2° The following various ways of speaking by which, like so many heralds, they proclaimed Christ must be differentiated and carefully appraised: catecheses, narratives, testimonies, hymns, doxologies, prayers, and other such literary forms that were customarily used in Sacred Scripture and by the people of that time. This earliest teaching which was first given orally and then in writing--for it soon happened that many at-tempted "to draw up an account of the events" 21 which concerned the Lord Jesus--was incorporated by the sacred writers for the benefit of the Church into the four Gospels, each one following the method adapted to the special purpose he had. From the great quantity of tra- See Acts 10:36-~1. See Acts 13:16--41 together with Acts 17:22-31. Acts 2:36; Jn 20:28. ~Acts 2:22; 10:37-9. See Jn 14:26; 16:13. ~Jn 2:22; 12:16; 11:51-2; see also 14:26; 16:12-3; 7:39. Lk 24:27. See Lk 24:44-5; Acts 1:3. Acts 6:4. gom 1:14. 1 Cor 9:19-23. See Lk 1:1. 4- 4- + Historicity o~ the Gospels VOLUME 24, 1965 ~9 4. Biblical Commission REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS ~0 ditional materials, they made a selection of some, some they presented in a synthesis, and some they explained in terms of the situation of the churches; and in all this they took every precaution that their readers might real-ize the trustworthiness of the message in which they had been instructed.2z From the matters which they had re-ceived, the sacred authors chose especially those things which were adapted to the various circumstances of the faithful and to the purpose intended by them; and they narrated their selections in a way that was consonant with those circumstances and that purpose. Since the meaning of a statement is also dependent on its place in a given sequence, the evangelists, when they related the words or actions of the Savior, explained them for the benefit of their readers through the context, one evangelist using one. context while another would employ a different context. Accordingly, the exegete should make a close investigation o[ what an evangelist intended when he narrated a saying or action in a given way or placed it in a given context. For the truth of the narra-tive is not at all desiroyed by the fact that the evangelists give the words and actions of the Lord in a different order23 or by the fact that they express His statements in different ways, no~ keeping to the letter but nevertheless relating the sense.24 As St. Augustine points out: "With regard to those matters the different ordering of which does not lessen the authority and truth of the Gospels, it is probable enough that each of the evangelist's thought that he should put his narratives in the order in which God willed to suggest them to his memory. If a person reverently and diligently inquires into the matter, he will be able with the help of God to find out why the Holy Spirit, who distributes His gifts to each as He wishes2~ and who therefore--because of the fact that these books were to be placed at the very summit of authority--without a doubt directed and controlled the minds of the sacred writers as they reflected on what they should write, permitted different writers to arrange their narratives in different ways." 26 Unless the exegete takes into account all the factors involved in the origin and the composition .of the Gospels and makes due use of the legitimate findings of recent research, he will not be performing his duty of ~ See Lk 1:4. ~ See St John Chrysostom, Homiliae 90 in Evangeliura S. Matthaei, I, 3; PG, v. 57, col. 16-7. a See St. Augustine, De consensu evangelistarura libri quatuor, 2, 12, 28; PL, v. 34, col. 1090-1. ~ 1 Cot 12:11. ~St. Augustine, De consensu, 2, 21, 51 f.; PL, v.34, col. 1102. finding out what the sacred writers intended and what they actually said. Since it appears from the findings of recent research that the doctrine and life of Jesus were not related for the sole purpose of retaining them in re-membrance but that they were "proclaimed" in such a way that they might furnish the Church a foundation for faith and morals, the interpreter who is untiring in mak-ing a close study of the testimony of the Gospels will be able to shed a greater light on the enduring theological value of the Gospels and to exhibit in the clearest light the negessity and importance of the Church's interpreta-tion. There still exist many questions of the greatest serious-ness in the discussion and explanation of which the Catholic exegete can and should freely exercise his in-telligence and ability so that each one individually may make his contribution to the benefit of all, to the con-tinued advancement of sacred doctine, to the prepara-tion for and further support of the decisions of the Church's teaching authority, and to the defence and honor of the Church.u7 But they must always be pre-pared to obey the teaching authority of the Church, nor should they forget that the Apostles were filled with the Holy Spirit when they proclaimed the good news and that the Gospels were written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit who preserved their authors from all error. "We came to know the plan of our salvation through no others than those through whom the gospel came to us. This gospel they first proclaimed by mouth, but afterwards by the will of God they passed it on to us in the Scriptures to be the foundation and pillar of our faith. For it is not permissible to say that they preached before they possessed perfect knowledge, as some dare to assert who boast that they are the correctors of the Apos-tles. For after our Lord had arisen from the dead and they had been invested from on high with the power of the Holy Spirit who descended upon them, they were filled with all the gifts and possessed perfect knowledge. They went forth to the ends of the earth preaching the message of the blessings we have from God and pro-claiming heavenly peace to men, each and every one of them equally possessing God's gospel." us 3. Those to whom the duty of teaching in seminaries or in similar institutions has been entrusted "should make it their first concern., that Sacred Scripture is taught in a way that is completely in consonance with ~See Divino a~ante Spiritu; EB, n. 565; AtlS, v.35 (1943), p. 319. ~St. Irenaeus, Adversus haereses, III, 1, 1; in the edition by W. Wigan Harvey, v. 2, p. 2; PG, v. 7, col. 844. ÷ ÷ ÷ Historicity oJ the Gospels VOLUME 24s 1965 31 + ÷ ÷ Biblical ~ommission REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS what the importance of the matter and the needs of the times warrant." 