What to Expect in the Order of the Present Moment

What to Expect: Name, Purpose, Vow, Patron, Mission

The name alone—Order of the Present Moment—may seem out of order. Some may think it a nebulous name for a religious order. And perhaps it is; but this is a spiritual order, and the Spirit is described in Genesis as a mist. For those called to traditional religious orders or groups, the Order of the Present Moment carries no existing images or defining attributes. 

For all the others, however, the Order of the Present Moment is a name to which anyone can relate—anyone who can comprehend a moment in the present as an invitation to live fully in this present moment. Yes, the name is vague, and that is its refining truth and beauty. Besides, it is the name given by God for this Order, and that is reason enough to identify it.

The purpose of the Order of the Present Moment (OPM) is to love to learn to love God, to live all for God (omnia pro Deo) and thus to love and live for others and all that God Created, and to love and live for God's Holy Catholic Church—and to do so moment by moment, in each present moment, in this life and the next. 

And this, too, is the OPM Vow: to love God, to love all God's Creation, and to love His Church. This is essentially the greatest commandment given by Christ, so it is the essential vow of the Order of the Present Moment. What other vow could excel the fullness in grace of this vow?

The patron of the OPM is St. Joseph. Why? That is because the Lord said he is, on that Feast of St. Joseph. We can ponder how St. Joseph would qualify as a patron of such an order, and what comes to mind is his love of God, his living all for God, his love for others and all of God's creation, and his love of God's Church. For St. Joseph truly loved God's Church in the form of the Blessed Virgin Mary and in Christ, the Head of the Church. 

While this may seem out of sequence. Christ instituted the Church and sent the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, and St. Joseph was not living on earth then. In the Order of the Present Moment, the moments can be likened to drops of water in the stream, river, or ocean, and they flow and intermingle, not in a line of droplets but as a fluid mass of droplets, with movement and spatial relationship not in any particular order. 

This, too, is how God's time is, for there is no set time with God, but rather all is His time—past, present, future—all one in His View, His Space. And that is one of the challenges within the Order of the Present Moment: to learn to view as God views, and to live in God's time, and in that, in God's order of present moments.

However, perhaps God said St. Joseph is the patron of the OPM because the question was asked on earth, in earth time, on the earth's Church date of St. Joseph's Feast. Perhaps the patron would be other saints on their earth Church dates of Church Feasts and Solemnities? For now we must assume that God chose St. Joseph as Patron of this Order, for the reasons that St. Joseph particularly lived as a humble man, and very much lived the pure purpose and vow of the Order of the Present Moment.

The mission of the OPM is to glorify God. That is simple enough. The various aspects and means of glory and glorification can unfold in creative and amazing ways, moment by moment. It will proceed from the living out of the Order of the Present Moment's vow. To glorify God emanates from the Order's very purpose, in unique, tangible--as well as mystical-- modalities.

Anticipating the Order of the Present Moment

Accessibility, Approval, and Authenticity

The stairway to heaven is accessible to both dockers and floaters. While it may seem dockers would gravitate more to the traditional religious orders and various Church-approved groups, the Order of the Present Moment may provide for  floaters who need this option, but appropriate to dockers, also.

The order of the present moment could be formed and constructed so as to work through the ecclesial approval process as institute, movement, or order (since a vow is involved here). But surely we realize now that this is not so much a religious order as a spiritual order. There is certainly nothing about the OPM that could not be church approved.

Temporal approval, while very necessary for temporal orders and groups—and for valid, crucial reasons left to canon lawyers and clerics to explain—is not essential for the Order of the Present Moment. This order does necessitate approval, but in a spiritual sense, as it is spiritual, it encompasses the temporal in that Christ is the Head and we are the Body.  We know in Scripture, Christ is wed to His Church. She is His. 

The temporal and spiritual must unite in all, but the approval for a spiritual order cannot equate with temporal regulations necessary for the traditional religious orders, even though we are all temporal as well as spiritual. Traditional orders share spiritual elements, obviously. Some aspects of those in the OPM may require temporal approval. We will deal with that in that moment, temporally. 

Now we examine  temporal components of  religious orders and how they integrate in a spiritual order, but first, some thoughts on authenticity. People tend to be influenced by that which is approved, assuming it then is authentic.

Consider a traditional religious order of our time period, for example, an order formed in imitating St. Francis' life, to live like the poor and serve the poor. We might think dressing in rough woolen, hooded, brown robes, sandals or barefoot, ridding modern conveniences (beds, table, dishwasher, microwave, refrigerator, carpeting, cars, bikes, gainful employment) makes us as St. Francis and the  poor. 

