Part 3 (1/2)
CHAPTER IX
MUST I ACCEPT THE INVITATION?
It is not the purpose of the writer to exaggerate, to frighten or coerce persons into religious life, by holding out threats of G.o.d's displeasure to those who refuse, or by citing examples of those whose careers were blighted through failure to heed the Divine call. It is His desire rather to imitate Christ's manner of action, portraying the beauty and excellence of virtue, and then leaving it to the promptings of aspiring hearts to follow the leadings of grace.
Christ, all mildness and meekness as He was, uttered terrible denunciations against sin and the false leaders of the people; but nowhere do we read that He denounced or threatened those who failed to accept His tender and loving call to the life of perfection. To draw men's hearts He used not compulsion, but the lure of kindness and affection.
Our Lord sometimes commanded and sometimes counselled and between these there is a difference. When a command is given by lawful superiors it must be obeyed, and that under penalty. G.o.d gave the commandments amidst thunder and lightning on Mount Sinai, and those commandments, as precepts of the natural law, or because corroborated in the New Testament, persist in the main to-day, and any one who violates them, refuses to keep them, is guilty of disobedience to G.o.d, commits a sin. But when Christ proclaimed the counsels, He was merely giving advice or exhortation, and hence no one was obliged to follow them under pain of His displeasure. Suppose a mother has two sons, who both obey exactly her every command, and one also takes her advice in a certain matter, while the other does not; she will love the second not less, but the first more. So of two boys, who are both favorites of G.o.d, if one accept and the other decline a proffered vocation, He will love the latter as before, but the former how much more tenderly!
Moreover, G.o.d loves the cheerful giver. By doing, out of an abundance of charity and fervor, what you are not obliged to do, you gain ampler merit for yourself, since you perform more than your duty, and at the same time you give greater glory to G.o.d, showing that He has willing children, who bound their service to Him by no bargaining considerations of weight and measure. But if, through fear of threat or punishment, you make an offering to G.o.d, your gift loses, to an extent, the worth and spontaneity of a heart-token.
Some think that not to accept the invitation to the counsels, is to show disregard and contempt for G.o.d's grace and favor, and hence sinful. But how does a young person act when he declines this proffered gift? He equivalently says, with tears in his eyes, ”My Saviour, I appreciate deeply Thy invitation to the higher life; I envy my companions who are so courageous as to follow Thy counsel; but, please be not offended with me if I have not the courage to imitate their example. I beg Thee to let me serve Thee in some other way.” Is there anything of contempt in such a reply? No more than if a child would tearfully pray its mother not to send it into a dark room to fetch something; and as such a mother, instead of insisting on her request, would only kiss away her child's tears, so will G.o.d treat one who weeps because he cannot muster courage to tread closely in His blood-stained footsteps.
The young have little relish for argumentative quotations and texts, but it may interest them to know that Saints Basil, Chrysostom, Gregory n.a.z.ianzen, Cyprian, Augustine and other Fathers all speak in a similar strain, holding that, as a vocation is a free gift or counsel, it may be declined without sin. [1] The great Theologians, St. Thomas, Suarez, Bellarmine and Cornelius a Lapide also agree on this point.
But putting aside the question of sin, we must admit that one who clearly realizes that the religious life is best for him and consequently more pleasing to G.o.d, would, by neglecting to avail himself of this grace, betray a certain ungenerosity of soul and a lack of appreciation of spiritual things, in depriving himself of a gift which would be the source of so many graces and spiritual advantages.
Do not, then, dear reader, embrace the higher life merely from motives of fear--which were unworthy an ingenuous child of G.o.d--but rather to please the Divine Majesty. You are dear to Him, dearer than the treasures of all the world. He loves you so much that He died for you, and now He asks you in return to nestle close to His heart, where He may ever enfold His arms about you, and lavish his blandishments upon your soul. Will you come to Him, your fresh young heart still sweet with the dew of innocence, and become His own forevermore? Will you say farewell to creatures, and rest upon that Bosom whose love and tenderness for you is high as the stars, wide as the universe, and deep as the sea? Come to the tender embraces of your heavenly spouse, and heaven will have begun for you on earth.
[1] The hypothetical case, sometimes mentioned by casuists, of one who is convinced that for him salvation outside of religion is impossible, can here safely be pa.s.sed over as unpractical for young readers.
CHAPTER X
I AM TOO YOUNG
Many a young person, when confronted with the thought of his vocation, puts it out of mind, with the off-hand remark, ”Oh, there is plenty of time to consider that; I am too young, and have had no experience of the world.” This method of procedure is summary, if not judicious, and it meets with the favor of some parents, who fear, as they think, to lose their children. It was also evidently highly acceptable to Luther, who is quoted by Bellarmine as teaching that no one should enter religious life until he is seventy or eighty years of age.
In deciding a question of this nature, however, we should not allow our prepossessions to bias our judgment, nor take without allowance the opinion of those steeped in worldly wisdom, but lacking in spiritual insight. Father William Humphrey, S.J., in his edition of Suarez's ”Religious Life” (page 49), says: ”Looking merely to _natural law_, it is lawful at any age freely to offer oneself to the perpetual service of G.o.d. There is no natural principle by which should be fixed any certain age for such an act.”
