Disturbed and Haunted by God

"Work as it now is, the Abbess argued with a kind of realism...can rarely offer satisfaction to the half-contemplative. A few professions, such as teaching or nursing, remain such that they can readily be invested with a spiritual significance. But although it is possible, and indeed demaded of us, that all and any occupation be given a sacramental meaning, this is now for the majority of people 'disturbed and haunted by God,' as she put it, who cannot find a work which satisfies them in the ordinary world, a life half retired and a work made simple and significant by its dedicated setting, is what is needed."

Iris Murdoch - The Bell

I wrote some time last year:
"I recall being told by one of my spies inside that a conversation at Oratory recreation had once touched on this problem. It was generally acknowledged by all present that such people exist and that they tend naturally to gravitate towards nad hover around the edges of more formally, canonically established communities like the Oratory, whence my running joke about the Oratory Empire. It exists, but only inasmuch as the community offers refuge to such as us who would receive no such solace anywhere else and would be like orphans without it. Not an empire by any means, but a vast refugee camp: people stumble in in various states of more or less permanent disarray to be ministered to and patched up as much as their injuries allow.

"I have seen that nearly every successful and faithful religious community of any solidity attracts these kinds of cast-offs."

I think I went on to say something snippy about the New Movements (not enough snippy things or time in the day) and complained that there isn't much going in the Church now for people like that. But of course, most of the stuff that once was there still is, if you know how to look for it. Admittedly, sometimes one has to look pretty hard.

There is also Oblation.

"Oblation" means offering. Oblates seek to offer themselves more fully to Christ and to the Church by pondering the wisdom found in the Rule of St. Benedict and by entering into fellowship with their community of affiliation. By these means Oblates discover ever anew that God calls us to holiness of life and that the Rule and the Benedictine community can be instruments of God’s grace in their vocation to become holy in the world.

Oblates do not take vows or live in a monastery. They continue to live in the world while they strive eagerly to live out the values of the Gospel. On the other hand, they do make promises to seek God more intensely through the principles of the Rule of St. Benedict and in partnership with the monks or sisters of the Benedictine community with which they are affiliated.

Someone asked me, "Is that like a third order?". No, a third order is like Oblates, since Benedict got there ahead of nearly everyone else.

I'm thinking seriously about this.

(Pic of Francis and Jane appropos of nothing, except that I really liked it.)