Sometimes even a thousand waves hitting the shore continuously one after other also cannot erase the few footprints on the seashore …A Legacy Left Behind
“In order to follow Jesus Christ, and as an expression of the total gift of their life to God, the Brothers commit themselves by vow to live a chaste celibate life in community. Consecrated chastity, a gift of the Holy Spirit and a mystery of death and resurrection, sacrifice and fruitfulness, bears witness before the world to the value of a life in which love is put at the service of all. It also manifests the hope of a promise, based on Jesus Christ’s resurrection, that this love has an eternal value. The vow of chastity makes the Brothers totally available to meet the requirements of their vow of association for the service of the mission.” (Mt. 19 – 11-12, PC 12, Can. 599, Med. 201: 3) THE RULE of THE BROTHERS OF THE CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS, Article 36.
Why live celibately? Efforts to answer this question are rarely satisfactory. After they are over, I rarely feel any more certain about the value of celibacy for myself or others. The question deserves an answer. It challenges young people contemplating religious life. The question haunts some celibates most of their lives. They are not half-hearted in their religious dedication or unsure of their vocation. They simply wonder occasionally why they have chosen and continue to choose a style of life which foregoes experiences which most men and women consider hard but attractive. The question poignantly presents itself to celibates from time to time when they meet married people who appear to have combined the appealing human fulfillment of marriage with zeal and service for God’s Kingdom—the very zeal and service for which the celibates renounced the attractions and satisfactions of marriage. Celibacy for the sake of Kingdom of God does not mean that celibacy must necessarily be a disagreeable way of living and its choice always painful violence against oneself. It means that celibacy, weather assumed easily or with a struggle, is directed to the Kingdom of God.
A Gift More than a Choice
For me, celibacy is a gift before it is a choice or commitment. It is first a gift because it issues from personal history, which is not entirely of my own making. No one selects one’s basic temperament or the fundamental orientation of one’s personality by parents. Many other influences of life are not chosen, but simply given. Some influences are chosen, of course, and the impact of others freely accepted, but most of these choices are at least partially contributed by unwilled or and even unknown factors. In any case, the freely chosen influences constitute only some of the factors which now prompt me to adopt or continue in celibate life. The initial or continuing choice of celibacy is the acceptance of a gift—my ‘self’ as the culmination of my personal history unfolded under God’s choice. Because the vocation to celibacy is as complex as a person’s whole life, the choice of celibacy is never fully explainable, even by the celibate making the choice. Celibacy is ultimately a personal mystery which is scarcely touched by abstract propositions and never explained by arguments. More satisfying than discussions of celibacy are testimonies of personal celibate experience. These testimonies portray in concrete form the value of celibacy, thus providing for the appearance of the good and so giving others the opportunity to discern if they are, or are not, comfortable with that good.
Brother T. Amalan FSC
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