Side jobs for priest?

[JohnSanzone5]

Seminaries? Why seminaries? What’s so strange? Secular students attend seminaries. Religious do not. Religious are formed in their own houses of formation and study theology at univesities or theologates. When neither are available or affordable, then a religious superior will strike up a deal with a diocesan seminary to have his religious study theoloyg there. Usually they do not live at the seminary to avoid mixing the waters, so to speak. You don’t want your secular seminarians being turned into religious or your religious turned into seculars. This happened a lot in the past.

Many secular seminarians, also known as diocesan seminarians, only if they belonged to a diocese, frequently these poor guys were subjected to a routine that was an imitation of life in a religious house: common liturgy of the hours, community mass, community times for meals, community recreation, community property, no freedom to enter and leave the grounds without permission, no personal property such as cars, telephones, TVs, radios, stereos, etc. In other words, they were imitation friars. But the big problem came when they were released from the seminary and found themselves in a parish. They were not ready to be responsible for themelves or to live alone. The result: most of these priests left during the 1970s. They were miserable, lonely and had little independent living skills.

On the other hand, those religious who were subjected to living with diocesans often lost their religious vocation. They became very independent. They had no sense of community life, community prayer, poverty, obedience to a superior, and became very clerical. Their life revolved aroiund their priesthood. They often mis-identified themselves as priests instead of: Franciscan Friars, Carmelite Friars, Dominican Friars, Benedictine Monks. They suddently became Franciscan Fathers, etc. When they found themselves in a house governed by a friar who was not a priest, they became condescending and angry. How dare a non-priest govern them. When they were required to surrender their cars, TVs, stereos, money, freedom, time and submit to community schedules, community rules and give up some of their pastoral work to allow time for community life, they were uspet and miserable. They left in the thousands during the 1980s and 90s. But God has a way of turning something wrong into something good.

Even though the numbers of ordained priests, secular and religious, went down, the men that we lost were very unhappy, broken and would have hurt their dioceses or their religious communities more than they would have contributed to them. They need to find their place in the world and in the Church. On the other hand, dioceses and religious communities had to reasses how they formed their men and their charism.

We confused and blended religious life with secular priesthood and created chaos. In the chaos, we tried quick fixes, instead of stepping back and recovering what was good and leaving what did not work. No one wanted to take the fall. So everyone blamed it on Vatican II. Some said Vatican II did not go far enough and others said it went too far. It’s easy to blame a Council, because councils cannot call you on your mistakes.

All Vatican II said was that priests should be priests and religious should be religious. Duh, this was a novelty? Many lay people opposed and still oppose the distinction between religious life and priesthood. As long as the laity resists and tries to mold every priest into an imitation friar and every friar into a priest, they are going to get resistance. This is not modernism. It’s priests and religious fighting for their right to be the men that God called them to be, not the men that the laity wants them to be.

We have to learn to appreciate the difference between Holy Orders and religious life, if we’re going to benefit from the richness that comes from having both priesthood and religious life working together, while maintaining their separate identity and mission in the Church. The whole idea of imposing poverty on secular priests is imposing something that is not pat of the priesthood. Only religious are called to make a vow of poverty. A religious who becomes a priest, already has a vow of poverty.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

But to extrapolate from your point, would you say that traditionalist secular orders (ex: Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest) in adopting the religious practices you mention will suffer for it? I have wondered how the Institute and FSSP maintain their ideals of community life, when they are spread out to their relatively distant oratories and chapels, helter-skelter.

 

[Friar_David_O.Carm]

But to extrapolate from your point, would you say that traditionalist secular orders (ex: Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest) in adopting the religious practices you mention will suffer for it? I have wondered how the Institute and FSSP maintain their ideals of community life, when they are spread out to their relatively distant oratories and chapels, helter-skelter.

I think the answer can be found in the (relatively) recent action of the the FSSP to pull their priest out of Toronto. One of the reasons stated by the FSSP was that the community could not support another FSSP priest to provide some sort of community for the priest who was there.

 

[JReducation]

But to extrapolate from your point, would you say that traditionalist secular orders (ex: Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest) in adopting the religious practices you mention will suffer for it? I have wondered how the Institute and FSSP maintain their ideals of community life, when they are spread out to their relatively distant oratories and chapels, helter-skelter.

I don’t think it would hurt them at all. The important thing is for us to remember that we cannot expect secular priests to live as religious do or the other way around. But if these secular priests voluntarilly choose to adopt certain characteristics of religious life, there is no problem. The problems arise when it is imposed.

