VOWED LIFE:
A Sign of
Contradiction amidst the Decadence o Values.
Introduction
Consecrated Life is rooted in Baptism and fully
expresses the Christian vocation to follow Christ more closely under the action
of the Holy Spirit. It calls for a total commitment to the way of Christ, to
the Evangelical counsels of Chastity, Poverty and Obedience and the Gospel
Values. Consecrated Life demands of the
one who called the gift of self in a total and undivided manner; a gift of
one’s whole being in response to Christ’s total gift of self. The gift of
consecrated life is a call to affirm the primacy of God in the lives of
consecrated persons and to continue discovering “the beauty and freshness of
the person of Jesus” and the centrality of Christ and His message as the
foundational element of one’s dedicated life. It also demands a passionate love
affair with the Lord and His Kingdom.
By the vows of Consecrated Celibacy, Evangelical
Poverty and Prophetic Obedience the religious create an alternate world, which
on the basis of the Gospel prophetically challenges the power of the Prince of
this World. This alternate world is not a place or even a group of people. It
is primarily a certain way of understanding, organizing and operating within
and upon the basic coordinates of all human life; material good , power and
sexuality. Each vow gives a specific response to the great temptations of time;
the lust of flesh, lust of the eyes and the pride of life. The three vows touch
the human persons at the level of the three essential spheres of one’s
existence and relationships; affectivity, possession and power. Through the
profession of Evangelical Counsels made in the Church, the religious wishes to
be set free from the hindrances that hold back her from loving God whole
heartedly.
By the VOW OF CHASTITY
the Religious dedicates herself to God with an undivided heart. This single
minded love and devotion helped her to control her sexual impulses and to be
open to others without any thought of domination and exclusiveness. This vow is
stark contrast to what the world holds as indispensable. The world is living
today in an era of carnality which glorifies sex, hates restraint, identifies
purity with coldness, innocence with ignorance and turns men and women into sex
objects.
On the other hand, a woman who takes the vow of
Chastity does so, not to escape the sacrifices that marriage demands, but to
detach herself from all the ties of the flesh in order to be free for greater
Service. As St. Paul puts it; “He that is with a life is solicitous for the
things of the world, how he may please his wife; and he is divided. He that is
without a wife solicitous for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may
please God.”
Society today has made sex another
consumer item, portraying sexual indulgences as one of the necessities of life.
The precise offering inherent in the Vow of Chastity is the offering of the
body, will and mind in regard to the self gift of the sexual faculties. By this
vow we renounce the intimate and faithful companionship of a beloved. For
example; sharing of “secrets” of intimate presence, promises, consolation, etc.
we place in the heart of Christ our need for such attention, concern and
gratification. The vow of Chastity is a real holocaust of body and soul. It is
willingly chosen for God’s sake and joyfully lived as a continuous breaking of
one’s body in love for Him. It is choice of undivided love of Christ and
dedication to His person. It is a profound and supernatural love that does not
absorb, or suppresses other loves but integrates them, enables them, enriches
them, conserves them, perfects them and illuminates them.(1Cor 13:4-7). It is
an imitation of Christ who renounced physical, sexual gratification or its
intimate expression; He renounced the companionship of a “Special” woman. This too
is our choice. (Mt 8:20, Mk 3:21, 31-35).
God and the soul of the religious have the sane
relation, spirituality that a man and woman have when they are married, where
no other creature may share certain aspects of this sacred ground. One is free
to love and serve not just another man or woman but everyone in the bonds of
charity in Christ Jesus our Lord. Marriage releases the flesh from its
individual selfishness for the service of the family; the vow of Chastity
releases the flesh not only from the narrow and circumscribed family but also
for the service of that family which embraces all humanity. Thus a Religious
belongs to not one family but to all.
The Vow of Chastity is not something
negative; it is not just an unopened bud; it is not something cold; it is not
selfishness born of love and the highest love of all. It is what Francis
Thompson calls a “passionless passion and wild tranquility.” Chastity is the
virtue which enables the soul to breathe purest air even in the foulest of
places. “Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see”- see even God. (Mt
5)
Life
in Poverty proclaims that God is one’s only real treasure. The word
“poverty” is foreign to the spirit of the world as its primary concern is to
acquire, to own, to posses; its aristocracy is not one of blood or virtue but
of money; it judges one’s worth not by righteousness in terms of possessions.
