A Yet-Unfulfilled Mission?

A great person once said that the first millennium of Christian faith was the millennium of the monastic. The second millennium of the Christian faith was the millennium of the secular ordained. And he said that he felt this next millennium of Christian faith would be the millennium of the laity, and let it be so.

A friend of mine has recently lamented our approach to the vocation of marriage. When looking at the diocese website she finds that, in the discussion of various vocations, there is information on the monastic life and on the life of the secular clergy, but a vocation to marriage is only mentioned in passing at the end, and even then only alluded to. What do we think of the vocation of marriage? Is it so base and common that it hardly counts as a vocation? And yet I read an anecdote, I believe in an article written by Ron Rolheiser, of an ascetic who returns home after seven years in the desert meditating on the Eucharist of Christ to see that his mother, who has never had a moment in her life of her own because of chasing after children and living the family life, is a deeper contemplative than he is. And this because she learned to give herself fully over to God, as she had given herself over to her family. Her family became a model teaching her how to give herself fully to God.

I am presently reading a book on one of the greatest mystics of our time, reading her writings and commentary on them, and marking my way through it so that I might learn and apply to my life what she learned and what she felt and what she can teach us and me. She was a nun, although a nun living in the world. And we all venerate the greatness of God through her life and actions in Calcutta. She was a nun, one who was set apart by God from the more common life of marriage and working 9-5 to return home, leaving work for the day. We can't be like her unless we deny the flesh and devote our bodies and our spirits solely to God in the way that she did. Can we?

I also see our respect and deference to the secular clergy. His Grace, Archbishop Thomas Collins, really is a spectacular man and a man of deep spiritual leading, I believe. In the hearts of many he is even akin to a celebrity, and I will confess to having succumbed to that feeling as well at times. He leads the Church in Toronto and inspires holiness in its youth and a passion for the will of Christ. And these things are all true. People follow his leading to Christ. We can't be like him unless we deny the flesh and devote our bodies and spirits solely to God in the way that he does. Can we?

Or can we? The Church has many heroes and heroines who denied their sexuality and followed Christ. Is it possible to have our Mother Teresas and Archbishop Thomas Collins among those who follow Christ to a family? For indeed Christ must lead us to bear families and serve him in the family life. If he does not, then we who raise families truly are weaker and less holy than those of the consecrated life by our very nature. If he does not, the Kingdom of God is torn apart by a caste system. And then we, who feel strongly, powerfully, truly called to raise a family for Christ... what of us?

No, we must have our own vocation which is as blessed and as holy as to the monastic life and as to the secular clergy. Whether it be recognised officially in the Church, whether it be recognised colloquially by the people, whether we can accept a vocation to such deep holiness as Christ can raise up in the life of a family, it must be true. Marrying is not simply succumbing to our passions and the lusts of the flesh: it is worshiping God with our whole bodies and experiencing the passion of the Eucharist in an intense and one-forming way, making us one with each other and one with God, and indeed His whole Church.

Can we have a married Mother Teresa? I do not know; but by the Grace of God I must believe that He will raise me up to be that, and that He will do so in the family He has called and indeed driven me to partake in.