We may genuinely aim to be like St. Francis, want to be in solidarity with, somehow to relate and help the poor. Spiritually we may be trying to directly focus on religious life via corporal and spiritual works of mercy: prayer, reading, liturgy, charity.  We may want to be to others a visual reminder of St. Francis and his saintly existence, for in his century he was in solidarity with the poor. A question: Can one authentically be in one century and culture, and yet authentically be as someone of another time and place?

In the 13^th century the poor wore dark-colored, rough tunics (don't show soil and not costly). The poor went barefoot and were fortunate if had sandals. They could not afford to wear their hair in the styles of the wealthy, nor did they own horses and carriages. The poor in St. Francis' time slept on the ground, did not have cooking conveniences of the rich (which to us would still be primitive), begged food scraps, and some existed on bread and water. Medical help for the poor of St. Francis' time consisted of whatever their poor comrades could provide through herbal remedies, or no help at all.

The wealthy in St. Francis' time wore robes, but of dyed, finer fabrics, and stockings, shoes, cloaks and hats. The men grew beards and long hair, kept trimmed; the women wore long hair fashioned under lovely headpieces and veils. Actually, other than the differences in fabrics and accessories, the clothing of rich and poor was not different in basic design. 

Homes of the materially fortunate were heated by fireplaces, cooking done over the fire or in modified stoves, dishes wood, pottery or pewter, and mattresses filled with feathers or for less wealthy, straw. The poor who were not servants of the wealthy often lived without shelter, or had lean-to's, or hovered in abandoned nature's nooks and crannies. They cooked what little they hunted or scrounged, over an open fire (for those who could find wood) and warmed themselves as best they could. The poor had little to no means of education. The profile could continue. We see an image of St. Francis' era.

We do well to ask ourselves: Is it possible to have solidarity with the poor of our time period by living as St. Francis did, in identifying with the poor of his time period? And by that endeavor, would we then in our time find the stairway to heaven that St. Francis discovered and climbed to holiness? Is such a way of life in our 21^st century going to accomplish these goals, and are they authentic? Consider further, is it even possible for us in the 21^st century, born in this country, educated, employable, and possessing, say, low to average conveniences—to truly experience being one with the poor?

What if we dress as the poor of our time, in jeans, tees, sweats, scruffy tennis shoes, thrift shop coats, a backpack for our earthly possessions which might include a bottle of wine or street drugs, our hair at whatever length from whatever last haircut and shave? We might be given a bike, or ride the buses and subways, begging tickets or given stubs from social welfare agencies. 

We could live in homeless shelters, halfway houses, or sleep on the streets. We could eat at soup kitchens or get sacks of groceries from church food pantries, and line up for medical help at inner city clinics or utilize the hospital emergency rooms, on payment plan or gratis. Yet with all the externals in place, are we truly in solidarity with the poor? Are we authentically the poor?

Or are we always authentically meant to be what God created us to be, in whatever culture, socio-economic status, demographic, and geographic region? Perhaps by our birth and upbringing, environment, personalities and temperaments--in actuality having lived something other than life of the authentically poor--we will never authentically be in solidarity with the poor. 

The same could be premised of the poor being authentically in solidarity with the wealthy. What if a poor person wins 16 million dollars in the lottery? The various factors beyond externals cannot be displaced or discounted. However, we can agree that we can be in empathy with others, poor, rich, in- between; educated, uneducated; intelligent or not. We can help one another, but we must be honest in that we cannot become the other, not authentically, no matter what we discard of possessions, no matter what we wear.

Perhaps the best we can hope for is authentic compassion, understanding, empathy, caring, giving, and accepting. And that is nothing to discount. But maybe the authentic approach to helping the poor or seeking, finding, and climbing the stairway to heaven is by being who we are in our own time period, where and how God placed us in whatever socio-economic status, race, culture, training, knowledge, physical attributes, moral, mental and spiritual development, and with whatever accompanying material circumstances. 

Whether or not the Order of the Present Moment is an authentic approach, solution, or option remains to be considered, developed, implemented over time, case studies and results observed, analyzed, and conclusions drawn. Part of the process in the OPM includes on-going review and revision. Hopefully this will eliminate the seeming cyclical trend in many traditional religious orders of: founding, growth, success, plateau, decline, demise or reform.

What About All the Others?

What About All the Others?