29 Professors should chiefly set forth the theological content so that Sacred Scripture "may become for the future priests of the Church a pure and never failing source of each one's spiritual life as well as a strength-giving food for the role of preaching which they will assume." a0 When they make use of critical tech-niques, especially those of what is known as literary criticism, they should not do so in order to exercise those techniques for their own sake but in order that by their light they may more clearly see the meaning communi-cated by God through the sacred writer. Hence they should not stop halfway and reniain satisfied with just the literary discoveries they have made; over and beyond this they should show how these really help to a clearer understanding of revealed doctrine or, if the case war-rants, to a refutation of erroneous positions. If teachers follow these norms, they will ensure that their students will find in Sacred Scripture that "which raises the mind to God/nourishes the soul, and fosters the interior life." ax 4. Those who instruct the Christian people by sacred preaching have in all truth a need for the greatest prudence. They should chiefly impart doctrine, mindful of St. Paul's warning: "Pay attention t9 yourself and your teaching, and be persistent in this; by doing this, you will further the salvation of yourselves and of those who hear you." ~2 They should refrain entirely from pro-posing matters that are useless novelties or not sufficiently proved. New views, once they are solidly established, may, if necessary, be set forth in a discreet way, account being taken of the nature of the audience. When they narrate biblical events, they should not make fictitious additions that are not conformed to truth. This virtue of prudence should be especially exer-cised by those who publish writings for the faithful at the popular level. They should take care to set forth the supernatural treasures of the Word of God "in order that the faithful., may be moved and incited to order their lives in a correct way." an They should regard it as an inviolable duty never to depart in the slightest from the common teaching and tradition of the Church; they should, to be sure, make use of whatever advances in biblical knowledge have been made by the intelligence of recent scholars, but they should completely avoid the The apostolic letter Quoniam in re biblica; EB, n. 162; Pii X Acta, v. 3, p. 72. ~°Divino a~lante Spiritu; EB, n. 567; AA$, v. 35 (1943), p. 322. ~Divino aOiante Spiritu; EB, n. 552; AA$, v. 35 (1943), p. 311. 1 Tim 4:16. Divino a~tante Spiritu; EB, n. 566; AAS, v. 35 (1943), p. 320. rash fabrications of innovators,a4 They are strictly for-bidden to give in to the destructive itching for novelty by thoughtlessly publicizing without any judicious and serious discrimination any and all attempts to solve dif-ficulties, thus disturbing the faith of many. Earlier, this Pontifical Biblical Commission had al-ready judged it good to recall to mind the fact that books together with magazine and newspaper articles dealing with biblical matters are subject to the authority and jurisdiction of ordinaries, since they are religious publications and are concerned with the religious in-struction of the faithful,a5 Hence the ordinaries are asked to pay the greatest attention to these popular publica-tions. 5. Those in charge of biblical associations should, in-violably obey the laws laid down by the Pontifical Bibli-cal Commission.a6 If all the above points are observed, the study of Sacred Scripture will result in profit to the faithful. There will be no one who does not also experience today what St. Paul described: the Sacred Scriptures "have the power to make you wise and to lead you to salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All scripture, being inspired by God, is useful for teaching, for reproving error, for cor-recting, and for training in right conduct so that the man who is God's may be perfect, equipped for good work of every kind." 37 His Holiness, Paul VI, in an audience graciously granted on April 21, 1964, to the undersigned consultor and secretary, approved this instruction and ordered it to be made public. Rome, April 21, 1964. BENJAMIN N. WAMBACQ, O.Praem., Consultor and Secretary ~' See the apostolic letter Quoniam in re biblica; EB, n. 175; Pii X Acta, v, 3, p. 75. ~ The Instruction to Local Ordinaries of December 15, 1955; EB, n. 626; AAS, v. 48 (1956), p. 63. ~°EB, nn. 622-33; AASo v. 48 (1956), pp. 61--4. ~ 2 Tim 3:15-7. 4- ÷ 4- Gospels VOLUME 24, 1965 33 LORENZO BOISVERT, O.F.M. The Nature. of Religious Authority Father Lorenzo Boisvert, O.F.M., is a member of the Franciscan com-munity looted at 5750, boulevard Rosemont; Mont-real 36, Canada. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS THE TEACHING OF JEsus ON AUTHORITY~ It is sometimes said that superiors talk a great deal about obedience but say little or even nothing at all about authority with the result that subjects know much about the notion of obedience which their superiors have but are ignorant of their idea of authority-~or, if they do know it, they have deduced it from their way of governing. This remark--it does not seem to be without foun-dation- is an expression of the legitimate need of sub-jects for clarification, of their desire to understand the governmental attitude of superiors. This does not pro-ceed from mere curiosity but rather is aimed at finding out what the nature of their obedience should be and how superiors intend to have them cooperate for the good of the community. A given concept of authority necessarily engenders' a corresponding notion of obedi-ence. If a superior conceives authority as a means of domination, his subjects have but one way of obeying, --that of executing his orders; accordingly, their col-, laboration for the common good remains very limited. If, on the other hand, the superior conceives authority' as a service, he is on his way towards achieving the complete collaboration of his subjects not only on the, level of execution but first of all on the level of thought and organization. There is a second reason which leads us to investigate the nature of authority, and this is the existence of a problem of obedience in the greater part of religious communities; this latter problem is one about which it can be asked whether it is not just as much or even ¯ This section originally appeared as a separate article, "L'auto-rit~ d'apr~s l'enseignement de J~sus," in La vie des communautds religi~uses, v. 20 (1962), pp. 271-6. more so a problem of authority.1 What makes obedience so difficult for today's religious is not just the need of a greater independence--fruit of their education--but also the desire for a more evangelical conception and exercise of authority. They cannot endure to have supe-riors form a notion of authority according to their own liking as though they were indifferent whether their notion does or does not square with that of Christ. In the face of this need for evangelical authenticity, supe-riors ought to reconsider their notion of authority, a matter that necessitates knowing the teaching of Christ on the point. Three times on the occasion of three different episodes Christ provided His disciples with clear instruction on the nature of authority. The first two of these episodes are reported for us by the synoptics while the third is told only by St. John. First episode: This episode is told us by St. Matthew and St. Mark in the following way: It was at this time that the disciples came to Jesus and asked him: "Who then is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?" Jesus called a little child and placed him in the midst of them. "I tell you in all seriousness," he said, "that if you do not return to the condition of children, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven. The man, therefore, who makes himself little like this little child, he is the one who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven" (Mt 18:1-4). When they arrived at Capernaum and had reached their house, he asked them: "What were you arguing about during the trip?" They kept quiet because during the journey they had been arguing about which of them was the greatest. There-upon he sat down and called the Twelve to him. "If any one of you wishes to be first," he said, "he must make himself the last of all and the servant of all" (Mk 9:33-5). On the journey to Capernaum (Mk) the disciples were vain enough to argue about which of them was the greatest and hence the rightful one to occupy the first place. As Father Congar remarks, this was a subject of frequent discussion in Judaism: In Judaism there was a great deal of discussion about the one to take the first place: whether it was a matter of a cultural meeting or of administration or of table arrangement, the ques-tion of precedence was constantly recurring. Perhaps as a re-sult of the promise to Peter o£ the keys .to the kingdom, the disciples themselves argued about who was the greatest? Once they had arrived at Capernaum and had settled down in a house (the owner of which is unknown), Jesus, *This problem of authority in the Church has been emphasized in the cooperative work entitled Probl~mes de l'autoritd (Paris: Cerf, 1962). ~, *Y. Congar, "La hi~rarchie comme service selon le Nouveau Testament et les documents de la tradition," in L'dpiscopat et l'Eglise universelle (Paris: Cerf, 1962), pp. 69-70. VOLUME 24, 1965 4. 