With many other thoughts I've shared since beginning my personal review of what I as a consecrated Catholic Hermit am to be doing and "being", I now turn to the section 920 in The Catechism under the general heading of "Consecrated Life of the Church," specifically "The Eremitic Life."
Having given some thoughts on the first few phrases in 920--although not at all exhaustive (insights come with passage of time lived as a Catholic hermit)--I'm turning to the phrase following "hermits devote their life to the praise of God and the salvation of the world": through a stricter separation from the world....
The singular word "stricter" continues to be an operative aspect for me in my hermit vocation of now over 20 years since I began the discernment process which included experiencing in practicum aspects of what the Church outlines and asks of her hermits. Separation from the world, for a hermit, brings up many decisions to be made between the hermit and God.
God may speak and guide the hermit in various ways. For me, over the years, God has guided and continues to guide my hermit life through His Living Word, His voice in locutions and dreams, through the Blessed Virgin Mary and my guardian angel, through the lives of saintly hermits as well as those who wrote of the hermit vocation through the centuries.
God guides me through His priests, particularly and predominantly one over the years but also through a bishop and monsignor for a more brief time period. God also guides me through life various life circumstances and experiences requiring the discerning of His will and way forward--sometimes God's "Yes, that way" or His "No, not that, not for you, My hermit."
All these avenues of God's guidance inform a Catholic hermit as to what aspects, in the various phases and situations in the hermit's life, separate him- or herself from the world. While hermits' backgrounds in life are unique and individual to each, and there are considerations to be made accordingly, once entered into the consecrated eremitic vocation, the hermit life in earnest begins.
To most hermits and their human directors and spiritual friends--even those few others who might know that the person is a consecrated Catholic hermit--the ways in which a hermit ought separate from the world are fairly obvious. The categories are both external separations and interior ones.
External separations from the world could include a hermit's work, if must work for financial sustenance and not receiving retirement, disability, or savings income. Through prayer and discernment, a hermit who must work determines what type of job will provide the least amount of involvement in the world that will provide the basic, simple necessities for the hermit's sustenance.
I don't plan on going through all the options, but my point is that this type of discernment becomes an exercise of prayerful and prudent decisions of the hermit, and informed by God and those directing the hermit's vocation. It should be obvious that a hermit would choose employment that keeps the person as much in the silence of solitude and hidden from the eyes of men, plus in stricter separation from the world. Separation from the world means the temporal world which can include those "worlds" within the world, and in any mode or place in which the person must noticeably interact verbally and noticeably with people and processes.
So the hermit who must work to earn money to live a basic life and be self-sufficient, must discern what is it to be separated from the world in the form of "stricter"--which is an evolving process. Such positions as quasi-leader or assistant in a public venue be it hospital, parish/diocese administrator, college or school teacher, employee of an active business would not be obvious choices. Unless as custodian or some work that provides as is stated clearly--a stricter separation from the world--the hermit would naturally seek more appropriate means of income.
Work in the hermitage or work in which the hermit can quietly and in more hidden mode complete the tasks opens a wide range of possibilities. In discerning jobs that provide income, working at tasks which may be completed mostly--depending on the position--in silence and relative solitude, are numerous and fulfill another fundamental quality and consideration in a hermit's life. Usually such jobs are humble ones. All the better, a hermit might conclude.
Work to generate needed income is one such example of the discernment and decision-making that a consecrated Catholic hermit must make. Others include the interior aspects of interests and hobbies, of activities such as radio, television, and computer. What of these links to the world will a hermit have and of what type and how much interaction with the world will a hermit ultimately engage?
This example helps with the operative word "stricter" that I, as a consecrated Catholic hermit, can and must discern and determine. "Stricter" is a moving, evolving aspect that each hermit must ponder, and "stricter" allows for gradation of more separation as the hermit grows and evolves in his or her individual vocation--all the while keeping in mind and heart that we consecrated Catholic hermits--whether publicly or privately professed--are united in the vocation.