What does the schema of dockers and floaters mean relative to those who seek God, who are desiring to find and climb the stairway to heaven? We seem to have two options or opportunities for Christians, and specifically Catholics. 


We have the religious vocation lived out in any of the various traditional religious orders, communities, congregations, confraternities, canonically consecrated hermits and virgins, Church institutes and movements, sodalities and groups. We have the religious vocation lived out to varying degrees of aptitude for all other people, the vast majority of souls, who are either married or single.

It seems that the outcome is somewhat startling when we consider the number who actually join any of the several approved, traditional religious orders (and all variations as stated above), compared to all the others--all others who comprise the vast majority of souls. Of these others, many may never in life come to a recognition or need of God, nor to find and climb some unfathomed stairway to heaven. Some others of all the others desire God, are trying to seek Him, but have not a raft upon which to float--let alone a grasp of the heavenly stairway's handrail. 

In St. Bernard's Medieval time, in just one monastery, Citeaux, 100 novices entered yearly. Soon the monastery had to be rebuilt to accommodate 700 monks. Consider, then, several other Cistercian monasteries formed throughout France, then spreading to other countries. Consider also during this time the numerous other burgeoning religious orders. So too, in our time, there are numerous approved orders (and variations therein)--but without the vast numbers of members. In fact, many traditional religious orders today are in decline. While the offshoot religious groups and movements are attracting some, in comparison to our general population, even our Church numbers, the correlative percentages are low.

 

Yes, some few of all the others—these other souls who for whatever reason are neither suited nor called to traditional, approved religious groups--may be fortunate to find a spiritual director in a priest who will agree to counsel and guide, but that is rare due to the shortage of priests as well as their increasingly administrative responsibilities of parish life. 


The bulk of all the others glean what pointers from confession, be inspired to read spiritual books and Scripture, or gain instruction from Catholic radio and television. Some few may make it a priority to go to daily Mass, or to read the Divine Office morning and evening prayers. They may join a parish Bible study, when offered, or pursue formal coursework in theology. And most others remain on the periphery, Sunday Mass and bi-yearly or yearly confession...many not even that.

The reality remains that a vast number of people exist in the way of the world, seeking, stumbling upon, and climbing social, capitalistic, secular stairways. For these souls who may have an awakening, as well as for the souls who are trying to live a Christian life but not suited to the structures existing in traditional religious order or group, there needs to be something. Thus, we return to the need for an option. Could the option be the Order of the Present Moment, the order of one or of one among many?

Dockers and Floaters

Understanding the Seekers: Schema of Dockers and Floaters

Envision a flowing river, wide enough that houses are built along at least one side. See docks in front of some or all of the houses, with land extending behind the buildings, then roads and towns off in the distance. Look at the river, and spot the rafts on them, wood log rafts or rubber rafts or plank rafts. They float along, headed downstream. 

On the rafts are people, one person usually, but sometimes two, or more if the raft is large. No motors; all is silent on this river except the sounds of nature or some quiet talk among the two or three or so together on the larger rafts. And there can be distance between the rafts; or they can be in sensible proximity.

Turn the gaze to the river's shoreline, the houses, the docks. See the home dwellers, finished with their career work for the day or weekend. Perhaps it is Sunday, and they are observing the Lord's day of rest. Perhaps not, but regardless the people are outside, drawn by what distinguishes their homes, and that is the river. 

The people on the river's bank, all along for miles and miles, notice the people on the rafts. They see while the rafts pass, one by one, their particular home and float down a ways, until the river bends or the view is too distant. The people on the rafts drift on by, slowly or rapidly, depending upon the current, based upon weather conditions and the river's concourse. The people on the rafts can see the home dwellers, their homes, their docks, their land, some woods, and the roads and towns off in the distance behind. Those on the rafts notice one after another, as they float downstream, those on the land.

Now consider what those on the land (some walking out to their docks for a better glimpse of ones on a raft) might wonder or think? What would you wonder or think, seeing a person (or two or three) on a raft, floating down the river? What are they doing? Where are they headed? Why would someone just float down a river on a raft?

What are the floaters thinking, as they float by and notice house after house and the people in them or outside, maybe more inside in our technological age, but always on land? Well, these people with their docks have houses, jobs, property to tend and earth to till, on-going contacts with society, cars to drive on the roads that lead to the towns. The floaters see the dockers and their effort, or at least some tangibles of their lives. But the dockers, those on the land with docks, might not comprehend what the floaters are doing or why they are doing it, for they float on by, alone or with a few, and then they float out of view.

