While I often do not comment on inquiries, I do receive them regularly, from readers. I tend not to desire being a "Dear Dr. Hermit" question-answer columnist, although such a format is certainly valid, I'd think, especially for those with more temporal aspects or curiosities of contemporary hermit life.
The difficulty remains, in such question-answer format commentary, by us consecrated Catholic hermits (privately as well as the more recently allowed, publicly professed), is that the hermit vocation is a rather uniquely individualized vocation in the day-to-day living of it. We Catholic hermits who write, such as in online blogs, realistically are merely sharing our own lived-out hermit vocations, for the requirements for this vocation are specifically stated, briefly but with scope that allows for the specifics of interpretation for individual hermits and their spiritual directors or if publicly professed, by a bishop or his designee.
What the Church states as far as the structure and parameters of the Eremitic Life, are found written in two sections, 920 and 921, in The Catechism of the Catholic Church. In addition, portions of 920 and 921 are repeated with additional provisions, found in the 1983 CL603 [Canon Law]. (This latter provides an option for those discerning a hermit vocation in the Consecrated Life of the Catholic Church--that of public profession as a diocesan hermit.)
My blog readers most often tended to inquire about "how to become a Catholic hermit." Yet there are other inquiries, of course, and these tend to have to do with curiosity and interest in topics having to do with a hermit's daily life, living out the hermit life, or why one would decide to become a Catholic hermit. These types of questions, if answered, would obviously be answered by individual consecrated Catholic hermits who write online or in articles, based upon their unique and personal opinions and descriptions. There is no official Church word or specifications on Her hermits and the living out of their vocations beyond what the Church sets forth in 920, 921 of The Catechism and the added portion of CL603.
Thus, when I or other hermits write about our hermit lives, or answer the inquiries we receive, our answers and input are strictly our own sharing, opinions, or personally experiential thoughts. For every hermit who writes, there will be varying answers and input, strictly from personal viewpoint of hermit and informed by what we've read of historical and traditional hermits, of deceased saint hermits, or evolved over our own, preferably years of our lives lived as professed and avowed, consecrated Catholic hermits, adhering to what the Church asks of us as stated in the cited documents.
So a reader has inquired "Does a hermit need friends?" Another has put it more as statement than question: "Hermits do not need friends." My comments on these recent inquiries to me will be obviously based on my hermit vocation lived experience of the past over 20 years, as well as with input from my late spiritual director who was my guide and mentor, as well, for over 24 years. [And now, if I would have questions, myself, or concerns regarding any aspect of how I am or should be living my hermit vocation, I email a priest whom I've known for over 8 years, or would ask my current confessor.
Usually if not always, the answers are found in prayer and asking the Lord or angel and saints including Mary to answer and guide me in specifics, and through lectio divina--the meditative pondering of Scripture. For by now in later years of life and entering third decade as a consecrated Catholic hermit, the more typical-type inquiries that readers ask, are not ones in which I have questions about myself that require other than referring back to what the Church explicitly states or are common sensical in the answers. Yet I find it personally good to ponder and review the various topics which arise through readers' questions.
Do hermits need friends? I tend to have come to recognize, at least after 20 years as a consecrated Catholic hermit and having evolved over time in this vocation to a more stricter living out of what I consider more the externals of the vocation (as the internal aspects are far more challenging, I think), that I do not need friends. So the reader who "asked" by including his own opinion--hermits do not need friends--at this point in my lived vocation, I agree. Hermits do not need "friends".
Yet, friends are all right for a hermit to have and enjoy; but they are not needed, per se. And we can become side-tracked and distracted from the benefits of living more actually and honestly a life of solitude and silence, in more hiddenness from the eyes of [others], when not having temporal friends and what is referred to as "particular friendships."
But a hermit having friends is not prohibited in what the Church sets forth on eremitic vocation, and saintly hermits over the centuries--some of them did have friends but perhaps not as in close alliances of temporal aspects of "friendships." They more had what we could describe as spiritual interactions, correspondence, or brief conversation of spiritual need or nature, with others that were of non-social nature.
