Varieties of Religious Life

There are various religious orders, societies,congregations, communities. This is so because the works of charity are various, and all religious are striving to achieve perfection in charity. One religious family may be devoted to teaching,another to the care of the sick, another to the reclamation ofdelinquents, another to the care of orphans, and so on. Hence,various religious communities exist. And religious practice is itself marked by variety; accordingly, one religious community practices silence; another, strict abstinence; another has a special task of perfectly reciting the Divine Office, another engages in manual labor, and so on. Here again we discern a reason for the existence of various religious communities.

There are religious communities for the works of charity in the active life, and there are others which are devoted to the contemplative life. For, while in itself the contemplativelife is the more excellent of the two types of Christian life, both active and contemplative life serve and pursue charity; for we are to love God, and neighbor for God. The contemplative life advances the soul directly in the love of God. The active life advances the soul through works that manifest the love of neighbor for the sake of God.

A religious community or order can exist for some special service to neighbors. Indeed, a religious order can exist for such a service as soldering. A military order cannot be established for material conquest or a worldly purpose. But it canbe established for the defense of divine worship, for public safety, for defense of the poor and the oppressed.

An order may be founded for preaching, for catechizing,for the hearing of confessions, and for other works that make forthe instruction and sanctification of human souls.

A religious order may justly exist for the purpose of study. For study enlightens the mind, helps to the understanding ofthe truths of religion, keeps the student from gross employment andthe urge to base sin, prepares the teacher and preacher and writer for their tasks.

It follows from what has been said in several places in our studies, that an order devoted to the contemplative life is,simply considered, more excellent than an order devoted to the active life.

The perfection of religious life is in no way hampered or hindered by the possession of goods in common. The vow of poverty is the surrendering of personal and private ownership of material things. And the perfection of this personal sacrifice isnot lessened by the fact that material things are owned by the order or community as such. The vow of poverty frees the individual religious from care and worry about privately owned property, fromthe love of amassing personal riches, and from the vainglory ofbeing personally wealthy. These are the ends intended by the vow of poverty; these ends the vow achieves perfectly despite the fact that goods are owned in common.

Religious living in community are a help to one another in their striving for perfection. One is helped by the good example of another; one profits by the instruction of another. And the earnest religious is helped even by noting what to avoid in the unsuitable attitude or conduct of another. But when one has reached perfection in contemplation, the life of solitude is more excellent than fife in community. Yet for anyone but the person who has really achieved perfection, the life of solitude is fraught with great dangers.