On occasion the floaters float into the shore. Maybe they have raft pole to change their course just enough to veer toward land. They dock if the docker is willing to have them, and most dockers are. After all, the floaters do need some practical provisions, and the dockers need and possess the practical provisions stored in their houses or have the transportation to go into the towns to purchase them, and have money to do so from their jobs. 

The floaters might need to fill up a water canteen or get some food grown on dockers' land or stored in the dockers' houses, although the floaters can also eat the fish of the river if they catch them, and can go to shore where there are no docks and homes, and forage for food along the river's edge and wooded areas.

The dockers are kind to share with these floaters, who they might not quite understand. They may develop thoughts of animosity for what the dockers could view as a waste of existence, as seen from the dockers' perspectives. Some dockers might want to know what it is like, floating on the river, and wonder what is the view upstream and downstream. 

The floaters are most appreciative for the dockers who help provide some practical aspects of their way of life. Young dockers might be intrigued by the floaters; old dockers may reflect on years of wishing they were floaters, but never could break away from land to try floating. Many dockers, at root level, consider the floaters a bit irresponsible and daft, and discourage the young from ever considering being a floater. It leads to...where? But staying on solid ground is secure and results in tangible productivity. 

Very few floaters, once they set off from river's edge (often from places where the river was but a stream) ever regret being floaters. Nor do they desire to be dockers, for they see dockers one after another, and the houses and land and roads and towns and cities beyond. It is all right for dockers, but floaters are floaters and must push off from the dock after a brief landing, and continue floating down stream.

Where do the floaters go? They follow the river and encounter whatever natural events occur on rivers. They never see too far what is coming, nor what is beyond the bend, but they have learned to follow the river's course, and eventually they find the river widening. Eventually the river will flow into the vast oceans, and at that point the floaters will need to either dock or put out to sea. 

By then, the floaters are adept at floating and not thrown off course by challenges requiring innovative adaptation. They may need to then live as dockers, but they would never become dockers, not really. And any dockers who may decide to float after years of docking, would need to go against solid ground, set off on a raft, and learn the ways of the floaters.

Dockers may not understand floaters, but floaters tend to understand dockers. It has to do with perspective, intuition and vision. Floaters have a broadened view. They not only see and experience the stream through river to ocean, upon shore and beyond, but they also see the dockers' land, dwellings, roads and beyond. They cannot see into the dwellings except at night, if curtains not drawn, but they sense the inside represents the outside. 

And while floaters come into shore when necessary, they do so briefly for they must continue to go with the flow. Floaters emanate from a dock, from some given point. They may have been born into a docker family but decided to become a floater from childhood intrigue of encountering floaters. Or they are born from birth waters, and seem never to be meant for land.

Floaters appreciate dockers for the good and practical. Dockers are salt of the earth. Dockers, too, have a perspective, and it is a practical, sensible, grounded perspective.

Maybe it has something to do with the thought that somehow, dockers very much know the ground beneath their feet; they stand on terra ferme. They work with what they know and touch, what is solid and firm. They know there is a Creator of all heaven and earth, and live with what they see, touch and know, here and now, with hope for heaven with practical assurance of its existence. 

Floaters seem to intuit what was before the here-and-now without being able to describe or define. They also are looking for what is to come, and living their lives while seeking. But they live on the water that flows above and between pieces solid ground, as well as falls from the skies. Their sense of God the Creator is perhaps experienced in more the grand scheme of things, but among others, in awareness of and appreciation of others. Dockers give floaters sustenance and solidity. Floaters give dockers variation and vision.

God created both dockers and floaters. They are inter- and intra-dependent, although some could argue that dockers really do not need floaters, that floaters simply add a touch of adventure and mystery. Perhaps floaters risk causing ire. It is said in Scripture that Martha complained to Jesus that Mary was sitting at His feet, not helping her with the tasks at hand. 

It may be presumed there are more dockers than floaters, just as there are more people with predominantly active lives than contemplative. Silly schemas like that of dockers and floaters, added to the numerous, sophisticated terms, analogies, constructs and comparisons that attempt to explain our human and spiritual variances, trying to live in the world and yet be not of it. No schema or theory is a pure replica for any set example of human and spiritual circumstance. 

Only Jesus Christ is the pure example, of God as Man, who was born, lived, suffered, died and resurrected. He is the only way to have full perspective and understanding, through love, as He comprehends all of life and all that is not.