We can also consider friends and friendship in the spiritual aspect of which a consecrated Catholic hermit would certainly want to be, and should be, evolving and developing, increasingly in the spiritual over the temporal. Is one's spiritual director a "friend"? I think this term could be included in the relationship between hermit and director/designee, for certainly one would not want to be aligned as enemies! Yet, the spiritual guide ought be not so much friend as a spiritual mentor, guide, confessor, and revealing mirror to the hermit's life--temporal and spiritual in all aspects of body, mind, heart, and soul.
I have come to realize that I do not need friends but have them, yet am currently experiencing an amazing reality of their becoming less credible and crucial as friends, and this due to the variance increasingly of my consecrated hermit life and their non-hermit vocations and of other faith backgrounds, with some. Over time, life circumstances and our personal situations, also bring about a natural attrition of those who had been closer friends in the past, prior to my conversion and my profession and vows as a consecrated Catholic hermit, over time have drifted away.
And also, those who have not by natural attrition, I am realizing have come to a point in which our differences and the limitations and distractions to our individual lives have become hindrances to each, even if we each do not recognize this negative at the same time or of one accord. I've personally found, in the past months and year or two, that it is I who have not let go, not thought I should, not been realistic about the friendships that had ceased to be necessary or best for either of us.
I marvel at this, actually. And as I wake up to realities, unique and individual in various relationships, I find that I have been uncharitable in not facing the realities of what is best for my own spiritual life and the molding of my hermit vocation by His Real Presence and not by temporal ways of thinking and perceiving and viewing.
As I let go (or in a couple instances have disrupted what had become not honest or healthy nor spiritually or temporally beneficial to both or either person), I've come to realize that not having the relationship in terms of being "friends" or a "friendship", has opened up our lives to what God has next, or in better keeping with His plan and our maturation in His will for what He desires for us to learn and in what path He has specifically, perfectly, fine-tuned, narrowed, for us to recognize and walk in His way for us.
I've had to pray about and ponder these friendships, concluded for this temporal life. Why had I held on to them? For now I can see the good for the others, to be freed to other situations and persons in their lives and freed from what in me is not the usual way of the temporal life of these others, not at all. I face the reality of my consecrated hermit vocation in a new depth of what this means, and in the faith required to see and face the ways in which God has increasingly been forming my life within this vocation, and in greater alignment with what the Church has stated of the actual living and spiritual purpose of the Church's hermits!
At some level, I have hung on to friends of what I can describe as from my other life--and of my dividing myself, in a way, which is actually rather false. I had one foot in and the rest of me out, or perhaps more one eye and one ear--trying to relate and fit into a world and way of being not mine in actuality, but theirs. And their way and world is exactly as God laid out for them, whether or not they are living it to God's expectations or not.
And of my own life, of the path God has laid out for me, and called me to live out then, in a variety of ways, over 20 years ago: a blessed phase of a life He allowed me as a parent of children and of social interactions lived as best possible with my increasing physical disability. But when the children grew up and needed to set out on the paths God desired for them, and revealed to me the hermit path, the vocational vehicle He chose for me, for then on out, I realize I have been hanging on, myself. It surely is awkward! I see that all the more! I make it awkward for others whether or not they have analyzed the situation, which I doubt they have for they are needing to be in their lives and on their paths.
I must be all the more be living and breathing and being and growing via this path, narrow and few and obscure it is to the full spectrum of all the lives being lived in various vocations, from lay single and married vocations to holy orders. The hermit life is one in which God and the saints and all those on the other side are actually the friends and friendships that make most sense for a hermit. Yet of course, we are very much to be present to those in our lives who do desire contact and consultation, prayer, love, compassion, encouragement.
What I'm finding is that there really are not that many who actually need my input or involvement! This is a joyously humbling recognition! Physically, psychologically, temporally, and perhaps even spiritually, most people living their vocations and lives (not hermits!) do not need a hermit as friend or otherwise! I am laughing at my ludicrous selfishness and viewpoint that has been from self, not as others view their situations.
One friend from over the years kindly sends a weekly email of her activities. I have mentioned in return contact, that I enjoy reading about her goings and doings in her retirement--a very active person who volunteers, exercises, hikes, plays golf and now pickle ball, goes to dinner and plays, movies, and social gatherings of other retirees. I read her weekly report and try to comment back; and I suppose I have told myself that it is good for me to be interested in and aware of what others do in their lives.