Our Blessed Lord came into the world to destroy this
acquisitiveness and this subservience of moral order to economic ends by
preaching the Blessedness of the poor in spirit. He not only preached but lived
it, right from the crib to the cross to conquer the three kinds of pride; Economic pride, that is the pride of
what one has, Social Pride, that is
the pride of what one is and Intellectual
Pride that the pride of what one knows.
Christ became economically poor, to
counteract the unlimited pursuit of wealth as the noblest end of man and the
glorifying in what one has. He chose his mother from the poor classes. He who
owned the earth and the fullness thereof chose for his birthplace a deserted
shepherd’s cave.
“The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have
their nets; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.”(Mat 8:20).
Bethlehem refused him an inn; Nazareth drove him from its gates and Jerusalem
stoned Him. In His death he was stripped off His garments-the last remnant of
earthly possessions, He was executed on a cross erected at public expense and
buried in a stranger’s grave. He who was rich became poor for our sake that we
might be rich. Our life in poverty is in imitation of Christ who was poor in
birth, poorer life, poorest of all in death. Contrary to the values of the
world, poverty prevents us from being enslaved by our personal needs, desires,
interests and pursuits.
For
Francis the basic element in poverty was not so much the absence of possessions
but rather the freedom from any obstacle to opening our hearts to welcome Him
who gave Himself to us.
By our life in poverty, we give up not
only all that we possess but also our pride and our cravings for power,
position, possession, prestige, pleasure, privileges and praise. We joyfully
place our time, talents, energy, potentials and our whole being at the service
of God’s people. We undertake a painful journey from complete self-sufficiency
to utter dependence on God, as we tread the self-emptying path of Christ in our
life of poverty.
“Seek
first the Kingdom of God and His holiness and all these things shall be yours
as well.” (Mt6:33). Since we have chosen God for our portion, we are under
His special care or providence. For us to seek God’s Kingdom and His holiness,
means to live our vocation as we ought. Yet it is precisely this abandonment to
Divine Providence that frees us from being smothered by our egoism and allows
us to live according to God’s plan.
Poverty of spirit is therefore a
progressive renunciation of any claim to ownership of possessions and
qualities. This self-renunciation leaves us naked before God with no though of
relying on what we are or what we have. We see clearly that whatever qualities
or riches we possess are free gifts from God. So joyfully and willingly we renounce
the right to freely use and dispose of material goods. Our claim to be poor is
accompanied by our clear choice of leaving aside everything unnecessary as St.
Paul says, “I consider everything else as
rubbish in the pursuit of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.”
A luminous, joyful and austere life of the Gospel values throws into
stark relief the futility of unbridled lust for economic and social power as a
basis for self realization. The rampant capitalism which is driven forward by
the profit motive even at the cost of crushing in it’s the path, the dignity
and life of many countries, is now permeating every social relationship,
threatening to produce a morality that serves to justify selfish pleasure
seeking. In such a world being poor means accepting the challenge that God
alone is our wealth and our only treasure.
Life in Obedience.
Obedience
in its true sense means to listen carefully/ pay attention(Ob-audire)- to give
an ear to the Spirit of God moving and working in my life; to listen so that I
might know what God’s will is for my life, in my life.
Our Life in Obedience is a “Response
of Love” to the One who loves us. The Root Paradigm for our life in obedience
is Christ, who came to do His Father’s will and becoming obedient unto death
wrought our salvation. He stated clearly the reason for His coming. “Lo I have
cone to do Thy will O God” (Heb 10:7). Carrying out the Father’s plan was his
purpose “My food is to do the will of Him who sent me” (Jn 4:34). Our life in
obedience is an imitation of the obedience of Christ. By our profession of
obedience we offer the complete surrender of our will as a sacrifice to God. We
daily try to be attentive to the Holy Spirit, discern God’s will here and now
and put it into practice in our daily life. The vow of obedience helps us to
live in the “Marian Role” of saying “Yes” to the will of God in every event of
our life.
