I found the following information on Catholic News Agency online site, May 9, 2023. The explanation of those who attempt the hermit life but find the solitude too arduous is excellent means of understanding the difference between actual hermits and those who refer to themselves as such or begin as solitaries yet make adaptations otherwise. Many who begin as hermits otherwise develop means of living together in community be it under the same roof or locationally nearby, or who share houseing with another diocese hermit or live on monastery grounds close to the monks or sisters, participating in liturgy, meals, or other involvements.
Some in recent times live as diocese hermits and are involved in parish life in leadership positions or careers on parish or diocese staff, or have other careers involving people such as hospital chaplains or engaging in paid spiritual direction. Some have social lives involving friends with whom they dine out, go on weekend travels, participate in community events and functions, run retreat centers in which people come to stay or help provide for the one who considers him-or-herself a diocese "hermit" but who is not actually living in the silence of solitude nor other aspects traditionally nor set forth in The Catechism of the Catholic Church as specifically hermit conditions. These persons are more likened to those of the past who were not able to fulfill hermit life so veered more to the also acceptable cenobitic type lifestyle.
Fending for oneself, going to medical appointments, running errands for living and food necessities, living by oneself in an abode, paying one's way in life, if earning income then doing so in a solitary job which avoids interactions or involvements with people around, occasional public worship participation, and limited, as-needed charitable accessibilty by those who may wish to contact the hermit--all these are aspects of a hermit's temporal world needs.
Remaining hidden from the specific notice of others has and remains a key aspect of a hermit's existence; living out the Word of God in prayer, praise, and penance, as well as charity to those one may encounter in the temporal world responsibiltiies, also, are basic to the Christian Catholic hermit's vows and life, of which most if not all vows would include the hermit living the Word of God and adhering to the Gospel.
For those who are actual hermits more than cenobites, there will of course be times in which the hermit is forced by circumstance to be less in solitude, such as if having surgery requiring a few days or a week of someone present in after-care needs. Or, when the hermit in keeping with the "hidden from the eyes of men [humankind], must interact with medical staff or those living in neighborhoods or apartment complexes, to not draw attention to oneself as a "hermit" per se--the hermit thus interacts briefly in charity, discussing situations the others may desire or need to discuss in the normal course of living as in the world yet not of it.
From the following, we can see there is nothing wrong or in dispute of those who are hermits and those who are more cenobitic in their life styles and needs. Being strictly a hermit is not an easy path, nor is it required of anyone to be noted nor criticized if they are not called to the hermit life nor can remain in that life for long or exclusively. That is why it is good to read about those from the earliest times in Christianity who sought other means of living their vocations when finding it necessary for themselves to be living with others in community, be it in a religious order or shared housing, or working and socializing with others.
But that is not technically then living the hermit vocation. It is more living as a cenobite, as a religious who is in part inwardly prayerful and quiet, but in circumstance is interacting mostly with others during the day in work place or social life or in shared housing be it as a roommate in a single dwelling or living amidst many in apartment units. Running a diocese retreat center is an example of one who is around many people day and night, interacting more as a hotel manager, business accountant, librarian/gift shop salesperson, facilities manager, and activities director--and not really as a hermit, whether or not approved as such. Being a parish administrator, worship service leader, preacher, hospital chaplain, and diocese employees of various designations, are also not actually hermits per se, either, but can be considered more single persons living in the world doing religious type work with others, or who are more cenobitic by nature and function.
There have been noted in various articles, of current clerics not understanding the traditional role and lifestyle of hermits versus cenobitic religious persons. These are those who want to be hermits but are not actually suited to the solitude and hiddenness involved. The following discussion of early hermits and those who became cenobites, is helpful in determining one's path that God has chosen, and to what extent or degree of "hermit"--or as a cenobitic type living more among people yet with some aspects of solitude, prayer, and penance but not to the level of the traditional and set forth stipulations of hermit vocation.
Regardless, the following will help discern if one is able to live as a Catholic hermit or needs an adaptive version of the more arduous hermit existence of silence and solitude and being hidden from others, more removed from the temporal world. As we can read, there are "saints" of various types of persons--hermit or those who were more interactive and working within society and with others in the world, but living in their own apartment, diocese-supplied housing, or home at night. (There are no aspersions cast of any or all types or variations of any vocations, as we can see by the life examples of these saints.)
St. Pachomius can justifiabley be called the founder of cenobitic monasticism, monks who live in community. Even though St. Antony the Great was the first to go into the desert to live a life of seclusion pursuing evangelical perfection, he lived a heremitic life, that is, a primarily solitary life.
Pachomius first started out as a hermit in the desert, like many of the other men and women in the third and fourth centuries who sought the most radical expression of Christian life. There he developed a very strong bond of friendship with the hermit Palemon. One day during prayer, he had a vision in which he was called to build a monastery, and was told in the vision that many people who were eager to live an ascetic life in the desert, but were not inclined to the solitary life of a hermit, would come and join him. His hermit friend, Palemon, helped him to build the monastery and Pachomius insisted that his cenobites were to aspire to the austerity of the hermits.
However, Pachomius knew that his idea was a radical one, because most of the men who came to live in his monastery had only ever conceived of the eremitic lifestyle. His great accomplishment was to reconcile this desire for austere perfection with an openness to fulfilling the mundane requirements of community life as an expression of Christian love and service. He spent most of his first years as a cenobitic doing all the menial work on his own, knowing that his brother monks needed to be gently inducted into serving their brothers in the same manner. He therefore allowed them to devote all their time to spiritual exercises in those first years. At his death, there were eleven Pachomian monasteries: nine for men and two for women.
The rule that Pachomius drew up was said to have been dictated to him by an angel, and it is this rule that both St. Benedict in the west and St. Basil in the east drew upon to develop their better known rules of cenobitic life. St. Pachomius died in the year 346.
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