Well, I think it is good to be other-centered, but I suspect she could quite easily and gratefully not have to feel obligated to send her weekly report to me. She does it to be kind, and in a good deed as a friend to a person shut-in and disabled. My vocation and spiritual life is not, of course, part of the relationship in any overt way. She is agnostic, perhaps atheist. Yet has been a good friend--yes--in that she has cared and been empathic in remaining in contact. She is intelligent, moral, and an interesting person, and does lovely things for those in her group of friends where she lives, 2200 miles away.
My aunt did call yesterday, and left a voicemail message of pleading with me to call her. She has not wanted phone calls for a couple months, so I have sent a couple notes. But now that she's decided she'd like to have me call her, I returned the call. I do understand how tired she is, and of a nervous temperament more so with advanced years and starting to wear out and feel loss of energy and general health. So we spoke five minutes or so, my telling her to set the time frame depending on her energy and wishes. We left off promising our prayers for one another. That is marvelous!
Another relative, a cousin of my eldest aunt, deceased a long time now, called last night. I had sent a Christmas card and note, and she was glad to reconnect. So we talked on the phone, and she caught up with my life and family, and I learned of hers. Plenty of laughter. She is a nonagenarian now. Is she a "friend" who I need, or am I one she needs? No. We are related, are family.
My vocation is, I think, unknown to her or forgotten if she ever was told by someone, or certainly is of no relevance to her. As I'm realizing over the years--it is of no relevance other than in His Real Presence and in my living out this path God desires for me, and to live the aspects set forth by the Church as one of Her consecrated Catholic hermits, and as a Christian living the Gospel Rule of Life. Follow Jesus, and as a Christian and consecrated Catholic hermit, live my life for the praise of God and in praying for the salvation of the world, in the silence of solitude, hidden from the eyes of [others], my life a silent preaching of Christ, and so forth.
I think, at this point in my life and hermit vocation, that other than the three adult children and their families, who are my loved adult children and loved grandchildren in this life and always will be--and of the couple of extended family members who desire to be in touch now and then (and whom I love, of course--hermits do love and love deeply, others, strangers included--that I have family spiritual relationships. I know a few persons who consider themselves spiritual friends, and I have acquaintances who I'd term spiritual acquaintances. All in my life are spiritual connections--not that they would view it that way, but as for me, all are spiritual for my life is that.
But if I die before them, or they before me, it is all right and as God deems, has planned, and desires in His perfect will.
So the readers' inquiries on this topic have helped me very much to review and consider if I need friends. No, I do not "need". Do I have friends? I think not so much as I have spiritual connection with human beings. I have love of human beings. I appreciate love between us, yet I accept if there is not seeming some identifiable action that in temporal life I'd think yes, that person loves me because he or she said so, or did some action that our temporal lives equate with a demonstration or show of love. I'm realizing that I do not need that as I had previously, evidently certainly thought I needed. I can consider more to the point, that I love others with an inner, spiritual love, and that some of them or all of them love with that type of love that is not seen nor expressed in ways we may think to demonstrated. Yet love is there in most all of us if not all of us, in some element and degree, such as expressed in Bernard of Clairvaux's Four Degrees of Love.
Thus, even though "friends" come and go in the various phases of lives, there is still love. I consider the person whom I realize is time and past due to let go in temporal aspects; our moral values are not in keeping with Christianity, and there is not anything I can offer or provide other than to pray for the person, and of course, to love in that way of love that transcends anything temporally interactive or visible. Love in God, as in love of God in Himself, of which His love permeates all He loves and thus all through, with, and in Him, we love.
Returning to what the readers perhaps had in mind, more, of less in-depth aspect of friendships, a hermit by virtue of not being a socially active person, not in the visible work force, not active in parishes, not noticeable (if one is going to be hidden, of which we are asked by the Church to be, or to live in the silence of solitude, of which solitude is fairly obvious in meaning, as is silence of solitude as a phrase)--a hermit will not have many (or might not have any) "friends" and will not "need" friends. But they will have family and acquaintances, and what my be termed "friends" if that term need be used at all. Hermits evolve in all these conditions and circumstances of possibilities.
