Notes from Michigan...
…and the miracle of having new, close friends in your 30s 👧
On the day I was consecrated, I had no friends who were also consecrated, knew no one my own age living this vocation, and didn’t expect any consecrated friends to come my way any time soon.
I didn’t even think to ask God for any!
This is the extravagant love he has for us… that he would give me new, best friends I’d never dreamed of, who were also consecrated.
The past few days, my consecrated sisters and I have been living life together in Michigan, amid the most vibrant autumn colours.
The film scenes that have most been in my mind - while staying in my friend’s cosy, midwestern home - are from Little Women:
The majority of consecrated virgins, like diocesan priests, live alone, and yet the experience of community is essential for the full flourishing of any human being.
We live in a world where simulated relationships are easier - and often preferred - than real ones. Real ones are messy, they show us our brokenness and poverty, the reality about ourselves. It is precisely when we experience ourselves as seen and known in our poverty - and, even there, accepted and loved - that we experience true freedom.
Simulated relationships curated online, on the other hands, show the best of ourselves (- or even, curated vulnerability -) and we never experience what we most crave but perhaps don’t even know is available to us: being known and loved precisely in our darkness.1
While this is true for all of us in our anonymised, fragmented society, I worry about it as a reality for celibates in the Church, specifically, diocesan vocations to priesthood and consecrated virginity: those whose daily lives are on the front-lines of mission and ministry.
Atomisation of these people is unhealthy on the human level, never mind the supernatural and spiritual level. The reality of living alone involves high levels of risk for never experiencing the Church in her deepest identity, as spirituality of communion.2
This is a reality I ponder, and have few answers for, but which I would love to continue pondering and entering conversation with other celibates on.
The last few days with my dear sisters have been cherished ones - of laughter, deep conversation, prayer and vulnerability with one other - as well as the practical experiences and joys of living life together. We know at the end of this time that we all desire more of this lived “spirituality of communion”, and we ponder all this in our hearts.
Ruth Gaskovski in her superb article, The 3 Rs of Unmachining, says it so well, particularly in her references to Sherry Turkle’s Alone Together.
I find that no one ever said it better than Pope St John Paul II in Novo Millennia Ineunte, 43.