World Day for Consecrated Life

World Day for Consecrated Life - February 2, 2022

Every Thanksgiving weekend our Congregation gathers to celebrate the lives of women who have lived their commitment to consecrated life for 25, 50, 60, 70, 75 and 80 years. It is a celebration of God’s fidelity and the Sisters’ joy of being called to minister to God’s people. 

Before I entered, I appreciated two songs that seemed to sum up my call: “The Simple Life” by Valdy and “Shower the People” by James Taylor. Even more now, the world celebrates “excess and extravagance.” “Give me the simple life, don’t want to worry about tomorrow,” sings Valdy. When you live simply, you are able to focus on what is truly important. James Taylor reminds us, “Shower the people you love with love, show them the way that you feel.” What a blessing it is to be able to pour yourself into your ministry so that those on the margins are seen and cared for.

“When you live simply, you are able to focus on what is truly important. ”

Image: Unsplash|Billy Pasco

You cannot live this life without being in relationship with the Source of all Being. This relationship supplies all the energy, direction, hope, love and grace that is required to be happy. It is not rainbows and balloons every day, but even in difficult times there is peace in the depths. And when one gets off track, there is plenty of mercy and forgiveness. There are many ways to live one’s life, to become a saint: single life, married life, religious life and priestly life, to name some. Each one offers a person a way to be in relationship with God and with the Church and the world. Religious life is a fulfilling adventure if you are called to it. Are you experiencing a desire to live a simple life? A life of joy and grace? A life of faith, hope and love? Consider life as a vowed consecrated person.  There’s no life like it!

-Sister Pat Carter, csj

Living with Christ/Bayard Presse Canada. Used with permission.

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Pat Carter, CSJ is a disciple, a teacher and an advocate for the poor.She has been a Sister of St. Joseph for more than half of her life and loves to use words to inspire faith and laughter.

World Day for Consecrated Life

“CELEBRATING THE EVER ANCIENT – EVER NEW”
I’ve just watched a short video clip, sent to me by a friend, of a TV interview with two young nuns who are members of the community of Poor Clares in Arundel, England. The interview was as a result of their “chart-hitting” recording, “Light for the World”, music from their enclosed convent. Their singing has touched thousands of people across the globe and especially so in these days of pandemic struggle. Who would have thought that such an impact could be made from this hidden life of a small community of contemplative women in a secluded place? Clearly, the two TV interviewers on a popular morning show were surprised and deeply moved. They were touched by the sisters’ profound joy that they had been invited into this musical initiative. It was for them a means to reach out to a world in need of great light at this time. The interviewers were impressed by the sisters’ expression of having made a life choice “of freedom to love”; to share God’s love beyond their physical walls but from an all-embracing and open heart in tune with the pulse of the world. The Sister’s commitment to consecrated life enabled them to do this.

The consecrated life, whatever its form, cloistered or ministerial, is celebrated on the World Day for Consecrated Life held on January 2 each year (observed in parishes on the following Sunday) since its inception by Pope John Paul 11 in 1997. The celebration is held on the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord also known as Candlemas Day; a day on which candles are blessed symbolizing the Light of Christ.

All Christians and indeed everyone, whatever our call in life are to be light in our world. We were poignantly reminded of this during the recent U.S. Presidential Inauguration by a young poet, Amanda Gorman in her stunning poem, “The Hill we Climb” which ends with the following words: “There is always light if only we are brave enough to see it. If only we are brave enough to be it.” This call is universal but those who are called to consecrated/religious life express it through particular vows made to God, within the Church, and for the light and life of the world. God continues to call women and men today to this way of life through the vows of poverty, celibate chastity, and obedience. These are vows of total self-giving to God who first gives love to us. They are vows for service to the other, all others, human, and in all of creation. Understood in more contemporary expressions these vows call women and men who commit to them for life as Sisters, Brothers, Priests to the simplicity of lifestyle, a spirituality of “enoughness” in the world as it is today, to a freedom to love inclusively and to a life of “listening”, of discerning God’s evolving Design for an ever new day. It is a radical, counter-cultural lifestyle that stands as witness to hope in today’s broken world and church. A central characteristic of consecrated life is its “ever ancient, ever new” nature. Rooted in the unchanging richness of contemplation, Gospel living and service it is also ever-evolving in response to the joys and sufferings of the world in which it is deeply immersed.

This was depicted clearly in the video clip mentioned above in which Sisters living a life of contemplation in a religious order, almost unchanged from its inception in 1212 embraced very modern means of communication to share the gifts of their daily prayer with a world of darkness and struggle now. And… how much that has meant to the lives of so many! Similarly, religious men and women who belong to communities that are ministerial, working in the world, constantly discern new ways of service. As the world “turns” a new day, so do they! From their traditional services in schools, hospitals, and parishes, we now find them in new ministries also including environmental work, justice initiatives, standing with the poor, vulnerable and disenfranchised, finding ever new ways to be the Light of Christ expressed in a contemporary form.

It is this life that is celebrated and affirmed on the World Day for Consecrated Life. For those of us who are members of communities of consecrated life, we give thanks for the joy and privilege of this vocation, God’s gift, and on this day too we ask the prayers of all peoples for fidelity, integrity, and complete love in our life. We commit anew!

As Pope Francis reminded us in his 2019 celebration of the World Day for Consecrated Life: “This then is the consecrated life: praise which gives joy to God’s people, prophetic vision that reveals what counts. … It is a living encounter with the Lord in his people. It is a call to faithful obedience of daily life and to the unexpected surprises from the Spirit. It is a vision of what we need to embrace in order to experience joy.”

So, Let’s celebrate this life, and perhaps if a reader “out there” has felt a call, however, quietly to such life, let’s talk!

Sister Mary Rowell, CSJ, Vocation Coordinator, Sisters of St. Joseph in Canada

mrowell@csjcanada.org |Telephone: 905-372-2741

How to Join

World Day for Consecrated Life

February 2, 2020 - World Day for Consecrated Life

There are many shapes, garbs and missions of persons committed to consecrated life, but each year on February 2 a day of prayer unfolds to celebrate this vowed way of life - a day to remember God’s continued outpouring of love. Pope Francis offers a message of inspiration, and women and men will gather in their respective chapels to give Eucharistic gratitude and to feast at the table of word and sacrament. We will sing hymns and songs about discipleship and we will remember the many varied ways we have had opportunity to work side-by-side with our sisters and brothers who profess other forms of commitment (married, single, activists, peacemakers). We are all one in the relationship of life, from the beginning of time. Together let us continue to build places of hope, compassion and mercy.

Enjoy this post from the Canadian Religious Conference

- Sister Loretta Manzara, csj