Imagine if someone came to your home and asked you to organize your family’s schedule, relationship with each other, behaviors and relationship with the Church to match that of the Benedictines. How would you feel about this? If you had wanted to live like a Benedictine, you would have joined the Benedictines. This is the same way that secular seminarians and secular priests feel when we place these rules and expectations on them.

One more note, these communities: FSSP,. SSPX, Maryknoll, Vincentians, Pierists Institute of Christ the King etc are not secular orders. They are priestly societies. Their canonical status is that of a Priestly Society of Apostolic Life.

A secular order, such as the Secular Franciscans, Secular Carmelites and Secular Dominicans are real orders with a rule, constitutions, a common way of life, common mission and vision, a public profession to live by the rule and their own government. The priestly societies do not have a public profession (commitment). Therefore, they are not orders or congregations.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[JohnSanzone5]

Thank you, both, I am learning a great deal just from asking questions.

When I first began studying, the organizational structures were very elusive, but now I am seeing the distinctions… finally.

 

[JReducation]

Thank you, both, I am learning a great deal just from asking questions.

When I first began studying, the organizational structures were very elusive, but now I am seeing the distinctions… finally.

I appreciate that you’re asking, because many people do not ask and then they place unreasonable expectations on others. When those expectations are not met, they are upset or even judgmental.

For example, it is reasonable for me to expect a Carmelite to be a contemplative. That is part of the Carmelite tradition. It is unreasonable to expect a Carmelite to be as poor as a Franciscan. Carmelites have always lived in larger communities called priories or in parishes where they needed a certain possessions in order to keep the community alive and well so they could pray. Not that Franciscans don’t pray, but we can pray on the road as we’re begging. We don’t have a tradition of praying in choir as the Carmelites do. If two or three of us are walking down the street, we can just pull over and sit on a park bench and pray the Liturgy of the Hours. The rule simply says that we must pray it together. But we have never had a choir in 800 years. This is why it’s good to ask questions.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[Young_Thinker]

Since Mr. Sanzone and others have brought up orders, I think that canons regular(such as the Norbertines) sound alluring, in part because they are said to be a “midway” between monks and mendicants. However, as myself, I do not think that I could always sing the Divine Office twice a day as the part of a choir(not that I dislike singing or the Divine Office). I assume that the average canon regular is a cheerful person, and I admittedly do not fit that description. Hopefully, that is not an example of a trivial reason for disinterest in a particular institution.

 

[JReducation]

Since Mr. Sanzone and others have brought up orders, I think that canons regular(such as the Norbertines) sound alluring, in part because they are said to be a “midway” between monks and mendicants. However, as myself, I do not think that I could always sing the Divine Office twice a day as the part of a choir(not that I dislike singing or the Divine Office). I assume that the average canon regular is a cheerful person, and I admittedly do not fit that description. Hopefully, that is not an example of a trivial reason for disinterest in a particular institution.

Actually, it’s not. I don’t know if this has changed. But the Carthusians did not admit anyone who could not sing the Divine Office, neither did the Benedictines. It was for this reason that when St. Francis founded his mendicant order he prohibitted the singing of the Divine Office. For 750 years we recited the Office. It was not until Vatican II that the Church allowed us to bypass that mandate from St. Francis and sing the Office. But it has never become part of our constitutions. It is up to each house to decide for themselves whether to sing or continue to recite. Most houses recite the Divine Office.

So, no you’re not offering a shallow reason for not being a canon or a monk. If singing the Divine Office is arduous for you, then you don’t have a call to that particular way of life. But there are other communities that do not sing it.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[Young_Thinker]

Actually, it’s not. I don’t know if this has changed. But the Carthusians did not admit anyone who could not sing the Divine Office, neither did the Benedictines. It was for this reason that when St. Francis founded his mendicant order he prohibitted the singing of the Divine Office. For 750 years we recited the Office. It was not until Vatican II that the Church allowed us to bypass that mandate from St. Francis and sing the Office. But it has never become part of our constitutions. It is up to each house to decide for themselves whether to sing or continue to recite. Most houses recite the Divine Office.

So, no you’re not offering a shallow reason for not being a canon or a monk. If singing the Divine Office is arduous for you, then you don’t have a call to that particular way of life. But there are other communities that do not sing it.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

All right.