But in and of life, perfectly exemplified in the life Jesus lived among the imperfect human dockers and floaters, there are individual factors, degrees and levels to any action and inaction due to the mystery of God and His creation of souls—created in His image and likeness—another mystery!

Seeking

Who will seek?

The invitation to consider living the Order of the Present Moment is tendered. Now the query is to discover who would seek such an Order. The question implies that some people will not seek the stairway to heaven. We readily “see” examples in history and in current times of the visible, traditional religious orders and those who seek to join them. 



We also know from statistics, that the traditional religious orders have experienced a decline in membership. There are various factors involved. Reasons may include the increasing technological distractions of our era, as well as reinforced approval of secularized self-identity. There is a shift away from the spiritual view.

In times past, or in current cultures of less tangible wealth, some join the traditional religious orders not only for reasons of faith and vocational calling, but as a means of education and position that result from a religious vocation. Also, unrefined and subjective as it may seem, secondary considerations include a deficit in appearance or socialization skills which may hinder a vocation to married life or success in a competitive, adult, work force. While, zeal for God and desire to serve Him in the religious life may be the primary and overriding influence, the likelihood of less lofty human factors remains. We are human, after all.

Why do some, within the various religious orders' age acceptance range, choose to enter, and others do not, yet later in life seem that they would have been prime candidates? To this question, a woman, age 62, responded candidly. When at a chronological age in which young people are prime for acceptance in religious orders, her life already was filled with childhood “baggage” that did not allow her to be free to recognize the options with clarity. Thus she married, had children, divorced, remarried, and divorced. She spent years dealing with the choices she'd already made and the environmental influences that had affected her emotionally, before she could be freed from the effects in order to be open more fully to God. 


The woman explains her current position: “I think I have always thought about becoming a nun--was often asked if I was one already because of my allegiance to this Church. However, I don't think I was, am, or will be ready to be as confined as they are to a set of rules. I have learned to function outside of that system and really would have a hard time living that closely with so many women with different opinions about things. I've been left too long by myself. All that would be just another distraction.”

Others informally have shared that they knew they were called to the married life, to have children. One young woman who suspects she is called to a traditional religious order, admits she also can see herself marrying a young man she is friends with, if she would allow their relationship to go in that direction. 

However, for now she is working to put herself through college with a goal toward a service career. She reveals feeling conflicted, for she very much desires to be closer to Jesus and to grow in holiness. She sees for herself that she would love to have children as she loves children, but that as a religious she could also work with children depending upon the order's charism, or founding mission, such as a teaching or nursing order.

Recently a young man, a two-year convert to Catholicism, did join an active religious order being formed in the pattern of St. Francis of Assisi's life of poverty and service. The seed was planted by the visible, tangible presence of the group--of their brown habits, shaved heads, full beards, barefoot and in sandals, their striving to live in temporal simplicity, hoping to visit the sick and pray, and be formed in the ways of religious life through ascetic practices. 

Had the young man not seen the group, not had opportunity to talk with them, or observe their external representation of living in relative opposition to the norm of the current secular culture, he may not have seriously considered this particular religious order, or perhaps not religious life at all. 

But he has been seeking, as many are seeking, young and old and in between. He is now one of twelve in this developing order. One factor worth mentioning is that of the members who have college degrees, none are in subject areas for marketable employment.  Also, 12 members are not significant quantity considering how many Catholics within a diocese, or the higher number of Christians in the geographic area—all souls who in varying degrees of intensity and awareness are seeking God, seeking the stairway to heaven!

What about all the thousands and thousands of souls, perhaps millions worldwide who are not in this order, not in any religious order, yet are Christians, and more specifically Catholics, who are also seeking within the parameters of their current circumstances and daily existences? 

For various reasons, some of which are suggested in a few individual examples, these majority of souls do not seek to join what they see, what is so visible in exterior signs, of these various traditional religious orders and varied, religiously defined groups. 

What about all the other souls? How do they seek and find a stairway to heaven, or is it meant by God that they do trial and error method, each to his own, stumbling, restarting, or stagnating, over the years? Perhaps explaining the schema of dockers and floaters will help--an understanding of types of persons, ways of being, learning styles, internal or external locus of control. Awareness of self and others, however, pales to the awareness of God. 

"Knowledge of created beings is one thing, and knowledge of the divine truth is another. The second surpasses the first just as the sun outshines the moon."--St. Mark the Ascetic

(If the schema discussed in the next post not helpful, skip to the post following.)