Spiritual detachment is prevalent in a hermit vocation, more so than in other vocations in which God asks more active life and corporal works of mercy, and of marital, familial, and social relationships and temporal "friendships." A hermit is, of course, "friend of Christ" if one wants to state the relationship in that term. I am espoused of Christ, having experienced the mystical marriage with Christ, but not having yet been blessed with the consummation of that divine yet quite actual marriage. So I consider Christ my Spouse or perhaps more accurately my Espoused, since the union has not been consummated. I was told to wait, that He would return for me.
I do not think that hermits all are, or ought to force themselves to be at the same phases or degrees or levels of hiddenness or silence of solitude, or silent preaching of the Lord, or the various other delineations and stated "expectations", if you will, that the Catholic Church specifies for Her consecrated, publicly or privately professed hermits. Let the Lord be the one to teach and guide, to form and unfold the hermit as He wills and desires. The Lord is never pushy or dictatorial; He is patient in mercy and love.
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There has been another inquiry that I will mention briefly, and that is, "Do hermits choose to be hermits?" I'd have to say, at this present moment and phase of my hermit vocation of two decades now, that hermits do not "choose" to be hermits. In a vocation within the Consecrated Life of the Church, I think that God chooses the vocation for the individual souls. But the soul either accepts or rejects what God asks and wills. So a hermit would have "accepted" the call of God, or His choosing the vocation for the hermit. God chooses, the hermit "chooses to accept or not accept." Let me leave it in that way of expressing an answer.
I will mention, also, however, that the signals of what God chooses for us, or wills for us, in whatever vocation religious, spiritual, temporal--come in a variety of ways and formats, and often not in just one way or format. To be called to the hermit life in a dream or locution would not be as typical as a gradual sensing, or over time, doors seemingly opening one's mind and heart to the idea of hermit vocation, and then through discerning with one's priest or confessor, or if in religious life, one's superior, and confirmation comes in various clues and cues--that way is probably more the reality of how God chooses the hermit vocation for a person, and the person begins to see what God has chosen and has asked, and then the hermit chooses to accept or decline.
And it is God who calls the hermit away from a rightly chosen and discerned hermit vocation. God on rare occasions has another purpose or need He wills the hermit to fulfill. This has occurred not often in history, but St. Colette, St. Benedict, and a few who God called out of hermit life to fill a need as a bishop or abbot, are such examples. Those persons who "choose" to be hermits of their own desires, such as some who are short-lived in the hermit vocation, young, or enticed by a romanticized notion of being a hermit, wanting attention or such, were choosing the vocation without God's choosing it for them.
Or there may be some who might choose or have chosen the hermit vocation for themselves, or are living it as a quasi religious sister or brother active in working in parishes, dioceses, or in civic and social activities and continue in that mode for the rest of their lives. They may not have had their vocations chosen by God, but rather they chose it themselves for a variety of reasons. But, it also could be that they simply have not been pared down yet or not recognized God's trying to form their hermit life to greater ideal and use, or their not yet assessing that their lives have not evolved or unfolded in increasingly living as the Church has asked and stated.
I certainly have evolved over time, and need to far more! There are phases in my hermit vocation in which I certainly am not pleased nor proud. For whatever reasons, I did not recognize or know in those phases, and my spiritual father allowed the Lord to lead and teach me Himself over time. Jesus has been most patient with me! I am praying for a spiritual director closer by or with good internet connection, as the confessor is so very busy, and the priest who has been interim since my spiritual da passed this past year, has not good internet connection. I feel a need if God desires and wills, to touch base with a priest or monk with some familiarity with hermit life and mystical and spiritual life. The evolving hermit formation is a years-long process, for most hermits whose vocation is chosen for them by God, and they accept the calling.
In closing, on this particular inquiry and topic, I certainly do not think that hermits or anyone other than a priest spiritual director, should be presuming to know the status of God's interactions or processes with hermits. But we can observe hermits in distant or contemporary times, and see what in their lived lives inspire us or those aspects that we want to avoid ourselves, or to grow through or out of ourselves. We can also observe in retrospect, of those who left hermit life, or those deceased who tried hermit life, such as the late Thomas Merton, but were not actually living hermit life, and why and what the reasons.
But in general and also in serious specific, for those of us who are contemporary, consecrated Catholic hermits: The jury is yet out on each of us--and it is Jesus who is the judge as well as the jury.
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