4. L. Bo~er~, REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS as St. Matthew tells it, was asked by the disciples to settle the argument. St. Mark, on the other hand, in-forms us that it was Jesus Himself who asked them the searching question: "What were you arguing about dur-ing the trip?" This leads one to suppose either that Christ did not make the trip to Capernaum with them or that the argument had been had by a group of the disciples with whom Christ was not present. But whether the question came from the disciples themselves or from Christ is of little importance; what matters is the instruction by action and by word that Christ gave on this occasion. He called a little child, placed it in the midst of them, and then said to them: "If you do not return to the condition of children, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, the man who makes himself little like this little child, he it is who is greatest in the kingdom of heaven." It should be noted that St. Matthew is the only one to speak here of the kingdom of heaven; and it is well known that the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God, and the Church are identified in their terrestrial phase, in their temporal realization. St. Mark, on the other hand, uses words of singular force: "If any man wishes to be the first, he will make himself the last of all and the servant of all." Christ, then, teaches us that to be the greatest in the kingdom a man mustmake himself the smallest, the last, the servant of all. Second episode: This episode is told us by both St. Matthew and St. Mark; but because the passages are long, only the text of St. Matthew will be given here: It was at this point that the mother of the sons of Zebedee, came up to him with her sons and knelt in front of him to ask him a favor. "What is it you want?" he asked. "Promise me," she said, "that in your kingdom these two sons of mine will sit next to you, one on the right and the other on the left." "You do not realize what you are asking," Jesus replied. "Can the two of you drink the cup that I am about to drink? . Yes, we can," they answered. "It is true," he told them, "that you will indeed drink my cup; but as for sitting on my right and on my left, that is not for me to grant; that belongs to the ones for whom my Father has destined it." When the other ten heard about this, they became indignant with the two brothers. Then Jesus called them to him and said: "You know that the ru.lers of the pagans lord it over them and that their mighty ones tyrannize them. But such must not be the case among you. On the contrary, whoever wishes to become great among you must become the servant of all of you; and whoever wishes to be the first among you must be ~our slave-- just as the Son of Man has not come in order to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for men" (Mt 20:20-8), This episode is concerned with a request made of Christ by the mother of the sons of Zebedee, as St. Matthew relates it; though St. Mark puts the request on the lips of the sons of Zebedee themselves. Their desire is nothing less than to sit on the right and left of Christ in His new kingdom; in other words, they wanted to have the chief positions after that of Christ.- After James and John had assured Christ that they could drink His cup, He told them that it was not His prerogative to determine who would sit at His right and His left in the kingdom and that this was a matter that pertained to His Father. Undoubtedly, this response left them as well as their mother a little confused and humiliated. Moreover, they came to realize that their request had been highly audacious and that it was not taken very graciously by the rest of the disciples who were indignant at it. It was precisely this indignation of the disciples which was the occasion not for words of reproach and blame but for the magnificent answer of Christ given in the text cited above. Hence, "as there are in the order of earthly societies, so also in the order of the gospel there exist the great ones, the first ones." ~ But the attitude of the great men in the order of the gospel should be entirely different from the attitude of the great ones of earthly societies. The great ones of the earth make their power felt, they show themselves as masters, they lord it over others. The relationship of inequality that exists between them and their subjects is a relationship of domination from the viewpoint of the former and one of subjection from the viewpoint of the latter. This, precisely, is a conception of authority which Christ cannot admit and which in consequence should not exist among His disciples. According to the gospel the way leading to the rank of first or great.is that of seeking a position or relationship not of power but of service, that of a minister [dial~onos], a servant, a doulos, a slave, a laborer. Throughout the New Testament diakonia--the state, behavior, and activity of a servant--ap-pears as coextensive and concretely identified with the character-istic condition of the disciple, of the person who, having been overwhelmed by Christ, lives in dependence on Him. This comportment of service, not of power, which Christ makes a law for His disciples is explicitly linked by Him with their comportment with regard to Him their Master; for the disciple is not just a pupil receiving instruction but is one who imiuites the Master whose life he shares. But Christ lived out and defined His mission in the Isaiah terms of the Servant of Yahweh. He had not come to lord it over others but to serve as a slave, to live the condition of a slave even to the specific detail of being sold so as to make himself the equivalent of a ransom.' The disciples likewise "ascend only by humbling them-selves, by following Christ on the way of descent, the ' Congar, "La hi~rarchie," p. 71. ' Congar, "La hi~rarchie," pp. 71-2. ÷ ÷ ÷ Religious Authodty VOLUME 24, 1965 ÷ ÷ ,÷ L. Bois~ert, O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS way of the gift and loss of self . " 5 The attitude of the servant and the slave should be the normal attitude of one who has been raised to a state of external greatness. Third episode: This episode is found in St. John 13:12-7: When he had washed their feet and had put on his clothes, he resumed his place at table and spoke to them: "Do you realize what I have just done to you? You call me 'Teacher' and 'Master' and you are right in saying this because I am such. But if I, your Master and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought also to wash the feet of each other. I have given you this example so that you may act as I have acted towards you. I tell you with all earnestness that the slave is not greater than his master and that the messenger is not greater than the man who sent him. Once you realize these things, you will find happiness in doing them." The occasion for Christ's action was, no doubt, the discreditable incident that took place during the pas-chal repast and "which was in singular contrast with the solemnity of the occasion";0 as St. Luke puts it: "There arose among them a dispute as to which of them should be regarded as the greatest" (Lk 22:24). Once more it is the question of precedence; Christ must have been saddened and even upset; His teaching about hu-mility had not been understood. Once again, instead of addressing the Apostles with words of lesser or greater harshness, Christ performs an action which constitutes an awesome lesson for them and makes them realize the ridiculousness of their dispute: He washes their feet. It is sufficient here to note the following: "The wash-ing of feet was classed distinctly as the work of slaves. A slave of Jewish descent could not be obligated to do it, but only a slave of another nationality." 