Benefits of Traditional Orders; Invitation to OPM

Benefits of the Traditional, Temporal Religious Order

Obviously, the traditional, temporal religious orders, congregations, institutes, ecclesial movements, confraternities and sodalities would not have survived had there not been solid benefits. St. Bernard in some letters to nuns, pinpoints some of the value of belonging to a traditional religious order. Other spiritual writers include along with the practical benefits, the graces that God gives to those who make obvious exterior sacrifices. Joining, avowing to religious orders as we know them historically and currently do positively affect the interior of a person's existence.

Many and varied are the external benefits of being a member of a traditional religious order, community, movement, institute, congregation, confraternity, third order or sodality. These religious groups can include diocese canonically approved hermits, for they are directly supervised by their Bishops, and are increasingly institutionalized in our era since the Canon Law 603 was revised in 1983. Commonalities among the various religious groups exist. For our purposes, we will clump all of the above groups under the title “religious order” with the traditional identifying factors.

Benefits include common purpose and a network of support. The structured environment is much like a traditional school, boarding school. Or for non-communal living groups, the support network is enhanced through communication and meetings. 

In some, the members live removed from society in varying degrees and modes, utilizing altered dress, hair style, functional amenities, daily schedule, diet, reading material, shared facilities and expenses, type of work, (often including manual labor) and enforced discipline. By working together, living in community, sharing talents and tangible assets, time is freed for more focused religious pursuits: prayer, worship, reading, adoration.

St. Bernard commented in letters to some religious sisters who considered leaving the convent. In one instance, the woman desired to leave her order in order to seek more solitude, hoping for greater perfection. While he commended her “zeal of God,” he said she lacked knowledge. He did not agree that in more solitude she would have greater security to achieve perfection. The saint pointed out that there would be no one to reprove what no one would witness when she errs, as we all do make mistakes in the spiritual ascent, and very much in our human state. 

He added that where we have no fear of being seen, caught and corrected, the temptation can be stronger. Then there may be less concern to strive, and it is easier to accept or succumb to what is less than holy. In the convent, he said, it is easier to be good because everyone else also is striving to be good, and if you want to be bad, it is not easy, for being bad stands out in stark contrast. 

However, St. Bernard reminds the woman that any good she does in community will be noticed, praised, and imitated by the others who witness the goodness. The good works quickly give glory to God, and the faults are quickly corrected. The virtues seen will please, and the vices noticed will displease. The person who joins a religious order has the opportunity to bring good to others there, as well as to learn holiness from those around them.

St. Bernard mentions to another woman who renounced wealth and social position to consecrate her life to God in traditional religious life, that she must persevere because the vanity of the world she left behind, with its extravagance and folly, would not assist her spiritual journey.

Besides spiritual benefits, there are some practical benefits that also can help in the spiritual. As studies have shown, several persons living under one roof, sharing the major expenses of the household, is cost effective compared to one or two people in a dwelling. The utility and food costs do not rise in direct correlation as the numbers of inhabitants rise. There is efficiency in cooking, cleaning, maintenance, and furnishing costs. Medical expenses can be lessened through group insurance. Transportation is shared, thus less costly. Chores are shared, thus freeing time for formal prayer and spiritual reading, as well as worship (Mass, Liturgy of the Hours). 

Traditional religious orders or those sanctioned and subsidized by the Church are tax exempt. Often benefactors assist with income through donations. Thus some orders, or at least some members, do not have to work to produce income, but rather can live lives of prayer or helping the poor. Those who become ill as well as end of life care, are cared for by the religious, and as needed with medical personnel sometimes donating services to the religious members.

Efficiency extends to dress in the religious orders that adopt a habit, or a specific style garment to be worn daily. A benefit includes simplification, not having to consider what to wear, and for women, the application of make-up or hair arrangement. There is the group-effect, the support and encouragement of being with others who share the same, external dress, routine, and life style. Even in third orders, confraternities and other ecclesial groups, there is often a similarity in vows, purpose, charism, and some outer sign or symbol worn to represent membership.

As recent studies have shown, people who live with others are found to have longer, healthier, happier lives than those who live alone. (This finding may be skewed depending upon the sacrifices and austerities that some religious orders practice, although external mortification is becoming less the norm now in traditional religious orders than it was in centuries past.) While St. Bernard did not have the catch phrase of our era, there is safety in numbers, it reflects the security of which he wrote to the nun who considered leaving the convent, to live in solitude.

