Variances on a Hermit Theme

The more I read and the more I sort of encounter a few hermits, it seems that God forms hermits like He does specimen trees. They are each unique and serve a function, mostly to be observed and to add beauty to the landscape, to be individual essences radiating His light back.

They are like ornaments with different values and purposes. One might be more reclusive, another with work to do such as didactic, theological impartation of information. Another might be sickly and still and mostly prayerful. Another might be, like St. Philip Neri, called to more activity and people, to organizing (such as St. Romuald) a religious community. Another might be called to inspire others to become hermits and to tighten the rule, such as Bl. Paul Giustiniani who traveled about and corresponded much.

Thus, it appears hermits are of varying shapes and sizes, colors and kinds but fall into the individual and unique category. And, as previously considered, they hang between worlds. Some hang more between worlds than others. Some seem more with toes in the other world and others more with heart-strings stretched to heaven.

It might be similar to the variances in mottos. I have been given my mission, expressed in a motto: just adore Him. I don't do a good job of this when I weaken and dabble in the other world, not heaven.

Being reminded of my mission and motto, and the more I read of hermit life, I am not inclined to think I am cultivated to be an intellectual variety, although I have advanced degrees from the other world. No, I have been told, years ago, to think with the heart, think with the heart, think with the heart!

Thus, the writing out of involved temporary vows and a complex plan of life (or rule, or whatever as I must have these terms intertwined or separated into two notions, the plan being administrative like a will and disposition of possessions, and the rule being more of the spiritual living it out) seems not for me. Rather, my heart thinks it should be simple, very simple.

My spiritual father said that to fear God and rejoice in His commands about says it all. It is sort of like "just adore Him". If I really did this well, I would not be in disruption of soul from time to time, huh?

But, I sense God wanting a little more out of me at this point in the process, and so my rule is the practice of the nine s' which includes what all is necessary daily (such as Mass, prayer, Office, spiritual reading, manual labor), and these are included in the Gospel and Epistle that will be the Scriptural basis of my Plan or Rule.

Here it is under the title: Fear God and Rejoice in His Commands/Just Adore Him; and under that, practice silence, solitude, slowness, suffering, selflessness, stability, simplicity, stillness, and serenity; then, as basis in the Word, live out St. John's Gospel and the Epistle to the Hebrews.

My temporary vows I offered on Dec. 29, 2000. I did not know of format then, or of Canonical Approval or Consecration. Here is what I offered, in the presence of my spiritual da, on a snowy night in an old, unused chapel of a dying out community of mostly dissenting religious sisters who knew nothing of the ceremony taking place in the beautiful cast-off chapel. Let me get out of bed and retrieve the signed and witnessed vows from the file cabinet.

"I, [given name and confirmation name, too] offer and present myself to the goodness of God to serve in the order of an anchorite; and according to the rule of that order I promise to remain henceforward in the service of God through the grace of God and the guidance of the Roman Catholic Church and to render canonical obedience to my spiritual fathers.

"I vow to devote my life to the praise of God and salvation of the world through a stricter separation of the world, the silence of solitude, and assiduous prayer and penance.

"To the prefection of charity to which I am called as a faithful servant of my Lord Jesus Christ, I avow myself to the practice of chastity in celibacy, to poverty in body, mind and spirit, and to obedience of my will to the Divine Will of God and His Church, in the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit."

Even now I see that these vows could be simplified, and I would substitute hermit for anchorite, as at the time I was living in a house across from a parish church which was as close to an anchorhold that an anchorite of our time period could have.

Have I lived these vows? Not well at all, not consistently, not to a high degree other than much penance, but that not "cheerfully". Today is a new day, and I must stop thinking of the past and what could have been, but continue to beg Jesus and Mary, my mistress here at Agnus Dei Hermitage, to help me rejoice in God's command to the hermit life, embrace what the vows encapsulate, to love and live the nine s' and live out the Gospel of John and Hebrews.