7 Christ, since He was Teacher and Master, had the right to lord it over them, to act as a master, to impose His will, to command, to dominate; He renounces this .right to take the attitude of a slave, of a servant. He does this to give His Apostles and all future Christians an example to be imitated so that we who before God are but servants and slaves might learn to give service and 'to minister to each other. The relationship which should exist among Christians is a relationship of service. "St. Luke, who does not record the washing of feet, still gives its moral lesson, precisely with reference to the * Congar, "La hi~rarchie," p. 73. e F. Prat, Jesus Christ: His LiIe, His Teaching, and His Work (Milwaukee: Bruce, 1950), v. 2, p. 264. 7 F. M. Willam, The Life of Jesus Christ (St. Louis: Herder, 1936), p. 380. incident which seems to us to have called it forth." s As Luke puts it: The kings of the heathen lord it over them, and the ones who tyrannize them are called their "benefactors." But it must not be so among you. On the contrary, the greatest among you should behave like the youngest and the chief like the servant. Who is the greater, the one reclining at table or the one serving? Is it not the one who is reclining? And I am in the midst of you as one who serves (Lk 22:25-7). The greatest, then, must make himself the servant; he must be in a state of service with regard to those who are subject to him. According to the teaching of Christ, authority is essen-tially a service; and the person who holds authority is a servant. This comportment of service which defines the condition of the superior likewise constitutes the essen-tial law of the members of the ecclesial community to such an extent that all Christians should serve one an-other. From this it can be seen that the activity of the superior is to be situated as a prolongation of the Christian life and that it is, in short, a special function of service within the community and for the good of the community. AUTHORITY AND COMMUNITYt Our brief analysis of these three gospel episodes has already shown us that according to the teaching of Christ authority is essentially a service and the person who pos-sesses it a servant: The kings of the pagans lord it over them and those who tyran-nize them are called their "benefactors." But it is not to be the same among you. On the contrary, the greatest among you is to act like the least and the chief like a servant (Lk 22:25-6). The aim of the present section of this article is to empha-size this central point of authority-service by specifying the relationship that should normally exist between aft-thority and the threefold community: the human com-munity, the Christian community, and the religious com-munity. Authority and the Human Community The human community is essentially a community of equals since all men are of the same nature. Hence those who command others do not do so by reason of an essen-tial superiority. Neither is it by reason of certain par-s Prat, Jesus Christ, v. 2, p. 267. ~fOriginally a separate article entitled, "Autoritfi et commu-naut.," this section appeared in La vie des communautds religieuses, v. 20 (1962), pp. 309-15. ÷ ÷ 4- Religious Authority VOLUME 24, 196S L. Bols~ert~ O.F.~I. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 40 ticular values (for example, nobility, wealth, power, su-perior degree of intelligence or virtue) that certain ones possess authority since these values, while they engender prestige, do not confer any rights over others. Even though an unlimited number of historical facts show the strong dominating the weak and even reducing them to slavery, still this proves only the existence of a state of disorder, the consequence of original sin, in which man behaves to his fellow man like a wolf (homo homini lupus) instead of like a brother. The only principle which justifies the possession and the exercise of authority within the human community is the good of others, whether of the others taken indi-vidually or as the entire community. Since the raison d'etre of authority is the welfare of others, it has mean-ing and can be understood only if it is considered in relation to the community. The person, then, who possesses authority is situated in a state of service with regard to his brothers, for he possesses it only in the interest of those subordinated to him. If he has a right to remuneration from the com-munity because he is at their service, he nevertheless abuses his power if he uses his authority for his own personal interest at the expense of his subjects. In this latter case authority, instead of being directed toward the good of each and all, is directed to the good of the person who possesses it; in place of being a state of re-sponsibility and of service, it is "an occasion of getting more enjoyment, of permitting oneself everything, and of serving oneself." The welfare of others being the fundamental prin-ciple that justifies the possession of authority, it is like-wise the principle that justifies the imposition of limits on the exercise of this authority. The person who pos-sesses power does not have the right to command what-ever he pleases, abstraction being made from the wel-fare of others. If the object of his command exceeds the range of the authority he has received or if the com-mand is flatly counter to the welfare of the community, the subjects can and even should refrain from obeying since the obligation to obey always supposes the legiti-mate possession and exercise of authority. Hence, already in the human community as such it is true that authority is a service and its holders are servants. The word "minister" which is sometimes used to denote persons in charge of the welfare of particular communities is nothing else than a translation of this fundamental truth. When we speak of the "prime min-ister" of a country or of some other political unit, this should normally mean the person who is most at the servi~e of this country or of this political unit; for degree of service corresponds or should correspond to the de-gree of authority. Authority and the Christian Community Far from constituting a reality apart from .and, as it were, exterior to the human community, the Christian community is actually situated within that community and is its perfective complement. Christ did not send His disciples to the desert to be far away from the world so as to preserve them from contagion; rather it was His wish that His own, united in the ecclesial community, should be present in the world so that they might make truth and love rule where error and discord had domi-nated. This ecclesial community, the Mystical Body of Christ, is not a large organization, a system, a legalistic structure, or a juridical person; neither is it a collectivity consisting only of the members of the hierarchy; rather it is the community of the faithful as they tend to the perfection of love. Since, however, it is the express will of Christ, it must be admitted that in this Church there are lead-ers, a hierarchy, an authority. And since this