While there are obvious spiritual benefits gained by being in a traditional religious order or any of the numerous off-shoots, including the charismatic renewal movement approved by the U.S. Bishops in the early 1970's, we will not delve into them at this point. The possible benefits are of the interior, spiritual realm, and thus many variables are involved which would be quite difficult to distinguish as being notable and singular to those in traditional religious orders (and the various off-shoots) over what individual souls may experience without belonging to one of these.

The Invitation to the Order of the Present Moment

And, this is the point at which the introduction concludes, for now we must explore the stairway to heaven, the spiritual climb of the souls who are members of traditional religious orders and their derivatives, as well as those souls who perhaps are in (without their realizing) or who want to attempt solus Deus, the spiritual Order of the Present Moment, the order of one or of one among many.

For those who are satisfied with their spiritual lives, who are content in their call and vocation to a traditional religious order, congregation, community, movement or institute of the Church, confraternity, third order, oblates, sodality or other group, then perhaps reading further is without need or purpose. For those who are content--as some friends with whom I've shared this little project or exercise have mentioned—with living their daily lives as they have been, as good Catholics, good Christians, with worship, Scripture, prayer and doing their daily tasks within their lay vocations, then there is no need to turn another page.

But for those souls who may be already in a specified, traditional, religious vocation of some sort, who perhaps are busy priests inundated with administrative duties and as the lone “Father” of a large family of parishioners...for those who are in absolutely nothing but sometimes wonder if they are missing the reality Christ...or wonder what is the meaning of the daily grind...or who have brushed against suffering or death and have known His touch and longed for Him all the more--perhaps a spiritual order, the Order of the Present Moment (an order of one or of one among many) will introduce the hand rail of the stairway to heaven for which you've been grasping.

May God inspire and bless the following pages, either way for whatever circumstance of souls. Regardless, this soul now writing desires very much to grasp the hand rail of the stairway to heaven. It is the stairway to heaven of that dream, two years ago August, when the angel took this soul's spiritual hand, and led this soul's spiritual body and heard with inner ear the angel speak: I'm taking you to the Stairway to Heaven.

Simple History, Description of Traditional Religious Orders

Simple History and Description of Traditional Religious Orders and Groups

The simple description: Persons gather, even if not often (as in confraternities and ecclesial movements), living together or not, to follow an agreed upon regimen of life, a kind of rule of life, with certain disciplines, in order to support one another in reaching a determined and expressed goal. 

Historically, as example, St. Antony of the Desert sold all his possessions, made provisions for his sister to be cared for and schooled by religious women, set off for the desert to find God without the distractions of the “world.” Eventually others followed him, sought him out to discover his secrets for success, and soon he was not a lone religious hermit. Essentially an order of men, and later women, formed out of St. Antony's life style, prayer life, and aesthetic practices.

But before St. Antony of the Desert, there are examples of groups of people living together, separating themselves from other persons and aspects of the world or certain lifestyles, to live a life of shared religious values and goals, with the desire to seek and find God, to be holy as He is Holy. 

The Virgin Mary's ancestors, according to historical accounts as well as the revelations of Bl. Anne Catherine Emmerich, were such a group called the Essenes. St. John the Baptist derived from this group of religious who lived lives to a degree of purity that affected the very flora and fauna in their environment. All was quite pure, loving, beautiful, peaceful, and holy.

Certain temporal (some visible) tenets and practices exist in these groups, these religious orders, for their basic tenet is their desire to seek and find God, to know God, to follow Jesus' commands and example. The components of the traditional religious orders include vows, rule of life, liturgical practices, a distinguishing habit, sometimes a new name and adopted personal motto, spiritual study, manual labor, prayer, and various austerities or physical disciplines, mortification. The members often live removed from the every-day activities of the world, but some interact or minister to the world-at-large, such as with ministry to the poor or as teachers, nursing the sick, or working in Church parishes.

There is an administrative structure, typically led by a superior general of the entire order which contains offshoot, founded communities, with each headed by a superior of its own, of which all are in obedience to and accountable to the general superior, all within the structure, faith life and canons of the Catholic Church. From the order's superior general, through the individual superiors, the spiritual and temporal goals are disseminated to the various members. 

Within specific communities or congregations, the administrative duties are performed by the superior, often with an assistant, as well as a procurator to manage the finances and acquisition of donations, as well as a novice master or mistress to teach those who join. 