Christ did not prescribe any age for those who wished to enter His special service, and He rebuked the apostles for keeping children from Him, saying, ”Let the little ones come unto Me.” And St. Thomas (Summa, 2a 2ae, Quaest. 189, art. 5), quotes approvingly the comment of Origen on this text, viz.: ”We should be careful lest in our superior wisdom we despise the little ones of the Church and prevent them from coming to Jesus.” And speaking in the same article of St.
Gregory's statement that the Roman n.o.bility offered their sons to St.
Benedict to be brought up in the service of G.o.d, the Angelic Doctor approves this practice on the principle that ”it is good for a man to bear the yoke from his youth,” and adds that it is in accord with the usual ”custom of setting boys to the duties and occupations in which they are to spend their life.”
The remark concerning St. Benedict recalls to mind the interesting fact that in olden times, not only boys of twelve and fourteen became little monks, but that children of three, four or five years of age were brought in their parents' arms and dedicated to the monasteries.
According to the ”Benedictine Centuries,” ”the reception of a child in those days was almost as solemn as a profession in our own. His parents carried him to the church. Whilst they wrapped his hand, which held the pet.i.tion, in the sacred linen of the altar, they promised, in the presence of G.o.d and His saints, stability in his name.” These children remained during infancy and childhood within the monastery enclosure, and on reaching the age of fourteen, they were given the choice of returning home, if they preferred, or of remaining for life.
[1]
The discipline of the Church, which as a wise Mother, she modifies to suit the exigencies of time and place, is somewhat different in our day. The ordinary law now prohibits religious profession before the age of sixteen; and the earliest age at which subjects are commonly admitted is fifteen. Orders which accept younger candidates, in order to train and prepare them for reception, cannot, as a rule, clothe them with the habit. A very recent decree also requires clerical students to have completed four years' study of Latin before admission as novices into any order.
Persons who object to early entrance into religion seem to forget that the young have equal rights with their elders to personal sanctification, and to the use of the means afforded for this purpose by the Church. It is now pa.s.sed into history, how some misguided individuals forbade frequent Communion to the faithful at large, and altogether excluded from the Holy Table children under twelve or fourteen, and this notwithstanding the plain teaching of the Council of Trent to the contrary. To correct the error, the Holy See was obliged to issue decrees on the subject, which may be styled the charter of Eucharistic freedom for all the faithful, and especially for children. As the Eucharist is not intended solely for the mature or aged, so neither is religious life meant only for the decrepit, or those who have squandered youth and innocence. Its portals are open to all the qualified, and particularly to the young, who wish to bring not a part of their life only, but the _whole_ of it, along with youthful enthusiasm and generosity, to G.o.d's service.
How many young religious have attained heroic sanct.i.ty which would never have been theirs had religion been closed against them by an arbitrary or unreasonable age restriction! A too rigid att.i.tude on this point would have barred those patrons of youth, Aloysius, Stanislaus Kostka and Berchmans, from religion and perhaps even from the honors of the altar. St. Thomas, the great theological luminary of the Church, was offered to the Benedictines when five years old, and he joined the Dominicans at fifteen or sixteen; and St. Rose of Lima made a vow of chast.i.ty at five. The Lily of Quito, Blessed Mary Ann, made the three vows of poverty, chast.i.ty and obedience before her tenth birthday, and the Little Flower was a Carmelite at fifteen. And uncounted others, who lived and died in the odor of sanct.i.ty, dedicated themselves by vow to the perpetual service of G.o.d, while still in the fragrance and bloom of childhood or youth.
”What a pity!” some exclaim, when a youth or maid enters religion.
”How much better for young people to wait a few years and see something of the world, so they will know what they are giving up.”
This is ever the comment of the worldly spirit, which aims to crush out entirely spiritual aspirations, and failing in that, to delay their fulfilment indefinitely. And yet the wise do not reason similarly in other matters. One who proposes to cultivate a marked musical talent is never advised to try his hand first at carpentering or tailoring, that he may make an intelligent choice between them. Nor is a promising law student counselled to spend several years in the study of engineering and dentistry, to avoid making a possible mistake. Why then wish a youth, of evident religious inclination, to mingle in the frivolity and gayeties of the world, with the certain risk of imbibing its spirit and losing his spiritual relish? ”He who loves the danger,” says the Scripture, ”will perish in it.”
”Yet a vocation should first be tried, and if it cannot resist temptation, it will never prove constant,” is the worn but oft-repeated reply. As if a parent would expose his boy to contagion to discover whether his const.i.tution be strong enough to resist it; or place him in the companions.h.i.+p of the depraved to try his virtue and see if it be proof against temptation. No, the tender sprout must be carefully tended, and s.h.i.+elded from wind and storm, until it grows into maturity. In like manner, a young person who desires to serve G.o.d, should be placed in an atmosphere favorable to the development of his design, and guarded from sinister influence, until he has acquired stability of purpose and strength of virtue.