authority is part of the Church's constitution, a knowledge of its exact nature can be had only by situating it in relation-ship to what we will call the fundamental exigency of the Christian community. According to the teaching of the gospel there is but one Master and but one Lord: Christ, the only source of every supernatural gift. Consequently, whatever con-stitutes the Christian community (for example, its Mys-tical Head, its animating Spirit, its sacraments, its min-istries, and so forth) is a gift of God, a grace from on high. From this there comes the obligation of this com-munity to be at the service of God, to have divine wor-ship as its principal goal, and to have thanksgiving as the central act of this worship. What is true for the ec-clesial community as such is equally true with regard to each of its members: the Christian possesses Christian reality only to the extent that he has received the grace of God. Since everything that makes him a Christian is a gift, he must assume the attitude not of a master and lord but that of a steward and administrator, roles which are essentially an attitude of service. He must be "a man of submission and of gratitude" and not a man of a pos-sessive spirit. When he uses the gifts he has received, he must force himself with the greatest fidelity to acknowl-edge and respect the purposes of his Master and Bene-factor. The purpose of Christ with regard to the gifts that He confers is clearly expressed by St. Paul: ÷ ÷ ÷ Religious Authority VOLUME 24, 1965 41 4. 4. 4. L. Bolsv~t, O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS Though there is a variety of spiritual gifts, there is but one and the same Spirit; though there is a variety of ministries, there is but one and the same Lord; and though there is a variety of ways in which God acts, still there is the one and same God acting in all. ~Each man is given his own manifestation of the Spirit Ior the sake o] the common good (1 Cor 12:4-7). He made some to be apostles, some prophets, some mission-aries, some pastors and teachers; he disposed Christians in this way for the sake of the ministry that the body of Christ might be built up (Eph 4:11-2). Hence the gifts which the Christian receives are directed to the building up of the Mystical Body of Christ; they are not given him for himself alone but for all; thus they make him "a means of living and growing for others." But the Christian can benefit others through the gifts he has received only if he takes an attitude of service with regard to his brethren, the way of behaving of a servant who gives himself devotedly. This is the attitude adopted by St. Paul: Though I am a free man in the eyes of all, still I have made myself a slave to all men in order that I might win more of them (1 Cor 9:19). It is not ourselves that we preach but Christ Jesus the Lord; and we are your slaves for the sake of Jesus (2 Cor 4:5). And this same attitude is considered by St. Paul and St. Peter as the normal attitude of every Christian: My brothers, you were called to be free; but do not use this freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love put yourselves at the service of each other (Gal 5:13). In accord with the grace each has received, put yourselves at the service of each other like trustworthy stewards of the mani-fold grace of God (1 Pt 4:10). Hence each member of the Mystical Body ought to be the servant of all. This fundamental exigency of the Christian condition is coextensive with the very state of a Christian, for there is no genuine life in Christ without charity; that is, without a love that gives and serves. There should exist among Christians a constant exchange of services. It is in this general context of service that authority is situated. It is not a primary gift prior to the com-munity and, as it were, independent of it; it is rather a secondary reality which supposes the existence of the primary reality and which cannot be properly under-stood except insofar as it is placed within this primary reality. According to the New Testament, the different words used to designate individual ministries "denote a task or an activity as a stable service within the com-munity." The following are examples of this: apostles, teachers, prophets (1 Cot 12:28); missionaries and teach-ers (Eph 4:11); pastors (Eph 4:11); guardians and over- seers (Acts 20:28; Phil 1:1); elders (Acts 11:30; 14:23); ministers (Phil 1:1; 1 Tim 3:8-9); leaders, rulers (Heb 13:7, 17); president (Kom 12:8); steward, manager (Lk 12:42; 1 Cot 4:1; Tit 1:7).9 This list gives the special titles and degTees of service within the Christian community and shows us that au-thority is not exempt from service but a call to a different and more perfect service. Between ordinary Christians and the members of the hierarchy there can and should exist only a difference in the situation of their service, only different manners of serving Christ and the breth-ren within the Mystical Body. Those who possess author-ity have above all the role of organizing and coordinating the particular services that exist in the Church and also of exercising the ministry of the word and of worship. Once more, this is only one of the forms of what Chris-tians are to do "by and for each other" in view of their common supernatural destiny. The attitude of Christ among men--an attitude that He has summarized in the words: "I have not come to be served but to serve"---ought to be the preeminent attitude of the person who presides in the Church. Thus, for example, St. Paul, who on occasion knew how to vindicate his title of Apostle (Rom 1:1; Gal 1:15) and his apostolic authority (Gal 1:8), after the manner of Christ preferred not to bring his rights and powers into play (I Cor 9:12). He preferred to act like the servant, the slave of his brethren (1 Cor 9:19; 2 Cot 4:5) rather than to rule and to act the master (2 Cor 1:24). He considered the faithful as his masters, and it is their welfare that determines the application of his efforts. When situated in the general context of service which defines Christian existence, authority appears to us less as the right and power of one Christian over other Christians than as a trust, a duty, a responsibility, a serv-ice. To express the nature of this authority it is not suffi-cient to say that it is an ordinary juridical power exer-cised in a spirit of disinterestedness and of service: like Christian existence itself, authority is essentially and intrinsically service. Authority and the Religious Community Just as the Christian community is situated within the human community and is its perfective complement, so also the religious community is so much a part of the Christian community that it is from the latter that the religious community derives its meaning and its life. The nature of the religious community will never be under-stood if it is separated from the Church or if it is 0 Congar, "La hi~rarchie," p. 81. 4- 4. 