Those who join are called postulants, and after an initiation period to gain an understanding of and adapt to the community, they become novices through mutual agreement with the administrators of the order. After an additional training period, usually called the novitiate and involving a spiritual director as well as instructor (previously described), the novices may take vows, sometimes levels of vows, until finally they make solemn vows, or final profession. The final vow includes agreeing to live with the group in accordance to their rule of life and style, in obedience to uphold the vows, for life.

While perhaps simplistic and brief, this is outline enough of the traditional formation and components of a religious order. [Outstanding and detailed explanations can be found in books and via online research.] 

Other religious groups and movements within the Church typically form and develop, in varying degrees, in accordance with this described, basic structure. These other groups include some aspects of the temporal organization plus the living out of a set spiritual goal with certain means of hopefully achieving it. Even with a simple parish prayer chain, there is a pattern: a leader, an assistant leader, a set purpose and goal, and an established, taught, disseminated routine to follow in order to meet the goal and succeed in the purpose.

(continued in next post)

Order of the Present Moment: Introduction

Why the Need or Desire for Religious Orders?

Wondering, even now, why am even writing this? Why try to describe, develop, explain my own observations and beginning awareness of the stairway to heaven, of its existence, and the steps? What difference does it make to write it out? Few people have expressed interest, and others seem to have no interest, seem content with their spiritual lives and progress.

The diocese newspaper arrives in the mail. An upstart religious order is featured in three articles, with photos, as well as  mention in the Bishop's column of three new postulants. Actually and otherwise, the entire paper is geared toward the visible, active, temporal Catholic world, the exception being the recently deceased listed in Obituaries.

Reflect upon this a bit. What feelings and thoughts surface? Well, what about people who aren't able to be in visible, active, temporal groups, or religious orders—maybe, simply, not called? Or perhaps they are too old, have health problems, desire something less visible, active and temporal? What do these people do? Where do they turn? What if they are married, divorced, young, aged, students, workers, professionals, already in third orders, or not even Catholic?

So it seems there ought to be something for the nothings, the nobodies, the folks without a category but still very much are souls who desire God, and desire a way of life that will help their souls more efficiently, effectively, effervescently, find God.

The desire of spiritual life is innate in our beings: to seek and find God. Many people, perhaps most if the entire world population is considered, may not be aware of this desire. Yet many of the souls who are aware of the desire, do not act upon it by joining any number of the religious orders, movements, congregations, confraternities, oblates, tertiaries or sodalities.  Among non-Catholics Christians, most do not join mission teams of organized volunteer efforts, or even get involved in small group ministries. Why?

Utilizing the traditional Catholic religious orders as the focus of this reflection, one reason why most Catholics are not members is because they did not make various sacrifices in other aspects of their visible, active, temporal lives. Or perhaps they did not discover the desire for the religious life until they already made choices that would preclude them from being able to join a religious order. This may also be why they cannot join other religious groups possessing a set purpose or charism. They may not fit into the group for one reason or another. Or they simply may not have a vocation or call to a traditional religious order or group. 

For Catholics, those who do answer the “call” and choose a religious vocation (joining one of the various traditional, visible, temporal Catholic orders, congregations, movements, tertiary groups, confraternities or sodalities) have agreed to certain stipulations. These include living in accordance with certain social and religious regulations and disciplines, and in which most including making varying degrees of vows.

Well, we might ask, should not Christian marriage be this, too? Live in accordance with social and religious regulations and discipline, and the couple makes a solemn vow? Yes, it should, and marriage is considered a vocation as well as a Sacrament--something religious vocations are not, other than the priesthood with the Sacrament of Holy Orders. 

But religious orders have some unique features that can be traced to the first centuries in the Church, in which people who desired a closeness with God beyond the distractions of the work-a-day world, beyond the temporal activities and relationships with family and friends, could strive to reach their goal presumably faster, more effectively and efficiently by going off to the desert or by entering one of the many, developing monasteries.

Soldiers approach their goal in similar fashion, by gathering together to study, to train in disciplined focus, set apart from other temporal distractions. Their vows differ only in that they give allegiance to country and ruler; and their fervor is more that of  temporal success than spiritual, although some may possess zeal fueled by lofty ideals.

Those called to the religious life, as in traditional religious orders, movements, congregations, institutes, tertiary orders or sodalities within the Catholic Church, with numerous, new start-ups or reformed existing orders in each century, possess spiritual zeal and focus.  Their vows are to God but with allegiance, also to their particular order or group as a means to come to God, rooted in Baptismal and Confirmation promises and adherence to the Catholic Faith.

(continued in next post)