Religious obedience

[JReducation]

JR, just to confirm, you are only a secular or third Order Fransican, right? According to your earlier posts, you only converted to the Church about 7 years ago after your wife died in a car accident. You stated that you are currently raising your autistic son.

So, when you say you are a “religious” you do mean simply a Third Order, or secular Franciscan, right?

I’m a regular Franciscan, not a secular. My community was started by three Secular Franciscans and two Caps. I have an autistic son, but he’s an adult now. I raised him, by myself. My wife died 17 years ago, not 7. I was one of the original five. I came from the SFO. But we’re OSF.

By the way, the Secular Franciscans would not appreciate it if they hear you calling them “only a secular” They are not only. They are equally Franciscan as the regular Franciscans.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[JReducation]

Introduction to the Devout Life is addressed to a married woman. As I recall, it speaks of her obedience to her husband as a duty comparable to religious obedience. As recently as Mere Christianity (1944) C.S. Lewis wrote of the wife’s obedience as a basic tenet of Christianity that was common to all Christians.

But if people get alarmed at the idea of “blind obedience” in religious obedience, they will practically start hyper-ventilating if one talks about obedience in marriage. The concept of obedience has very negative connotations to the modern mind. Shall we predict how many posts it takes until someone says “Stepford Wives”?

The problem is that obedience has been abused. People are skittish. Obedience, as taught in the Gospels, is the flip side of a coin. The other side of the coin is love. The spouse, the superior, the person being obeyed should treat the other with love.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[Thomas_Aquinas_1]

I’m a regular Franciscan, not a secular. My community was started by three Secular Franciscans and two Caps. I have an autistic son, but he’s an adult now. I raised him, by myself. My wife died 17 years ago, not 7. I was one of the original five. I came from the SFO. But we’re OSF.

By the way, the Secular Franciscans would not appreciate it if they hear you calling them “only a secular” They are not only. They are equally Franciscan as the regular Franciscans.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

Thanks for the information And I didn’t mean that your wife died 7 years ago. I meant that you became a Catholic 7 years ago. You told the story in one of your posts that I stumbled across. Your wife, and I think one or more of your children, died in a car accident in 1994. They were Catholic at the time, and you were Jewish. You then converted to the Catholic Church about 6 or 7 years ago. Do I have the details right?

 

[JReducation]

Thanks for the information And I didn’t mean that your wife died 7 years ago. I meant that you became a Catholic 7 years ago. You told the story in one of your posts that I stumbled across. Your wife, and I think one or more of your children, died in a car accident in 1994. They were Catholic at the time, and you were Jewish. You then converted to the Catholic Church about 6 or 7 years ago. Do I have the details right?

Actually, it will be 8 this March. That same year I became a Franciscan. I was very familiar with the Franciscans from my childhood and my college days. They ran the school in my hometown. I became a Catholic because I fell in love with St. Francis. Through him, I came to understand Jesus. I did spend several years studying theology before all of this. Francis and his sons triggered my curiosity, with a little help from Teresa of Avila, Mother Teresa, John Paul II and Elizabeth Ann Seton. These are all people whom I greatly admire.

Yes, the older of my two sons died with his mother. I was alone with one son and a daughter. They are both adults now. My daughter is a therapist and my son is a concept artist. Don’t ask me to explain. I know very little about concept art. LOL

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[floresco]

The problem is that obedience has been abused. People are skittish. Obedience, as taught in the Gospels, is the flip side of a coin. The other side of the coin is love. The spouse, the superior, the person being obeyed should treat the other with love.

I agree that obedience must be matched with love. However, this extreme, almost pathological, skittishness seems a fairly recent development, even though obedience has always been capable of abuse. In writings of the Saints, and older writing in general, people speak of obedience in a positive way.

 

[JReducation]

I agree that obedience must be matched with love. However, this extreme, almost pathological, skittishness seems a fairly recent development, even though obedience has always been capable of abuse. In writings of the Saints, and older writing in general, people speak of obedience in a positive way.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that obedience is not good. Obedience is the most Christ-like of the virtues. “Christ obeyed even unto death.”

I’m just stating that people are skittish, because many have abused their power. On the other hand, sin is not a good excuse to avoid living a virtuous life. In fact, it’s probably the worse reason. Abuse of power is a sin against justice. However, to fight legitimate authority out of fear is not a legitimate fight, not matter how much we justify it.

There is a difference between something being understandable and justifiable. Fear of abuse is understandable. Disobedience, because of fear is never justifiable. One must always choose the higher good. In these situations, one can only speculate. There is no guarrantee that the person in authority is going to abuse you.

Christ submitted himself to abuse out of obedience. He chose to submit. However, when we read the Gospel, we also see that Jesus is terrified, so much so that he sweats blood in the garden. He is the prime example of obedience, even when it hurts.

The Christian writers have taught us that obedience is not always pleasant and will not always lead to pleasant results. However, these unpleasant results are often part of God’s plan of salvation. The visible or anticipated results are not pleasant, but the supernatural results are very much a higher good.

What happens is that those who are fearful of obedience cannot see beyond the temporal outcome. We see this even among Catholics.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[simple_soul]

*I have been thinking about this a lot over the last few months.
I want nothing more than to be obedient to my husband. I believe this is what God calls me to be. Yes, I was raised in a somewhat very sheltered life but it does not change this. The way I understand it is that a wife should have blind obedience to the husband and that the husband should be the leader. Yes, it is scary, but there is such a subtle sweetness in this surrender and it does something to my very soul that I find hard to describe and I can not help but surrender to …
But, I have learned that even though my husband is willing to be the leader he is also very sensitive to the fact that he does not want me to “feel” like I am being subjected to this. I do believe he went to great lengths to make sure I was choosing to live this way of my own free will. But sometimes I “think” his “sensitivity”, while being very loving and appreciated, causes me some confusion.
The one area in our relationship I am having trouble sorting out and maybe some one here can help me understand better is this.
He does want me to use my own judgment and he tries really hard to not just tell me to do or not to do certain things but I find it hard to just go with my decision.
For some reason I know sometimes my choices or ways of doing things are not how he would have “preferred” I do them but he never explicitly says “don’t do it that way” so I go with my decision even though my intuition told me he would have preferred I did not do it the way I chose.
This makes me “feel” am I somehow not showing him the obedience I should be. I had to ask him the other night that if he really did not want me to follow my decision and go with his would he point blankly tell me?
He did say he would.
But I wonder sometimes…is he just saying this because he does not want me to “feel” like I am being “subjected” to his will?..
So I wonder, should my decision be to following my intuition and just go with what I believe he would be wanting me to do or do I take him at his word and wait for him to point blankly tell me when he wants me to follow his lead…
I hope I am not derailing this thread but from what I have read so far I am beginning to think that maybe in understanding how the religious have obedience for their superiors and how the superiors relate to those who are in there care maybe it might help me in understanding my relationship with my husband…

I believe that what I am asking is should I trust my judgment and wait for him to point blankly tell me what he does and does not want me to do or should I trust and follow my intuition and do what I believe he wants me to do or not to do?

I so hope and pray this makes some sense. Any help in trying to sort this out would be greatly appreciated. If you need me to clarify anything please let me know.
*