4. Religious Authority VOLUME 24, 1965 43 L. Boisvert, O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 44 regarded as being attached to it like some merely ex-ternal appendage. An individual religious community is formed of baptized persons who have taken a serious attitude towards their baptismal commitments and who have adopted a manner of life more favorable to their accomplishment. Hence a religious community should not be considered as first of all a large organization in which everything runs smoothly when the relations between superiors and subjects are without difficulty; it should rather be con-sidered as a community of baptized peisons who have chosen a particular state of life which allows them a more intimate encounter with Christ and a more inte-gral response to their Christian vocation. Since one of the fundamental exigencies of this voca-tion is that of service [diakonia], it is normal that religious should excel in this, that more perfectly than others they should be at the service of God and of their brethren. Only thus will they be true witnesses to the One who emptied Himself for us by taking on the condition of a slave, of us (Phil 2:6-11). What should distinguish religious from ordinary Christians is not a difference in Christian life but a difference in the situation of their service and even more in the perfection of this service. Religious should live out to their fullness the following words of St. Peter: "Each according to the grace he has received, put yourselves at the service of one another like trustworthy stewards of the manifold grace of God" (1 Pt 4:10). Such an exchange of mutual services supposes, it is true, a great degree of availability, a profound interior freedom, and an effective death to oneself. Are not these indispensable conditions of service included in the very life of religious who by their profession prolong in their daily living the mystical death of their baptism? Their renunciation of the things of this world by poverty, of their own body by chastity, of the free use of their will by obedience puts them in a state of availability and of interior freedom which facilitates their service both of God and of their neighbor. It is in this context of a more perfect Christian service that it is necessary to situate the authority of the reli-gious superior. Just as the service of consecrated religious is distinguished from the service of ordinary Christians by the mode and perfection of its exercise, so also the authority of the religious superior should be distin-guished from Christian authority in general principally by the perfection of its exercise. It is necessary that the superior be at the service of his subjects as integrally as possible since the authority he possesses is essentially service and since he, by the renunciation contained in his religious life, should have acquired the interior free-dom necessary to be a perfect or at least a very good servant of his subjects. To have an effective solicitude for his subjects to the complete forgetfulness of himself should be the normal attitude of the religi6us superior. Only on this condition will he manifest to his sub-jects that he has not accepted au.thority for his own ad-vantage but for their temporal and spiritual welfare. And at the same time he will be a genuine witness to the Christ who came upon earth to serve and who has taught us that authority by its very structm;e is a service. While it is true that authority even in the human community can be regarded as a service since its pos-sessors have received it only for the benefit of others, in the ecclesial community it is only a special application of the common situation of service which characterizes Christian existence. Hence it is not a thing apart in the Church where it is exercised, but it is one way among many others of serving God and men. It is likewise in this general context of service that there is to be situated the authority of the religious superior, with the distinc-tive note, however; that it should be exercised in a more perfect way, given that religious enter a community not to cease serving God and their brethren but to serve them more perfectly. POSITlVE EXIGENCIES OF AUTHORITY-SERvICE~ As we have seen, according to Scripture authority is essentially service and the person who possesses it a serv-ant. The religious superior1° who, as he should, ac-cepts this divine teaching will doubtless abstain from re-garding his authority as an honor and a source of privi-leges or as an end in itself which can be sought for its own sake; likewise he will refrain from "ruling like a lord over his flock as the pagans do" and from making the weight of his authority felt. But this is not enough. It is furthermore necessary that the superior should know the principal positive exigencies of this Christian con-ception of authority and that he should respect these exigencies in his manner of government. The present sec-tion of this article will be concerned with pointing out some of these exigencies and will center its considerations around two fundamental ideas: (1) the superior is at the service of a community of persons (2) who are tending toward the perfection of charity. ++This section was originally entitled, "Exigences positives de l'autorit~-service" and appeared in La vie des communautds reli-gieuses, v. 21 (1963), pp. 5-14. lo When I speak of "religious superior" and of "religious," I in-clude in a generic fashion all men and women superiors of religious communities and all men and women religious. + + 4- Religious Authtrrity VOLUME 24, 1965 L. Boisvert, O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 46 At the Service of a Community of Persons Knowing one's subjects: When one wishes to be of service to another person, it is first of all necessary to know him well; for the better one knows another, the more he is in a position to help him. The superior, whose duty it is to serve, should make every effort to acquire a thorough knowledge of his subjects, of their aspira-tions, their aptitudes, their needs. The great means of acquiring this knowledge still remains that of listening to them.--something that implies a great deal more than a more or less distracted hearing of what they say. To listen means to open oneself to another, to put oneself in a state of availability, of total receptivity to the other's words so that what is said can be grasped exactly and totally without exaggeration or diminution. A person is not listening when he continues his own thoughts while the other person is speaking, or when he presents a solu-tion even though the other person has scarcely begun to express his problem, or when he gives a decision-- favorable or unfavorable--before the statement of the case has been finished. Neither is a person listening in a true sense when he gives more attention to the person speaking and the way in which he speaks than to what he says--as though the importance of the communication is measured by the likableness of the person and the finesse of his way of expressing himself. The superior who knows how to listen to his subjects gradually comes to a genuine knowledge of them and in this way becomes more able to serve them. This does not mean that he accepts all their ideas, their tastes, their whims, their enthusiasms; but it does mean that he recog-nizes and respects the immutable truths and values that are in them; and it means that if there are deviations and errors, he searches for the origin of these for the purpose of better rectifying or eliminating them. Act-ing in this way, he will discover in the religious of today--who give the appearance of being of a new and startling nature--a great deal of good will along with uprightness and honor coupled with a sincere desire to advance to perfection. He will also recognize that these religious do not appreciate at all a negative morality where the first place is given to renunciation, abnega-tion, suffering, and pain--to the cross without the halo of the Resurrection. What they prefer is a holiness that will be the free fulfillment of their life, of their courage and generosity, of their love and joy--a holiness that is under the sign of fulfillment rather than that of renun-ciation. Informing one's subjects: This knowledge that the su-perior acquires of his subjects by listening to them per- mits him not only to provide them with individual help but also to promote and organize their collaboration for the common good. It is the duty of all religious to serve the community