Stricter separation from the world in an interior sense is all that which keeps a hermit's mind, heart, and soul from being drawn away into the distractions of the world. The need for stricter separation allows the consecrated Catholic hermit to ascend the spiritual ladder, uplifting with the hermit those with the hermit in the consecrated life of the Church, all in the Body of Christ. This ascension to God may occur in part through the hermit's devoted life in the praise of God and the salvation of the world, with a spiritually unimpeded hermit in whatever ways and essences God wills, desires, and allows.
The more we can adhere to each aspect of hermit vocation be it explicitly or implicitly laid out for us in the Church's institutes or in the lives of exemplary, saintly hermits of tradition, the more we uplift one another and the hermit vocation in a way that builds up the Body of Christ, exalts the Church, and lives out in a supernal reality our devotion to the praise of God and the salvation of the world.
In each hermit adhering to a stricter separation from the world, we are better able to fulfill the aspects of our vocation and what God wills of us as stated in the beautifully-worded section on Eremitic Life, 921, in The Catechism of the Catholic Church.
"921 They manifest to everyone the interior aspect of the mystery of the Church, that is, personal intimacy with Christ. Hidden from the eyes of men, the life of the hermit is a silent preaching of the Lord, to whom he has surrendered his life simply because he is everything to him. Here is a particular call to find in the desert, in the thick of spiritual battle, the glory of the Crucified One."
Here, I must include the above selection because what is stated helps inform me and other consecrated Catholic hermits as to why we must separate ourselves from the world--plus gives us description within the words as to how and from what we must separate ourselves. Yet due to the "stricter" upon which I am personally now examining, the Church is not unrealistic with us, as we are human and in process even within our vocations. We are hermits in a continuum of formation, so to speak, of advancing to the heights of ultimately finding "the glory of the Crucified One."
We as consecrated Catholic hermits, live as one in Christ and in the Body of Christ. Thus through our lives being a silent preaching of the Lord, in our total surrender of our lives so that Christ is our all, we live "in the desert"--in silence of solitude, our specific call, our unique vocation, despite spiritual trials.
Stricter separation from the world rather than, such as, strict separation from the world, allows us to evolve in the loving mercy of Christ and in His Church's eremitic vocation. The word "stricter," though, involves subjectivity; what is stricter to one is lenient to another. Thus, tremendous honesty in self-examination and in not self-justification or self-deception. The human body, mind, and emotions struggle against what is more the challenge, what requires greater effort in the spiritual ascent.
That is why it is well to know in truth and faith the graces given through the eremitic vocation, being and living and doing all that the Church sets forth in the hermit life within the consecrated life of the Church. God will bring about, hone in us hermits, the progression, strength, the holy means to do and be hermits as He wills--increasingly so, degree by incremental degrees-- as long as we remain faithful to Him, to His Church, to the explicit and implicit form of the consecrated and Catholic, hermit life.
I pray this makes any sense to you readers. So much of a hermit's vocation, of course, is inherent in the truthfulness and honesty of a hermit's soul, in knowing oneself and seeing oneself clearly. We must make sure--not deceive ourselves--that we have a holy, experienced priest or bishop (or a holy bishop's delegate) as our spiritual director who is well-versed and "strict-er" in what it means to live out all aspects--what it is to do and be--as a consecrated Catholic hermit.
What is stricter to one may be not stricter at all to another. Personally, I am currently undergoing yet another transition or turning point in my vocation as a consecrated eremitic. This shift to more "-er" in the "stricter" occurs periodically in the nearly 20 years of living this vocation (nearly 19 years since the profession of the evangelical counsels and making my vows in private ceremony with my spiritual father, then a holy priest for 54 years.
God has all along tightened if not heightened in my hermit life, the aspects of which the Church not only suggests and purports but asks--of her consecrated hermits--beyond the required profession of and adherence to the counsels of poverty, obedience, and chastity. I pray that in this current, personal transition, for all the grace needed to live to the fullness of what the Lord desires and wills of me, at this point of my on-going, eremitic and mystical, Christian journey.
God bless His Real Presence in us!
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