Obedience is a vow about listening to
the intimate voice of God, who truly commands our obedience. To seek God’s will
is to make the most loving choices and decisions at any given moment. Obedience
is not merely when asked for, or required absolutely, or when the authorities
are present, or when it is pleasant. It is a life time business; it demands a
constant sacrifice of our ego and the annihilation of self.
Obedience is the key to God’s heart
(Heb 10:5). It is a dying of self and allowing one’s heart be wounded so as to
accept in full the Father’s will; not to bend God to my will but to bend my own
sweet will to God and saying “Yes”. More than anything else our will belongs to
Christ. Therefore every time we make use of our will for ourselves, we are
taking it away from its rightful owner. Jesus shared the same will with the
Father, yet it caused Him to sweat blood to obey the Father’s will. Like Christ
a religious should be able to say, “I always do what is pleasing to Him.”(Jn
8:29).
Religious Obedience is not merely the
submission of one’s will to another’s will; through obedience we submit to the
mysteriously hidden wisdom of God, working through His weak instruments,
sometimes reminding us that, “My ways are not your ways.” The members who
renounce joyfully their family, the privilege of having children and
possessions are drawn for a greater purpose and live together as a supernatural
family. While living together in fraternal harmony we are better able to
discern and carry out God’s will, encouraging each other to follow the path of
obedience to the Father. When we choose to live the Gospel life in fraternity,
we renounce the luxury of deciding thongs for ourselves.
Our free will is an indelible gift of
God. In surrendering our will to God through the superiors, we are renouncing
the instinct to follow our self-will and to arrange our own lives. The innate
desire to rule our lives makes obedience hard. The universal desire for
self-fulfillment must be accepted as given by God, yet our ultimate fulfillment
lies in fulfilling God’s will and this involves our personal vocation, His plan
for the use of our talents and for our happiness. The purpose of life is not
that our talents be used to the full, or that our drives be satisfied. Our
personal drives and talents can be a means to explore what God’s plan might be.
The talented need discipline and their success both as persons and apostles is
best guaranteed by obedience. The restless human spirit always seeks something
better, even a mistaken better; it is brought to peace by obedience.
Obedience becomes a response to duty,
rather than to a person whom we love. It implies readiness for pain, fatigue,
incompleteness, even on a physical level. The temptation to put oneself above
the law while appealing to something higher can have foundations other than
love. The words of the apostles, “We must obey God rather than men.” (Acts
5:29), cannot justifiably used as general concept to nullify laws or commands
that we do not like or do not agree with. Yet human fulfillment cannot be
considered authentic unless it includes close union with God. Living on the
margins of the community, or minimal participation are not a legitimate choice
but a violation of vowed obedience. It includes that sometimes onerous task of
working our differences with other members and leaders. At all times it will
demand genuine self-abnegation for the sake of the common good.Vowed life is a
working together, in season and out of season, when convenient and
inconvenient, when one’s ideas prevail and when they do not.
Conclusion.
In our vowed life we offer ourselves
as fragrant victims to our Celestial Spouse and make an irrevocable solemn
sacrifice of oyr whole being to Him with the Triple vows of Chastity, Poverty
and Obedience. As spouses of Christ we should live for God, with God, in God
and in Jesus our only good. These three vows are the nails with which we are
fixed to the Cross along with the Crucified Jesus, who help us to live our
vowed life in joy and peace.
Religious Life, a discipleship of
equals united in mutual service could become the alternative political world
which would announce to the power-structure of this world the possibility of a
truly non-hierarchical community of sisters united around the Risen Lord. Human
nature is indeed deformed towards violence by the influence of the evil one.
Even in Jesus’ life time He had to intervene in the power dynamics among his
disciples, jockeying for prestige and power over each other and trying to
control the relation of others to Him. The politics of domination has always been
the ways of the world but it must be different among us who are called together
by One who washed your feet (Jn 13: 1-15), and who refused recourse to power
even to save His own life. (Mt 26: 53).
May the thought: I am a person
consecrated to God (1Pet 2:9). I am a part of the body of Christ (1Cor 6: 16),
I am the temple of the Holy Trinity (1Cor ^:19), and chosen as Royal priesthood
(1Pet 2:9) help us to live a faithful and fruitful vowed life! May we take care
of our life in prayer and God will take care of our life in Chastity, Poverty
and Obedience.