of which they are members, since in tak-ing the religious habit they ha,~e not denied their particu-lar talents and since in promising obedience they have not made a vow of rigid passivity. And their collabora-tion for the common good should not be limited only to the execution of directives emanating from authority but should extend to every possible and useful level. This, as can be easily seen, can 'take place only if the superior keeps his religious knowledgeable about the problems, difficulties, projects, and so forth which con-cern the community so that they can aid him in tinding solutions and in improving things. Unless he has the charism of ~nspiration and of reve-lation- and perhaps also that of infallibility--the supe-rior cannot by himself find an adequate solution to all the problems involved in his community; nor can he per-ceive all the advantages and disadvantages of a project. Hence if he wants the complement of light which comes from his subjects, he must first of all inform them of the difficulties that need solutions and of the projects that need to be considered. The only person who would neg-lect the collaboration of his religious is one who believes himself wiser than he is, who has greater confidence in himself than is warranted, and who thinks that he is filled with the gifts of knowledge and wisdom. Actually, he, no more than the founder, has not received the gift from God "to speak the last word of wisdom for all time." 11 Promoting public opinion: The purpose of this in-forming of subjects by the superior is not only to com-municate to the religious the principal problems and projects of the community but also and above all to provoke personal reflection and discussions from which will emerge a public opinion. This public opinion is as necessary to the vitality of a religious community as it is to the vitality of the Church herself; and this latter need was affirmed by Pius XII in February of 1950 when he said: Because the Church is a living body, something would be wanting in her life if public opinion were lacking--and the blame for this deficiency would fall back upon the pastors and the faithful.~ This public opinion will become a source of life for ax Archbishop Roberts, S.J., Blacl~ Popes (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1954), p. 40. = Pius XII, "Allocutlon on the Catholic Press and Public Opinion" (February 18, 1950), Catholic Mind, v. 48 (1950), p. 753. ÷ + ÷ Religious Authorit~ VOLUME 24, 1965 the religious community only if the superior recognizes it and takes account of it to the degree that it includes elements of value. Hence it is necessary for him to con-sult his subjects after having informed them of the principal questions which concern them. This consulta-tion should not be considered by him as an act of con-descension on his part but as a duty and, from the side of the subjects, as a privilege and a right. This consulta-tion is so necessary to good government that Archbishop Roberts has not hesitated to affirm: "It is humanly im-possible to exercise authority without consulting the governed. To deny this is to make nonsense of obedi-ence." is This does not mean that the consultation of subjects is essential for the valid exercise of authority, no more than the consultation of the laity, even on questions of vital interest to them, is essential in order that the su-preme pontiff or the ecumenical council can authorita-tively pronounce on such questions. Nevertheless, the sovereign pontiff and the bishops are consulting the laity more and more because they know very well that the latter are more capable to explaining their own problems and 6f finding the most adequate solutions for them. Why should any other way of acting be used by the religious superior who does not have the special assist-ance of the Holy Spirit which Christ has promised the hierarchy in doctrinal matters? If, then, it is necessary for the superior to consult his subjects in order to exercise his authority in a more profitable way and thereby to serve his community bet-ter, it is equally necessary that subjects should present the superior with all the data necessary to judge a given question. When the matter at stake appears to them to be fundamental, subjects should not fear to use all their competence to support their arguments in the discus-sions they may have with the superior. This proves that their concern engrosses them sufficiently "to arouse them to make their needs known by effective presentations." Take, for example, "the apostolic practice of daily Com-munion, in abeyance for so many years"; this was not restored just by a stroke of the papal pen. Effect was given to our Lord's wish because some people expressed de-cisively- yes, at the risk of being hurt--the hunger they felt. The same is true of recent facilities for evening Mass and non-fasting Communion, and indeed of every other reform that has ever been?' L. Boi~vert, O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 48 Public opinion, the purpose of which is to furnish the superior with the complement of information that Roberts, Black Popes, p. 4. Roberts, Black Popes, p. 5. permits him to give a decision with a better knowledge of the matter, should not, however, so influence his de-cision that the superior appears to be but "the resultant or the projection of the forces which are at work in the group." In this way a religious community would be-come a naive democracy where the superior would be only the representative or the voice of his subjects. This would be a complete failure to recognize the nature both of authority and of obedience. If the decision of the su-perior can and even should be illuminated by public opinion, still it must not be considered as the simple logical resultant of it. It pertains to authority, not to subjects, to make definitive decisions. Consequently, when a decision is made by the superior, the subjects should accept and execute it with the great-est loyalty without bringing up, as a sort of riposte, the elements which the superior has not included in his decision. It is even necessary to add that the more vital public opinion is in a community, the more humble and total should be the acceptance of what the superior decides. If this is lacking, public opinion becomes a source of hurtful criticism, of disobedience, of disorder: it kills the religious spirit. On his side, the superior who makes a decision after having taken the best account he could of public opinion should not withdraw the decision except for a reasonable cause of legitimate necessity or great utility. To act "otherwise would be to give proof of levity and incon-stancy, of instability in judgment and command. On the other hand, if he sees that modifying his decision is nec-essary or useful, he should not obstinately keep to his first idea, thus depriving his subjects of an evident good. Delegating his powers: Religious, as we have remarked, have the duty of collaborating for the good of the com-munity. This collaboration should not be limited to the mere execution of directives coming from authority nor even just to the communication of their personal reflec-tions on matters proposed by the superior. Over and be-yond these, the superior must make his subjects share his responsibility by delegating them a part of his powers--a matter which does not at all mean that he renounces his own rights. A person who possesses authority is not under the obligation of making immediate and personal use of it in every case; that is, he does not himself have to regu-late all the details of common life with a great deal of attention to minutiae and a great loss of time. Such a procedure would result in making his subjects mere functionaries, instruments to receive and execute au-thority. The person possessing power can and even should en-trust others with particular tasks in order to develop in + + + Religious Authority VOLUME 24, 1965 49 4, 4, L. Boi~vert~ O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 50 them a sense of responsibility and to promote a better collaboration for the common good. This delegation of power, in addition to obliging subjects to make options that are revelatory to themselves and to others, provides the opportunity for initiative and the occasion for dis-covering and developing unsuspected talents. That this delegation of power includes the risk of error and mis-takes is part of the normal course of events. This risk, however, should not lead the superior to refuse to dele-gate any power since, in using his authority, he himself can commit the same or similar errors. The religious to whom the superior has delegated certain powers should exercise them fully without asking the superior to intervene in areas where they have the power to act themselves. If there are abuses in the area entrusted to them, subjects must learn to eliminate them without waiting for the superior to feel forced to intervene because of their inertia. They should have the courage to take measures that are distasteful to others rather than to throw the responsibility for them back on the superior, and this they should do even though the measures merit them dislike and unpopularity. It is only by paying this cost that delegation of power will develop in them a sense of responsibility and will genuinely con-tribute to the common good. On his side, the superior who has entrusted particular tasks to his subjects should take care to leave them the freedom that is necessary for them to carry out their tasks to the best of their ability. He should avoid con-stantly intervening to judge work already done, to im-pose his own ideas, or to insist on modifications. He should put complete confidence in his subjects, espe-cially in those areas where they have a real competence that he himself does not possess. The strength of the superior'.s authority and the effectiveness of his subjects' work will be in proportion to the frequency with which he acts by means of his subordinates and to the rarity of his personal interventions. The Service oI Persons Tending to the PerIection ol Charity Building up the interior man: Besides the exigencies of authority-service that we have already mentioned, there are others that flow from the fact that the superior is not only at the service of persons but precisely at the service of persons tending in a special way to the per-fection of charity. Without a doubt, the first of these exigencies is the superior's obligation to work for the spiritual welfare of his subjects, for the growth in them of the spiritual man. By the very nature of his office, the head of a religious community is a spiritual father, a pastor of souls, and not primarily an administrator or an organizer. In order to devote himself more completely to this central task of his, he should disengage himself as far as possible from routine matters, administrative tasks, and all affairs that prevent him from successfully fulfilling his primary duty. Hence he should hand over to others the care of matters of lesser importance that would dissipate his efforts; in this way he can devote himself more freely and effectively to the important spiritual function that is proper to him. He should not easily allow himself to succumb to the natural temptation to keep for himself the area of temporalities and to entrust to others the spiritual welfare of the community. Preaching the Word: As a pastor of souls, the superior should first of all nourish the spiritual life of his reli-gious by giving them the substantial food that is the Word of God. A profound interior life is impossible without faith, and there is no faith without meditation on the Word. Always necessary for the spiritual life, this Word is especially so for religious of the present generation among whom there is found a malaise, a dis-content, even a revolt which Father Ir~n~e Hausherr, S.J., considers a crisis of undernourishment, an anxiety of the hungry, a phenomenon of starvation.1~ Having come into the community to be spiritually filled, they re-volt when their entire nourishment consists of rules, reg-ulations, prohibitions, notices, and so forth. They are hungry for the Word of God which will nourish them and lead them to give themselves more fully; this it is that explains their discontent when they do not hear the Word. There can be no doubt that they would make their own the cry of an old gypsy woman in the presence of George Borrow, the English novelist and moralist. As he was passing a camp of gypsies in the vicinity of Chester, they mistook him for a minister of religion because of his ap-pearance and begged him to stop and speak to them of God. "I am neither a priest or a minister," he replied; "may the Lord have mercy on you--more than this I cannot say to you." As he went on his way, throwing some coins to the children, an old woman cried out to him: "We do not need money; give us God." 16 Fostering prayer: Besides nourishing his subjects with÷ the Word, the superior should help them to pray by+ providing them with a method and forms of praye+r which correspond to their religious sensibility. Not all ~ I. Hausherr, s.J., "Fundamentos teol6gicos de la vida religiosa," Seminarios, v. 12 (1960), pp. 7-18. 10 p. Blanchard, Saintetd aujourd'hui (Paris: Descl~e de Brouwer, 1954), p. 72. Religious Authority VOLUME 24, 1965 5] L. Bois~ert~ 0~. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS forms of prayer are equally valuable for all human be-ings at all times. There are forms of prayer that fifty years ago engendered and fostered prayer but that are incapable of producing this effect at the present time. The reason for this is not that present day religious have a bad will, that they want to break ancient structures for the mere pleasure of hearing them crack and fall to pieces. It is not a case of sheer desire for change or mere whim leading them to want to abandon and condemn what their seniors respect; what they want is a legitimate adaptation of forms of prayer, and traditionalism and conformism will not prevent them from refusing to re-tain antiquatedelements which have no other effect than to impede their prayer. Religious, for example, who have grasped the im-portance of the liturgy in the spiritual life, wish to in-tegrate it into their own lives as perfectly as possible and find it difficult to tolerate the imposition of a series of small prayers in addition to meditation, Mass, and the Divine Office. They cannot be reproached for want-ing to pray with and as the Church. Nor can they be blamed if, for the purpose of respecting as well as possi-ble the meaning of the canonical hours, they ask for the suppression of certain devotional prayers which en-cumber the horarium of the community and give the im-pression of having the same importance as canonical prayer. Observing, warning, correcting: Another exigency of authority-service is the painful duty of the superior to observe, warn, and correct his religious. St. Francis ex-presses this exigency at the beginning of Chapter Sixteen of his Second Rule: "The brothers who are ministers and servants of the other brothers should visit and warn their brothers and correct them with humility and charity . " Since the superior has the duty of weighing aptitude for religious life or for the priesthood in the case of those who have not yet taken these definitive steps, he must get a clear idea of their worth by observ-ing their actions. It is by action rather than by wor